Light Pollution

by Quillamore

First Night: Diamond Cut

Everything in the restaurant had a sort of constant, swirling motion to it. The pendulums on the clocks moved back and forth in time with the wing-shaped ceiling fans that barely even blew any air onto the tables. In the center of all of this, a grand fountain trickled with streams of water. Signs surrounded the fountain, but hordes of foals found their way around them, splashing and running through it without a single worry about what their parents would think.

She’d never really thought about it that much before, but when it came down to it, Diamond Tiara really did wish she had that sort of luxury. It wasn’t so much that she wanted to get her mane wet and messy, but instead the feeling of just wanting to be in a place without having to fret about what to say or what to do. She thought she’d escaped those fears for the time being, especially considering the way her mother had brushed her off for—for how long exactly? A week, like she’d assumed up until then? Or forever?

Watching the fan go by, she shook those thoughts out of her head. If she was going to survive in this city, she had to have her priorities straight. And if she had any hope of staying with Coco’s family, she had to patch things up with Babs like she’d planned on doing anyway. Somehow.

All she knew at this point was that focusing on her mother was not going to help. So she tried focusing on other things, even insignificant ones, just to keep the stress off the situation so she could seem as sincere as possible.

The rest of the table seemed to be at a similar loss for words. Diamond had heard Coco try to explain the situation to Babs and her sister while they were waiting in line to be seated, but after that, everything about it had been dropped. But she could tell Babs was sizing her up, just like she was doing to her.

After a while, she’d been staring off into space until she’d forgotten where she was. While she didn’t forget who she was with, everything just seemed to blur into some indistinct mass, and for all she knew, she could’ve been anywhere in Manehattan. So when a single hoof went towards her front leg, she flinched without thinking.

Strangely enough, she could barely feel anything when the hoof actually did hit her fur. With all the tension in the room, she’d half-expected it to be Babs waiting for the right moment to punch her out of her chair. Honestly, that was probably what she deserved, anyway. Latching onto Babs’ mother only months after bullying her cousin, barging into her hometown without warning, interrupting what could’ve been a peaceful family gathering.

Instead, when Diamond’s focus returned to the real world, all she could see was a gentle smile from the one mare she knew didn’t have a grudge against her. Probably.

“I just wanted to ask if you knew what you wanted yet,” Coco whispered with a slight chuckle. “No need to be so jumpy about it.”

“The spicy vegetable pizza looks good,” Diamond answered, trying to act natural.

Instead, she was met only with blank stares from the rest of the table, the first time she’d been addressed in over fifteen minutes.

“You might want to take a look at the menu,” Babs’ sister, Bambi, said. From her tone, Diamond still wasn’t able to tell whether she was on her side or not, and her face certainly didn’t reveal anything of the sort. “Seeing as you just happened to pick the one Manehattan dish the Cheesecake Mill doesn’t serve.”

At that moment, Diamond was half-tempted to see if the giant fountain had a hidden pile of quicksand on top of the base. It’d almost be preferable to this whole situation, that was for sure. And even if there wasn’t, anything would be better than staying there to face her past faults.

Just as she was about to step off the seat, however, another hoof reached out to stop her. Diamond looked up to see the pony’s face and saw the one she dreaded most, with her head as close to hers as it could be.

“Common mistake, assuming everyplace in Manehattan has pizza,” Babs muttered. “I was like that, first time I came here.”

Diamond stared at the filly in confusion. She still didn’t know very much about Babs, even after spending an entire week practically tied at her hip, but she’d always assumed she’d never been anything else other than a Manehattanite. Then again, that would just have to be another distraction she’d figure out once she actually got in good with this family.

The top priority now was figuring out why the first words out of Babs’ mouth had been casual, even though her face was still tight with suspicion. Was forgiveness really going to come that easy?

“Heads up,” Babs spoke softly, tilting her head towards the waitress approaching their table. “If you still can’t decide, I have a feelin’ you’d like the pepper and mushroom sandwich.”

And that had been the last encounter they’d had when the food came. Diamond had taken up Babs’ advice about the sandwich, but she still wasn’t quite sure what the filly was thinking.

She’d made a show about enjoying her meal, hoping that compliments would get her somewhere, but there was still no response. She’d went through all the friendship-making techniques she’d been secretly learning at Twilight Time, but all of them seemed too embarrassing for the situation.

Then again, playing it cool had never really gotten her anywhere, especially not with the Crusaders. They’d only chosen to forgive her after they saw how close she was to breaking. While she had no way of replicating that with Babs, she could make herself vulnerable in a different way.

“Hey, Babs,” she said just as the brown filly had returned from the bathroom, her cutie mark fully visible. “I feel like you and your cutie mark could really help my father. After all…he always has liked to cut costs.”

After saying this, she laughed and pumped her front hooves back and forth towards Babs, trying her best to hide her nervous smile.

Pinkie Pie had told her that bad puns were the key to making good friends, and that, after making one, you had to move your hooves around like, in the party planner’s own words, “a pirate pony loading a cannon.” Yet when she did this, Babs looked unaffected and maybe even a bit insulted.

Maybe that one wasn’t bad enough, Diamond thought to herself. The whole idea of intentionally doing something badly to make friends had confused her from the beginning, and maybe she was still trying too hard to make a good joke. With that on her mind, she decided to try again as if her life depended on it. Which, if it rained again like it did today, it probably would.

“Wow, I mean, getting a cutie mark before any of your other friends? I really did underestimate you all along. You really were cut out for this!”

Another round of laughter. More hoof cannons. Still no response.

