The next hour or so was... it was like most hours sitting inside with my parents were. Rather boring, but still left me feeling good. Pinkie was amazingly sitting still with us the entire time. We talked about everything we normally did. All of the things I'd done over the past year since I'd seen them, everything they'd done in that time, the memorable things from before then, the things my mom thought would embarrass me in front of my marefriend... normal things. Then it was time to go. It felt like dinner time, and even if it looked safe, we weren't allowed to take the suits off inside to eat with my parents.
I smiled at my parents, and did a combination yawn and stretch. "Well, I think it's time that we go for the night. Should I stop by tomorrow, or just wait until you guys can be outside again?"
"Honey, this is a city full of things to do, and almost none of them are in here. Just enjoy yourselves, and wait for our visit in two months. We've always wanted to visit you in previous years, and now you finally have a place for us to visit." She smiled gently. "We settled on the time so that you could settle in before we come over. We'll try not to embarrass you too much."
I was a bit teary as I smiled, but only a bit. "Okay, mom. I guess I can go back home the day after tomorrow. No point in staying here all week if you're better." I gave her a hug through the suit, and Pinkie hugged me from behind also hugging my mom a little bit, then my dad joined in making it a strange for pony hug, and thank Luna that the doctor decided not to join the group hug.
After goodbyes Pinkie and I made our way to a nearby hotel that I had set up reservations at. One room with two beds on the third floor. Room 321. I wanted two rooms, but they were overbooked. Not much happened that night, though.
I took Pinkie out to dinner at a basement restaurant that was less famous in the area, but had great sandwiches and ice cream. Dessert was the fun part. I got a small hot fudge shake, and she got strawberry, and we split a banana split. She got some whipped cream on her nose from her drink, and I licked it off as a joke, then a few minutes later I had some milkshake on my lip, and she licked that off, then she picked the cherry off of the banana split, and we split it with a kiss. After a few odd looks and a laugh from the table next to us we each took our spoons and finished by feeding eachother scoops of banana split.
When we got back to the hotel we took turns taking showers, rented a movie from the hotel, then brushed our teeth, and sat lay together on to of one bed watching the movie. It was a silly comedy about two stallions that pretended to be cops. I don't want to write it all down. Pinkie fell asleep during the credits, and I tucked her in and gave her a pillow. I moved to the other bed, and it wasn't long until I fell asleep as well.
I dreamt of sweetness and laughter. Beds made of cotton candy, and smiles and joy all around. There were some storm clouds on the horizon, but they were small and far away. They didn't matter. Some days are dark and lonely, but something made me feel that they wouldn't be that bad.
Morning came gently for her it seemed, and although I slept well, it was a bit more of a surprise for me to wake up to Pinkie landing on top of me. "Oof." I grunted a little more from surprise than pain. "You couldn't wake me gently?"
She shook her head no. "That's not as fun." With a kiss on my nose she hopped off of me and was waiting by the door. "Come on! They have breakfast ready downstairs! Pancakes and syrup, waffles and syrup, hot cocoa, french toast and syrup, cereal, everything!"
It was hard to argue with that. I hopped out of bed and we went down to breakfast together a bit faster than we probably should have been walking in a hotel. I had orange juice, she had hot cocoa, I had cereal, she had one waffle with a pancake on that and a slice of french toast on top, and I finished with some toast and jam, but she got the last bite of it.
We made our way back to the room to brush our teeth for the morning, because even if you love sugar, you should also try and keep all your teeth. Then we made plans for the day. The hotel had a pool, so we decided to go swimming for a bit before we went anywhere. There were a few children in the water with their parents relaxing at the side of the pool. We got roped into a game of Marco Polo followed by sharks and minnows, but I think we would have joined even if they didn't ask us to. What was the point of a pool if there weren't any games to play?
After drying off we made our way around the city, and mostly ignored our plans. We stopped at Pony Joe's donuts, made our way to look at the waterfall, and even watched a play before a late lunch at one. I don't even remember where we ate. The rest of the day was a blurr of different things. Visiting the castle quickly, though we'd both been there before, finding a place to go dancing in the middle of the day, shopping, playing at an arcade, playing even more at the arcade, we probably spent fifty bits at the arcade, grabbing fries, falafel, fritters, and fritatas from four different food carts, and eating them while watching the sun set.
