A few months have passed since Winter Wrap-Up, and you were enjoying a pseudo-normal life with Ditzy. Nothing exciting had happened for awhile, not that you were complaining. Dramatic events only made your and Ditzy’s life more complicated, so for the most part it was good to have a break.
With spring showers coming in seemingly random intervals, work had kept you busier than ever, and it was a group effort to get the clouds in position in time. But the start of spring also brought sickness. Ditzy was one of the many that caught this bug. It wasn’t a serious condition, but it had kept her bedridden for the past week with a fever and flu-like symptoms. Today you decided that enough was enough, and much to Ditzy’s displeasure, you were dragging her out of bed to go see Nurse Redheart.
“Don’t make me get up,” Ditzy moaned as she slipped under the covers. She clutched weakly at the bottom of the mattress, doing her best to prevent you from dragging her out of bed.
“Please get up,” you plead, refusing to give in without a fight. Well this has to be the first time I’m trying to get her out of the bed. You suppress your somewhat-dirty thoughts for the sake of Ditzy’s health and redouble your efforts to separate her from the sheets. “Sweetie, can you please come with me?” you exhale through gritted teeth as you try pulling her again.
“No!” she shouts, gripping the mattress even tighter.
“I need you to get out of bed, now!”
“I feel fine!”
“Good, that means you can get out of bed.”
“I don’t wanna!”
“You’re so difficult sometimes,” you grunted.
“Be nice, I’m sick. Now let me stay in bed.”
“See, you admitted it!”
She scowls, unhappy about walking into that verbal trap. “Don’t play mind games with me, mister!”
Stepping back momentarily to catch your breath, you lean against the wall and slide down to the floor. “What will it take to get you out of bed?” you ask with a hint of futility.
“Well,” Ditzy slowly pokes her head out from under the bedsheets, confident that you had given up for the moment. “You could, carry me.” She ended the sentence with a large bright smile, uncharacteristic of her current condition. You looked back at her with a defeated expression.
“Is that the only thing that will get you up?”
“Yep.”
“And if I try anything else you are going to flop on the bed and stay there until I carry you?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wonderful.”
After somehow managing to get through the door, you start your walk to the hospital. As expected, the additional weight made you a little more sluggish. You turn your head to see if Ditzy is ready to walk on her own, watching as she lies contently across your back. She gives you a warm smile before relaxing again.
“You know, I never thought that having a girlfriend would be this much trouble,” you say, smiling.
She sticks out her tongue at you playfully. “And I never thought that having a boyfriend would have all these perks.”
You sigh. “Well, we better get going before my back gives out. I’m not your pack mule, you know.”
“That’s racist.”
“Do you want me to drop you off here and make you walk the rest of the way?”
“No...”
“Good, be nice.”
You walk out into the street, catching sight of Sparkler, Dinky, and Wingsley all standing together. Today, Wingsley and Sparkler were going to have a ‘practically-brother-and-sister-bonding-day.’ You and Ditzy feel that those two should spend more time together. Dinky was somewhat disappointed that she wasn’t able to go, but she understood how important this was. Sparkler said that she had a fun place to take Wingsley and you trust her judgement. They were in the middle of conversation when they saw you with Ditzy strewn across your back.
Wingsley turned his head, confused at the situation in front of him. “Hey Big Bro, what’cha doin’ with Ditzy?” he asked.
“I’ve noticed that Ditzy has had a sore throat lately along with some other things,” you say in a sincere voice. “It’s better for everyone if we can handle this as soon as possible.”
“When you say...” Wingsley’s voice trails off, the unspoken question hanging in the air.. “You know what, never mind.” Only now do you realize how your statement might have been interpreted to a colt at his age. To avoid any further awkwardness you decide to leave it be and walk off to get Ditzy her check-up.
Ditzy props her head up and calls to the kids, saying “Now be good girls, mommy loves you. I’ll see you both later. And make sure to have fun, Wingsley.” She waves to them as you both disappear down the street. “You know, I think you may have just scarred Wingsley with that little slip-up,” says Ditzy, once you’re out of sight.
“No kidding. I mean, it didn’t help that you were riding me as well, but...” Ditzy just smiled at you with her eyebrow raised. You hang your head in shame. “Dear Celestia, what is wrong with me today?”
“Ditzy Doo?” called the receptionist. You perk up and turn towards the front desk to see the receptionist looking at you and Ditzy. “Nurse Redheart will see you now.” Ditzy blew her nose into her final tissue and began to stand up. She was a little uneasy and wobbling, so giving her a hoof, you help support her as she made her way towards the door.
“Took them long enough.” Ditzy looks up at you and chuckles.
“Better late than never.”
“And by late you mean…” she prompted.
“I mean about two hours after the expected time,” you sigh.
