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Pain

Big Macintosh couldn't say much.

Whether it was because he didn't know what to say to begin with, or he didn't want to ruin a thing with a word or two, it didn't matter.

He couldn't say much when he'd walked back into the farmhouse that afternoon, happy as could be but completely unable to put it all into words, which he was no good at in the first place. He couldn't say much when he'd opted on sitting down in the living room and staring up at the ceiling with a big, goofy grin plastered on his face, thoughts drifting between faces and words he couldn't wholly appreciate due to his own gluttony. He couldn't say much when he'd been disturbed by Apple Bloom's return from her rather late meeting—"And just what were you three up to so late?"—but he'd tried anyway, and, as the young mare ascended the staircase to search for something in her room, he'd silently cursed himself out for being so nosy, because he couldn't do much for speaking aloud. He couldn't say much as he did so. And he couldn't say much as he'd heard old Granny Smith twirl about in the excited filly's wake, tip over at the top of the stair, and tumble end over end down the entire flight and crack her skull open at the bottom. And he couldn't say much as he watched, even as the rare sounds of Apple Bloom hellishly screaming in his ears threatened to bleed them dry. He couldn't say much as he frantically grabbed for the old mare off the floor, and he would have been reduced to mere babbles if he had anything to say as Applejack, hearing the noise from the barn, rushed back in and told him not to move her until they called for somepony.

Whether it was fate, or destiny, or what have him whatsoever, a young nurse leaving work alongside her boyfriend happened to be trotting past the Acres' front gate in an admitted attempt to barter for some leftover cider for the night, and was able to administer useless care for Granny Smith until she finally had to just look up at the three of them and shake her head, tears in her eyes.

He couldn't say much as Applejack clenched Apple Bloom in a tight hug, both wailing miserably but only one of them able to drown the other out.

He couldn't say much at the funeral, even as his name was called to come up to the podium by the closed casket to say something. He was dismissed as catatonic by more than a select few, and swiftly given a pardon, but he still couldn't say much even as Cheerilee, dressed in black and weeping into a tissue, pulled him closer—her foreleg linked with his—and buried her head on his shoulder. He couldn't say anything, but he was sure he wouldn't be able to, because the absolute stone expression stuck hard on his face wouldn't let him move his lips for even the tiniest quiver. He couldn't say much as a ringing in his ears began to grow louder, and louder, and louder, and he was deadset on simply letting the whole thing run its course, burning up his head and clenching his teeth and keeling him over and beating his heart and seizing his breaths and now sucking out his brain and running ice water over his head and–

"Mac?"

And there she was again. The one thing in his life that saved him, time and time again, even as he faced death a couple times every other month or so.

An old cow passing peacefully in the night. One of their pigs at the bottom of a food-driven stampede in the morning. A rabbit—a new addition—getting lost in the apple trees one afternoon and quickly snatched up by a lone wolf.

Death wasn't a stranger to him, as odd it came to his door, but he felt somethin' completely awful for only feeling for Granny Smith's.

It pained him when he suddenly stopped seeking out Cheerilee, but, mostly, it was because he couldn't say much about the whole thing, and even as he newly spent his every waking hour staring at his bedroom's ceiling alone as could be, words just didn't come to him, not audibly or mentally. He waited for them, time and time again, and maybe that was why he just kept sitting there every day and every night and every early morning and every late dusk just watching nothing in particular but speckles of dust floating through the air in the light of the sun or the moon. He thought for awhile his interest to be in the poorly-layered paint, then the odd shadow his fan made when the current luminance hit it all just right, then how hungry he was and the sensation of aching for the smallest morsel, then how dry his throat felt when he prodded it with his hoof and tried to make vowels and consonants, then how... not there his limbs and his bones and his muscles and his entire self felt on his bed there. But then his thoughts pushed, and pushed, and pushed their way to clarity, and all he could tell was that he was entirely at fault for every little reason he was just sitting there in the first place, ignoring the soft cries of Apple Bloom down the hall every night and the door to his room knock-knock-knocking with Applejack's well-toned foreleg rapping at it ceaselessly.

He could have stopped it. He could have saved his sisters from their misery and torment and blame, and all the concern from their respective friends and all the letters in the mail and the visits and the knocking and the tears and the crying and the sobbing and the horrible gutwrenching muffles of Apple Bloom in the bathroom, and he could have done it all if he had just said any little thing that day. He could have called out to Granny Smith as she trotted toward the top of the stair, stopping her from being in Apple Bloom's way with a discussion of the later forsaken night's meal of soup and pie. He could have called for Apple Bloom as she put her first hoof on the landing, letting Granny Smith descend it peacefully all while he questioned Apple Bloom for further details on her excursion that he was sure she'd be more than happy to tell him all about and more.

He could have done literally anything, but, in the end, he hadn't, because Big Macintosh couldn't say much, and he couldn't very well save his Granny from splitting her skull wide open from the very wood she so precariously walked up and down his entire life.

It was all his fault, and there was nothing that could be said to change it, even if it was from somepony managing to tear down his locked door to give him an entire earful and a half.

The fields began to grow unhealthily, just as his own declined in turn.

The apples grew rancid, picked by birds and other wayward animals who didn't deserve such good graces.

His room became his world, and even then it felt as far away as the sounds of his own home just trying its hardest to comfort him.

Big Macintosh couldn't say much, but he didn't need to in the hopeless spiral of isolation. He made small sojourns in the kitchen, prying open bottles and downing them by the pack, and his blue moon partings from his room were emphasized by his involuntary sway and stumble, and the clinking that met his ears whenever he adjusted his position on his bed. His long, quiet hoping for a beard was scraggly met in short time during a time he didn't want it to, and his mane grew so grossly misshapen he had to push it out of his eyes by the minute so as to not disturb the liquids pouring uselessly down his throat whenever he felt the strength to grasp their homes. His yoke threatened to choke him as he stared, feeling tighter and tighter each day until he felt no possibility of being able to tear the whole thing off. It grew dirty, and collected stains, a disgusting sight completing a disgusting stallion that, if anypony were to see him, would probably vomit at the mere prospect of being known again. His goal was to disappear, and make sure of being forgotten in a farmhouse still occupied of three, sometimes two, but always by at least one.

Big Macintosh knew what it was like to feel happy, and at the back of his mind all he wanted was to return to such times, face to face with a face of smiles and cheer that he'd put on hold so selfishly and rudely. A face of beauty and belonging that he wasn't sure he'd see again. The face of Cheerilee, who he'd so ruthlessly shoved away at a time when they both needed each other desperately, after so recently exchanging three-word sentences that had changed their lives for the absolute best.

And about three months later, he finally rose from his bed and opened his door to find a mare covered in snow and wrapped in a scarf and coat, bearing food and drink and a runny nose she kept cutely wiping at.

And a day later, in the early morning, he threw her out again. And he kept her accessories, and returned to his bed.

And that night, he was back to it all, but he at least had a new smell to smell. And whenever he smelled it, he reached for the scarf and clutched it as close to his heart as he could without pulling it all open, feeling the warm embrace of a figure he so terribly, so horribly, loved so, so dearly.

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NorrisThePony

NorrisThePony #1 · Apr 11th, 2018 · 2 · ·

Dunno how I missed this update, but...

Christ, I’m so envious of your prose. It’s hard to convey the emotions you do without a single phrase of dialogue, so congratulations on pulling it off very very well.

re- Yamsmos