Ever since Flash and Twilight realized that the two of them had met as children, the two of them had been tormented by the memory of that first meeting and the odd feeling of attraction that came with it. That night, Flash lay awake in bed staring up at the glow-in-the-dark stars painted on his ceiling.
Ugh! How could this have happened? All Flash wanted back then was to be Twilight’s friend, and now, he was lying awake in the middle of the night thinking about her, feeling painfully attracted to her, and feeling jealous of her boyfriend. Why? He got what he wanted, didn’t he? He and Twilight were friends now. Wait. Were he and Twilight friends? He didn’t even know if the two of them were friends. The two of them might not even be friends. Ugh! Why did he even care so much?!
Flash groaned in frustration as he buried his face in his pillow. He lifted his hand to his chest and rubbed two metal rectangles with rounded corners dangling from a ball chain under his shirt, a small memento from someone who was no longer with him.
“What would you do if you were me?” he asked, knowing that he wasn’t going to get an answer.
“Who wouldn’t want to be friends with a kid like you?” his grandfather had told him all those years ago.
“Apparently, Twilight Sparkle,” Flash muttered to himself bitterly as he forced his eyes shut.
Meanwhile, Twilight was also lying awake in her room, her mind still aging and de-aging her mental image of Flash’s face. Gosh, what was it about that boy’s face that was just so unforgettable? She switched focus from his face to the events of that first meeting. After he got down from the tree, he had invited her and Cadance to join him and his companions for ice cream. She had said no. What would have happened if she had said yes?
“Does it even matter?” she thought crossly to herself as she tossed and turned in her bed. “What happened happened. There’s no changing it and, therefore, no point in dwelling on it.”
When she finally stopped tossing and turning, she found her eyes drifting towards her bookshelf where her plush owl Owlowiscious was perched on the top shelf, its felt note hanging off the shelf in such a way that she would have been able to read the words clearly if she had her glasses on. She didn’t have her glasses on, but she didn’t need them. She already knew what the note said. Once upon a time, those three words were a reminder of the older brother she loved dearly who needed to be away from home. Now, they were taunting her with the memory of a forgotten first meeting and an offer of friendship that she had rejected out of fear.
“What’s wrong, Twilight?” a voice whispered next to her. Twilight sat up, looked over the edge of her bed, and saw her puppy Spike. He was standing up on his hind legs trying to get up on her bed, but he wasn’t quite long enough to reach over the edge and pull himself up.
“Oh, hey, Spike, did I wake you?” Twilight asked as she reached down, picked him up, and set him down next to her.
“Yeah, but I don’t mind.” The little dog curled up next to her. On nights like these, Spike’s presence never failed to put her more at ease. “Can’t sleep?”
“No,” Twilight groaned as she lay her head back on her pillow. “There’s this boy from school that I ran into today, and for some reason, I can’t stop thinking about him. Why can’t I stop thinking about him?”
“Thinking about him how? Did he do something that made you mad?”
“No, no, he didn’t. It’s just that, well, it turns out that I had met him once before when we were kids, and he was really nice to me.”
“Did he change?”
“He got older and better at climbing trees, but that’s about it.”
“Did you do something terrible to him even after he was so nice to you?”
Twilight didn’t reply. She started to remember every single kind deed Flash had ever done for her and how she responded each time by brushing him off like he was unimportant.
“Not really,” she finally answered. “I just ignored him a lot. Ugh! What’s with him? Why does he keep treating me like that when I never return his kindness? Is he trying to win me over and get me to like-like him or something? I mean, he knows I already have a boyfriend.”
“Are you the only person that he’s nice to or have you seen him be nice to other people?” Spike pointed out.
Twilight bit her lip as she remembered what had happened earlier at the park. Like how she had been all those years ago, that little girl with the stuffed turtle was just some stranger who needed help. Flash had nothing to gain from helping her, but he helped her anyway. He didn’t even brag about the deed to Twilight when the girl and her mother left, which was so different from how Timber acted after she and her friends helped his sister save their camp.
“Well, yeah, I have seen him be nice to other people,” Twilight replied. “I guess he genuinely is that kind.”
Spike opened his mouth to say something, but instead a yawn came out.
“It’s late,” Twilight continued. “Let’s try to get some sleep, and we’ll talk more in the morning.”
