You breathe heavily through your nose as you strain to stay concentrated on your goal. How long has it been now? Five minutes? Ten? It's what it feels like.
Your eyelids twitch and your knuckles turn completely white as you grip your seat. You won't hold out much longer. She looks like she won't either, but you know that she's just as determined as you are.
Your breathing quickens as you feel the pain setting in. A little longer, Anon. Just a little longer...
You tell yourself this over and over again, but it does little to ease your worries. The pain is just getting extremely worse with every second. A small bead of sweat drips down your face and you give a small whimper.
You can't do this! You can't!
Finally, you relent and shut your eyes...
...
"YES! I WIN AGAIN!!"
You give a frustrated growl as you begin to rub your eyes, now moist with tears. "Dang it, Pinkie, how do you do that?!"
That's the seventh staring contest that you've lost in a row.
Pinkie giggles as she rubs her moist eyes as well. "Cheer up, Nonny! You're getting better! I was actually scared on that last round! I thought you were gonna win for sure!"
You smirk. "Aww, look at you, making up crap just for me. Aren't you sweet?"
She laughs and playfully pushes you with her hoof. "Oh stop it, Anon! I really meant it!"
"No you didn't!" You smile wide and playfully push her back.
You both start giggling like complete idiots and push each other back and forth until she tackles you. You laugh and start tickling each other as you roll on your backs across the grass.
Eventually, you come to a stop with her on your stomach, looking down at you with a wide smile on her face. You both just look at each other for a few moments.
"So, what do you wanna do now?!" She asks.
You tap your chin and think for a moment. What's something fun you can do that Pinkie would love?
"Ooh!" You snap your fingers. "Do you wanna go to the store and play with the chairs that have wheels on them?! We can take turns pushing each other down the aisles and see how fast we can go!"
She gasps and sits up on your chest. "That's the best idea ever!"
You spring to your feet and Pinkie leaps onto your shoulders. She straddles the back of your neck and you grab her hind legs dangling on either side of your head.
She puts an astronaut helmet on, and makes a radio static sound through her teeth as she speaks into a pretend microphone she's holding in her hoof. "5...4...3...2...1...Blast off!"
You make a rocket sound with your own mouth before you take off running back to Ponyville with Pinkie on your back, laughing the whole way. You run through the streets, making whooshing and zooming noises as you almost bump into a few ponies, until you reach Quills and Sofas.
Practically smashing your way through the entrance, the doors swing wide open and you skid to a halt. You hold your arms out for the thunderous applause that was sure to follow.
"The Eagle has landed!" You announce.
The few ponies inside the store just stare at you both, silently.
No applause, but that's okay.
The closest pony, Bon Bon, sticks her face in her hoof and groans. "Oh great, the hairless monkey is back..."
You point directly at her. "That's 'Mister-Doctor-Professor' Hairless Monkey to you, missy! And we're here to have fun and stuff!"
Pinkie stands up on the top of your head. "Yeah! Who doesn't like to have fun and stuff, silly?!"
You both just stare at Bon Bon and she groans again. "Just... Please don't break anything this time, okay?"
You tap your chin and stick your bottom lip out. "Hmmm... I don't think we can promise anything."
Pinkie gasps. "Wait! Anon, yes we can promise!"
You look up at Pinkie. "We can?"
She smiles and nods ecstatically. "Yeah! We'll make a Pinkie promise!"
You smile back at her. "Oh yeah! That's a great idea, Pinkie!"
She jumps off your head, and the two of you stand at attention as you face Bon Bon. You both make the appropriate gestures as you say your Pinkie promise.
"Cross my heart..."
"...hope to fly..."
"...stick a cupcake..."
"...in my eye!"
You both laugh and take off running into the store, leaving Bon Bon there.
You find the office chairs and take turns pushing each other down the aisles, bumping into the shelves and knocking stuff off of them each time. After a while, that gets boring, so you head over to where the recliner chairs are and sit in a couple of them.
You both slowly turn and face each other with grimaces on your faces, cowboy hats on your heads, and a respective hand or hoof hovering over the leg rest lever on the right side of the recliner.
Suddenly, you're Clint Eastwood.
"...Now you just have to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky?" Your hand twitches over the lever, which makes Pinkie's hoof twitch as well. "Well... Do ya... Pink?"
Pinkie's grimace never falters as she lifts her hoof up to blow on it before letting it hover over the handle of her recliner again. She cracks her neck and takes a deep breath.
