Unopened
Spike hadn't asked if Rarity wanted him to walk her home, but she offered no protest when he fell into step beside her. He was quiet as they walked, as though he didn't know what to say. Or whether there was anything to say.
He broke his silence when they arrived in front of the darkened, shuttered Carousel Boutique. "So... here we are, Rarity."
Rarity studied the intricate facade of her home and livelihood for a moment, before unlocking the door and nudging it open with a flash of her horn.
Spike's feet scraped in the dirt as he turned to leave. "I'll see you around, I guess."
"Spike, wait." Rarity flashed her horn again, seizing Spike's wrist and pulling him to a stop. She dropped her aura and looked invitingly at him; he stared back, puzzled. "Won't you come and sit with me a moment?"
Spike looked down at his hand, rubbing his wrist where her magic had caught him, delaying for so long that Rarity was certain he'd try to leave again. But, at last, he padded inside cautiously, as though he were walking on rotten ice.
Another flash of her horn, and the lamps and candles around the boutique lit, bathing the showroom in gentle firelight. Ponyquins, clad in formalwear, stood in tableau around the boutique; their shadows, distorted by the outfits, danced against the walls and the floor. Rarity inhaled the scent of melted wax and vanilla, regretting that the scented candles she'd bought and arranged in preparation for tonight would not see their intended use. Still, the candles lent the room a warm and intimate atmosphere, one which she felt was curiously appropriate.
Her horn kept shimmering as she pulled a velvet-upholstered sofa ā her chosen piece of furniture for melodrama and emotional indulgence ā from a room off to the side. She hopped onto it, gathering her dress and smoothing it out beneath her, and patted the spot beside her for Spike.
Still looking uncertain, he climbed up, sighing as he pulled the strap from his bag off of his neck. His scales glowed, each one a mirror for the faint little flames of the candles. Nervously, he glanced at Rarity from the corners of his eyes.
"You know, you're allowed to look directly at me, Spike. You won't turn to stone." Rarity cocked her head wryly. "Or am I so disheveled that it hurts to do so?"
"You're a vision," Spike mumbled, pulling the strap taut. "I told you before."
Rarity didn't dispute the compliment. She knew it wasn't true. She knew he meant it anyway.
"I've been thinking," she sighed, leaning against the sofa's backrest. "I've been burned many times before, by... oh, so many stallions over the years that it's become comical."
Their faces and voices and promises and declarations played out in her mind, one after the other. She always swore she'd never fall for somepony like that again, yet time after time...
I have sewn myself into this miserable garment. She chuckled bitterly.
"Something funny?" Spike said.
"Just my love life. My increasingly ironic, moribund love life. It's comical, I told you."
"I'm glad you can still laugh at it, at least." Spike almost turned to look at her. "Those guys who broke your heart... You know I wasn't after what they were after, right?"
"I know that." Rarity fixed Spike with a scowl that he never saw. "But regardless of your motive, even if your intentions were good, that doesn't make your actions any less wrong."
Spike shuddered, and nodded slowly. "I know. I get that now."
He meant it. He still wouldn't look at her, but Rarity could see his sincerity, hear it in his voice. He deserved the truth from her, too.
"I'm not trying to condemn you, Spike. You're not the only one who told a white lie, after all." Rarity scooted closer to him on the couch. "After the ice cream incident, you offered to call things off. I said that I wanted to keep going. Remember?"
Spike snorted and shook his head. "I should've known. There's no way you wanted to stick around after that."
"Not really, no. But I knew that being there meant something to you, and I didn't want to hurt you with the truth. So, I put on a happy face, and resolved to tough it out. Which worked out swimmingly, needless to say." Rarity laughed again, a touch less ironically.
Her laughter was met with a fleeting, sullen smirk from Spike. "That's nowhere near as bad as what I did."
Rarity fought back the impulse to roll her eyes. "It isn't a competition, Spike. We both made mistakes. We both lied to one another, and all we did was make matters worse. But our mistakes don't have to define us, so long as we come to terms with them, seek forgiveness, and learn."
"I forgive you," Spike said, immediately, automatically. His shoulders rose and sagged in a half-hearted shrug. "You didn't need to apologize, though. You lied to make me feel better. I lied because..."
"...You wanted to make me feel better."
"Even so, you were right. That's no excuse for what I did."
