Little sunshine
Do horses have laps? If they do, I’m lying on one.
If I am being honest it is probably my favourite place. Not one of my favourite places, just the favourite place. Even now as a whole, intact, you know, person, with access to all of my old non-horsey life I can still say fairly comfortably that this is my favourite place, whether it’s a lap or not.
Oh, I could pontificate on why, I’m sure. I’m sure I could come up with lots of deep and meaningful reasons why it’s my favourite place. But what would be the point of that?
It’s comfortable and it’s close to her. What more do I really need to know?
Ah, lovely.
We were on a roof, she and I. One of the roofs (rooves? I always forget) of the castle. Perks of being with someone who can fly and also teleport. My initial plan (read: polite and spontaneous request) had been - perhaps a little childishly, maybe, possibly - to go up to the highest point in the castle, just because. I should probably have noticed something in her cheerful eagerness to oblige me.
A short while of freezing my bollocks off atop what turned out to be Luna’s tower (she has a whole tower!) we’d moved to a lower, more comfortable roof, though Celestia had yet to stop grinning about it and about how funny she was. Pffbt.
She’d laid a blanket down, laid down on the blanket and then I’d laid down on her (laying down on the blanket), and it was in this arrangement that we were enjoying the sunshine.
Perks of a girlfriend who can control the sun? Probably not. Probably just a nicely sunny day anyway, though it is hard for me now not to kind of conflate her and sunshine in my head. Both warm me. Hah! What a dumb thing to say.
Also, thinking of it, is she my girlfriend? I mean, technically speaking yes, that would fit, it just didn’t feel right. It felt like the sort of word I’d use back when my voice was still breaking, you know? It fit, it just didn’t fit. What would fit? Significant other? Partner? Hmm. None of them felt right!
This vexed me!
It vexed me so much, in fact, that I could no longer lay still. This combined with the realisation that I hadn’t actually kissed my girlfriend (partner, significant other, et al) in a good few minutes, and that this wouldn’t do at all, had me wriggling over and crawling up.
Celestia seemed to have half-dozed off, because she only noticed my doing this once I’d basically already done it, one (very pretty) eye blearily opening up and blinking and peering at me.
“John? Is som-”
Smooching cut her off. Hah!
Smooching then went on for a bit longer than I had initially anticipated, as it turned out to be something that she was reluctant to see stop and was eager to participate in. Very eager. So there was that.
Had to stop eventually though, if only because we needed to breathe…
“What was that for?” She asked. Somehow in the midst of all of it she’d wound up on top of me, so I was now looking up at her, framed by the sun. Appropriate, that, eh? I shrugged as best I could while pinned.
“It’s a fun thing to do,” I said.
“I can’t deny that,” she said, schooching about and settling down so she was now the one lying on top of me, head resting on my chest or kind of on my belly or really just across both. I put one arm under my head and let my other hand go to just behind her ears. A reflex, at this point. I could hear her humming happily. All was well.
A single cloud trundled along somewhere near the horizon. I remembered the thought that had vexed me.
“Are you my girlfriend?” I asked, bluntly. Best to just get it out there.
She stopped humming and raised her head to look at me.
“Have you lost your memory again?” She asked.
Thinks she’s funny.
“No, hurr, very good. I mean, what are we? Boyfriend and girlfriend? Partners?”
It looked like she was going to say something to this straight out but then paused, thought about it a little.
“...isn’t this something we’ve talked about before?” She asked.
“You know, I don’t think so,” I said. I genuinely couldn’t remember. If I could, I wouldn’t have brought it up. If we had, I’d hoped one of us might have remembered. There was a lack of remembering here is what I’m driving at.
She thought about it a little longer and rolled onto her front, still lying on me, chin on my chest now, horn right over my face and making me go a bit cross-eyed until I stopped trying to focus on it.
“What was that one you said? Girlfriend? I’m more used to marefriend, when I hear it. I rather like your way, though,” she said.
“Well, it’s an option, I just, ah…” I couldn’t finish this, as I wasn’t sure how.
“What?”
“It just doesn’t feel very, I don’t know - mature, I guess?” I said, feebly.
Not the best word, ‘mature’, but the only one I could find in my head that worked at that moment.
“I’ve had a lot of time to be mature,” Celestia said. I blinked.
“Suppose that’s true. Didn’t think about it that way…”
She is, after all, an older lady (a cradlesnatcher!), and I her young, svelte, nubile, innocent, smooth-skinned boytoy. Or, er, well, maybe not quite that but something similar, maybe? Or not at all?
Was I ever svelte?
And now I’m staring at her, I realise, and she’s just smiling at me. Pretty smile. Pretty lady!