Spike nodded and snuggled up against Twilight, falling asleep immediately. The sound of his soft snores distracted Twilight from her troubled thoughts and soon lulled her into a dreamless sleep.
The next morning, Flash and his family were having breakfast together. That morning the five of them were having chocolate chip pancakes, which his younger brother First Base was practically inhaling. His mother Lantern Heart and Grandma Free Bird also each had a cup of tea while Aunt Flare had a cup of coffee.
Like his brother, Flash was quite fond of opportunities to have chocolate for breakfast. What growing teenage boy wouldn’t be? However, Flash was so tired from his sleepless night and so troubled by his unwanted feelings for Twilight that he couldn’t enjoy breakfast that morning. This did not go unnoticed by his family.
“Honey,” his mother asked him, “is everything alright?”
“Huh?” Flash replied, shaking himself awake for at least the fifth time that morning. “Oh, yeah, Mom. Everything’s fine. I just had trouble sleeping last night. That’s all.”
“Is something on your mind?”
“No, not really,” Flash denied before backpedaling, “Well, okay, there’s one thing.” He bit his lip, wondering how to get advice from his family without outright telling them what was bothering him. Once again, he began rubbing on the metal tags under his shirt. He stared intently at where the tags were before looking at his grandmother. “Grandma, can I ask you something?”
“Oh, of course, hun, ask away,” Grandma Birdie replied.
“How did you and Grandpa end up getting together? I want to know.”
Flash’s grandmother stopped eating and looked him in the eye, trying to deduce what could have brought out such a question.
After a solid thirty seconds of making Flash uncomfortable, she smiled and replied, “Well, your grandfather and I knew each other since we were kids, growing up in the same town and the same neighborhood and all. The two of us started out as friends, and eventually, the two of us fell in love, got married, and raised two beautiful girls together.”
Lantern Heart and Flare both rolled their eyes affectionately at the last part of that statement.
“How did the two of you become friends?” Flash asked.
“Well, like I said, we grew up in the same neighborhood,” Grandma continued, “but of course, there’s more to it than that. Growing up, the two of us also didn’t quite fit in with everyone else, me because my mama ran off on me and my daddy when I was young and him because his mother was from China.”
“Really?” First Base exclaimed. “I didn’t know that. That’s kind of cool.”
“Well, you think so,” Grandma replied with a laugh, “but things were different back then. Most people didn’t like that your great-grandma was so different from everyone else. She didn’t dress like everyone else or cook like everyone else. She also spoke English with an accent. But everyone had a lot of respect for your great-grandpa, so no one dared make fun of his wife to her face. Your grandfather, on the other hand, wasn’t so lucky.”
Flash hung on his grandmother’s every word. He didn’t know why, but knowing about his grandparents’ past made him feel much better about his current situation. Maybe knowing that his heroes were once troubled kids like him made him feel less alone and less troubled.
“Other kids made fun of Grandpa, didn’t they?” Flash asked.
“Oh, did they ever!” Grandma exclaimed in disgust.
“Did you used to make fun of him too?”
“Oh no! You see, even though most people weren’t accepting of your great-grandma, my daddy and I were some of the few people who saw and treated her and your grandpa’s family like they were people. It didn’t matter to us at all that they were a bit different. Anyway, back then, I used to go from house to house in my neighborhood asking all the housewives to teach me how to cook since I didn’t have anyone to teach me at home,” Grandma continued, “One day, I had gone over to your grandfather’s house on the day he and another boy from school were getting punished for getting into a fight, and their punishment was to help your great-grandma fold the dumplings that she was going to bring to the church potluck.
“So, the four of us were folding dumplings together. Your grandfather and that boy were glaring daggers at each other the whole time while your great-grandma and I talked about anything and everything, mostly cooking and our families. Now, I can’t remember what exactly we were talking about or what I was thinking about at the time, but suddenly, I said to your great-grandma, ‘I wish I had a mother like you.’ As soon as I said that, your grandfather turns to me with this look that was somewhere between ‘Are you kidding me?’ and ‘Mercy me, what have I done?’”
“Why? Did he treat his family bad or something back when he was a kid?” Flash asked. The idea of his grandfather treating anyone bad was unthinkable to Flash, but then again, maybe his grandfather still had growing up to do back then much like how Flash did now.
