“Um… you know what, Heartstrings? Maybe this isn’t such a good idea after all.”
“Huh? What are you talking about, Fluttershy? You were the one who convinced me we should do this!”
“I know but— I think I’ve changed my mind. I really don’t want to make her mad.”
“Well, alright. Let’s just forget about this and go home, then.”
“No, wait! I mean— We have to do this. I have to do this, I have to do this, I have to do this…”
Mustering up all my courage, I finally knocked on Bon Bon’s door.
“I’m telling you, she’s going to slam the door in our faces as soon as she sees me,” said Heartstrings.
Bon Bon opened the door just a crack at first (probably to see who it was) and then opened it all the way when she saw me.
“Oh! Good morning, Fluttershy. Back again? What can I do for you?”
“Hi, Bon Bon. Um… is it okay if we—” I took a big gulp. “—if we come in and talk about something?”
“Oh… well sure, Fluttershy. Why, what’s on your—” But as she opened the door more, she must’ve seen Heartstrings next to me, because she gasped and swung the door back. “Hang on, what is she doing there?”
“Nice to see you too, Bon Bon,” Heartstrings grumbled.
They both sneered at each other. I wasn’t sure whether to speak up. In fact, I almost wanted to quietly sneak away.
“Um… girls? If it’s, okay with you… Can we still talk, about—”
“Wait a minute,” Bon Bon interrupted. “This is about what I think it is, isn’t it? If it is, then I’m sorry, Fluttershy. I really don’t want to disappoint a friend, but I’m afraid you’re not going to convince me to get back together with Lyra— I mean, Heartstrings.”
“Oh, well that’s okay, then. We’ll just be going, then… Come on, Heartstrings.” I could feel some tension between them. I decided it would be best to get away as quick as I could. But…
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on a second, sister!” Suddenly, Heartstrings grabbed me and dragged me back in-between them. “We already made it this far, and Fluttershy really wanted to talk to you! The least you could do is let her try!”
“Um, hey girls?” I tried to speak up from under their shouting heads.
“But there’s nothing to talk about here, missy! We are never ever getting back together! And if you keep acting like this, I’m not going to want to be your friend anymore, either!”
“Hey girls?”
“Excuse me? What is this ‘friend’ talk? I already decided I don’t want to be your friend anyway!”
“Hey… girls?”
“Well, well, well, it looks like we finally agree on something! Why don’t you just wander back to your fancy family palace in Canterlot and keep playing your harp into the night!”
“GIRLS!”
I had to shout at the top of my lungs, and I was extremely out of breath afterwards. I had startled both of them… and myself.
“Can we… please… just go inside and… talk? Or something. Just please… please stop arguing…”
“You know…” said Bon Bon. “Maybe she has a point.”
“What, you mean now you want to get back together?”
“NO! But maybe, just maybe, Fluttershy can help us get to a point where we can talk to each other like civil ponies instead of lunging at each other’s throats.” She held the door open for us.
“Oh. Well sure, I’d be happy with that,” said Heartstrings. She walked inside the house. “I wasn’t going to lunge at your throat, though.”
“It’s a figure of speech, Lyra.”
“Great…” I wheezed. “Everypony’s happy… Woo-hoo…”
Bon Bon and Heartstrings are both really good friends of mine, and I couldn’t bear to see Heartstrings so sad. So, even though I was afraid, I decided to take her to see Bon Bon, and figure out how to make them happy again. ‘Easier said than done’ though, like Rarity always says…
Ten minutes went by after we went inside. Bon Bon made us some really nice tea and we all sat down to drink it. Well, Bon Bon and Heartstrings were on opposite sides of the room. Heartstrings took up the couch for herself, while Bon Bon pulled up two chairs for her and I to sit on. She sat across from the table.
And they both sat there, glaring at each other. After a while, I finally took a big gulp and decided to speak up.
“Um… this is some really good tea, Bon Bon. I—”
“Snob,” said Heartstrings.
“Stuck-up bum.”
“I hope you get diabetes.”
