Rainbow Dash Is Jealous!

by GalaxySwirl22

I Need To Know!

Today was New Year's Eve and a lot of ponies would get out of bed due to the excitement but I had other plans. I got out of bed and after just a few minutes or so, I was outside flying, heading toward Carousel Boutique. I zoomed past all the buildings, dodging trees that got in my way every now and then until I finally reached the front door to Rarity's house. I knocked on the door and suddenly heard a gasp from the inside of the boutique and something inaudible, then hoofsteps that came closer and lastly a click as the door to the boutique opened up.

"Rainbow Dash, darling! So good to see you, come in come in!" Rarity said in surprise and opened up the door even more so that I could step inside. "What are you doing up this early? It's only 8 AM" she continued.

I gave Rarity a suspicious look. If anypony knew what was going on, it was Rarity, and that's why I had come here to her, to get some answers.

"I have a question" I said as I looked around the boutique, searching for anything that could give me the slightest hint of the things I didn't know.

"Do ask! Although I am very surprised you came this early just to ask a question!" Rarity said happily as she went over to her sewing machine and cut some fabric.

"Was Applejack really looking for a present for her special somepony?" I asked without hesitating. I knew Rarity knew about something I didn't, and I had to find out what it was, but my biggest question was why I never knew about any of that in the first place. Again, it wasn't like Applejack to leave someone out when it came to things like these. Especially not her best friends.

"Huh?" Rarity looked up from her sewing machine and at me with a slightly shocked expression, as if I had asked something crazy, then she furrowed her eyebrows and shook her head. "So you're telling me you were listening to the conversation me and Fluttershy were having yesterday? Without us knowing?!" Rarity exclaimed in annoyance as she returned to working on her fabric.

I rolled my eyes and groaned which made Rarity look back up at me again with a whole different expression. She wasn't irritated, or well, she didn't look like it. Instead, she was smiling mysteriously and giggled slightly as she stepped away from her sewing machine and back to where I was.

"Now Rainbow Dash, why are you so desperate to know if Applejack has been looking for a present for her special somepony?" Rarity asked and flashed her eyebrows as she grinned.

I turned away from her in frustration. Maybe getting an answer from Rarity would be way more difficult than I had originally thought. Ironic, since Rarity would happily gossip about anything she had heard in Ponyville or read in the magazines, and now she was questioning me? But then again, it was none of her business to know why I needed that information.

"None of your business" I said as I faced her again and gave a glare. "But I need to know"

Rarity shrugged and smiled as if she was satisfied with herself. "What you're asking me is none of your business either darling!" she then said and went toward her shelf with ribbons.

"But it is!"

"It is not! Now now, calm down, you're acting as if Applejack has stolen your money or something!"

"Ugh, whatever, I'll see you later at the party" I muttered and stepped out of the boutique. I heard Rarity reply with a joyful goodbye before closing the door.

Was I supposed to go to Fluttershy and ask her instead? Fluttershy was probably way easier to convince compared to Rarity, but she was also way more sensitive and I didn't want to bother her too much. I thought I'd go and ask her anyway, if she refused to tell, I'd ask Pinkie Pie. I wasn't sure if Pinkie Pie was a part of this whole thing, but just in case.

It had started to snow and the wind was stronger than before, so I had to walk all the way to Fluttershy's in the blizzard. As I finally made it up to Fluttershy's front door, it suddenly flung up by itself followed by her pet Angel running out with a scarf in his grasp. I pushed the door open more and now saw Fluttershy also heading toward the opening in a rush but as she saw me she slowed down.

"Rainbow Dash! I'm so sorry I'm in a rush, Angel stole somepony's scarf and I gotta take it from him and return it!" she said quickly as she put on her boots and stepped out of the door.

I sighed. "I'll get him" I said and took off quickly, it didn't take long for me to catch up to Angel since he was literally just a bunny. I then grabbed him and went back to Fluttershy.

"Angel! Bad bunny, this is no way to behave" Fluttershy scolded and took back her pet. She then gripped the scarf that Angel had and sent him back inside the cottage. "Now don't cause any more trouble, I promise I'll give you the carrot you asked for" she said and turned back to face me.

"I came here to ask something, that is if you're not in a rush anymore" I said as Fluttershy shut the front door behind her.

"Ask away! I have the scarf, and now I just gotta give it back to Strawberry Sunrise, but you can come along if you want to!" Fluttershy suggested.

"Yeah sure" I stepped down the path, starting to walk toward the centre of Ponyville with Fluttershy. "Soooo, have you seen Applejack around today?" I asked. I thought maybe if I started the topic slowly, it would be way easier to get an answer, maybe Fluttershy would say something useful by accident.

Fluttershy giggled. "No, it's only 9 AM, I've been inside and just finished eating breakfast" she answered.

Oops, I had forgotten how early it was. Usually I'd sleep in late till noon or so but I just couldn't, not today at least. Not while knowing that all of my friends knew something that I didn't. Now if Twilight, who was in Canterlot, also knew...ugh. I shook my head to get rid of all those thoughts and turned my attention back to Fluttershy.

"Hehe, right, but what about yesterday?" I asked.

Fluttershy seemed to think about something for a second, then smiled. "Yes! I saw her yesterday, she was shopping for a present!"

Yes! Finally I could get some answers. "Who for?" I asked, almost a little too quickly. I guess I was just really eager to get to know who the present was for. I needed to know who that special somepony was and why they were so important to Applejack.

"Her special somepony!" Fluttershy said happily as she continued walking through the path.

"And her special somepony is-??" I asked, hoping she'd give me the answer I was looking for.

"Oh I don't know! And even if I did, I wouldn't tell you" Fluttershy bit her lip and started walking faster.

