//------------------------------// // 32: Breathe out, so I can breathe you in. (MMC) // Story: Xenophilia: Further tales. // by TheQuietMan //------------------------------// Breathe out, so I can breathe you in. Chapter published 4th June 2014 ******************** 07.59.55am 07.59.56am 07.59.57am 07.59.58am 07.59.59am RINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRINGRING The alarm clock was loud and it was shrill, an urgent screeching filling the air not unlike the cries of an operatic chicken running for its life from an entire leash of hungry foxes. Nearby, an unkempt mound of bedclothes moved and groaned as the pony underneath burrowed her head further and further under the pillows, just to get away from all this Celestia-damned noise. As if indifferent to its mistress's suffering, the alarm continued to buzz and shriek and jump about on the bedside table like it was never ever ever going to stop. A swift hoof shooting out from beneath the covers, coming down with full earth pony strength atop the offending instrument of chronographical torture soon put paid to that idea... permanently. After ‘just a few more minutes’ of glorious peace and quiet, all snuggled up under the blissfully warm covers, Tavi Melody finally poked her head out from under her messy pile of blankets. Bleary eyed and struggling to focus, she reached out, fumbling around on the bedside table, searching amongst the smashed alarm parts for her sunglasses. Small pieces of shattered glass and loose clockwork fell onto the floor, pushing a recollection of the outcome of her early morning altercation with her now mangled alarm clock though her still groggy brain. Oh rats... I’ll have to buy another one now... again. Locating her errant eyewear she slipped them on, glad of the welcome reprieve against the cruel sliver of early morning light that forced its way through the tiny gap in the bedroom curtains to stab its way across her bed and into her face. Carefully opening the drawer in her bedside table, she used a forehoof to sweep the collection of mutilated clock pieces both out of sight and out of mind. With that problem dealt with she propped herself up on her side, using the opportunity to take in the view of her pegasus roommate, still asleep as she was in her own bed on the other side of the room. When Tavi had found out just last month that her pegasus roommate - the much respected concert violinist Ditzee von Strudlehoffen-Doo, 1st chair violin at Canterlot Philharmonic Orchestra and one of the nation’s most in-demand player of violins and violas - would be travelling to Ponyville to represent House Strudlehoffen-   A pegasus representing one of the most noble of Earth Pony households? How remarkable! Though Ditzee is a totally remarkable mare. -Tavi had pulled just about every string she could find - no pun intended - and used the Melody clan’s tenuous connection to the Apples to ensure that they could make the trip together. She’d even managed to arrange a few days here in one of the more modest of the family’s summer homes. While Tavi would never admit it, the main reason she’d jumped at the chance - argued, pleaded, begged almost - to represent the Melody family at the Apple’s petitioning the day before was that she was well aware that the small cottage that her family kept here in Ponyville only had one bedroom... and even better, only one bed. This meant that - and this was a totally unfortunate side effect over which she had absolutely no control... none what-so-ever - she would have to share a bed with her... friend. Unfortunately, once they’d arrived she’d been dismayed to discover - though she’d hidden it well - that the family had at some point replaced the large princess sized bed with two singles. Damn them! But, on the upside, while they might be in separate beds they were at least in the same room, so it still meant that she could listen to her roommate sleep. There the pegasus lay on the other side of the room, so prim, so proper; laying on her back with her eyes closed, her forehooves daintily holding her blanket against her chest, her usually so-elegantly brushed blonde mane instead fanned out all across the pillow around her head. There were even a couple of strands in her mouth. Lost in thought, the earth pony watched the slumbering mare - so dignified even as she slept, the gentle rise and fall of her chest as she breathed, the soft wheeze and groan of her almost imperceptible - and ridiculously cute - snores. Even the thin line of drool from her mouth managed to put out an air of sophistication. She was so refined, so cultured... everything that Tavi had left behind all those years ago, back when she'd decided that her own path lay more in the modern than in the classical, much to her mother’s despair. As if knowing that she was being watched, Ditzee moaned softly in her sleep before turning onto her side, the collection of origami ponies that stood guard over their princess from their positions on her bedside table wavering as the pegasus’ snores pushed and pulled at their tiny papery bodies. It was a good few minutes later before Tavi realised that she’d just been sitting there, listening to her friend sleep, watching her chest rise and fall with every breath, hanging on every sound like some kind of love sick schoolfilly. Aaaarrgh, what’s wrong with you, Tavi? You’re usually so much cooler than this! Really, what was wrong with her? Usually she was so forthright and would just say whatever was on her mind and hang the consequences. She