“Almost done sveetheart, just a moment," the spa pony croons.
You do your best to sit still as Lotus finishes forming a long, fishtail braid through your dark brown hair. You hate to admit it, I mean really really hate to admit it, but you are almost enjoying the feel of the repeated brief tug, then release, as every strand is tucked neatly into place. It's been quite a while since you've had someone else braid your hair, and it's almost too long for you to properly do it yourself now. Come to think of it, the last person who did it for you was probably your mother.
Ouch, that's a thought you'd rather not feel again.
Beside you, Fluttershy is smiling a sheepish, almost embarrassed smile as another spa pony fold flowers and vines into her hair. You have the urge to tell her that she looks a little like Poison Ivy, a character from your homeworld, but decide not to. Would be too long an explanation, and you doubt you could explain it without sounding somehow insulting. You doubt Fluttershy would take too well to being compared to a super-villain, no matter if it was a really cool one.
Across the way, Rarity is still holding her chin high as two ponies run a long, ornate blue comb over and over again through her wet and still drying mane.
“I'm so glad you finally took us up on our spa-day offer,” Rarity says to you brightly. “Fluttershy and I have been doing it for years, but it's so much nicer when there's a trio of us, wouldn’t you say, darling?”
“Yes of course,” Fluttershy says with a big smile and nod.
The spa pony puts a hoof under her chin to stop the nodding, seeing as it’s messing with the careful vine-weaving. Fluttershy blushes, and the spa pony gives her a good-natured scowl.
"Stay still please."
“Oops, sorry,” the yellow pony says in an almost whispered squeak.
If you're being honest, you’d say this actually is pretty nice. You've never been one for being pampered, but this vague feeling of belonging is definitely something you've been missing.
“Well...thanks for inviting me,” you say at last.
“Anytime dear, we simply must make this a regular thing.”
“I agree,” Fluttershy says, again nodding.
Again the spa pony stills her head with one hoof, and Fluttershy apologizes meekly.
You've never been good at thankyous, even though you feel compelled to be polite, and you've never really been good at interacting with other girls. Especially quadrupedal ones. Saying it this time wasn’t so bad though, you tell yourself. None of this is so bad.
With a deep sigh, you shut your eyes and allow yourself to be ok with being here, for a change. No missing home right now, no feeling completely alone in this world, and no being sad about being excluded. You're with friends, this is your home, and you're not alone. Stop worrying. Just breathe.
You feel a short sharp tug, and the pony behind you announces that she's finished with your hair. With a hesitant hand, you reach back and gingerly brush across the carefully woven layers, letting your fingers play over the crossing strands. You can feel the braid undulate from the top of your hair downward, like a snake, forming a switchback of brunette hair twice against your head and neck. You wonder, not for the first time, how these spa ponies can be so dextrous with their hooves. As you shoot the blue on an impressed glance, she gives you a proud wink in response. Even though you haven't seen a mirror yet, you're sure her work looks simply lovely. In fact, as you sit up, Rarity tells you so.
“Why it's magnificent darling, just ever so chic,” she croons, clapping together the fronts of her hooves in delight.
This time Fluttershy remains silent and doesn’t bother the pony who’s just finishing up on her mane. But she offers you an approving smile.
“Thanks,” you kind of stutter out, feeling more awkward this time. “Y-you look lovely too.”
Rarity smiles.
“Well of course, but that's old hat my dear, I don't think I've ever seen you look quite so ladylike.”
Ladylike?
You feel yourself flush.
Even in your old world, you were never one for proper ladylike qualities. You didn't mind getting your clothes dirty, you didn't care how neat your nails were, and most of your friends had been guys anyway. Sure, you know how to be polite and put value in it, but being a “lady?” Somehow it makes you ashamed, even though you know it's a compliment, and you’re not entirely sure why.
“That’s…nice of you,” you manage.
“You simply must come back to my studio,” she goes on, as the spa ponies set her mane in its usual curling loops. “I have some dresses you really should try. They'd look magnifique with that new do of yours.”
