It was late in the evening, Stan didn't know exactly when; his mind was heavy from the secrets he now kept. A chill ran through him as he stepped into his bedroom. On the bed was his wife, sleeping soundly, and curled up at the head of the mattress with her tail draped over herself. Mary's... back leg kicked absently in her peaceful sleep.
Reacting to the sight, his lungs filled with air and his throat tightened. It was as close to losing it as he would allow himself, what the man really wanted was to yell from the tallest mountain he could find. I'm gonna fix this for you, Mar... somehow. He turned around and walked back out of the room with his heavy thoughts in tow. If I can't... then... I will make sure you have everything you need. I won't let anyone hurt you. His eye twitched at the very idea.
Stan's solemn journey through the living room, into the dining room and then back towards the mud room, eventually led him to the most sacred part of the house—to him, at least. Amidst the coat racks in the mud room, as they called it, was a locked door. It went down to the basement, his sanctuary. It stayed locked, unless he had guests or as was the case now, life proved to be really stressful. The lock clicked obediently and he opened the old, creaking oak door.
Descending the stairs took a moment, his chamber was set low into the earth. The light clicked on, illuminating a cool, earthy toned room. A small bar with mugs hanging above it flanked one side of the basement, a couch was on the other and a pool table sat in the center. The back corner beside the stairwell had a work station not much unlike Mary's sewing setup upstairs.
The difference however with his desk over his wife's, were the models. On every shelf and much of the ceiling hung a model ship, plane, boat or tank. Stan took a moment to look over his old hobby's fruits in the dim studio-like lighting. He breathed out a sigh and trudged over to the work table. A small, 1:18 scale and half painted Russian KV sat on the surface, scornful at him from being ignored for over a week. He sat down, clicked on the work light, and picked up a brush.
Stan built models when he was stressed out, he'd picked up the hobby in his youth. Though he had never told anyone... It was a big reason he was who he was today, or so he thought. Building a model took patience, it took precision, it took calm, or it would never be seen through by the modeler. Somehow, all of that had stuck, and transferred into his demeanor, after almost a decade of causing trouble.
It really does seem to run in the family... he briefly considered, thinking of his son.
Herbert had given him a box of the things a long time ago, they had been antiques almost, and had belonged to Stan's grandfather, Herbert's dad. That had made them significant, and important to him. Goat-man should've stuck around a little longer... he thought solemnly.
Something hard poked him in his ribs from behind. Stan turned around to see what it was.
"Hey." Mary stood on all fours, her bath robe draped over her and tied around the middle. It obscured her tail and most of her body. Her orange fur matched well with the dark tones in the room, actually.
"Hey." Stan answered back. On instinct his hand reached out, and smoothed her loose hair back over her ear. He kept from flinching when his hand came into contact with the new swiveling addition to his wife's head. The floppy ear sprang back up immediately.
Mary's eyes shut and she leaned into his hand, forcing him to keep it there.
"Are you going to stay down here...?" she intoned quietly.
"All night?..." Stan asked. "It hadn't really crossed my mind, no. I'll be up soon I think." More silence, then Mary pulled away and sat down on the ground in that way she could now.
"Mind if I wait until you come back upstairs?" A short smile flickered over her face, but returned to flatness just as quick.
"Of course not, you know I love company, especially yours." His own smile was almost a smirk, but was broad enough to break the definition just barely. His eyes were amused though. "Things have been so terribly boring these days, you know?" I'm not a comedian Mar, you know that, but I'll try to cheer you up as best I can.
"Ha ha ha..." Her laugh shot out playfully, and she raised an eye brow at him demurely. "Oh, I do, despite being such an anti-social lug with strangers, you're completely content to bore your friends and family with your pastimes."
"Fishing is not boring..." Stan turned away and hunched his shoulders defensively.
"Aaw, did I hurt your feelings-" A warm presence wrapped itself around him from behind in a hug. Stan hadn't expected that. He flinched when his wife's head came up over his shoulder...accidentally. Mary released him before he could say anything.
Beside him, she shuffled a bit, then quietly said. "Sorry..."
Stan looked back at her, words already trying to form, but she was facing away from him now. It caused his thoughts to stumble, until it seemed too late, and he didn't say anything. That was probably a lot worse. He didn't want to admit to himself that the stumble had been because of her...condition. The love they shared was unconditional, after all. Right?... Dammit, you oaf. Mary slunked over to the couch, then hopped up onto it without a word.
After watching her go, Stan finally spoke to her. "You just caught me by... It was just cop reflexes, Mar."
His wife didn't answer him, she just stared at the nook's blank television from her seat on the couch.
