Before Dark

by Rambling Writer

8:07 PM - Interim

We were ten minutes from the summit if you decided to walk really slow. The sunset still wasn’t for a while, so we decided to take a short break and digest our dinner. There was a grassy ledge not too far off the path; I’d gone up there plenty of times during the summer as a foal. Aegis and I lay there on our backs, side by side, staring up at the clouds. There was a tense silence between us, something we had to say but couldn’t. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t comfortable, either.

“You know,” Aegis said at last, “there’s one thing we really haven’t touched on yet.”

“Yeah?”

“How’s life treating you?”

And there it was. I was kind of surprised it hadn’t come up earlier. We’d danced around the whole issue of what had happened in the five years since. I’d been thinking about it, and I was sure he was thinking about it, but we’d never even alluded to it. Probably should’ve. I decided to go first to just get it over with. “Not bad,” I said, somewhat distantly. “Farming’s been going good. Nothing really special. Just keep growing and selling.”

“Doing okay business?”

“Little more than okay, actually. Good crop last year, had a little bit of surplus money. Saved it, just in case.”

“Oh. That’s good.” Aegis’s voice was only there, like he wasn’t really paying attention to me. It was kind of hard to blame him; there wasn’t a lot to pay attention to.

“Yeah.”

Silence. Really, I’d kept beating around the bush for the question he was really asking. I went and said it, to try to keep the awkwardness level as low as possible. “And… and I haven’t really been in a relationship since.”

That got his attention. “Really?”

I scratched my head. “Technically, I have been — several times, actually — but it doesn’t matter what I do once I’m in a relationship, nothing’s working for me.”

“Nothing’s working? Why?”

“I don’t know,” I muttered. I glared at one of the few clouds in the sky. It was hard to say. I’d never really thought about the whole why. I knew things didn’t work, and that was that. “It’s, I don’t know. I really can’t say.”

“Try something,” said Aegis. “Even if it doesn’t make sense. The hardest part of getting an idea is starting it.”

“What if I can’t think of something?”

“You’re good with words, you’ll figure it out. And if it takes you a while, I’ll wait.”

“Fine. It’s like…” I stopped and thought. What was it like? I went back over my relationships for the past four years. I’d tried to make them work, and there was never really anything wrong with them. But they never worked out and always coasted to a zero-chemistry stop. It always felt like some part of me was missing, no matter what I did.

Well, then, that was it, wasn’t it? “I just put so much of myself into that night. The romantic part. You took that with you when you left, and I was okay, because you’d be back next year, right? Then you weren’t back, and I didn’t get the romantic part back, and I… This probably sounds stupid, but it was like I couldn’t be romantic anymore. It’d just been… sucked out of me. I went through the motions and tried relationship stuff, but just couldn’t get any zing out of it.” I turned my head to face Aegis, my cheek brushing the grass. “That make sense?”

After a moment, Aegis nodded. “Yeah. It’s hard to explain why, but I think I get what you’re saying.”

“Cool.” I looked back up. “Right now, I’m… kind of with somepony, b-”

“Wait, what?” Aegis rolled over and stood up, looking down at me. “You’ve got somepony, but you went back to me at the drop of a hat? That’s-”

“Hey,” I said. I lightly swatted at his face. “The thing is, it’s not really working. I’ve been with him for several moons, but I’ve got less sparks in all that than in the few hours I’ve spent with you today. We’re friends, and we started going out because we thought we had feelings for each other, but it’s not clicking. I think we’re only staying together because we’re already a couple, and ponies are kind of expected to be in a relationship.”

“Oh.” Aegis slowly lay back down, but he still felt a bit tense. Guess he was more worried about my coltfriend than I was. Ponies can be weird like that.

“And if nothing else, we’re avoiding the matchmakers.”

Aegis bit back a snort. “Oh. Those kinds of ponies. Yeah, I’ve run into them.”

“Like I said, we’re still friends,” I said, “just not, you know… those friends. Not really. It’s complicated.” I waved vaguely at the sky.

“Hmm.” Aegis didn’t sound particularly convinced, but he didn’t try to push the matter, either.

“And if my love life stays like this, well, I really don’t know what I’ll do. I want to be romantic, but I don’t know where to go from here. Not if I can’t connect with anypony the way I connect with you.”

“Oh.” I didn’t look at him, but I could imagine Aegis smiling. “Good thing I came back, then, right?”

“Yep.”

When Aegis didn’t add anything, I lay there for a moment, resting my legs and watching the clouds. How had I not thought of that before? It was like I was deliberately ignoring it. In hindsight, yeah, it felt like all my attempts at romance were doomed to failure, but I’d always convinced myself that this was the one that would work. Why hadn’t I seen any of the warning signs?

