Chapter Eight
It took until the next lunchtime to get Fly alone. I grabbed her and dragged her back to the room during our lunch break, leaving Rarity and Miri in the common room with their sandwiches.
“What is it, Cat?” Fly asked, puzzled.
I made sure the door was shut tightly and that nopony was going to disturb us before turning to my best friend. “Miri told me some gossip about Rarity yesterday. Did she tell you?”
“No. What is it? Rarity is never involved in gossip and things.”
I nodded and sat down on the bed next to Fly.
“Miri told me she’d overheard Rarity on the phone to her coltfriend. Apparently they were talking about... it.”
“About what?”
“You know, it. Doing it. The thing with a colt.”
“Oh.”
I rubbed my hooves together awkwardly. “Miri says that Rarity has done it. With her coltfriend.”
Fly turned a very deep shade of red. “I see,” she whispered.
“She told me not to tell anypony but I just had to tell you. It seems so weird.”
The green pony nodded. “Isn’t it a bit... grown-up? I’ve never really thought about it before.”
“Me too. I just... wanted to tell you. Rarity doesn’t think anypony knows so don’t tell anypony else. It has to stay a secret. I don’t think Miri will tell anypony, since it’s such a big secret about Rarity.”
The secret kept playing on my mind. My plan to get over her on Hearts & Hooves day had worked. All of my feelings for her were gone, replaced with wondering about Rarity and her coltfriend, and trying to find out which pony had sent me the card. I’d had a few surreptitious looks around when I was walking through the corridors, trying to spot any blushing younger fillies, but I didn’t notice any. And I just looked really paranoid, always glancing over my shoulder. I decided it was time to pull out the big guns.
“Miri, do you know who this card is from?” I asked, handing her my mystery card. “I can’t work it out.”
Miri studied it. “No, I don’t. But I can find out for you, if you like.”
“If you could.”
The earth pony looked pleased as punch to have some kind of gossip to work on. I could see the cogs in her head working out which ponies were best to ask about this, and who she’d go to first.
“Can I hang onto the card? It might help.”
“Go ahead.”
That was one less thing for me to worry about. If Miri couldn’t track them down, nopony could. Only a very skilled pony could successfully hide from Miri’s instincts.
Rarity seemed subdued in lessons, and I kept gently trying to find out why, but she always claimed she was tired. She seemed to be sleeping as well as she usually did, and the schoolwork wasn’t getting any more difficult. The scheming part of me instantly jumped to the conclusion that she was having trouble with her coltfriend, but I ignored it. She could just be homesick or something. I couldn’t just assume things.
But then again, if I were in her hooves, I would be worried about my coltfriend. If I was willing to do it with somepony, then I was going to be worrying about whether they really cared about me. In all the films, there were colts who would just ignore you as soon as it was done, and I hoped Rarity wasn’t in that situation. At least all of Miri’s break-ups were painless and didn’t involve any real attachment. This was just too grown-up for me. I wanted to just hide and somehow go back to when we were fourth-years and had nothing to complain about except how few bits we always seemed to have.
On the plus side for Rarity, she did seem to be visiting her coltfriend every weekend. So even if she was a bit more withdrawn than usual in lessons, I was confident that everything was going well for her. Sadly, the same couldn’t be said for my schoolwork, which had definitely suffered over the first half of the term. Teachers began announcing mock exams for March, which rapidly approached while I was busy pondering everypony else’s love life and doing no work. Only when I realised how much time Fly spent with her nose stuck in a textbook did I realise that I should probably start doing something.
“When’s your first exam?” Miri asked me as we attempted a marathon revision session in the common room one afternoon. I was drawing up a revision timetable, colour-coded by subject.
“The fifth. Way too soon.”
“I’ve got until the tenth, at least. They should really let us have some time off if they’re giving us exams.”
Everypony was jealous of the seventh years who got weeks and weeks off in the lead-up to their exams, although theirs weren’t mocks. I’d have given my hind legs to get even a week off to do revision.
Rarity walked into the common room, distracting me from my shading. She tutted disdainfully at somepony wearing faux ears, then trotted over to our table. “Hi everypony. I’ve just finished a load of work for textiles, so now that’s out of the way until after the mocks.”