For the amount of time you spent in the waiting room, the actual appointment was pretty short and straight forward. Once you were inside her office, Nurse Redheart gave a quick examination and asked a few questions to Ditzy while you were forced to wait outside. After what felt like an eternity, you were allowed back in and the nurse gave her diagnosis. She told you both it was a more severe case of the virus that was going around, and gave Ditzy some medication, saying it would take care of some of the pain but she should stay in bed during this time. The side effects are apparently different for everypony. You thanked her and headed back home with Ditzy in tow.
“Hey,” she spoke up softly, not more than thirty feet from the entrance from the clinic. “I’m feeling kinda tired, can you carry me back home?” She flashes a warm smile to go along with it while wobbling slightly.
“Sure,” you respond. You pick her up again and place her over your back, the same way you brought her here. Once she was safely secured, it wasn’t long before you heard a small sigh of contentment and the slow, steady breathing of a sleeping pony. Smiling, you begin walking back home. It wasn’t the most comfortable arrangement, but compared to your life before, carrying your girlfriend home on your back was easily bearable. You’re happy that you can manage to enjoy these small luxuries, not to say that Ditzy being sick was a luxury, but a cute pony cuddling up on your back certainly was. Laughing at how much of a hopeless romantic you are, you continue your journey.
“Hey, we’re home,” you call into the house, not sure if anypony was home. After hearing only silence in response, you conclude that Wingsley and Sparkler must still be out and Dinky mentioned earlier she was going to play with the Cutie Mark Crusaders. You sigh and move to Ditzy’s bedroom, placing her on her bed and pulling the covers over her. Doing this action awakens her from her slumber momentarily.
“Hey what’s up, is it time to work now?” Ditzy asks groggily.
“No, I know how much you wanted to work today but you need to rest. Go ahead and take a nap.”
“Nap time?”
“Yes, nap time.” With an affirmative grunt, Ditzy rolls over and begins snoring again. Chuckling a little, you take a moment to write a note to Ditzy explaining that you have to work a single shift today and she needs to stay in bed until you arrive home. Ditzy had volunteered a few weeks ago to help set up some event at Town Hall that was scheduled today. Although she really wanted to participate, you make it very clear in your note that you’re forbidding her from working. It’s for her best interests that you didn’t want her to do anything.
“I’ll be back to check up on you,” you say to an unresponsive Ditzy. Smiling lightly, you closed the door gently and left.
Work wasn’t anything too difficult. Standard operating procedure: Move clouds, move more clouds, destroy clouds, make sky look neat. It’s all habit at this point. At least it pays well, or well enough I guess. Anyway, it’s time to make sure that Ditzy is still in bed. You fly at a leisurely pace away from the weather station without a worry.
I mean what could go wrong at this point?
For a while this appeared to be the case; you drift through your tasks with ease and finish your shift for the day. Sitting on the bench across from your locker, you pack your items back into their respective places, slowly and without hurry. You close your eyes and take a deep breath, enjoying the relative peace. You aren’t in any rush to get back home. Ditzy should be sleeping, and after being on edge for a few days, you deserved this break.
From the side you notice one of the showers being turned off. You turn in mild curiosity to find out who it was. Seeing Prevailing come in, you wave lazily.
“You look beat,” stated Prevailing as he turned and opened his own locker.
“Yeah, it’s been a tough week with Ditzy being sick.” You sigh to emphasize your point.
“Oh I forgot,” Prevailing said, picking up interest. “How is she doing?”
“Hopefully better now, I just took her to see Nurse Redheart. She gave her some medicine to help with the symptoms. It’s a waiting game now.”
“So is she resting right now?”
“Yep, I’m going to head- Wait!” you shout in sudden realization.
“What is it?” Prevailing asked, unsure about what was happening.
“I remembered that I need to pick up something,” you hurriedly explain as you finish pack up your things. With a slight smile on your face you rush out the door. You thought that you heard Prevailing ask something regarding your sudden explosion of energy, but by the time he would have finished you were already out the door. You fly at breakneck speed to your destination, a smile plastered over your face.
“Here you go sir,” the store owner pleasantly says as he hands your item to you.
“Thanks, this was the first chance I had to come and pick it up.” You place the large amount of bits on the counter for the transaction.
“I understand, I’ve been in this business long enough to know how careful you have to be with something this important.” You nodd at him and put the item in a concealed section of you bags. As you make your way toward the door, the owner calls to you, “I feel I’m inclined to ask, when are going to do it?”
You pause, head tilted up in contemplation. After a moment, you turn back towards him, give a smile and say simply, “Soon.”
It doesn’t take you long after that to arrive home. Putting your bags down, you walk up to the bedroom. You open the door slowly, knowing that you probably wouldn’t disturb her but deciding to be careful anyway. “Ditzy? You awake?”
There was no answer. “I guess it’s for the best, she should be resting as much as she can.”
