“I still can’t believe that you’re going to be a mommy soon!”
While it’s great that Trixie and Maud decided to invite her for lunch to her favorite restaurant (which is not saying much, since this is the only restaurant in Ponyville), Starlight is still debating the logic of actually telling the two about her pregnancy. Not that she could’ve hidden it for long, but between the altogether terrifying look in Trixie’s eyes when she started rambling about baby clothes to Maud’s insistence on throwing her a baby shower to celebrate, Starlight wished there had been a way to put off the announcement until…never.
“Yeah, I heard you the first time.”
“But it’s so…so…” Trixie trails off, words failing her as she can’t quite think of the right one to describe the situation. It makes her feel old, Starlight would have liked to add, but all that would earn her is some chuckling about how she’s already an old mare with a baby on the way, so she lets it be.
When the words don’t come to Trixie soon enough, Maud steps in with a more direct approach. She puts a colorful box in front of her and slides it over. “Here, a gift for your bundle of joy.”
Starlight pulls the ribbon and pops the lid open, looking inside. “That’s a lot of rocks.” Of course. Starlight had expected nothing less.
“My sisters and I used to play with these all the time. Besides these are the best stones that the rock farm has to offer, playing with them will help your son to build character.”
“I’ll make sure he plays with it every day.” She’s never quite sure if Maud is just that ignorant of sarcasm, or if she can see through it and just chooses not to care.
Either way, the earth pony cracks a tiny smile and says: “I was joking, push the rocks aside for the real gift.”
Starlight does so, and is immediately blown away by the size of the crystal she pulls out from the box. She has no idea what kind of crystal it is, but it’s white and cut in such a way that reminds her of a tower, the kind of stone used to decorate the tips of wands. It catches the light of the restaurant’s lamps and reflects them back into colorful rainbows, it even came with a stand made out of silver. She doesn’t feel any magic on it when she holds it, it's merely a decorative rock, but she loves it and knows it will look beautiful in the nursery.
“Oh, Maud,” Starlight says with awe. “It’s beautiful!” She smiles widely and takes the grey mare into a hug, which Maud accepts in her own way, by going limp and letting Starlight have her fill of affection.
“Alright, alright!” Trixie says and playfully pushes them apart. “Now let me show you how the Great and Powerful Trixie blows your little rock out of the water!”
“Guys…you shouldn’t have.”
“But we wanted too,” Trixie said as she digs into her bag for the present. “What kind of aunts we would be if we didn’t spoil this kid?”
She pulls a colorful parcel from under the table and hands it over. It’s infinitely lighter than Maud’s, wrapped in colorful silver paper and she immediately knows that it’s clothes. Still, she coos when she pulls out the ensemble: a little wizard hat and cape combo, with the same color and star pattern like the ones Trixie wears for her performances.
“So…” Trixie says and smiles slyly. “…when’s the wedding?”
“…The wedding?”
“Yeah! Yours and Sunburst’s! There’ll be lots of food, right?”
“I want to help with the bachelorette party.”
“Who said anything about a wedding?”
“You’re not getting married?”
“Er, no. Why?”
“Oh, I don’t know, I mean, you’re only pregnant with his kid and all. Nothing much.”
“Well, we were planning on doing that…just…later.”
Maud raises an eyebrow. “Later?”
“We’ve only been dating for two years. I thought we had plenty of time before committing.”
“Starlight, honey. You know they invented contraceptive spells for a reason…”
“It was just once!”
“The sex?” Maud quips dryly and Trixie snorts into her drink.
“NO!”
“Sure…”
“…we just got caught in the moment, you know.”
Being captured by a creature that feeds on love, who also happened to hate her guts, held prisoner for a number of days, watching the world almost end and then saved in a matter of minutes left her pretty high strung, to say the least. And when she finally had a moment of quiet with Sunburst—who was also going through his own emotional roller coaster—caution had been thrown to the floor like Sunburst’s cape that night.
“Hard to believe that Sunburst of all ponies would let you get away with that. He’s worse than Twilight when it comes to the rules.” Trixie said with a roll of her eyes. “Hah, what, you did him in your office or something?”
Starlight fell silent, her lips pressed in a thin line to keep from smiling like an idiot as a pleasant blush appeared on her cheeks, looking down at the table while her hormonal imagination took Trixie’s suggestion and ran, berating herself for not thinking of that sooner. Trixie’s idea sounded amazingly hot. The low light, his husky voice in her ear, the way he was moving, and that moan…
“EW! THAT’S DISGUSTING! TRIXIE SAT IN THAT OFFICE ON MULTIPLE OCCASIONS! YOU SICKO!”
“Keep your voice down.” Maud says. But it’s no use. Every pony in the restaurant is looking at their table. Trixie is in full rant mode, and nothing short of a disaster would stop her now. Ugh, just what she needed.
Starlight sighs and draws her drink closer with her magic, sinking low in her seat, or as low as her stomach would allow her. She takes a sip and wishes it was something stronger than just juice, still, it doesn’t take long for her to find her friends banter funny. Though it would be funnier if alcohol were involved.