"Nor does it excuse what I did."
Spike shook his head frantically. "Stop it. It's not the same thing. What I lied about was worse, way worse. And however you cut it, I'm no better than one of those other guys who messed with you."
Rarity felt her temper flare. She'd indulged Spike enough tonight; she had no patience for further self-pity. "Do you want me to agree with you? Tell you that you're scum? Will that make you feel better? Hating yourself solves nothing. You don't learn from your mistakes if you let them define you; you become less than what you are. And you don't want to do that to yourself."
She reached for his shoulder and stroked his scales, watching the firelight play off her pony-pedi as he stiffened.
"Because what you are is a good person, Spike. You came clean and apologized when you really didn't have to, when it may have served you better to say nothing at all. That's something none of those other stallions would have ever done."
Rarity's hoof slid up his neck to cup Spike's cheek and tilt his head toward hers. He didn't bother trying to look away.
"You have a good heart, darling. Good enough to realize when you've done wrong, to account for your mistakes. That's what sets you apart from the Bluebloods and the Brass Buttons and the Lucky Strikes of the world."
She smiled, and saw it reflected in his eyes.
He was right, and I was wrong. I am a vision.
"Even if you err, I can always count on you to do the right thing in the end." She stroked his cheek, once, and let her hoof fall to the couch cushion. "And that is what makes you worth forgiving."
Spike looked relieved for an instant. His mouth opened, but his expression changed before he said whatever he was about to say, as though he thought better of it. He hesitated, choosing his words carefully before speaking again. "Thank you. But I still don't feel like I deserve your forgiveness right now."
"Then take heart. I'm not ready to give it to you yet." She pulled her hoof away from him and straightened on the couch. "But I will be. In time for next year's carnival, I'm sure."
"Next year?" There was a note of hope in his words that made his voice crack boyishly.
"Why not? Tonight was a bit of a misfire; there's no arguing that. I'd love the chance for a do-over under more auspicious circumstances." She hesitated, feeling the cold prick of a needle at her heart. "Wouldn't you, my friend?"
A jolt ran through Spike. He sagged. His face fell. Whatever hope she'd given him, however unintentionally, bled away. For a moment, Rarity worried she'd broken him, but he squared his shoulders and cleared his throat and forced a resigned smile.
"I'd like nothing more," said Spike.
It was the answer Rarity had hoped for. It was the answer Rarity had dreaded.
She had been wondering whether or not Spike would make them have that talk this evening, if that was why he'd walked her home. After all, on the ferris wheel, he'd come as close to openly acknowledging his feelings for her as he had in years, for the first time since that long-ago moment of freefall. She'd invited him inside half-expecting him to force the issue, and entirely hoping he wouldn't.
Because what would be the point? He didn't need to hear that she wasn't in love with him; he clearly already knew. And he didn't need to be told that she loved him regardless, not in so many words, anyway.
If he knew all that, and let the matter pass without comment, then that spoke to his maturity. And if they never had that talk at all, then that came as a relief. But regardless of whether or not the subtext ceased being subtextual, the nature of their friendship was going to change after tonight. His crush on her was never a secret, but he never knew how much Rarity treasured his adoration, covertly and guiltily prided herself on winning the dragon's heart. Winning and keeping it.
And while Spike had taken her to the carnival with the intention of kindling her spirits, nothing had worked half as well as championing him when he needed her.
But that had to come to an end. She needed to let Spike go, as much as Spike needed to let her go.
Rarity looped her hooves around Spike's shoulders, and pulled him close so he wouldn't see her blinking back tears. He buried his face in her dress's fabric and clutched her tightly, like they were swinging in the ferris wheel's cage, at gravity's mercy. They stayed like that long enough for some of Rarity's candles to gutter out, leaving the room dimmer, darker, than before.
At last, Spike shifted, pulling his head away from Rarity. Gently, he smoothed out the wrinkles he'd made in the dress. "Twi's probably worried sick. I should get home to her."
"Don't let me keep you, darling. Just, I'd like to beg one thing of you before you go." Rarity ran her hoof over the spot where Spike's face had been, feeling the moisture of his tears. She offered him her other hoof. "I wonder if you wouldn't mind letting me keep the scarf after all?"
