Stop all the clocks
Cheese took a deep breath. This was going to be very hard. Nearby, yellow and blue balloons twisted slowly, a mute tribute to Pinkie Pie. He swallowed, hoping his voice wouldn’t shake.
“I don’t think Pinkie had any idea how important she was to so many ponies. I’ve tried to tell her, and I don’t think she believed me. But I think Equestria’s always going to be a bit happier because of her, and it’s good to look back on her life and remember everything she’s done.”
He tucked a noisemaker into the corner of his mouth.
“And it’s especially amazing and super-duper awesometastic to do that on her birthday! Happy birthday, Pinks!”
He blew his noisemaker and spread his arms wide, a small puff of confetti exploding up and settling around him. But there were no answering cheers or party horns, no laughter or applause: nothing but silence.
Nopony else was there at all.
“Even if you’d been here earlier, there wasn’t anything you could have done.”
The last few hours had been a confusing fog: arriving home late, hoping Pinkie wouldn’t be too hurt, seeing the lights on at home, and then a succession of front legs thrown around his neck, feminine voices wailing that they were sorry, they were so, so sorry . . . and then the frantic gallop to the Ponyville Hospital, and more weeping, more hugs, and more cries of “we are so, so sorry.”
He didn’t really know what they were talking about. It wasn’t as though they’d done anything wrong. As for him, he wasn’t feeling sorry, or sad, or anything in particular right now. He was just standing in a hospital room so chilly that he’d had to keep his serape on. Besides, what he was looking at wasn’t Pinkie. He was looking at the silent dead body of a small pink mare with none of Pinkie’s Joy or laughter or spirit. He was looking at the absence of Pinkie. Nothing could be less like Pinkie than this.
He glanced up at the clock on the tile wall. 2 am. May 4th , the day after Pinkie’s birthday. He was just a little bit too late.
“I could have said goodbye,” Cheese said mildly. “I think she would have liked that. I would have liked that. That might have made a difference to her.”
Something deep inside whispered that he’d left her while she was asleep, that he’d never said goodbye at all, that maybe she’d died wondering where he was. But it was as though those were somepony else’s thoughts, and somepony else’s thoughts really didn’t concern him right now. They didn’t even make sense.
The intern, he noticed, was young—as young as Pinkie, in fact—shifting from foot to foot, and unable to look Cheese in the face. His nervousness was so extreme that in other circumstances, Cheese would have been forced to try to make him laugh. Cheese instinctively looked at Pinkie, because she always knew what to do to make ponies smile, and oh, right. She couldn’t do that right now.
The intern coughed. “Did you know she was carrying triplets?”
“Triplets? Really?” Now he knew why Pinkie wanted to pick out so many names for both fillies and colts, when he’d suggested that one of each was plenty. That had been a nice evening, before she started having to stay in bed all the time. Picking out names made everything much more real. She had lots of cute filly names, like Silly String, and for some reason, she absolutely insisted on a name with “Surprise” in it, so “Cheesecake Surprise” went on the list. He’d surprised himself and her by pushing strongly for “Sachertorte.” His grandfather Sachertorte had passed away quite a while ago, he’d explained, and if they had a colt, he would be the first one born in the family since his grandfather’s death. That’s how they did things in his family. Cheese rarely talked about his family, and almost never about family traditions, so Pinkie agreed that had to be the top pick for a colt. He shook his head to get rid of the memory.
“Triplets. No. No, I didn’t know.” But Carrot Cake guessed, he thought. That’s what he was trying to tell me.
“Well,” admitted the intern, “we can’t always tell, even with good screening equipment, and this was her first pregnancy, so I’m sure she can’t have known.”
Oh, no. She knew all right. Something inside him started to burn.
“A mare’s body isn’t really designed to carry multiple fetuses to term. There isn’t enough space and there aren’t enough nutrients to feed them. Twins are bad enough. They’re extremely risky, and most of the time, they aren’t both born alive.”
Cheese only really caught a few words and phrases—things like “reabsorption” and “malformation.” Carrot’s worried face and his cautions that Pinkie needed help kept getting in the way. He loved Pinkie almost like a daughter. He’s going to be pretty upset, he thought, and more of the numbness wore off.
“Fortunately,” continued the intern, clearly much happier now that he was able to stick to technicalities, “twins are also very rare, and triplets are nearly unheard of. There’s never been a live birth of three healthy triplet foals that I know of. I’m amazed that she was carrying triplets at all.”
“Oh, I’m not,” said Cheese, and more of the numbness burned off. “You didn’t know Pinkie. She could do some incredible things. And I’m sure she thought having triplets would be hilarious.” He began to shake, and something rose, and rose, and rose in his chest, until he erupted like a volcano.
“WAS THAT WORTH IT, PINKIE PIE? DOING THIS TO YOURSELF? THROWING YOUR WHOLE LIFE AWAY? FOR A PUNCHLINE? I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said, rushing forward and placing a hoof on the velvety pink neck, which was already very slightly stiff. He rocked her back and forth. “You know I never yell at you, beautiful, I’m sorry, but you know—this just isn’t funny.”
He nestled his muzzle down in the curly mane. Cotton candy. Everything else in the room smelled like antiseptic and iodine, but she still smelled like cotton candy and strawberry sauce. The scent hit him in the gut as nothing else had. For just a moment he thought, this will be the last time. Then he pushed that thought away. He was trying to reach back for the numbness that was keeping him sane. He needed not to feel anything. At the same time, this would be the last time he could kiss her on the nose, and even if this wasn’t really Pinkie, as he kept telling himself, he’d be sorry later if he didn’t, because this really was the last time.
He pressed his nose to her neck, to her shoulder, to her withers, as he’d done hundreds of times just to say, “did you hear that? That was funny,” or “I’m glad you’re here,” or to remind her how beautiful she was. He reached the sheet covering the back half of her body. He wasn’t sure he wanted to see, but he was her husband and it was his duty to bear this.
