I looked at Test in shock. He...he loved me? Not more than a few weeks ago he was asking me what love even felt like. No. This had to be a trick. He couldn't love me even if he'd been trying to. I stepped back and away from him, making him raise an eyebrow at me. "Rhythm, what's wrong?" He asked as I shook my head, tears starting to sting my eyes. "Rhythm?" Test began to step closer to me but with every step he took towards me, I took two away from him.
"N-no." I said quietly, my voice shaking as I felt tears spill over and start running down my cheeks. "No, this is all a trick." I said as I glanced over to my left to see if the exit of the restaurant was clear for an escape. The only pony even close to it was the maitre d' who stood at his podium looking over the reservations for the evening. As fast as I could, I bolted for the exit and out into the summer night. I tried to continue to run but I felt the familiar aura of Test Tube's magic grabbing me and lifting me off the ground. My legs stopped moving as I accepted that I was not going to get away from the grey unicorn and his magic turned me around in the air to face him.
"Rhythm, I don't get it. First you kiss me, and then you run when I kiss you." Test said with a hurt tone in his voice. "Why would you run?"
"Because there's no way you can love me. You didn't even know what love felt like a few weeks ago. How could you possibly know now?" I asked him as he set me back down but kept me in place by wrapping his forelegs around me in a hug. His warmth felt nice as a cool summer breeze danced through the night air and made my face cold from the tears.
"I know because when I'm with you I feel happier than I ever have in my life. I get butterflies in my stomach every time I see you. If I'm not with you then I'm thinking about you. When I dream I see you. When you were in the hospital, I felt so helpless. I felt like my life was ending. And when Lyra and Bon Bon said that somepony needed to stay with you, I saw my chance to be close to you. I thought you might have had feelings for me but I wasn't sure so I never said anything." His words seemed to echo in my head as he continued to hug me. He truly was in love. He was there telling me how much he loved me. And there I was crying after trying to run away from him. Sweet baby Luna, I was an idiot. I nuzzled my head onto his neck and sniffled as his words really sank in. "Rhythm?" He asked, his neck vibrating as he talked.
"Yes?" I replied, my voice quiet and sad.
"You know that I love you, right?" Test asked me as he leaned his head back to look at me. I looked up at him and past his glasses at his beautiful blue eyes. "You know that I love you...don't you?" I gave a couple small, quick nods of confirmation before looking down at the ground. His hoof reached under my chin and gently pulled my head up to let him look me in the eyes. "I love you, Rhythm. And don't you ever forget it. I love you and all your little quirks that make you, you." He said with a small chuckle. "Like how you will relock the door eight times or how you have to have three ice cubes in your drink and if there're more then you'll fish them out. I love how you look in the morning with your mane all sticking up and wild because you haven't showered yet. I love how you can sing and dance along to a record like there's nopony there. I love how you play the piano in the shop when nopony comes in and you never mess up a single note. I love all the little and big things you do that make you so perfect to me. But most importantly, I love you." He leaned forwards to kiss me and I knew he meant it as a way to seal his speech on how much he loved me, but I turned my head to the side. This of course was not unnoticed by Test who stopped when he'd gotten half way to me. "Rhythm?"
"I'm sorry, Test. I'm just having a hard time believing all this right now. Give it some time to sink into my brain. Besides, I'm sure you'll eventually get tired of me wanting to hug and kiss you all the time." I told him, earning a small chuckle from him in response.
"How could I get tired of you? I love you. If I was going to grow tired of you then I wouldn't want to date you." He told me but it did little to convince me.
"Look, everypony gets tired of me eventually. Everypony leaves me after awhile. If you're going to leave me, do it sooner than later so as to save me the pain, OK? That's all I ask of you." I told him and he looked at me before pulling me into another hug.
"Rhythm, you have my word as a nerd and a gentlecolt that I wouldn't leave you." He replied while squeezing me harder than he had during the first hug.