“Oh no! At least, I don’t think he did,” Grandma replied. “He did admit to me later that he had been feeling ashamed of his mother but more on that later. Anyway, your great-grandma lifts my head up, looks me in the eye, and says to me, ‘You good daughter. Your mama did not know what she had.’ The next day at the church potluck, your grandfather pulls me aside and asks me if I meant what I had said the day before, and I told him that I did. We start talking together, and he tells me about feeling embarrassed by his mother and how he terrible he felt for feeling ashamed of her. Apparently, up until I said what I said, he hadn’t even realized how much he took his mother for granted. Anyway, long story short, we became friends, he started caring less what other people thought of him and his mother, and the rest was history.”
“That was a pretty weird way to become friends with someone,” First Base noted. Flash had to agree. Growing up, his grandfather had been like Superman; he embodied everything Flash thought a man should be. The Grandpa in Grandma’s story just seemed so human just like Flash.
“Grandma,” Flash began, “what was it about Grandpa that made you want to be friends with an insecure kid who everyone else looked down on and who got into fights with people?”
When Grandma Birdie turned and looked him in the eye again, Flash turned away. One thing Flash both loved and hated about his grandmother was how she can figure out so much about her children and grandchildren just by looking into their eyes. Right now, he was trying hide the doubt, insecurity, and jealousy that Twilight Sparkle and her boyfriend were making him feel, but knowing Grandma, she probably already figured it out.
“I became friends with your grandfather because I saw who he really was underneath all that, an honest, caring person who wasn’t afraid to be vulnerable with me, admit his mistakes, and try to fix them,” Grandma replied, “and believe it or not, I see a lot of that in you, Flash.”
Flash couldn’t help but smile at that. His smile shrank a bit, however, when Grandma continued, “Now, you mind telling us about that girl you like?”
Flash looked up at her, his eyes wider than the plate he was eating his breakfast out of.
“Wha-, bu-but, how, how did you know?!” Flash exclaimed.
“You had trouble sleeping last night, and this morning, you start asking me questions about my relationship with your grandfather,” Grandma answered plainly. “Also, yesterday, you kept going back and forth between staring at that girl we met and avoiding her eyes.”
Yup, as Flash suspected, his grandmother had already figured him out.
Flash sighed. “Her name is Twilight Sparkle, and the two of us actually met a long time ago. I just forgot about it until now.”
“What’s she like?” his mother asked.
“Well, when I first met her, Grandpa and I had helped her get her toy back when some bullies threw it up into a tree. She was shy, guarded, like a turtle in its shell. I met her again during the Friendship Games, and she was still like that, except I found out that she was also smart and curious.”
“Curious meaning weird or curious meaning that she likes learning stuff?” asked Base.
“The second one. Anyway, ever since I found out that she was that girl I met a long time ago, I’ve been having these weird feelings toward her.”
“It’s called like-liking a girl,” his brother pointed out with an eyeroll. “It’s happened to you before. It’s not weird, just annoying.”
“But why do I like-like her?” Flash snapped, pushing away his breakfast in frustration. “She already has a boyfriend and has zero interest in me. Last time I checked, the two of us aren’t even friends.”
Flash hung his head as he put a hand over his face. His mother, grandmother, and aunt all shared looks with each other.
Then, his grandmother turned to him and spoke, “Flash, do you want to be friends with this girl?”
“Yes,” Flash admitted. “I mean, I’d love to be more than that to her, but since that might never happen, I’d be okay with just being friends.” He let out another sigh as he shook his head. “That’s probably not going to happen either.”
“Why ever not?” his mother retorted.
“Because after the Friendship Games, she made other friends who have done a better job getting her out of her shell than I ever could have,” Flash answered. “With the six of them and her boyfriend, what would she want a guy like me around for?”
“A guy like you?” his brother repeated.
“An ordinary, unremarkable guy among thousands,” Flash elaborated. “What would she need someone like that for?”
“You’re never going to know if you don’t at least try to be friends with her, aren’t you?” Aunt Flare challenged.
Flash pressed his lips together and blinked twice. He had no way of countering that, so he simply nodded and went back to eating his breakfast. Lantern Heart stared at her sister incredulously while Flare took another sip of her coffee with a satisfied smirk on her face.
Flash’s mother shook her head and smiled. She got up from her seat, walked up to her son, and ran her right hand through his hair.
“You are so much more than one guy among thousands, Flashy. You are my son, and I love you very much. We all do,” she said to Flash. Lantern Heart gave her son a quick, tender kiss on the top of his head before returning to her seat.
