A Twinkle and a Sparkle

by xzillerationer

Chapter 2

Chapter 2:

“So, you completed the first step?” Moondancer said, sipping on a cup of tea.

“Y-ye- yehs.” I said, breathlessly from galloping over to her house as quick as I could after Twilight accepted my invitation.

“Well, that’s excellent. Why don’t you sit down, and we can talk about step two?”

I gratefully (but not quite gracefully) collapsed onto her musty old couch. I didn’t even care at this point what had been done previously to (or on) said couch, at least it was comfortable. On second thought, I think I might sit on the chair instead. Not that it necessarily was going to be much better, but there was less I could imagine happening in the the chair than on the couch. Well, maybe that’s why...nevermind. “Okay.”

Moondancer sipped her tea once again, looking surprisingly regal. “Due to the fact that it took you an entire minute to respond, I can infer that you were worrying yourself over the state of this room’s seating arrangement. Don’t worry- that chair’s perfectly fine.”

I sighed, and sank down deeper into the chair. Ponyfeathers, can she read my mind.

“Wait, there was that one time...” she burst out laughing, and I just felt my brain wrecking itself in disbelief. Sidenote, find better metaphors. “I was only joking!” She said, with the grin still prominent on her face. “Calm your hooves. Celestia! You take everything so literally!” she calmly sipped her tea once again. She placed the teacup down on the table in front of her, and assumed a serious face. Which for her is quite impressive. “Now then, to business.”

My eyes went wide, then I suppressed the thought. “What’s step two?”

She grinned.

I found myself standing outside of a Canterlot restaurant, staring nervously at the sign. She was probably inside somewhere. Anywhere. And the place was huge. I sighed nervously. Maybe I should just give up looking for her now. Run home, go bury my pillow and call up Luna. Surely she was awake at this hour.

“Twinkleshine! Over here!” Twilight looked...happy to see me. This was good. I think. I hope. It was.

I waved back, “Hi, Twilight. You look lovely in that dress!” she was wearing her dress, probably one that Rarity made her. Good thing Moondancer gave me that anti-nervousness spell. Else my knees would be wobbling like a tornado chaser. Note self: I still need to work on the metaphors. Maybe Luna could help?

“Thanks, so, we gonna go in?” Twilight must’ve noticed it. “You’ve been standing there inquisitively for at least ten minutes.” Ten minutes?! Ten minutes! How could I stand there for ten minutes!

“Yes.” The gold trimmed double doors opened with an audible whoosh into the body of the building, bringing with it the buzz of conversation and the delightful aroma of delicious food. The whole experience was being sharpened and magnified by my anticipation of the date. A waiter with a sharp looking suit ushered us into the only open table left in the restaurant, a balcony seat built inside the building, overlooking the rest of the establishment. It was weird for a restaurant. How many restaurants have you seated in a balcony that overlooks the rest of the restaurant? It was a beautiful view, over the rest of the dates and social gatherings. Oh Celestia, why does she have to be so beautiful. The good thing is if she catches me staring, it would be relatively normal, since we’re on a date, aren't we?

“So...is this your...first date?” Twilight asked me. My eyes went wide, hadn’t Moondancer said this was something you’re not supposed to talk about? I just smiled.

“Uh, yeah, I wasn’t exactly a very...uh, popular mare with the stallions.” My grin went wide as I tried to cover it up, “I guess tonight kinda explains why, heh heh.” That spell was starting to wear off now. Maybe it was a placebo? No, she would never do such a thing to me.

“No need to be nervous,” Twilight said noting my obvious failure to maintain my composure. “It’s just a casual get together. Sorry about that question,” Twilight let out a nervous chuckle that was all too familiar. “I don’t get asked out a lot.”

Now was my time to shine, she left herself wide open for a compliment, and by Celestia, I was going to give it to her, “Why? A filly like you, especially with how beautiful you are, should get asked out all the time!” I’m. So. Smooth.

Twilight blushes, “Thanks, I guess.” It was obvious she’d been asked out before, but I still had no idea if she’d ever actually accepted or not. Not that I was going to ask. Moondancer said that was definitely a faux pas. After looking up the word in the dictionary, I couldn’t agree more. I decided to change the subject.

“Have you ever been here before?” I asked casually, trying not to seem as if I was asking her about her dating history. Which I wasn’t.

“I’ve been here once before, but only with Spike. He wondered what this place was, so we had to check it out.” Spike, that was her assistant, the baby dragon, right? No competition there. I hoped.

“Is the food any good?” I asked naïvely, wishing she could provide me with the small talk I so desperately yearned.

“Well, we never really ate. Turns out they wouldn’t let dragons in. Or maybe it was just Spike, because he did kind or crush their old building Don’t worry, Princess Celestia paid for it. It wasn’t ENTIRELY my fault. And the new building looks nice, so I can’t see where the problem is.” She chuckled, she was comfortable around me. Buck yeah.

“Entirely? What’d you do?” My words and smile were the definition of casual.

“Oh, I might’ve cast a spell that matured him into a full fledged dragon for a day. Or a week.” She looked falsely nervous, a smile, teaming on her lips before she turned back and burst out laughing. I joined in shortly, we stopped when I noticed some of the other visitors shooting odd looks upwards at us.

“A week?” I cast a disbelieving look towards her I get up.

“Yeah, he was like that for a week. He rested just outside Canterlot, scared tourists out for years! Ah, good time.”

“I remember that, I was curious who’s dragon it was illegally parked there. Must’ve been one hay of a ticket.” In truth, I really did remember it. I had been working at a tourist agency at the time, and no one came in for almost three whole months. If it wasn’t a federally funded shop, it would’ve closed down.

