Sunset Shimmer wanted to die.
Sunset couldn’t admit this to herself, and instead clung to a few pathetic scraps of life, persisting in her bedroom, staring at the ceiling and dreaming about doing something, about being the badass she always pretended to be, but everyone in the audience could see it was the only way to escape Starlight. She dreamed of hanging herself with her bed sheets, of Starlight being unable to reach her. If Sunset couldn’t stop Starlight, she could at least do that one thing. She could march into a building seconds before implosion just to spite the people who made her life unbearable. It’s not like she had a daughter counting on her. The only person left to care about Sunset was Starlight. She’d gotten rid of everyone else.
“Hi, Sunset,” Starlight’s voice came from the answering machine Sunset had brought next to her bed. “I’m sorry for losing my temper earlier, you just don’t know how important you are to me. It’s just, have you ever loved someone so much, it hurt?” Sunset had. She’d loved Starlight, and now everything hurt. “It hurts thinking about what I did, and I just want to make everything right. Please, tell me how to make things right. Ok, I love you.” The answering machine beeped and Sunset deleted the message. The next call would come soon.
Sunset should have stopped her. If she did, maybe she’d still deserve to live, but she didn’t, she still couldn’t. She’d been given the opportunity three times, and each time, she balked. She chose to love and love and love until all she could feel was hurt. What type of ‘badass’ would do that? Her mother made the same mistake, always standing next to her husband, always being the obedient child, and always being there for her daughter.
“Hi, Sunset,” the answering machine went again. “I didn’t see you at school today, and I’m starting to get worried. I know we had our fight, but I love you and I just wanted you to know how much I care about you. Please don’t leave me. Love, Starlight.” Delete.
The last time Sunset saw her mom was a few days after her parents had their 12th anniversary. Her dad rented a big, hotel lobby for the occasion, hanging a giant banner. ‘Congratulations Mirror Catch and Morning Gleam,’ and Sunset remembered fidgeting in the dress her dad made her wear, purchased for her 10th birthday, and now struggling to keep up with the latest growth spurt. “Please, just be a good girl,” her mother whispered in her ear. “Your father wants this night to be special, and we can’t let anything ruin it.”
And nothing did. Her mom talked and smiled when her parents told her about the best new diet they heard about on the news. She smiled when Mirror Catch came to her defense, grabbed out at her and pinched her ass, saying she looked fine as she did they day they married. She cried tears of happiness as she caught up with friends from college, listening as they talked about anthropological expeditions or conventions, and whispered to her daughter later that night that “all of mommy’s friends have jobs just like daddy does. Can you imagine mommy if she did something like that?” Sunset laughed. Why would mommy want to do anything else?
“Sunset!” Angry Starlight now. “Stop avoiding me. I know you’re in there. I drove by your house today and saw your motorcycle. You haven’t been out of your house in two days! Why won’t you let me help you? I know what it’s like to feel lost, to question yourself, but you were my voice in the dark. You reassured me what we were doing is right. Why won’t you let me help you now? I’ll always love you.” Delete.
A few days later, they were supposed to go do back to school shopping, but her dad had a demolition scheduled for that day, and Sunset didn’t stop crying until her mom took her to see the site. She loved seeing the buildings explode, the way they grumbled and collapsed in on themselves. She liked watching things break, and her dad was the best thing-breaker ever.
Her mother lit a cigarette, looking at the library entrance, minutes counting down until demolition. “I’m sorry, Sunset,” she said, tapping the ashes onto the pavement. “You’re a smart girl, just like mommy.”
Sunset pulled at the door, safety lock keeping her from stretching her legs. She was ten, but her mom still treated her like a kid. “Why are you apologizing? Being smart’s a good thing, that’s what you always said.”
“Because, one day, you’re going to look at the world and your life and see it for exactly what it is.” She leaned out the car window and blew smoke. “Do you know, this is one of the first libraries in the nation?” She pointed at the words ‘Knowledge is for Everyone’ engraved on an arch hanging over the door. “And after daddy’s done with it, they’re going to build a brand new strip mall. With hair salons and movie theaters and a Snappy Snack Shack. What do you think of that?”