Under the sheet, Pinkie was a wreck. Somepony had done her best to clean her up and make her look close to presentable, but he knew his wife’s body and this was not the way it was supposed to look. In the background, he heard the nervous chatter of the intern using words like “torsion” and “rupture,” but all he understood was that his Pinkie had suffered, had suffered badly, and that this was all his fault.
“She was heavily sedated,” finished the intern, “so as I said, even if you’d been here, I don’t think there was anything you could have done, even to say goodbye.”
Cheese ignored this so that he could inhale Pinkie’s mane some more. He’d always loved the way her mane smelled. Then a thought hit him.
“What about the foals?”
“What?” quavered the intern.
“The foals. Tell me about the foals.”
“Oh. Well, you have to understand, none of them were viable. The male probably hadn’t been for at least a month . . .”
A colt, he thought. One of them was a colt. Sorry, Grandpa Sachertorte. We tried.
“ . . . and they never breathed. But they were going to be two fillies and a colt.”
Something inside Cheese exploded for the second time.
“What do you mean, ‘they were going to be two fillies and a colt?’ They weren’t going to be. They are. They’re our foals, Pinkie’s and mine, and they don’t stop being our foals and Pinkie doesn’t stop being my wife just because they’re all dead. Where are they?”
“Well . . . well, I don’t know what the hospital policy is to . . .”
“WHERE ARE THEY?”
Nurse Redheart popped her head inside the door, alarmed by the shouting. One look at Cheese told her everything she needed to know.
“Go,” she hissed at the intern under her breath. “Just . . . make yourself useful somewhere else. So much for med school sensitivity training.” The intern almost ran out of the room. “I’m really sorry,” she said.
“Why does everypony keep saying that?”
The nurse sighed. “Because we don’t know what else to say,” she admitted. “There’s never anything good to say. Anyway, I was apologizing for Suture Thread. He’ll learn better with time, I hope, but that won’t do you much good now.”
She was calm, and at least somepony was making a little bit of sense.
“You can see the foals if you want to,” she said. “It’s up to you.”
He nodded. “I want to.”
“Well, they’re just down the hall, so—”
“I don’t want to leave her.”
She was quiet for a moment, and nodded. “Yes. I’ll have them brought to you. Take as much time as you like. And—and we do have grief counseling.”
“They never understand us, do they, Pinkie?” he murmured. “We never could be sad at the same time. And you asked me to make other ponies laugh for you when you couldn’t.” He sighed. “I guess it’s all down to me now.”
He looked up with a bright smile.
“Oh, that won’t be necessary.”
And Cheese Sandwich was never seen looking sad again. Not in public, anyway.
The funeral was one of the hardest things he’d ever had to live through. Everypony was so sad and miserable that his party pony instincts shrieked at him to cheer them up, and of course, that was what Pinkie had told him to do: make other ponies laugh when she couldn’t. At the same time, all he wanted was to crawl off by himself and grieve alone, but that wasn’t an option either. He had to force himself to keep his smile reasonable and not have it turn into a giant, manic grin, because otherwise everypony would have thought he’d gone mad, which sometimes he thought he really had.
He insisted on Silly String, Cheesecake Surprise, and Sachertorte being buried with their mother. To him, they were real little ponies with names and potential lives. It wasn’t their fault that they’d never had a chance to live them.
Even Maud wept, leaning her head against her sister’s coffin as tears streaked silently down her face, but Cheese didn’t. The worst was when everypony was asked to say something. Only Town Hall was large enough to hold all of Pinkie’s friends, and they spilled out the door and into the square. It was nice to see how many ponies loved Pinkie, but he knew that anyway.
Finally it was his turn. He dreaded this. Ponies assumed that it was easy for a performer to say things in public, but he rarely had to say anything as his private self without his accordion as his backup. He ended up saying, “I’m so glad Pinkie loved me and I’m glad that she was my wife, even if we couldn’t be together very long. Pinkie brought me nothing but Joy. And that makes me happy.”
They all walked up to Sweet Apple Acres. Applejack had insisted on offering a lovely spot on a hillside in the North Orchard, saying that as far as she was concerned, Pinkie was kin and belonged with her kinfolk. The Pies didn’t like taking charity from anypony, but they accepted. The rock farm was so far away and Applejack so sincere about calling Pinkie her cousin that they had to say yes. There were still blossoms on many of the apple trees, floating gently down and scenting the air, and Cheese thought that Pinkie would really have liked using them for party decorations. Then he walked back down the hill and left everypony he loved most up on the hillside. The next morning he opened up the joke shop he and Pinkie had bought from the previous owners and went on about his business, because Pinkie had left him a job to do, and by Gouda, he was going to do it.
It took months for reality to sink in. He noticed that Pinkie’s supply of bubble fluid was running low. Silly filly, she always forgot about things like that until the last minute. He was on his way to buy some more before he realized that, oh, right, Pinkie would never need more bubble fluid again, because she was dead. He stopped right where he was, in the middle of the street, sat down, tilted up his head, and squeezed his eyes shut. Then he got up, turned around, went home, bolted the door and pulled the blinds before he lost it.
“Ha,” he coughed, as the laughter stuck in his throat. “Ha-ha. Ah-ha-ha-ha.”
He learned how to fend for himself without Pinkie. He learned what baby alligators ate. The hardest was learning how to function in the kitchen without cutting himself, poisoning himself, or burning the house down. He never became a good cook, and nothing close to what Pinkie had been, but he learned enough to get by and even enough to bake a simple cake, which came in handy when her birthday rolled around.
He went out on the road whenever there was a party he had to throw, and when he wasn’t on the road, he came back home and opened up the joke shop. He didn’t see any reason why he shouldn’t keep it open or why he shouldn’t just keep living in the flat they’d shared on the second floor. If he sold it and went back to living his old nomadic life, it would be as though Pinkie had never been in his life, and why would he want to pretend that when she was the best thing that had ever happened to him?
Fillies and colts loved the joke shop. He got to see Pound and Pumpkin Cake growing up and they brought their friends, and there were afternoons when the store was a riot of little ponies practically tearing the place apart or singing along to the accordion.