“Got three points on my license.” She said, very suave, taking a casual sip of her water before bursting out laughing. “No, even if there was a dragon driving license, I know the Princess, so I don’t have to worry about it.”

“You know the Princess?” Of COURSE she knew the Princess. Who doesn’t these days.

“Yeah, I’m her protégée. I’ve been training with her since I was but a little filly.”

As I was about to reply, the waiterpony comes up, “What shall we be ordering tonight?”

“I’ll have a” Then Twilight said something I didn’t understand, nor could even begin to remember. Something Griffin, maybe?

I put down the menu which I had subconsciously picked up, “Uh, I’ll have a daisy salad.”

“Very well.” He quickly plucked the menus with magic, and I looked back towards Twilight.

Celestia, she looked beautiful. “So, how exactly did you make Spike so...massive?”

“Well, I remember it as if it were yesterday, really. I was in the library when I discovered a spell that lets you alter the biological age of the subject you’re casting it on. So, naturally, I tested it on Spike. I may have slightly overdone it, but, three mana crystals in one night will do that to you. My magic output was four times that of which it usually was. Unaware, I cast it on Spike. Well, it kinda worked. A lot more than intended, my tower was out of commision for weeks! I lost four books in the process. Four. whole. book. I mean, Princess Celestia returned them after a two month punishment of them being gone. She just barely let me into the Starswirl the Bearded section. Well, I waited a week for my magic to recover, and was in the hospital for three entire days.” Twilight smiled, lost in nostalgia. “Princess Celestia wouldn’t leave my side until I woke up. Coincidentally, that was also the week they banned mana crystals from recreational use.” Twilight chuckled at the memory, resting her head on one hoof. It had appeared she was looking deep into my eyes, myself doing the same. We had started leaning in towards each other when we were finally snapped out of the wonderful daze.

I was so lost in her tale, and her eyes, that neither of us noticed that the food had arrived until the waiterpony loudly cleared his throat. “Oh, thanks.” I said, as Twilight said the same.

“So,” I said, munching lazily on a daisy, “I guess learning from Celestia isn’t all sunshine and smiles.” I inwardly grimaced at the unintended horrible pun.

“Well, it is wonderful. I couldn’t have asked for a better teacher, really.” My magic teacher had sucked apples. If it wasn’t for Moondancer giving me lessons after school, I wouldn’t be nearly as good as I was today. Not that I’m great, but I know a thing or two about illusions. Well, that’s what my cutie mark is for anyways. I do illusion magic, on stage I’m a very confident magician who wows crowds and entertains ponies. I also do parties. And I’m humble, I’ve not once let my position or ability go to my head. I perform, and then I leave. “What’s your cutie mark for?” Welp.

“I’m a magician, I do a lot of illusion magic.” I felt proud. Twilight, my friend, no, my MAREfriend, also had a cutie mark in magic.

“Oh, like Trixie?” My eyes widened, and I suddenly grew nervous. Luna damn it, Moondancer! Twilight, noticing my pupils dilating, replied. “Oh, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean it like that!” It was too late, I was already thinking it.

“Trixie was...” I let out a breath, not wanting to recall these horrible moments I had though I had put behind me. “We went to school together.” A single tear rolled down my cheek, dropping into my salad. “She wasn’t nice to me, I think because I was the only other one in the class with a specialty in illusion magic.” Luna damn it, I hadn’t thought about her in years. I trembled at the thought, but seeing Twilight’s utmost concern, I smiled.

“I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up. If you want to go home now, it’s okay.” She said that all so quickly.

“It’s okay. I need to eventually put it all behind me, talking about it will just make it faster.” I smiled, and put my hoof on hers, “It’s alright, really.”

“Actually,” Twilight said with a glint in her eye, “I have a story that might interest you. About a year and a half ago, Trixie decided to put on a show here in Ponyville. She made a foal out of everypony, and was generally a huge bitch. Pardon my Griffon. A few schoolponies, Snips and Snails, were so taken up on one of her little braggart tales of taming an ursa major that they decided to go find one and bring it to ponyville for her to defeat. To make a long story short, it was actually an ursa minor, and I ended up having to use a water silo as a giant milk bottle to stop it from destroying the town. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to stop it from crushing Trixie’s little wagon. We haven’t heard from her since.”

A smile gleamed across my face, “Really?” I even let out a laugh.

“Yeah, nopony knows where she went, but I heard she went and got a job bucking cherries.” She let out the most casual and beautiful smile I’ve ever seen. And a cute chuckle. “Can you believe that? Bucking cherries!”

By this point I was laughing too. Having been munching on the meal throughout both stories, we had both finished our food, and had hardly noticed the time. The restaurant was going to close soon, so we were being hurried out. “Wow, where did the night go?” I asked nonchalantly.

“Probably into the stories,” she smirked. “does that mean we have to go?” Her face drooped.

“Well, we have to leave the restaurant, but not go home.”

I reached to grab a few bits from my saddlebag, but Twilight stopped me. “It’s all my treat.” She put the bits on the table, and we wound our way through the restaurant body to the double doors.

“So, do we call it a night?” I asked, wondering what we were going to do next.

“I think so, I have a lot of work to do tomorrow. A very important letter.” Twilight trotted up to me, and gently kissed me on the cheek. Good thing it was dark so nopony could see how furiously I was blushing. As she was walking away, she turned her head back towards me, and I could barely move to look. “I can’t wait for the second date.”

I smiled the entire way home.

Comments

[WintherBloom]

Loved it! Keep up the good work!

[Solid Sun]

A great chapter.