From the backseat, Sunset laughed. Her mom was in one of her funny moods again where she talked about things Sunset never quite understood, but always wanted to. She thought hard. She liked books, but with libraries, she had to give them back, while Snack Shacks had slushies. But her mom still seemed sad about it. “But if they didn’t replace the library, Daddy wouldn’t have any work, and then what would we do?”
Her mom opened the door and stood up, she looked back at Sunset one last time. “I ask myself that all the time, Sunset. Let me know when you find the answer.”
“Hi, Sunset.” Sunset pushed herself out of bed, stumbling into the kitchen for food. “I hate how I came off last time, you don’t know how weird I’ve been feeling these past few days. I can’t stop thinking about you and what I did to lose you or how I can get you back. But don’t worry, Sunset.” Sunset poured a bowl of cereal, dry, for herself to subsist on for another few days, too cowardly to just starve to death. Sunset didn’t deserve dry cereal, and she knew it. Sunset only deserved to rot. “I promise, I’m going to get you back, and once I do, we’re going to be so happy together! We’ll never be separated again, and nothing’s going to come between us again.” Sunset screamed. And screamed. And screamed. She screamed until her voice gave, until it hurt to make a sound. And then she kept screaming.
Her dad pulled her out of the car, grabbing her by the arm. “What did you do?” he shouted, as Sunset sniffled back tears. What did she do? A fire ignited inside her, feeding on every kind thought she had about her dad. She looked back at the rubble that used to be a library.
“It was you,” Sunset shouted, trying to break away, not strong enough to escape his grip. “Not me. She wanted to escape you.” Her dad might as well have killed her. He’d set the fuse, he’d planted the charges, and when the time came, he flipped the switch, and he took her away. “You killed her. You– You–” She saw it, the last thing her mom wanted her to see. To understand a truth she could never quite vocalize. Unable to find the words, Sunset settled for screaming. She would do better. She owed her mom that much.
Sunset flopped down in the den, laying down on her dad’s recliner when she heard it. Footsteps crunching in the flowerbed that came with the house, now barren and dead due to the change of seasons and general neglect. Sunset needed to hide or she’d be hanging with Daisy soon enough. And she deserved it, she knew, but still a stupid part of her clung to life. She rolled out of the recliner and crawled on her hands and knees, moving away from the sound and towards the bathroom, the only room in the house without windows. She shut the door behind her and leaned against it, locking the door and turning herself into a wedge to keep it shut. And then, she waited, listening for any other sounds, absolutely quiet in the dark.
“Hi, Sunset!” She’d woken up when the phone started ringing again, back to being alone in her house. At least she hadn’t gotten vanished while she slept on a bathroom floor. “Why did you hide from me, Sunset? I came to see how you were doing, and instead of letting me in, you just hid in the bathroom. Are you that afraid of me? You know I’d never hurt you. You’re the only thing in my world that matters.” Sunset crawled to the toilet in the dark. “Anyways, because I’m worried, when I was at your house, I took your dad’s gun and the sharper knives, because I refuse to let anything bad happen to you.. I’ll see you at the Winter Formal, love you!”
After she flushed her sickness down the toilet, Sunset didn’t rest until every door to the house was locked and boarded up, and every window papered over. She tore up her schoolbooks, taping the pages to the windows to keep any eyes or cameras out. Sunset couldn’t stop until she’d shut the world out. It was the only way to be safe.
“Hi, Sunset.” Sunset thought about destroying the stupid answering machine for half a second before thinking about how Starlight might respond if she did. “Do you know what I keep thinking about? When you promised you’d never leave me and gave me your duster. Because, vanishing of me for five days? That kind of feels like you trying to break that promise. I know you’re going through some stuff, but I’m starting to get upset over here, so why don’t you just call me? I love you unconditionally.” Delete.
On the stage, I watched Sunset flip through old photo albums, a chronology of her family’s life together, always ending at her parents’ wedding anniversary and the three of them smiling together, her mom wearing the blue dress she’d purchased special for that night. In her mind, Sunset always wore that dress, even as she walked into the library.