“I hope you break every Celestia-damned string on that miniature harp!”
“Take. That. Back.”
Oh, no. “Um, you know what? Maybe I should just go…” I got up to leave, but then Heartstrings spoke up.
“No, no. Please stay, Fluttershy. I’m really sorry. I shouldn’t have called you a ‘snob’, Bon Bon. You said we should talk to each other like civil ponies, but here I am still trying to pick a fight with you.”
Bon Bon didn’t stay anything at first. Finally, she closed her eyes. “That’s okay, Lyra. I forgive you.”
Wow. Maybe we really are getting somewhere with this.
I decided now might be a good time to ask what had been on my mind.
“Um… hey Bon Bon, can I— ask you something?”
“What is it?”
“If you don’t mind me asking, um… what caused you and Heartstrings to break up?”
“Wait— what?”
“Oh um, I’m sorry. If it’s too personal, then you don’t have to—”
“No, no, it’s not,” she said, interrupting me again. “It’s just… I don’t know, I figured Lyra would’ve already told you.”
“I didn’t tell her, because… well to be perfectly honest, I still don’t even know how we grew apart so fast,” said Lyra, shrugging.
“Oh, please! You know exactly what you were doing that was driving me nuts, and why I eventually had no choice but to give you the slip.”
“Girls, please!” Once again, they both went quiet.
“Sorry, Fluttershy,” they both said.
“Okay, Bon Bon. Can you please tell me what happened? Because it’s just, you two seemed so happy when I was here a few days ago.”
“We did?” Bon Bon replied. “Well, we must not have made it very obvious, then. By that time, I was already starting to grow tired of having to deal with her all the time.”
“I still don’t know what you even mean by that!”
“Alright. Listen up, Fluttershy.” Bon Bon put down her tea as she started to tell her story. “The truth is, you remember how I started doing business with Sugarcube Corner a while ago, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well once I made that deal, I started earning a lot more money for work. Apparently, enough money that Little Miss Heartstrings over there decided she didn’t need to have a career of her own anymore!”
“That’s not true!”
“It basically is.” Bon Bon turned towards me again. “She completely stopped taking offers to play at venues, and didn’t bother trying to book any performances anymore. When I asked her why, she just said, ‘Oh, well, you’re working so hard now, that I guess we don’t need the extra money anymore.’ What hogwash!”
“Okay, first of all, what does washing a hog even have to do with any of this? Secondly, that is a terrible imitation of my voice.”
“So what does she decide to do with all of her new-found free time? Become a house-worker? Start a garden? Work out? No! Instead, she would go up into her room and just sit in bed playing her harp! All day long!”
“I keep telling you, it’s not a harp. It’s a lyre. There’s a very distinct difference.”
“Oh, whatever! Fact of the matter is, you still never came out of there! Just up there playing all day like a music-loving hermit!”
“Hey, at least I had the window open!”
“What difference does that make?”
“I was playing for all of Ponyville to hear!”
“If you want to play for all of Ponyville to hear, then why don’t you do it on stage?”
“Alright, that’s it!”
They both stood up. I could already see what was about to happen. I jumped onto the table and held out my hooves.
“Stop!” I shouted as I held them back from trying to fight with each other. “Now sit down! BOTH OF YOU!”
They both went back to their seats. I went back to mine, lowered my head, and took a deep breath. I never like raising my voice like that.
But still, I have to keep trying to be assertive sometimes.
“Please Bon Bon, keep going.”
“Every so often, I would tell her to get off her flank and go look for a gig, and she would just say ‘No. I don’t need to anymore.’ And I kept telling her, and she just kept saying, ‘No!’ ‘No!’ ‘No!’ At least two or three times a week, this happened!”
She stopped to take a breath, and another sip of tea. “And so finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. Just yesterday, I packed all her stuff into suitcases and tossed them out. I told her we were broken up, and to get out of my house. And that’s how it all went down, at least from my point of view.”
“Hmmph.”