When we got back to the hotel we rearranged some of the furniture to make a fort in the middle of the room, and we got another movie. It was an animated movie about computers, and an evil program that tried to use its powers to hurt people, but in the end it failed. Movies staring humans were always fun. We had gotten popcorn at some point, and ate it while we watched. After the movie ended we just lay there for a while, and talked.
I remember the most important part. "Pinkie?"
"Yeah?" She was happy and sounded excited, but we were both tired and you could hear it.
"Thank you for being here with me."
She yawned and gave me a hug. "Where else would I be when somepony needs me?"
Pinkie could always make me smile. "Right by their side."
She nodded with her head next to mine, so it turned into sort of a nuzzle. We fell asleep on the floor instead of in the beds that night. I thought that visit was going to be the worst days of my life, but instead she made those two days some of the best.
I woke up first around seven, and woke Pinkie with a big kiss on the lips. He eyes opened and she smiled returning the kiss. I used my magic to move the blanket covering the fort back onto one of the beds. "THAT's how you wake somepony up."
She stretched before rolling onto her feet. "Or you can lick their nose."
We both giggled trading back and forth with other fun ways to wake eachother up, and putting the room mostly back where it belonged. Breakfast was apple juice, and oatmeal with honey for Pinkie, and fruit ring cereal, a bagel, and a french vanilla latte for me. Our train back home left around eight, so we had a bit of a rush in getting there, but we made it in time. Once we got back to Ponyville we went straight from the train station to my house. I took the closed sign down because it felt like the right thing to do even if we weren't scheduled to open for another few days.
I was once again very glad that Pinkie was there.
At first one or two ponies at a time wandered in, and left an hour or so later after painting, sculpting, or learning a little bit of how to do something else from me or Pinkie. Then school got out... It got really busy really fast. Pinkie could handle the kitchen well enough helping anypony that wanted to learn how to cook or bake anything, and I was stuck between helping three colts that were working on game design projects on the computers, five fillies finger painting, a colt and a filly working with oil paints, a colt doing wire sculptures, two mares that wanted to make simple jewelry, and a stallion that needed help repairing a very complicated watch, while also making sure that nopony left without paying the little bit that it cost them, or opening an account that could get payed of later.
In the middle I somehow managed to eat something for lunch, and it was almost seven when we closed for dinner. Pinkie made her way back to Sugar Cube Corner, and I made a microwaveable pizza. After eating I relaxed in a warm bath. We were closed for the day, and I was not going to change that. I finished the night by writing in here. I don't know why, but I felt like I needed to. It is sort of relaxing writing it all down, and sorting it all out. Making sure that everything that happened makes sense. It made enough, and I can sleep happy tonight. Even if half my days with Pinkie are a blur, I'm smiling the whole time.
It's been three weeks and I don't think I'll have any reason to write in here again. Everything... has been happy. My workshop is doing pretty well, and I am now employing two teenagers. One of which got their cutie mark right in the store. A late bloomer, but... not as late as most. She got it in child care. She learned here that helping take care of colts and fillies was really rewarding and what she wanted to do. The other worker is a stallion, and he had a talent for computer work, but also really liked helping with anything the kids wanted. His cutie mark was in game design, but he was also the oldest brother of four, so was used to taking care of little fillies, colts, and foals.
A group of frequent workshoppers, spearheadded by the little colt that comes to make wire statues, and his friend that is a filly that is not at all his fillyfriend, asked me to set up an art show for things that anypony that made something here could submit art for. There are four weeks for submissions, then it will be a two night event. I've been working with Pinkie on how to set up everything for it, and it looks to be a great event for publicity, and for letting everyone show off their art.
Two short games are going to be available for play on the computers if the second gets done. The first was submitted by my own store worker, and it's a learning game for kids to try and make math more fun. He incorporated aliens and calls it Blaster Math. The second is being made by two colts that come in almost every day to work using the Surreal gaming engine. They won't tell me what it is, but they are required to keep it rated T or less, so they aren't going too overboard. From the peeks I've gotten at their screens it looks like it will be a simple 3D platformer with only three levels that take a few minutes to beat if you know what you're doing. They're almost halfway done with the levels, but haven't even started on the character skins and the textures for the levels, so it's all grey on grey at the moment.
