That morning, the sun did not come up.
Even though it was planned, it still felt so weird, y’know? I mean, how could it not?
If you’ve ever woken up at a truly despicable hour to do something that was only sort of worth it, then you know exactly how it felt to wake up in total darkness. Like when you drag yourself out of bed pre-dawn to catch a train, and you’re only sort of looking forward to your destination, and you’re kind of wondering if you should just call it quits and go back to bed already.
I guess the sun must, like, do something. I’m not exactly a scientist, so I couldn’t tell you what, but eight a.m. in total darkness is totally and completely different than eight a.m. in the morning sunlight. Smells different, feels different, the whole shebang. Like some sort of reverse deja vu, where a perfectly normal routine is suddenly entirely foreign.
I sat in bed for a somewhat extended period of time, gazing silently at the ceiling and wondering just how badly I’d regret it if I went right back to sleep. Then I sat up and stared at the wall, just to shake things up.
“Weird,” I muttered, for no particular reason.
I mean, it was weird. I just don’t know why I said it, because it was so obviously weird that even if somepony else had been in the room, I shouldn’t have needed to say it.
I cleared my throat. “Tavi?” I shouted through the house.
There was a long silence.
“Hey, Tavi!” I repeated, a little louder.
I could have sworn I heard a distant moan of moderate annoyance. “What?”
“This is so weird!” I yelled.
Another silence.
“Tavi?”
“Of course it’s weird!” Tavi snapped back.
I chuckled to myself. “What are we having for breakfast?”
“What are you having for breakfast?”
“Do we have anything space-y?” I asked. “Y’know, to fit the theme?”
“I’m not certain what constitutes a comet-related breakfast,” Octavia coolly pointed out.
I shrugged, even though she couldn’t see me. “I dunno. Burnt toast?”
Octavia laughed a little bit. She was probably hoping I couldn’t hear it, but I counted it as a silent win. “I’m not eating burnt toast. Not even on Comet Day.”
“Aw,” I groaned in faux disappointment. “You’re no fun!”
Octavia said nothing, but I heard the springs creak as she rolled out of bed. With a deep sigh and a strange twinge of excitement in my chest, I did the same.
We left our rooms at precisely the same moment. Had we looked a thing alike, it would have been like bumping into a mirror.
“Damn.” I nodded a little. “You look awful.”
Octavia rolled her eyes and began pawing at her mane. “And you look the same.”
I winked. “You bet I do. Bedhead chic.”
“One of these days, I’ll have to introduce you to a comb,” Octavia muttered, taking off towards the kitchen at a light trot.
“No way, Tavi,” I chirped, right on her heels. “Not my brand.”
As we passed into the kitchen, I flicked on the lights and the radio. The house lit up in steps, each light revealing another room bathed in artificial twilight.
“--orders from newly-crowned Princess Twilight Sparkle to keep the sky dark, allowing all of Equestria to observe the comet passing overhead,” a fuzzy voice informed us as we began our morning dance around the kitchen. “Schools have also been granted dismissal, and the day has been declared a holiday for all non-essential businesses.”
“I wonder if any of the food carts will be open,” I mused. “I bet comet-viewing would pair really well with a big, fat calzone.”
Octavia cast a glance over her shoulder at me. “I’m quite certain that calzones are not considered essential.”
I shrugged. “Guess that depends how you define ‘essential’,” I continued. “Pretty essential to me.”
“Although the comet is a morning event, Princess Twilight has decided to excuse all activities for the duration of the day,” the announcer continued. “This is all a part of her science education initiative, a five-year project which the Princess hopes will increase scientific inquiry in all young ponies, particularly those with non-scientific special talents.”
The broadcast cut over to a sound bite from the Princess: “In this period of technological advancement, all little ponies should hope to find inspiration in science. We need all of the bright young minds we can get-- even those who may not see science in their futures!”
“You think we’ll get any more days off for astral events?” I asked absentmindedly. “I can see this becoming a trend.”
Octavia brushed past me, reaching up towards the cabinet filled with cereal boxes. “Now, that’d be something.”
She lingered there, just a moment longer than perhaps she needed to. Like she wasn’t really listening, wasn’t really browsing the cereal options… just standing there. Very, very close to me.
I coughed.
She snapped out of it, pulling down two boxes-- raisin and oats for her, and some store-brand sugar-y gold for me.
We poured our bowls in unison.
“As of right now, the comet is expected to pass overhead in approximately thirty-four minutes,” the radio told us as I stashed the milk back in the fridge. “After which, Princess Twilight Sparkle will address the nation--live--on her science education initiative.”
“We’d better get set up soon,” Octavia said, dropping a spoon in each bowl. “Don’t want to miss out on the good spots, now, do we?”
I nodded, mouth full of something that tasted vaguely fruit-punch-y. “Sounds like a plan, Tavi.”
She didn’t say anything about talking with my mouth full.
“Hey, you wanna carry one of these?” I asked, putting on a very dramatic huff-and-puff tone.
But Octavia wasn’t one to fall for that. She clucked her tongue, said “unicorn” as if it were an insult, and trotted ahead of me.
Had to try, right?
The folding chairs clattered against my side as we made our way through Ponyville, trying to stake out a comet-watching spot from somewhere with the fewest possible ponies-- a task which was proving extremely difficult.
I guess I underestimated the number of ponies who actually wanted to see this thing. I figured most of them would rather just take the day off, sleep in, and look at photos later, but it seemed like the whole town was out here, all of them in their own folding chairs.
It was almost like being at the beach. Except it was dark and cold and nopony was wearing sunglasses.
And it wasn’t the beach.
So… not like the beach at all.
Whatever.
“Ooh! Right here, Vinyl!”
Octavia had managed to get ahead of me by a rather significant margin, and was bouncing excitedly from hoof to hoof at her find.