Pinkie’s friends didn’t forget her, or forget him. Nopony judged him for cracking jokes and throwing parties; nopony suggested he was heartless. They might not understand why Joy was so important and why he was killing himself trying to keep other ponies happy, but they gave him the benefit of the doubt. Ponyville missed Pinkie, but it did its best to love Cheese for her sake and then for his own, and he was grateful. They told each other that he was certainly adjusting well, and then they didn’t think about it at all anymore, except for one rainy evening when a mare in a purple hat and cloak came knocking on the door after the shop was closed. There were a few speculations about whether or not Cheese might be moving on, but since she left before midnight and never came back, everypony forgot all about it. He was happy to socialize or throw parties whenever he was asked, but not on May 3rd.
May 3rd belonged to him and his family, and to nopony else.
Every year, Cheese baked a birthday cake, put four candles on it, and threw a party for Pinkie and the foals. It was one of the few times when he allowed himself to talk to them. He didn’t do it much, as he was afraid he’d crack up and start doing it all the time. As long as the candles were still lit, he visited with them and caught them up on the news. He knew it was cheating to have extra-long candles this year, but he couldn’t help himself: he was feeling especially lonely, and it would have been the triplets’ tenth birthday. That meant—that meant he’d have been married to Pinkie for over eleven years by now. Eleven years married to Pinkie.
But he couldn’t allow his mind to wander to the life he could have had with her. He’d crack up if he thought about that too much, too. Instead, he played the accordion for them. After all, they’d seemed to appreciate it when Pinkie was pregnant, so it figured they would now.
“I can’t believe you guys are so grown up. I mean, you would be so grown up by now. Y’know, I was already pretty good at the accordion by the time I was your age.”
Yep, he thought, I would have started to sound like a boring grownup, but hey, I’m a boring grownup anyway.
“I was just about a total loss in every other way until I met your Mom, though. Yes, I was, Pinks. Well, you didn’t know me before I was cool. I was a total dork.”
“You’re still a total dork, Cheesie, but you’re my total dork.”
That was one good thing about the birthday party; he remembered things Pinkie had actually said to him. It was strange that it didn’t make him miss her more, but it didn’t. It felt almost as though she’d been there, even for just a second.
He remembered what they’d looked like, just in those few moments he’d been able to spend with them: Silly String’s two-toned pink mane and long legs, Sachertorte’s chocolate and pink mane, Cheesecake Surprise with her blue eyes like her mother’s. He could almost imagine what they’d have looked like, and he spent so much time with fillies and colts their age that he knew they’d already be bored by now.
“I don’t know what you would have done or what your cutie marks would have been; whether you would have been great in the kitchen like Pinkie or a disaster like me; whether you’d like singing and partying like us or just standing around staring at rocks like your Aunt Maud, but I hope you’d know this: that no matter what you did or chose to do, your mom and I loved you. All three of you were a surprise, but the best kind of surprise, and we wanted you. I’m glad you were almost in this world. I just wish you could have stayed. Now skedaddle, because I want to talk to your mom.”
He looked over at Pinkie’s chair. Ten years later, it was still Pinkie’s chair to him, and he still felt uneasy when anypony else sat down in it.
“I miss you so much, do you know that? Is there any way you can know? I don’t think so. You told me your Granny Pie left you laughter when she went away, and you left me yours, but I wish I could have had you instead. I’m not angry at you for wanting triplets. They would have been great. I hope you can forgive me for breaking you like that. I don’t think I’ll ever really forgive myself, but I’m trying. We were much too young and we took on too much, I guess, but I got carried away because I was so crazy in love with you and I still am.”
“Oh, by the way, Trixie stopped by. We’ve met on the road a few times, and I think she feels sorry for me. She wanted to say she was sorry for blowing me up and asked if there was anything she could do. Everypony says that, and it’s such a dumb thing to say. What am I supposed to say? ‘Sure! Can you bring back my wife and my children? Because that’s the only thing I want.’ Anyway, she meant well, and I thought I’d pass on her apology because you were much madder at her about it than I was.”
“I’m not you, Pinkie. I’ll never be you. I can’t make friends as easily as you did, and I can’t remember any birthdays except for yours, even when I try my hardest. I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older or what, but I totally blanked on Matilda’s birthday. I’m sorry. She was really nice about it, and I could tell she was thinking about you, but I wish I’d remembered.”
He rested his head between his hooves.
“I’m getting tired, Pinks. There’s still no new party ponies in Equestria. You’d think somewhere there would be a colt like me or a filly like you, wouldn’t you? Well, there could never be another filly like you, but you know what I mean. I wish somepony could take over making ponies happy. Then maybe I could just stop and try to do something else. But Ma Ponyacci says that being a party pony isn’t something you retire from, so I don’t know.”
The candles began to gutter and cast flickering shadows on the ceiling and walls.
“It always feels much too short. I’d give anything for it to be real—if you and they were really here with me—but I’m glad I can remember you, anyhow.”
“It’s time to say goodnight now. We’ll talk again on Hearth’s Warming Eve. Miss you. Love you. Forever.”
And then, in his mind, they were gone.
The first few years, he’d been so upset that he’d hurled the cake against the wall and let Gummy clean up the mess, but now he saved it for the fillies and colts who stopped by after school. It had been so long ago that most of them didn’t remember Pinkie and had no idea it was her birthday. They were just happy to have some cake and he was happy to let them have it, because he was never in the mood to eat it himself.
In a few minutes, he’d head upstairs to bed, hang his shirt in the half-empty closet, and go to sleep on his side of the bed. But first, he carefully snuffed each candle with his hoof. He never blew them out.
That would mean there was something still worth wishing for. And there wasn’t.
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You know, I still need to read all of these stories, but was there no way to just make one story and make chapters for it instead of releasing more and more stories?
I personally don't care, but I find it odd that you keep this series going.
*Tragedy Tag*
WHAT?
Note to other readers: if you see missing images in the story, those are custom line breaks, so don't worry.