The brush clattered onto the desk table and he spun around on the bench. After a moment more, he pushed himself up to stand, then crept across the thick carpet to the couch. Mary's eyes remained straight-faced and stubbornly set forward. Mar- Come...come on, I didn't mean to. Her tail moved over to cover up the empty spot on the furniture... Now you're just being sullen...say something to her blockhead, it's just nerves. He continued to frown at the blue and cream colored hair, slightly obscured by her bathrobe, and draped over the end of the sofa.
There wasn't a time before in his life that he could think of right then, when he'd felt stage fright this bad.
"I'm sorry..." Stan's fist stayed clenched at his side, he wasn't angry...but what he could do that he had not already just wasn't clear. She knew he loved her. She did, but an insult was an insult, accident or not. "Not sure what to say, I can't really take back that. It's not how I really feel, Mar... It-" He crushed the bridge of his nose in his hand thinking of something better to say. "Doubt I could joke the thing away either..." The irony of him telling jokes, had always been the laughable part, of course.
"I don't want to laugh Stan..." Her eyes clenched a moment, and she took to harshly rubbing her left leg with her right in thought.
"I don't even want to feel better, I just want you to want me. I want my body... I don't... I never thought I'd be a burden, not like this. Not until I was old and our children had grown up, anyway, not that I think about it mu-" Mary clicked her mouth shut and continued to glare at the blank TV. "I sound like a broken record. I'm sorry, I'm being so stupid. I already said I'd stop that, too." The mare on his couch laughed bitterly, then grinned up at him wistfully.
Stan blinked, surprised by his wife's apology. What? But I- His stonewalled state of mind didn't have a chance to recover though.
Mary's tail swept away from the empty space on the couch, and her eyes stared up at him sideways. "So, I'm sorry, for running just a moment ago and then guilting you. Sit with me already? You big wool head...?" Her husband's wide-eyed look finally relaxed.
The couch sank slightly as he added his weight to the empty spot. Stan began to speak with his usual fail safe. "Well lass, I canno' rightly sa-" Mary's hoof popped into his open mouth with a click. She stifled her laughter over his renewed look of surprise. Wolfishly, her head shook from side to side, saying no to his traditional accent, which was used in their stressful, private encounters.
"I can't say I wouldn't have acted the same way just a little, either, if you were in my shoes Stan... Not that I wear shoes anymore." Mary coughed, then put on an even more thoughtful look and smiled down coolly at the carpeted floor. She leaned over onto his arm.
Stan's face was again its usual stolid form. He gladly wrapped his arms around Mary, pulling his wife in close. Her head found a spot to rest on his chest, and his hands held her tightly against him.
"Well, at least this isn't too uncomfortable." She leaned up briefly to grab a blanket off the back of the couch with her teeth, then covered the both of them with it.
"Still miss the girls..." Mary nipped at his hand, getting a surprised yelp from the complacent sheriff. They laughed, before snuggling tighter together on the pillowy couch, and falling asleep.
The pine furnishings in the room gave it an earthy cabin-like feel, which clashed horridly with her own Victorian-like furniture and nick-knacks on the shelves. A trio of fat, furry cats lay sprawled about at odd intervals in the big bedroom. One particularly odd example lay on its back, fast asleep at the foot of her bed. She poked its tummy causing it to shoot its head up and growl, before seeing who it was. Agnes smirked and moved to her side of the bed, next to which, Herbert was reading.
The bed's mattress springs creaked as the old grandmother slowly sat down on its side. Her house slippers were left behind on the floor, and beside her Herbert sat upright with the bedside light on. His bespectacled face was looking over the contents of a Green Lantern comic through his reading glasses.
The thin comforter came up over them both as Agnes got comfortable, then sighed. Herbert now received a sour stare from her, and she continued to deliver it to him gravely until he finally reacted.
Herbert looked over once, then did a double take. "What? Whatever it is, it wasn't me." His eyes resettled on the comic book, determined not to pay her mind this late in the night. His wife groaned in disgust and pulled the magazine away from him. "Hey! I was reading that, easy, it's a collector's item."
The new stare she set him with was still deadly serious, but more searching as she looked at him closely for his reaction.
"Mary turned into a mare." Herbert's eyebrows sprang up above his reading glasses, while the rest of his face remained still. Agnes handed the magazine back to him slowly. "I am also, not, counter pranking." This caused him to take his reading glasses off slowly, without blinking, to stare back at Agnes.
"A mare? What like a horse?" His face twisted in pure incredulity, before shifting to reveal what he really thought of this strange news from his wife, who was apparently also telling the truth... "Did she get super powers?"