But I’m kind of stuck on the, ah, implications of what she said there.And now I’m thinking about the future. Not the immediate future, the far-ish future. A hundred years, say. Some point from now when I’m dead and Celestia, you know, isn’t. When I’m not around anymore and she still is. She’ll be sad about that, right?
What am I saying, of course she will. So that’s a mental image. Her, alone, sad. Or without me at least - she’ll still have Luna and whoever else, just no me. And she’ll be sad about that. For a bit.
How long of a bit?
There’s no good answer to this, is there. Either she breezes over it in no time (which, honestly, even as a thought experiment I can’t really picture her doing, but who’s to say) or else she has it hang over her like a pall for however long an immortal horse can have a pall hang over them. A while, presumably. Neither option appeals to me, even if I would be dead. They make me sad to imagine now.
Suppose there is kind of a middle ground where she’s sad but comes to terms with it in a healthy way, remembering me fondly but moving on in life as life continues to move on and all that. Everyone’s different but that’s usually a pretty good area for these things, in my experience.
But, you know, we’re dealing with timescales here that aren’t usually an issue.
Hypothetically, had I got married back home - to a human, if you can imagine such a thing - and either I died or they died then the survivor would be trundling along alone for, what? Depends, really, but probably a decade or so, or more, but whichever way it’d be an amount of years you could wrap your head around. Celestia won’t have that.
Once I’m gone, she’ll just be keeping going. Keeping going throughout however long I managed to last for all over again, then again, then just on and on. My lifespan on top of my lifespan. How long we had together times infinity. Right? That’s how it works. I think.
And is she going to be keeping me in mind that whole time? Forefront, or tucked away at the back? Something she thinks about on the day-to-day, or that weird experience she had x-hundred years ago that just sometimes bubbles up if something halfway-reminds her of it?
How long is my face going to last in her head?
This is just going to make me miserable. That’s no good. Let’s stop thinking about this. Pointless anyway. However she reacts you will be dead, and there’s not much use in getting upset about it now. I think your best bet would be to make sure that whatever memories you do leave her with are good ones. Or at least amusing ones. Right?
Right.
“You’re really enjoying staring at me today,” she says, bringing me back to the moment with a pleasant bump. She does have a lovely voice. Lovely everything, really.
I shake my head to clear out the thought residue.
“Sorry, miles away. Uh, not to say I don’t enjoy staring at you, I do. But not, you know, in a weird way. It’s-”
She shut me up with more smooching. Probably the best move in the circumstances.
“You’re thinking too much,” she said once she’d finished. It’s like she knows me!
“It’s a problem I have.”
One of many.
“What is it about this time?” She asks.
“You.”
Not a lie!
“You can’t always be thinking about me,” she said, semi-serious.
Obviously I wasn’t going to actually explain what it was I’d been thinking about - where would I start? And, worse, where would it go? - so instead I propped myself up on one elbow and held forth thus:
“Oh, but I am and I do! My love, my muse, my life! Oh, after being in the presence of such radiance, how could my every thought bend, as though pulled by gravity, towards-mmph.”
Not smooching this time, she’d just shoved a wing in my face.
“Very good,” she said, rolling her eyes. Success! I pushed the wing aside.
“Yeah well. I like you. Deal with it,” I said.
For my troubles here I got a nuzzle and whisper in my ear:
“I like you too.”
Ah, shivers. Everytime. That voice!
Life is pretty good.
She’s basically sitting on me now, hooves either side of my head, face smiling down and fancy magic hair just doing that billowing thing it tends to do. I am fine with this arrangement. My hands come to rest on her hips because that seems a good place for them to come to rest. She seems fine with this arrangement.
“We should do something,” she said.
“I thought we were doing something.”
“No, we were deliberately not doing anything, then there was canoodling, then you started thinking too much, and now it’s not really nothing anymore but it’s also not something, not really. So we should do something.”
I think I followed that?
“Uh, sure?” I said, and I got a giggle out of her. It was lovely.
“I’m open to suggestions,” she said, and my mind went obligingly blank.
“Uh…”
Quick! Something! Anything! What’s close?
“We should…jump in the pool,” I said, working it through on a word-to-word basis. This just confused her though.
“Pool?”
“There’s, like, a pool. Just down there,” I said, nodding to the edge of the roof.
I’d seen the pool when we’d first got up here and I’d gone to have a peer at how high up we were. Turned out, fairly high, but not too high. It was a level below us. Not too far, but far enough that when I’d seen it I’d thought to myself ‘That’d be pretty fun to jump into, if I was a crazy person’, and for whatever reason this was what had come to mind just then.
