//------------------------------// // Chapter 6: Can You Say Awkward? // Story: Clusterbuck to City Hall // by Caddy Finz //------------------------------// "So, Tavi..." Vinyl said. "Was he cute?" "Well, yeah I guess you could say that. It turns out that I actually hung out with him at the Nightmare Night party at Sweet apple acres a couple years ago. He looked like a train wreck back then but now he's actually quite handsome." "Sweet deal. So you think he left that phone number, eh?" "I don't know anypony else who would have, Vinyl." "And you're totally sure it's not fake?" "Well, It doesn't star with five-five-five or end with eight-six-seven-five-three-oh-nine so that's a good indication." "Ugh, I hate that song even when I'm high. So do you think you'll call him? I think it would do you some good to start dating. I know how you wanna find that 'special somepony' or whatever but nopony ever ends up settling down with their first date. You gotta start somewhere." "I guess you have a point there. Well, here it goes." Octavia then dialed the number that she found on her vehicle the previous day and waited for an answer on the other end. After ringing five times, a familiar voice had finally broken the silence. "Hey, you've reached Caramel. I'm not around right now 'cause I'm probably busy saving the day as usual. Heheh, leave me a message with the four-one-one and I might call you back if I feel like it." Beep! "Uh h-hey, Caramel." Octavia nervously began as Vinyl coached her through leaving a message by whispering some advice to her. "Um, this is Octavia. So yeah, I uh got your phone number and called you back." Vinyl then facehoofed out of frustration at her friend stating the most obvious and making a mess of what should have been a simple message. "I thought maybe we could hang out or something." Octavia continued. "Like, I guess just call me back and we can set something up. See ya." Click "Real smooth, Tavi." Vinyl said. "Oh you think so?" Octavia replied. "No. In fact, his voice recording was more smooth than you. I'm also really disappointed that you can't read lips. I had all the perfect lines and you just decided to go your own crappy way." "I knew very well what you were saying and I am not about to leave a message involving pelvic thrusts and saying I want him to mount my-" Meanwhile, several bocks away... "She sounded kinda nervous there, cuz." Big Mac said as he was giving Caramel pick-up advice. "When a mare's nervous, That means she's interested." "That so?" Caramel replied as he wrote everything down in a small note pad. "Okay so then I should call her back soon, right?" "Ah think ya should give it a whole day before ya do that. Nothin' gets a mare's skirt off faster than actin' like ya don't care." "I'm not really in it just to get laid, Mac. She's a nice girl, I don't wanna lead her on like that." "Well, it still can't hurt to just play it cool. I gotta get goin' now. I got a date an' Ah don't wanna keep mah lil' Flutterpie waitn' too long. See ya at the station next week, cuz." "Okay see you around, Mac. Thanks for the help." Big Macintosh then left Caramel's apartment to be with his girlfriend. Caramel now had the peace and quiet he needed to think things over on how he would go about returning Octavia's call and when he would do so. He pondered his options over a Jab soda and decided that he would take his cousin's advice and call his crush tomorrow. After flipping through his entire television package of nine channels with still nothing good on to watch, He would start off his vacation by just taking a leisurely stroll down the street. Caramel lived on the West side of Ponyville which was the busier side of town. Instead of a house converted into three separate apartments, it was a four story brick building with a total of sixteen apartments. Despite the different arrangement, it was still a decent place to live. Nothing overly fancy but certainly not a slum. Being with the Ponyville Police Department paid his bills, filled his fridge and kept a 1984 Plottsmouth J Series in the tenant parking lot. It was more on the compact side but it was a comfortable ride. Caramel continued his already slow pace towards the park on the South side of Ponyville, stopping once in a while to smell flowers and even answered a payphone out of pure curiosity. After politely declining a job offer that involved stealing vehicles, he trotted over to a park bench and took a seat to just admire the beautiful summer scenery the small town had to offer. "Hmm...calling random payphones to offer mob jobs..." Caramel said to himself as he pondered what just happened over a cigarette. "Somepony should make a video game out of that. I know I'd play it." As the off duty police stallion enjoyed the first day if his vacation and partook in "pony watching" on the bench on which he sat, his time to relax quickly turned into something where his keen wits would be needed more than ever. "I'm so glad we came here, Vinyl." Octavia said to her best friend as they trotted behind Caramel, apparently not noticing that he was there. "This walk is just what we needed after all this crap we've been dealing with the past few days." "You can say that again, Tavi." Vinyl replied. "See this is why I'm glad we moved from Canterlot. We're not constantly being pushed aside by bigshots but we're not in the sticks so much that everypony's related to eacho-" Vinyl's sentence was cut short as the pair stopped directly behind Caramel who was nervously trying to blend in as to avoid being seen. He had not mentally prepared himself enough for his next conversation with Octavia so avoiding an unexpected encounter at an inconvenient time was his best option. "What's wrong, Vinyl?" Octavia asked as the DJ sniffed at the air. "Listen." Vinyl whispered. "Do you smell something? "Other than the park's garden, I don't smell anything." "I smell...bacon!" Vinyl, being the borderline reckless partier she was, never liked the police and had a knack for picking even the most well disguised undercover officer out of a crowd. This sixth sent of hers that she developed even went so far as to differentiate the unique odor that the blue dye from a police uniform gave off and could smell it on anypony who wore one within the last week. Caramel was now hiding behind a newspaper he had brought with him and was beginning to sweat as his nervousness got the better of him. His own sixth sense started to kick in as he finally lowered the newspaper revealing the face of the crazy DJ a mere few inches away from his. Vinyl's pupils had shrunk to the size of pins and she was snorting like a minotaur getting ready to charge. Standing a few feet behind Vinyl was Octavia who now looked as nervous as caramel did. "Vinyl..." Octavia said, knowing she didn't have much time to stop her friend from starting trouble. "This is Caramel, the nice charming guy I told you about." Vinyl could not believe what she had just heard and turned around to face her long time friend. "Tavi, we're gonna have some fucking problems, aren't we?"