//------------------------------// // The Dream of Marigold // Story: You're Here! // by Arn //------------------------------// She never though she'd ever want one, she, quite content to live out her days alone. Walking the paths of Filly Delphi, her boring quiet life from home to work to market, work and home again. Clients customers parties and weddings to fill the monotony.... ...weddings... ....monogam... News! News on the community tree! Her eyes wandered to the tree in the square. She saw that proclamation nailed in public view! Her face flushed her heart raced, her mouth opened and her tongue went to the the top of her mouth as if to click looking through half lidded eyes! A stallion. A poster. From Celestia herself,Depicting what the perfect male would look like! A promising: to every eligible female!Their own male. Just come to capital. She stared at it a long time. A very long time with her blue eyes, blue as crystal. Then she shook her head breaking the eye lock, "I don't need a male! "she said rubbing her sore lower lip realizing she had closed her mouth and had been biting it, hard." I'm not like that! Nope! Not like those: uncontrolled brutes, chasing males all over town this time of year. "She stood up straighter putting her nose and air with a sniff that would have made a unicorn proud turning her back on the poster. She turned her back on tree and poster. "Mustanga!Them!" head held high. "I am better!" "Simply follow mother's time honored instructions this time of year. "She repeated her mother's instruction"...eat lots of parsnip and turnip soup." then of her own volition as to what to do after. "Have a nice bubble bath and all will be fine...just fine. "the cream colored mare mused to herself. She departing with a flick of her blonde tail with red highlights and pink strands matching her mane, going home away from the tree with the poster applied. As the pink flyaways seemed to drift against her coat main and tail, that direction, toward tree and poster! A nice walk along garden paths of the city of Filly Delphi to her house. Good business at her shop had allowed her to buy this small plot and build her dream house, what we here on earth would describe as a narrow two story colonial. She wanted squares, and had many arguments with the architect finally drawing up the plans herself. His contribution? The house looked like a box of flowers spilling into an open garden. Proud of her house she was, standing there among the trees with her garden about. .....and the best thing about it, a relatively new innovation. Indoor plumbing! Yes, a lovely night in her lovely house, eating lovely soup, taking a lovely bath and lovely sleep after a hard day's work upstairs in her lovely bed. Lovely! The night did not go well. Scalded soup: too much sherry; absentmindedly she stirred the pot. She stopped, noticing the bottle held aloft tightly in her hoof and caught herself attempting to swig from the bottle. So uncivilized. So gauche. "What am thinking? I'm not! "she replied with a scowl. "Don't want to become a lush." After pouring its entire contents into the pot, draining with protest of air and sherry trading places from the bottle, a strange high pitched gurgling, watching the wall across through half lidded eyes of disgust annoyance and disbelief at the sound coming from the bottle. "Really, seriously?" Listening or not, she hurled the empty bottle across the room to said wall. It shattered everywhere. "Snip the bud early keep the bad habits away as mom and dad would say. "She grumbled quietly as she left the soup to clean the mess. There was a stinging smell to her nose. The soup had bubbled over, scalded then burned. "How did it take so long to clean up the glass?" she thought. She frantically opened up the windows, her trying to keep her house smelling like that of vegetable miser's of ill repute! When she had a good breeze going, she sat down to eat her creation as an ugly brown bubble popped in her bowl startling her. Staring at the bowl with shock and dread, she hit her hoof to the table determined to clear the noiseless air. "Enough!" she said. "Its still good food! I'm not wasting it! "She gripped the spoon tightly. "I will finish it all." She finished with a burp that tasted worse than on its way down. "Come on! Your a lady...."she whined. "For heaven's sake be a lady!" She cleaned up her kitchen waiting for the air in her house to clear. Working and scrubbing really helped to take her mind off the building and conflicting pressures dancing inside as well as the prancing stallions dancing in her head trotting around her neurons as in a yard at a barrel race. "Use the passion to get work done."thought she on her mother's and father's advice. She didn't stop with the kitchen. When she was finished she was a sweeting mess. "I really went over the top cleaning." she mumbled wiping her brow. "If I was going to be away for a couple weeks, that would be another matter...."she stretched. "It's late! I'm looking forward to that bath, just to float." she saw herself in a mirror."Heh. I'm a mess. I really need that bath, "she said with a smile." just to float." The evening was not a total loss. She gathered her things placed in a bucket on her