Spike's puzzled look quickly gave way to a small, gratified smile. He fumbled inside his courier bag and retrieved the scarf, draping it tenderly over Rarity's outstretched hoof. Once more, she marveled at its warmth and softness, even as she noted the streaks of grime mashed into its yarn from when she'd tossed it to the floor of the cage.
It will wash.
"Thank you, Spike. This really was a thoughtful gift."
"I'm just glad you liked it." With that, he slid off the couch and padded to the front door with that subtle, babyish waddle. The door creaked, so slightly, as he pulled it open. "I'll see you soon?"
"You will. Goodnight, Spikey-Wikey."
He hesitated, perhaps savoring the moment. "'Night, Rarity."
The night ended as Rarity thought it would from the start, more or less. She was alone in her darkened boutique, neither drunk nor crying, but tired and sore. The aroma of vanilla wax that had hung in the room was already dissipating, some of it ushered out the door with Spike. Left to her own devices, she looked down at her dress, stained as it was with sweat and chocolate, ice cream and dragon's tears, and she chuckled.
"I am quite a mess right now."
Folding the scarf, Rarity laid it on her sofa and stood. Her aura chimed and tinkled as she strode upstairs, her path illuminated by pale hornlight. Bit by bit, she undid her dress, carefully and gently stripping it from her body, and sighing as the cool air of the boutique kissed her coat.
She found Opalescence sleeping on a ponequin she'd expected to be bare, and gently moved her to the bed without waking her. Habit made her want to dress the ponequin with her discarded formalwear, but she was too exhausted to contemplate the possibility for long ā after all, she'd just taken the damn thing off. Masterpiece or no, she wasn't so keen on reassembling, and it needed a thorough wash, anyway.
So, with a sigh, she dropped the dress over the ponyquin's back, mentally adding "cat hair" to the list of things that would need to be laundered off, and turned her back on it, toward her armoire. The doors glowed blue as she pulled them open, revealing rows of impeccably hung dresses and sweaters. Rarity shifted them, one by one, to expose a shelf at the back of the armoire.
Hidden behind her outfits was an unopened bottle of Merlot. There'd been many more; the rings on the wood where less dust had accumulated spoke of the other dates and heartbreaks Rarity had faced over the years. She'd bought each bottle with the intent of sharing, but drank them all alone.
Rarity's mouth watered as she floated the Merlot off its shelf, letting it hover inches away from her face. She turned it slowly, noting how nicely drawn the vineyard on the label was, failing to recall whether the vintage was a good one. She tilted it from one side to the next, listened to the contents slosh against the glass.
This was the last one. She supposed that meant something, but she wasn't sure what, and she too tired to dwell on it.
That's a thought for another night.
She set the bottle on the shelf, slid her outfits back into place, and gently closed the door.
"I could use a good soak before bed," Rarity declared to herself. She floated over a towel from her closet and headed toward the bathroom, humming a tune she didn't immediately place. One of Pinkie's? A song Sweetie'd been singing?
Then she remembered the calliope's melody, and the lights of the carnival, and the smells of spun sugar and fried food, and couldn't stop herself from smiling.
How funny that a heart so callously broken could still feel so full.
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I'm so happy to see this concluded. I'm very fond of this story, and I thank you for coming back to it.
Well this was a pleasant surprise to see in my feed. Then I reread the previous chapter to remind myself exactly where we'd left off and realized "pleasant" may not technically be the right word. Still, this was a beautiful story. The ending was too hopeful to really classify it as tragedy, but the implication that the ending left us with isn't terribly cheerful either. I don't really know what else I can say about this story that I haven't already said, other than well done on so effectively conveying melancholy without going right into depression. That can be pretty hard to do.
I'm hoping that this story finally being finished is a sign that we'll at long last start to see more of you around here again. Your particular brand of horsewords is something I've missed around these parts. Of course, I understand if that isn't the case. Real life's a bitch like that.
good story thank you for finishing it, I still would of liked to see a happy ending for spike and rarity, you know being together lol but I liked what you did, nice read thank you
9699458 I know, I've been away for a while. But I'm back
to kick some butt at Pumpkin Hill.9700528
The fresher the wound, the more that it hurts. Showing up when it hurts the most means you have the opportunity to soothe more pain, and ensure that a loved one doesn't endure the worst of a hardship alone. Sometimes you actually need someone to drag you into something you're not in the mood for, too... especially if you're just going to go home and drink an unhealthy amount of alcohol, as was the case here. And as for him not cutting the most impressive or mature figure, everyone has flaws - he was still there for her when no one else was. And relationships aren't about being impressive, they're about being real and caring.