“I really am sorry about what I did, I promise. Treating you the way I did, I really did deserve to be dragged through the mud that way. But I promise, I’ve changed. And I’m open for any cutting remarks you might still have about me.”

Diamond only got a few moments of laughter in before realizing that this plan was having the exact opposite effect on everypony. Coco and Bambi were staring at her oddly, both trying to figure out what she was trying to accomplish to no avail. And more importantly, Babs’ blank stare had soon turned into a scowl.

“To think I’d thought you were actually bein’ sincere about that,” Babs muttered with a sigh. “And I was actually gonna think about acceptin’ your apology up until you dissed my cutie mark.”

“I didn’t—oh…“

She stopped there, realizing what her comments could have sounded like without context. What they could’ve sounded like to somepony who’d known the old Diamond Tiara. The fact that it’d been about cutie marks certainly made it seem that way, at least. At that point, the best thing she could’ve done probably would’ve been to shut up about it and never bring it up again, assuming she got another chance.

But ponies didn’t tend to give her another chance and more importantly, she’d never really been the best at getting herself to shut up. Her mind, and everything else about her, had ways of digging her into bigger holes.

“I really…didn’t…mean it like that,” she muttered, barely struggling to get the words out. “If I’d wanted to make fun of ponies, I certainly wouldn’t have come here to do it. It’s so far away from everything I’ve known, and Manehattanites are supposed to be insane.”

“We are,” Babs replied, half-threatening, half-teasing. “But if you didn’t mean it like that, then how else could you have meant it?”

She breathed in deeply, sighed out, and continued, “I really, really don’t know about you. Don’t get me wrong, Apple Bloom briefed me on it and everythin’, talkin’ about how excited she was to get her cutie mark, how worried she’d been about you. Celestia knows how I wanted to believe you, the way my cuz has taught me to see the best in ponies. I know there are a lot of us out there who deserve forgiveness, but I’ve been hurt before more times than you know. Back then, I even thought you were the answer to keepin’ me from bein’ hurt. I even thought, after that whole thing with your mama, I thought I could do the same for you. But seein’ after what you said to me…it doesn’t seem like you want forgiveness.”

“I thought it would break the ice, all right?” Diamond answered, all the words suddenly flowing out of her mouth. “I talked to as many ponies as I could about how to make friends, and especially about how to make friends with ponies who didn’t like you, okay? And none of them were working, and Pinkie had this really dumb idea about making bad puns so you’d laugh at me, so I figured I’d try it. Because I came all this way to Manehattan and got shoved out of a cab just so I could be forgiven by the one pony who understands me most. All this time, nopony understood what I was going through, but you did. And I just wanted you to know that.”

At this point, Diamond was panting, desperate, and trying her best to hold down tears. Confessing to these sorts of things had never been the easiest on her, but knowing that there was a fifty-fifty chance they could fall on barren ground hit her harder than any other confessions she’d had to make before.

“Well, if that’s what you meant all along,” Babs sighed, “then you should’ve just stopped putting on all those airs and just cut it out.”

As stupid as it was, hearing that was enough to make Diamond stop wanting to cry. She knew it wasn’t something she should’ve been laughing about, but she did anyway. Realizing her mistake, Babs soon followed.

“I didn’t mean for that to happen!” the brown filly blurted out, waving her hooves from side to side in embarrassment. “I swear!”

“I guess it means it cuts both ways now,” Diamond shot back.

Babs gave her a slight look of disapproval and tried to maintain her cool composure, which lasted all of five seconds before she joined in laughing. After both fillies’ throats gave out from all the laughter, the table was quiet yet again.

But this time, Diamond couldn’t help but tell that the quietness was different. While she suspected that she wasn’t quite out of the woods yet with Babs, at least she seemed willing to give her a chance, and that was more than she could’ve said a day ago. When dessert came to the table, Babs had even given her the largest slice of the strawberry cheesecake.

“We’ll make a deal,” the brown filly whispered. “No more puns, and I’ll try to give you another chance.”

Diamond could tell from the way she smiled, though, that she was much more excited about this than she was letting on. Maybe she wasn’t the only pony who needed an understanding hoof once in a while.

“And what about staying with you?” Diamond asked. “Do you really think you could live under the same roof as your old enemy without, you know, going insane?”

“I’ve dealt with worse,” Babs muttered.

Later, Diamond would realize that her voice hadn’t had a hint of playfulness in it when she’d said that. If Babs had meant it the same way she’d meant everything else in the conversation, then Diamond would’ve been able to tell. But her potential new friend had a flicker of seriousness in that moment, almost as if there was still some mystery she didn’t know. As if, even then, there was still some distance between them.

“Something tells me I can handle it.”

That flicker had already faded once Babs opened her mouth again, only to be drowned out more by happy family chatter and heaping slices of cheesecake. But that didn’t make it go away, not by a long shot. Just looking at Bambi and Coco’s concerned gazes made that even clearer.

Diamond didn’t know anything about Babs’ past or the darkness it had held, she realized. All she really knew was that, somehow, she understood.

Author's Note:

Hope you enjoyed the first full segment of this story (day+night)! There'll still be some tension between the two, but for the most part, a lot of this story will be dedicated to them discovering each other and growing ever closer as friends. Also, I had too much fun making Diamond explore the world of puns.

P.S. The restaurant in this chapter is half-fictional, half-based on reality. I've never actually eaten at a Cheesecake Factory, so I tried to imagine what one would be like based on being inside one once, while still giving it a fantasy touch.