"No powers..." Agnes rolled her eyes. "And yes, as crazy as it sounds." Agnes rolled over to lie down on the bed. "It's strange, she looks a bit like a person still, kind of like Sonic the Hedgehog or something... She can still talk, by the way. It's just so strange... Well, we're going over tomorrow morning, early. Mary wants us to help break it to Bobby and Anna. It seems they don't know yet, Herby."
A five minute pause in the conversation occurred before the aging comic book nerd answered his wife. "Hm, well that's out of left field." He reopened his magazine, and turned a few pages slowly before he resettled his eyes onto them.
"Ironic, too." Agnes sighed again and faced away from him, the comment forcing her to fight down a bemused smile. Herbert casually re-raised the magazine back in front of him, and replaced his glasses.
"Pity..." Herbert mumbled.
Agnes nodded in reply. "Mmmhmm."
Great bursts of lightning flashed through purple clouds. Darkness in the distance swallowed the light instantly, and thunder seemed to rumble all the way to her ears from hundreds of miles away.
Mary looked everywhere at once, but there was nothing to see. Until...one of the blots moved. It was different from the rest, but no less indescribable. The presence seemed to shift about, sweeping one cloudy limb from side to side. Maybe it was looking at her? If that made any sense...
"Hello...?" It was unmistakably a nightmare, a molded cast of one's darkest fears...and it was never a good idea to interact with your fears. If you did they would seem more real. The feeling of floating, the strange breeze and the fog that roiled everywhere all had her on edge anyway. As if it really were real... A part of her was able to recognize it for what it was, just like any other night horror.
She wasn't afraid.
An ethereal voice echoed out and washed over her. It was strange, the dream had such defined clarity, but she could still tell that's all that it was. The ghostly voice greeted her, responding to her greeting with one of its own...
"...Hello," it spoke simply.
Mary hadn't ever expected to actually get one, the cloud only vaguely looked like a shape.
"Are you afraid?" it said, continuing to speak. The voice seem to coil in the air in front of her, as a snake would, adding to her unease. On top of that, the entire conversation felt like it was taking place a thousand feet above the ground, in the midst of the worst storm that Earth had ever seen, and they were in the eye of it.
Mary felt she could do little else but answer. "Yes..."
The voice was preceded by a low rumble of thunder, before it answered for a second time.
"You have nothing to fear, you are surrounded by those who care for you. These hard times you face... will pass. All things come to an end; the good, and the bad..." Mary hugged herself while she floated there at the thing's mercy. Despite the monotone, maybe even somewhat soothing voice it used, this was by far one of the most vivid and stressing dreams she'd ever had. Last night had been a drowning dream, too! her memory reminded.
The voice seemed to be waiting for something, or a reply.
Mary managed to stammer out, "I don't thi-think that this thing's going away a-any time soon, thanks."
The echoing voice whispered another reply out to her, and a question. "I wish to help, in whatever way I may. Tell me, what is the trouble that harms you so?"
Mary thought... it sounded kind of like... she couldn't put her finger on what it sounded like as a voice. Before she could answer, a new noise entered the arena of symphonious weather racket, loud and annoying, like a bell of some sort. She tried to ignore, and think about what was so interesting about the weird dream-voice.
It spoke again, though it was difficult to hear now. "Hello? Are you still there?" The message was still clear though. The other noise Mary kept hearing was threatening to drown it out, though. Whatever was banging in the distance obscured the quiet sounds of the thunder, too; whatever it was, it was unbearable.
Mary groaned, being overwhelmed, and shouted in confusion, the voice and its message forgotten for the moment. "What's going on-!?"
"-on?" Mary gasped and sat up on the couch. Her wide-eyed stare leaped across the basement room in every direction, while her left hoof scrambled to find Stan. It plonked on his behind, causing him to growl a protest in his sleep, loudly. His cell phone was blaring into the bedroom from beside her, yelling a morning waking ritual in a vain attempt to wake up Stan. He must have set it to get himself up for work, or rather, get her up in order to get him up for work...
Oh, it was the alarm I heard over... over what exactly? Mary shuddered, and the breath that she had held finally made it out of her, shakily. Oh well, just a dream.
The sound of footsteps thumping down the staircase bounced down into the basement.
The sound of...
Hide! Must hide! Mary knew she only had a moment. But there's nowhere to hide! Her searching, panicked eyes looked everywhere, then finally shut tight. The knowledge and quick thinking about the basement's lack of hiding spots barely saved her. Instead of diving for a corner, she threw the blanket that she and Stan had shared through the night over herself.
