“MOOOOOOOOM!”
Octavia burst into her home, tears streaming down her face. The first pony she saw inside was her father, absent-mindedly nibbling on a cookie in the entryway. “Uh, hey, kiddo,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Oh…” the filly stopped to look at her hooves. “I… Um… Where’s Mom?”
Octavia’s father sighed, closed his eyes, and took another bite of his cookie. “She’s in the kitchen.” The grey filly scampered to the room in question without much more hesitation.
“Mommy?”
Minor stopped humming to herself and pulled a tray full of fresh baked pastries out of their oven to join others on a plate in the center of their table. She looked to her daughter, the gleam of happiness from an afternoon’s simple pleasure giving way to a glum sorrow at the sight of Octavia’s damp face. “Sweetie, what’s wrong?”
Seeing the sadness in her mother’s features at the sight of her own only brought Octavia’s tears a new force. “Oh, Mom!” She ran into her mother’s forelegs, and Minor set them both gently into a chair at the table. Minor handed her daughter a cookie, and the filly held it for a moment as she continued. “The kids at school… They’re making fun of me again! Because of my… my…”
“Blank flank?” Minor smiled sadly.
“Don’t say that!” Octavia yelled. “I don’t like those words… They sound mean…”
“Not all words are nice, no…” Minor sighed. “So what are the kids saying about your… About your lack of a cutie mark?”
“That I don’t have one…” Octavia sniffed. “That I don’t have one, and they all have one, and that I’ll probably never be good at anything…”
“Oh, hush,” Minor said. Octavia looked up at her mother stunned. Minor continued, “You don’t need to listen to what those silly foals have to say. Octavia, let me ask you something: do you like who you are?”
“What?” Octavia didn’t really understand the question. “Um… No… I guess not…”
“Why is that, sweetheart?”
“Because I don’t have a cutie mark…” Octavia rubbed one of her eyes.
“Sweetie, forget about the cutie mark for a moment. Were you happy before those kids started making fun of you?”
Octavia thought for a moment. “Um… I guess so… but—”
“Upp upp upp!” Minor tutted. “You were happy. And you didn’t have your cutie mark then either. So why should you be unhappy now when you were happy then?”
“Um… Well… The other kids—”
“We’re not talking about them.” Minor smiled. Octavia didn’t. The filly took another bite of her cookie and looked down to avoid her mother’s gaze.
“Octavia, dear, I love you. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, I know…” Octavia swallowed the small amount of crumbs in her mouth.
“And that I’ll always love you, no matter what?”
“Yeah, but you have to.”
“Have to?” Minor asked, a mockery of confusion in her voice.
“Yeah, because you’re my mom. So you have to love me.”
Minor chuckled. “No, sweetheart, I love you because I choose to love you. No matter what. All love is a choice, dear.” Octavia said nothing and bit off a few more crumbs of her cookie. “And you know what else?” Minor said continuing, “I love you exactly the way you are. Isn’t that nice?”
Octavia sniffed and tried swallowing, but was finding it rather difficult. “But,” she stammered, “but what if I change? What if when I get my cutie mark I turn into somepony different?”
Minor laughed and said, “Let me rephrase what I said a little then: I love you exactly the way you are, and I will also love whomever you become. No matter what.”
“But how can you say that if you haven’t met future me?”
“A mother knows,” Minor said, pulling her daughter into a close hug.
Octavia didn’t seemed overly changed for the better from her mother’s words. “But… But the kids at school… They don’t like me… What if even after I get my cutie mark they still don’t like me?”
“Again with your classmates? Octavia, it—”
“Mom!” New tears were welling up in the filly’s eyes. Clearly the approval of her peers was of great importance to her.