“Good for you,” I replied, despairing at how little free time I had left. “I should really be starting some history work.”
“I can give you a hoof if you like. I need to do history too.”
“Sorry Miri. We can go back to this tomorrow,” I said to the earth pony, who I then abandoned to her work so that Rarity could go through some topics from the history textbook.
Miri stalked off somewhere, probably back to the room so she could work in peace and quiet with Fly, who was probably still reading.
“I miss the days before we had exams,” Rarity said, piling her heavy textbooks up on the table. “It’s just been non-stop for the past two years, it seems.”
“And all of next year,” I sighed, flicking aimlessly through the history book with my magic. “At least we get time off then.”
Rarity shrugged. “Oh well. Anyway, history. Which chapters do you want to go through?”
“Pretty much all of them.”
The purple-maned unicorn just opened the book at a random page and then turned back to the beginning of that chapter. “Ah, Chancellor Puddinghead. Good choice, Cat.”
I rested my head on the desk.
“There will probably be a long-answer question on earth pony society under the Chancellor, so you should consider writing up answers for some of the questions here,” Rarity said, pointing with her hoof. “Then you’re prepared for whatever comes up in the end.”
My hooves absent-mindedly ran through my limp mane. “Okay, that’s a good idea.”
“Then you can give them to the teacher to mark and he’ll show you where you’re going wrong.”
There were six questions, and my heart sank because I knew that each of them would take hours.
The only time any of the four of us had left to socialise was in the evenings when we’d burnt out from studying. Fly just continued to read, but Miri was making up for being quiet all day by being especially exuberant and refusing to stop talking about anything she could.
“I hate Minty so much,” she whined, waving her hooves pointlessly. “She’s such a stupid pony. I wish she didn’t go to school here.”
I just continued reading my magazine, not taking much notice, but Rarity was in the mood to agree.
“She keeps looking at me and whispering,” Rarity said in a flat tone. “I have no idea why.”
We found out why on the day of my first exam. I had endured two hours of history with Rarity, sitting in the draughty hall and writing until it felt like my hoof would fall off, and we were both looking forward to the lunch break when Minty appeared in front of us, her green mane shaking with suppressed laughter.
“Hi Rarity,” she said in a petulant tone. “Seen your coltfriend lately?”
I was inclined to ignore her, but Rarity always insisted on politeness.
“I saw him this Saturday just gone, why?” she asked, wondering why Minty had brought it up. I tried to drag her away, but it wasn’t enough.
“Oh, just wondering. Tell me, was the hotel room nice?” she added, giggling openly.
Rarity blushed from the tip of her muzzle to her hooves, and I grabbed her shoulder and tried to move on. Clearly Minty was just being ridiculous. As we left, Minty called back at us.
“I bet he wasn’t even your first!”
Rarity was shaking in my grip, her eyes shimmering. I nearly galloped towards the nearest bathroom, pulling my friend in with me before she broke down completely. Minty’s laughter was still ringing in my ears.
Rarity burst into unhappy tears as soon as we were inside, her carefully applied mascara turning into long black streaks down her face.
“Ignore her,” I said firmly. “She’s just being mean because she doesn’t have a coltfriend of her own.” Even as I said it, I was sure there was more to it than that. I needed to have a stern word with Miri.
The unicorn couldn’t even speak for her tears for a few minutes, so I just stroked her mane and hugged her.
“It’s just not true...” Rarity eventually managed, choking the words out one by one. “I’ve never done anything like that, why would anypony say such hurtful things?”
“It’s just Minty, you know what she’s like,” I said.
“I mean, we... we haven’t even kissed since the dance! He’s too much of a gentlecolt,” Rarity told me, tears dripping onto my coat. Now that came as a surprise, and I had to stop my mouth from falling open.
“We just go for walks and talk! Why would Minty just make something like that up?”
Looking at her tear-strewn face, I knew that it was unfair to keep it from her any longer.
“Miri told me she overheard you on the phone with your coltfriend, talking about... well, saying about how you two had... done it,” I admitted, watching her face change to an expression that was somehow even worse than it had been before.
