//------------------------------// // Epilogue // Story: Falling For Our Stars // by bobdat //------------------------------// Epilogue One Year Later Dear Rarity, Thank you for your latest letter. I’m glad that Sweetie Belle is getting on okay, and that the boutique is running smoothly. I promised you I’d visit and I will - as soon as I can get the bits! I’m just back from visiting Fly. You’ll be surprised to hear that she’s not the top of her class at Oxmare; there’s a colt who is outperforming her, but only just. Apparently they’re rivals now, but I think it’ll turn into love before long! Just don’t tell her I said that, she’s not really over that break-up with her coltfriend yet. She says to thank you for the flowers you sent for her mother’s funeral last week. It was rather sad, and Fly is having a hard time, but you cheered her up a great deal. She apologises for not having written you a letter, but the circumstances are rather upsetting. Miri was at the funeral, although the occasion meant she was a little subdued. She’s been elected president of her university debating society, which is keeping her busy. She gave me a letter to send to you, so hopefully you’ll find that enclosed. It saves on postage if we send stuff together! Miri also says she’s going to visit the boutique as soon as we’ve got the money, so you’d better design something extra-special for us to buy. I’m fine otherwise. I’m auditioning for the Britannic National Orchestra, which has an open slot at piano, but it’s a long shot. I’m hoping it’ll get me experience of professional auditions more than anything. Otherwise I’m just gearing up to go back to Princess in the autumn. I’m living in a house with two other musicians, so we’ve had to soundproof the walls! It’s nothing like as fun as sharing a room with you and the others, but I do my best. I won’t ramble any longer. Keep working hard and I’m sure we’ll be seeing your designs in the shops over here before long. After all, some of your originals are made here! I hear that you’ve made some new friends in Ponyville and vanquished some kind of villain - don’t get too big for your boots! Hope that your parents are keeping well, and give my love to Sweetie. Hugs and kisses (and still a little bit of love) from Cat xxxxx *** I folded the letter and put it into the envelope with Miri’s letter. I was trying to put a positive spin on everything, which was, after all, good, but I didn’t mention the fact that neither Miri or I were even close to financing a trip to Britannia, and with Fly losing her mother, she wasn’t even thinking about it. The chances of seeing Rarity again were getting less and less likely, something which made me more sad than anything else. “Mum? I’m going out to post this,” I shouted up the stairs. “Okay Toccata.” The post box was down the road a little way, but I went and sat on the rock by the stream instead, soaking up the hot summer sun. It was an early heat wave that had no signs of abating. The rock was hot to the touch, but I sat on it anyway and looked out across the stream. I missed my friends a lot. My new friends at Princess School were nice, but they weren’t as close as I had been to Fly and Rarity and even Miri. I wished more than anything that I could see them all again. I thought back to the day that I’d sat on the rock with Rarity. I’d been so close to telling her how I’d felt about her, and if I had, things might have been different. Or if I’d told her in Mareis. My love for the purple-maned unicorn had abated in her absence. I no longer felt quite as intensely about her, and when I thought about her it felt more like thinking about a particularly happy period of my life more than thinking about somepony I loved. I had definitely loved her, in a way I hadn’t loved River. It was more than an attraction and compliments, there was just something about Rarity’s personality that made me fall in love with her. Her generosity and near-infinite grace were so unique, I didn’t think I’d ever meet anypony like her again. My mind wandered onto other things as I got up and made my way to the postbox. Life went on.