You want to protest, but they've been so kind to you and paid for this spa treatment. And she's just trying to be nice, you remind yourself. This what friendliness is like, just accept it with a smile.
You manage the smile, though it feels like you're probably grimacing at her.
“Ok, sure,” you say.
“Oh I’m so excited!” she says brightly. “This is going to be oodles of fun, darlings!”
Rarity beams at you, and you feel some fraction of your pride withering like an unwatered flower.
——
An hour later, you're all back at Rarity's boutique, and you wish, more than ever, that you'd just gone home as you originally intended.
You stand on a small modeling pedestal, awkwardly holding up a lilac colored dress around your chest and shoulder. It' pulls taut across your breasts, almost painfully, but bags loose around your neck, like an stretched out sweater. It doesn't even quite make it to your waist before it balloons out and down in back, like you have a poorly placed bustle there. In front, however, it cuts so high that you're afraid to move or else you'll flash someone, and you long ago ran out of usable human underwear. It could be that ponies have panties, but you haven't exactly gone shopping for them. That’s one conversation with a store clerk you’d rather not have.
Rarity surveys you with a calculating eye, slowly shaking her head.
“Oh dear me, no,” she says. “Not at all what I had in mind.”
She circles you, and you can’t help feeing so on display, like some prized little doll. You’ve seen Fluttershy model before, and you’re not quite sure how she does it, giving how it feels even being in front of just them. Rarity stops in front of you again and shrugs defeatedly.
“I'm sorry darling,” she says with a sigh, “I had forgotten how different we are in body-types. It doesn’t quite…work with your natural figure.”
“I think it looks...nice.” Fluttershy says hesitantly.
Gee thanks. Nice. That was real convincing.
“Don't worry about it,” you say with a dismissive wave of your hand. “Just...help me get this off and we'll call it a day, ok?”
Rarity is frowning now.
“Well, alright, but you must let me take your measurements first so I can make you a proper dress before we next have a spa date. It’ll just be a moment, I need to get your inseam, your shoulders, and waist, and…”
You stare at her as she continues her list. What…does she mean naked? You feel your face redden, much against your will, and you try to hide it with a very forced smile.
“Th-that's ok.”
“Come now, I insist.”
“No, really.”
“I can take them right now, before you even get out of that dress, alright my dear?”
It's a compromise. One you're not quite willing to make, but it's certainly better than nothing. With a heavy heart, you consent.
“Wonderful, Fluttershy, lend me a hoof, won't you?”
“Yes of course!”
Even she looks excited at the prospect of this. Fluttershy may be quiet, but you’re quickly realizing that she’s just about as into fashion as Rarity is.
You stand uncomfortably still on the platform, your arms both out to the sides and your legs apart as the ponies circle you like hungry sharks. You want to reach down and hold up the neckline of the dress, as it's showing the tops of your breasts (and it's kinda cold in here) but you do as you've been told. You stand still and tall, like a cute little mannequin.
Using magic and hooves, Rarity pulls a cloth tape-measurer around your hips, waist, thighs, and finally inseam. You feel the thing creep up your inner thigh, uncomfortably cold, and you can't help but flinch at the sensation and intimacy of her so high up your inner thigh. Every so often, you hear Rarity call out a size to Fluttershy, who quickly jots it down, pen in mouth, on a pad of white paper.
When at last she climbs up on a stool to get your bust measurement, she stops, staring dumbly down at your barely ample bosoms like she’s not sure what to do. She stays like that for more than a moment or two, and now you really are simply dying to reach down and cover yourself. Her eyes feel like they’re looking right through that dress.
“May I help you?” you say at last, a little indignantly.
This seems to jolt her out of her titacular fascination.
“Ah, yes, sorry I was just...um...wondering...”
“...What?”
“Well...about these.”
She pokes the side of one of your breasts with the tip of her hoof and you jump a little. Shit, so much for personal space.
“What about them,” you grumble as you cover the spot she poked with one hand.
She hesitates again before speaking.
“Well, I don't really...understand what they are.”
You're fucking kidding me. You stammer at her, fumbling through your mind for delicate but still blunt enough ways to explain things.
