There's a Monster Pony Outside My Window

by Halira

Chapter 15: Birthmark

Andrea didn't always get along with her sisters. Actually, they fought often. She and Kristin were constantly fighting about who got what and keeping things on the appropriate sides of their room. Charlotte was usually an annoying afterthought to those arguments. At six years old, Andrea's baby sister didn't have much ability to put up a fight beyond screaming and crying. Still, Andrea never let bullies pick on her sisters. She had a responsibility as the eldest to protect them. She could pick at them, big sisters got to do that, but no one else had better think about it.

As they sat in the parking lot, Andrea only partially paid attention to her parents arguing with Miss Newman. Instead of staying in the back like she usually did, Andrea was in the backseat with her sisters, with the pony hiding on the floorboard behind their mother's seat in front of Andrea with a blanket draped over her. She sat and considered her role as the big sister and her duty to protect her little sisters. She looked at Kristin and Charlotte, and, for the first time, thought about the fact they wouldn't be little forever; none of them would. If Andrea were a little younger, maybe she wouldn't be thinking about these things, but she was older, and her family was in danger. She was just a kid, but it was time to be a bigger kid than she had been only the day before.

She watched as Kristin uncharacteristically let Charlotte cuddle up with her. Charlotte was laying her head on Kristin's lap, and Kristin had her arm wrapped around their baby sister. Kristin claimed she was as brave as Andrea, but both of them knew it wasn't true. Kristin had to be as afraid as Charlotte right now. She was just pretending she wasn't. Andrea knew this because she herself was scared, and if she was scared, her chicken sisters had to be terrified.

Her parents and the pony were arguing about where to go. Andrea didn't fully understand it all. They'd been talking about going to Florida before, but that seemed uncertain now—something to do with whoever Miss Newman had been calling before. Something had changed when the person didn't call back and then didn't pick up when called. There was all that fear about a car outside, and it was very confusing. Andrea might be some super-secret agent or whatever in the future, but she wasn't that yet, so she didn't understand what was going on.

However, there were some things that people were just naturally good at. Andrea was good at noticing visual details. Maybe that's why she became a secret agent, or detective, or whatever she did in the future; because she saw things that others missed. She always liked hearing about Sherlock Holmes and tried to imitate him to some extent. That meant trying to notice little things. It took some practice, but she felt she had gotten good at it. Now, she wondered if what she saw earlier during all the commotion was real and, if it was, what she was supposed to do about it.

There was a lull in the adult's argument, which left the car silent. She reached an arm out towards her little sisters. "Hey, Charlotte, can you come over here? You can lay against me. I have a bigger lap than Kristin."

Charlotte lifted her head and wordlessly turned and cuddled up on Andrea's lap. Kristin looked like that hurt her feelings for some reason, and after a quick second thought, Andrea gestured to Kristin to come join them. Kristin hesitated for a second, but Charlotte scooted back against the seat, giving Kristin space, and so Kristin joined them.

The pony took a moment to crawl over to the floorboard behind the driver's seat now that all three girls were bunched up behind her. The blanket glowed and followed along.

"Charles, mind if we step outside a minute and have a conversation in private?" their mom asked their dad.

Their dad looked back at them, weighing whether he felt safe leaving them alone in the car with the unicorn, but ended up nodding. That decided, their parents got out of the car and walked back behind it till they were out of earshot.

Andrea watched Miss Newman's ears perk and twitched, probably straining to listen to what was being said. Andrea wondered if her parents had thought about how big the pony's ears were and how good her hearing must have been. Even though Andrea couldn't hear, the look on Miss Newman's face said that the pony was able to hear, even if she was straining a little to do so.

Her parents were having a long conversation. Every once in and while Andrea was able to pick out some faint bits of sound when her parents got slightly louder, but still couldn't tell what was being said, and quickly stopped trying to listen. Her little sisters were exhausted after two days without much sleep, and so was she, but her mind wouldn't let her drift off to sleep. She was thinking about what would happen next, where they were going to go, wondering if the bat-winged pony was already searching for them, and also about what she had seen in the last minutes before they left the house.