“What do you mean? Of course that’s not true! Who has she told?”
“She told me, and I told Fly, but I didn’t know she had told anypony else,” I said, feeling ashamed. “Sorry.”
“But... what will everypony say? Minty will tell everypony in school, and even the teachers... they might throw me out.”
“They won’t do that,” I reassured her. “Everypony will think it’s just Minty being spiteful. I’ll talk to Miri and find out who she’s told about this, and set her straight,” I promised. Rarity just looked so upset that I could feel tears coming myself.
“I don’t want a reputation as that kind of pony,” Rarity said, sniffing her tears back.
“Nopony will believe her, trust me.”
“But you believed it when Miri told you! And Fly!”
I couldn’t argue with that, and I just felt more guilty for ever believing Miri.
My chance to confront Miri came that evening. Rarity didn’t go to any lessons, and I had spotted Minty whispering with lots of other ponies, her eyes always fixed on me. I headed Miri off as she left the common room, walking back to our room where Rarity was hiding.
“Miri, I need to talk to you,” I said in a firm voice. “It’s about Rarity.”
We found a spot in an empty classroom, and I shut the door with a chair so we weren’t disturbed. The earth pony looked pleased about something.
“What is it, Miri?” I asked, knowing that she needed to get it out of her system otherwise she wouldn’t listen to a word I said.
“I found out who sent you that card!” she said happily. “It was soooo difficult but I managed it.”
“Okay, so who is it?”
“It’s actually a fifth year, her name is River Blossom and she does music. She’s pale blue with a pale pink mane, so you’ll probably recognise her when you see her.”
“Did you speak to her?”
“I spoke to her friends, but not her. Apparently she would be really embarrassed to know that you know who she is.”
This was all interesting, but I had more pressing matters to think about than some fifth year who liked the way I played the piano. “Miri, Minty has been spreading rumours about Rarity.”
“Like what?”
“Like about what she’s been doing with her coltfriend.” My expression was like stone and Miri suddenly seemed a lot less happy.
“I don’t know where-”
“Miri, only you and Fly and I know about what you overheard, right?”
Miri paused, and my suspicions seemed confirmed. “Who did you tell?”
“Nobody! I truly and honestly didn’t tell anypony else. Well, I told Fly, but she said you’d already told her.”
“Promise?”
“Of course! I would never spread a secret like that about Rarity. About other ponies, yes, but not Rarity. I know how sensitive she can be.”
I sighed. This was turning into another detective story. “Also, I spoke to Rarity about it, and what you heard on the phone isn’t true. She hasn’t even kissed him since the dance.”
The earth pony nodded solemnly, her mane bouncing. “I didn’t realise...”
“Well, you can try and stop the rumour if you can. Rarity’s been crying all day in our room. You had better apologise.”
Miri trotted off to go and do that, and I headed for the common room. Somepony had to know which room belonged to Minty.
Apparently Minty lived in a different block to us, so I made my way there and hoped that no teachers spotted me wandering around after lessons. I’d memorised her room number and I banged loudly on the door.
“Oh, hi Cat,” the pony who came to the door said. “Why are you here?”
“Hi Dusk Pear. Is Minty in?”
“Yeah, she’s here.”
Minty came to the door, looking bored.
“Minty, who told you that horrible rumour about Rarity?” I asked sternly.
The pegasus with the green mane just shrugged. “I can’t tell you that.”
“I’m not joking. You do know it’s not true?”
“How do I know that? I haven’t got any proof.”
I shook my head. Minty had always been a difficult pony to get along with. “It’s not true, so there’s no point spreading it around. Everypony will know you’re making it up.”
“I didn’t make it up!”
“Then who told you?”
“Okay, so I heard it from Sky Prancer.”
I didn’t know the name. “Who’s Sky Prancer?”
“She’s a fourth year.”
“Who did she hear it from?”
“She overheard two ponies talking about it.”
“Was it Miri?”
Minty blanched at the name. “Ugh, I hate that pony so much.”
“I don’t care who you hate.”
“Yeah, she heard Miri telling some green pegasus. There are a few of us green pegasi around so I don’t know who that was exactly.”