Neither of them spoke for a while after that. I felt like if I didn’t speak up again, it would stay that way.
“Um… so Heartstrings, can you tell me what happened?”
“Oh yeah, that’ll be a laugh,” said Bon Bon. “Let’s hear your version of events.”
She looked down to the floor, thinking to herself I guess. She sighed and closed her eyes.
“There’s nothing to tell.”
“Ha! Because I hit it right on the mark, didn’t I? Couldn’t have phrased it any better.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“Well, what else is there? That’s what you did, and that’s what you told me. I’m just telling it how I saw it.”
She turned herself away from us. “I just… I just don’t want to talk, okay?”
“Why don’t you just admit it?”
“Admit what?”
“That you just wanted an excuse to not have to go out and play for money, and when I struck that deal, you used that and your ‘well now, we don’t need the money’ shtick to get yourself out!”
Suddenly, Heartstrings turned around and stood up, looking very angry at Bon Bon. It… scared me a little bit.
“Enough! You know what your problem is, Bon Bon? You just assume. You take everything at face value, and don’t think about anything else beyond that. You don’t think about other ponies’ feelings.”
“I don’t know what you’re even talking about.”
“Did you ever think about why I started acting like a loner? Why I suddenly gave up on everything? Why I was doing the things I did? No, you didn’t. Because you’re right. I was lying about quitting on doing gigs because I didn’t feel like we needed the money anymore.”
“Well then, why did you stop doing gigs?”
“Because, I—” But then she stopped. She threw her head back and sat down again. “I, I don’t want to talk about it.”
“What!?”
This wasn’t good. Heartstrings was turning into… into me.
“Heartstrings, please?” I begged.
“No, Fluttershy.”
“Oh, are you sure? Because… I think we really need to know—”
“I said no!”
“Please? How are we ever going to get this whole thing fixed if you’re not going t—”
“BECAUSE BON BON DIDN’T HAVE TIME FOR ME ANYMORE!”
Everything went silent.
Until finally…
“I— W-What?”
“Once you took up that deal with the Cakes, you became busier than ever! Managing your own bakery and making goods for Sugarcube Corner! In the midst of all, we didn’t get to spend any time together anymore! Because whenever I was free to do something, you were busy making ‘four dozens of bonbons by next Tuesday’! And on those rare moments when you were free, I was too busy doing a concert or a venue or something!”
Bon Bon gasped. “So that’s why you…”
“At first, yeah. But then eventually, it was just because I was too upset to play anything in public anymore. I felt like all my heartstrings were broken. You spent so much time making sweets for everypony day in and day out, but… even when I quit the gigs, you still barely had any of that sweetness left for me. For us. It was like…” She was starting to cry. “Like I wasn’t as important to you anymore.”
“Lyra…” Bon Bon looked like she was about to cry too. I was already crying. I could feel it running down my cheeks.
“So, I shut myself into my room all the time because— because I wanted to be alone. I didn’t want to stay down here and watch you completely ignore me. And the reason I would sit there and play the lyre all day? It wasn’t because I was playing for all of Ponyville to hear. It was because…”
I looked at Bon Bon, and nodded at her.
“B-because why?” She was starting to cry so much, she could barely get the words out.
“Because it reminded me of that day. That day I serenaded you. The day you told me you love me. Every day, I’ve been playing the same song that I played on that one day. Because I wanted to forget, to go back. Go back to that day, when I loved you, and you loved me, and we were happy. Because I miss that day. I miss that day so, so much.”
We were all gushing with tears by now. I had already used up their entire tissue box. After a few minutes of quiet except for crying and sniffling, Bon Bon got off her chair and ran over to Heartstrings on the couch.
“Oh, Lyra! My honeybun! Why didn’t you just tell me that you felt like I was neglecting you!?”
“Because… I didn’t think you would listen.”
Bon Bon pulled her off of the couch and embraced her in a tight hug. I wonder how long it’d been since they hugged.
