“Hey, Dad, I’ve been meaning to talk to you, and I’m not trying to sneak out of the house at all.” I sighed, looking back at the dark den. I should just go, but when the hell did I walk away from toxic relationships?
“Well, Sunset,” I said, dropping my voice an octave and stepping down into the den. “I know you have a life of your own, so I won’t keep you long.”
He chuckled, lolling his head to look at me as he stretched back in his recliner. “You goin’ to that pretty li’l girl of yours?” he asked. I closed my eyes. Of course she was my first girlfriend Dad halfway approved of. Not that I didn’t love her. I loved her. Even if she could be intense. And homicidal.
I forced a smile, playing nice and taking a few steps down into the sunken den. “That’s the one.” I’d go over and we’d talk more about ‘the work,’ and what we’d do now that we’d taken care of Lily, and Starlight had finished framing her for Daisy.
“That’s… Ya know, that story about them two gay boys who ran off got me thinking.” Please, no. “I ain’t been the best, not even before your mother passed. I know it. I haven’t been the father you needed, and maybe that’s the way you turned out like you are.” I rolled my eyes.
He wanted to make amends now? Again? Let’s see how long it stuck. “It’s fine,” I said. “I’ve got to go talk to Starlight, but if you want, we can talk about this more tomorrow.”
And now he’d protest and be all ‘I’m your father, you ain’t running off with your skank girlfriend when I want to talk with you. We got to talk about this, Sunset.’
My dad sat up and frowned, stroking stubble with his free hand. “Alright, Sunset, I… I suppose I understand.” Huh? That’s not how this went. He looked me over and shook his head. “You’re almost a grown woman now, capable of making your own decisions. And I don’t want to lose you like...” Mom.
“Thanks, that’s… it’s nice to hear you say that,” I settled on. “And I promise, we’ll talk more about this tomorrow, alright? Just, I promised my girlfriend I’d meet her, and I’d hate to disappoint her.” He smiled at that, thinking he understood. If only.
***
I couldn’t stop thinking about my dad even after I got to Starlight’s house. Did he really want to change or was this just the next step in him getting increasingly pathetic. And if he could change? I looked at Starlight. “Do you want to do something different tonight?”
She frowned. “Like what, Sunset? How are we following up the end of the Flowers? Who’s next?” Starlight leaned forward, all ears on my new diabolical scheme.
“No one.” She stared like I started speaking German. “We took care of the worst people at school and a few others as well, so I’ve got this crazy idea: Let’s be normal. See bad movies, sneak a beer, and watch TV.”
Starlight laughed. “Ooh, or we could bake brownies or go bowling, right? Get real, Sunset. That’s not what people like us do, and you’d be going out of your mind by the time the first act was over.”
“Well, I’m tired of ‘work.’ We made the world better, yay, so let’s see how things shakeout and enjoy ourselves. We don’t have to give our lives for the cause.” And maybe we could put that fucking camera behind us or bury it in the box it came in.
“Yes we do,” Starlight said automatically. “If what we were doing before was ethical, then stopping now must be unethical. Stopping just because we got rid of the jerks in our life is beyond selfish. What we need to do is scale up. Start separating the good people from the bad as quickly as possible.”
“But I don’t care about that,” I shouted. “We’ve done more than enough. Can’t we just be together? Without trying to save the world?”
“You can’t uncross a river, Sunset.” Starlight rubbed her temples, the camera hanging around her neck from a convenient strap. She never let it leave her side these days. “We can’t go back just because the right thing is hard or makes us feel bad, but…” She looked down at me. “I love you, and if it means that much to you, we can take a few days off.” She smiled getting down on her knees. “The Winter Formal is next week, what do you say we go together, and until then, I promise I won’t talk about the camera or work or any of that?” It was a start, at least.
I nodded, and we embraced. I tried to let myself just get lost in the hug like I did so easily when things started. “I’d do anything for you,” Starlight whispered in my ear. I could almost believe her.
“And I’d do anything for you,” I echoed back, letting her rest her head on my shoulder. What else could I say?
We stayed like that for a long minute, neither of us wanting to break away from the other.
Starlight broke the connection, flopping down onto the bed. “You’re right, though, I’ve been terrible, completely focused on myself and what I want, so… how are you? Can I do anything for you?” Beyond what I just asked? The thing she refused to do?
“I’m good,” I said, trying to ignore how similar her request to help sounded like my dad wanting to talk. “And I’m about the same, if we’re not talking about the photos. Dad’s still my dad, which sucks, but I’m used to it.” And hey, maybe that might start changing, too.
Starlight nuzzled against me, taking my hand in hers and rubbing little circles on the back of my hand. “There’s an easy answer to that problem, Sunset. You should just live with me.”
I laughed. “Really? Your parents would be ok with that?” Also, that might be moving a little fast, but I’d be damned if I told Starlight that.
“They will be if I say they should be.” She perked up. “Ooh, you should come over tomorrow after school and meet them.” She threw her arms around me again, squeezing the life out of me. “I’m sure they’ll love you as much as I do.”