Minor gave a small smile. “Alright. Octavia, I’m going to tell you some things not all fillies know.” Her daughter leaned in closer, the thought of forbidden knowledge too tantalizing to resist. “As you grow up, not everypony is going to like who you are. And some who do like you won’t like who you become. And that’s okay. It’s okay because as long as you like who you are and make good choices to make sure you stay happy, then you’ll find yourself surrounded by people who do like you. What the fillies and colts at school think… Someday it won’t even matter. The only thing that matters is that you’re happy. And if you are and others think that’s wrong, well, why should you listen to them?”
Octavia remained silent for a moment. “I… I guess…”
“Well, I know,” Minor said sharply. “Listen to me, Octavia: you are an incredibly special young filly with a bright future ahead of you, full of ponies who are going to love you and be so happy to have you in their lives. Including those who already are,” Minor finished, giving her daughter a nuzzle.
Octavia giggled. “Okay, Mom, stop, I get it!” Minor was now tickling the filly, each protest only increasing the intensity of the tickles. “MOM! STOP! I— HAHA STOP! I’M GONNA PEE!”
Minor chuckled and eventually released the filly. “Alright, Octavia. Now why don’t you go get yourself cleaned up for supper.”
“Okay…” Octavia hopped out of her mother’s lap.
“Oh, and Octavia?”
“Hm?”
“Don’t forget: just as you want other ponies to love you for who you are, you need to make sure to do the same for them. Even if they don’t always do things you like.”
“Okay, Mom.” Octavia then turned around to look back up at the table. “Um… Can I have another cookie?”
Minor pondered this for a moment. “Okay, but only one. You’ll spoil your appetite, and I don’t want you up all night. You’ve got a big day tomorrow at school, after all; Miss Jubilee says you’re having a music day…?”
“Uh huh.” Octavia stood as tall as she could on her hind legs to reach the plate on the table. “We get to play with some instruments and everything! I’m gonna see how hard I can hit a drum!”
“Yes, that does sound like fun,” Minor chuckled. The grey filly, having claimed her prize, darted from the room. “And I saw you take two cookies instead of one, young lady!” The sound of her daughter giggling from another room barely reached Minor’s ears, yet still managed to cause her to do the same.
- * - * - * -
Minor’s front door opened and slammed shut, and a familiar voice in an unfamiliar tone echoed from the entryway. “WHERE IS SHE?!”
Minor sighed and set down her tea. She left the kitchen to greet her daughter, whose face was now a manic, twisted version of its former self. “If you’re talking about Vinyl, dear, she just left.”
“LEFT?!” Octavia started pacing and talking to herself. “Oh, of course she just up and left. Why not? It’s not like she just left me standing humiliated in front of a bunch of foals! And this way she gets to make sure that she has the LAST BUCKING WORD!”
“Octavia, calm down!” Minor’s voice was stern.
The cellist said nothing, and instead marched past her mother towards her old bedroom. Minor followed reluctantly to find her daughter ripping through chests and drawers, pulling out miscellaneous artifacts from their depths.
“That selfish… To think that I… Some friend…”
“Octavia, dear, what are you doing?” Minor asked hesitantly.
“Burning it!” Octavia answered without turning around. “Burning it all! Everything that reminds me of her! I’M GOING TO TAKE IT ALL OUT BACK AND—”
“OCTAVIA!” Minor reached out and caught a shoulder. “CALM!” She spun her daughter around and put a hoof and both of her shoulders. “Down.” She gently yet firmly pushed the grey mare onto her haunches, effectively putting her into a sitting position.
Octavia looked to the shoulder Minor spun her on, then glared back up at the hoof’s owner. “Let go of me, Mother.”
“I am, but you need to stay put.” Minor released her daughter, hooves hovering for a moment before returning to the floor. She sat opposite her daughter. “Octavia… Please talk to me. What happened. Vinyl barely said good-bye before storming out of here in the same fashion you came in.”
“What happened… Mother… is that sorry excuse for a musician embarrassed me in front of a group of fillies and colts who were looking up to us for advice on a future in musical careers.”
“Embarrassed you how?”
“She insulted me! Insulted my life! She started a fight with me right there in the schoolhouse!”