So ultimately, she's mad because she let him take her to the carnival despite her reservations, hoping she would have a good time. She was repeatedly dishonest with him, hiding her unhappiness whenever something went wrong, instead of just admitting she'd rather go home. She didn't even take advantage of the naturally arisen opportunity (once she got out of the washroom and Spike was gonna let her call it a night). And then when despite his very best efforts, he failed to finally wow her and show her a good time... she exploded when she found out that he had planned to come cheer her up after she was stood up.
Maybe I'm alone in this, but I still just don't get how she's logically justified in being mad.
9700684 First, let me say that I understand your criticism well enough to address it in the final chapter. I added an exchange where Rarity acknowledges that she lied for the sake of Spike's feelings, and that they both made similar mistakes during the night, being dishonest to protect one another from the truth. She apologizes for doing so. I was trying to hint at that subtly, anyway, but decided to make it more explicit.
Make no mistake, though, Rarity is still firmly in the right.
That Spike is genuine and caring toward Rarity isn't the issue. Going home and getting drunk to cope with heartbreak isn't a healthy strategy, no. But it's not for Spike to determine what Rarity needs in a moment of vulnerability, and Spike does not deserve to be rewarded for caring about Rarity when his feelings for her manifest in such a selfish way.
And, as my friend R5h pointed out (he gave me feedback on my revision), "Spike's complicit in the wound" by not telling Rarity she was going to be stood up. The whole situation could have been avoided if he'd just been honest from the start.
Instead, he opted for a grand gesture. And it backfired.
Like, if you stab a guy in a bar fight, and you stitch him up afterward, you don't get a free pass; you still stabbed that sum'gun.
1. Rarity never asked to be shown a good time.
2. Rarity does not owe Spike anything in this situation.
3. Spike knew she would be stood up and didn't tell her. You keep forgetting that detail. It's crucial to understanding why Rarity's angry, and it's why I was expecting people to empathize with her. It's not like he found out too late to do anything about it; he learned about it days in advance, and sat on that information all week.
9701246
No, it's up to her. And she agreed to go with him.
---
---
Yes, exactly. Before posting even my first criticism I knew that if that was the reason that Rarity is upset it would all make sense. But it's not: Right after he tells her about how he knew she was going to be stood up...
She's not upset he didn't tell her. She just as much said so. And she just explained that having overheard the stallions' conversation he was put in an awkward position, since if he told her about it she'd just have her heart broken sooner than later - her thoughts, not mine. Now, it seems she's upset that he came to comfort her directly afterwards as if it were an opportunity for him to win her. But then...
So she doesn't forgive him once he tells her that he wasn't trying to win her and he was just trying to cheer her up, which really seemed at this point to be the reason. She wasn't mad at him for not telling her, as was established earlier, and then when he fails to make the night a good one for her despite his best efforts, she gets mad at him.
No, she just agreed to let him take her.
No more than common courtesy, yes.
She had the opportunity to be justly mad at him for not telling her she was going to be stood up, but instead she mentions that regardless she would've gotten hurt and admitted that it was an awkward, lose-lose position for him to be in - so she as much as openly excused him for that. How is she in the right for being mad at him for anything else?
9701298
I think you have somewhat misunderstood: the point wasn't precisely that Rarity wasn't angry about Spike not telling her, but that the thing she was angriest about was Spike using that information to manipulate her into spending time with him. She is angry about two things (maybe more! Imagine). I agree that it could have been phrased somewhat more clearly, but her anger is still very justified.
Re-reading the previous chapter, it's apparent to me that the confusion stems from my own wording.
What I should have written was "You think that is the only issue here?" I didn't mean to say that Rarity was not angry about Spike withholding the truth. She outright says, a few paragraphs later, "you lied to me," in an accusatory way, so the dishonesty sticks in her craw badly. I meant to convey that that wasn't the primary reason she was upset. She wasn't merely mad that he kept the truth to himself; she was mad because of what he did with the truth. Rather than come clean or keep it to himself, he sat on it, waited until after she'd been stood up, and then capitalized on it, thinking that he knew how to cheer her up.
