How long have I lived like this?
This silent charade in the dark, sandwiched between showers and sleep...
I can't tell when the day dies and the night begins.
Perhaps I have always lived like this. I just don't remember it being so dim. The curtains are closed and the lamps gather dust. The more that I think about it, this house has only ever needed light for Tavi's sake. I could always feel the shapes and contours of things in the dark... guided my own crimson steps via the green hum of the world and the crazy colors in between.
Now, it's different. Everything is dull... uniform... a tan coin frozen to the bottom of a black well. The only vibrance is Scribbler's purrs. She shimmers in the dark, innocent, loving. We've bonded over these past... days? Weeks? I hold her close as I struggle to keep myself from pondering over how far Tavi has gone. I wonder if she's someplace safe... or at least someplace decent. I can afford to live like a bum—at least, for a little while. Her, though? Her situation is different. I've always managed the budget of this place; I've simply never bothered to explain to her precisely how.
I wonder how long it will take for her to realize how desperately she needs me. Then I wonder how long until she gets over her remorse from such a realization.
And that's how I've come to expect... to not expect.
Octavia is never coming back.
It's only me now.
Me... and this delightful little ball of orange mirth. Scribbler's too precious to know that there are absurd creatures who walk this planet—creatures capable of squandering innocence... of ruining the best things that life has to offer because they cling to the selfish dream of something more.
Our relationship. Over the past few days, I've thought about it so many times and with such intensity that even the dust from my tears no longer have the energy to scatter. I should have done more for Octavia. But I don't think I could have accomplished that by giving my all. Just how would the two of us have benefited if I indulged more in the DJ-P0N3 persona? Would she have liked living in a fancier apartment? In a fancier town? With fancier friends?
If I really gave into my fame and fortune... like truly given into it, then surely I would have dragged my roommate far from here. All of the friends we made in Ponyville—along with all the memories we've enjoyed—would never have existed. Yes, perhaps we would have had a slightly more sophisticated existence in a place like Canterlot or Manehattan... but—for all of Octavia's eccentricities—would that be the life that she would have wanted? Especially if she didn't earn it on her own?
Hell, if I played my cards right, I could even have swayed some of the record label execs to have Octavia's name brushed under the noses of several representatives of the Canterlot Symphony Orchestra. But—if I know Tavi—she doesn't want to be grandfathered into anything... especially when it comes to a destiny that aligns with her dreams... her aspirations.
She has so much to prove... just as I had so much to give. And yet—after seven long years—neither of us did any of that. Tavi had her wine and my ears. I had my Dr. Pony and her voice. Day by day, we lived in the comfort of each other's... comfort. Too afraid to make changes that could... change us. Even becoming Royal Minstrels was just an act of pretense. For if I wanted to live the simple life that I desired... and if Tavi wanted to climb to the heights she dreamed of...
...then our only choice would have been to go our separate ways... to venture forth on courageous crusades under the colorless banners of lonesome guile. We'd become our talents and our talents would become us. There would be no room for companionship. It'd be a frayed string at best, connecting us flimsily across the huge void between our separate schools.
In the end, the only thing that bound us so tightly... was our fears. Two grown mares, too afaid of the heartstopping leap it would take to reach some place higher... better... healthier.
Seven long years...
...and nothing accomplished.
I don't blame Tavi for being mad. It would seem a far better thing if those seven years never happened at all.
And that's what finally makes me move... shattering the stillness of this shadowed hovel.
I gently place Scribbler on the edge of the couch, nuzzle her, and trot slowly across the room.
I open the drawer of a desk next to my studio, and I pull out both a calendar and a record book tied to my banking account. Even before I start planning, I know how frigid the road ahead of me is... including the very texture of its frost.
But before I take care of that...
...I have one last thing to look after. The last precious thing in my existence.