I might point out to them the few models that I may have put on the computers in my spare time, and the ones that I saved a long time ago when I first got into computers, but I'll see how much help they need first.
Because most of my clientel are kids, and most adults are busy during the week Tuesday has become my day to go to the library. Spike and I have become pretty good friends, and most weeks we talk about comic books, I reccommend a few to him, he reccommends a lot to me, I check them out and spend a few hours before school gets out reading them. Every time I finish a non-graphic novel I return it and get a new one as well. Twilight is busy a lot with other duties, but the times that we've talked we've had good conversation.
On the note of Pinkie's friends I have now attended two girls' night outings. It might become part of my regular week from now on. They all seem to like me enough. Rarity and I have been friends longer than the rest of them have been friends technically, even if there was that whole huge gap from when I was a kid until last month, but still. Fluttershy is always quiet, but she's been kind and opened up enough that I can actually hear her when she talks most of the time. Applejack was very quick to be friendly, and we've even exchanged recipies once. Rainbow Dash was acting rather jealous of Pinkie and I for a while, but I think she's gotten over it. At least I hope so. She is really good at over reacting.
Pinkie and I are taking things faster than I thought we would, but everything still just feels right. Last night in fact... I asked her to move in with me. Just because she is only living in a room above her employer's business, and I think it would be better if she had a more permanent place to live. Maybe so that we could stay with eachother later at night, and not have to have either of us go home alone. Probably so that we could brush our teeth next to eachother, then watch something on the couch, fall asleep there, then wake up and go to our rooms to sleep. We would still have separate rooms of course. It isn't like we're married or anything. She hasn't said yes yet, but It's almost dark. I hear a knock at the door, so I'll finish writing later.
Dear Salli's journal,
I'm Pinkie Pie and of course I said yes, because he and I get along so well, and we haven't done any funny stuff or anything, but kissing is really fun, and he's good at it, or at least as good as I've had, but I haven't really kissed a lot of ponies other than him. Anyway, I was at the door with almost all of my stuff, and he already had a room with everything set up for me other than a bed, so for tonight I'm going to use his bed, because he said that he couldn't stand making me sleep on the couch, and it was totally sweet of him. It's totally gonna be like a slumber party, only every night from now on. We're going to have snacks, and play with coloring books and crayons, and watch movies, and play truth or dare, and other fun stuff all the time! (maybe not ALL of that every night, but some of it) He has a lot of stuff in his kitchen that we don't have back at Sugar Cube Corner because we only have stuff for baking, but he has things for baking, cooking, grilling, flambaying, and a bunch of other ways to make food! There's even one of the fancy food torches that you use for making creme bru le, and other fancy desserts from across the sea! I still think lady's fingers sound weird for a dessert food. I don't have to work every day, and on some days that I don't have to work I don't have plans set up with Twilight, or Rarity, or Applejack, or Rainbow, or Fluttershy, or Salli, so I'm going to give baking lessons to some of the ponies that come through here! Mr. and Mrs. Cake didn't think it would hurt business at all, and said that it was okay. I'm probably going to miss being over there so much, but I'll still be there almost every day, instead of every day, and it's just a few blocks away, so it's not a big deal. Sallieri's been super nice to me, and he's the best coltfriend that I've ever had. We might be going fast with a few things, but not faster than I think the two of us can handle, and we aren't doing anything that either of us are uncomfortable with I don't think, so it's great. I read a little bit before, and I really do hope that we don't have to write in here any more about bad things, because if good things could happen to him all the time from now on, then I know I could keep smiling by his side, unless I got sick or something, then I would have to get better first, and if he got sick I could take the day of work and make him soup, and dress up like a nurse, and take care of him until he got better, and if I was sick maybe he would do that for me! I wonder what he would look like dressed up as a nurse... Probably really cute and embarrassed, I'll try and get him in my nurse costume some time. Bye bye journal! I'll be back to read the rest of you later if Salli says that it's okay, but I think he will. Why write it down if you don't want anypony to read it?
Dear Salieri's journal,
I... I didn't know that it was that hard. He told me of the stuff before too. Of growing up like that. Nopony deserves that, and no journal deserves that. Together I think we can make it so that we never have another journal to burn.