You walk over to where she was sleeping, pulling the covers up to make sure she was doing okay. Turns out the jury was still out on that question, since there was only a Ditzy sized imprint of where she was supposed to be. You nervously tilt your head to the side. “Or maybe she decided to run off while under the effects of heavy drugs. I guess that’s good too.” You pause, not exactly sure how to react to the present situation. “Okay this probably isn’t as bad as it seems,” you say to yourself, voice wavering. “Or maybe this is one of the worst things that could ever happen and lead to a series of catastrophic events, maybe. Hopefully not, but maybe, probably, I really need to find her.”
With that you dash down the stairs as fast as you can, opening and hurtling out the door in one quick motion. As you run down the street, your head swivels left and right, surveying and scanning all visible locations. Where could she be? What was work that she was doing? Dammit, why can’t I remember? It was somewhere in town so that narrows it down to anywhere I haven’t looked yet. Fantastic. Sweet Celestia, I can’t think right now. You stop suddenly, eyes wide open, mouth agape. “Oh, buck me!”
“Now, careful, Derpy! Don't want to do any more damage than you've already done,” said Rainbow Dash in a mildly annoyed tone. You were speechless, it was like watching an oncoming carriage wreck. No matter how hard you tried you couldn’t look away. There was a crash, and the next thing you knew, everything was in pieces.
“I just don’t know what went wrong,” she exclaimed in her congested voice.
You weren’t sure what happened in the next few minutes; you had buried your face in your hooves to not look at the rampant destruction your girlfriend was causing.
Please Celestia, let this nightmare end, you beg.
Following the incident, fearing the medication she took had unforeseen side effects, you rushed Ditzy to the hospital with the help of Prevailing, who you had managed to flag down. The doctors had taken her from you and you were forced to stay in the waiting room.
“How long are they going to take?” you frustratedly ask no-pony in particular, your patience wearing thin.
“Hey, don’t worry about it.” Prevailing gave you a slight shove to break you from your trance. “The doctors are just checking up on her, nothing is going to go wrong. Speaking of which, what happened?”
“Hmm? What do you mean ‘what happened’?” you ask sharply, not really in the mood for conversation.
“Town Hall, or whatever is left of it. When I saw it, it seemed like it had invoked the wrath of an angry god or something.”
You look away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, it was like that when I got there. Your guess is as good as mine.” Prevailing sighed in defeat; noticing you weren’t in the mood for casual chit-chat, he relaxed back into his seat.
The clock on the wall ticked away in a quiet rhythm. Seconds slowly became minutes, and the minutes seemed to take hours. You sat in silent thought, thinking of all the worst possible situations that Ditzy could be in. Beside you, Prevailing had his eyes fixed on a worn out magazine titled “Colt Quarterly”. If the clock wasn’t there, you could have sworn you had been sitting in the waiting room for word of Ditzy’s condition for days, but realistically it had only been 45 minutes before a light orange mare came through a door to your right and called your name.
“You and your friend can come on back now, Ditzy’s stable.”
You leap to your hooves and moved to the doorway before Prevailing even had time to put down the magazine. With Prevailing in tow, you briskly make your way through the hospital’s many hallways until you arrive at Ditzy’s room. The door to the room was open, and inside you could see a much more coherent Ditzy, skimming whatever reading material was with her. You knock on the doorframe before cautiously peeking your head in. Ditzy jumped at the noise, looking towards you, and as she realized who it was, she visibly relaxed and gave a small smile.
“Hey,” she said meekly, still smiling up at you. “Sorry to put you through all of this.”
Relieved that she was back to her normal self, you took a deep breath and returned her smile. It felt like you were holding all the stress of the day in your wings; as you exhaled, all of the built-up tension left you and was replaced by a soreness similar to a day of flying against the wind in a snowstorm. Having actually done that once or twice, the feeling was not welcomed. Even so, you shrug off your discomfort, trying to put on a calm face for Ditzy. You felt it was best that she didn’t know how worried you had been about her. While there was nothing inherently wrong with that, you liked to have the façade of a calm, cool stallion. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it,” you tell her in a smooth, level voice. “Just stay in bed next time, alright?”
Ditzy looks at you with an apologetic expression. “Yeah, I guess can do that.”
“Good,” you respond, going over to her and giving her a kiss on the forehead. Ditzy gave a cute giggle, happy you weren’t mad at her. Of course, it wasn’t like you could stay mad at her for very long, and by now you’ve pretty much forgotten that you ever were angry in the first place. You stare at each other deeply, comforted by the simple fact of being together.
“If you want a few minutes, or something, just let me know,” Prevailing interrupted. “I’ll step out for a little while. Just put a coat or something on the door, alright?”
“Come on Prevailing don’t be such an ass-” you began, cutting yourself off. Standing in the doorway was Dinky. Prevailing, also noticing this, forced himself to keep a lid on what he was about to say. The air of the room changed as everyone censored themselves for the young one in their midst.