“Thanks Minty. Now please stop spreading it.”
“Yeah right.” She shut the door in my face.
“And tell Sky Prancer to stop, too!” I yelled through the door, pounding it with my hooves before turning and walking away, feeling angry.
The rumour continued to be spread, but after I told Rarity that I had confronted Minty, she seemed comforted enough to return to lessons. Of course, there were still exams to do work for amongst all of this. Miri spent the next week trying to make it up to Rarity by helping her with everything she could.
I filled Fly in with all of the details of what had happened, and she just seemed resigned to it.
“It was inevitable. Miri would leak it sooner or later. At least this time she was just overheard telling me,” Fly said, rolling her eyes.
Rarity still had to endure whispers and pointing hooves wherever she went, but Miri was telling everypony about how the rumour was just something Minty had made up because Minty had been turned down by a colt. This seemed to do the trick, and although I didn’t really approve of making up a mean rumour about Minty, it did mean that some of the whispers and points shifted to the gossipy pegasus, which made Rarity feel a little bit better.
All that remained, apart from the fact that I was even further behind on my exam revision, was to find this River Blossom pony and see her for myself. I was turning into a regular detective pony, always trying to find clues to her existence. Eventually my chance came after a music class. I had asked the teacher and she told me that River Blossom was in the music class that was using the room next, so I deliberately spilt my pencil case all over the floor. By the time I’d tidied it up, the next class of ponies were on the way in.
I spotted her as I left, and we passed in the corridor. The moment she spotted me she went red and looked away, pretending to be absorbed in the wall next to her. I smiled to myself and remembered when I’d seen the popular ponies when I was younger, always chatting excitedly about them afterwards. But some small part of me managed to note that River Blossom was actually a very pretty filly. This was a thought I tried to ignore.
The exams went okay, In my opinion. We got our results back almost instantly since they were only mocks, and everything except history turned out to be a pleasant surprise. History was... well it was disappointing. And I didn’t pass.
“Don’t worry. It’s ages until the real exam,” Rarity told me, but deep down I knew that I probably wouldn’t pass that either. Not that it mattered, since I had the luxury of dropping one subject at the end of the year. But that was still months away and history wasn’t getting any easier.
I felt a little bit down about everything and spent a few hours moping around in the room, feeling disappointed in myself after all of that revision. Fly tried to cheer me up by talking about how it wasn’t too long until the holidays were here again, but it didn’t really make me feel any better. In the end, Rarity had the brainwave that finally got me out of my slump.
“I know what will cheer you up darling. I’ll give you a makeover!”
I asked if I could have faux ears and just got a frosty look in return.
Rarity and Fly went shopping in secret. I wasn’t allowed to know what they were buying me, but I gave them all of the bits I had left for the term. I wasn’t sure what I was letting myself in for, but Miri was staying at home so I was sure that their choices would at least look tasteful. In fact I could feel myself getting excited to see what they had in store, but Miri kept me occupied by blabbing on about some scandal involving a younger pony who had called a teacher a rude word and subsequently got triple detention. I just tried to get my homework out of the way.
When they got back, they were carrying a number of bags that they hid from me.
“Now now Cat, it’ll be more of a surprise if you just be patient,” Rarity told me as Fly blindfolded me with an empty pillowcase. I didn’t like not being able to see, so Miri guided me over towards the bathroom where Rarity wanted to get to work.
“Hey, don’t play some mean joke on me,” I complained, wondering if they were going to dress me up in some costume. “I don’t think I could take that.”
“Just stop talking and let me take care of you,” Rarity told me, slapping my flailing hooves. “Stay still.”
I had a fright when I felt the scissors snipping my mane.
“I told you to stay still!” Rarity sighed. “If you move around you’ll end up looking a sight.”
Fly carefully held me in place on the chair while Rarity snipped here and there, doing something that I couldn’t work out. With nothing to look at, I suddenly felt a whole host of itches that I hadn’t had before, and whenever I could I scratched them with a hoof, usually getting a slap from Fly or Rarity, I couldn’t tell which.