back walked into the bathroom to prepared her bath. Draw the water. Fill the bucket and the tub. Nice hot tub, bubbles to cover in a heap of foam, and cold water in a bucket beside to drink. Wait for the bucket to be room temperature and rinse off the suds when she was done. A tradition she had on a good week of selling flowers. She always had a good week this time of year! She settled in with a sigh. Let the water wash it all away. Leaning back to relax her ear suddenly flopped. A powerful inclination began asserting itself like a growing storm coming over the horizon. The thought of that poster, wondering what it would be like. She could handle her thoughts, she was an adult, she could stop anytime she wanted. Strong back and trunk, firm legs and neck, long mane, something she had never allowed herself to think about let alone experience, before she knew it "it" had overcome her thinking, raging roaring... it was overwhelming! She felt her self control rapidly going: a rabid cavalry charge over the hill to the defenseless town! A raging tidal wave. A frantic flood! She gasped realizing she was about to be washed away in the torrent. Frantically she grabbed the large bucket full of ice cold water and dropped over her self as she shrieked in shock of the unexpected cold, awash of frustration. The following silence accented as the wooden tub fell to the floor with a hollow sound in the silence aftermath, with only the sound of sputtering cough and heavy, angry breathing through nostrils. Now the evening was a total loss! She went outside into the garden, in the cool of the evening when the best flowers are most fragrant, it smelt ravishing and delectable. As if the most fragrant of flowers were putting out their best for the one who took care of them. Especially tonight when she felt most blue. But she was a florist, that was her job, it did nothing to make her feel better. It reminded her when home was shop bound, when she first started the business. All the worst of living above her shop, waking up in the middle of the night to rushing carts or commotion on the streets. It was why she had moved to her own house a distance away from the business. It was a way of knowing her customers and community better. Making friends. She peered a gaze at her cutie mark, an expertly done bouquet depicting flowers of love and faithfulness wrapped up in what looked like a spreadsheet or grocery list, before darting her eyes forward again. Her cutie mark signifying the seal of the new her, her rebirth. Although throughout her business everything she had done to that point she had done in joy, to advance, to progress, to achieve greater maturity. She felt to go back living above the shop, would be a regression, a lack of maturing. There was a grinding sound as Marigold brought her teeth together like millstone grinding barley to flour. Lack of maturing like this gnawing stallion fever she had right now, that she thought was defeated long ago! How her mother sat up with her this time of year... It turned on in her too early. So bad in the days of her youth, she had to be sent home from school. Teacher took one look at this gasping mass of sweating hormones that day it was found out and immediately sent her to the nurse who contacted her parents. "Remedial studies with mom at home..."she said to her self. "So very embarrassing beyond words." The fillies and colts at school found words: Marigold the over fragrant/flatulent and other names less noble. An only child of elderly parents, their time together was too short. First mom left then dad. Dad tried very hard not to blame Marigold for all the times mom had to be away from him, becalming their little filly. Males also had their season. Marigold sat up with him in a flop sweet, laying on his back as she gently applying a cool cloth to his head mopping. Marigold had practice deep self control her urges seemingly conquered. The last days with dad seemed to be the richer he taught her much. She learned that males were not just objects of attraction. Most important in those last days of his he taught her what was love! "As you stay by this sick old stallion you are showing love." he said looking at her face. "So much like your mother." he said with a gentle smile. "I feel that love...it believes all things, hopes all thing does not rejoice in evil...I love you, to protect you, yes, yes I will cling to that. I will cling to that unknown deep abiding love your mother talked about as if it were a being itself! Yes I will cling and trust that love! I know I have loved and continue to love and...and I am sure...I know for certain...love is life...."and those were his last words. All her anger dried up in a single feeling of loss and defeat, a brokenness inside. "Why?!!"she said mewling and whining loudly complaining, stinking sweating, as it spilled out. "Why would Celestia do such things?"leaving her alone to build her up illusions of conquest and maturity then put this poster in front of her face, as if to mock her. "Having heralds put up such a poster in the public square for weak mare like me to see?" she cried. "How an omnipotent long lived ruler could be so cruel? Doesn't she know? Doesn't she care?" She said complaining