In short, in that moment, above all else, she's mad because she thinks that he played her. Even if she accepts that his motivations were altruistic, and that he wasn't trying to make her fall into his arms, it doesn't erase the fact that he lied to her, both directly and by omission. The entire night has been based on a falsehood.
I'll make that edit once I'm done responding to this comment.
If I'm interpreting your post correctly, the line that you're specifically pointing at is Rarity's initial response to Spike's explanation:
Which isn't intended to be a the explanation for why Rarity's angry. It's not supposed to be taken at face value. It's a sardonic retort. She's being sarcastic about their situation; she's not seriously saying "I'm angry at you because you didn't try hard enough to cheer me up," or "because your efforts at cheering me up failed."
You make a comment about Spike deserving common courtesy; I agree to an extent. But I also would argue that Rarity has shown that courtesy through the patience she's shown Spike throughout the story. He's been a bit of a prick; he was kind of selfish and ignored Rarity's wants and needs, not just at the start of the night, but several times afterward (particularly in the third chapter).
These aren't signs that he's a bad person, just that he's not on Rarity's level of emotional maturity. As mature as he is, Spike's still a kid, with a kid's understanding of interpersonal interactions and romance. He'll grow out of it. That's one of the things I wanted to say with this story.
I accept that part of this dialogue comes from how I wrote the previous chapter, unintentionally writing it as a binary (trinary) "I am mad for this reason, and no other" scenario. But there's also a fundamental question of how people are expected to behave in social situations that you and I seem to disagree on.
Namely, the scene you're responding to is the one in which Spike admits to Rarity that he lied to her. And even though she accepts his explanation by the end of it (yes, she believes he's being genuine, and yes, she's capable of forgiving him), the emotion that his confession dredges out of her is still very, very raw in that moment.
Rarity is not a person governed by her head over her heart on a good day, and this has been an exceedingly tough and traumatic evening for her. She isn't going to just flip and get over it after Spike destroys her emotional breakdown with facts and logic. She's going to say stuff that she doesn't entirely mean, stuff which doesn't necessarily reflect what's in her heart, and stuff she'll probably feel bad about later, which is how people who've been hurt can be expected to behave.
It just makes her a person.
Further complicating her emotions is the question of where Spike's emphasis is being placed: He's still more wrapped up in himself, and how he perceives the events of the night, than in Rarity and her emotional state. By the end of the scene, and the next chapter, too, that's really the primary sticking point for Rarity. Spike is throwing a pity party (as people, especially young people, are wont to), and she doesn't have any patience for it.
Yes, I am aware that Rarity is also prone to throwing pity parties, and that she intended to throw one for herself at the start of the story. She and Spike are supposed to be mirrors for one another, and she is supposed to learn something about self-pity from this story, and from interacting with Spike.
Even in that scene, she relaxes considerably before the end, and by the end of the story, she's basically over it. Not quite to the point of saying "I forgive you," (to me, forgiveness implies trust, and I think it's going to take a little time before she can bring herself to fully trust Spike again) but she's going to get there. They are going to be okay in the end.
(As an aside, there was a kernel of truth to Rarity's assumption about Spike. It's not merely that he wanted to cheer her up; he wanted to be the one to cheer her up. That's a key distinction. At their heart, his actions have a degree of self-interest. And I tried very, very hard to hint at that in the story through his actions without saying so directly)
Glad to see this story to the end. Good job!
9701419
YES. This is a big part of what was so confusing to me. Changing this line as you said will help the story make more sense as a whole.
What's so selfish about wanting to be the one to cheer up someone you love? That's normal in any healthy, mutual relationship... to want to be the one who is there for them. What was he supposed to do? Go out of his way to get one of the mane 6 to go instead because he wanted to be the one to help her too much and that's bad?
I feel like that's rather harsh on Spike. Not telling her she was going to be stood up was wrong, but he's been very attentive to her throughout the story. Instead of letting her use an unhealthy coping mechanism he persuades her to let him take her to the carnival - she agreed, though she could have refused.
When Rarity fell down and got a mess on her dress he did his best to try to clean it, though it didn't work out so well, at least he was trying. When it didn't clean off very well after she went to the washroom, he considerately offered to let her go home despite the fact that she had promised to give him a full hour - she didn't accept.