Come to think of it, I’d always wanted to jump into a body of water from a height. That’s a very specific desire I’ll admit, but who doesn’t have those? And how often did I get the chance to indulge this one? It might never come again! I might never want to again! Seize the day! It’ll be an anecdote in years to come! Yeah!
Celestia glanced behind her.
“That’s an ornamental pool,” she said. Guess she knows the layout of the place like the back of her, uh, hoof, so knew what I was talking about. She looked concerned.
“Yeah but, still water, right? And I don’t think there’s anyone around so who’ll know?
My thought here being that her concern might have been witnesses. The more I lay there and watched her clearly engaged in some internal wrangling the less convinced I became that this actually was her concern.
“Not a good idea?” I asked. I knew it wasn’t a good idea - it was a silly idea - but she was usually fairly on-board with my non-good ideas. I still remember the time when I was stuck in that wheelchair and we tried to see how fast we could go. Ah, fun times.
“I…” she said, chewing her lip a little and then concluding: “Will go down. And watch you.”
Kind of a weird thing to say and kind of a weird way to say it, but whatever.
“Whatever floats your boat, lovely,” I said, and after a rather tepid smile from her (a mere four on the scale, if I had to rate it) she vanished in a flash of golden light. As she is sometimes wont to do.
“Gah! Teleporting!”
Without her sitting on me anymore I was able to stand and so I did that, stretching a bit before sauntering over to the edge of the room. There indeed was the pool, a perfectly safe distance below me and, by its edge, Celestia, looking up.
It is definitely a perfectly safe height. My memory hadn’t made it any safer. Looking at it now I could see the safety. Any reluctance I might have felt in my gut about approaching the edge was entirely down to a lifetime’s worth of societal condition as regarded being apprehensive about the edges of roofs. Rooves.
Whatever. Backing down now would be unthinkable anyway. A girl is watching!
Hah!
Whelp, hesitation never got anyone anywhere, I’m fairly certain, so just geronimo!
And there we go. Airbourne! Running wild and free, through the air. Falling with style, that’s me! Ooh, tumbling. Not sure I intended to tumble but I am. Wind whistling, guts lurching. This is fun. Thrilling, you might say.
What is the best way to land in water from this height, anyway? Should probably have decided that before jumping. Wrong angle for diving now, I think. Can’t really get into the right position. Hmm, I’m very horizontal. I think this might hurt a bit. Only a bit though. Best brace, water’s coming up. Close eyes…
And…
…nothing?
Open eyes. Not falling anymore. Water just underneath me. Hmm. That’s unorthodox.
And what’s that tinkling sound?
“Hey, what-”
Then the splash. Face-first into the water.
There follows some splashing and spluttering, and when I break the surface and wipe the water from my eyes and blink I find Celestia there, grinning at me. At least it’s a proper grin.
“Masterful,” she says as I paddle over. This pool is deeper than it looked! Colder, too!
Why had I wanted to do this, again? This is another of those things in life that are much more fun to imagine than to actually do. Well, now I know for certain, at least. Was only speculating before.
“Did you catch me?” I asked, one arm on the lip, squinting up at her.
“I didn’t think you were going to stick the landing,” she said.
“Harrumph.”
My belly-flopping abilities being slandered, maligned!
And so in defiance did I splash a bit of water on her hoof. She looked down.
“What was that?” She asked, flicking some of the water back off again.
“Me. Being defiant by splashing water onto you. Take that,” I said, splashing some more.
“My hoof?” She asked, holding up said hoof. The hoof dripped. A little bit.
“Well, I didn’t want to go too overboard-” I said, just before a minor tidal wave of magically shunted water smacked into me from the side. Oh. I see how it is.
“That’s not fair. You’re not even in the water!” I protested, blinking water from my eyes. She, looming, tapped her chin.
“You know, it did feel a little bit unfair,” she says before sharply dropping her front and raising her rear in what I immediately recognise is her signature pre-pounce posture. She even did the wiggle!
“Ah, crap,” I said, paddling away in what I knew was a futile effort. I heard her leap, saw her shadow pass over me, and saw her splash down right in the path of my paddling. I then got a faceful of water. Again.
She’s so mean to me!
And I’m there spluttering and wiping my eyes and a second later she breaks the surface, sopping and smiling. I am not going to question how magical flappy hair can get wet. It can. Stills flaps, just more wetly. It’s an odd look. It’s like there’s a salmon under there.
“You’re all wet, dear,” I said. Hurr. Funny.
“You do have that effect on me, sometimes.”
“...wow.”
Didn’t miss a beat! She’s filthy! Since when was she filthy? It get hot in here? That my imagination? That the sunshine?
