//------------------------------// // Chapter 5: No means no // Story: A New Symphony // by damandan28 //------------------------------// The crowd applauded as I took a bow and left. I went back to the same room I was in before and started  looking for the guitar stand. Dammit. What box was it in? Pinkie took less than a second to find my guitar and it's gonna take the whole night to find the stand.  As I was going through the boxes I heard a voice from the entrance. “Quite some voice you got there,” Ginger said, standing in the doorway. “Thanks Ginger. Glad to see you made it to the party.” Ginger walked towards me. “How else was I going to give back your 50 bits?” I paused in my search, “…clever mare. Did you just get here? I haven’t seen you all night.” “Thanks. I've been here since it started but I got lost.” She said looking at some of the boxes. I cocked my eyebrow as I looked at her. “Sneaking around I see.” “What, no!” She looked at me, shocked. “The bathrooms were being used and I went around to find another one. I found one but when I left I didn’t know how to get back so I followed your voice back to the main room.” “Sure,” I said sarcastically while going back to my search. “Whatever. What’s in all these boxes?” She said looking at my collection of boxes. “My music collection and some other stuff.” Ginger walked toward the record player that I used before. “You're a fan of Score too?” I went wide eyed while thinking of escape plans. “Yes…are you?” “Not really. He's alright, but not my style. My old man loves him though.” I turned around and Ginger was taking a long stare at me. She was  freaking me out. “You alright there?” I asked. “….take off your pants.” Well that was quick. I shook my head. “Wait, what!?” “I want to see your cutie mark.” “Why?” “Just take it off!” She tackled me and pinned me to the ground, trying to unbutton my pants. “No means no!” “Oh stop being a baby!” “You’re stealing my innocence!” I turn my head to see an embarrassed Twilight in the doorway. “Oh, heeeeeey Twilight” Ginger turned to see Twilight and got off me immediately. “Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt,” Twilight said, blushing. “You're not interrupting anything, I assure you,” I said, rising and wiping off some dust. “I just wanted to see his cutie mark,” Ginger told her, innocent as a foal. “Hmm, what is your cutie mark, Score?” Twilight placed her hoof in her mouth. “Aha, I knew it!” Ginger pointed her hoof at me. I sighed and took of my pants, revealing my cutie mark. “Just like the one on the record.” I looked blankly at Twilight who only gave me a week smile. “Sorry,” she said. I sighed, “It's alright. Ginger is a clever mare and she already caught on.” “I can't wait to tell my dad,” Ginger said. “Ginger, please don’t.” “Why not?” I told her the reason why I retired and moved here to Ponyville. “Well, that sucks,” was her response. “I know. If a lot of ponies found out, word would spread and those same ponies that drove me to retire would come back for me to compose again.” “I promise I won’t tell anypony, then.” “Thank you, Ginger.”     I decided to say fuck it and I left the guitar standing against the wall and continued with the party. I wore my pants again to hide my identity from the other ponies. Many of the party goers praised me and I felt embarrassed the whole time. It started to get me thinking. This feeling again. Should it feel like this every time I play? Maybe I should play my new songs. These ponies here seem to like it. Wait, I'm here to get away. If I play word would spread and I don’t want that.   I decided to keep my head down for the rest of the party. Luckily for me, it was a weeknight so everypony left around nine, leaving me Twilight, Rarity, Pinkie, and Applejack. We were in the main room, cleaning up the mess. “Bright, I told you, we threw the party, so we clean it up,” Twilight explained to me. “So what? I can’t help?” I replied. “Of course you can but--” “Well, there we then.” “Ugh,” she groaned, but she didn’t sound like she really meant it. Applejack spoke up, “So Bright, who are you really?” “Um...” I started to sweat bullets. “I’m Bright Side,” I said with no confidence. Twilight had a panicked look on her face as she turned to Pinkie. “Hey Pinkie, aren’t you suppose to feed Gummy his nightly cupcake?” Pinkie responded, “Oh yeah!  Thanks Twilight. Bye everyone.” She left in a pink flash. “Excuse me darling, but how did you know Pinkie had to feed Gumby?” Rarity asked.   “I didn’t. I thought it’d be something Pinkie would do.” Twilight giggled as did the rest of us. Applejack turned to me. “Back to the question. Who are you?” I sighed. I didn’t want to go through it again. I turned to Twilight. “Trustworthy?” She nodded. “Do you mind if you tell her? I’m just tired of explaining it to people.” “Its fine with me,” Twilight responded. She told Applejack the truth about me, while I finished cleaning. Applejack turned to me. “So you were a-” “Yep.” I interrupted her, know what she was going to ask. “And you’re here beca-” “Mmhm.” “Well Ah say you’re yeller.” “That’s ri--wait, what?” I turned to her, not expecting that. “That’s right, you’re a coward. You’re running away.” I sighed. “I was just tired of fighting. I wanted to get away and I did.” Even to my ears, I sounded depressed.   There was a moment of awkward silence. Applejack spoke first holding a bottle of window cleaner. “Um, where do you want me to put this?” “Under the sink,” I replied. Applejack went behind the counter and disappeared underneath it. “What is this?” She rose up with a bottle of rum in her hoof. She unscrewed the cap and took a sip and then shook her head. “This is filly stuff.” She looked over at me. “Come over to mah farm one day and I’ll show you something worthy enough for drinkin’.” I chuckled, “I’ll hold you to that offer.” We finished cleaning a short time after. Twilight and Applejack left, leaving me to myself. I was thinking about the new friends I’d made and then I realized something: this was one of the greatest days I’d had in my whole life.