It was nice. Right under a tree, but still enough sky visible to catch a glimpse of the thing. At least several yards from any other pony, and even further from any particularly young or loud ponies. Prime comet-watching zone.
I made a big show of hauling the chairs the last few steps, then dropping them theatrically on the grass.
Octavia glared at me.
I shrugged. “I carry, you pitch. That’s the deal.”
“Comet Day doesn’t mean your magic has suddenly stopped working, does it?” she asked.
“Uh…” I cleared my throat. “It could mean that.”
“Vinyl,” she whined, just as over-the-top as I had been.
“Fine, fine.” I shooed her away with one hoof.
In the dark, you could hardly tell that we were both smirking. Privately. Secretly.
The chairs snapped open and settled into the dewy grass with ease. Did the sun somehow make the dew go away? Or was it just something I was noticing all of a sudden?
Octavia relaxed into her chair. I collapsed into mine, and it made an unsettling sound which I expertly ignored.
There was nothing left to do but wait.
It struck me, again, just how strange this was. Because it kind of was like being at the beach, but like being at the beach in the middle of the night. Like we’d arrived in the evening and just refused to go home. I couldn’t ever recall lounging on the beach at night, though I’m sure other ponies had done it before.
Suddenly I wanted some hay fries really bad. Or maybe cotton candy.
“Have you ever seen a comet?” Octavia asked.
“Uh…” I scratched my head. “I don’t think so.”
Octavia made a little sound that I couldn’t quite identify. “Me neither.”
I nodded. “Are you… excited?” I asked.
She cocked her head. “I suppose. I’m not sure what to expect, really.”
“I feel like there’s a good chance this was way over-hyped,” I said, folding my hooves over my stomach. “I mean, how big could it even be?”
“I’m sure it’ll be interesting,” Octavia said.
We were quiet for a while.
In the distance, we could hear groups of ponies cheering and carrying on as the comet approached. Over here, though, it was quiet.
“This is nice,” I said.
“Mm-hm.”
“We should hang out like this more.”
“Erm… sure.”
I looked over at Octavia. “What?”
She blinked. “Hm?”
“What was that little ‘erm’ about?” I asked. I reached over to give her a poke in the ribs. “What, you don’t like hanging out with me?”
Octavia batted away my hoof. “Of course I do!”
“So?”
“So,” she said, “I’m not quite sure how often an occasion like this will arise.”
I scoffed. “We don’t need another Comet Day to hang out.”
“Hm.”
“We used to hang out all the time,” I reminded her. “Remember?”
“Sure.”
“We don’t hang out so much anymore.”
“Of course we do.” Octavia wasn’t looking at me.
“Not like we used to,” I argued. “We only ever go out with other ponies.”
She scoffed, but it was rather strained. “That’s not true.”
“We used to, like, stay up all night talking about music and junk,” I continued. “Don’t you remember that night we spent arguing--”
“Arguing about the merits of experimental jazz,” she finished for me, the barest hint of a smile on her face. “Yes. I remember.”
“When was the last time we did something like that, huh?”
Octavia sighed. “Oh, I don’t know.”
I squinted at her.
It was hard to tell in the dark, but she had this odd sort of private grin curling her lips, and she was blushing ever so slightly.
To say it was a surprise, or a sudden realization… that would be a total lie. I guess I always had an inkling that something was weird about us, but it was the sort of weird like waking up in total darkness when the sun should be up.
That is to say, it was so weird, but I didn’t know who to tell because I always tell Octavia those things. And, even though it was so weird, I had to go about my day as usual.
Y’know?
I chuckled.
“What’s so funny?” Octavia asked snidely.
I sighed lightly. “Oh, nothin’.”
She clucked her tongue. “You have to tell me.”
“Do not.”
“You do, too!”
“Do not.”
She huffed. “You can’t laugh at me and then not say why you’re laughing,” she said. “That’s rude.”
I shrugged. “I think it might be ruder to say what I’m thinking.”
That gave her pause.
In the center of town, the ponies began to count down. The comet was almost here.
“Say it anyway,” she said. Barely a whisper.
I chuckled again. “You totally have a crush on me, don’t you?”
She was silent for a long time.
I rubber-necked around in my chair, trying to catch a glimpse of her expression, but she tipped her head forward and allowed her mane to spill out from behind her ear. It created the perfect little screen for her to hide behind.
I rolled onto my side, and the chair creaked under me. “Tavi, it’s okay, I just--” But I didn’t know what I just, and so the sentence died.
Her shoulders crept up higher and higher the longer she sat there.
I mean, what do you even do?
Do you apologise? That didn’t seem right. But all I felt like saying was how sorry I was-- and for what? For saying it? For treating it like a joke?
For not feeling the same way?
There came a sudden clattering sound, like one of those stupid cowbell noisemakers, and teh distant roar of an unruly crowd.
I pushed myself up and stretched forward.
“Ten! Nine! Eight!”
Despite her obvious embarrassment, Octavia’s head tilted up, too.
“Seven! Six! Five!”
I snuck a glance at her.
“Four!”
She had this way of looking that really wasn’t looking at all. Or maybe it was more than looking-- like it was really seeing.
“Three!”
It was a look she got all too often when attending a symphony or whatever other fancy musical event she got all dressed up for; intense concentration, and yet a glimmer of wonder and awe.
“Two!”
As many times as she heard an orchestra perform, as many times as she had been a part of one herself, the look in her eyes made it seem like it was the first time.
“One!”
And, as the comet crossed the sky, its light sparkled in her eyes. Her embarrassment was forgotten entirely, though the shadow of it still lingered on her cheeks. The hint of a smile even tugged at her lips.
All said and done, I didn’t see the comet that day.
But I saw the way it lit up her eyes.