Ok ... before reading it, I think I know what you've written. It's one you foreshadow in Great Expectations as well ... so let's see ...
... and I was right. But it was even sadder than I thought it would be, precisely because you knew how to make it restrained.
He's almost completely broken. He still tries, which only makes me care for him more.
I mean, I'm sad for Pinkie and the foals too, but they're not still suffering. Cheese is.
Shit. God-damn dude. I'm drunk right now and these feels hurt.
OH MAN!
I cried the whole way through. OH MAN
I could see it and the tears just keep on coming
Me too. If someone writes a tragedy, and breaks my heart, then tells me that it was all a lie, I don't feel relieved. I feel confused and betrayed.
Anyways, this story was... different. I rarely read tragedies, but my trust in you made me go through it. It was sad, yes, but a good story. I just hoped that Cheese would tear down his walls and fully open up to Pinkie's friends, instead of walling himself up even more and facing his grief alone.
And ignore the downvotes. When I first checked the story, it had 2 views (=chapter page loads) and already one downvote, so the guy who downvoted probably didn't even read it. Some people just downvote for the story idea itself...
MY HEART
IT CAN'T
(Insert GIF of horribly accurate crying episode)
Triple Slam... ugh, I've been listening to this a lot recently, and the correlations here... the name, and the song. Ugh, it could be a very fitting song, but instead I have to come along and present myself as a heartless dick.
I always feel a little odd with the Tragedy and Sad tags with Pinkie and/or Cheese. I've read fics with them of course, but these two seem the least like those tags. Their entire lives are dedicated to the opposite, so to see them in the positions themselves, it's just... weird.
Like how you presented Cheese. He lost a bundle of motivation for throwing parties, even flat-out forgetting dates. There was a shift in his life and his passion, and it's because of Pinkie's passing. His life won't be the same as it was once. And who could blame him? The rarity of triplets and surviving wasn't in his favour.
I'm going to be honest and say I didn't cry. You've gotten me depressed, but I didn't shed a tear. That's because it's just me. I have to ask though, how many tears did you stream when writing this? I can tell this wasn't a deliberate tear-jerker; it isn't. It's not supposed to just give off a vibe that's supposed to bring in 'The Feels'. It's disheartening yes, but it's not shouting towards the audience. That just makes it work better, in my opinion. It's sad to see this alternative route ending up this way, but if alternative universes branch out and everything, this is just one of them. This is the end of this particular 'branch' I'm guessing. Saddening. Re-reading Triple Threat and then giving this one a go, only to see the stuff in Triple Threat not happening... That's the lives of four ponies gone right there, and to see it vanish like that. Comparing Cheese in that to Cheese in this hand in hand, it's damn touching.
Like I mentioned before, I have seen Pinkie and/or Cheese been put with these tags before. Pizzema Forte did one (which I haven't read), and there's a number of Pinkie-commiting-suicide fics everywhere. Here's one I found a good read, despite its premise. It has the Gore tag, which I know you avoid, but I think the first 5 or 6 chapters of it are pretty damn clenching. After that, I think it goes a little skew-whiff, but still enjoyable.
4792986 No. They interrelate sometimes, but not always. These three go together, but they aren't all one work; and they're not in continuity with the others. Most of them started as one shots that became mini-groups--when I felt like it. And frankly, if I thought I was writing one giant coherently-planned novel, I'd quit. I'm not interested in that. I write a new more or less self-contained story as I see fit, when I want to.
I'm not kidding. I have zero interest in writing another long-runner. I don't want the "when are you writing another chapter?" or the pressure of some laid-out in stone goal. There's no real outline or plot. I would stop writing it altogether.
4793360
I have a long-runner fic, and I still write whenever. XP
And I was just curious. They all seemed somewhat connected, but I guess they weren't overall.
4793031 Sorry about the custom line breaks. I'll go back in and edit in some HLs. I hope the image at the end was visible.
4793056 I don't do over the top tragedy. I mean, this is a tragedy, but I think it's of the quiet desperation type, and therefore more realistic. At least that's what I hope I did.
4793068 Does the alcohol make it worse? It's not something I do all the time, if you were worried.
4793081 I hope that's a good thing--sort of.
4793106 I find "it was only a dream" cop-outs incredibly annoying, and besides, both it and Triple Slam and Great Expectations are potential visions of the future that might or might not happen. It's still only one downrate, which doesn't worry me. I've started getting one or two at least, so I'm used to it. I don't often write tragedy--bittersweet, but not tragedy. And Cheese, or at least my Cheese, does keep it bottled up. He's not used to confiding in others, and he thinks that sharing his grief is a betrayal of what he's supposed to do.
4793159 Is that good?
4793170 Is Triple Slam a song? Not familiar with it.
A bit of backstory: I actually wrote the first true CheesePie funeral fic, Swear on Camembert. If you give it a read, or a re-read, it has very little in common with those others, which came out in a wave: not inspired by mine, but basically all the same fic. There were so many of them that I started calling them "Pinkie Dies, Cheese Cries, Details At Eleven." It got to where he was the assumed funeral director in stories where he and Pinkie weren't even the focus! It was crazy.
I've read them--all of them, including the one you linked. I don't want to sound dismissive of someone else's stories, but I do not think most of them captured the essence of Pinkie OR Cheese, which is to keep going and laugh in the face of adversity. They giggle at the ghostie. That's what laughter is for. That's why Cheese runs a joke shop filled with happy kids instead of going on the run and trying to pretend it didn't happen. That's why he throws an annual birthday party instead of a gloomfest. He says over and over that he's glad to have had them in his life, even if it was only for a while.
I actually didn't cry either, although I relied on the memories of people I've lost and what that felt like, including the physical sensations and the denial and the delayed reaction. For example, I didn't truly lose it over my cats, who both died shortly before one Christmas, until February, and what triggered it was assembling a piece of furniture. I'd been putting it off, and when I got going, I realized why. I was used to one of them coming over and "supervising" things like that. It felt utterly wrong without him. And that's when I cried. I think that's what most true grief is like. Or like Emily Dickinson's poem, "After Great Pain, A Formal Feeling Comes," which is more like the way it feels earlier:
This is the hour of lead,
Remembered, if outlived,
As freezing people recollect the snow:
First chill, then stupor, then the letting go.
