“Racing Shadows” and Other Promptly Written Stories

by Narrative Style

Clydesdale's Mark

Author's Note:

This Short is a: Sad/Drama

Description: When ‘Troubleshoes’ Clydesdale tried out for the Rope-n-Rodeo rodeo school, he didn't expect to get his cutie mark. But when he did get it, he really wished he hadn't. His friend tries to comfort him in his darkest hour.

It was fantastic. Magnificent. Incredible. For the first time, the lanky young colt felt like he truly fit in; traveling from rodeo to rodeo, competing with the best.

That feeling lasted for all of three seconds before it all went wrong.

It started with his cutie mark; he saw it out of the corner of his eye while he whipped around his lasso. Of course it drew his attention; he could finally find out his destiny. But as he turned to see what it was, he lost track of his rope. It caught on a barrel nearby, and the next thing he knew, he was sticking out of the barrel’s smashed remains. All of the judges he was performing for laughed.

He left without a word, his dream crushed as quickly as it had flourished.

Walking back toward the train station, toward home, he noticed somepony walking beside him. He didn’t particularly care for company right then. He didn’t even bother to turn his head and see who it was. But the other pony wouldn’t leave him be.

“Howdy, Clyde. Hay, Clyde. Clyde, hi. How’d it go? Did they let ya in? Did they… your mark! You got yer cutie mark! Clyde, ya got your cutie mark! What’s it fer? What’s it fer?”

It was a filly, of tan fur and tiny for her age. Anypony who knew her would say most of her energy was spent through her mouth. Through his attempts to get into the rodeos, including his just-now failure to enter the Rope-n-Rodeo School, she was the only one who ever encouraged him. It was only because of her that Clydesdale had scraped up the guts to try out at all.

He didn’t acknowledge her for a while, although she kept yammering away, speculating about what his cutie mark meant. But he already knew what it meant; and he finally just had to say it.

“Bonnie, do you know what an upside-down horseshoe means?” Clyde kept his eyes on the road in front of him.

‘Bonnie’ Bonanza was quick to reply, and keep replying. “I’ve no idea, that’s what I’ve been trying to figure. Is it horseshoe-throwing? Is that a rodeo event? I’m not sure, but it would be great if it were, Ah can do that one. Or maybe-”

Clyde cut her off. “An upside-down horseshoe means bad luck!” He hadn’t meant to shout, but that’s what he did. He stopped walking, partially in surprise at his own volume, partially because he had lost the will to move.

“So you’re “bad luck” for yer competitors, then? That’s a-”

Again, he cut her off. “No! It’s bad luck!” He fell on his rump, barely resisting the urge to bury his face in the dirt in front of him. After a pause, he spoke again, much softer, trying desperately to get his meaning across. “My talent is bad luck… I’m bad luck…”

Bonnie finally seemed to catch on to the situation. She sat down beside the larger colt, looking into the side of his eye even though he refused to look back. “Now that’s just silly. Why would yer talent be bad luck? How could ya even be good at somethin’ like that?”

Clyde shook his head. He didn’t know the how or why, but he knew it was true. “I failed the entrance test. I blew it. This… mark, appeared, and I blew it higher than a tumble weed in a storm. My talent is bad luck; that was the only thing I discovered, so it must be what it means.”

The filly wasn’t so easily convinced, though. “If it’s yer talent, then you should be able to show it to me, right? Can ya show me some bad luck?”

Clyde looked up from the dust of the ground to meet Bonnie’s eyes. “Right now?”

“Yes!” A firm nod accompanied the exclamation, but more than anything it was the shortness of the statement that told him how much she meant it. She never used one-word-sentences when she could get away with it.

He looked at the ground again, puzzling out how he could activate the bad luck. He grimaced at the thought of trying to get bad luck, but he had to prove that it was his talent. He turned his gaze to the small town around them, and spotted a rain barrel at the side of a building. He walked over to it; slowly, cautiously, ready to turn tail and run from whatever horrible thing he was about to provoke.

He reached the barrel.

He kicked it hesitantly with a forehoof.

Nothing happened.

Clyde frowned harder, and kicked the barrel again, this time putting strength into the motion. The barrel wobbled a little, then settled back into position. Clyde turned to look at Bonnie, who was standing next to him, examining the barrel intently. After a moment, she turned back to Clyde, her head tilted in an exaggerated question.

The brown colt looked at Bonnie, then at the barrel. He sighed. “I can’t even show it to ya. Just mah luck…”

Bonnie’s expression shifted then, passing neutral for the first time and turning to an angry glare. “Now that’s jus’ not right! What I saw was that you don’t have no bad luck! It’s not your talent, so stop saying it is!”

Clyde sat down again, this time staring into the depths of the wooden grain of the barrel. “Tell that to the judges who laughed me out of the school.”

Sitting down as well, Bonnie lost her glare, shifting to a calm thoughtfulness. “Laughing? Did ya do somethin’ funny?”

A scowl at the barrel. “If by ‘funny’, ya mean ‘made a fool of mahself’, then yes.”

Bonnie didn’t say anything for a minute. Her uncommon silence made Clyde nervous, but he dared not look at her. If he had, he would have seen a face twisted in concentration, fishing for a thought that was just out of reach.

Finally, she found it. Her face brightened as if a lantern had been lit over her head. “You made a fool of yerself, ya say?”

“That’s what Ah said.”

“So maybe you’re meant to be a rodeo clown!”

Clyde looked up from the barrel, meeting Bonnie’s sincere smile with an uncertain frown. “I don’t know…”

Bonnie stood up, hoping to urge her friend into the same motion. “You can try, at least!”

Clyde made no move to get up himself. “Ah… Ah’m not…”

Reaching down, Bonnie dragged the much larger pony to his feet. “Yes you are! Come on! Yah love rodeos, ah know you do. You can do this!” She started to lead him back toward the school.

But just as he began to follow, a group of older colts appeared from around a corner. One of them spotted his new cutie mark. “Hah, look boys, a cutie mark for bad luck!” He pointed with a hoof, and the rest of the group laughed as they moved past.

Clyde pulled his leg out of Bonnie’s grip. Turning, he ran for the train station, tears forming in his eyes. He wanted to be home. He wanted to run away from the place that gave him this curse.

Bonnie stood there, hoof still outstretched, watching him flee. She didn’t know what to do. Clydesdale had never been easy to motivate, but she’d always found a way. Now, though, she wasn’t sure she could do anything. So she stood, watching as her friend rushed aboard a train, letting it carry him away from his fears, and his dreams.