“Dinky, where have you been?” you ask sternly, tone changing completely.
“Sorry,” Dinky responded. “I stayed at the town hall for a while. I thought it would be fine.”
“Didn’t you see me rush your mom to the hospital? Why didn’t you come with us?” you scold her.
“I did see you, but I was with an old friend of Mom’s, so I thought that it would be okay if I stayed.”
“Old friend?” You turn and look at Ditzy, who just shrugged, unsure about the conversation.
“When did I introduce you to them, sweetie?” Ditzy asked, clearly wanting to know more about this new pony.
“I just met him today, but he knew all about you, so I assumed he was a friend.”
“Dinky, were you ever taught not to talk to strangers?” you sigh, more than a little disturbed about this whole ordeal for some reason.
“Dinky, what was his name?” Ditzy asked, her voice a surprisingly emotionless monotone.
“He said that he was going to come back sometime soon and say hello and ‘catch up on old times,’ or something…” Dinky continued, not seeming to have noticed the question.
“What was his name!” Ditzy demanded, her outburst scaring you half to death. You had never seen her act this way towards Dinky before.
“He said it was... um... Max. Maxwell Hooves,” Dinky mumbled, unsure about being yelled at.
You turn to Ditzy, disturbed by her sudden change. “Hey, why did you need to know his name so badly? Ditzy?” You aren’t sure that she even heard you. Her eyes were wide open, pupils contracted to a dot. Her breathing came in uneasy gasps. A single bead of sweat ran down her muzzle. Unhappy at being left out of the loop, you glance over at Prevailing, only to see the same thing from him. A shroud of hostility swept over his face, eyes focused on the floor in front of him. His teeth dug into his lip so hard, he drew blood. “Ditzy? Who is this guy? Ditzy!”
“He... he. He’s Dinky’s father.”
You sit back in a chair, overwhelmed and lost. It had only been a few hours since Ditzy received the shocking revelation that her ex-lover had returned to Ponyville. It was almost too much for you to comprehend. You had no idea how to help her, nor did you have the faintest clue what you were going to do about the situation. Ditzy had been pacing impatiently for a while now, almost as if she was trying to wear a hole through the floor tiles.
You get up and walk over to her. The least you can do is try to comfort her, and it’s questionable at best if that will even work. You placed a hoof on her back, startling her as she jumped with surprise. “Are you alright?” you ask, equally surprised at her reaction.
“Sorry, I’m just a little tense.”
“I’m sure, it only makes sense,” you empathize with her. “But still, pacing isn’t going to help. It’s past midnight, you need sleep.” It wouldn’t fix anything and you understood that, but having her stay up won’t be healthy. Her mind is working in overdrive, thinking about her different moves in this chess game of life, how to effectively deal with this bad situation and come out ahead. Needless to say, Ditzy wasn’t making any progress.
As her emotions and exhaustion finally caught up with her, Ditzy dropped down and sat, defeated, on the floor. She looked up at you with tears in her eyes and managed to express all of her frustration, hopelessness, and pain with two words.
“I’m scared...”
Without any further prompting, you walk up to her and embrace her. You held her softly yet firmly, letting her know that you would be there to support her wherever she went.
Ditzy’s grasp around your shoulders faltered, and you managed to catch her before she slipped from your arms completely. She was so tired from the day’s events, you doubted she would even be able to stand up straight on her own. Carefully, you lead her up to her room and tuck her into bed. A grateful smile on Ditzy’s face eases your mind. It’s been a long day for all of us. Before bed, you decide to head back down to the kitchen for tea, and as you reach for the box, you notice something propped against a half-eaten muffin on the counter. It’s a letter. Your curiosity gets the better of you and you can’t help but look to see who the letter’s from.
“Cloudsdale? Huh, the hospital? Did they send me an overdue bill or something?” you mutter as you tear the top of the envelope off. Carefully removing the letter, you unfolded it and read what was on the page.
Dear Next of Kin,
It is with a heavy heart that we must send this letter. We regret to inform you that your father passed away Monday of this week and was discovered in his house at 8:00 pm. The report says that he was found by his neighbor, who told the officials that he was going over to bring over soup as a “late dinner.” He followed up by calling emergency personnel immediately after. The cause of death was most likely self-inflicted. Again we are....
The ceremony will be held...
...severe depression...
…don’t blame yourself...
...our sincere condolences...
“No. No. No. It can’t be. They’re lying.” You laughed , with not a speck of humor present in your voice. “Alright, the joke’s over, it couldn’t be right.” You go back to re-read the page, but the words refused to change. Your back leg became weak and you collapsed, not even caring. “No, please Celestia, Luna, tell me that this isn’t true!” You lay on the ground in shock. Your mind, normally active, was as empty as the void.
“It can’t be true...”