I did think his taking on Flim's challenge as a means to defend Rarity was misguided, but I understood that he saw it as his duty to defend her - as is his instinct with anyone he cares about - and he felt this was the only way. After Flim said a lot of horrible things to him, and he was unable to emerge having 'defended Rarity's honor and given her a prize', he felt very unhappy, and started to feel inadequate and as though those awful things Flim said were true.
In chapter 4 Spike sees a glimmer of hope when she seems to like the scarf he gives her, and as an added bonus he sees it brings her physical comfort in the form of warmth. But then his conscience dictates he tell her the truth about him showing up so conveniently. She gets very angry at him when he was already thoroughly depressed at being unable to make this night the success for her like he had wanted. She throws the scarf down. In tears, he first-most defends Starlight (maturely thinking of someone else over defending himself first) and then explains that he wasn't trying to make her fall into his arms, he just wanted to cheer her up, then she - as you said being emotional - snaps at him, still.
I'm sensing duality here. Capitalizing implies that he gains something for himself, but we established that he wasn't trying to 'make her fall into his arms', so just what was his motivation? What were his intentions? Easy, he didn't want her to wallow in her misery, he wanted to be there for her and maker her feel better. And you hit the nail on the head as to what the final straw was that results in him having a pity party when you said:
Yes, thinking that he could cheer her up. He showed up for her, thinking that he could cheer her up. Every whole-hearted attempt failing, he gets verbally bullied on top of that, and then Rarity gets angry at him for him having told her he happened upon her by mistake, though his motivation for showing up was still because he wanted to make her feel better.
And what about Spike's wants and needs? Rarity is being played off as the emotionally mature one, but when it came down to it, how much concern did she show for his emotional state? She tried to defend him from Flim in her own way, and she also tried to get him talking again when he was in his funk right after that. But she blames Spike for his dishonesty, despite the fact that his goal was to be considerate of her feelings. How is that different from her lying to him throughout the night, pretending she was fine and she didn't want to go home so that he'd feel better? If Spike wasn't trying to get her to fall for him, then his motivations for lying are the same as hers.
So did she! She lied when she said it was fine, and by omission she didn't just say "I'd rather go home, thanks anyways. We'll talk later, Spike."
So Rarity is angry with Spike for lying, like she lied. She acts like she's the mature one here, but when he's in tears, she shows him no mercy. Yes, you explained that her emotions are raw, but she's not crying, he is. How is she the one being emotionally mature, when she can't even look beyond her own self-pity to see that Spike is absolutely tearing himself up for not being able to give her what he wanted to: a break from all the heartache. True, with your alteration to the final chapter, as you said:
But you'll note that for Rarity, her side of things was an afterthought. Now let's take a look at what's at the core of his self-pity:
Okay, so Spike's heartbroken and in tears, but the dress she made is dirty. Who exactly is the one here who is making it all about them? Additionally, saying 'I'm being punished for lying to you' is not the same as being selfish and making everything about one's self.
He is acknowledging that lying to her was wrong, and he's trying to make sense of why despite his best efforts she keeps having a bad night when all he wanted to do was make Rarity happy: coming to the conclusion that the night was not blessed by fate because he lied. There is nothing he wants more than to see her happy, so of course the ultimate punishment would be her continuing to be miserable... and in response to his revelation, she's getting mad at him all over again.
She says 'fate wouldn't be so cruel as to punish me in my innocence, just because you did something wrong' instead of realizing that the reason he's upset is because she's upset, and acknowledging that his lies aren't much different from her own lies.
9701629 I don't know how to communicate my intentions any more clearly than I already have, and the idea of defending my writing choices any longer is exhausting. If what you got out of this story is that the nice guy Spike was treated unfairly by the cruel alcoholic Rarity, who was mad at him for getting her dress dirty at the carnival, then that's fine; I'm glad you were at least able to glean some kind of meaning from it.
9702165
I'm sorry if it seemed like that was what I was trying to say. The truth is there's a lot about the story I liked. You illustrate a pretty masterful skill with language in this one, and I like how it immerses us into Rarity's mentality, and it's 'wordy' in a good way.
I honestly never heard of fried ice cream before, and now I wanna try it because of this story too. šØI don't have much of anything to really critique before chapter 4, I was just referencing previous chapters because I was trying to make sense of how it culminated into events there I didn't really get.