Flash smiled and replied, “You guys are the best. You know that?”
“And don’t you forget it,” Aunt Flare countered cheekily before taking another sip out of her coffee mug. The sheer amount of feistiness in that sentence caused First Base to explode with laughter, accidentally spraying milk all over the right half of his brother’s face.
“Bro!” Flash cried before reaching for a napkin.
“Sorry,” Base apologized with a sheepish grimace. He also grabbed for a napkin and began to help his brother clean up the splattered milk.
Meanwhile, Twilight Sparkle was also having breakfast with her family, which consisted of her older brother Shining Armor, her father Night Light, and her mother Twilight Velvet. Like Flash’s family the four of them were also having pancakes, but theirs were of the blueberry variety. The empty place setting at the table also indicated that they were expecting a guest.
Even though Twilight was far more well rested than Flash was, she was just as troubled and had less of an appetite as evidenced by the way she kept poking at her food instead of eating it. This did not go unnoticed by the rest of her family members, particularly Shining Armor.
“Twily,” her brother called, getting her attention, “is everything okay?”
“Everything’s fine, BBBFF,” Twilight replied, still poking at her stack of pancakes with her fork.
“You sure about that? Because people who are fine usually don’t have trouble eating their breakfast?” Shining pointed out.
“I said I’m fine!” Twilight shouted far more forcefully than she intended. Great. Now, everyone at the table was looking at her. Thirty seconds of tense silence later, everyone awkwardly resumed having breakfast.
Although they tried to hide it, Twilight could see her parents having a conversation with their eyes, trying to decide which one of them should try to speak to her. In the end, her father ended up volunteering for the job.
“I know you prefer solving your problems on your own, Twily,” Night Light began, “but it’s okay to get help from the people who care about you. The problem is we can’t help you with your problems unless you tell us what they are.”
Twilight didn’t reply or even look up at her father. She knew his advice was sound, but she didn’t want anyone in her family to know that she was beginning to show an interest in guys or that she was dating someone behind their backs. She had two reasons for hiding her romantic interests, and one of them was sitting next to her while the other was sitting next to her dad.
Then again, if anyone had any idea of what is normal and healthy in a relationship, it would be her parents and her brother. As much as Twilight loved her new friends, they would likely be of little help to her in this situation. All she had to do was find a way to ask her parents for advice without letting them know what she needed the advice for.
Twilight looked around the table for anything to use as an alternate conversation topic. Her eyes came to rest on the empty place setting. Perfect. She smiled to herself.
“So,” Twilight began, turning towards Shining Armor, “when is Cadance going to arrive?”
“Soon,” he replied.
“You did remember to invite her over, didn’t you, Shiny?” Velvet asked her son.
“Of course,” Shining retorted. “Besides, she’s over so often and so regularly that I probably didn’t even need to invite her. She practically lives with us.”
“The two of you sure have been together a long time,” Twilight noted.
“We have,” Shining agreed. “It’s almost been too long, but I think we’re getting close to the right time.”
“Oh, you don’t mean!” Velvet nearly squealed.
“Mom, you promised that you wouldn’t make a scene,” Shining Armor sternly reminded her.
“Ooh, sorry, Shiny, but I can’t help but be excited for the two of you!”
“Don’t forget that you also promised not to spoil the surprise to Cadance,” added Night Light.
“Hey, BBBFF, just a random thought,” Twilight half-lied, “but in the time you and Cadance have been together, have you ever, I don’t know, found yourself wanting to be with other women?”
Shining Armor turned and stared at his younger sister as if she had suddenly grown a second head or an extra limb.
“You mean as in while the two of us were still dating or during those two times when we had broken up with each other?” he asked.
“Well, either, I guess.”
Shining Armor pursed his lips as he thought about how his relationship with Cadance had grown and changed over the years.
Then, he answered, “I mean, I had passing attractions to other women while we were dating but nothing that made me want to cheat or break up with her. I also tried dating other women while we were apart, but those relationships never went past the first date. Basically, those two breakups were spent fixing whatever caused the breakup in the first place only for us to get back together again.”
“So, you found other woman attractive, but no other woman made you feel the same way Cadance made you feel?” Twilight asked Shining Armor. “Would that be considered normal in a relationship?’
Now, everyone at the table was giving her weird looks. So much for being subtle. Thankfully, they don’t seem to have caught on that she was dating someone without them knowing.