“Well,” you say at last, very haltingly. “They’re…a part of my body...”
No shit Sherlock, she needs more than that. Fluttershy has joined her, looking equally baffled by your funpillows. You clear your throat and continue, now pulling your arms into your body to partially cover the topic of discussion.
“They're meant so that...when we have babies...they can get food from there. Like...drink milk from them.”
Dear god. So…uncomfortable. Urge to hide...rising. You can feel the hot blush of your face, and know it won't go away no matter how much you tell it to this time. However, this description does seem to suddenly illuminate something in Rarity's head. Recognition dawns in her eyes, and she nods suddenly, smiling a little.
“Ah yes, we have those too, but they only really appear when we have foals. Strange that you should have them there all the time, it must be uncomfortable.”
Subject change time. Now.
But it's too late, Fluttershy is beginning to speak.
“Um, Anon,” she murmurs. “I'm sorry to ask but...are your babies very tall? I mean, you walk on two legs, so high up and, well, your...mammaries are high up too. How do your children suckle?”
Mammaries. Suckle. Oh god, these words. You have the urge to giggle and vomit at the same time, and the sensation is...less than pleasant. Again, it takes a moment for coherent thoughts and sentences to reach you.
“Uh, well we hold them in our arms, up like this.”
You pantomime rocking a baby in your arms and the two light up, suddenly making soft noises of adoration.
“Oh my, that's so sweet,” Fluttershy says, like she's just hugged a kitten.
“Isn’t it? It must look simply adorable! It does seem like so much work though,” Rarity says, though she too is smiling cozily as if daydreaming about it. “We simply have our breasts here.”
She points almost to her crotch, right above it towards her stomach. Come to think of it, you've never seen foals nursing here, and the mental image of it now is both uncomfortable, disgusting, endearing...and a little saddening. But as you try not to think about it, the image becomes all the more chiseled into your thoughts.
Suddenly, you really just want to go home. Not Pony home either. Real home, where there are others like you, where breasts aren't a thing to be poked and discussed except by you and whoever you're dating at the time. And even then, sparingly.
Why are you feeling like you've swallowed a large rock, and that it's now sitting undigested somewhere in your intestines? Why do you feel all trembly inside and angry and alone?
Completely against your will, you feel your eyes getting wet with tears. Hoping the others don't see, you quickly brush them away, blinking back any more that threaten to spring free. You hate these stupid tears. They show up when you least expect it or want it, and completely debase any argument or statement you're trying to make at the time. The so-sorries and pity you get from people seeing them when you're just trying to talk seriously? God, fuck that. Even in a world where you tower over everyone, feeling like you're about to cry in front of anyone at all makes you feel two inches tall.
God damn fucking ovaries and hormones.
“I have to go,” you say suddenly.
The two ponies, who had been continually discussing foals in soft, cooing sounds, both look up. Rarity looks perplexed.
“Are you alright darling?”
“Yeah, fine,” you say hastily.
“I hope we didn't-”
“Everything’s fine, don't worry, I just forgot that I had something to do for Applejack, that's all. I don’t want to be late.”
You're already red in the face, so they can't see you redden from the lie. You duck behind Rarity’s lavish bedroom door and quickly change, trying not to glance at your own breasts as you fix your bra straps over each shoulder. They started this whole mess, the stupid fucking things.
As you duck back in and hand Rarity the now badly stretched dress, she again eyes you with notable concern.
“You're sure you're alright, dear? One of us could certainly walk you back.”
Fluttershy nods and chimes in.
“I was headed that way anyway, so if you like...”
“No, really, it's ok, gotta get there asap. Sorry to run off like this, really.”
Before they can make another kind offer, you pretty much bolt for the door. Still, you stop, hand poised against the frame, and feel some sort of urging from your time being a polite little girl back on earth. Without looking back, you give a short sigh.
“Th-thanks for inviting me to a spa day with you,” you say quietly. “I...had a fun time. We should do that again soon.”