"If you say so. You've seen my better days though." I said as I rested my head on his shoulder.
"What're your bad days like?" Test asked me as we continued to sit together and hug.
"Heh, it can be interesting. Some days I can be crazier than an outhouse rat; others I just get so fed up with myself that I'll throw things." Test's hold on me seemed to tighten a bit after I'd said that.
"Well good days or bad, I'll be there for you. Bad days aren't going to make me leave you. Everypony has bad days. I have bad days. It's just making sure that those bad days don't take control." We broke the hug and he slowly stood up. "What do you say we head back to your place? It's getting pretty late." I nodded in agreement and tried to stand up to follow him. There was just one problem.
"Um, Test?" He turned around and looked at me. "Can you help me up?" I saw him smile and nod as he trotted over and offered a hoof to me which I grabbed a hold of with my own. He pulled me up and we walked back to my apartment in silence. Though, while I was reluctant to believe him, I did find myself walking closer to Test Tube than normal on the way home. When we finally got to the apartment, we both headed inside to get ready for bed. As I stood in front of my bedroom mirror and removed my shirt and tie; I could hear Test just across the hall getting himself undressed. Hanging up my shirt and placing my tie on a small rack on my wall, I decided to put Test to the test and see if he really did want me. "Hey, Test?" I asked and I heard him stop what he was doing in his room.
"Yes?" He answered as I heard him trot over to his doorway.
"I was wondering if...perhaps you would want to sleep in my bed tonight." There was a few moments of silence until I heard hoofsteps coming across the hall and towards my room. He slowly entered my room and looked over at me as if to see whether I was serious or not.
"I'd love to but only if you're offering because you want to and not because you're just being nice." He replied as he looked around my room. That seemed to put my mind at ease as I slowly walked over to him. Looking into his eyes, I saw that they were nothing but genuine in his affection for me. Maybe he really did love me. Of course, knowing my luck it was all just a dream. But if it was, then it was a dream I was happy to live with.
"No, I really want to. It gets kind of cold in that big bed all by myself. I need somepony to keep me warm." I told him as an idea popped into my head. "And if you do a really good job for a few nights," I walked towards the bed and ran my short tail under his chin as I passed him. "I'll even give you a reward." I climbed into the bed and Test was quickly hurrying over with his face seeming to glow red.
"I'm gonna keep you so warm you'll think you're in Appleoosa."
While I was still somewhat reluctant to believe him, it was nice to feel Test's foreleg wrapped around me. While I had not yet opened my eyes, I knew it was still before dawn due to the lack of sunlight coming through the window and onto the bed. I carefully rolled over to face Test and smiled to myself when I saw that I hadn't managed to wake him up. He was so cute while he was asleep. Carefully, I reached a hoof up to his chest which rose and fell gently with each breath he took. I placed my hoof on his chest and could feel his heart beating away. It was like a small drum beat. It was then that an idea struck me. I turned my head around just enough to see the alarm clock on my nightstand. When the second hand was pointed straight up, I began counting Test's heartbeats. I'm sure it would've looked weird to anypony else but it didn't cross my mind at the time. After one minute I carefully rolled out of bed without waking Test. I slipped on my prosthetic and quietly made my way downstairs to the shop and over to the display grand piano. While I couldn't read sheet music, I knew what each note sounded like. So with a pencil, paper, and Test's heartbeat; I set to work writing down the letters for each corresponding note as I began to compose a song and it wasn't until the sound of an alarm clock upstairs made me realize how long I'd been working on it. Looking out the front windows, I saw the sun was coming up and I quickly put away the paper as I heard Test's hooves hit the floor as he climbed out of bed.
"Rhythm? Are you down there?" Test's voice called down the stairs. I trotted over to the base of the stairs and saw the grey unicorn up at the top. His purple mane was a tangled mess that made me smile and my heart melt. I climbed the stairs and smiled at him before leaning over and planting a small kiss on his cheek. His face and ears began to turn red and I chuckled as I went past him to head for the shower.