I don't quite trust stories that make a deliberate grab at the heartstrings. Maybe that is just me.
Yep. That's the end of this particular branch. Regular Cheese and Pinkie haven't even thought of marriage, let alone children. I think Pinkie knows that this is what is going to happen, but not in any specific way. Cheese has only gotten around to acknowledging that he loves her, something that's pretty clear to everyone else. He hasn't told her so, and isn't quite sure how she feels about him. (He's not a dope, though. She kisses him, for heaven's sake, and says it's going to be hard to say goodbye. That's gotta mean something.) But her focus is on the fact that he will come back, and that she can trust him to do that.
The Cheese in this future knows she's not coming back, ever. There's nothing more to show about his future. He lives this life until he dies, basically, taking happiness from the fact that he can give it to others and that he's giving what Pinkie gave him. That's more than most people have, isn't it--a sense of purpose? I think eventually more party ponies will come along and there won't be so much strain on him personally. But he'll never really leave the joke shop and some of this is the kind of heartbreak that changes you permanently.
That's all I got on this one. Back to regularly-scheduled CheesePie--Looking Glass World, I think.
4793437 I just don't need the pressure of creating an overall through plot line. They're a collection of short stories, not a novel.
When seeing the "Tragedy" and "Sad" tag, I had to brace myself for what I was about to read. It was a good thing, too, because I had to take some deep breaths to prevent tears as I read each line. It was very touching, and I think this story hits closer to home for me because I have a friend whose husband just died suddenly, and they just had their first baby six weeks prior.
Anyways, I always enjoy reading your fics, and I'm looking forward to seeing more.
Well... I'm sad now. I wasn't aiming to be sad this morning, and you ruined that little plan. Now I just want to give Cheese a hug, but I also have the nagging thought of "What good would that do?" in the back of my mind.
At least Cheese is trying to carry on with life, in dedication to her. I think it's very sweet, though kind of depressing.
4793478
Oh no, it's more a thing to do with the song I linked. If you're unsure, it's combining a rap from Space Jam by Quad City DJ's with My Heart Will Go On. So basically, a mesh of slight Comedy and Tragedy. And because Slam is present in both this fic title and the name of the video, it felt fitting, while the Titanic theme was more fitting for the premise. It's completely crazy, but at the same time works in a twisted way.
I actually haven't seen a huge amount of funeral-based fics. Or at least, starring the pair. I know a few, but I'm more familiar with the suicide ones. Although I see your point regarding the suicide ones—giggling at the ghosties, there are a few that I do think kind of pull it off. The one I linked I think pulls it off fantastically, especially after Pinkie realises how much she's affected her friends' lives by her ignorance. She may have been depressed, but damn she saw how much she affected them, and all she wanted after that was a smile, all while seeing how low Rainbow Dash got, and that's when the guilt hit her. Heck, even the end is strong in that sense. Very strong actually. Or at least, it is in my view. Others don't pull it off nearly as well, and really, it's kind of hard to portray it.
We're talking about Pinkie, the embodiment of Laughter and Joy. How do you present the death for someone that only wants ponies to smile and laugh? It's no easy thing, especially if her last request is to 'always smile' but then everyone tears up at her funeral. Actually, thinking more in general, no death is particularly easy anyway (Unless you do a Comedy on Smash Entry's funeral). But this fic wasn't going on that; it was more of a back-message thing. It was that that corresponds to how Cheese is acting from the aftermath. Which, like you mentioned, isn't usually done that well. I geuss it could be because Cheese hasn't looked the sort to deal with death before, or his status as a non-EOH might hinder it somewhat. Some might see him as some form of R63 Pinkie, but even then, you can't just slap on "Always smile," on his gravestone. That's Pinkie, not Cheese, which may be why some authors fail a bit at presenting it.
But of course, you write Cheese like it's nothing, so you handled it just as I'd see it. I can see him doing everything you've written here.
I remember shedding a few tears for Cheese Pie Cake. Fun fact: It was initially going to have a more tragic feel, while not earning the Tragedy tag. Cheese would have walked away like usual, and Pinkie would have been left in Sugarcube Corner moping about how she never did anything to get him to stay, or never told him how she felt. There was none of that offering to spend the night thing. When I had that original idea going, it hit me with a few tears. Even then, when I changed it to what it is now, I still let some out because of... well, how heart-warming it was. Sometimes, the oddest of soft moments can get to me rather than deaths or funerals. I don't get it sometimes. Fics without the Sad or Tragedy have gotten more tears out of me than those catered to the tags specifically. Just how I am, I guess.
It's a bit of a shame we won't see anymore of the party pony trio, given that this branch is finished. But at the same time, it's going to be great seeing how the main 'verse continues. And Looking Glass. And the Trixie and the dragon thing.
On another note, I think you lost a follower after you posted this story. I think it used to be 205.
4793622 Oh, I never said I'd never write anything about the triplets ever again. I might, or I might not. That's why I leave things open. This particular branch--the one in which Cheese is left a widower--is almost certainly done.
As far as I can tell, the aftermath is seldom dealt with at all. It's usually a dramatic high point (low point?) like a funeral. To me, life without, going on, feeling her loss like a missing limb--that's far sadder.
I don't want to say "I don't care" about followers, and I did notice, but it's not as though I haven't shed the odd follower before. I'm just not that obsessive about it. I appreciate everyone who takes an interest, and if for some reason a person isn't amused anymore or doesn't like tragedy or what have you, that's their choice, and I respect it. On the other hand, I'm going to write what I want to. If I made a total switch to darkfic, say, I'd expect a lot of people wouldn't be interested, but I'm not. I'm basically the same writer with the same interests as before.
