Cheese had woken up early and waited patiently. Soon the sun would rise, and Pinkie Pie would wake up. He’d kissed her for the first time last night, but for months, when Dawn had come and the sky was filled with pink, he’d seen only her and felt her magic, welcoming her as though she were coming towards him, greeting her and telling her how beautiful she was. Now she was really here, and he didn’t know what to expect, but he had the feeling it would be something very special.
He was wrong. It wasn’t just special. It was stunning.
It was one of those perfect sunrises, when the sky is streaked with dark gold and rose that gradually become lighter and more brilliant as the sun slowly slips above the horizon. At the same time, perhaps because the sunlight was falling on her face, Pinkie turned in her sleep so that she was facing him. Her eyes opened, and Cheese caught a glimpse of irises the same pure blue as the sky, framed in curly black lashes. Then she sat up and yawned, and the morning sun illuminated her from behind, so that her coat was radiant and her mane blazed with pink, and Cheese had to shade his eyes. Laughter Herself was awake, and day could begin again: fresh, new, and happy. Then the sun climbed a little higher, and she was just Pinkie again, but she could never be “just Pinkie” to him. To him, she still glowed, because . . .
. . . well, because he loved her.
“Good morning, beautiful,” he murmured.
She didn’t say anything. She simply smiled and held out her front legs towards him in a gesture that even foals know means “I want to be held, please.” He scooped her up before she had to ask again.
The nice thing about second kisses is that there are usually a third and a fourth. “Good morning, Cheesie,” she said at last, and giggled. “Did you know you look funny sleeping on your back?”
He laughed. “No, I didn’t. I don’t usually watch myself when I’m asleep.”
“Oooo, good point,” she said. “I guess you never know how you sleep unless somepony tells you. Rainbow Dash sleeps all sprawly, too, only her legs don’t stick straight up in the air and she snores really, really badly, and you don’t.”
“Of course I don’t snore,” he said indignantly. “You talk in your sleep and I don’t want to miss anything. You were curled up like a ball of yarn,” he added, pushing away a bit of unruly pink mane that was falling into her eyes. “It was . . . .” Adorable, he thought. “Cute.”
He kissed her on the nose, because it obviously needed to be kissed, and then so did her forehead and both cheeks, and then he had to kiss her eyes, because she’d closed them. He realized with some surprise that tears were brimming up from under her closed eyelids. Was he making her unhappy?
“Pinkie? Are you crying?” She nodded, but her eyes were still closed, and she didn’t say anything. “Why?”
She opened her eyes, and the tears rolled down her cheeks. “Because I know you’re going to have to go away,” she quavered.
She’d never been upset about that before that he could remember. “But Pinkie, I’ll come back. You know I always come back.”
“I know,” she said, nodding, her eyes downcast. Everything about her was slightly wilted: her mane, her tail, and definitely her smile. She even seemed to have become a bit smaller. Pinkie was deflating like one of her own balloons. “Because of the way our magic is connected. You come back because you have to.”
I come back because I have to? Does she really think that? He was horrified at the idea, but he only had himself to blame. If he’d only been more honest with her and with himself all along, she could never have thought such a thing.
“No, Pinkie!” he exclaimed, and lifted her chin with his hoof so he could look directly into her eyes. “That’s not true. I don’t really understand how or why the magic works between us. I just know it does, and I’m glad it does, but that’s not why I come back. I come back for you. I have for a long time now. Maybe I always did. I don’t know. But you know that every time I go away, I always come back to you.”
She sniffed. “I know you do,” she said. “But this time, it’s going to hurt.” She leaned her head against his chest and burst into tears in earnest.