was a strong, independent, successful mare. Every night she was out there, hundreds of ponies at her hooftips, moving at her every command, jumping and dancing and moving and swaying along with her whims as their beloved DJ Pon-3 threw down the slickest beats in the country, packing out nightclubs across the nation night after night, week after week. Really, you should just mare up and tell her how you feel! She’d headlined galas, rocked debutante balls, thrown down at royal weddings, all without so much as a worry, her ever nonchalant grin and her permanently present shades plastered across her face as she made the world sit up and take notice. So why, ohhh whhhhy, was it that whenever she wanted to tell her high-class friend how she felt about her she was so... sooo... tongue tied? Why did she always get so scared of making a fool of herself and then give up every single time? Every! Single! Time! But she’d do it today, she’d tell her today for sure... Definitely... One hundred percent... Absolutely... Probably... Slipping out of bed, careful not to make too much noise - not that this was really a worry, her roommate could generally sleep through anything short of a sonic rainboom - she padded her way across the room. As she passed by the sleeping pegasus she caught a whiff of the madly expensive shampoo and that super classy frou-frou night-lotion that Ditzee loved so much. She’d always claimed it kept her hooves supple - making it easier to hold both her violin and its bow for the hours on end that some of her longer performances took - but the earth pony suspected that she just really loved its sweet, sweet smell of blueberries and lemon. Tavi remembered spending week after week last year tracking down the lotion’s supplier to some fancy little boutique up in Vortex. It had been hard work, and had cost her a hefty pile of bits - and even now just thinking about the cloud walking spell made her a little nauseous - but it was more than worth it just to see the look in her friend’s eyes when she’d opened her Hearths Warming Eve gift to find a twelve month supply of her favourite indulgence staring back at her. Walking into the bathroom, the earth pony sat herself down in front of the sink before taking a long hard look at herself in the mirror. Dark sunglasses and a chronic case of bed mane stared back at her, just as it always did whenever she was up at this kind of crazy hour. Maybe she could try ditching the glasses for something more refined? She usually wore them to protect her sensitive eyes, but the last few days she’d been finding that she didn’t need them. Her eyes moved over the bathroom shelf and soon fell on the large pink ribbon that Ditzee usually wore as a bow in the back of her mane, sitting between yet more of the pegasus’ origami creatures. They’d only been here in Ponyville a few days and already these tiny creations were showing up in the most unlikely of places. Maybe I could try dressing up nicely? I haven’t done that since I was a filly.   How about a bow tie? Bowties are still cool. right? Lifting Ditzee’s bow, Tavi held it against her throat, moving her head from side to side to get a better look before carefully putting it back on the shelf. I might still have that pink one mom gave me for my tenth birthday... ...before I became the family odd-ball. With just a quick ruffle of her forehooves though her hair, most of her trademark two tone black and charcoal grey spikes sprang back into place. It was a look of wild abandon that she’d carefully crafted since she was young, having served her well all these years since she’d cast aside all her years of training in classical music to pursue her dream to become Canterlot’s number one club DJ. Oh, how her parents had cried the day she’d told her that she was giving up the cello to work in  ‘some seedy bar’ as her sire had put it, though not as much as her dam had cried the day Tavi had first had her long, lustrous mane cut short - its elegant sweep and soft strands replaced with mane-dye, savage spikes and copious amounts of hair gel. Turning her head so she could better see the back of her neck in the mirror, Tavi pondered growing her mane out again. As a young filly she’d so often been complimented on her long, dark mane, told time after time how it set off her appearance perfectly. Maybe that was why she’d cut it so short once she’d decided to make such a radical change in direction, ‘throwing away’ years of classical training so she could pursue her dreams. Either way, she’d thought her mother would never forgive her, what with all the melodrama and fainting fits and the sudden installation of chaise-longue in every room of the house. How her mother still wept whenever the subject of her career choice came up. But, on the other hoof, mommy dearest had been so excited to meet Ditzee when the two of them had started rooming, forever dropping subtle comments that somehow the cultured pegasus might ‘rub off’ on her wayward daughter. Maybe mother was right for once, maybe she had rubbed off on her... and if she ever plucked up the courage to tell her how she felt then maybe they could rub off on each other. Snorting at her own smutty joke, Tavi’s hooves shot to her mouth. Praying that she hadn’t woken up the sleeping beauty in the adjoining room, the earth pony leant over and poked her head around the door frame. There she was, the pegasus still snoring away, the blanket having fallen away from her flank as she’d turned over, her purple treble clef cutie mark no longer hidden