You wish you weren't lying. You wish you could say that it had been a crazy fun time and that you looked forward to being around these girls again soon. But now, you pretty much dread the idea.
You've never been good at being friends with other girls, you remind yourself. These are still girls, just the four-legged kind. It makes sense this would be hard. You'll have to try, you know, to make friends eventually, and they're probably going to be female. And a bit of politeness now might keep this door open for you, once you decide to return. Plus, they tried. And they were nice to you all day. Thanking them for that is just the right thing to do.
“Yes we simply must!” Rarity calls to you quickly as you begin to shut the door on the two ponies.
“Take care, Anon!”
You duck outside so you don't have time to process their warm and heartfelt goodbyes.
As you turn your steps away from the boutique, you have no direction in general right now. You just want to get out, away from your own thoughts. But ironically, now that you're alone, your thoughts are all you have. And they're loud. And insistent.
This talk of foals, this talk of having a family, breasts, and how to nurse a baby...it's reminded you of something you try desperately to forget every day that you're here. And now it’s front and center in your thoughts, each individual piece of knowledge punctuated by a different sullen heartbeat.
Your family is gone.
Your old life is gone.
Your hopes, dreams, aspirations of future careers, favorite food, favorite music are all gone.
And you won't even be able to start a new family here, as you’d wanted. Humans and horses can't breed, you're well aware of that, and that would assume you even found any of these ponies attractive in the first place. Sure, maybe you could adopt, but you don't know the first thing about raising a foal, as Fluttershy and Rarity have just made painfully apparent. What kind of life would a foal have with you? No, that's not going to happen. You know that’s never going to happen.
The voice is even louder as you walk, and as your pace quickens like you're trying to run from it, it repeats itself. Now, it falls in synch with your footfalls, each one a drumbeat ringing out in your mind.
You will never be a mother.
You will never have a child.
You’re never going to have a family.
It hurts. Some part of you that you can't name, and don't care to understand, aches as you think that. You had wanted a family somewhere down the line, and you'd always assumed that you'd have all time you needed. That it was always just around the corner, something for one day soon when everything was right in your world.
But you're here now.
All at once, irrationally, you hate this place, as if it is somehow watching you with malice and glee as you suffer. You hate the ponies, you hate the sun, the air, everything here. You know it's not their fault, really, but it feels better to hate something at least, rather than just yourself. You try to shake the thoughts away, and again feel tears threatening to spring loose from you.
No.
Fuck that.
No crying over something that was never yours to begin with.
Hastily, you reach up and tug the ties out of your hair, then run your hands through the neat, carefully woven folds. The braids quickly loosen and give way, and your long brown hair falls limp and lifeless around your shoulders. A strand blows across your face, sticking to your cheek for a moment. You don't reach up to move it. You simply open your hand and let the breeze take the ties from your palm, blowing them away.
With more intent, you now turn your steps towards Applejack's home. Looks like you weren’t completely lying after all, you tell yourself with muted satisfaction. You know the pony keeps some cider hidden away, and you have a bit or two saved up. Applejack loves money, so she'll probably sell you some booze in a heartbeat, no questions asked.
Then, you'll head back to the little cottage the ponies gave you, and drink yourself into a coma.
It's probably bad to do that, you know, again, but at the same time, you know it's better than the alternative of eating chocolate in the library while Spike asks incessantly if you're ok. One time doing that was enough, and you worry that if you pass out from drinking there that Spike might call for a medic. You doubt he knows how to deal with drunkards, especially the sad-drunk kind. So it’s better to knock yourself out as soon as you get to your bedroom. Do it alone.
You do everything alone anyway, so this is hardly a change.
If only they made actual horse tranquilizer here, now that would really do the trick, you muse. Then you could sleep the sleep of one who doesn’t really want to wake up. You could dream for days and let the ponies here forget you for a while. Just indulge in not being here for a bit. You find yourself smiling bitterly, almost laughing at yourself.
Maybe in your dreams at least, you can pretend you're still on earth, home, making friends, getting your dream job, starting a family, chasing your life goals…
Maybe in your dreams, you can pretend you still have time.
-End-