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// Adapting to Normalcy 
// Story: Bearers at Ease 
// by leonidas701 
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        You know, I don’t think I actually woke up this morning until I got to the schoolhouse. The first thing I remember clearly is the teacher, Ms. Sherry? Merry? I don’t know, the purple bitch. Mare! Mare. Gotta remember, not in Oka anymore, right. Well, anyways, Her. Yeah, I remember her making me stand in front of the class, and everything before that is sax practice and panic. See, I actually forgot I had school now, because I haven’t in… I haven’t. I’ve had tutors, but… I’m getting off topic. 

        I had forgotten about school until I glanced at a clock while I was half-asleep playing my sax. Fifteen minutes before it started. I rushed out the house, grabbing my backpack and my hoodie, and ran to the building, my brain just active enough to keep my body following the little white arrow telling me where to go. That reminds me, I should probably thank Dr. Card for that. 

        So, there I was in front of the schoolhouse. Half-asleep, lacking breakfast, probably late, and my headphones on, but not playing anything. Or, probably, connected to anything. It wasn’t until I watched, dumbfounded, as the arrow went into my backpack that I realized I should probably knock on the door.

        I don’t even want to think about how long it was before I actually did.

        But I did eventually, and then the door opened and there stood the teacher. She said something to me. Probably. Maybe. She definitely made some kind of noise with her mouth. Well, she definitely made some kind of noise as she pulled me in and stood me at the front of the class. It was as I stood there, gazing blankly at an entire crayon box’s worth of foals, that I guess my brain finally finished loading.

        My entire body jerked in different directions, and I made noise, probably something like, “Dahg!” I quickly shook the last of the sleepiness from my head and looked at the teacher. “Sorry, what?”

        “Perhaps you would like to introduce yourself to the class?” she asked.

        I turned my head back to the sea of faces and noticed that they were all looking at me like they were expecting something. “Oh. Uh, hi. My name’s Guile. I am residing in Ponyville for the next few months. I am very pleased to meet you all, and look forward to the coming semester.” Yeah, whenever I can’t think of anything to say, my brain just defaults to Silver’s lessons.

        There came a cacophony of “Hi”s, and “Hey”s, directed at me while I desperately tried to compose myself. 

        “Now,” the teacher, I really need to ask about her name tomorrow, said. “I can see an empty seat right in front of Tech. Why don’t you go sit there, and we’ll continue with the lesson.”

        I went over to this unicorn colt with interesting hair, it was black but spiked down and with green borders, and sat at the desk in front of him, putting my backpack next to me. He didn’t say anything, so I didn’t say anything back.

        “Excuse me, but we like to keep hoods down in this classroom,” the teacher said.

        I pulled my hood down.

        “Headphones too, young stallion.”

        “Wha?” I mumbled. I felt my head, looking for the headphones. “Uhm, oh.” I pulled them down around my neck.

        “Excellent.” She turned to face a chalkboard and started saying something about Equish. I just drifted off, taking care to pay enough attention that I would be able to tell if she mentioned something I didn’t know, which she didn’t. It was like that for a couple of hours, through Equish, history, and science, until finally something happened that did make me pay attention.

        “Okay, it’s time for lunch, you can all go outside now.”

        I grabbed my backpack, and was the first one out the door. You see, the main thing that I use my backpack for is to carry my books and comics when I’m walking around, in case I get bored. I found the shadiest tree in the yard and planted my ass underneath it, reaching into my bag and pulling out the first thing I touched. I never actually saw what it was, because I like to listen to music while I read. So I put down the comic, it was too thin to be a book, and pulled my player out of my pocket. While I was attaching my headphones to it, I got interupted.

        “Hey.” I looked up and saw Silver Spoon standing there in front of me. I really hate to admit it, but it never occurred to me that Silver Spoon would be going to the same school as me, despite the fact that there only seemed to be the one school in the village. When I saw her that stream of logic suddenly bashed into my skull and made me feel really stupid, to the point that I spent a few seconds frozen, amazed at my own stupidity. I only snapped out of it when I realized that I was frozen with my eyes locked onto her face, which understandably made her feel uncomfortable. I least, I assume so given that she was blushing pretty hard and not looking at me.

        I realized I hadn’t responded to her yet and began to say hello back, but she started speaking before I could. I unfortunately couldn’t understand what she said because she was mumbling and spoke really quickly, so I asked her to repeat herself.

        She took a quick breath, squared her shoulders, and looked me in the eyes. “Come on,” she said. “You can eat lunch with us.” She jerked her head to a circular table in the yard that was empty except for one pony and two lunchboxes.

        I accepted the offer and stood up, grabbing my backpack. She lead me to the table and I sat down. As I did that, I noticed some of the foals on the yard staring at me. It was only for a second though, then they whipped their heads back to what they were doing.

        “Guile,” Silver Spoon said, “This is Diamond Tiara. Diamond, Guile.” 

        I was about to say hello, but Diamond Tiara spoke up before I could. “Silver Spoon told me about you. She said you were worthy of being one of us.” Diamond said the last part the same way someone would tell you that their friend believed birds had jet engines. I was slightly put out by this. Still, I tried to hide it.

        “What do you mean, one of you?” I asked. Diamond Tiara turned her head, looking at a group of foals, they looked a year or two older then us, eating lunch on the grass a-ways away.

        “Spanner,” she said in a sickly sweet voice.

        One of the colts froze in his place. He slowly turned around and looked at Diamond Tiara. “Y- yes?” he asked. He seemed to be in disbelief that she had spoken to him.

        “May I please have that soda?” 

        Spanner looked at the can of unopened soda next to him. Without a second thought he picked it up and walked over to Diamond Tiara. “Here,” he said.

        “Thank you.” Diamond Tiara had a slight smile on her face as she watched Spanner quickly walk back to his friends. She turned back to face me. Her eyebrow lifted as if to say, “Understand?”, and I did. I had to deal with her type all the time. Noble’s brats who thought they owned the world because their parents have power and money, and everyone around them were too afraid of retribution to say otherwise. I knew exactly what she was offering me. Power by association. I had been offered it before, but this time was different. Usually it was by people wanting to get influence over my brothers through me, but Diamond Tiara didn’t, and still doesn’t, know about Silver and Shade. It bothered me, but if there’s one thing Shade was able to teach me, it’s the desire to have my own power, not sponge it off of others. I thought knew my answer, but that nagging bother wouldn’t leave my head.

        “Why?” I asked.

        Silver Spoon was shocked. “What? Why?” she asked. “Aren’t we friends?” She had a sad, puzzled look in her eyes.

        “Yeah, Silver Spoon told me that you two hung out together over winter break,” Diamond Tiara said. “Why would you want to stop now?” 

        My brain was starting to ache. They both seemed genuine in their reasons and their confusion. That’s when it hit me. They weren’t trying to recruit me. They really did want to be my friend, well Silver Spoon did, I think Diamond Tiara just wanted Silver Spoon to be happy, and this was their way of showing me why I should be theirs. 

        I accepted; I really did enjoy the short time I spent with Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara didn’t seem too bad. We spent the rest of the lunch period talking, them telling me about some interesting things that happened to them and I told them about Oka. Then it was time to go back to class, which I half-slept through until the end of day bell rang. Anyways, that was my first day at school. Wonder what the next one will be like.