Cheerilee's Thousand

by xjuggernaughtx


Date Forty-Nine - On The Ledge Of Disaster

Another bead of sweat rolled down the side of Tenderheart’s face before she wiped it away with the back of her hoof. “Wouldn’t you just know it? I’ve waited years for somepony to notice all of my hard work, and now that they finally have, I’d rather be anywhere else. This hotel has ruined the whole thing.”

Cheerilee fanned herself with her program and noticed with some dismay that the end she was holding was soaked through with perspiration. “Well, I don’t know about ruined—Oh, dear.”

In the row ahead, a pale stallion slid out of his chair in a dead faint. Several of the nearby nurses that made up the majority of the audience hurried over to him. Pushing stringy, sweaty manes from their eyes, the nurses checked his vitals and shot several unsanitary glances in the direction of the increasingly uncomfortable-looking hotel management.

Tenderheart fished out a bit of gauze from her pack and mopped her brow with it. “Cheerilee, you don’t have to suffer through this with me. If my mother wasn’t so excited to see my photo in the the paper, I’d just tell them to mail me the award. I could always meet you somewhere once this is all over with.”

Cheerilee chuckled, but the oppressively still and humid air sucked most of the humor out of it. “Suffer? Trust me, this—” Cheerilee waved a limp hoof at the lethargic crowd “—is a roaring success in my book.”

The nurse dropped her eyes for a moment, then inched her chair slightly closer to Cheerilee. “Well, um… good.” Tenderheart dropped her head into her hoof. “Celestia, that sounds lame. I… uh, well, I was just worried that you wouldn’t want to see—”

Taking Tenderheart’s hoof in her own, Cheerilee gave it a squeeze. “Don’t be silly. I wouldn’t hold this against you, plus, do you remember when I had to come in with those burns on my flank because that joker trapped us in a volcano?”

A small grin twitched across Tenderheart’s face, and she nodded.

“Yeah. Hotter than this.” Cheerilee twisted around to catch a glimpse of the faint circular scars the burning embers had left on her hindquarters. “Much hotter.”

Tenderheart leaned back in her chair, her head tilted up toward the ceiling in an attempt to keep the sweat from flowing into her eyes. “Heh. I guess that does put this into perspective. If they’d just get on with it already!” She frowned at the still-closed curtains that were pulled across the main stage. “This should have started an hour ago! Half the audience will have heat stroke by the time this is over with.”

“Look, I’m going to find us some water or something.” Willing herself into motion, Cheerilee struggled to her hooves. The effort left her panting.

“Don’t bother,” Tenderheart said, shaking her head. “I asked the manager when I went to the bathroom. All they have is that bucket in the corner. You could make tea in that water, it’s so hot.”

Cheerilee dropped the nurse a wink. “I’ve got a hunch. Don’t go anywhere.”

She tried to add a coquettish bounce to her trot, but the unrelenting heat weighed down Cheerilee’s hooves. She scowled at them as they barely managed a weary, stumbling shuffle down the aisle. Glancing back over her shoulder, Tenderheart was still staring at the ceiling and fanning herself with two programs. Well, at least she isn’t watching me. I’d hate for her to think I wasn’t interested. She was so kind during that hospital stay. 

Craning her neck, Cheerilee spied one of the hotel’s waitstaff, and trudged over to him. “Can I have a word, please?”

The gangly young stallion’s eyes darted around the room, searching for an escape. “Uhhh…”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Cheerilee said, waving a hoof in the air between them. “I’m not here to gripe at you about the broken heater.”

“Uh, good.” The stallion’s voice cracked slightly as he spoke, and he stole a glance at the small index card he held in his hoof. “I-I mean… Address guest by name, or say ‘Sir’ or ‘Madam’, we are pleased that you found—err, are finding, the service here at—”

“Let’s cut through this, shall we?” Cheerilee cleared her throat and leaned in close. “Look, I worked in a hotel when I was in college, and the staff always had a few… things hidden around the place to make the shift easier.” She batted her eyelashes and stepped even closer, dropping her voice to a husky whisper. “We’re just two hot, sweaty mares who really want a cold drink. Think you can help us out?”

The stallion pulled at the perspiration-ringed collar of his once crisply pressed shirt. “Uh…”

Cheerilee allowed her lower lip tremble slightly. “Please?”

A heavy flush crept up the stallion’s neck and into his face. “That way,” he said, nodding his head down a hallway tucked behind a half-drawn curtain. “There’s a door. Go through it, but don’t tell anypony I told you, or I’ll get it!”