4793496 Oh, ouch. I am very sorry for your friend. Writing about it is one thing and living it is another, but I do hope I handled grief in a respectful way. I'm glad you read it anyway, and you can know that this is an unusual direction for me and not a permanent departure.
4793598 I'm sorry this gave you a dose of the sads. I'm sure Cheese would very much appreciate the hug! He thinks smiling's important. He tries to do it and mean it as much as he can. "Is there anything I can do?" is a bit annoying, I guess, because the real answer is often "not really," although sometimes the real answer would be, "yeah, I'm wiped out from the funeral and figuring out the finances and a casserole would make a big difference." I bet the Apples and the Cakes sent over food until he got the hang of the kitchen. A hug's different. He'd probably take two and tell you to cheer up, because life's not that bad. He had Pinkie in it, right? Best thing ever.
If I may ask, ma'am, what sparked your initial interest in CheesePie? You seem to be very talented at lookimgna step farther than most writers to give life to the characters and write realistic storylines.
that was sad but I still liked it alot
4793696
That's the exact same reason I wrote Collateral Damage the way I did, too. Falcon and Thermal are dead. Their stories (and sufferings) are over. But Ceymi, Strawberry, Cheerilee and Berryshine have to live with what happened, which is the whole point of the final chapter.
Yours may hit harder because you have it happen to characters we already know from before, and it's closer to civilian life than deaths in a covert war. And, of course, because of the contrasts in the personalities involved.
The contrasts in personalities was in part why I made Strawberry so bubbly-cheerful-innocent -- she's the last Pony one would expect to handle a major tragedy well, and she doesn't: it's the beginning of her own spiral downward. There's a reason she isn't around by the time of Luna's Return.
Cheese of course is tough under all the goofiness: he has to be to roam the land and survive. But this struck under his defenses, because he thought Pinkie was safe.
4793696
I have a rather good online friend who had a stillbirth. She almost succeeded in carrying the child to term and had no idea she was going to lose the baby. She and her husband were devastated -- this was many months ago now and you can still sometimes see the sadness in her just in text-chatting.
Not sure why I tell you this, it just seems relevant.
Though I prefer a happy ending, I think you did a great job with this story. I would love to read another story from this series if you would be so kind. Good luck with future stories.
Everything that can happen, does. Just not necessarily in the same place. That's the crux of Many Worlds Theory. What some don't realize is that "everything that can happen" is quite a lot, and relatively little of it is very nice. Some worldlines are full of love and laughter and Joy. Others... aren't.
A beautiful, tasteful story of uncaring reality and smiling through the tears. Thank you for it. I look forward to something happier... so just about anything.
I loved it, I've always loved tragedy and I think this one was well done. It expresses grief in the unique perspective of cheese sandwich the party pony and how he tries to overcome it while at the same time filling one with the sense that this tragedy, for this pony, isn't one that will be moving on. for some over coming grief is sisyphean.
Imma gonna cry
Clopfics and Gorefics shall drown in the tears procured from your creative mind
4794031 Comedy in itself is a powerful weapon. It assert's Life's goodness at the worst possible times. You're from New York. You noticed Cheese's suggestion that if they had a colt, it should be named Sachertorte after his dead grandfather. Not a living one, but one who has passed on? Do you know a group in New York that does that, when so many Americans name their kids after living grandmas and grandpas? If you're looking for it, it's a hint about Cheese's cultural identity and just WHY laughter through intense suffering is possible for him. "Well, Mr. Aleichem, let's not talk about it any more; let's talk of something more cheerful. Tell me, how is the cholera in Odessa?" But I don't hit it too hard or make it explicit because it wouldn't work well, I think.
4793908 Thank you!
4793854 Thank you! and hmm--that's tough to answer. I can say that until Pinkie Pride, I had absolutely no interest in shipping at all. I wanted it out of MLP and dreaded the signs that there would be canon ships. I thought it was really strange to ship a real person with a pony. The episode turned me around.
I think ships themselves tell a story, and they say something about the person who loves them. CheesePie, to me, has a lot of powerful, positive messages:
1. No matter how weird or "unacceptable" or strange you are, there is someone out there who will understand you and love you exactly as you are.
2. You have no conception of the good you are doing with the smallest kind or happy gestures. Somewhere out there, there is a person whose life you changed for the better that you'll probably never know about.
3. Laughter is powerful.
And then of course this slowly developed into Party Pony Magic, with a touch of courtly love, explosive romanticism, and innocence. I have a soft spot for innocence and kindliness. You'd think I'd write more for Fluttershy, wouldn't you? But almost everything in this is spurred off in the one or two minute segment, "Cheese's Confession."
I think it's a hopeful ship, I guess. Even in this fic, in the tough part of his life, Cheese is profoundly grateful that he had a Pinkie Pie who loved him, and he's still trying to pay forward what he's gotten from her. That's about all I can say.
4794038 I've never experienced this personally, but it must be devastating. I have friends who have lost babies. And we're not good at dealing with this. We're not good at dealing with death, period. Hospitals are getting better at it, but I think we're a callous culture sometimes. I saw an interview with one of the parents of a kid killed at Sandy Hook, and the parent said was that one of the worst things was when a person who knew better referred to them as having one child. The parent said, "No, I have two children. One of them is dead." I think Cheese's honoring his three foals once a year is probably a pretty healthy thing to do, but the important bit is that it's his choice.
4794048 Thank you. Oh yes, that's possible, though probably nothing this sad!
4794132 Well, that's true, and alternate possibilities often aren't nice. This actually was closer to what might happen in a real triplet birth. The thing is, there's still Joy here--and love, too. It just looks different, that's all.
I worry that people will be cranky with me about the next chapter of Looking Glass World, because that's going to have some serious elements, too. But I don't think you're going to get anything like this from me anytime soon. The next regular CheesePie fic will be anything but sad.
4794349 I know--and I was reluctant to write yet another horrible thing happening to Pinkie. But I think of this as a bit like the horrible future predicted for Rarity in "For Whom The Sweetie Belle Toils" or Christmas Future. Ultimately, it isn't what happens. If any of this happens at all, it's probably Great Expectations, followed by Triple Threat.
