//------------------------------// // 9. Garden // Story: Long-Distance // by Bicyclette //------------------------------// Wallflower sighed as she took in the sorry state of Sunset’s flower bed through the screen in her lenses. “I swear, I’m doing everything just like you’re telling me, babe,” Sunset insisted as she considered a sad, sparse-looking cluster of purple blossoms in her aura. “I just don’t know what went wrong.” Wallflower’s lenses went clear, and she saw her own flower bed, with its beautiful, well-maintained clusters in full bloom. She picked up her watering can and began moistening the soil, imagining Sunset watching her through the camera. “These are supposed to be easy to grow. I swear, Sunset, you have the opposite of a green thumb.” “I don’t have any thumbs, you know that! And you get two, that’s just not fair.” Wallflower smiled at the well-worn joke. “Well, there’s always next spring.” Wallflower regretted the words as soon as she said them. They hung in the air like a noxious cloud, suffocating the space between them. She put down her watering can. “You know. Pinkie still doesn’t believe it’s going to happen.“ “She still thinks that?” Sunset’s voice was unsure. “She thinks Celestia and Twilight and everyone are wrong?” “Oh, it’s a bit different than that.” Wallflower picked up her pruning shears, intending to start clipping off the spent blooms at the bottom of the plant. “She explained it to us the last time we all met. If she thought she was going to die, it wouldn’t change the way she lives now or what she cares about, except that she’ll dread that the end was coming. But if she believes that she’ll live, she’ll never get a chance to find out if she’s wrong, or regret it after. So why not believe that she’ll live forever?” “It’s hard to just make yourself believe something like that.” “That’s what we said, but she just got confused, then tried to explain herself again. She seemed sad that it was so hard for us to understand.“ Sunset laughed. “That’s Pinkie being Pinkie for you.” “Yeah!” Wallflower noticed she was still holding up the shears, and put them back down. She frowned. “But it is going to happen, you know.” A long silence. Then, in a quiet voice. “I know.” She took the shard of the Memory Stone around her neck in her hand, and held it in front of her so Sunset could see. “I thought about it, you know. I really did.” “I know.” She had told her all of this before. She was going to tell it again. She closed her palm around the shard, feeling the edges press against her skin. “I never told them how strong it still was, before they closed the portal. I could have pulled out every memory you had of me, of this whole world, right before you left it forever. I really thought about doing it. Isn’t that awful? Like I never really changed at all.“ “But you did change, Wally, because you didn’t. And I’m really glad you didn’t. Losing my memory of you, of all my friends… I can’t think of anything more horrible.” “But you wouldn’t have known any better! Twilight and Starlight would have taken care of you. They would have made sure you had a good life there. You wouldn’t have had to carry the memories and guilt of a dying world. You wouldn’t have to feel the pain of losing it.” “Wally, like I’ve said before. I’ve had a good life. I don’t regret anything. Not even the pain. It will be worth it.” The time had gone by so fast, for both of them. The weight of the years bore on her. How little time there was left. “Will it really?” “Doesn’t that tell you how much you mean to me? That you’re totally worth the worst pain I’ll ever feel? I love you so much.“ “I love you, too,” Wallflower squeaked. She wiped away the tears in her eyes. “But you won’t feel the pain alone. Starlight will be there for you.” She smiled weakly. “I’m so glad for that.” Sunset sighed. “Wally…” They had had this conversation before, too. “I just want you to tell me that you’ll be open to it. You’ve been so close for years, and have so much in common.” She also had lost someone, Wallflower didn’t have to say. “I can’t think of her as anything more than a friend, you know that.“ “I’m just saying, don’t close yourself off. You’ll have to learn to live after me, Sunset. I want you to.” Wallflower blinked away another set of tears. Sunset spoke. “I will. That’s what I hate. I know that I will because I saw it happen to her with Maud. I saw it!” Sunset took a shaky breath. “It will be hard at first. It’ll feel like I’m always drowning, that nothing will ever seem bright or happy ever again. But one day I’ll find something that makes me smile, for a little bit. Then another thing, for a little longer. Then another. And the waves will still come and I’ll still sink under them but the space in between will get longer and longer. And I’ll learn how to be happy without you, and you’ll become just a warm memory that I’ll miss so, so much, but can live without. And that’s when you’ll really be gone…” Wallflower imagined that happening, and could not help but feel a sort of peace. A tranquil smile formed on her lips. She closed her eyes. “But I will be gone, Sunset. I don’t want to be all that your life was. I want to become that warm memory.” “I know you do. And I love you for that. But for now, you’re still here. And I don’t want to talk about you like you’re already gone.” Wallflower opened her eyes again, and saw the plant in front of her. The one that she had been regrowing from cuttings every year ever since she started using this community garden plot. Ever since she first saw them bloom in the first summer she moved in with Sunset. “Okay, Sunset. I’m still here.” She picked up her shears and began to cut into the stems of the plant. She had gotten three before Sunset seemed to realize what she was doing. “You’re taking cuttings for next year?” “I always do around this time, you know that.” She smiled. “Maybe Pinkie has a point.”