//------------------------------// // Chapter 4: Find You Again // Story: In a Crowd of Thousands // by Godslittleprincess //------------------------------// Twilight anxiously played with the kite keychain Timber had won for her as she sat at one of the coffee shop’s outdoor tables. “You can do this,” Twilight thought to herself. “Just rip the Band-Aid off and get it over with.” She was startled out of her thoughts when someone put his hands over her eyes and greeted, “Guess who.” Twilight sighed in frustration and grumbled, “Hello, Timber.” Timber frowned as he removed his hands from Twilight’s eyes. “Is everything okay?” he asked as he sat down next to her. “You don’t sound very happy to see me.” “Timber,” Twilight began hesitantly before forcing herself to meet Timber’s gaze, “we need to talk.” Timber’s frown deepened. Those four words in combination with her tone, facial expression, and body language were like a flock of ravens circling around him. “‘We need to talk’?” Timber repeated uncertainly. “As in ‘let’s chat’ or ‘I’m about to break up with you’?” Twilight sighed and replied, “The second one.” “What?! Why?!” Timber cried. “I thought everything was great between us. What changed?” “It’s hard to say, but,” she paused, searching for the right words to explain her feelings, “I’ve been doing a little self-examination, and it would appear that I’ve been getting less and less attracted to you.” “What?! Bu-bu-but, how?! How can you possibly find all this,” Timber gestured to himself, “less attractive?” “I don’t know. I just do,” Twilight snapped, trying not to yell. She placed the keychain on the table and slid it over to Timber. “Here. Just to make it official.” Timber glared at her bitterly in response. “What if I don’t want to take it?” “Then, I’m afraid I’m going to have to get my family involved, and trust me. You do not want me to have to do that. My brother is a cop.” Timber’s eyes widened, and his face went two tints paler. “Uh, how tall is your brother exactly?” Timber tittered nervously. “Taller than you and strong enough to break your arm if he wanted to,” Twilight bluntly replied. “Did I mention that he used to be in the Marines?” After blanching a bit more, Timber scowled and took the keychain. “Fine. I’ll go along with this,” Timber huffed as he got out of his seat, “but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.” With that, Timber stormed off, muttering to himself angrily all the while. Twilight simply sat there for a little while longer, alone with her thoughts. She didn’t know how long she had been sitting, but eventually, she got up and left as well. As she began walking away, Twilight carefully examined her emotions. She felt like she had gotten released from a Victorian-era prison, sat through a round of kindergarten vaccines without crying, and buried a pet goldfish all at once. None of those emotions were unexpected, and each emotion made sense individually. She had gotten out of a relationship she didn’t want to be in anymore, followed through with a breakup that she wasn’t sure she was going to be brave enough to pull off, and lost her first boyfriend. However, getting hit with all those emotions simultaneously made Twilight’s brain feel as if it had been shoved into a snow globe and shaken to bits. As Twilight struggled to piece her head back together, life decided to give the metaphorical brain snow globe another good shake. She grunted as she slammed into someone, splattering a rocky road ice cream cone all over his clean white shirt. Twilight looked up and saw the face of the second to last person she wanted to see right now. “Oh, oh, my gosh!” she sputtered, looking from Flash’s shocked face to his stained T-shirt. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” Flash just smiled and replied, “Don’t worry about it. I know it was an accident.” He grimaced as he wiped the remains of his crushed ice cream cone off his shirt with his hands. “Umm, do you have a napkin or something I can borrow?” Flash asked Twilight with a sheepish grin. Twilight smiled back and pulled out a packet of tissues from her skirt pocket. She handed Flash a few sheets to wipe the sticky mess off his hands with. “Thanks,” Flash replied, taking the tissues. “No problem,” said Twilight. “I’m so sorry about your ice cream. I’ll compensate you for however much you paid for it.” “That won’t be necessary. Besides, I can wait another couple weeks for ice cream,” Flash declined. “Maybe you can, but you won’t have to,” Twilight insisted. “Come on. The ice cream shop is just a couple blocks away. Let’s head over there, and I’ll treat you.” Flash frowned at Twilight’s sudden, almost uncharacteristic boldness. “Look, that’s very generous of you, but,” Flash paused, trying to think of a convincing reason for Twilight to relent, “wouldn’t your boyfriend have a problem with you treating another guy to ice cream?” Twilight looked away from him and sighed, “His opinion on the matter is no longer relevant. I just broke up with him, uh, today.” “Hold on,” Flash exclaimed. “You just broke up with Timber Spruce TODAY, and now, you want to take me out for ice cream?” “Don’t flatter yourself,” Twilight scoffed. “I’m merely paying off a few debts. This doesn’t mean anything.” As soon as those words left her mouth, Twilight could hear her heart whispering to her head, “Liar.” She bit her lip and looked away from him once again. If the emotions from her breakup had sent Twilight reeling, they were nothing compared to what she was feeling right now. The emotions that came with her growing attraction to Flash felt as if she had gone on every ride in Equestria Land seven times back-to-back, but she couldn’t let Flash know about that yet, not so soon. “I didn’t say it did,” Flash replied hesitantly. “Well, it doesn’t,” Twilight huffed back, talking hurriedly, “but if you’re so