“Hi, Sunset. I’ve been thinking day and night about how to get you back, and I’m pretty sure I have it all worked out, and I can admit I was wrong.” She laughed on the other end of the line. “No wonder I couldn’t convince you when my plan was so terrible.” Sunset sat up. Did she win by doing nothing, by letting Starlight vent all of the fear eating her alive. She dared to dream. “The new plan’s perfect, though, and I promise, once you see it, you’ll understand, and we can put all this behind us.” No, she hadn’t. Just found a new way of being terrible. “I’ll see you at the Formal. I love you!” Like hell she would, at the very least, Sunset could deny her that satisfaction.
Morning Gleam made a choice. She felt trapped and powerless and like if she stuck around, life would only get worse for her, so she went somewhere life wouldn’t hurt her anymore. She could have stuck around, but I guess she figured Sunset was old enough to survive on her own, like a ten-year-old girl could just handle watching her mom get blown up or live with her dad after the one thing keeping him in check went away. Because at the end of the day, Sunset had to accept her mom just didn’t care.
And now, Sunset thought about the same, and... I just wanted to shake her. Yes, her mom killed herself to escape her problems, but the problems didn’t go away. They just fell on other people. Like Sunset, could just go away and not have to deal with any of her problems ever again. She could talk with her mom in hell about philosophy or about how killing yourself in front of your daughter is an awful thing to do, but that just made things worse. Mirror Catch didn’t stop being awful, and tearing down old landmarks in favor of new strip malls was still the way of the future. It wasn’t rebellion, it was a forfeit. Would James Dean do that? Would the baddest, punkest chick in Westercolt just leave the mess she made for everyone else to deal with because that’s what mommy taught her? Sunset closed the photo album, looking at the last photo taken of her family, seeing how happy they pretended to be as the phone rang again, and then she closed the book on it.
“Uhmm, hi,” a very not-Starlight voice said. “This is Twilight Sparkle calling for Sunset Shimmer. Sunset, we met back in September.” She knew that voice. “We met at the Canterhorn, I gave you that box, told you not to open it, and considering the wave of disappearances that started the day after we met, I feel like you ignored me.” I watched Sunset move to the phone, willing her to just… pick it up. “I don’t know what you’re like, Sunset. My Sunset tells me I’m more adorable and a lot less insufferable than the other me, but there are still similarities, so there’s at least the seed of a good person in you, and I feel like if you really are this universe’s Sunset, you’ll help me make this right. Call me back at 467-7475. Please, I want to solve this without anyone else getting hurt.” I stood up and forced my way onto the set, grabbing the phone. Fuck me if I was letting this have an ending where Sunset didn’t at least go out swinging. Then, you-know-who pounded on the door.
“Sunset!” Starlight cried. “Sunset, I want you to know I took care of everything. Everything that could get in the way of us being together? It’s gone. I know I made a mistake with your dad, and if I could bring him back without jeopardizing everything we worked for, I would. But instead, we can live together, and I promise I’ll take care of you, and never let you out of my sight. And because I know you don’t want to live with my parents, I got rid of them as well. Consider that just the first part of my apology about what I did to your dad. Now, we’re both orphans, and if you want to talk about what it felt like to lose a parent, I’ll be able to relate!” Starlight gave a tortured laugh that quickly choked into a sob.
“I can’t stop thinking about what I did wrong, about what I did that drove you away, and I promise when you take me back, I’ll spend the rest of my life apologizing for it, but you have to take me back. You can’t just not be with me, Sunset, we– I was meant to be yours. I know that in my soul. I know we belong together no matter what, and do you know why? Because it’s destiny. Think about it, we meet, twenty-four hours later, we’re having our first date, you find the camera, I have a falling out with Rose, we find out what the camera can do, and then you take Rose’s photo. It all fits together so perfectly, how can it be anything else? Why are you fighting destiny, Sunset?” I could stay. Do what my mom didn’t, and stand by Starlight, trying to tone down Starlight’s worst impulses, and I could be with her and why did I still want to be with her?
“Listen, I don’t like making threats, but the Winter Formal’s in a few hours, and I’ve done everything I can to make it special for you, but if you don’t show up, you won’t see how much you mean to me, and I can’t have that. So, if you decide to keep sulking and avoiding me, then we’ll see what happens when I start burning photos. I’m not sure if I’m going to start with Daisy or your dad first, and I hope I won’t have to decide, but I will if it’s the only way I can see you again. And try to look nice, this is a big event, I don’t want you wearing jeans for it.” She paused, and Sunset could hear her moving on the other side of the door. “Oh, and don’t act smart and try to call the police. Like I said, I took care of everything.”