"This town ain't big enough fer the both of us to relax in..." She growls.
A tumbleweed blows by between you both as you stare each other down. Your heart is beating in your ears and your fingers twitch over the handle of the recliner.
"Draw!"
Your hand grabs the lever with lightning speed and yanks upwards, making the leg rest shoot out in front of you. Pinkie does the same thing and the sound of recliner springs echoes through the store. However, you were just a millisecond faster than Pinkie. That means she's dead and you're the new sheriff in town.
Pinkie grunts and grabs her chest before over-exaggerating her 'death' by falling over to her side and squirming and grunting on the ground.
You stand up and bask in your victory. "...And the crowd goes wild!" You cup your hands over your mouth and hiss loudly to imitate a crowd cheering.
Pinkie stays on the ground for a moment longer before laughing hard with you. "Hee Hee! Nice one, Nonny! I'd like to see you try that against Applejack though!"
You giggle. "You'll see that the same day I see you have a staring contest with Fluttershy!"
Pinkie almost retorts, but stops and thinks about it for a moment. "Touché! You got me there!"
You both laugh again and get up to wander around the store some more, looking around for more fun things to play with.
About three hours later, you decided to have a joust with each other! The King demands it!
You both stand next to each other, holding medieval horns (that resemble tubes of wrapping paper), and blow a Royal tune into them to announce the beginning of the joust! Then you, Knight Anon, don your wastebasket helmet, while Knight Pinkie dons her lampshade helmet, before heading to your Royal steeds on opposite ends of the aisle.
On one end of the aisle sits you, in a large office chair with wheels and armrests. In your hand, you hold a stool, but it will serve you better now as a lance. Knight Pinkie sits on the other end of the aisle, looking exactly the same way.
You both let out a battle cry as you're about to set off against each other when you hear a hoof stomp behind you. The both of you freeze where you are.
You turn around to see a very angry looking Bon Bon staring you both down.
"The store is closing!" She yells. "Both of you leave, now!"
You hear Pinkie roll up behind you. "Aww come on, Bonny! We were having fun!"
"Fun?! FUN?!" She looks rabid. "Look at this place!"
You and Pinkie look around at the store. Every inch of it is littered with overturned chairs, stools, quills and paper. It looks like a tornado hit this place.
"Everything in this store is destroyed because of you two!" She points her hoof at you.
You put on your smartypants glasses as you reply to her, holding a finger in the air. "Uh, well, ackchyually, no store merchandise is technically broken, by my astute observation. Things are just simply quite messy, and nothing more."
"Yeah!" Pinkie giggles. "We'd never break anything! We Pinkie promised that we wouldn't!"
You nod. "However, comma, that Pinkie promise did not specify that messes could not be made with the unbroken stuff in the store! Which means, we did nothing wrong!"
A large, evil, angry-looking vein appears on Bon Bon's forehead, and seems to possess her. Like a demon! She stomps her hoof again, and the floor cracks beneath it to reveal over a thousand terrible things awaiting you both in the Underworld, Tartarus, and Helheim all at once, when she gets done with you.
"GET OOOOUT!!"
You and Pinkie both reel back, terrified, and look at each other.
"Time to go!" You both drop your 'weapons' and book it past the angry mare as you run out of the store together.
On the darkened streets of Ponyville, you both laugh with each other as you jog toward Sugarcube Corner.
"That was fun!" Pinkie giggles.
You laugh with her. "Yeah it was!"
"Even if we did make Bon Bon a teensy bit mad." She admits.
You scoff and wave your hand. "Bon Bon's always mad! Don't worry about her."
Pinkie giggles again. "Yeah, I guess you're right. She'll be fine! She likes to pretend she's a 'secret agent' all the time anyway! I'm sure she understands!"
As you round a street corner, you both slow down to a walk. Sugarcube Corner is just in sight now.
"Thanks for hanging out today, Pinkie. I had a blast!" You smile.
"Hee Hee! Me too, Nonny!" She replies. "We should do this again tomorrow!"
"We really should!" You say.
You reach Sugarcube Corner and give Pinkie a hug.
"Goodnight, Nonny!" She says. "Thanks for the super fun day!"
"Goodnight, Pinkie! You're welcome for the super fun day!"
You squeeze each other tight in a bear hug before letting each other go and separating. As she opens the door, she turns and you wave at each other before she shuts the door behind her.
You smile as you head back to your place for the night.
Today was a good day.