“A fight?” Minor asked. “What were you fighting about?”
“We were telling the foals how to be successful, and she was trying to tell them nonsense, like not needing school, and going to clubs!”
“Young foals certainly do not belong in clubs. And that’s why they have an age restriction at the door.”
Octavia looked up at her mother, eyes narrowing; she could tell the mare was building up to something. She always did.
“Vinyl, however,” The name sparked a fire in Octavia’s chest. “is now a young adult free to make such choices, and has found a home in those walls.”
“That doesn’t mean she should be telling kids to go there, Mother!” Octavia exclaimed.
“Was she really? Was she inviting the foals to go to one immediately, see what they’re like first hoof?” Minor asked.
“Well… No… Not directly, anyway.”
“Like I said, she found her place there.” Minor leaned back and allowed some breathing room between she and her daughter. “And it’s possible one of those foals may some day as well. Close your mouth, dear, I’m not done. No, they shouldn’t go to one at their age, but someday when they’re older they may find themselves in one. Vinyl seems happy there, in any case.”
“That still doesn’t— Mother, she was telling them they didn’t have to go to school!”
“School is good. It taught you what you needed to know to do what you do.”
“Exactly!”
“But Vinyl didn’t graduate, yet she’s perfectly happy with her job.” Minor tilted her head. “Now what does that tell you?”
“That she’s a fool.”
“I think what she was trying to say to those foals, dear, is that if they try school and fail at it, that doesn’t mean that their life is incomplete.” Minor sighed and smiled, looking away from her daughter. “There are many ways to find happiness in this world, Octavia. You found one way, and Vinyl found another.”
“There’s a difference between happiness and success, Mother,” Octavia sneered.
“Is there?” Minor was now on the offensive. “Why do ponies want to be successful? Because they think it will make them happy. And sometimes it does, but other times it doesn’t. And sometimes ponies find happiness without success. Do you remember Lyra Heartstrings?”
“Yes. We ran into her the other day.”
“She went to your school too, if you recall.”
“I do.”
“She graduated just like you did, if a few years later.” Minor continued. “By all means she was set to lead the same life you are now. But she wasn’t happy in Canterlot, even if she did get to play her music and use her degree. Eventually she moved back here and has been working in a small confectionery shop with a dear friend of hers. And you know what? I’ve never seen her happier.”
“I suppose some ponies may find the quiet small town life charming, but—”
“But you think no one in a small community can be successful. Yes, you told me at your graduation.” Octavia shifted uncomfortably at her mother's words. Minor gave the motion no notice. “But what of your friend Rarity?” she pressed. “She never left this town, yet she owns her own business and her works can be seen even in Canterlot. She even made the bride’s dress for the royal wedding! Or so I’m told, anyway. And what’s more is she has a number of extremely close friends. I’ve never seen a closer knit of ponies in my entire life. And even though sometimes her work can exhaust her, I’ve never once seen anything from her to suggest that she’s unhappy with how her life has turned out. I’m rather envious of it, truth be told.”
“Mother…”
“Octavia, are you happy?”
The cellist squinted her eyes, her mouth agape. “Mother, I’m furious. I thought we would have established this when—”
“No, Octavia. With your life,” Minor clarified. “Are you happy in Canterlot, playing your music, spending time with the friends you’ve made there?”
“I…” Octavia had to stop to think. Playing in Canterlot had always been her dream, and she lived that dream every day. She never really saw any fault in it. But when her mother said the word ‘friends’ she felt her heart sink; she only really had peers and acquaintances. In fact, wasn’t this realization the whole reason she made that fateful call to Vinyl in the first place?
“Octavia…” One of Minor’s hooves returned to Octavia’s shoulder, though this time for comfort rather than control. “I’m happy that you fulfilled your dreams by being there. I’m proud of all of your accomplishments. But your friends… The people you’ve come to love in your life… That, to me, is what true success is. And true happiness.”
