Six Stages of Grief

by mushroompone

II: Depression

The first thing that went into disarray after my parents died was the dishes.

It's funny because, the whole time my mom was sick, the dishes still got done. And it's not like it was just my dad doing them. We all took turns—expect for Apple Bloom, of course.

With things like that, it's not so much that you lost the pony who used to take care of it. It's that dishes and laundry and dusting and showering all stop mattering. Every time you roll over in those sweat-stained sheets, you gotta think to yourself if it's worth getting up to do any of it.

And, just as you're about to convince yourself that it is, you remember that your parents are dead.

And you just don't care.

And you go back to sleep.

So part of the work was the farm, sure. It takes a lot to keep up a farm when you lose two of the folks helping to keep it all moving—half the ponies who were running the show at the time. But a lot of it was the house. Changing the bedding. Dusting the corners. Doing the dishes.

I started there.

It was while I was doing the dishes the next morning that Marble Pie found her way into the kitchen and plopped down at the table.

I hardly noticed her. The only thing that tipped me off was the sound of the table wobbling. She's quieter than a mouse in new-fallen snow, that filly.

I looked over my shoulder, up to my fetlocks in dishwater. "Oh. Howdy, Marble."

She tucked her mane behind her ear. "Mhm."

I nodded, and turned back to the stubborn bit of egg stuck to the fry pan between my hooves. "You holdin' up okay?"

There was a long pause. I twisted to look at her again, and she only offered a small shrug.

I offered a taut smile. "Yeah. I know it."

She gave me an identical smile in return.

“Well, I'm here to help with whatever you think needs it,” I said, plunging my hooves into the dishwater once again. “You just say the word and I'll—well, you know what I mean.”

I cast a playful look over my shoulder, and Marble blushed.

She was a blusher if I ever knew one. The type to flush at any old thing. I used to be the same way.

I rinsed off the last of the suds from the fry pan and set it in the drying rack. The sink emptied with a gluggada-gluggada-gluggada, and I wiped my hooves on the red-and-white towel draped over the handle on the oven door.

Marble pulled her hooves into her lap and sort of cringed away from me when I came to sit across from her at the table. She did it in a way that showed she was trying hard not to, but I sure didn’t draw any attention to it.

The table rocked when I put my own hooves on it. Enough that I made a little sound.

“Huh,” I said, testing the table’s range of motion. “This table always been wobbly like that?”

Marble thought about it, then nodded.

“Too bad,” I said. “It's nice. Old.” I ran my hooves over it, slow and steady. Mac sometimes called it my ‘carbon-dater’—I could guess down to the decade on most old furniture.

Marble cleared her throat, a sound I’d never heard from her before. When I looked up at her, she tapped the tabletop gently with one hoof, then pointed at me.

I pointed to my own chest. “Me… the table?”

Marble only stared wide-eyed back at me.

I took my hooves off the tabletop, and it wobbled again.

Marble made an insistent sound.

“You want me to fix it?” I asked.

She nodded firmly.

I looked down at the table and sighed. “Well, I… I'd need some tools,” I mused. I tried to work it through in my head. Nice, old table like this—I couldn’t just slap on a tennis ball and call it fair. “A saw and some furniture polish should fix her up. Oh—and a tape measure.”

Marble nodded again and jumped up from the table. Quickest I’d ever seen her move for sure.

She paused at the threshold and made another little sound, a practically toneless grunt that would have been meaningless had she not also tossed her head towards the front door.

“I gotcha, I’m comin’,” I said, scrambling out of the chair. It howled as I kicked it out from under me.

Marble, despite the introversion rivaling Fluttershy’s, led me with confidence out of the farmhouse.

Another blazing hot day. I squinted, reached for my hat, and found that my head was in the nude this morning. It had been a long while since I’d forgotten to put that hat on. I tried not to let it distract me, and shaded my eyes with one hoof instead.

Marble circled the side of the house and pointed to… something.

I ducked my head and sped to her side.

She was pointing to a shed.

“You got tools in there?” I asked.

She shrugged.

“Well. They’re either there or they’re nowhere, right?”

She nodded.

“C’mon, then,” I said, waving her along. “I’ll need some help carryin’ things back to the house.”

The shed was as musty and dusty as you’d expect the oversized tool chest of a broken-down house to be. I mean, I get it—there’s a lot you’re willing to just put up with when you’re working a farm and cooking every meal from scratch. A wobbly table or a loose doorknob won’t exactly hit the top of the priority list. Even busted pipes are more likely to be wrapped up in duct tape than given any genuine TLC. So the shed probably didn’t see much use.

I coughed and waved away the cloud of dust and pollen and who knows what else. Marble sneezed delicately.