away from sight. Her hooves falling from her mouth, Tavi found her gaze moving down to her own cutie mark, a  pair of barred eighth notes, the solid black lines standing out against her own grey coat. The same thought struck her now as had back when the violinist had first walked into the acoustic labs back at the university, carrying that huge cello of hers- Hang on, she plays violin... -turning her head as her mane flowed over her back, capturing Tavi and all her fellow undergraduates with her piercing mulberry eyes- But her eyes are gold... -before setting up her instrument with all the care and dedication of a mother taking care of her first born foal. Tavi couldn’t even remember what the experiment that Ditzee had been booked to help with had been, but the earth pony did remember that she’d secretly, and deliberately, sabotaged the results not one, not two, but three times just so the department would pay to keep having the cell... violinist back again. It had taken not a small number of hints - followed up by straight out invites - to talk the pegasus into stopping by at Tavi’s ‘other’ place of work. The earth pony could remember it like yesterday; the way she’d known, just known - even over the pumping bass and the flashing lights -  the very second that Ditzee had walked into the club. She’d looked up, spotting the grey coat and blonde mane all the way from the other side of the dancefloor, the way the colored lights made her coat shine, the way that everything else had faded away leaving the DJ standing, gawping down from her booth as the pegasus had veritably floated her way across the room. It was at that moment that Tavi had decided that she had to spend as much time as ponily possible with this mare, this picture of beauty and refinement that could light up any room that she walked into in a way that could rival Princess Celestia’s sun for sheer brilliance. And it wasn’t a one time visit either. Though she knew that it wasn’t Ditzee’s kind of place-   But there was a time when it wasn’t exactly mine either. -she’d somehow talked the pegasus into coming back a few more times. Somehow, and quite surprisingly, she’d then managed not to screw it all up and scare her new friend away. Even with all their differences they just kept meeting up, time after time, event after event. And then had come that fateful day when they’ve both found themselves apartment hunting at the same time, and she’d thrown out that crazy idea that maybe they could get a place together... and Ditzee hadn’t laughed... instead she’d said yes! But with all these good times, all these successes, why couldn’t she just say it, why couldn’t she stop hiding behind her glasses and her big goofy grin and just say ‘hey, I like you, as in really like you, why don’t we go out on a proper date, just the two of us?’ How hard could that be? Boy, I am such a coward! Come on Tavi, get your teats out of your purse and just ask the girl! Hang on... what was I just thinking about eye colour? Ooow, sudden headache. Not cool.  Turning back to the bathroom mirror and picking up one of her roommate’s many mane-brushes - the DJ didn’t own any of her own - the earth pony began to run it through her hair, carefully working out the knots and tangles, clearing the strands of the small amount of product she now used to keep her spikes in place. Over the years her mane had become accustomed to its ‘tearaway’ mane-style, an arrangement she’d had to meticulously crafted for years until eventually it had started springing up of its own accord without needing much interference from its mistress. Now though, it seemed to have no trouble remembering the way it used to sit, all those years back when she'd been just a child, sitting at the hooves of the best music tutors that bits could buy. Running the brush through her mane, every hair fell into place, nothing was sticking up, nothing was misbehaving. Smoothing down the last little bit, she pulled her fringe into an elegant sweep across her forehead before setting the brush down. Slowly she pulled off her shades, laying them down on the shelf between the brush and the origami ponies, all tiny little silver unicorns every one of them. Looking back at her was a totally different mare, one she hadn’t seen in years, though it felt like just days had passed. Lowering her eyelids just a fraction she lifted her nose slightly, a little turn of the head completing the ‘cool  beauty’ look, the ‘untouchable ice queen’, the elegant and aloof ‘mare about town’. Taking in the poised and confident mare that stared back at her, she imagined herself in a bowtie, a violin and bow held gently in the crook of her ankle. Oh yeah, she could pull it off; she could be refined, she could be cultured, she could be... ...beautiful.   Could she pull it off, could she let her roommate see the mare she was inside? Could she make Ditzee feel the way about her that she did about the pegasus? Would the room still light up when she walked in? Could she play music just for her and make her feel the way that Tavi felt every time Ditzee picked up that violin? Could they ever make such sweet music like that together, as one? So didn’t know, but she sure was ready to give it a try. This is it, this is the day! From the next room came a delicate noise, echoing off of the walls as Ditzee snorted herself awake. Quick as a bunny, Tavi ruffled her mane back into its usual spikes before clamping her shades back over her eyes. Or, maybe tomorrow.. One step at a time, Octavia... one step at a time.