He appeared no less’n twenty-somethin’ years after Applejack was born, when she was a grown mare and Apple Bloom was still in school. It was a Tuesday, and he made sure everypony else was gone before he stepped in sight o’ me.
I’d been working the fields while Granny Smith slept in the house. AJ was out with her friends. Bloomie was at a sleepover. At that moment, it was only me was out there tendin’ the orchard.
Then he appeared beside the white-stile, just outside our property line. He looked as ragged as he ever been, and his jowls and sags made ‘im look like somepony took his face and stuck it in a blender. He was in his ratty overcoat which I knew even from this far smelt like bad turnips. And-a he just stood there by the stile, watchin’ me like he always used to do.
My papa.
At first I wanted t’get Granny, but I nearly slapped myself fo’ thinkin’ sucha thing. Why’d she want to see him? I didn’t want to look at ‘im, so sure as shootin’ Granny didn’t wanna see him.
And yet, he stood there by the stile, watchin’ me with his piggy eyes like a buzzard would watch a dyin’ animal. I knew if he’d smiled he’d shown nothing but gaps and rotten cores. He had a smile like a snake.
If he ever smiled at all.
I ignored him for the longest while, just buckin’ the apples and plowing the fields, alternating ‘cause of AJ’s absence. I didn’t mind so much her friends. I liked ‘em, actually. The pink one always makes me chuckle.
But I was glad AJ weren’t here to see him. She still didn’t know who her daddy was, and I weren’t one to begin to tell her.
I plowed on, but inside-a me a flame was flickerin’, growin’ with every beat o’ my heart. Anger of the worst sort caught my body and made me sweat. It weren’t that hot out, but I could feel his pig-eyes drillin’ into the back’o my skull, judging me like he used to back when I was no bigger ‘n a milk bucket.
He wanted me t’come to him, and I didn’t want t’give him the satisfaction. I was stronger and tougher than he was. He weren’t no threat to me.
But if Applejack…
Outta the corner of my eye he came across the field, tramplin’ the seeds I’d planted with indifference. He weren’t here to apologize. He weren’t remorseful at all. He’d just come t’gloat. I’d die before I let him get the best o’me now.
He stopped ‘bout ten feet away from where I stood, just eyein’ away with his hooves tucked underneath ‘im, egging me on to ask him what the heck he was doin’ back. Even in my eye corner I could see the smirk on his sagged face.
“You turned out big, Mac.”
His voice is like sharpened hooves onna chalkboard, like nails on wood, grating and meshing and altogether unpleasant.
“Y’can stop plowin’ along, son, and lemme in the house. I wanted t’talk t’Granny.”
“You ain’t getting near her, Strudel,” I growl, refusing t’look at him, starin’ intently at the ground. I heard him chuckle.
“I’m still yo’ daddy, Mac. You do what I say.”
I had it right there and then. I’d made a promise t’myself, if I ever saw his hide ‘round here again I’d tan it til it browned, but now I wanted nothin’ more than t’be far away as possible from him.
So I gave in. I turned around. He smirked and began t’trot backwards, back toward the fence. Can’t think of a reason why, ‘cept so he could dictate the terms o’ this meeting, to give him some inklin’ of power that he thought he still had.
“I ain’t doin’ nothing you say, Strudel.”
“You will address me ‘s Pa, boy.”
“I ain’t yo boy.”
“You damn well my boy, Mac!”
“The devil lay inside-a you, Strudel, and I ain’t no son of the devil.”
“The devil be who you meet if you don’ shut up and get outta my way!”
“Why’d you come, Strudel? Why’d you come back? T’mock? T’gloat? You cain’t be here t’pologize.”
“You right. I ain’t.” He leaned back on the rickety fence. “I’m here for my babies.”
He struck me dumb right ‘bout there. “Babies? Sun’s gotten t’ya, Strudel, either that or your brain got even smaller…”
“Whadyu say, boy?!”
“You heard what I said, Strudel! You ain’t welcome here. You never was, you never gonna be. You got ‘bout ten seconds ‘fore I whip yo’ sorry hide.”
He laughed harder, harder ‘n I ever saw him laugh. His voice were bad enough, but his laugh sounded like the clankin’ and clunkin’ of hell itself. I was maybe a couple feet away from him, my hooves dug deep inna ground.
“You whip me? Boy, I oughta whip you’s for sayin’ that! You lil’!”
“I ain’t lil’ no more, Strudel. I bigger now. Smarter, too. You mighta noticed that were yo’ head not so far up yo’ rump.”
