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// The Strength to Walk Out 
// Story: And I Hope You Die 
// by Aquaman 
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“What the hell is wrong with you, Cozy?”

All too characteristically, Cozy answered a question other than the one she’d been directly asked. “I mean, I thought I handled things well, all things considered.”

“Are… are you being serious right now?” Flurry sputtered, furiously waving a hoof before Cozy could come up with another smart-ass deflection. “No, forget it, I know you’re not. You never are. Not when it’s important for me, not even when it’s important for you.”

Standing in the doorway to Flurry’s bedroom, looking in her yellow satin cocktail dress like exactly the smug prick she loved being at every opportunity, Cozy just smirked and nonchalantly shrugged. “Got me there. It’s really a problem, isn’t it?”

Flurry’s own dress hung from her shoulders and flanks like a curtain tossed over a couch—an unavoidable consequence of hours spent chasing down party guests, apologizing with drinks and small gifts and assurances that this would never happen again, and finally trudging up to her castle chambers and finding Cozy waiting there for her with that simpering, infuriating smile on her face.

“What were you thinking?” Flurry snapped at her. “And don’t even start talking about what you wanted to accomplish or how you meant for it all to play out. I want to know, literally, what thoughts went through your head tonight.”

Cozy glanced up towards the ceiling, deep in pantomimed recollection. “Okay, well, first I thought, ‘Damn, Flurry’s ass looks great in that dress,’ and then I thought, “This is the most boring thing I’ve ever experienced,’ and I was trapped in stone for a decade so you know I meant that. And then, maybe I’m getting the order mixed up, but I’m pretty sure I thought, “Hey, that stuffy rich asshole’s head looks like it could use a punch-bowl swirlie,’ and… straight up, after that it was just pure instinct.” She looked back at Flurry, and her grin returned. “C’mon, you used to love stuff like that. What happened to the fun Flurry?”

“She grew up,” Flurry seethed. “She asked you politely—begged you—to pull yourself together for just one night. Not for my parents, not for some stuffy rich assholes, for me. For one night that was really, really important to me. And you never thought, even for one second, how acting like a childish idiot might affect me.”

There was a strange look in Cozy’s eyes—not amusement or chagrin, but something more like melancholy, like she really couldn’t believe they were having this conversation. “I never had to before,” she said. “What makes tonight any different?”

Flurry felt bile rise in her throat. She swallowed it back and laced its sentiment through every one of her next words. “You are just a perfect asshole, aren’t you? I mean, it’s genuinely impressive how much work you put into it. Every chance you have, every single moment where you could maybe be a functional pony, you just sprint headlong in the opposite direction. Honestly, I’m an idiot for expecting anything else.”

Cozy twitched her lips and glanced up at the ceiling again. Her eyes still held that strange look, even more noticeable now than before, but her tone was just as sardonic as ever. “You said it, not me,” she said.

“I trusted you, Cozy,” Flurry told her. “Celestia help me, I really did. I thought if you didn’t care about anything else in the world, you at least cared about me. And you don’t. I know that now, and I should’ve known it before, but I… I thought it all meant something. The last few months, what I’ve told you, what you said back… I thought it was real. I thought you thought it was real.”

Flurry couldn’t look her in the eyes anymore, so she couldn’t see whether Cozy’s expression had changed. She grit her teeth, squeezed her eyes shut until the tears prickling under her eyelids were gone, and forced herself to meet her supposed marefriend’s gaze. Cozy said nothing. Her expression hadn’t changed.

“Are you gonna say anything?” Flurry asked her, stupidly. “Are you gonna apologize, or tell me that anything I just said was wrong? ‘Cause if you’re going to, now’s your last chance.”

Flurry waited several moments for a response, each one longer and more devastating than the last. Finally, Cozy Glow blinked, and her lips parted.

“You’re so hot when you’re angry,” she said.

Flurry slammed the bedroom door so hard the whole castle shook.