"Why not?!"

"Oh look! We are at Strawberry Sunrises house now, thanks for tagging along with me Rainbow Dash, see you later!" Fluttershy said quickly as she hurried toward Strawberry Sunrise's front door, knocking on it. She then smiled and waved goodbye to me as the door opened and she disappeared into the house.

I blinked a few times in disbelief. Even Fluttershy didn't tell me anything?! I facehooved and turned around, starting to walk toward Sugarcube Corner. It was probably a good idea to go there anyway since I hadn't had any breakfast and I had forgotten how hungry I was.

The blizzard had cleared out and only a few snowflakes were slowly falling down through the sky, landing gently on the ground. Maybe I should've told Applejack about everything earlier and not waited so long. Now it was probably too late because she was with somepony else, and somepony I didn't even know about. Or did I?

If it was someone who lived in Ponyville, there was a very high chance I knew about them too. But I hadn't seen Applejack hang out with somepony specific for an extended amount of time. No, they were all just casual everyday conversations with casual everyday ponies. None of it made any sense at all to me. Was it somepony she saw in secret, without the knowledge of anypony else? If so, why would she even do that?

I was thrown out of my thoughts the moment a hard wooden surface hit my face. I backed up and realized that I had walked right into the front door of Sugarcube Corner.

"Well this day is going just great" I muttered to myself and opened up the door to the bakery, stepping inside.

The moment I stepped in I was met with the warmth of the bakery and the smell of cinnamon and candy. I sighed in satisfaction, it was nice to be someplace warm after being out in the cold the whole morning. I then looked around for Pinkie Pie, who was nowhere to be seen in the main room so I decided to head toward the kitchen where I thought I heard some sounds coming from.

As always, I was right. Pinkie Pie was in the kitchen mixing some cake batter at an incredibly fast pace, not only that, she was mixing three bowls at the same time but then again, Pinkie Pie was Pinkie Pie and she could always do things nopony else could. I was just about to greet her when she turned around with a wide smile on her face.

"Hiya!!! Are you here to test out the cakes I'm making for tonight's party?! It's gonna be super amazing!" she cheered.

"Oh I know it will" I agreed. "And not really, I just came here to talk" I added as I stepped further into the kitchen, looking at all the things Pinkie Pie had been preparing for the party. There were pies, cakes, cupcakes and cookies, well, all sorts of sweet things you could imagine. You know, seeing Pinkie's excitement actually made me less worried and wanted to look forward to the New Year's Eve party instead, but it was only for a few seconds since the other thoughts returned.

"Whatcha wanna talk about?!" Pinkie Pie asked in the same cheerful tone as before.

"Do you happen to know somepony really special to Applejack? You've said how you knew a lot about everypony in town and-"

"Oh I do know A LOT about ALL the ponies in Ponyville!" Pinkie Pie interrupted. "Her family is special to her, ooh ohh! And me, and Fluttershy and Rarity and Twilight, her best friends!! Ohhh and-"

I furrowed my eyebrows at that statement. Why did Pinkie Pie mention all but me? "Uh- and me too" I interrupted Pinkie Pie before she could finish her sentence. "I'm her best friend too"

Pinkie Pie giggled innocently, like she always did when somepony didn't get something so obvious. "You're not her best friend, silly!" she spoke, unfazed by what she had just said. "More like h-"

"You know what? I don't need to know" I said harshly as I turned around and stepped out of the kitchen and out of the bakery as fast as I could. Had Pinkie Pie just said that I wasn't one of Applejack's best friends?

Since when?!

Last time I hung out with her was just two days ago! She seemed fine back then, and we definitely didn't have a fight or anything. Or well, I don't think we did.

I thought back to the last time I saw Applejack as I walked away from Sugarcube Corner, not really knowing where I was heading. Applejack had been just fine last time when I came over to Sweet Apple Acres to hang out. She had been walking around in the orchard to make sure all her trees were doing okay.

You know, just casual Applejack stuff.

Anyway, so I sneaked up on her and threw a snowball at her, to which she turned around to and shouted my name. And I remember laughing until I got hit by a snowball from Applejack. But we weren't fighting, no, we were having fun, and so after a while we ended the snowball fight and went inside. Applejack said she was gonna make some delicious cider for both of us. And I remember watching her make the cider and there was no sign of any anger or frustration, she was just very happy.

And so was I.

Could it have been that Applejack had known about me liking her, and on purpose avoided telling me about her special somepony so that it wouldn't get upsetting? I don't really know.

But that doesn't really sound like Applejack either. She wouldn't hide the truth even though it could've been upsetting.

Oh great, now I was upset about two things. One, that Applejack apparently didn't like me back even though I thought she did, and second, she didn't even care to tell me who she liked! Was it because I was bad at keeping secrets? Because I was 120% sure that I could keep a secret way better than Rarity. But she knew, and I didn't. At this point I was pretty sure even Twilight knew about who Applejack liked and yet, she lived all the way back in Canterlot.

As I finally payed attention to my surroundings, I realized I was now at Sweet Apple Acres. The trees looked bare and there were no apples to be seen, obviously, cause it was wintertime and all, but through all that chilly breeze outside, there was a slight warmth coming from the farmhouse. I really didn't want to step closer but I did anyway.

Suddenly the front door to the farmhouse flung open and I could've taken off quickly and flown away back to my house, but I didn't. The door closed shortly after, revealing Applejack who was holding a cup of coffee in one of her hooves as she breathed in the fresh morning air. It didn't take more than a split second till she noticed me standing a bit further away from the farmhouse.

"Howdy Rainbow! What are ya doin' up so early?" She chuckled and took a sip of her coffee.

Well, there was no escape now.