“You’re a lifesaver,” Cheerilee breathed, then gave the stallion a quick peck on the cheek. While he somehow turned a brighter shade of scarlet, she dragged herself back into motion. Clever design. I’d never have noticed this hallway on my own. 

The passage wasn’t hidden, but it was so featurelessly designed that her eye tended to slide right past it without taking it in. Rows of nearly invisible doors lined the walls, and the dim light barely allowed her to see the turn at the end. No wonder they’ve hidden it down here.

Rounding the corner, she nearly ran muzzle-first into a large door. The slightest of breezes flowed around the edges, and Cheerilee slowly turned her head to allow one cheek to cool, then the other. Grinning, she turned the door’s handle and pushed.

Cheerilee gasped when Manehattan’s icy cold autumn air bit into her skin. The air wasn’t as clean as it was in Ponyville, and it had a certain urban tang, but at least it was freezing cold. Right now, cold was all that really mattered.

Halfway open, the door banged into something heavy on the other side. Sweet sisters, what now? Cheerilee poked her head around the door, and a slow grin spread across her face. Already in the smallish side, the balcony had little room for anything other than the massive water cooler that the door was now wedged firmly against. After squirming the rest of the way through the narrow opening, she placed a hoof on the tank, and her grin widened. It was ice cold.

Cheerilee opened the spigot and filled several of the cooler’s small paper cups. Shivering pleasantly, she drank one down in a single pull. “Oh, Sweet Celestia! That’s good!” After filling her cup again, she leaned against the cold metal door and let the next few sips of water slowly trickle down her throat. Cheerilee sighed and rested her head against the frigid metal door. “I needed that.”

Cheerilee drank the second cup, then rose to fill the cups again. As nice as it was out here, Tenderheart was waiting in that horrible, sweltering room. Carefully standing on her hind legs, she held the cups in one hoof and pulled the door handle.

It didn’t open. It didn’t even wiggle.

“No.” Cheerilee yanked on the door several times. “No! This is not happening!”

A gust of frigid air hit her, knocking over the cups she had balanced on her hoof and destroying the very last remnants of the meticulously styled mane curl that she’d spend so much time on. She swore as the cups spilled, then tumbled over the side of the balcony. Now her hoof was soaking wet and freezing.

In fact, every part of her was starting to feel pretty cold.

Cheerilee pounded on the door. “Can anypony hear me?” Pressing her ear to the cold metal, she frowned. The surrounding city was so loud that she couldn’t tell if anyone was responding. After a moment, she hammered at the door again. Still, no response.

Cheerilee glared at the door. “We’re going to play it that way, huh?” Turning, she leaned over the railing as far as she dared and squeezed down on it for all she was worth. Ten stories below, the street seemed unbelievably distant. Cheerilee swallowed hard and took aim over her shoulder. Well, Applejack does it all the time. How hard can it be to kick down a door? Even if it doesn’t open, somepony should hear me, at least. She cocked hind legs back and let them fly.

“Nonononono!” Cheerilee’s pelvis slammed into the railing, and she pitched forward. Without enough room to brace for what Applejack would call an ‘A Good, Ol’ Fashioned Applebuckin’ Kick’, she’d nearly sent herself flying off of the balcony. As she teetered, the ground below suddenly seemed to leap up at her. Cheerilee gripped the railing with every ounce of strength that she had. Inch by inch, she struggled to get her center of gravity back to the sane side of the precipice.

Cheerilee turned, then slid her back down the railing until she was sitting. Baring her teeth, she slammed her forehoof into the cold cement, then regretted it instantly as her hoof began to throb. “Tartarus!” She kicked at the door a few more times. No one answered, but it did make her feel a little better and warmed her momentarily before her teeth started chattering again. What now?

The inevitable answer floated up to the forefront of her consciousness.

“There’s going to be a ledge, isn’t there?” she said, climbing back to her hooves. “There’s always a ledge that ponies have to sidle along in those stupid movies where people get trapped outside of tall buildings.” Frowning, she looked to the left.

There was a ledge. A tiny, miniscule, totally-turning-a-corner-at-the-end ledge. On it sat a red jay and a pigeon, both looking equal parts scrawny and belligerent.

Cheerilee stared at the ledge for a moment. “REALLY?!” Stretching her neck out, she looked down again. The ground looked very far away. “Nu-uh! No way! Not going to happen!”