Well, it beat talking about the camera and who was next, at least. “Ok,” I said, cuddling up against her. “Just, we can’t spend all night talking to your parents. I promised my dad I’d talk to him tomorrow.”
“Don’t worry,” she said, twisting a strand of my hair around her finger. “That won’t be a problem.”
***
I sat opposite Starlight’s parents in their living room, breaking eye contact with them occasionally to look at the rows and rows of books on the back wall. I’d been passing the awkward silence waiting for Starlight by trying to count the spy thrillers I could identify. “So,” Starlight’s dad began, leaning back in his chair, rolling an unlit pipe between thumb and forefinger. “You say you’ve known our Starlight for how long?”
“Since September,” I said, keeping up a cramping smile, glancing at the clock. Where the hell was she? “Should we be worried?” Why didn’t we just meet at school like normal?
Her mom laughed, sitting straight up and all right angles, her smile worn into her face. “Oh, no. She told me this morning she might be a little late because of something to do with the Winter Formal. Said someone cancelled and she wants to make sure it’s perfect.” Or she was going overboard with a project to impress me. How very Starlight.
“That’s our little girl,” her dad said before taking a bite of liverwurst and dabbing at the corners of his lips with a purple pocket handkerchief to compliment his skin. “Always taking the world on her shoulders.” He didn’t know how very much.
“She’s going to do something great,” her mom chimed in. “I know she had her trouble in the past, but she’s beyond that now, and it’s so good to see her making real friends again. One day soon, everyone’s going to hear of our Starlight.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, not touching the liverwurst. “What did happen? I know it involved someone named Sunburst, but I haven’t gotten the full story.”
Both of them drained of color. “Oh, our Starlight is very sensitive, you have to understand. She cares about people with her whole heart, and when she feels like they’re rejecting her…” Her mom trailed off, leaving the obvious unsaid.
“It’s important we always tell her how much we care about her,” her dad finished. “And remind her what a good person she is.” Yeah, and now I had enough to get the broad strokes of how Starlight became Starlight. All she needed was someone she cared about to point her in whatever direction they picked, and away she went.
“Ok,” I said, nodding along, trying not to piss her parents off. “But did you teach her how to handle rejection or deal with a mistake?”
“Oh, Sunset,” her mom laughed. “You are a card. Our Starlight’s a genius. If she makes a mistake, she’ll figure it out on her own, and as for rejection? Well, who likes being rejected?”
I cursed under my breath, hopefully quiet enough they couldn’t hear me. “No one, but aren’t there better ways of handling it than others?”
Her mom’s calculated smile dropped a fraction. “Of course there are, but Starlight learned that lesson with Sunburst, she saw the problem, we sent her to some very good doctors, and it turned out to all be blown out of proportion. Our little girl had a hard time dealing with her first, big crush, she wrote some letters to Sunburst, and when he didn’t respond, she got a little upset. Perfectly normal behavior, but when you hear his parents tell the story, you’d think she tried to kill him.” Yeah. Funny how you’d get that impression.
The phone rang. “One second,” her mom said, standing up to get it. “Hello?” A pause. “Oh, Starlight! Your friend’s here and we’ve been waiting for you.” A longer pause. “What’s that? The Winter Formal?” I sighed, getting the feeling I wasted my time coming out here. “Yes, I’ll tell her. I love you, sweetie.” She hung up. “I’m sorry, Sunset, but Starlight says the issue with the Winter Formal is taking longer than she thought, and you should just go home. She said you had something with your father she didn’t want to keep you from?”
How nice of her to remember tha– Something tickled the back of my neck as I rose.“It was nice meeting you,” I managed to say before dropping my smile and turning towards the door, heading home with all due speed, gut screaming at me someone as meticulous at Starlight would have planned out every detail of the formal weeks ago.
***
Starlight’s car was parked in my driveway, right next to my dad’s. I stopped my bike on the curb and sprinted across the grass, into my house. “You made it!” Starlight’s voice rang out from the den. She didn’t. She couldn’t. She smiled at me as I got to the living room. “I know we said we’d take the week off work, but after I thought about how much you helped me with the people who made my life miserable, I thought it was time I returned the favor.” I saw a photo resting on my dad’s recliner, right where he’d be sitting now if she hadn’t–
“I didn’t want this,” I managed to say as my throat tightened. “I never wanted you to–” I lunged towards the photo, this madness needed to stop right now.
Starlight grabbed at the photo, looking like she wanted to rip it in half. “Careful, Sunset. Right now, he’s safe in his photograph, but if we start fighting? Who knows what might happen to the photograph? I don’t want it to get damaged, do you?” She twisted her face into mock horror at the very notion.
“Starlight, you need to stop this,” I said, keeping my eyes on the photo. “Just let him go, and we can talk.”