Mary did her best not to shiver in fear, and huddled in the corner of the couch, squirming her hooves into the back cushions to get smaller.
"Hey dad, you down here?" her sons voice asked from far too close by.
It's Bobby! Oh pleasedon'tseemepleasedon'tseeme. Mary pressed her other thought to the back of her mind. It was the one saying that she was supposed to show him...show him how she looked now, and this very morning! But another fought for dominance. No way, I can't...I- Her breath was panicked and near hyper-ventilation already, she tried to stop it and keep quiet. The couch began to rock slightly, Bobby was trying to shake Stan awake right next to her! aaah.... Suppressing a whimper was almost too difficult.
"Dad! Hey, wake up would you?" Bobby kept pushing his shoulder, until finally the man's eyes opened a tiny crack, and looked around the basement.
"zz-hah? Oh- what." Stan's hand wiped across his face and drug his eyelids down attempting to open them further. "What is it Bobby? What are you doing up this late?"
His son's eyes rolled and he pointed at the small clock hanging from the wall. "It's almost six, dad. Grandma and Herbert are upstairs, they just got here, I guess." Bobby yawned and scratched his side absently in the dim light. "They woke me up when they couldn't find you and no one answered the phone. He looked over at the still shrieking cell phone, trying vainly to report someone had called.
Stan's eyes hardened, and he glanced down at his side. Mary was gone, immediately his hand began to push himself up, when he froze. It had found something under the blanket, not unlike a body. Bobby, meanwhile, picked up the cellphone and put an end to its noise.
"I think they're worried or something that they can't find you or mom. I told them I didn't know and they called the hospital too, I think. Where is mom?" Stan could feel himself begin to sweat, the lump his wife quivered beside him under the thin covering. "I thought we were doing some kind of like, intervention or something today." The withering look Stan gave him spoke volumes about the thoughts he had about what his own son just implied.
"I. DO NOT. DO. DRUGS!" The blanket churned violently and Mary's voice erupted from underneath it. Stan moved swiftly to lay across his wife, holding her down.
"What the- Mom?"
"Bobby, go wait upstairs." The greasy haired boy wore a bewildered look from the sight of what seemed to be his father wrestling down his mom. All the while Mary was shouting objections. "We'll be upstairs in a second..." When his son didn't move, Stan tried to think of something to get rid of him. Bobby merely gave himself and the blanket enshrouded pony a skeptical look. Stan added, "Your mom's naked, alright? As well as peeved at what you just said."
Bobby made an immediate look of disgust and ugghed loudly, before all but sprinting up and out of the room. "Grandma I found them! They're in the basement being disgusting!" Stan frowned after his son, but at least he'd gotten rid of him. I didn't call that girl he brought over two months ago disgusting...
Mary's head popped out from under the blanket, nostrils flaring. "Stan, I've had it! I'm strangling Faith, you hear me?" He opened his mouth but promptly shut it again as his wife's face all but pressed up into his. "No! My personal life is entirely ruined! Not only can I not live normally in secret, but now even my kids think I'm some kind of junky! Next Bobby's going to be all 'hook me up with somma dat sick magic crunk yo' and slamming doobies left and RIGHT! I can't handle that Stan, turn me into a dang tea cozy next, but. I. Cannot. HANDLE. THAT!" She breathed heavily, her forehead pushing him nearly off the couch and her hooves pressed into his sternum.
"...Better?" Stan gave a weak smile, then gulped.
"Mary? You down here dear?" Agnes called down the stairs in a hesitant voice. "Are you both...decent?"
Stan was the first to answer her, "Yeah mom, we're decent, it's safe to come down!"
Mary's previous frown turned into a scowl, and then an embarrassed look upon realizing certain assumptions that may have been made. I can't believe that Bobby thinks I'm doing drugs, and now he thinks... Aw heck why do I even care. She groaned and hopped off the couch, her mother was walking down the stairs by herself. The pony shook her body as if she'd just climbed out of a river, then combed her hair back with a single hoof. It had become a tangled mess and she could feel it.
"I take it Bobby didn't see yo-" Mary cut off Agnes sharply.
"No, Stan...diverted his attention. However I would very much appreciate it if someone would go and speak to him about how his mother DOES. NOT. DO.-" Stan's hand carefully cupped over her mouth and muffled the last shout. The older woman had straightened in shock where she stood at the foot of the staircase, still holding the rail.
"Likely as not Mar, he can hear you now, with the way you keep yelling. Would you calm down?" The husband let go when his wife shook her head from side to side, then she jumped away from him surprisingly quick.
