//------------------------------//
// You Were Perfect 
// Story: Running Out Of Air 
// by I-A-M 
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Wallflower Blush








“It’s smaller than yours.”
They’re the first words out of my mouth as I step inside the small studio apartment and I’m instantly afraid that it makes me sound ungrateful. 
I look over my shoulder at Sunset Shimmer who’s carrying in the two bags that contain the lion’s share of my worldly possessions, and she smiles at me.
There’s already a bed frame and mattress in the apartment, courtesy of Applejack’s brother. Big Macintosh put it together over a couple of days.
I’m always a little in awe of people who can work so effortlessly with their hands like that. There’s nothing particularly complicated about the bedframe, and I know it’s basically just a couple of posts and planks nailed together and given a good finish, but it’s still impressive.
“A little,” Sunset replies with that fetching grin of hers, ignoring the awkward moment. “I gotta say though, I’m not thrilled that it’s in the East End.”
“Why?”
“It’s hobo knife-fight central is why,” Sunset says blithely.
I chuckle weakly and shrug.
“It’s barely in the East End.” I gesture to the lone, small window that looks out over the city. “See? You can see downtown.”
Sunset moves over to the window and leans on the sill, looking out across the skyline. I join her a moment later and she nudges me with her shoulder.
It’s been a rough few weeks since I went and saw Doctor Hive, and things have been different between Sunset and I since that night.
I’m not sure if it’s a ‘bad’ difference, but it’s been different. I’ve tried to put a little distance between us even though I know I’m only doing it because I’m scared. The difference is that, unlike most times when my anxiety is just getting the better of me, this time it’s for a completely legitimate reason.
I don’t want to be the reason Sunset decides to pitch herself into the fire, and this is the best way I know to do that.
She cares about me. I know that and I’ll always love her for it, but she can do better than me.
“Are you sure it’s big enough?” Sunset asks after a moment.
“I’m sure,” I say. “I don’t need much room.”
Sunset wrings her hands. When she stops, she looks back up at me with the shadow of a pleading look on her face.
“There are still open studios at the Commonplace,” Sunset says quietly, looking over at me. “We could ask Sticky to resubmit the paperwork, you’d only have to wait a week or so.”
Have I mentioned that I love her?
Because I love her.
I really, really do.
“I’ll be fine,” I say, putting a hand on hers. “I uhm, I think this is… is better.”
There are days, like today, that I wish Sunset was a little better at concealing her emotions around me, even though I know that sounds selfish. It’s just that if she was, it wouldn’t be so easy to tell when I’ve almost made her cry.
“Y-Yeah,” Sunset says, almost concealing the shake in her voice as she nods. “Better… it’ll be better. And y’know, if you ever want to come hang out at my place we’ll finally be able to sit on the couch!”
We laugh softly together. It’s not what I’d call a happy laugh, but it’s a laugh, and it’s not faked so at least there’s that.
I don’t know how to tell Sunset that in my wildest, craziest daydreams, I’d like to stay with her. That if the world were perfect and if I weren’t so messed up, and if Sunset weren’t such a disaster about it, then I’d want to stay with her because just being around her feels right. 
It feels better than right, it feels perfect.
Every day I’m not around her feels like I’m slowly suffocating under the weight of the world, and then suddenly Sunset is there and I can breathe again and everything feels okay again, right up until something happens and I remember that it’s not safe for Sunset to spend all her time around me because I’ll mess up.
I’ll mess up, and then Sunset will have to fix it, and every time she’ll burn up a little bit more of herself. She’ll take bigger risks, do something a little bit crazier, and if it happens enough I know that, no matter how great and amazing and brilliant Sunset is, she will eventually make a bet on me and lose.
And then she’ll lose everything, and it will be my fault.
“I uhm, I asked Principal Celestia if I can have the key to the gardening shed,” I say after our laughter trails off, and Sunset gives me a curious look at the odd change in topic.
“Okay,” Sunset says with a small laugh. “That’s… actually, probably for the best, since you’re a better gardener than our school’s landscaper.”
“The little garden in the rear copse behind the school,” I continue. “I’m going to start cleaning it up properly, and planting some new flowers.”
Sunset smiles a little more broadly at that.
“That’s great!” Sunset says. “Do you uh… I mean, I wouldn’t be much help I guess, but maybe… maybe you’d like some company sometime while you’re working?”