“If I let him go, he’ll tell the cops and try to take you away from me, just like Sunburst’s parents tried to do.” Dark shadows haunted her eyes. “Did you know he broke up with me before even leaving for Canterlot. We could have had a few more weeks together, but he just–” She gave a gargled shout as too many words tried to get out at once. “He wouldn’t even tell me what I did wrong.” Those last words came out quieter, and she shoved the photo into her bag, making sure to zip the compartment up. I weighed the chances of me getting it from her without destroying the photo. “Maybe I shouldn’t have vanished your father without asking, but you did the same thing with Rose, and it was the nicest thing anyone ever did for me. That instant? It gave me my purpose. I thought if I returned the favor, you’d understand.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “I just wanted to make you happy like you made me happy.”
A wave of nausea rose up inside me. What had she done? What had I done? “Jesus.” I staggered against the wall, world tilting around me, fighting the urge to hurl all over her. “How did I ever fall for your act?”
“What act?” she asked. She stepped closer, tears catching her mascara and smearing it down. “I love you!”
“Yeah, sure, just like you were heartbroken when Rose vanished, right? And tell me, did we really need to get rid of Daisy or did you just hate the idea of me having a friend who wasn’t you?”
“I couldn’t live if you left me,” she cried. She dried her eyes off with the sleeve of my duster. “I can’t take that again, not from you. But, do you really think what we’re doing is wrong? That we’re not making the world a better place?”
“I’m kind of coming around to the idea,” I said.
“Well, if you really think that, then…” She sniffled. “Then I have to make this right.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me. “Follow me.” We went to my dad’s bedroom, and she moved to his nightstand. “I hope you don’t mind, but after I took care of your father, I looked around his room to find some of his handwriting, and I found this.” She opened the drawer and pulled my dad’s pistol, gripping it by the barrel. She shoved the grip at me. “If what I’m doing is wrong, then I need to be stopped. And if what you think I’m doing is wrong, if you think I’m manipulating you, I don’t want you to disappoint you anymore.” I could almost visualize the scene in third person, me standing there, not bothering to hide my horror as Starlight shoved the gun at me. What would an outsider watching this say? What could I say?
“There are ways to handle this without me shooting you,” I decided on, grabbing the gun and trying to take it away from her before she hurt someone. “You could go back to your therapists, we could–”
“No!” She wrenched the opening of the barrel to press against her heart. “You’re not putting me back there. If what I did is wrong, then I’m worse than anyone we’ve ever vanished, so I need to go. Just, please don’t force me to live for eternity without you. After Hoops and Score, I realized if we were right, we had to keep going. To keep making the world a better place. And if I was wrong? Then I needed to be stopped. Logically, consistently, nothing else makes sense.” She let go, leaving the gun pointed right at her heart. “I chose to believe I’m a good person, Sunset, but if you don’t? Do what you have to do.” She closed her eyes, and I could see little palpitations running up her arms.
“Me not wanting to kill doesn’t make you right, it just means I don’t want to kill my girlfriend,” I said, keeping the gun pointed. If it was Rose or anyone else, would I be hesitating right now? Or would I have saved the day?
“Too bad, because I can’t stop. Not for you, not for anyone. Because I have to believe what we’re doing is right. So what’s it going to be?”
I should. I should just pull the trigger and put her out of our misery. But dammit, when I looked at her, tears staining to her cheek, hair clinging to smeared makeup, I only saw my girlfriend suffering, being eaten alive by guilt and fear. Yes, if I shot her, I could get to the photos, free everyone, and maybe the town could start to heal. Who knows, maybe, I wouldn’t get sent to jail for being an accomplice to magic kidnapping. All I had to do was squeeze the trigger. It was the smart choice. The choice that undid at least some of the damage we caused. My finger wavered as I started pulling back the hammer.
“Fuck,” I shouted, tossing the gun down onto the bed. “You need help.”
Starlight stepped forward, holding me tight against her. “I have you. And I knew you’d see I was right once I explained myself. I never doubted you for a second.”
“You need to get out of my house.” My voice sounded tinny and far away, like I was watching the scene unfold through an old television, unable to change Starlight’s script or do anything to help anyone, not even myself. Instead, I watched horror and disgust and hopelessness war on the love interest’s face, Sunset unable to reconcile herself with what she knew she needed to do, even though everyone in the audience could see the answer. She stumbled back into despair she thought she’d escaped six years ago.
“Sunset, please don’t shut me out,” Starlight said, clinging to her girlfriend. I shouted at Sunset to just do something, to do anything.
“You need to go. Right now,” Sunset said, dragging Starlight to the door. She fought Sunset every step.
“But I love you, you know I do. I’d do anything for you.” Starlight clutched at the camera. “If it means that much, I can free your dad! We can just… chain him up, but he’ll be nice and safe and there and he won’t be trapped in the photo anymore. Please, just talk with me. Let’s compromise!”
Sunset heaved, shoving Starlight stumbling backwards out the door, not wanting to say another word, not wanting much of anything. “You know I’ll never leave you,” Starlight shouted as the door slammed on Starlight and Sunset’s chance to do what needed to be done. “As long as I live!” Sunset knew.