//------------------------------// // The Heat of the Moment (August 2020) [T-Rated - Profanity, Horse Kissing] [Apple Bloom] [Diamond Tiara] [Drama] [Romance] // Story: The Voices Told Me to Hug You // by Aquaman //------------------------------// “Diamond? That you?” She jumps a bit when I say her name, then waits a bit before turning around--I see her shoulders rise and tense up, like hackles on a dog. But when she does turn, she’s all smiles. All teeth and gums, at least. As close to a genuine grin as I’ll see from anyone here tonight, I reckon. “Oh my gosh, Apple Bloom!” She pushes herself off the baluster she was leaned against and wraps me up in a hug. I hug her back--it feels nice and warm, like an old happy memory. Which, I guess, she is. “I thought that was you I saw earlier! Stars above, I haven’t seen you since graduation, how have you been?” “Well enough,” I tell her. “Business is good. Think we’ll have a new distribution partner in Vanhoover after tonight, long as he don’t think twice about it in the mornin’. How ‘bout you?” “Oh, same old,” she says quickly. “I made CFO a few months ago, but, you know, I suspect nepotism was involved.” I let out a whistle. “Family connection or not, that’s some big shoes to fill.” “Well, you know what they say about ponies with big hooves!” Diamond’s laugh comes out airy and light--almost tinny, like it’s been played back over a gramophone. “Anyway, yeah, it’s been good. Stressful, but… what job isn’t?” “True enough.” I could say more, but I don’t. I’m suddenly curious about something. “Well, you look great,” Diamond continues after a long pause, smile still pasted on and glinting in the moonlight. “Seriously, that dress is… silver suits you. I would know, I suppose.” “You would, huh?” “Well… in a manner of, ah…” Diamond swallows, and her smile falters when she tries to put it back on. I can’t help but sigh. “Really has been ages, huh?” I say. Diamond gets caught between motions--I guess she couldn’t decide whether to nod or shrug, and ended up doing neither. A heavy feeling settles over my chest, a suffocating warmth that even the cool evening breeze can’t do anything about. “Di, I’m a big girl, all right? It’s been years, we’re different ponies, you don’t need to act like--” “I do!” She says it so fast she almost shouts. When she stammers to correct itself, it’s more like a whisper. “I mean, I… I wanted to see you. I’m glad I did. Really.” I can’t help but chuckle. “You used to be better at lyin’.” Diamond grits her teeth--I can see her jaw clench underneath her reddening cheeks. “You used to be easier to lie to,” she mumbles, looking away from me and up at the sky. She shivers when the breeze kicks up again. I feel like I ought to hug her again. “How are you doing?” I ask her quietly, sidling up next to her at the baluster. “Really?” “I’m…” she begins to say, before her teeth clench again. “I’d rather not go into it. It was nice to see you, Apple Bloom.” Before I can say anything back, she’s turned around and started walking away, back towards the gala we both came out here to escape from. The heaviness in my chest suddenly lifts, so fast it pushes words out of my mouth before I’m fully ready to say them. “Diamond, don’t walk away.” She stops cold, flinches as if I’ve smacked her. I don’t know what exactly I said to make her do that, but I have an inkling of an idea that’s been squeezing my lungs shut ever since I walked over here. “You always do this when you’re upset,” I say. “You just walk away. And far as I’m concerned, we’re still friends no matter how long it’s been, so--” “So what?” Her voice is icy when she interrupts. “What exactly do you want me to do?” “I guess be honest, for onc--” “Oh, is that all?” She whirls around, and there’s a scary look in her eyes--not hateful or even angry, but just blank, like the glass of a doll’s eye. “Sure, Apple Bloom, I can be honest. Let’s be honest for a change. Where should I start?” “Di--” “Let’s start with the gala. This… fucking gala, let’s start with that. If I’m being honest, I wish somepony would come up here with a torch and a barrel of oil and burn this place to the ground. Honestly, I wish I was brave enough to do it myself. I wish I was honest with all the trust-fund pricks and their stuck-up wives and the hopeless, desperate kiss-asses who lurch around these things looking for spare change in somepony’s art collection fund, all while three blocks away there are homeless ponies who’ll eat less in a month than some socialite puked up tonight. Stars, I wish I could tell them what I thought of us.” “Why don’t you?” I ask. “Because, Apple Bloom, I walk away. Because nopony wants to hear any of that, and it doesn’t help to talk about things that are never going to change. So thank you, goodnight, great to see you, I’m going home. And you can go back to… whatever you want to do with that stallion you were with earlier.” I think back to my night schmoozing on behalf of the farm--to how my skin crawled when our new distribution partner wrapped his hoof around my shoulders and squeezed like it belonged there. Like I was part of the deal too. How could she think I wanted that? “I did what I wanted to do,” I tell her. “I got a deal done. And what I wanted to do after that was come out here and take a breather, and maybe catch up with you and--” “And what? Psychoanalyze me? Pity me? Apple Bloom, trust me, I don’t need it. Save it for somepony who deserves it. And just… leave me alone. Please.” She didn’t think I wanted that, I realize a bit too late. She knew me better than that. And I know her better too. “It really bothered you that much?” “Moondamn son of a bitch had the nerve to…” She catches herself--I guess before she got lost in honesty again. “He doesn’t deserve you. None of us do.” “You’re not like the rest of them in there.” “I always have been,” Diamond says, her voice cracking as her eyes begin to shine. “Since we were kids, through college, all the way to now, I just… every moment I spent with you was better than I deserved. Every moment.” Guess my curious feeling was right. The heaviness in my chest was too. “That night after the party, in junior year. Diamond, we--” “Talked about it, I know, I know, and I shouldn’t--” “No, we didn’t talk about it,” I half-shout over her. “I didn’t let us. I didn’t know what I wanted, but I told you I did and I acted like it meant nothin’, and I’m sorry. I was confused and I was… I was scared, okay? I was scared too. Scared of graduatin’, of growin’ up, all that. And that’s okay, Di. We didn’t have to know what we wanted back then. We just… we did what felt right. We were honest. So don’t act like I’m too good for you or you’re not good enough for me, because I’m not and you are.” She lifts a hoof and wipes her eyes. I don’t know where I’m even going with what I’m saying, but I’m not about to quit now. “You have no idea what you want,” I tell her. “Neither do I. And that doesn’t make us bad ponies. It makes us--” I don’t get to finish. I don’t need to. Diamond’s already closed the gap between us, thrown her hooves around my neck, pressed her lips to mine and kissed me like she means to make up for every year since our last one in a single immutable moment. I taste salt from her tears, gin on her breath, the weight of night after lonely night spent staring at the ceiling and cursing myself for the biggest lie I ever told anypony: that it was great, but we probably shouldn’t do that again. That it was just a one-time thing. That it hadn’t meant to me what I knew it had meant to her. It had. It did. It still does. “I wanted that,” she whispers to me once she pulls away. “I wanted that so bad.” I wipe my eyes, then hers. Finally, I’m going to be honest with her. “Me too,” I whisper back. “I always did.”