Probably because they were related to Aegis. I hadn’t wanted to think about him, so I didn’t, and that meant I didn’t think about what was going wrong. Now that I’d finally admitted that to myself, it felt like I’d taken off a gas mask I hadn’t realized I was wearing.

If Aegis left and we didn’t stay in touch, would the gas mask go back on?

Eventually, I decided to keep the conversation going. “So… you?”

“Well…” Aegis chuckled. “The image of the starving artist is based in reality. I haven’t really been able to sell much of my stuff — mostly sculptures, by the by — so money’s kinda tight. I’m doing alright, don’t get me wrong, but dinner often has an awful lot of ramen.”

“Bummer. Got another job?”

“Yeah. Retail.” He didn’t continue.

“…I take it I shouldn’t speak of it?”

“Nope.”

“Alrighty then.”

“Still…” Aegis sighed. “Could be worse. I’ve got some friends and roommates helping me out, and there’s a local show featuring some of my art tomorrow that might get it some more attention, so hooves crossed.”

I rolled onto my side to look at him. “You asked your family for help?”

“Nah, it’s not that bad,” he said, gesturing vaguely. “Nowhere near that bad. Splitting rent with a few roommates already cuts down expenses a ton, and my job pays… well enough. I’m kinda poor, just not, you know, living from paycheck to paycheck poor.”

“Okay, cool.” I rolled back onto my back. “How do you think the show’ll go?”

“Hard to say. First one, so I’m still a little unsure of how it all goes. Might make a lot of money, might not make any.”

That was one of the reasons I’d never really understood being an artist as a job. It was just so finicky, and you couldn’t have a steady paycheck; money came in large bursts if it came at all. Even being a farmer was more dependable than that; you grew food, you sold it, and that was that. Grow the food right, and you don’t have to worry about commissions or anything like that.

“S-so, um,” I said, “what’s, what’s your love life been like?”

Aegis sighed. “Worse than yours, if you can believe that. Completely nonexistent.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I wasn’t exactly Casaneighva before, but, but now, I… I just can’t stop thinking about you. I don’t really get attracted to mares anymore, and when I think about it, the only reason I can come up with is that they’re not you.”

“Huh. You know why?”

“That’s the really annoying part. I don’t. You’re forward, but there’re other ponies who’re forward. You’re witty, but there’re other ponies who’re witty. You’re a good conversationalist, but there’re other ponies who’re good conversationalists. It’s not even all those put together, because there’re other… Yeah, you know. It’s, I don’t know. Something about you. That’s the whole reason I came out here. To either have you reject me and just try and put the whole thing to rest or get back together.”

“Oh, wow. I, I’m sorry.” What was I sorry about? It wasn’t my fault.

“Thanks.” Aegis reached out and stroked my mane for a moment. “Now, I still don’t know why, but it’s definitely something about you.”

We were silent again for another few seconds, but now it was a comfortable silence. We weren’t saying anything because we didn’t need to say anything.

“Think this really is love?” I asked. “Actual, bona fide love and not just lust and puppy love?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Because, when you get right down to it, we’ve only known each other for, what, ten hours? We had no contact those five years in between, they don’t count. But right now, we’re spilling our hearts out to each other, no problem. I’ve never told anypony about the problems I had after you didn’t show up, but I tell you without a second thought.”

“Well, it… could just be friendship.”

“Yeah, maybe, but it totally wrecked our love lives. Friendship doesn’t work like that. But we’ve never really done any romantic stuff, either. Just, you know, talked.”

“And that one hug, right before I left.”

“Yeah, but that’s not, you know, romantic romantic. It might be love, but it might not be.”

The grass rustled as Aegis shifted his weight a little. “Well, if we’re gonna be serious about this, we should know what we’re talking about. First of all, what is love?”

Too easy. “Baby, don’t hurt me,” I said.

I could almost hear Aegis rolling his eyes. “Ba-dum tish,” he said. “Seriously, wh-”

I scooted over a foot or so and put my hoof on his mouth. “You know what, Aegis? Let’s not analyze this and just accept it for what it is, love or not. Trying to pick apart love is like trying to pick apart a kitten. It doesn’t make it cuter, it just makes a terrible mess, and now you’re without something you liked.”

“…Just where did you get that metaphor from?”

“Dunno. My mind, probably.”

“…I love your mind.”

“Me, too.”

We lay on our backs and watched the few clouds go by.

Comments

[Purple Pony]

That metaphor was BRILLIANT!!! Last chapter made my head explode, this one made my gut explode from the laughter!!