Special Chapter Four
Rain was hitting the windows of the carriage with a constant droning. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, wishing that we’d chosen a taxi carriage with more cushioned seats. Or maybe I’d just grown soft and Britannic taxi carriages had always been this uncomfortable.
Beside me, Sweetie Belle was sleeping, letting out a gentle snoring that occasionally turned into a loud snort when the carriage went over a bump. It was only because she had a cold, and the flight had taken a lot out of her, so I didn’t complain. Anyway, I could see the school gates approaching through the murk, and she’d have to be woken soon.
“Sweetie, darling, wake up.”
“Hmm?” she said, stretching and rolling into a seated position. “Are we here now?”
“Yes, it’s here.”
She pressed her face against the window to get a glimpse. I looked at her and smiled. She’d had a hard time leaving Ponyville, where Scootaloo and Apple Bloom were, but Scootaloo was going away to flight training and Apple Bloom was busy working on the farm, so it wasn’t as if she was breaking up the crusaders on her own. Well, the crusaders weren’t really broken up, just made part-time.
The carriage parked at the end of a long row. The rain didn’t show any signs of abating, so I put up and umbrella and Sweetie huddled underneath it with me. I took a look at the drive and the front of the school and smiled, before helping my sister to get her suitcases out of the back. We trotted up the drive smartly to get indoors.
“Ah, hello. You must be Sweetie Belle,” the head mare said, giving her a smile.
“How do you know?” Sweetie asked, tilting her head.
“I recognise your sister. Now, if you go through to that desk, you can get your room key and take your belongings.”
Once she’d gone, I turned to the head mare. “You’re looking well.
“And you! Always nice to see an ex-pupil, especially a successful one. I keep dropping hints for my husband to buy me a Carousel Boutique design, but he’s as thick as two short planks,” she laughed.
“That’s very kind,” I replied, blushing slightly. “I have a request, if I may.”
“Of course!”
“Once Sweetie is settle in, can I go and see our class picture?”
“You certainly may. Do you remember the way?”
“I think so.”
Sweetie Belle reappeared, carrying a room key with an excited look on her face.
“Okay, so I’m in 141. Do you know where that is?” she asked.
“Didn’t they give you directions?” I asked, wondering if I could remember.
“Oh, maybe. I didn’t really listen.”
I rolled my eyes. “Well, I think it’s in the main building, so we can just explore a bit.” I picked up the suitcases and we made our way into the living block, which brought back memories of traipsing along corridors to get to lessons and corridor parties.
“Here, 141,” I said, pointing to it. It was on the second floor and hadn’t been too hard to find. “Now, it’s right at one end of the corridor, so make sure you hide your biscuits and chocolate really well, because you never know when you’ll get an inspection,” I told her as we stepped inside. Too late did I realise that the dorm matron was inside, helping another pony get settled in.
“Oops. Sorry.”
She raised an eyebrow at me, but I was too old to discipline.
“Pick your bed,” I told Sweetie.
She opted for the one by the window, so I dropped her stuff there. The filly was busy introducing herself to her roommate, so I decided not to hang around.
“I’m off now, okay? I’ll come back in a week to see how you’re settling,” I said, and gave her a quick kiss on the forehead.
“Okay Rarity. She’s not my mom, she’s my sister,” Sweetie explained.
“Nice to meet you,” I said to the other filly, before making my exit. Sweetie would settle in better if I left her to it.
For old times’ sake, I went to the room that I had shared with Cat and Fly and Miri and looked at the door. I wanted to look inside, but there were probably some ponies in there and I didn’t want to disturb them.
“Can I help you?” a voice said from behind me. I turned to find a seventh-year with poorly-hidden biscuits in her saddlebags. Clearly she was concerned that I was a dorm matron she’d never seen before.
“Oh, I used to have this room,” I explained, and her relief was evident. “I’m only visiting.”
“Want a look inside? Everypony else is out shopping.”
She let me in and I took in the room. It was basically unchanged except for the decor, which belonged to its current residents. The filly who had helped me started unloading the biscuits onto the bed which had once been Miri’s, and then she ferried them under the mattress.
“You know, that bedside table has a false panel in the bottom,” I said nonchalantly. The filly looked at me, and then opened up the table. Miri’s secret area was still there, and the filly grinned at me and began filling it.