4794711 It was. I'm still proud of it, but there aren't going to be a lot more like this.
4794728 Thank you very much! Yes, I hoped it would be a bit different. I prefer comedy, but if I'm going to write tragedy, I want it to be a good one.
4794783 I'm sorry you'll cry! I couldn't quite understand what you mean--can you explain?
4794898 Oh, thank you! I am VERY glad you liked it.
Your art is perfect for it, too. I was glad to have the silhouette for the end. So really, you've now illustrated a trilogy!
4794989
I know...but as a writer you an idea you had to get it out there But in all honesty this is an alt ending so it doesnt have to be a direct sequel to "great expectations" I get how its hard to write something tragic happening to pinkie i mean she's so full of life and when something bad happens its like aww.
4794989
Oh yes ... I get that.
I'm from those origins.
I'm named after members of my adoptive family.
4794989
Cheese is definitely a better Pony for having known Pinkie, and Pinkie has made everypony who knew her more aware of the possibilities and virtues of Laughter. They're sad because she's gone, but they would never have preferred not to know her.
I don't know if and how Cheese will recover from this. If he does, I'm sure he'll always love Pinkie in memory, even if he remarries.
4794989
My adoptive mother practiced yahrtzeit, particularly where her beloved mother -- my adoptive grandmother -- was concerned. Later, she did the same thing for my adoptive father -- her husband. So I know of what Cheese's little ritual is a variant.
In my fanon, that would imply he's of part-Onager descent. Actually, he has elements of the appearance.
4795016 Some people seem to enjoy writing about terrible things happening to Pinkie Pie, and I don't. In a way, this is sort of an answer to those kinds of fics. It's not really about terrible things happening to Pinkie so much as Cheese's reaction to losing his wife, and how he feels about it even ten years later. I guess the important thing is that I don't like the idea of writing about awful stuff happening to Pinkie just for fun.
4795063 Almost the same here. My stepfather's family, and he adopted me when he married my mom.
4795077
I'm not sure he could. I mean, just remarrying by itself wouldn't mean he didn't really love her, but he has a lot of baggage about her death--feeling that he wasn't there for her, blaming himself--and I think that would be tough to get past.
4795090 Can you explain about the Onagers? In fact, can I bug you to write up one of your essays on that, if you haven't already? I hunted around on your blog for your essays, and I saw some things about cervids, but not onagers. And I noticed that Piercing Gaze is part onager, but that makes him sterile, so how is that possible to have onager ancestry?
(Cheese is pretty tall and lanky, so kinda tall for an onager, I'd think.)
I... I want to cry
This was beautifully tragic, if you know what I mean. And the timing of it all is incredible.
My family has just been through the 7 year anniversary of the death of a very dear family member, and I've been struggling for the past little while. And this story feels like an old friend who lived through it and has a shoulder to cry on.
This was beautiful. Thank you.
You know you've done a good job when I tear up reading, because I never cry.
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go read Triple Threat ten times to make me feel better.
4797732 I'm glad if this helped. And I'm glad you found it beautiful.
I meant to PM you and let you know, but I guess I wasn't going to NOT make Silly String their foal, if you see what I mean.
4798878 Good? I'm sort of sorry about Silly String
Do, please, read Triple Threat as many times as you want! I can't promise that is what WILL happen, but since I lean towards the happy ending, it's much, much more LIKELY to happen than this scenario. And I am very glad you let me use Silly String. Cheese and Pinkie love her.
4797473
I suspect that if he ever does fall in love again it will start as an attempt to help somepony. Or perhaps due to the acquisition of a disciple of his own. In any case, I don't think it would be anytime soon.
The Onagers are my Fantasy Counterpart Culture for the Semites (of various kinds). They're closer biologically to the Ponies than real onagers are to real horses, so it's easier to get fertile hybrids from them, but there's also a good chance of getting a "mule" in the genetic sense (such as Piercing Gaze). Like the Semites, they led world civilization in the distant past, more than once, but are currently past their glory days.
The group of Onagers that corresponds to the Jews are mostly divided into Semi-Onagers (Ashkenazim-equivalents) and Full Onagers (Sephardim-equivalents). The Semi-Onagers are much better at passing for Ponies and are more likely to be interfertile with them, but less likely to be interfertile with the Full Onagers. Some Semi-Onagers (like Piercing Gaze) look so much like Ponies that they can't be told apart at a glance, and some (also like Piercing Gaze) actually have acquired the abilities of the Kind they resemble (Piercing Gaze has quite adequate telekinesis through his horn).
I invented them because I wanted to have Ponified Fantasy Counterpart Culture Jews, basically.
4797473
Also on Onagers:
Many Equestrians who self-identify as Onagers are the result of repeated intermarriages with Ponies. In consequence, it's sometimes more about the culture. Golden Quill, Piercing's secretary, is more Unicorn than Onager, but she thinks of herself as an Onager. Which is what counts.
One of the major problems the Onagers have everywhere is that they are strict monotheists who refuse to worship the local gods -- and they live in a world where said gods are often incarnate and living down the street. This does not bother Celestia one bit, as she dislikes being worshipped anyway. Consequently, Equestria has become a magnet for Onagerish immigration.
4801345 I think if Cheese did acquire a disciple, it would be more like the way Ponyacci instructed him--as a kind of mentor. That usually puts romantic relationships off-limits, plus (not to be sexist about it), most nomadic party ponies are male.
I know, I know, that sounds unbelievably sexist, and I am almost embarrassed about it! Clearly it's possible for a mare to lead an itinerant showmare lifestyle, and I'd like to think that Equestria's just a little bit better-balanced on career things, etc., than our culture is. But with party ponies, it's like the wand choosing the wizard. It chooses you. I'm pretty sure that in Cheese's case, Pinkie Pie chose him, for reasons that weren't clear to either of them at the time.