It was true, he thought, as he folded his front legs around her. He’d have to leave her, maybe as early as tonight, and suddenly he felt the sick certainty that this was exactly what would happen. Tonight, when the party was at its peak, his Cheesy Sense was going to kick in and send him off where somepony else needed him. That happened a lot. Sometimes the Cheesy Sense let him go, his muscles relaxed, and he knew he was free and it was time to leave, but sometimes it hit him in the middle of a party and didn’t allow him any breathing space at all. There had never been a problem with that before. He liked moving on, and he didn’t really like staying at parties to the bitter end. This time was different. He wanted to stay. He wanted to help clean up and kiss Pinkie goodnight, and see her tomorrow, and maybe they could even do something that had nothing to do with parties at all. This time it was going to rip him away from Pinkie, and she was right. This time it was going to hurt really badly.
Pinkie was still crying, wetting the coat on his chest down to the skin. All his instincts as a party pony were screaming at him to cheer her up, because that was his job, and because Pinkie Pie crying was the worst thing in the world. But something else told him just to hold her and let her cry herself out. He rested his chin on top of her curly mane, so that her head was tucked protectively under his. She might be Joy Herself, but she needed to be allowed to be sad sometimes, and if she couldn’t be sad in front of him, she couldn’t be sad in front of anypony. He had to stay calm for her, because if they were ever both sad at the same time, there wouldn’t be anypony to lift them both out of the darkness, and then neither of them could make other ponies smile.
Finally, she began to take long, slow, shaky breaths, and he knew she was coming out of it. He mentally went through his inventory, found a handkerchief, and held it up to her nose. She blew, and blew, and when she gave him the handkerchief back, he decided that maybe he should just toss it, because it was a goner. He hoofed it towards the sky and it disappeared.
“Pinkie? Are you OK?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said, still breathing shakily. “Yeah, I’m ok.” She slid back a little way, out of his embrace.
“Good,” he said, “because you were just kissed by the premier party pony in all of Equestria, and if you don’t stop crying, I’ll start thinking I was doing it wrong.”
She giggled and sniffed, rubbing her nose with the back of her hoof. “Is there a wrong way to kiss ponies? I guess there must be a wrong way to kiss ponies. Maybe there’s more wrong ways than right ways, and I bet you could think up a lot of wrong ways, Cheesie, because Mr. Cake always says he’s amazed how many ways you can mess up a kitchen, and I think there are some silly ways, but I don’t think you did anything wrong. I just feel sad ‘cause I liked it when you kissed me good morning and I know you won’t kiss me good morning tomorrow, will you.” Both of her front hooves were planted solidly on the ground now, and her wide blue eyes met his directly.
It wasn’t a question. He wasn’t sure, but she already knew. She sighed. “I wish I could go with you,” she said wistfully.
Do it, something whispered in his ear. When the Cheesy Sense hits tonight, take her by the hoof and run away with her. Then you’ll never have to say goodbye. You can kiss her good morning every morning, and you can fall asleep listening to her talk every night. Nopony here really appreciates her anyway; they don’t really deserve her. She could make ponies happy all over Equestria. You’ll fade into the background, but that won’t matter, not when She’s with them.
It was so tempting, even though he knew it wasn’t true at all. Ponyville might not really understand her, but everypony in it loved her and would miss her terribly, and her five best friends would miss her most of all. He almost said something anyway, but when he saw the sadness on her face, he knew it was no good asking.
“Someday you will,” he said, and as soon as he said it, he knew deep down that it was true. Someday they would dance out of Ponyville together, party pony and party pony, and Equestria would see a kind of Joy it had never known.
“I know,” she said, and brought her right hoof up to click against his. They stayed like that for a long moment, pressing hoof to hoof, and the solidity of it was a comfort to both of them. There wasn’t any Pinkie Promise or Cheesy Swear. There wasn’t any need for it.
Something had been settled, even though he wasn’t quite sure what it was, and now that it had, it was time for breakfast. Pinkie had packed such a large picnic last night that there were plenty of leftovers. She pulled out plate after plate of food, and they sprawled back on the blanket, enjoying the early morning sunshine as they ate.
“It could be worse,” he said through a mouthful of hay chips. “Other ponies have real problems.”