Once they were finished torturing my poor mane, which looked bad enough to begin with, Rarity started work on my tail. This kept sending funny sensations up my back, enough to make me squirm and get a poke from a disapproving hoof.
Next they started with clothes, which meant a lot of having my hooves moved around and negotiated into sleeves. I was desperate to open my eyes, especially after Rarity spent another five minutes adjusting my mane.
Then came make-up, which meant they had to remove my blindfold. I had to keep my eyes closed at all times, and when they were allowed to be opened briefly, Fly stood between me and the mirror so I couldn’t see anything, and Rarity applied the eye make-up with her magic.
“Why can’t I see? Surely you must be nearly done,” I complained when Fly made me close my eyes again.
“Five more minutes,” Fly told me gently, trying to keep me from moving around too much. Rarity giggled and I suspected that they were having a laugh at my expense.
“Let me seeeeeee!” I whined, flailing my hooves and getting another slap. “Pleeeeease?”
Rarity was making some adjustments to something, then stopped. “I declared this makeover done! Show Miri in.”
I had to keep my eyes closed while Miri made excited noises at my appearance. The tension was killing me, and I had convinced myself that it was some kind of mass joke between the other three. I decided to count down from ten and then take a peek.
“Okay, Fly, put her in front of the mirror. Cat, you can look now,” Rarity said just as my count reached five.
I did as she asked for a change, opening my eyes slowly and letting them adjust to the light, then focusing on the pony in the mirror. She looked a little bit shocked. My mane had been cut into a slightly wavy style and whatever Rarity had used had given it a bit more volume than it normally had. The same could be said for my tail. They’d bought me a shimmery white dress that went well with my coat, but there were obvious some details that Rarity had added and made it look even better.
My make-up had been expertly applied and made the whole thing look even more amazing. I paused for a few moments to take it in, and then started gushing.
“Oh thank you sooo much Rarity and Fly you’ve done such a great job I really look amazing oh my this is so great I can’t believe-” I said all in one go, hopping around on the spot.
“You’re very welcome, Cat,” Rarity told me, turning a little red at my gratitude. “It was nothing, really.”
“I chose the dress,” Fly told me shyly, still taking it in. “But Rarity made it so great.”
I was just continuously squee-ing and hopping around happily, so Miri dragged me into the room so I could look in the full-length mirror. I just looked so nice, even better than I had at the Hearth’s Warming Dance.
“You really do look good, Cat,” Miri told me, admiring my manestyle.
“Your mane should definitely look better than it usually does, even without the special stuff on it,” Rarity told me. “I found some tips in a magazine on how to give manecuts and turned out to be pretty good at it.”
I pulled all three of my friends into a hug.
Eventually Miri insisted it was a moment too good to miss and dashed downstairs to borrow a school camera. We worked out how to take pictures with a delay so that all four of us could be in it, and Miri gave me the photo that it printed.
“You should keep this. I have the one from the dance,” she told me. “Plus the one you’ve got is probably from fourth year or something.”
With some guilt, I realised she was right, so I packed the photo carefully away in my suitcase so that I wouldn’t forget to take it home.
The next morning, Rarity helped me do my hair again so that it looked just as good. I couldn’t wear the dress for lessons, but for once I drew admiring glances from the other fillies as I made my way around school. I spotted Rarity taking a certain amount of satisfaction from it, which she was entitled to do. She’d really done a magnificent job, and I wasn’t exactly the perfect material to be working with. Throughout my music lesson I just glowed with happiness that my mane was finally nice-looking.
On the way out, I was thinking about what might potentially be for lunch and wasn’t really looking where I was going. So, of course, I walked straight into another pony, knocking her flat onto her rump.
“Oh my, I’m so sorry,” I said, reaching out a hoof and helping her to her hooves.
“No, that’s okay,” the pony replied, rubbing her bruises. She took one look at me and her eyes widened in some kind of mixture of fear and shock. I instinctively touched my face with my hooves, wondering if the collision had given me a nosebleed.
Then it clicked. The pony I’d knocked over was River Blossom, and a blush was spreading across her face as she stared at the ground, drawing figures of eight with one of her hooves.