worried about this coming off as a rebound date, then why don’t you call some of your friends, and I’ll call some of mine, and we make it a group hang-out, a totally platonic, mixed gender group hang-out.” Flash opened his mouth to reply when something Twilight had said caught his attention. “Wait a minute,” he cried. “What did you mean by ‘a few debts’? Running into me and wasting my ice cream was an accident. You don’t owe me anything for that. Even if you did, that’s technically only one debt. What’s the rest of them?” “Well, there’s all those times you were nice to me, and I totally brushed you off,” Twilight began. “Oh,” Flash uttered before turning a shade of red and looking away from her. “Yeah, about those, do me a favor and not count those. I might have had ulterior motives a few of those times, and I’d rather not be rewarded for them.” “You didn’t have ulterior motives EVERY SINGLE time you were nice to me, did you?” “Well, no, at least, I don’t think so. I’m not really sure. It’s just, ugh!” Flash groaned as he put a hand to his face. “All I know is that for a few of those times I was nice to you, I did it because I wanted you to notice me, and that I’ve done it enough times to feel ashamed of myself, and I’m sorry.” Twilight blinked a few times, trying to process what Flash had just told her. “Are you sorry for treating me kindly, sorry for being ashamed of yourself, or sorry for having ulterior motives?” Twilight asked, her face scrunched in confusion. “For having ulterior motives, of course,” Flash retorted. “I don’t want to do the right thing just for the potential reward. I want to do the right thing because it’s the right thing. It's just really hard to sometimes, but darn it! I want to try anyway.” “Well, at least you’re not too proud to apologize or admit when you’re wrong. Besides, even if I wasn’t counting all those, I definitely still owe you for that ice cream invitation I turned down six or seven years ago.” Flash turned and stared at Twilight, his eyes wide with surprise. She remembered. “Okay, one,” Flash started, “I don’t think you can get into debt for turning down an invitation. Two, I can’t believe you even remember that.” “Well, you somehow managed to remember,” Twilight pointed out. “Why didn’t you say anything?” “What was I supposed to say? ‘Hey, this is going to sound crazy, but I think we met before as kids’? Besides, your boyfriend, or should I say ex-boyfriend, was there, so that conversation would have turned out extra awkward.” Twilight thought back to that day at the summer festival. When she did, she remembered a key detail about that encounter, especially in comparison to her and Flash’s first meeting. “Hey, Flash,” Twilight began, unsure how to ask him her question, “uh, how’s your grandfather doing? I didn’t see him with the rest of your family at the festival.” Flash’s face dropped and he looked away. “Oh, uh, Grandpa,” he sighed, “Grandpa passed away about two years ago.” “Oh, I’m sorry,” Twilight replied sympathetically “It’s okay. You didn’t know. Besides, I’m over it, or at least, as over it as you can get when you lose someone you love and look up to.” Twilight bit her lip, wishing she could say something comforting to Flash. She looked intently at his face as if the words she wanted to say were somehow going to magically appear on it. They didn’t; however, the more Twilight studied Flash’s face, the more obvious a certain detail became to her. “Has anyone ever told you that you and your grandfather have the same eyes?” Twilight asked. “What?” Flash replied, staring at her as if she had told him that she was from another planet. “I mean, sure, your eye colors are different, but you and you grandfather have similarly shaped eyes. Now that I’m really looking, a lot of your other facial features are similar, too.” Flash just continued to stare at her. “What? No one’s told you that before?” “No, not really,” Flash replied. “I mean, Grandma’s always told me that I take after Grandpa, but she’s never mentioned our looks specifically.” Suddenly, Flash smiled, and Twilight couldn’t help but smile back at him. “I, uh, sure hope I got a lot more from him than just his looks,” Flash continued. “I’m sure you did,” stuttered Twilight, shyly looking away to hide her blushing face. “How would you even know? You’ve only met him once,” Flash noted in amusement. “And the one time I met him, he took time out of whatever he was doing to help a couple of strangers,” Twilight argued. “You did the same thing during the summer festival.” Flash laughed, and Twilight found herself laughing along with him. When the two of them stopped, Flash’s face became serious again. “Hey, Twilight,” Flash started, “there’s something that’s been bothering me, and I was wondering if I can ask you about it.” “By all means, ask away,” Twilight replied. “Are we friends?” Flash asked. “Excuse me.” Twilight hadn’t been expecting Flash’s question to be so direct and personal, so she was quite surprised by it. “Are you and I friends?” Flash repeated before biting his lip. Twilight also bit her lip as considered the question carefully and thought back to what she had said about Flash to her family. She answered, “No, I don’t think so.” “I figured,” Flash thought to himself bitterly, looking away from Twilight to hide the frown forming on his face. “But I’d like to be,” she finished, turning towards him. “Excuse me,” Flash stuttered as he turned to face her. “I’d like to be friends with you,” Twilight reiterated. Unbeknownst to both of them, Twilight had subconsciously reached out and taken Flash’s hand in hers. “Seriously?” Flash’s eyes lit up and a wide grin slowly spread from ear to ear. He subconsciously began to brush his thumb over the back of Twilight’s hand. “Of course,” Twilight affirmed, grinning back. “Who wouldn’t want to be friends with someone like you?”