“Yepperooni,” agreed Pinkie. “Like what if I was in this universe and you lived in an alternate universe and we couldn’t see each other and you couldn’t visit because it would cause paradoxes that would destroy, like, everything? It would be really, really hard to throw birthday parties that way!”
He hadn’t thought about that possibility. He chewed on things for a while, literally and metaphorically. “I don’t know a lot about alternate universes, but I do know I could never forget your birthday.”
“That makes it easy, Cheesie, because if we ever find another mirror pool by mistake and there winds up being twenty of you, I can just ask them when my birthday is, and whichever one of them says . . . um. . . says . . .”
“May 3rd,” he prompted.
“Yep. That’s the real Cheesie. But I’d better get Twilight to ask, ‘cause I can already see how that might go wrong.”
It was nice just to lie next to her and know that she was there, less than a leg’s length away. Every so often, she would drape one of her back ankles across his leg, or he’d reach out and brush her shoulder with his hoof. It was as though neither of them really wanted completely to let go. But finally, breakfast was over, and she sat up and began to pack the picnic basket, while he started to clean up camp.
“Anyway, I’m glad you make other ponies happy like I do,” she said, “and I guess your going away isn’t as bad as if you didn’t live in Equestria at all, right?”
“We’ll work something out,” he agreed, putting away the lantern. He was covering up the fire pit when the thought sunk in, wait a second. There’s a we? Like, an us kind of we? He glanced over at her, but she didn’t seem to think he’d said anything unusual.
He didn’t want to ask her anything more. He was afraid he’d hear something he didn’t want to hear, and everything would pop like a shiny soap bubble, and right now, he’d be shattered. He wasn’t going to take anything for granted. Still, he’d kissed her, and he knew that was true. He also knew it was true that someday they’d travel Equestria together, whether as party ponies, or—something else. The things that were true were more than enough to make him happy, and besides, the sun was barely up and he’d already done enough serious thinking today to last him an entire week. This called for a hat. He reached out for a fish hat and a loud print shirt, turned, saw that Pinkie had already had on a set of swim fins and an arrow through her head, and burst out laughing. He could top that, though, and switched out the fish hat for a pirate hat. She countered with a fruit hat a foot high, topped with a pineapple, and stuck her tongue out at him.
Oh, so that’s the way you’re going to play it, hmm? he thought. No fooling around. I’m going for the Edam. He opened his hooves, his concertina falling neatly between them, and balanced on top of a round, red cheese. She topped him with a trombone and a beachball. It was almost like the Goof-Off, but there was something different about it this time.
Then it hit him. They weren’t doing this to impress anypony. They were just trying to make each other smile. The very thought made him so happy that he stashed his accordion and bounced off the Edam.
“You win, Pinkie,” he said, and swept her a bow. “I couldn’t be any happier.”
“Really?” she squeaked.
“Really and truly.”
She jumped off the beach ball and hugged him. “Me too!”
This was something he could probably do all day, or most of it, anyway, but they had a lot to do. “Any ideas for the party tonight?”
She nodded. “Lots. I’ve got one that’s a doozy! You’re really going to like it, and Twilight’s going to love it, only we’ll need my friend Rarity’s help, because we won’t be able to do it on our own.”
“Maybe we should ask her now,” he suggested, switching his hat for his “I-am-a-serious-party-pony” black hat and pulling on his serape. “We need all the time we can get.”
“Oh, no,” said Pinkie, shaking her head until her mane rippled. “Rarity won’t be up for a while. She’ll be really, really upset if we go wake her up now. We should wait another hour. I guess we’ll have to find something else to do.”
Something about her tone made him nervous. “Uh, really? What, exactly?”
“Oh,” she said, “I’ve got some great ideas about that, too.”
She put both hooves in front of her eyes. “1, 2, 3, 4 . . .” She slipped a hoof off one of her eyes. “What are you waiting for, Cheesie? Hide!”