"Can you start some coffee? I'll get breakfast going when I'm out of the shower."
"Now you take your left forehoof and place it where my right one just was." I said as I attempted to teach Test how to dance. He had been struggling to get it at first but the more we went over the steps, the more he seemed to get it. "There we go, now you're getting into the groove of things." I told him as I began to speed up my steps and he was able to keep up with them. "After this, I'm going to teach you a dance my grandpa picked up in Germaney." I said as we danced around the living room without bumping into furniture or anything else in the room.
"What dance would that be?" He asked as we made our way around the couch.
"The polka." I replied with a smile.
"Ah buck me!" He replied with a groan but he laughed as well at the thought. "Please tell me we're not going to wear those stupid lederhosen." Test said with a serious tone.
"Aww, you're no fun!"
After Test had fallen asleep, I managed to slip out of bed and back down to the shop. I trotted over to the counter and opened one of the drawers to pull out the paper I'd been writing on the night before. I carried it over to the piano and sat down on the bench when I heard a voice behind me. "What ya working on?" Test asked from the doorway to the shop and I turned around to face him.
"Just a song. It's nothing, really. Just a little pet project." I told him as I attempted to hide the paper behind me back.
"A pony doesn't work on a 'pet project' at half past eleven." He said as he came over and sat next to me. "So what kind of song are you composing?"
"I guess it's kind of a love song. I'm not sure. He's what I've got so far." I replied as I handed over the paper with the lyrics. He looked them over and smiled at me. "You know, my sister works in with some performers in Canterlot. Would it be alright if I show this to her?"
I thought it over for a few moments before nodding my head. Besides, it wasn't like anypony big was going to actually perform it.
A week had passed from that night and I tugged gently at the collar on my shirt. It always seemed like tuxedo shirts were too tight on me around the collar and wanted to choke me. "I'm surprised your sister managed to get us free tickets to Jazz Rhythm's show." I said to Test Tube who trotted along happily next to me.
"I'm still trying to believe you when you say that you two aren't related. You both have the a special talent in similar types of music, the same last name, and you're both earth ponies." He replied as we trotted up to a night club near the heart of downtown Canterlot. Test hoofed over our tickets and a stallion in a tailcoat showed us to a table right in front of the stage. I looked around the club in amazement as another stallion set two plates on our table for the night's meal. From the ceiling hung a gold covered chandelier and paintings of the history of Canterlot adorned the individual sections of the ceiling. I turned my attention from the ceiling down to the plate and the glass of champagne in front of me. I began to dig into the hay steak as the lights dimmed and a brown mare in a red dress came out on stage. That was going to be a good night.
Everypony had long since finished their meals and applauded as the mare on stage bowed after finishing a song. "Thank you! Thank you everypony." She said as she looked around at all the ponies in the room. "For my last song, I'd like to do something special. One of my dear friends showed me this song." While I watched and listened to her, it didn't click in my mind but I also hadn't seen Test smiling while watching me. "This song was written by a pony who's actually in this audience tonight. Alright fellas, hit it." The band started up and I raised an eyebrow as I thought that it sounded familiar.
And then when she began to sing, I gasped while putting my forehooves up to my mouth. The mare who was my favorite singer was singing the song I had written. She was singing my song. I looked over to Test who just smiled at me as he reached a hoof over to hold mine.
"Happy birthday, sweetheart." Test said as he continued to smile. He'd found out my birthday? He then let go of my hoof to reach into his jacket pocket. He pulled out a shipping envelope and slid it across the table to me. "I got you this. I know how upset you were about it getting broken. I carefully opened it up and pulled out the same exact record that had gotten broke when Test first spent a night with me. While I might have written a song based around the beats of Test's heart, I decided at that moment that that record was now the song for us. It was our song.