I just believe that if a kindness benefits us - like with Spike getting to spend time with Rarity while trying to cheer her up, that doesn't mean we did it to benefit us. It was immature and wrong of Spike not to tell Rarity about what was going to happen to her. I guess when it comes right down to it, I was just frustrated that Rarity became so upset with Spike for what he did, when even if he didn't do everything the right way, his intention was that he make Rarity happy.
Additionally, I just can't stand the idea of a person crying and nobody softening up in that moment to comfort them, even if they've done wrong... especially a character I care about like the little dragon Spike.
I'm the sort of person who values mercy over justice in my personal life, and I guess that to me forgiveness doesn't mean the same thing it does to you...
To me forgiveness isn't a package deal with trust. Forgiveness is letting go of somebody wronging you, and not getting mad about what they did after or bringing it up afterwards - it's putting your anger at them in the past. It might make me sad that they did it at some points after, but I'm not going to make a big deal out of it with them, and I'm not going to just forget about how they hurt me and trust them without them giving me good reason, either.
I'm sorry if you thought my tone was angry, I was just in debate mode, and I meant it entirely on an intellectual level. I appreciate you entertaining my points and listening. You responded maturely and point by point, and I really felt like there was some headway in our understanding one another's points of view. I might add, that I was also getting pretty close to just saying: 'Well, I think we're good now. We have pretty different viewpoints on this, and debating it much further would probably go on longer than either of us are up for. But I appreciate what headway we did make in understanding each other.'
I hope you're not mad at me, 'cause I like reading your stories and I'd really dislike the idea that anytime my username popped up making a comment you got a feeling of dread or something.
Also, I don't think Rarity is an alcoholic, and of course she was mad about more than her dress being dirty - I was just saying that in that moment it seemed to me that Spike was the worse off, and I wanted her to put aside her hurt for a minute, reassure Spike a bit so he wasn't crying, and then talk to Spike with her emotions more balanced, expressing her points a bit more sympathetically in light of his emotional state... it's just what I imagine I would do in that situation. 
Also, here's a puppy!:
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Please tell me you're not mad.
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In fact, I'm sorry for kinda popping off at the end there. It's just, I felt really good about this story when I first started writing it, and it kinda skated under the radar for years and years (one of the reasons I struggled to finish it for so long was that I didn't know if anyone would care enough to read it), and this is kiiiind of the most attention it's ever gotten from anyone ever.
No, truth is, I appreciated this discussion; it helped me consider the events of the story form another perspective and resulted in some revisions that clarified and added to what I was trying to say. So, no mad, plenty of thank you, and extreme gratitude for the puppy.
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I'm so glad you're not upset. Truth is I very rarely ever give voice to my opinion if it isn't completely positive 'cause I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, or discourage them after they put themselves out there. So your reply is honestly a huge relief. 
Whew!
I look forward to reading and enjoying more of your stories in future. You're a very talented writer.
Huh. Ya finished this one. Neat.
9760455 I-- yeah. I did!
Wow, this was really good. A friend and I were talking just the other day about inter-personal iffiness within Sparity. Aside from the ship's obvious problem of a) Spike being a literal minor (so, either go the older Spike or Mane Six are younger-than-they-seem route) and b) Rarity being treated like a trophy to be given instead of a driven and complex female character and c) ignoring Spike's dorky charm for the sake of "nice guy" wish-fulfillment, there's usually the issue of temperaments. Rarity is a very independent character with a lot to say, but it's very obvious that most Sparity stories are from Spike's perspective ā often for the wrong reasons.
This really immersed me in Rarity's voice and balanced well-thought-out angst with awesome chemistry. I didn't feel creeped out reading it, and the addressing of numerous character flaws and situations (nice guy/girl situations in particular) felt like a good way to play on Rarity's theatric side and Spike's somewhat greedier immaturity. The lesson felt very much on par with Inspiration Manifestation with a lot of mutual progress on both ends. The jokes were funny, the prose was strong, and Rarity's voice was as posh as ever. This was a really fun read with a lot of hope spots after a not so great day yesterday. The choice to use Rarity as the focal character was a fuckin' A, dude.
10557705 thank you, brother
now, to battle the MPLA
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Homie... are you talking about The People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola? Or some other deal?
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Kay, Iām down.