“To answer your first question,” Shining Armor replied, “yes. As for your second, I think so.” He turned to his parents. “The two of you went through something similar, right?”
“Well, sort of,” Night Light hesitantly agreed. “Granted, the two of use didn’t date as long as you and Cadance did, and we didn’t breakup with each other at any point, but I think we both had passing attractions towards other people that never amounted to anything during the dating period. Once we were engaged and married, we both made a point to not even look at other people.”
“Why not?” Twilight asked. She didn’t want to admit it even to herself, but she was much more naïve about romantic love and relationships than she had realized.
“Well, when your mother and I married, we made a promise to love and cherish each other and only each other until the day one of us dies. Not looking at other people helps us to not only remember that promise but why we made it in the first place.”
Twilight bit her lip as a pit formed in her stomach. Promise. She didn’t know why, but thinking about that word and putting it together with Timber Spruce made her feel uneasy. That word was just so heavy, so solemn, so permanent, so unlike her current relationship.
“No, no, no, don’t think like that, Twilight,” Twilight thought to herself. “I mean, sure, your relationship with Timber doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere now, but that’ll change with enough time, right? Besides, Mom, Dad, and Shining Armor said that passing attractions were normal during dating, so whatever it is you’re feeling towards Flash is probably nothing and will go away eventually, right? I mean, it has to.” Okay, why did that pit in her stomach just grow bigger?
To her relief, her thoughts and her conversation with her family were interrupted by the doorbell ringing.
“I’ll get it,” Velvet and Shining Armor said simultaneously as they both got up from the table.
“I should get it, Mom. She’s my girlfriend,” Shining Armor argued.
“And I’m the lady of this house, and Cadance is our guest. It’s my responsibility to welcome her and make her feel at home,” his mother countered.
“You’re just using that as an excuse get all chummy and close with her like back when we were in high school,” Shining snapped.
“And why do say that like it’s a bad thing? I’m allowed to get along with my future daughter-in-law.”
“Mom! She’ll hear you!”
While his son and his wife were still arguing with each other, Night Light calmly got up from the table, walked past the two of them, and opened the door.
“Cadance, come on in,” he greeted the young woman on the other side. As soon as Shining and Velvet heard Night Light’s greeting and noticed that he was no longer at the table, they both sighed in defeat and sat back down.
“Hello, Mr. Light, I’m so sorry I’m late. I overslept this morning,” Cadance greeted back. “I hope I didn’t keep you all waiting.”
“Oh, not at all. Besides, you’re in and out of here so often that you practically live here.”
Shining Armor turned pink at that assertion while his father and his girlfriend shared a laugh. For some reason, he found that statement less funny coming out of his father and when Cadance was around to hear it. Cadance took her seat at the empty place setting while Velvet piled her plate high with pancakes.
“I sure hope you’re hungry because Night and I made enough for an army,” Velvet declared.
“My, how generous!” Cadance exclaimed before putting a forkful in her mouth. “Mmmm!”
Twilight rolled her eyes at the sudden chaos that ensued. She could only imagine how embarrassing bringing Timber over to meet her family will be. The less her family knew about her romantic life the better.
“So, Twilight, did anything new happen since we last saw each other?” Cadance asked.
“No, not at all. Why do you ask?” Twilight answered.
Cadance suddenly stopped eating and stared at Twilight intently. Twilight froze when she saw the look Cadance was giving her. It was the same look Cadance used to give her whenever she denied sneaking cookies even though Cadance could clearly see her with her hand in the cookie jar. Why would Cadance be looking at her like that for? Unless…No way!
“What?!” Twilight cried, trying to act as natural as possible.
“Honey, is something wrong?” Shining asked his girlfriend.
“That’s what I’d like to know,” Cadance replied with her gaze still locked on Twilight.
“No, nothing’s wrong. Everything is fine.” Twilight couldn’t even look Cadance in the eye as she said those words. The unnaturally wide smile she was displaying wasn’t helping her case at all because Shining Armor quickly caught on to exactly what was going on.
“Twilight is hiding something from us, and you somehow know what it is!” Shining exclaimed. “What is it?”
“It’s not really my business to say,” Cadance replied, breaking her gaze away from Twilight, “but let’s just say that it’s something she should have told the three of you about and that it involves another person.”
Shining Armor jumped up, turned to his sister, and shouted, “Who were you with, and what did this person do to you?!”