Mary looked quickly, back and forth, to and fro between Stan and Agnes. "I'm calm! I am so calm!" Her face was smooth, but her eyes were contrasting by being maniacally wide and staring. "Also, I am not ready to tell the kids! Nope. I don't think I ever want them to know, either. I'll just... speak with Anna for the rest of her life through the door... and call Bobby at his wedding from seclusion... and-"
"Mary!" Stan and Agnes both called out together. The pony's mouth hung open slack jawed, and her head sagged a little on its long neck.
Agnes smiled and tried to break the tension, or at least shock her into a different state of mind. "I told Herbert last night Mary, like we talked about." Agnes continued, before Stan could say anything himself. "...You won the bet, he asked if you got super powers from this."
Mary opened and closed her mouth twice, then placed a hoof calmly to her forehead and sat down in the middle of the floor beside the pool table. An answer to that for the mare, wasn't forthcoming, she'd been joking when she had made that bet with her mother-in-law...
A big, rigid hand laid on her shoulder. Mary looked up into the calm eyes of her husband. "Are you alright?" he asked.
"Yeah..." Mary sighed outwardly, now slightly calmed from the confusion of Herbert's weirdness, then added. "I don't do drugs..."
I'll have to find out what her stigma with drugs is one of these days, not a word about it in fifteen years and then suddenly- Stan's thoughts were cut off by his mother.
"Yes dear, we know." The three of them stood and sat and knelt there respectively, until finally Stan stretched, his back cracking.
"Eh, the couch wasn't a great idea for me, it seems. Thank you for the company though, Mar." He smiled down at her calmly. "I'm...going to go and get ready for work." He glanced down at his wrist watch. "I'm sorry I can't be home for this..."
Mary's face melted to a despondent visage in an instant. She tried to make up for her unbidden descent into the doleful look. "Ah, right, well I'm sure we'll have everything under control here Stan... We won't tell the kids until this weekend I think, we'll all be free that way... Hm they can still go to school this way at least..."
Her husband nodded to her gravely. "Whatever you want, Mar. I'll see you after work, as soon I can get free again. I'll have time off as soon as this mess is finished...alright? I'm...gonna go shower."
Mary smiled up at him, looked uncertainly at the ground, then jumped vertically. Her back hooves caught herself and splayed out slightly, keeping her steady. The pony held her arms out for a moment, gaining her balance, then hugged the surprised Stan Morris around his stomach.
"That sounds great, love. I'll be here." Mary knew it tore him up to leave, but it was important to her that he was okay to leave her. That he wouldn't worry about her. Like Agnes had so thoroughly thumped into her head the day before... She was a big girl, new body aside her emotions were controllable.
"Uhm." Mary looked over to Agnes holding up one finger pointed to the ceiling. Stan pecked a kiss on Mary's forehead, and eased her back down to the ground.
"Yes, Mom?" Mary said absently to the grandmother, trying to gain her attention. "Thanks... Stan." The pony let a hoof linger on his leg as he backed towards the staircase to leave.
Stan nodded down to her, smiling. After saying another goodbye to Mary, he headed up the stairs, one hand scratching the back of his head absently. He whispered grimly to Agnes as he walked past. "Take good care of her, Mom."
Agnes diverted her attention from her thoughts and Mary long enough to answer back with her own reassurances that she would. After Stan left, Agnes hurriedly looked back to her daughter-in-law still seated on the carpet, her own mouth stuck hanging ajar.
Mary thought she looked as though she was having trouble finding the words for something. "Mom? What is it?" Mary turned her head slightly, curious.
"Uhm, well you see..." Agnes kept looking up at the ceiling for some reason...
A sinking feeling began to settle in the mare's gut, her eyes began to follow Stan as he shut the basement door, then they re-centered on Agnes. What is she trying to say? "Just spit it out, Mom, what is it?" The cream and blue haired mare stood up on all fours to assume an impatient posture.
"I told Herbert to preemptively explain everything to them! That is, about...you...right now." Her mother-in-law twiddled her thumbs distractedly in front of her, while giving Mary flickering looks over them.
Mary's rump thudded on the ground as she sat down. Her eyes trailed upwards to where the dining room sat above her. The goofy looking ears that matched no pony or horse she'd ever seen strained to hear something eliciting from the room above her. The room was shaking, no, her shoulders were and it was bouncing her vision.
Agnes was kneeling beside her, smiling reassuringly. Her hand rubbed Mary's back, the bathrobe the pony wore going slightly off kilter from being too big... Anna and Bobby's mother opened her mouth to speak.
"..."
Only a squeak made its way out.