to the night, complaining to the mare in the moon. "Are you entertained?" she said with a sneer in a final fit of temper looking up at it. And with that she hung her head, dragged herself up the stairs a soggy smelly mess in the second story of her house in Filly Delphi. Then to bed. She dreamed. There was spinning pavilion before her. She navigated a large screaming throng. Stallions hid among the columns of the spinning structure clutching and peering out confused at the world whirling before them. Atop, the point roof standing on the struts , wiggly bipeds sang an introductory song of complicated cords, as strange as the exaggerated lutes and drums grasped in spidery like appendages they held. A loud voice introduced them. They didn't look like *Beatles! The music started as they rocked back and forth with every word singing to each other. Seeming to try and out sing each other as the herd screamed! She could just make out They wanted to hold and...she couldn't make out the rest (maybe because it was copyrighted) During the song some stallions jumped of, sometimes mares jumped on taking a stallion off. Again, others were thrown out. Again they sang about holding and being something..... It continued, this. "The lines are to long, too long, too long look there are plenty of earth ponies why should we be denied? One for everymare one for everywhere!" said a voice. Not being able to hide she heard, Just then, a swarm of pegisi descended on the pavilion zipping through, seizing stallions with abandon and glee. Something and wanting to hold and something. At the same time unicorns used their magic and pulled stallions off, wrenching them out, the stallions desperately grasping empty air holding high in the air their prized studs. Earth ponies sprang out of the earth seizing unicorn males who had inhibitor rings on their horns. Being happy and not able to hide, they sang. Then the pavilion began to spin faster and faster, throwing stallions out more and more to the waiting mares who caught them with delight, it seemed our cream colored mare would miss out. Repeating they wanted to hold and something again three times. The crowd was gone all sated. The pavilion stopped. The band packed up and left. In the silence, Marigold though she had missed out. Then she smelled smoke and through the haze saw him a stallion the others had missed. The smoke was like a haze about him as he clutched the posts with all his might, between two as if he wanted to bring down the roof. A voice came from out of the smoke as it curled around his ear, "Mutilated and bent. Beast! "it snickered." You've lost your soul!" "Faithful, faithful..faithful, faithful...I am called to be faithful! "gripping the pillars tighter so that they cracked. "Not to win or lose, just to be faithful! "he cried out as he shivered a stallion's huddled figure. He held a book to his trunk. On it were great golden letters. She could not see him in the sun's fading light but a wad. "That one needs more help than the others. That one needs me!" She looked at him and loved him. "There you are. So you have consider my imago dei, my son, Helpmate?" She turned and sitting on a bench was another one of those wiggly creatures only different. More real. "What do the letters on the tattered book with the new cover say she asked? "surprised at her boldness. "It was recovered by a unicorn who acted in good faith. Though he knew not, he imitated my first born the intercessor as he was led by an unknown hand, he reasoned with this one saving him from the fire and Equestria from the devourer, delivering his mind from the evil one during the suns blindness." It was hard to reply to that...what could one say to that? "Gosh." He continued. "The words say, In the Beginning. He then pat the bench. "Come. Sit with me. Let us reason together. I'd like that." She did so and sat the way he did, she was comfortable, strange. "So you have arrived." he said knowingly. "It took you some very big steps and now...."he said with a sigh. "You are here...with me."a beaming giant. "Hee."he found another thing amusing. "You will never be more comfortable than when you sit atop your husband, a stately gate,as he steadily walks along. " She blinked at his pleasant smile. He leaned in close. "He will call it side saddle." A small laugh in his voice. She felt her face smile back. Such wonderful nonsense! She felt happy. "Now for serious things, business." he turned serious. "My imago dei looks like me...and I take myself very seriously!" there was a solemn in the air that commanded attention. "Listen carefully because you won't remember everything and that is for the best. What we speak of here, right now, is important and I will remind you always." She looked up at him and felt disappointed upset she would have to be reminded. " Its complicated for ponies, peeps too...but I will come again in dreams." her heart felt glad. "I will talk to you again starting in the morning." He said. "Remember be wise. Remember your parents teaching and of what to be fearful. In dreams, or whatever you hear: you, be discerning...for not all spirits come from me not all voices are mine." They talked of many things especially the stallion He called imago dei.