Cheerilee pounded on the door several more times, hammering at it with as much force as she could manage.

Nothing.

“It’s o-okay. S-s-somepony’s g-going to w-want water soon.” Cheerilee wrapped her legs tightly around herself and rubbed vigorously. The wind was gusting regularly now, and her mane streamed away behind her. She moved to the lee side of the cooler, but the freezing blast of air seemed to go out of its way to curl around the hulking device’s edges and dig into her skin. Cheerilee breathed into her hooves, but it did little to still their violent trembling.

Almost against her will, Cheerilee’s gazed traveled back to the ledge. It continued to seem alarmingly narrow. “Really?” she said in a voice that sounded very small and very alone. Swallowing hard, she tested the ledge’s sturdiness against her weight, then climbed onto it.

Several steps away, the birds glared at her, then scowled and hunkered down more firmly in place.

“You’re going to have to move,” she said to both the birds and her hooves.

The birds did not move. If remaining immobile could be considered an action, they did it emphatically.

Several more inching steps to the left, Cheerilee found herself surprised that she’d become obsessed with looking down, and then with not looking down. As she crept along the ledge, some primal part of her brain needed to know what it looked like, hanging out over the city like this. After the first glance brought on a heart-poundly terrifying bout of vertigo, she bit her lip hard and kept her eyes squarely focused at the building across from her, but the reality kept playing in her mind again and again.

She was a hundred feet in the air, balanced on nothing but a six-inch ledge while being severely eyeballed by surly birds.

Cheerilee’s knees felt rubbery. Her mouth dried up. Her tongue felt too large. The whipping wind seemed to work its way behind and under her, attempting to pry her from the building. The chilly air had turned her hooves numb, and—

To her right, the door opened, and the gangly young staffer in the limp dress shirt squeezed his way out. Whistling tunelessly, he kicked the door closed as he filled a bottle with water.

Cheerilee nearly fainted with relief, and then nearly fell as the adrenaline kicked in from her near faint. “Oh, th-thank Celestia! Let m-m-me in!”

The staffer turned and he blinked at her for several long seconds. “Why are you up there?”

Cheerilee began inching her way back. “B-b-because I was l-locked out!”

The staffer screwed his face up. “Huh?”

“The d-door was locked!”

“It is?”

Cheerilee grimaced and clutched the building as the wind buffeted her again. “What d-do you mean ‘is’?” she said carefully.

The staffer thought for a moment. “Well, I’ve never been out here before. I usually work on the third floor, but since they’re having that thing tonight, they needed more hooves up here. I only have keys for third floor stuff.”

“And th-they don’t lock the d-doors on the third f-floor?”

The staffer’s brow furrowed. “Um, yeah. They lock them.”

Cheerilee started to throw her hooves up, but gripped the wall as best she could when she wobbled. “Then w-why wouldn’t this d-door be locked, t-t-too?!”

The staffer bit his lip and thought hard. “Well, ’cause I don’t have the key for this one. It’s not fair to lock a door that the staff doesn’t have a key to.” An expression of horror slowly made its way across the stallion’s face. “They’re gonna count this as my break, aren’t they? It’s not fair to give me my break when I’m trapped outside!”

Cheerilee covered her eyes with a hoof and counted to ten. One day, in a sweet, sunny future, she would return and give this whole hotel a piece of her mind, but first she needed to get through this. “W-w-where does this ledge g-go?”

“That way,” the stallion said, pointing beyond her.

“I can s-see that!” Cheeriee hissed through a clenched jaw. “Does it g-go somewhere that I c-could get inside from?”

The staffer shrugged. “Just another balcony like this one. That door’ll be locked, too.”

Her shoulders slumped for a moment before Cheerilee stood ramrod straight again. The street below seemed to twist and writhe below her. Swallowing hard, she inched her way back the way she’d come. Beside her, the birds made dismissive shooing motions with their wings.

“Oh, sh-shut up!” she growled at them. “You g-guys are p-probably part d-d-duck, aren’t you?”

The red jay stuck the tip of its wing under its beak, then flicked it out at her. The pigeon strutted back and forth, daring her to approach.

“Hypothermia m-must be setting in,” Cheerilee said under her breath. “I’m arguing w-with birds.” Taking a few deep breaths, she fixed her gaze on the building across the street and willed her hooves into motion again. The minutes crawled by, but she finally made it to the balcony’s railing. There, her body finally threw in the towel and refused to step off of the ledge. Pursing her lips, she stared at the stallion, who was picking at a bit of acne. “Do you think you could lend me a hoof?”