“Mother… Years ago… You told me… You told me that no one else matters. That it doesn’t matter what others think as long as I’m happy.”
“I never once said others don’t matter, and if I did I was very mistaken.” Octavia looked up at her mother, no longer sure what to believe. “Yes, you shouldn’t count on the approval for others to make you happy. They should love you for who you are. If you remember I also told you to do the same for others. Vinyl doesn’t lead a life you approve of, yet over the last few days I saw the love between you reigniting. You were able to move past this and see the friend she used to be. And she saw the same in you. You didn’t always get along as fillies either, if you remember.” Minor stooped forward to pick up an aged blanket tossed from a chest at the foot of Octavia’s bed. A stitching at one end showed where it had been ripped, then repaired. “But you always made up and were back to being best friends again in a day or two. Sometimes even sooner than that.”
Octavia took the blanket from her mother and gazed at the stitches that were carefully yet unprofessionally made. As she stared, and old wound reopened, but not because of the tear; it was because of the repair to it.
“She was my friend…”
“She still is, Octavia. Even if she doesn’t realize it,” Minor said. “You need to ask yourself: can you forgive her? Can you forgive her for every pain she ever caused, and sew it back up again? Can you accept her for who she is, good and bad, just as you want everypony else to do the same for you?”
“Vinyl…” Octavia shuddered. “Vinyl is brash, arrogant, loud, obnoxious, spontaneous, and…” she trailed off for a moment. “…and I think that’s exactly why she was my friend. She was so different from me in every regard, yet we got along perfectly well together… For years even, not just as fillies.”
Minor smiled and nodded. “You completed each other in way. It was always interesting to see your relationship grow over the years; she would want to do something dangerous, and you would talk her out of it, then the next day she was helping you to overcome your shyness and fears. I really couldn’t have asked for a better friend to help you grow as a pony, dear.”
“I… I miss her. I miss being us. Who we were. These last few days I was trying to get us to recapture that, but…”
The room was silent for a minute or two.
“Octavia… You need to tell her.”
“Tell her what?” Octavia asked. “That she’s leading a life I hate, that I’m too stubborn to let that go, and that I want her to pretend to like me anyway? All because I haven’t been able to make a single true friend since I met her?”
“Close,” Minor said. “I would rephrase to something more along the lines of ‘I know you’re not leading the life I hoped you would, but you’re happy, and I’m happy for you. Please accept my apology and forgive me’. You can come up with something better, I’m sure, but that’s just what I was able to work up off the cuff here.”
“What makes you think she’d even want to talk to me?”
“Sweetheart, she just traveled miles with you on a whim after you reappeared in her life for a few hours after disappearing from it years ago. Even if she’s mad, even after letting years of anger fester into a borderline hatred, she still felt enough love for you to give you a second chance.” Minor smiled. “And a love that strong doesn’t go away after a little row, no matter how bad.”
“Even if you’re right, Mother,” Octavia said as she picked up an old magazine from the floor, its pages filled with information on the (then) latest tech music and instruments, “what am I supposed to do about it? Go to Manehattan and do something stupid and desperate?”
“Isn’t that what brought you there in the first place?” Minor said with a smile.
Octavia shrugged. “It didn’t seem like it at the time.”
Minor was silent for a moment. “Octavia, when your father left… It hurt. A lot. I know I don’t talk about him much, but—”
“Mom,”
“Octavia, let me finish,” Minor said, cutting her daughter off before she had much of a chance to begin. “Before he left I could tell that it was coming, but I didn’t know what to do about it. He wasn’t happy, and I didn’t feel like there was anything I could do to make him happy again. So when he left I let it happen. I didn’t fight it. Only after he was gone did I realize how foolish I was for not trying to fight for what I believed made me happy. Of all the things I wished I had done differently, one regret stood out the most in my mind.”
“And what was that?” Octavia asked.
Minor smiled. “Not doing something stupid and desperate.”