//------------------------------// // Chapter 8: School Days // Story: Two Worlds; One Family // by MrEnter //------------------------------// After Rarity's forgiveness, things more or less turned to normal in Fluttershy's life. Or at least, as close to normal as they could get. Fluttershy still avoided taking walks in town with Harry. Sad to say, but Rarity's reaction wasn't too far out of the norm. Unfortunately, Fluttershy couldn't hide Harry from the world forever. Harry and Fluttershy walked through the town to get to the school house. Along the way they got those stares and scoffs. Harry was blissfully unaware. He kept rambling on about all of the colts and fillies he was going to meet. After all of this time they still looked at Harry like that. If this was how the adults were acting, then how would the kids treat him? "Hello Cheerilee," Fluttershy said. "Hi... Fluttershy, is it? What brings you here?" Cheerilee replied. She was looking through papers so she didn't pay Fluttershy much mind. "I'm here to enroll my son in your class," Fluttershy said. Her mind ran with panic. "I didn't know you had a son," Cheerilee said. She put down her papers and gave Fluttershy her undivided attention. Harry popped out from behind Fluttershy, and in a moment of weakness Cheerilee cringed. Fluttershy stepped back and prepare for the scream, or the refusal, or anything but what actually happened. Harry walked up to Cheerilee and introduced himself, catching her off guard. "Well hello there," Cheerilee said, lost for words. "Why don't you go play outside while me and your mommy talk?" Harry nodded and ran outside. Cheerilee looked to Fluttershy, but stayed quiet for awhile. Fluttershy's mind moved even faster. Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe Fluttershy should have tried to school Harry at home. "Nice kid you've got there," Cheerilee blurted out. "I'm sure he'll make lots of friends." "So you're going to let him enroll?" "What kind of teacher would I be if I turned any student away?" The next morning, Fluttershy and Harry stood outside the school house waiting for class to begin. Fluttershy kept him close, asking him all sorts of questions: if he had his lunch, if his jacket was too tight, and the most asked question, was he going to be alright. She kept nuzzling him until Cheerilee rang a bell to signal all the kids to come inside. "We have a new student today," Cheerilee said nervously to the class. "Harry, why don't you come up here and introduce yourself?" Harry got up in front of the class and started to talk a little about himself. The other kids in his class just looked on in stunned silence for awhile. Some made gagging noises, others gave canned laughter. Harry didn't seem to notice until after he was done talking. "That was really interesting Harry," Cherilee said. She turned to the class, "Does anypony have any questions for Harry?" "Yeah, what is he?" a filly in the front row asked. The class errupted in laughter. Harry was confused. Why were they laughing at him? Did he do something funny? Was there a joke that he missed? The worst part of it was that they didn't stop. Cheerilee tried to calm down the class, but their laughter was insatiable. "I'm a mira ," Harry said. "I know what you are," another kid responded. "You're a freak!" The class laughed even louder. Harry felt tears welling up in his eyes. Cheerilee still failed to calm down the class. She tried shouting, banging a ruler on the board, but nothing would stop them. Harry ended up running out of the class crying. Cheerilee huffed, defeated by the rambunctious school kids. She decided to follow after Harry instead of continuing there. If she couldn't calm down the class, then perhaps she could calm Harry down. "Why were they laughing at me?" Harry asked, sitting on a stump in the courtyard, still sobbing. "Kids can be mean sometimes," Cheerilee comforted him. "You can't let them bother you. Listen to me: sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me." "Ms. Cheerilee, do you know what I am?" Harry asked, wiping away the tears from his eyes. "Yes I do. You're a kid who needs to get back to class. Come on now." Harry's first day of school was not his best. Whenever Cheerilee's back was turned, the kids that didn't snicker or sneer outright threw stuff at him. And then there were the insults. Oh, you're not a freak, you're a crybaby! What was it like to be born in the Everfree? Wow, your mommy loves you when you look like that? Wish my mommy was blind too, I could get away with so much. By the end of the day Harry was coming close to being in tears once more. As soon as Cheerilee rang that bell he dashed outside, excited and relieved to leave all of that torment behind him. He felt so happy that his mother was right outside waiting. Harry ran up and embraced her, bursting into tears. "I'm never going back there! Mommy it was awful!" Fluttershy knew what happened. In fact she almost expected it to happen, though she prayed that it wouldn't. Fluttershy thought back to her days as a filly. It must have been so much worse for Harry. And it made it so much harder to say what she had to say. "It'll be okay. But you have to go back tomorrow. Try to be brave for mommy." Harry stepped back. Mommy made all the bad things go away. She always did! Why did she want him to go back to that horrible place? Did she want him to feel sad, to be hurt by the other kids? Did she want to see him in tears? If that was the case, he was happy to oblige. He cried harder than he had cried all day, and ran into town. "Hey kid, you look bluer than I do." "Hi Rainbow," Harry said. He was sobbing under a tree. "Did something happen? I don't think I've ever seen you like this. You're usually happy enough to make Pinkie Pie look depressed." "Today was my first day of school," Harry sniffed. "The other kids were so mean to me. They made me cry, and that made them meaner! Mommy said that I had to go back tomorrow so I ran away. I don't ever want to go back!" "Wow, you are Fluttershy's son," Rainbow said. She sat down next to Harry and put her wing around him. "What's that supposed to mean?" Harry asked, wiping away the snot and the tears. "Ponies used to tease her a lot, and the only way she was able to deal with it was by running away. That was a long time ago though." "I've never seen Mommy run away from anything," Harry said, almost angry that someone was insulting her. "Yeah, she has been brave for awhile. You know what I think? I think she's been brave for you. I bet she's thinking 'what would Harry think if he saw his brave Mommy running away?'" "You really think that she's brave because of me?" "The proof is in the pudding. Maybe you should be brave for Mommy?" "But... it's just so hard." "Lots of things are hard, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try them. I've done things that I not only thought were hard, but impossible." "Like what?" "I pulled off a sonic rainboom: a huge boom with rainbow colors in the sky. I'm gonna have to show you one some day. Hey, that gives me an idea. If you be brave for Mommy for a whole week I'll let you ride on my back and I'll fly you around Ponyville. But you need to be brave! Can't have you getting scared up there because once Rainbow gets going, she don't stop!" "Oh you found him Rainbow, thank Celestia!" Fluttershy said, running up the hill towards the tree. She ran and nuzzled Harry once again. "I've been looking all over for you. You had me so worried. I'm sorry I made you go to that place. If you don't want to go back, you don't have to." Rainbow Dash raised her eyebrow at Harry. "No Mommy, I'll be brave. I'll go back. For you."