The stallion’s face crinkled as he thought for a moment. “Uh, we’re not really supposed to do physical stuff with the guests. The manager says—”

Forget about your stupid manager and help me!

“Okay, okay! Jeez” the stallion said, jumping. “You don’t have to get all bossy.” Reaching up, he stretched out a hoof and steadied her while she hopped down from the ledge.

Cheerilee gripped the railing and gulped down a ragged gasps of air. “Oh, sweet Celestia, I’m never d-doing that again.”

“Gosh, it’s c-cold,” the stallion said while trying to work the final button on his collar through its hole. “It’s not f-fair being c-c-cold when I’m trapped outside on m-my break that I didn’t want yet.”

Cheerilee looked down at the patio. “Look, th-this is going to be w-weird, but we’re g-going to f-f-freeze out here if we don’t w-work together. What’s your n-name?”

The stallion scratched behind his ear. “Huh?”

“Your n-name!

“Uh, it’s C-cobblestone, but—”

“Hi, Cobblestone, I’m Ch-cheerilee. Now, I want you t-to wrap yourself around me.”

The stallion’s face turned beet red. “Uh…”

“We n-n-need to our conserve body heat until s-somepony finds us.” Cheerilee stepped close, threading her hooves under his legs and around his back. “Just g-go with it.”

After several seconds, Cobblestone gently encircled her, and Cheerilee sighed. It was still bitterly cold, but manageable for the time being. She nestled her face into his neck. “At least y-you—”

I should have known!

Both Cheerilee and Cobblestone jumped, releasing each other reflexively.

Tenderheart’s chest rose and fell in ragged gasps, and unshed tears filled her eyes. “Here I was, all worried because you’d disappeared! I thought you were better than this, Cheerilee! ‘I’m going to go get us some water because I care about you so much!’ That was a good one!”

No, this isn’t what it looks like! We’re—”

“Oh, save it!” Tenderheart said, the words dripping with venom as she spit them out. “You must think I’m some kind of idiot! Well, don’t let me interrupt!”

Cheerilee dove for the handle. “No! Don’t—”

Her cheeks flaming and her lower lip quivering, Tenderheart slammed the door closed. Nearby, the birds let out a surprised squawk and took to the air.

“No!” Cheerilee pounded on the door. “It’s not like that!”

“So what n-now?” Cobblestone said, picking at his acne again.

“I don’t know!”

“J-jeez, lay off!” he replied, holding his hooves up between them. “I’m j-just asking.”

Cheerilee dropped her head into her hooves. “Sorry. I’m s-sorry. I d-don’t mean to t-t-take it out on you.”

Cobblestone exhaled out a steaming cloud. “Too b-bad the building’s n-not on fire.”

Cheerilee looked up, her face screwed up in confusion. “Um, I know it’s c-cold, but that wouldn’t be any b-better. It’d be w-worse, actually.”

“No, I m-mean we could use the f-fire escape then.”

Her templed began to throb. “What fire escape?”

Cobblestone rolled his eyes. “The one on th-the other balcony! Jeez, I thought you s-said you worked in a hotel.”

Cheerilee shot to her hooves. “Why didn’t you tell me there was a way down when I was halfway there?”

“Because the rules say we can only use the fire escape when the building’s on fire!” Cobblestone swept his hoof in the direction of the hotel’s vast wall. “I don’t see a fire anywhere.”

“Ugh! Wh-whatever!” Cheerilee swallowed hard and stepped up onto the ledge again. “I’ll l-let somepony know y-you’re out here.”

“Uh, okay,” Cobblestone bit his lip and looked down for a moment. “C-can you t-tell them it’s not f-fair that I’m on break? I don’t w-want this to be my b-break.”

“I’ll let them know.”

“And Cheerilee,” Cobblestone stepped forward, extending a tentative hoof toward her. “I just wanted to let you know…” He took a deep breath. “Um… that pigeon pooped in your mane when it flew off. It’s right there,” he continued, pointing several times, “and it kind of looks like an icicle.”

Cheerilee rolled her eyes and inched further along the ledge. “Thanks.”

Cobblestone took out his index card again. “Address guest by name, or say ‘Sir’ or ‘Madam’, we are pleased...”

Resting the back of her head against the cold, stone wall, Cheerilee stopped to whisper a prayer for patience and bravery, then edged around the corner.