He stopped laughin’. “Whatchu sayin’? Boy I oughta beat you!”
“Bring it on, old-timer. I always wanted t’make you a part o’ the ground.”
“You cain’t stop me.”
“Why you here? So you can violate my gramma again?!”
His eyes went wider ‘n saucers. “What’yu say?”
“I know ‘bout that night, Strudel. That night you beat me silly. You took her and you done things to her that no pony in his right mind shoulda done to her. I heard it. You made me listen. She’s yo’ mama, for Celestia’s sake!”
“You don’t know shit, boy. Not a damned thing.”
“I know when I see a friend and I see a foe. Right now, I see a coward. A feckless sack o’ dung that has no place in this world but somehow managed t’worm his way into existence. You a stain, Strudel, and I ain’t never gonna call you pa no more! You step off now or I swear I kill you.”
He laughed again. I lost it, pawin’ at the ground like a bull, ready t’charge him.
“Y’aint serious, boy. C’mon, now. You ‘n I know you cain’t fight worth shit.”
“I fought bigger ‘n you, y’piece of shit,” I growl angry-like. “I fought timber wolves, you coward. You sayin’ you better thanna timber?”
He finally got it and stepped up offa the fence, rollin’ up his sleeves. “Alrighty, if itsa fight you want…”
I didn’t let him finish. How could I with such a sweet opportunity?
I beat him. Good Celestia, I beat him bad. I beat him til the sun went down. He never got a punch off. He just sat there and took it, and after a while it got so frustratin’ that it were like beating a dead horse. Soon I was forcin’ him up, forcin’ him to swing so I could have ‘n excuse to knock him back down.
I beat him til his blood ran red on the white fence. I beat him til his eyes so swelled that he couldn’t see nothin’ out of em. I beat him and beat him until the moon came up and he no longer had t’energy to yell in pain. He just stood there an took it, like he’d done with Granny. Like he’d done with me.
I said a-many things, too many things to remember, and I never stopped beating him. I beat him until my hooves were chipped and raw and his blood lay hidden on my coat. I beat him until I was crying at my own pain, until I hit ‘im so much my hooves started to bleed, until he was nothin’ but a sack of bones ‘n skin with eyes and a ratty coat, no longer a pony but a useless, feckless…
“Big Macintosh?!”
I looked up and there a-stood AJ, mouth agape an’ all. Bloomie was with her. She never looked more afraid then she did then.
“What in Equestria are you doin’, Big Macintosh? Get offa that poor fella!”
“AJ, listen t’me, this stallion ain’t…”
“Stop it! Good grief, you mighta killed him! Apple Bloom, go in ‘n get Granny Smith to…”
“NO!”
My voice shook the blood-covered fence and made my sisters jump in their horseshoes. I was breathin’ hard, too hard, and I musta looked like a pony from a nightmare, all covered in blood and tears.
“This…fella…he’s…he’s…”
“What? He badmouth you or somthin’? You gettin fights now?! What kinda brother are you? Settin’ a poor example fer yer little sister!”
“But…AJ…”
“And you didn’t finish the buckin’! You told me you’d get the job while I was away, ‘n now I hafta work double…”
“…ergh…”
Strudel spoke in gurgles, blood seepin’ from his mouth like a red fountain. AJ went up to him and, to my utter disgust, touched him.
“GET OFFA HIM!” I screamed, tacklin’ my sister into the dust.
“What in tarnation?!” Bloomie yelled, confused and frightened as a pony in the dark.
“You get offa me, Big Macintosh! What the heck is wrong with you?!”
I’m speechless. No words. “I…”
“That does it. Fine. You wanna beat up somepony who spoke you wrong, go right ahead. Don’t come whinin’ to me or Granny if yer hooves hurt afterwards. C’mon, sis.”
She hustled along down the path to the house and Apple Bloom looked at me one more time, and I knew that look. It was the same kinda look I gave my pa every day of my miserable colthood. It was the look of a pony questionin’ whether or not the pony he sees is a pony or a monster.
But the monster lay on the ground next to the bloody fence.
Didn’t he?
I sat down on my rump and slipped off my harness. Overhead the clouds were ‘bout to break free. Good.
In the rain, ain’t nopony can see you cryin’.
And that’s what I did, as my pa lay dyin’ not inches behind me in the dirt, strewn before the once-white fence. I cried and cried until I weren’t shedding tears but rather tears of blood. My blood.
And then I cried some more. I cried when I no longer heard Strudel breathin’. I cried when the clouds broke.
I cried. My soul cried.
The monster cried.