“Shiny!” Cadance exclaimed, grabbing her boyfriend’s arm and pulling him back towards his seat. “I know your mind just went into worst case scenario mode, but I swear it’s nothing that bad. If it was, I would have told you and your parents about it yesterday.”
“Oh, what a relief!” sighed Velvet. “But we still don’t know what it is Twily is hiding from us.”
“Come on, Twilight, just tell them,” Cadance gently urged.
Twilight clenched her teeth, shoved her breakfast away from her, and whipped her head towards Cadance, glaring angrily.
“How did you even find out?!” she yelled.
“I was out at the summer festival with Principal Celestia, Vice Principal Luna, and several other teachers from both CHS and Crystal Prep,” Cadance replied, keeping her voice even. “There were a lot of people around, so you probably didn’t see us.”
Twilight groaned and facepalmed herself, suppressing the urge to scream.
“Hold on,” Night Light cut in. “Twily, are you dating someone behind our backs?”
“YES!” Twilight screamed. “I am dating someone! There! I said it! Are you happy now?! Because I’m not!”
Everyone backed away at Twilight’s outburst, unsure how to best reply to that or calm her down. Once again, Velvet and Night looked at each other, silently conversing with their eyes, and once again, Night made the first move.
“Are you unhappy because of the guy you’re dating or because we know about the two of you now?” he asked for clarification.
Twilight opened her mouth to answer, but then, she paused. True, she was unhappy because her secret was out, but until now, she hadn’t even considered whether the relationship itself made her happy. Before, she certainly thought she was happy with Timber, but now, she wasn’t so certain. She enjoyed spending time with Timber; Twilight knew that much. She also liked talking with him about natural science and little-known facts, and the two of them always chose great activities to do together. However, could Twilight really call those little moments of nerdy frivolity happiness?
She let out a breath and calmly replied, “It’s complicated, okay?”
All the adults in the room looked at each other, confused by her statement. Then, Cadance cleared her throat and spoke up first.
“Why don’t we all just calm down and focus on one thing at a time?” she suggested. “Let’s start with why you felt the need to date a guy without your family knowing about him.”
“That’s what I’d like to know, too,” Velvet agreed. “Were you even ever planning on bringing him home to meet the family?”
Twilight scowled and retorted, “No, Mom. I had no plans of bringing Timber to meet you guys. In fact, if things went the way I planned them, you guys and Timber Spruce would have never known the other existed.”
Night and Velvet shared another look, and Night said to his daughter, “You were planning on keeping that guy a secret from us forever? Twily, you do realize how unrealistic that is, right? What were you planning on doing when the two of you start getting closer and he starts asking to meet us?”
Twilight didn’t answer. Honestly, she hadn’t even thought that far ahead regarding her relationship with Timber. In fact, some unconscious part of her didn’t even want their relationship to move forward. She wanted things between her and Timber to stay the way they are now and not change.
“I don’t know,” Twilight finally replied. She sighed and finally admitted, “I just didn’t want Mom and Shining Armor scaring him off and embarrassing me.”
Mother and son looked at each other as their faces fell. Twilight couldn’t even look at either of them. She knew that what she just admitted hurt them and that her mom and brother were likely angry with her for finding them embarrassing.
“You think I’m embarrassing?” Velvet asked her, her voice unusually quiet compared to how she normally talked. Okay, that felt so much worse than having her be angry.
Twilight sighed again, saying, “Remember how you were like when Shining Armor and Cadance first started dating? You kept taking pictures of them, showing Cadance Shining’s baby pictures, and telling her stories about his less than stellar childhood moments among other things.”
“I didn’t think how I acted was that bad,” Velvet exclaimed defensively.
“Neither did I,” Cadance agreed.
“Actually, yeah, it was that bad,” Shining cut in, cringing at the memories before turning to glare at his younger sister, “although I do recall you enjoying my misfortune back when it happened.”
“Hey, just because I enjoyed watching it happen to you doesn’t mean that I want it to happen to me,” Twilight retorted.
“Night, was I that bad?” Velvet demanded from her husband.
Night Light bit his lip and sheepishly answered, “Well, I did have to reel you in a few times.”
“Et tu, my husband?!”