“Of course I would’ve listened! I’d always listen to you, Lyra Heartstrings, because I love you! Don’t you ever forget that, okay? No matter what happens, don’t ever, EVER forget! And I’m sorry! I am so, so sorry!”
“I’m sorry too, Bon Bon!”
And then finally, they closed their eyes and shared a very deep, passionate kiss. I could feel my tear ducts almost drying up by now. But I wasn’t crying tears of sadness anymore. They were tears of joy.
“So… what do we do now, then?” Heartstrings asked, after they broke.
“I… I’m not sure.”
“Um, if I could make a suggestion…” I finally said. They both looked at me. They were so into the confessions and kissing, they might have completely forgotten I was there. “Maybe you could… work together and try to figure out a schedule that would work best for the both of you; where you can still work on your baking duties, you can go back to playing at concerts and stuff, and then you two can still have time for each other somewhere.”
“You know what?” said Bon Bon. She turned back to Heartstrings. “That doesn’t sound like a bad idea.”
“Yeah, it doesn’t.” Then, she turned to me. “Thank you, Fluttershy.”
“Oh, it’s no problem I—”
“Thank you I mean… for everything. For convincing me to come here and confront my problems, and for egging me on to finally tell Bon Bon how I’ve been feeling. If it wasn’t for you, I’d probably still be moping at Sugarcube Corner right now. You’ve shown so much bravery today that… you’ve inspired me to show some of my own.”
“Huh?” Bon Bon and I both asked.
“I’ll be right back.”
After several minutes, Heartstrings came back downstairs again, having tucked something behind her mane.
“Do you know what the most heart-breaking thing was for me, Bon Bon? It wasn’t that I felt like I was unimportant to you, or that you didn’t understand how I felt, or any of that.”
“Lyra, I’m confused. What’s this about?”
“You see… what hurt me the most was that— well, this all started happening right as I was about to ask you something. Something really important.”
Finally, she pulled the object out of her mane. I gasped when I saw what it was.
“Oh, my.”
Heartstrings hunched down on her forelegs and took Bon Bon’s hoof. Bon Bon looked really shocked. I definitely was.
“Bon Bon… in the two years that you’ve been my girlfriend, you’ve made me so happy. Happier than I’ve ever been in my life. And in spite of everything that happened recently, I want to make our relationship work again, and I want to continue being happy with you. And that’s why, just before you took the deal, I was getting ready to ask you…”
She finally opened it up. It was a single diamond gold-banded ring. It must’ve come from Diamond Stone’s shop, because I remember seeing that specific type of ring being sold out when I was there with the girls yesterday.
“Bon Bon Sweetie Drops, will you marry me?”
“Oh, Lyra…” She gave Heartstrings yet another warm hug. “Yes! Yes, of course I will!”
I’m going to need a lot more tissues.
“Well, now we’re going to be really busy for a while,” said Bon Bon as they both stood at the door. “Not only do we need to make up that schedule, now we have some big planning to do.” She kissed Heartstrings on the cheek. “But we’ll make it work, won’t we, my honeybun?”
“Oh, you bet we will, my sweet angel. We’re going to be the first same-gender married couple in Ponyville, so let’s make this damn town proud.”
“Well, good luck with all of that,” I said to them as I walked out.
“Oh, and Fluttershy?”
“Yes?” I turned around to face Heartstrings. I couldn’t help but smile as the engagement ring proudly shined on her horn.
“I know I already said this enough times, but thank you. Just, thank you.”
“You’re very welcome, Heartstrings.”
“Hey, Fluttershy?”
“Um, yes?”
“Please…” She wrapped her arm around Bon Bon. “Just call me Lyra.”
This is great. This is really great.
I mean, I thought I was just simply going to try to talk my friends into getting back together. And even then, I was scared to at first.
But I was able to do it. I was able to find the confidence and the strength. It was inside of me all along. and I was so confident, that I inspired Lyra to do something very brave herself.
If I could do all of that, then hey… telling Rarity how I feel about her should be no problem!
Yes! I’m going to do it this time! No more backing out! I’m going to tell her!