“I’d like that,” I say softly, looking over at her briefly before leaning against her and resting my head on her shoulder.
The rain has petered out over the last few weeks, so the sky is clear and the great steel-and-stone skyscrapers of Canterlot gleaming in the early afternoon sunlight. There are birds on the wing, and I watch them flick across the sky in lazy arcs, their heads cast downward as they search for morsels of bread.
“I guess it’ll be nice to have your apartment to yourself again, huh?” I say after a moment. “Sorry I took up so much of it for so long.”
Sunset doesn’t answer right away. Her arm just fits itself over my shoulder and she squeezes gently. I try to look up at her, to see the expression on her face, but I can’t. Her head is resting on mine and as she’s staring out the window, so all I can see is the edge of her graceful profile.
And what I think might be wetness on her cheek.
“Yeah,” Sunset says finally. “I guess so.”
This is okay. That’s what I tell myself because it has to be okay. Because now that I’m out of Sunset’s apartment, I can slowly drift out of her life. I can go back to being Wallflower Blush, the forgotten girl, and Sunset can go back to burning bright as a star, and never have to worry about the time that a silly flower fell in love with the sun.
She’ll forget about me, like everyone else, and she’ll go on to something absolutely incredible.
“You’ll never lose me, you know,” Sunset says softly, and I freeze.
For a brief, crazy moment, I’m sure she just read my mind. I know that’s crazy though. I know because she doesn’t have her geode on her. She keeps it stashed away somewhere ever since what happened with the prescriptions. She says it’s because she trusts me, but I think it’s also because the power scares her a little.
“I’ll always be here for you if you need me, Wallie,” Sunset continues, then she turns her head to look down at me, and I remember why I fell so hard for her in the first place.
That look in her eyes. Those fierce, fire-blue eyes that have the courage to take the world by the throat, and the set of her regal features that doesn’t just demand respect, but commands it.
She’s always so sure of herself. I don’t understand what that’s like, and I don’t think I ever will, but seeing it so clear and blatant on Sunset’s face is something I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of.
“Just say the word, and I’m there, okay?” Sunset says.
Then she turns and wraps her arms around me, and I lean into the embrace and rest my head in the crook of her neck for what I’m terrified might be the last time.
Even though I know tomorrow we’ll be back at school, and we’ll be that way for a few more months, so I know it’s not the last time I’ll be able to see Sunset, or to hug her.
But the end is coming.
Summer is coming, and with it will come finals, Senior Prom, then graduation, and then she’ll be gone to university or something else to do something incredible, and I’ll be right where she left me.
Forgotten.
But not yet.
She hasn’t forgotten me yet.
“Wallie?” Sunset says softly.
I realise I haven’t said anything for a little while, and I chuckle weakly as I pull back and look up at her again. I do my best to memorise her in this moment, while she’s looking at me, and there’s something in her eyes that I think might be more than just care.
For a long moment, I memorise the line of her straight duchess nose, and the soft gleam in her cerulean eyes, and the way her gorgeous, curling, red-and-gold hair falls around her face.
“I know,” I say quietly. “I remember.”
I move forward again, and this time I lay my head on her chest and briefly allow myself the selfishness of losing myself in the sound of her heartbeat.
Sunset wraps her arms around me completely and squeezes as she rests her chin on top of my head.
“Good,” Sunset says. “Don’t ever forget that I’m here, okay? Because you’re…”
“I know.”
I know what she’s going to say, because she’s said it before, and I feel a little bad that even now I have trouble believing it. But I think she believes it, and isn’t that just a little bit incredible?
I owe Sunset more than I can ever thank her for. She pulled me out of a dark place and gave me more than anyone has ever given, and now there are two parts of me that are at war trying to decide why. The first part is the old part, and I’m still not sure that it’s wrong when it tells me that Sunset did it because she pitied me, because she felt bad, and because I was a project for her to fix.
The other part though… I like it a little better even if I’m not sure I believe what it tells me. It tells me that the reason Sunset did what she did for me is for the reason she gave when she was holding me in the hospital.
In a perfect world, I hope that’s really true. Even if I’m not sure that it is, I hope it is, and it’s been a very long time since I’ve hoped for anything that nice. So maybe Sunset won’t forget me completely. Maybe she won’t because Sunset never lets anything she cares about out of her hand and if it’s true then she won’t let me go either because—
Because I’m precious to her.