Vinyl pushed open the door to the familiar house. This was Octavia’s house. She and Vinyl used to live here together, before that fight anyways. It was small but very well kept and in a good area. It looked… nothing like it used to.
Vinyl took in a deep breath to stabilize herself. Steel Helmet had advised her that to go here and see what she could find to maybe help Octavia. In the very least, it might provide some closure to her. She was starting to think it was a bad idea.
Looking around the house she saw things, little things, that wouldn’t be out of place if this was the house of some pony who was not, in fact, Octavia’s. The seats were scooted out of perfect symmetry. Octavia had a thing for everything in a room being symmetrical. That was noticed immediately upon entering the living area. There was dishes and a film of dust on the coffee table. This wasn’t normal for the mare that would get furious if anything was left on the coffee table overnight. Vinyl took a deep breath, before turning to the kitchen.
The sink was full of soiled plates and various cups, that was a completely foreign idea to her. Octavia would always insist that the day’s dishes were to be washed and put away. Vinyl had to calm down a bit before opening the fridge. She found nothing in there, and that was distressing. Octavia was always the type to have one more than needed of anything. For the fridge to be barren was just unnatural. She had to force herself to leave before she found anything else wrong.
Vinyl hesitated at the door to the bedroom. This was the bedroom they shared. This room no matter what stated it was going to be in this was going to be hard. She didn’t know if she even wanted to go in at all.
Vinyl continued to hesitate until Octavia’s bedroom alarm went off. That was at least right it was the ten o’clock. The alarm was never to wake Octavia up, no, she got in the habit of setting it to wake Vinyl up. Vinyl’s eyes got watery, but she made up her mind to go in.
Vinyl pushed open the door. It was all wrong. The bed not being made was to be a given. That was where they found Octavia after all. But the rest… The rest was completely unexpected. The layout of the room, which Octavia insisted on being rearranged every other month, hadn’t changed at all. Everything was in the same places as the last time Vinyl had seen the room. That wasn’t even the most distressing part. It was all broken…
At some point, Vinyl surmised, Octavia’s grief turned violent on herself. The mirror was shattered, the reading chair was smashed, the night stand and shelves looked like Octavia bucked them as hard as she could, and the worst was the cello. Octavia’s cello, it was undamaged, but it had a layer of dust on it that would have never ever been allowed to settle on it. It looked as if it hadn’t been moved not once in six months.
"This was a bad idea." Vinyl muttered as she took the rest of her strength to pull out a little book from between the mattress and the box spring. It was Octavia’s little secret that Vinyl never confessed to knowing. In hoofwritten lavender script the word Diary was written on the front cover.
Vinyl turned and left the house, not wanting to see the disturbing place any longer.
Vinyl entered Octavia’s room. She was given permission to stay with Octavia overnight. She still hadn’t woken up, but it wasn’t really expected that she would so soon. She walked over to Octavia and ran a hoof through her mane.
“What happened to you?” She knew where she could get those answers.
Vinyl pulled a chair up next to Octavia and opened the diary. Octavia was a nut about recording all of her thoughts and feelings. She knew just the page she had to read first.
October 15th,
I have broken up with Vinyl... it was hard. Very hard. I feel sick to my stomach and as if, there is an emptiness in me now. I had to do it. They were going to destroy both of our careers. I didn’t want to do it but Vinyl’s agent threatened to ruin her if I didn’t leave. Worst of all, I had to make Vinyl think it was what I wanted. I have my career at least... Perhaps I could just pour myself into work.
Octavia went on for the whole page but Vinyl had read enough. She was furious. Her agent was why they weren’t together. Her agent was why Octavia was in a spiral of self loathing that ended in her trying to kill herself? Vinyl seethed. It was hard for her not to just storm out of there right now, stick her hoof up Silver Star’s plot, and break it off at the knee. Then Vinyl remembered why she was here and looked down at Octavia’s face.
“Tomorrow.” Vinyl took a deep breath. “Tomorrow, I deal with that witch.” She laid her head down on Octavia’s bed and sung a little lullaby to her and Octy.