Charlotte started to snore, and Kristin was breathing heavily enough that Andrea knew both were now asleep. The pony gave Charlotte a dirty look but didn't say anything. Andrea guessed the snoring made it harder for the pony to hear.

Confident that it wouldn't wake Charlotte, Andrea carefully pulled Charlotte's shirt partly up to look underneath. She knew Charlotte had a birthmark on her side, but she had never paid it a lot of attention. Charlotte cared about it, sure, thinking it made her ugly or something, but Andrea and Kristin couldn't care less. Everybody had birthmarks somewhere; Andrea had one on her upper back that she could only see with a mirror. However, right now, she wanted to be sure her baby sister's birthmark was what she remembered.

Charlotte didn't stir as Andrea checked the mark out. It was what she remembered, a dark reddish-brown splotch about the size of a dollar bill shaped vaguely like a squashed and lopsided star.

Kristin stirred, and Andrea quickly lowered Charlotte's shirt again before she was caught looking. Neither of her sisters woke up, but Miss Newman had turned her attention to her and no longer seemed interested in listening to the conversation taking place outside. The pony was now hyper-focused on Andrea, and Andrea knew that the pony knew what she was thinking.

Andrea looked the pony in the eyes and swallowed. "Miss Newman, why do you look the way you do when you turn human?"

The pony matched her stare. "It is part of the spell. It tries to match what it thinks I should look like as a human as best it can. It pulls on memories and genetics."

Andrea licked her lips. "I saw you taking your shirt off when I was coming out of the bathroom, and you were going in. I saw your side."

Miss Newman continued to stare unblinking into Andrea's eyes. "I see...and here I was trying to be careful about that." The pony broke her stare and sadly shook her head. "Figures that it would be you who ended up noticing. You've always been more observant than most. You even got your cutie mark in being observant after you became a pony—that's the pictures on our flanks; they say something about a pony's personality, primary interests, or talents. You've got a keen eye."

Andrea briefly looked down at her baby sister sleeping in her lap. "So it's true?"

The unicorn nodded. "Can you do me a favor?"

"What favor?" Andrea asked hesitantly.

"Don't tell your parents or sisters yet."

Andrea blinked. "Why?"

"Because it will only make dealing with them more complicated and doesn't do anything to help fix our current predicament," the pony explained. "We need to be focused entirely on keeping you all safe, and them knowing is only a distraction that can interfere with that. I know you are just a kid, but I need you to be the mature big sister right now, and don't let your parents get distracted from that, okay?"

"They're your parents too," Andrea said and bit her lip.

The pony shook her head. "This is probably too complicated for you to understand, but they stopped being my parents the second those other ponies came back in time and created a different timeline. My parents are back in my time. They're old, really old, and don't have much time left. It is a blessing that they have lived as long as they have, even if I'm emotionally bracing myself each day for one of them to pass in their sleep, and the same goes for my sisters, who aren't spring chickens either. They have a lot of history and experiences that all of you don't and never will. You all are close reflections of my family in their youth, but none of you are them." The pony then pointed at the sleeping six-year-old in Andrea's lap. "And she and I are not the same person. You all have your own paths to follow, and they won't be the ones my family and I did. I am only Miss Newman to you, got it?"

Andrea wasn't sure she understood it all, but she did think the pony had a point about it not being important to keep them safe. "I can keep a secret."

Miss Newman sighed in relief. "Good. I appreciate that."

Andrea chewed on her lip. "Are you a good person, Miss Newman?"

The pony let out a brief laugh. "All we can do is try to be good. Whether we succeed or not is up to God to judge. I've made mistakes, bad ones, but I've always tried my best to be good. That's the best answer I can give you."

"Are you going to keep us safe?"

"I'll try. That's all I can do."

Comments

[harts fire]

well that is a interesting twist in the story.
i am really liking this story.

[Charlie_K]

Well now. I certainly didn't see that sort of twist coming.

[NotSuspicious366]

I knew it!_{Probably because I read part of the sequel before reading this, but still.}