“Oh, come on, Velvet,” Night cried. “Don’t be like that with me. Besides, how is reeling you in from going overboard about our son’s first girlfriend different from any other time I’ve had to reel you in? That’s part of what makes our relationship work so well. I reel you in when you start doing crazy things, and you push me into trying crazy things I’m normally too scared to try.”
Velvet crossed her arms and frowned at her husband for a good five seconds before giving him a small smile and a giggle. Then, to everyone’s surprise, Cadance began laughing.
“I think this might be my favorite part about coming over here,” Cadance said as her laughter died down to a few giggles.
“What? The butting heads and the chaos?” Twilight asked, staring at Cadance disbelievingly.
“Chaos? Is that what you see?” Cadance exclaimed, staring back at Twilight. “No. I like how your parents work through their differences and the moments when they don’t agree. Sure, there might be a little tension and a few harsh words, but at the end of the day, the two of them clearly love each other, and they both clearly love you and Shining Armor. It makes me excited to be part of your family someday.”
Velvet looked like she was about to spill Shining Armor’s surprise when Night gave her a look that said, “Honey, you promised,” forcing her to control herself. Meanwhile, Twilight couldn’t help but feel guilty all over again. Where Twilight saw craziness in her family, Cadance only saw love. Why couldn’t Twilight see that love earlier?
“Well,” Velvet admitted, returning the conversation back to its original topic, “I guess I can go a little overboard when it comes to you kids dating.”
“Yeah, you can,” Shining Armor agreed, causing Velvet to shoot her son an offended look, “but I don’t think my relationship with Cadance would have lasted this long if she couldn’t get along with you even at your most extreme.”
“Why not?” asked Twilight.
“Because even when she embarrasses me, I love Mom, and I would have absolutely hated being caught in a situation where I had to choose between her and Cadance,” Shining replied, flashing Velvet a cheeky smile. “The fact that Cadance never put me through that ultimatum shows that she understands how important my family is to me.”
“Aww, Shiny,” Cadance cooed before kissing him on the cheek.
“Gee,” Twilight thought to herself, biting her lip uncomfortably as she looked away from the show of affection, “if Timber met my family, would he be anywhere near as understanding?”
“Twily, I’m sure you’ve realized by now that anyone who quits on you because of us isn’t going to be worth your time or your feelings,” Night Light said to his daughter. Twilight merely sighed and nodded.
“By the way, why did you want your boyfriend to avoid meeting me specifically?” Shining Armor asked.
“Shining Armor, you’re a cop, a former Marine, and my older brother,” Twilight retorted. “Do the math.”
Everyone except Shining Armor quickly understood what Twilight was trying to say. About a half a second later, Shining Armor caught on too.
“You’re worried that I’m going to intimidate your boyfriend so bad that he breaks up with you,” Shining Armor realized.
“And not just my current boyfriend too, but also every other potential significant other who so much as looks at me,” Twilight added bitterly. “As if I didn’t have a hard enough time getting guys to find me attractive.”
All the adults looked at each other again, a mixture of worry, understanding, and sympathy on their faces. No one knew how to reply to what Twilight had just said without coming off as insincere or lecturing. Then, Cadance spoke.
“Twilight, do you really want to spend the rest of your life splitting yourself between a boyfriend and your family?” she asked.
“No, of course not,” Twilight answered immediately. “I want what you and Shining Armor have, but Timber Spruce is the first guy who’s made me feel like someone could like me for me, and I don’t want to risk anything that could ruin that.”
“Oh, Twily, if he does like you for all the right reasons, then nothing our family throws at him will get him to change his mind,” Night declared. “If meeting us does end up ruining it, maybe it’s for the best.”
“Dad!” Twilight cried out.
“You seemed to imply earlier that you don’t even know if you’re happy in this relationship. If you aren’t, don’t you think it’s best to let it go?”
“But what if I never find another guy who likes me like that again?”
“Oh, sweetie, you will,” Velvet assured.
“How do you know?”
“I don’t,” Velvet admitted, but before Twilight could roll her eyes or scoff at her answer, Velvet continued, “but I know that you’re a lot more desirable and beautiful than you give yourself credit for, and I believe that one day, you’ll find someone who sees that too.”
“Yeah, right,” Twilight thought sarcastically to herself as she looked away from her family, “who could possibly—” Before she could finish that thought, her mind went to the kind, friendly, blue-haired boy who had been plaguing her thoughts. “No, that’s crazy. There’s no way someone like him would go for someone like me, not for the right reasons anyway.”