If a young filly or colt washed up in Ponyville, I think Cheese would be happy to pass on what he knows, although I'm inclined to think he'd send him or her off to Ponyacci's school in Mane-tua first. And if it happened to be a filly, I'm almost positive he'd send her off to Ma Ponyacci to look after. That could be a very sweet little story, which I'm about 100% sure I will never write.
Oh, well, Cheese just shrieks Ashkenazi to me--always has. I'm always finding myself checking stuff like "do klezmer bands have accordions?--yes." I try to avoid definite one-to-one analogies, because I find they have the potential to close things off and make them less relatable, but my ideas about party ponies are a bit based on medieval fools, jesters, and troubadours, and also on early Franciscans (and the two are very closely linked.)
But in any case, a lot of things that Cheese's mom Gefilte deeply disapproves of.
4801920
Well, in my fanon ...
... because of what happened in the Time of Annihilation six thousand years ago, when Ponykind was nearly wiped out and the surviving cultures had sedentary mare herds with attached stallion herds, sedentary mares and nomadic stallions feels "natural" to Ponies: what Pinkie and Cheese are doing as of the end of Season Four is a very old story. The difference being that in the interim marriage was reinstated during the Reclamation, so they'll probably have a more formal arrangement than existed with the mares of Paradise Estate and their Big Brother herds. Though Ponies loved specific individuals back then too -- they didn't just mate at random.
During the many centuries between the fall of the Age of Wonders and the rise of Enlightenment Equestria, with no suppressors available stallions tended to work away from settlements and mares work in settlements when possible, so the mares were more sedentary. This varied based on cultures, and among the Pegasi there wasn't as much difference because Pegasi can fly long distances and return home relatively quickly, compared to Unicorns or Earth Ponies.
Equestria is gradually becoming more sexually egalitarian but a nomadic mare like Trixie being in love with a sedentary stallion like Piercing is still an anomaly -- it goes against expectations. It would feel more normal to Equestrians if Piercing and Trixie were either on the road together or at the Hippodrome together. Piercing would much prefer the latter; Trixie spends years wandering in part because she wants to find her destiny as the Alicorn Illusion. She has very little idea what she's doing, because she repeatedly rejects sound advice from several quarters. Though she does learn a lot from Goldie Pie at the Pie Rock Farm. Trixie halfway likes her, which means she'll sometimes listen to the old Earth Pony mare.
I've actually been thinking about the way my Shadow Wars universe would run as an AU if Pinkie Pie died as shown in Triple Slam. I can see at least two versions of this:
(1) Pinkie and the foals die as in your tale, or
(2) Pinkie dies expending her last energies to warp reality so that the foals live.
Each has different implications.
In both cases the main problem is that Pinkie is dead and thus unable to serve as the Herald of Paradise. And the Shadow attacks are increasing, and Paradise really needs a Herald. This is the exact situation it feared in Dragonshyness, when Pinkie risks herself too much to save everypony else.
It might, actually, choose Cheese Sandwich.
4801920
I doubt I will ever do that AU because of the very sad pre-requisite. But then I wrote Collateral Damage, and inflicted terrible backstories on Fluttershy and Rarity, so who knows ....
4802154
And that, I think, would be the worst possible thing, not to use a Rarity-ism. I seriously cannot imagine what a burden that would be.
And no worries, anyone who's reading this: this story aside, I have no intentions of killing off either Pinkie or Cheese! That would be sad. And they are not about making ponies sad. And I'm not really, either.
Prepare to shift gears into the sweet and fluffy any time now. Well, after dipping into the world of EG. Frankly, all of this sadness with the foals is making me think I'll have to ring the triplets back in for a curtain call, if only to cheer everyone up!
4802492
Oh, it would be horrible for Cheese Sandwich. The more so because he might not actually care whether he lived or died, provided that he succeeded. Paradise would do this out of desperation -- conflicting First Law imperatives -- Cheese's interests weighed against all of Ponykind's. Though it would try hard to avoid letting him die.
This was tragically beautiful, you really embraced the tags in this story, because... damn. You got me so converted to this pairing, you actually have me crying over it. Definitely a step up from your usual gooey fluff that I adore, but wow. I know it's cliche to say this, yet you really did hit me in the feels. I'm gonna have to rewatch the crazy random happiness of Pinkie Pride in order to smile again and have happy feels for this ship. Five out of five mustaches, and a hug for you, scoots.
*hugs*
Never stop writing, dearie. You really are a diamond in the rough on this site, I wish your stories were more popular.
I can't bring myself to favorite this, because I don't think I could stand reading it again, but you have definitely earned the thumbs up I'm giving you. It was well-written with a "show, don't tell" and showed a side of Cheese that is plausible, believable, and easy to relate to.
It's a brilliant idea and a brilliant story, and you're a brilliant writer, but I still kind of hate you for writing this...but I kind of love you for it, too.
4805033 Oh, I completely understand that. I just hope you and other readers didn't feel betrayed that I wrote this, but I did try to make it clear what people were getting into. I'm glad you thought I did it well, and I do not blame you a bit for not wanting to read it again!
4804892 Aw, thank you. I guess I don't like to do gratuitous sadness. 90% of the time, that's what I like to visit Equestria to get away from. And I think this was partly a response to fics that like to hit you with big stuff like death, when to me, the saddest part is the aftermath. Anyhoo, it IS a departure for me.
I don't worry too much about popularity. It does matter some, of course, because I like people reading my stories, but comments from people like you are worth about 1000% more
I do care about conversion to CheesePie, however.
Holy crap, man. I wasn't expecting to cry but I just couldn't help it. This story packed a poweful punch. I agree with everything that 4805033 said. I don't want to remember this story, I wouldn't love for this to be the end for these characters. But at the same time it's written so well and I appreciate it for what you did with the characters. The struggle is real.
Could you just...make an alternate timeline where the bad thing doesn't happen and everything is happy? Please?
4810476 Read Triple Threat. That's your alternative, right there!
Actually, Triple Threat came first. Triple Slam is another way things could have ended.