The shed was mostly taken up by a great, big thing that looked like a ride-on lawnmower, but I knew better than to think anyone around here was cutting the grass. It was probably something to do with digging up rocks. Or burying rocks. Who knows how any of that works at all.

There were a few shelves installed on the walls, mostly holding toolboxes and other stuff that wouldn’t fit in a toolbox.

And there were a few guns. Big ones. Shotguns.

I don’t typically like guns. For a lot of reasons. But guns are a fact of farm life. I guess even rock farming.

I couldn’t for the life of me think what might be threatening the rocks that would need to be shot.

I thought it best not to ask.

“Alrighty, let’s see what we got here…” I muttered, just trying to fill the silence.

One shelf up over my head held a newer-looking toolbox and a rather large saw. I took those down (with some effort) and passed them over to Marble.

“Do me a favor ‘n’ see if there’s any furniture polish in there,” I said. “Your folks might have stashed some in the house somewhere. Or they might not have it.”

Marble wordlessly did as she was asked. The toolbox creaked as she opened it and, after a moment or two rooting around, she held up a small bottle.

I squinted at it. “That’s grease. Not quite what we’re lookin’ for.”

She set it back in the box and pulled out another bottle.

“That’s the stuff,” I said. “Now we’re in business. Step back while I close up.”

Marble quickly gathered the supplies and took a few steps out of the swing of the shed doors. They were sorta flimsy, like any shed. They didn’t really close as much as hang lopsided from the doorframe.

“You ever do any fix-it type stuff around the house?” I asked Marble.

She shook her head.

“That’s okay. I’ll show ya what I do so you can help out your sisters, alright?”

A little smile.

She nodded.

Everyone likes to be helpful.

“Alright. Let’s get a move on.”

And we walked back up to the house.

Fixing the table was a breeze. Measure twice, cut once. A little polish on the raw edges. I showed Marble every step, a lot more patiently than I typically have for things like wobbly tables.

We were quiet. I didn't say anything, besides the occasional "right here" or "push harder" or "nice work". We sat sweaty on the cool tile floor side by side.

When we were done, the table didn't wobble anymore. Still, we sat on the floor, tucked away under the finished table like it was a blanket fort.

"Feels good, don't it?" I said.

Marble nodded. She ran one hoof along the leg she'd sawed down and smiled to herself.

I sighed. "Pinkie still hasn't come down, huh?"

Marble looked over her shoulders at the stairs, hopeful for a moment, before solemnly shaking her head.

"Ah, horseapples…" I rubbed one hoof along my brow, trying to dissipate the headache that had suddenly sprung up.

Marble made a small sound of agreement.

I hooked one hoof around the tabletop and hauled myself up, hard as it was to leave that little kitchen fort. My head rushed, but I shook it off.

Marble watched me for a moment, then pulled herself towards one of the table's legs with both hooves. She looked like a filly clinging onto her ma's—

I closed my eyes. Steadied myself.

"You don't think Pinkie has anything that needs fixin', do you?" I said.

Marble blinked. She raised her eyebrows and shrugged, not so much in the ‘I don't know’ way as the ‘you should go find out’ way.

"Right…" I mumbled.

I stuffed the remaining tools roughly back into their box and clicked the locks shut. Marble stayed still under the table, tracking me with only her eyes as I crossed the kitchen.

"I'll let you know how she's doing," I said. I wanted to tack on a little platitude, like "I'm sure she's just fine," but I couldn't bring myself to lie.

I climbed the stairs with the toolbox on my back. The steps squeaked and squealed under my hooves.

The door to Pinkie's room was closed.

I knocked.

"Mornin', Pinkie," I called, cheerful as I could. "Marble 'n' I are doing a little home renovation today. You got anything that needs fixin'? Squeaky window? Broken knob on your chest a'drawers?"

I pressed my ear against the wood of the door, but heard nothing.

"Pinks? You in there?"

Still nothing.

I hesitated a long moment, my hoof hovering before another knock.

It's always hard to know exactly what to do. Sometimes you wanna give privacy. Sometimes you don't wanna risk leaving someone alone for even a second.

But I know Pinkie.

"Pinkie?" I called again. Softer. "Sugarcube, I'm coming in."

I pushed open the door.

There was a bit of motion as Pinkie gathered her blankets and rolled away from the door. That quilt—the one I'd never seen before—was lumped up like a mountain range along her steadily rising side.

She didn't say anything. I took that as a good sign.

"Howdy," I said.

She curled up a little tighter. The mountains came together. I caught a glimpse of her pin-straight hair as it slipped and pooled on the pillow.

She hadn't been in here long enough for things to really get bad, but the heat of the sun through the beat-up blinds was enough to cook her sweat and tears into a recognizable smell. Salty and thick.

"Look, I'm not gonna bug ya," I said, kicking the door shut behind me. "You just point and I'll get to work."

Pinkie didn't point. She just breathed.