What the fuck had I done? I hurt everyone I knew, and instead of trying to fix it, I hid in my house from the one person I’d damaged the most. Starlight didn’t deserve to die, no one did, but if I let her keep going, a lot of people might.
I headed to the phone and dialed.
“Hello, this is Twilight Sparkle,” the other woman said, picking up after only a couple of rings.
“Hi,” I creaked, voice scratchy from a week of not talking, except for the one screaming session. “This is Sunset Shimmer. How soon can you get to Colt Lake?”
***
I hated dressing up under the best of circumstances, I even more hated that the only dress we had in the house was the one my mom wore at her anniversary, kept by my dad for sentimental reasons, and most of all, I hated how well I’d grown into it. I shivered in the cold, wishing it hadn’t been summer when she’d gotten the dress and winter when I needed it, but what would family be if they didn’t disappoint you? “Do you know what’s the hold-up?” I asked the rando in front of me. If I survived this, unlikely, and if I didn’t go to prison, unlikelier, I really should bother learning my classmates names.
“Oh, hey,” he said turning behind him and recognizing me. “You’re Starlight’s girlfriend, right? I heard you were sick.”
“From Starlight, right?” I asked, rolling my eyes and checking my watch. Six more hours to go until Twilight could get here, maybe more depending on how awful traffic was.
“Yeah,” he said, nodding his head. “She seemed real shook up about it, sounded like she didn’t know if you were going to pull through. You’re looking a lot better, though.”
“Uh-huh.” I glanced again at my watch as we shuffled forward. “And I guess I was sick, but I’d be sicker if I didn’t come out tonight. Now, why is this stupid line taking so long?”
“Your girlfriend didn’t tell you?” he asked, and my stomach dropped to my shoes. “She wants to get photos of everyone for the yearbook. You know, so we’re all looking our best.”
I shoved past him, running to the entrance. “You need to go home,” I said, turning back as I sprinted. “Everyone here needs to go home right now.” I pumped my legs, thanking the stars I decided to wear regular boots under the dress instead of heels or something equally inconvenient for fighting your crazy girlfriend. “Formal’s cancelled; there’s a big gas leak, and the whole school could blow at any moment.” I pushed past anyone in my way, trying to dodge when I could, but never ever stopping until I got to the front of the line, getting in front of the couple about to enter.
“What the hell, man,” the guy said. Again, needed to work on names. Hey, maybe if I saved their lives, they could be character witnesses at my trial or give a super bomb eulogy. “No cutting.”
“You two, get out of here right now,” I said, pointing to the parking lot. “Get in your car and do literally anything else with your night, I promise it will work out better for you.”
He pulled his girlfriend next to him. “Look, I know Formals are the weakest high school dances, but if I play my cards right, I think I might get…” He dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “L-A-I-D.”
And I wanted to save this idiot, why? I took a half-step back, getting out of his way before catching myself. “First, stop thinking with your dick, dude. Second, your girlfriend knows how to spell. Third, get out of here before I change my mind.”
“But we–” I didn’t have time or patience for this.
“Out!” I shouted, pointing again, not giving them any room to disagree.
“Fine,” the guy relented. “Come on, babe, this dance was probably going to suck, anyways.”
“Everyone needs to get out of here,” I shouted as loud as I could. “Go home, sneak into a bar, watch whatever movie’s playing in the theater, just get out of here!” The crowd shuffled and a few people left, but most just glared at me. Well, I’d saved a few, at least, and if I could stop Starlight, I could save the rest. Easiest thing in the world. I opened the door and pulled back the black curtain she’d used to darken the vestibule, keeping it safe from prying eyes.
“Sunset, you made it,” Starlight said, happiness clinging to every word. “I was so scared you wouldn’t show and would force me to do something terrible.” I tried to find where she was in the dark room, eyes struggling to adjust. “But you’re here, so we don’t have to worry about that anymore. Tonight’s going to be so magical, I promise, and I’m sure you look stunning, but I’m not quite done with the decorations, so you’re going to have to wait just a little bit longer while I make everything perfect.”
And then the world flashed and everything was white.