I’m distracted from this, uh, distracting line of thought by her daintily splashing me with her hoof. In contrast to the magic wave and the leaping it’s, shall we say, pretty low key.
“This does feel more fair,” she said.
“I feel like you’re mocking me.”
“That’s because I am. Lovingly.”
So mean.
There’s a bit of back-and-forth splashing, but not a lot because she’s already done the jumping in and the joke is starting to wear a little at this point, so it fairly quickly just becomes a watery snuggle. Which I am fine with.
“We could have been dry and snuggling, you know,” she said.
“I know,” I said.
And not long after that we climbed out. Further benefits of magical horse girlfriend: can magically dry herself and you after entering bodies of water. Neat! Hadn’t even considered that. It was like turning a hairdryer up under my shirt but all over! Would recommend.
“That was a very silly thing to do,” she said, landing after quickly nipping back up again to grab the blanket (wouldn’t do to leave it for someone else). In this I was fairly certain she was referring more to my leap of faith than our little splash battle. Just a guess. It’s what I’d be referring to!
“Very us then, wouldn’t you say?” I said, and it looked like she was going to disagree. Only for a second though.
“...maybe a little bit.”
Gave her a peck on the cheek. She smiles. Life continues to be good.
“Though now of course we are again at a loose end! Just one thing after another. Unless there’s anything official that needs doing?” I asked.
She’d told me she wasn’t on the clock today but I wasn’t entirely sure I believed her. There had to be something, surely? But she just shook her head, all innocence.
“Not that I’m aware of,” she said.
“Hmm. Well, if you say so,” I said, then I snapped my fingers. A thought occurred! “I actually have an idea!”
“Oh?” She asked, an eyebrow raising.
“Yes! Let’s go!” I said, one finger raised in triumph, the other pointing forward (triumphantly) as I took a step forward, to demonstrate boldness of action. I then paused.
“Uh, wait…”
I could not see an immediate or obvious exit from where we were. I looked around. Nope, no doors. This was just some sort of…ornamental pool…area…?
What the hell was the point? Who designed this place? Madness.
“Need some help down?”
“Um, yes please. Then we go!”
A giggle. Then a flash.
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Ahh, glad to see this sappy story update.
Oh, if only Luna knew they tried some dastardly canoodling upon her roof.
The scandal!
11176188
Some Canterlot citizen with a telescope just-so pointed in the right direction at the right time, the things they might have seen!
Yeah, that whole existential mess of, "I'm a mortal dating someone who will be around long after I die" is definitely going to need to be touched on a bit more. They both know this won't last forever, but they're still happy for the time they have together, and I'm not sure if that's saddening or sweet.
Also, Celly's a dirty pony. Somebody grab the water sprayer!
11176246
Think it's probably more of an intellectual issue at this moment, and only as age begins to catch John up (and not catch Celestia up) will the gravity of it begin to sink in. Right now it's "Huh, fancy that" while yet being a little bit unreal. At least to me.
But it may fall into the scope of the story, depending on how long it ends up being...
11176254
Reminds me of a certain ash-coated megalomaniac with a big red horn that kidnapped John for the same reason. Remember her? wink wink nudge nudge
11176309
All in good time, all in good time...
Massive pog, happy day, pain is forgotten am happy
Were you ever svelte? Asking the real questions here.
Uh oh
11176246 Meh, dying, living... when you've done it a few times, it loses the mystery.
11176217
I'm guessing there's an entire Canterlot tabloid devoted to the highly improper and un-princess-like shenanigans wrought by Celestia? Bet it sells better than the one with "Bighoof spotted at local doughnut shop!" on the front page.
Oh hey, something plotless and fluffy with Celestia in it updated.
How nice!
Fantastic! I loved the second part even more than the first. Especially the Umbra kidnap arc. Although, I did find his newfound suspicion that he's in an illusion to be a little too delayed. Would have been nice for it to fester while he was being captive. Like he starts tapping while inside the tower because it's shown that surfaces emit contradictory sounds or something of the sort.
Additionally, John's irrational fear of his "previous self" was a little inconsistent with his character I feel. Only a little though. It's just that all of his other reactions were disproportionately muted.
Also, in a real setting such fanatic refusal to accept help would probably earn him a slap from the other side tbh 😄.
Anyway. Does anybody know of another story where the MC is kidnapped to be a cuddle slave? Asking for a friend, of course.
But Celestia is the opposite of plotless. It's the biggest in Equestria!
Celestia, being 1000+ years old, would be "robbing the cradle" even if John were 120.
She's so far into the definition of a "cougar" that the "puma" she used to be isn't even a memory of being dust any more.