I waited. Nothing changed.

I remembered this. The laying. The curled-up quiet, too tired to even cry. The big emptiness of a silent room.

"Alright," I said. "I'll start with those blinds, then."

Pinkie moved. I guess to cover her face. It was hard to tell.

I just walked slowly to the window and set the toolbox down beside me. Fixing blinds was a piece of cake, even though it could get a bit tedious. These were wood. Much more forgiving than plastic.

I set to work. Wood glue and sandpaper. A quiet job.

Pinkie didn't stir.

I did my best not to look back at her. That would upset her. She didn't like being seen like this.

Slow work. Just like the table.

Not talking. Just being there.

I thought about how much I would've liked to have someone be there. Someone who wasn't hurt like I was.

The quiet started to get to me, though, and I think I started humming. Little songs I remembered from lots of little places. Pieces that bled into other pieces. A mish-mash.

I ain't exactly musical.

I get by, though.

Humming turned to scatting, and scatting turned to singing, and soon I was crooning like a lonely barn cat.

"Cotton in my ears… scotch on my tongue…" I sang, sanding in rhythm. "But when I'm with you, baby, I stop feelin' numb…"

Pinkie sniffled.

I did my best to ignore it, instead swishing my tail back and forth across the floor to cover up the sound.

"Uhm… Applejack?"

I froze up, but didn't turn around.

"Whatcha singin'?" Pinkie asked. Her voice was all strangled from crying, even though I hadn't heard a peep from her all this time.

I chuckled. "A song my mama liked," I said. "Sorry. Sometimes I just get a songbird caught in my throat."

Pinkie sniffled again. I heard the blankets rustle around her, too. "I like it, too," she said. "It's nice."

I didn't have a chance to think about it. I just turned to look at her.

I don't know what I thought I'd see, but I was surprised she was still pink at all. It seemed to me that all the color should've gone, but here she was. Colorful. Even though her mane was flat and she was hunched over in her blankets.

Her eyes were pink-red too. From crying. Or from not crying. Or from not sleeping.

She was just sort of slack. Everything weak and wilting, like a plant shriveling in the sun.

It made me sad.

But I smiled anyway. "Aw, I'm sure my mama would love to hear you say so," I told her. "I think she made it up. But I don't really remember."

That maybe wasn't the right thing to say, even though it was honest. Pinkie crumpled even more.

"Anything else I can fix for you?" I asked. "Finishing touches on these blinds."

Pinkie sighed. "I dunno. My closet door doesn't shut all the way."

I raised my brows. "Yeah? Easy fix. I can get that tightened up and oiled for you."

"Mmkay," Pinkie mumbled as she burrowed back into the blankets.

"Okey-doke," I agreed.

I went back to work. The blinds rattled as I sanded and scraped. It sounded like big, wood wind chimes. That particular kind of thunk.

"Could you…" Pinkie cleared her throat. Her voice was muffled by the quilt. "Could you maybe keep singing?"

I smiled, even though she couldn't see it. "Sure thing, sugar cube."

---

A few days went by like that. I'm not sure exactly how many, but enough.

I would wake up early, make some breakfast for the girls before Maud and Limestone went out to the fields, then deliver up Pinkie's portion and get to work.

Slowly, she started talking again.

I would ask questions I knew the answer to just to hear her talk.

"We said the carpet next, right?"

"Mhm."

"You want me to sing for you today?"

"Okay."

"You like your breakfast?"

"Yeah."

It turned to conversation soon enough. That mare's a chatty one. It wasn't quite as much as usual, but it was talk, and I encouraged it as much as possible.

One morning, I was surprised to find Pinkie already sitting up.

"Well, hey there," I said, brandishing a tray of food. "I made some flapjacks this morning—all the fixin's. That why you're sitting up?"

Pinkie scratched her head. "Uh… my lightbulb blew," she said, pointing to the lamp on her side table.

Sure enough, it was dark.

It wasn't much of an answer, though. I guess it popped and woke her up.

"Aw, shoot." I set the tray down on the end of the bed and circled to the lamp, giving it two experimental clicks. Sure enough, nothing. "Well, no big deal. I'm sure I can turn up some new bulbs somewhere in this house."

I turned to go, but Pinkie made a little sound.

"W-wait," she squeaked out.

I turned back. "You okay?"

"I think there's some in the closet," she said. "On the top shelf. I just…"

Her sentence trailed off. She made no effort to pick it up again.

I could make a guess where it was going. I remembered being scared to open the cabinet where the dishes were because my Mama's favorite was in there, and I didn't wanna see it.

You don't really think straight when you're that depressed.

I nodded slowly. "Okay," I said. "Eat your breakfast, Pinks. I've got this."

Pinkie didn't touch her food as I crossed the room and opened the newly-repaired closet.