I took a last look at the bed I’d once occupied, which was now covered in magazines, and took in the photo on the bedside table. It showed four ponies, who I assumed lived in the room, standing in front of the big wheel thing they’d built in the city.
“Thanks,” I said, and left, closing the door behind me. Next stop was the class photograph, which was on the wall near the head mare’s office. I cast my eye over the photograph of ponies in days gone by, noticing the fact that fillies of our age never seemed to change very much. It took a while to locate ours amidst all of the others, especially since it was no longer the most recent. But I did find it, and I traced my hoof along the rows, spotting Fly looking serene at the back and Miri grinning madly at the front. Cat and I were sat in the middle, smiling nicely. The photo had been the second-to-last time I’d seen her, and even the tiny blob that was her face in the photo made me miss seeing her, and Miri and Fly. It had been too long.
As I left, I had to wade through a crowd of excited new fillies, weaving their way around the older fillies who were resigned to another year of lessons and, for some, exams. I remembered the feeling and smiled, heading for a taxi carriage. I’d have plenty of time to reminisce about Buckingham when Sweetie came back to Ponyville.
“The railway station, please,” I told the driver, and we set off back down the drive. It seemed a very long time since I sat in a taxi carriage going down the same drive, waving out of the back to my three best friends, tears streaming down my face. That was the last time I saw them.
At the railway station I bought a ticket to Trottingham and got onto the next train. It was much less comfortable than the trains in Equestria, but I didn’t mind. I couldn’t resist, and I felt in my saddlebags for the ticket.
EXCLUSIVE: Britannic National Orchestra IN CONCERT
FEATURING Toccata performing Toccata No. 5 AND Wind Whistler performing Beethoofen’s Ninth
ADMIT ONE Seat: 14B
The train wasn’t the swiftest, but it seemed like no time at all until I was occupying seat 14B. Fly, looking no older than she had when I left, was in 14A, and Miri, with her hair returned to its natural colour, was in 14C. We were going on to a restaurant afterwards and then I was going to stay with Miri for the week. Fly was living with her dad in Plymhoof and working in some kind of high-tech job, and Cat was on tour, so it was the only choice that made sense.
“You’ll just have to mind the campaign flyers, the stallion who was meant to pick them up didn’t arrive in time,” Miri whispered as the concert started. “Sorry.”
“No problem,” I replied, turning my attention to the huge stage.
Cat was sitting behind a shiny black grand piano, scanning the audience. When she saw us, she smiled and I waved back. Then she started to play, her specialty; the same piece she’d performed on the last day at Buckingham. I looked at her as she played and I couldn’t keep a smile off my face. The slightly awkward pony I’d left looked fantastic in the stage lighting, her mane re-cut into layers to minimise the limp look and wearing a Rarity pre-Carousel original. I recognised it as the same dress she’d worn to the winter dance in our sixth year, perhaps one of my finest works to date.
The look of intense concentration on her face was always one of her best looks, like somepony out to achieve a goal and who wouldn’t stop until it was done. In her last letter she’d told me about her grand Equestrian tour with the orchestra, and I’d promised to get tickets and let her stay at the boutique. I wondered how I was going to tell my new friends about her; I’d never really found the moment to tell them all about my old school friends, although the photo of the four of us was still on my bedside table, alongside the one we’d had taken after the defeat of Nightmare Moon.
Sometimes, when I was searching for inspiration for a dress, I thought about the last day at Buckingham. It had meant so much to me, and was full of so much bittersweet emotion, that it never failed to keep my eyes dry. Part of me, the part that still wanted to be at school with my friends, wished that I could live with the three of them and go back to how we had once been, but it was impossible. Everypony had jobs and responsibilities. I was living a little through Sweetie Belle, who didn’t know how lucky she was to have seven exciting years stretching ahead of her.
But maybe we could recapture a little bit of what we’d lost this evening; a chat about old times and catching up with each other. While Fly and Miri were top professional mares, and Cat was a famous classical musician, I could tell just from seeing them that they were the same ponies I left on that last day underneath. Cat was still a little bit awkward, Fly was shy and Miri was over-the-top. I wouldn’t have it any other way.