“Oh, you’re River Blossom?” I asked, looking at her.
“Um... yes.”
“I heard about you from one of my friends, I think. You like music too.”
She brightened a little and looked at me, her blue eyes looking into mine. “Yes.”
I noticed her cutie mark was of a musical score, which tallied up with what I’d just said. “Um, anyway. I’ve got to go, got to get some lunch,” I said, starting to head for the common room after the strange encounter.
“Wait, Toccata?” River Blossom asked, looking terribly nervous.
“Yes? Oh, and please call me Cat,” I replied, swivelling around to look at her.
“I... no wait never mind.”
“Okay. See you around, River Blossom,” I said, turning again and heading for the door.
“No, no, wait!”
I paused again.
“No... it’s okay.”
This time I left, shaking my head and wondering what she could possibly have wanted. Probably fashion advice. Well, good thing she bottled it, since I wouldn’t have been much help whatsoever.
I picked up some sandwiches and juice from the cafeteria and then headed for the common room, the funny encounter with the younger filly still playing over in my head. I felt bad for knocking her over.
“Hi Cat, I saved you a seat,” Fly said, pointing to the empty seat by the window that was next to her. I took it gratefully.
“How was music?” she asked as I unwrapped my food.
“Uneventful,” I said truthfully, still mulling over the encounter in my head.
Rarity and Fly went back to whatever they were discussing while I stared out of the window and wondered about River Blossom. She’d seemed so embarrassed to bump into me. When I was a fifth-year pony, I suppose I would have been embarrassed to bump into one of the fashion icons that I admired from afar. But then they were all much older than me - they’d all left the school by the time I was a fifth year. It was certainly unusual for fillies to admire others who were only a year older. Oh well. I continued with my sandwich, accepting that I was never going to be able to work out the minds of others.
“What are you thinking about?” Fly asked, noticing my vacant expression.
“Oh, nothing,” I said, shrugging. “Just thinking about that filly who sent me the Hearts & Hooves card.”
“River something?” Rarity asked, pausing halfway through her lunch. “Miri told me. She’s a bit old to be admiring you.”
“I think she just likes my musical talent,” I replied. “I keep seeing her outside music class.”
“You are very talented at playing the piano,” Fly told me. “I wish you’d play it more so I could listen.”
Nothing was worse than performing on the piano. All those ponies staring at me, waiting for me to make a single mistake... no way. I hated it.
“Maybe once. Ever. I don’t like doing it,” I said.
Rarity shrugged. “It’s a better talent than having a gem detecting spell.”
“Yeah, but you can make beautiful dresses. That’s a good talent.”
The unicorn smiled. “Maybe. But you can make beautiful music, which is just as important.” Fly nodded vigorously in agreement, and I sighed.
“I wish it wasn’t so nerve-racking though.”
The door to the common room opened and Miri came in with a funny expression on her face. She walked over to the table, and Rarity pointed her towards the empty seat.
“Um, Cat? Somepony wants to talk to you,” she said.
“Who?”
“It’s River Blossom.”
I spotted a hint of pink tail outside the door to the common room, so I left my lunch and got up to go and find out what she wanted.
“Hi River Blossom.”
“Oh, hi Cat. I hoped you were in there.” There was a pause as I waited for her to elaborate, but she was rapidly blushing again. I could practically feel it from where I was stood. The younger filly waited for another pony to pass in the corridor before continuing.
“I wanted to ask you something.”
“Ask away. But if it’s about fashion, I’ll go and get my friend Rarity. She knows about it better than I do.”
“No, it’s not fashion.”
“Music?”
“No.”
Her voice was tailing away to a squeak, and I wondered if she was ever going to spit it out.
“Well?”
She shifted nervously from hoof to hoof, biting her lip.
“Do you want advice about something?” I tried, studying her face to see if there was any reaction. There wasn’t, unless you count her looking even more embarrassed. “Well, if you think of it, I’ll be in there eating my lunch,” I eventually said, not wanting to be rude.
“Wait... um...”
I paused, deciding that this was the final time I was going to listen to one of her ‘Wait... oh actually no’ statements.
“Cat... do you, um, well, will you go out with me?”