She was right: there was a box of light bulbs up there. There was an unlabeled shoe box up there, too. I figured that's what she was avoiding.

"Alrighty. This'll be quick," I said, mostly to myself.

I walked back over to the side table and sat down in front of it. The shade lifted off easily. It was a little dusty, and so I placed it down carefully on the floor next to me.

Pinkie leaned back in her bed, like it was a hospital bed, and watched me. Very intently. Her hooves twisted in the blankets. The breakfast tray rattled softly.

The light bulb squeaked as I unscrewed it.

"How are you doing today?" I asked.

Pinkie made a small sound. "I dunno. I didn't wanna lay down anymore."

"That's good!" I said.

"Mm…" Pinkie moaned noncommittally. "I still feel… I dunno."

I pulled the used light bulb out and set it on the carpet.

Pinkie sighed again and slid down a bit so she was laying flatter on her back, then rolled towards me and onto her stomach. Her mane drizzled off the side of the mattress like a waterfall.

She watched me. Quietly. Closely.

"I feel bad," she said.

"That's only natural."

"I feel like a bad sister," she said.

I furrowed my brows. "What do you mean?"

Pinkie buried her face in her hooves. "They're all working together and stuff," she said, her voice tightening as she drew closer to tears. "And I'm just… up here. By myself."

I nodded. "You don't have to be here by yourself, Pinkie."

"Yes I do."

"You don't," I said. "Your sisters are worried about you. I'm sure they'd love to—"

"I just wanna be with you, Applejack."

Huh.

I stumbled over my words. "You, uh—th-that's okay, too," I stuttered out. "You know I'm here for you as long as—"

She didn't wait for me to finish, just lunged at me and threw her hooves around me and started crying.

I almost said something, but I decided not to.

I just stroked her mane. Gently.

Comments

[Hobbestc]

My mom died when I was young so this hits in the feels pretty solidly.

[Shaslan]

I did not think this ship would work but this is beautiful. I've lost people and this is very resonant. Very accurate. Some really wonderful writing.

[Bicyclette]

And, just as you're about to convince yourself that it is, you remember that your parents are dead.

And you just don't care.

And you go back to sleep.

augh, the way that Applejack relates things back to her own experience with her parents to set the stage for each chapter is a really great structure. reminds me of a few of Otter's stories

She's quieter than a mouse in new-fallen snow, that filly.

aww, but she's the same age as Pinkie! and augh, love that comparison

Marble pulled her hooves into her lap and sort of cringed away from me when I came to sit across from her at the table. She did it in a way that showed she was trying hard not to, but I sure didn’t draw any attention to it.

aww, this is so Marble, i love it! just love these little character details in what is just a single moment

Another blazing hot day. I squinted, reached for my hat, and found that my head was in the nude this morning.

hehe, funny that Applejack is walking around naked but thinks of her hatless head as "nude". so pony!

It was probably something to do with digging up rocks. Or burying rocks. Who knows how any of that works at all.

aww, Applejack never read your other stories about how rock farming works, so she would not know

I don’t typically like guns. For a lot of reasons. But guns are a fact of farm life. I guess even rock farming.

I couldn’t for the life of me think what might be threatening the rocks that would need to be shot.

I thought it best not to ask.

honestly that is such an absurd thing that i really love it and instantly accept it as canon

“You ever do any fix-it type stuff around the house?” I asked Marble.

She shook her head.

“That’s okay. I’ll show ya what I do so you can help out your sisters, alright?”

A little smile.

really love this bonding moment between Applejack and Marble

Marble blinked. She raised her eyebrows and shrugged, not so much in the ‘I don't know’ way as the ‘you should go find out’ way.

this does make me think about how Applejack has at least some experience with siblings that don't have very many words to say

That quilt—the one I'd never seen before—was lumped up like a mountain range along her steadily rising side.

love the simile, and dang, that quilt is going to be important to the story, isn't it?

I chuckled. "A song my mama liked," I said. "Sorry. Sometimes I just get a songbird caught in my throat."

Pinkie sniffled again. I heard the blankets rustle around her, too. "I like it, too," she said. "It's nice."

augh, i mean, there's just so much character in how your characters do and say everything! they really come alive

She was right: there was a box of light bulbs up there. There was an unlabeled shoe box up there, too. I figured that's what she was avoiding.

so many things to pay off later!

She didn't wait for me to finish, just lunged at me and threw her hooves around me and started crying.

I almost said something, but I decided not to.

I just stroked her mane. Gently.

and yeah, this does bring up the fact that Pinkie's sisters are also going through the loss of their parents right now, but Pinkie does seem to be reacting to it differently than they are, and i understand her guilt for feeling like a burden on her sisters.

the shading on these characters' interactions and personalities are just so finely drawn, and it is an experience to read. i just wanted to end this chapter saying that.