Forgive, Forget and Fall in Love

by raunbiw

Flowers

Afternoon, her first day single in half a month. Rainbow Dash was going to speak to Applejack. Her ex. Her other ex, Fluttershy had helped her come to the decision.

Step after step after step, her fingers fumbled with each other as she walked down the path to Sweet Apple Acres. She had a loud, obnoxious voice at the back of her head telling her that this would be a mistake that would take her pride and send her into a different but more dizzying spiral, so she tried to drown it out with Fluttershy’s words. “Talk to her then, just talk to her. She’ll understand.” Mumbled into her hair. “She’s Applejack, you know Applejack.” Whispered into her ear. Applejack, stubborn, one-sided but also, maybe just a little compassionate.

As she got closer and closer, the more she wanted to turn around and leave. However she had to troop through it because she knew she wouldn’t survive if she didn’t do this. Stuff had to be cleared up, she knew Applejack deserved it and maybe Rainbow Dash felt like she did too, at least after yesterday.

The closer she got, she remembered how mad Applejack had been that day, during their fight. The glare plastered on her face. The fire in her eyes, it was scary. Unexpected.

“I’m angry, Dash, this is ridiculous”

She came to the conclusion that she’d rather think about a happier instance. There couldn’t be any harm to it now. She was single so there was no guilt to feel about it and she wasn’t trying to get over her ex anymore, so…

Valentine’s day, the only Valentine’s day we had together. See, usually that would be a really sad thing for other couples but for us, it was just another day. I didn’t buy you flowers and you didn’t buy me chocolate. I was happy you weren’t into mushy stuff either because getting chocolate with a sappy card in the hallways at school and liking it? So embarrassing.

Since other people expect that garbage on Valentine’s day, I guess they expected it for us too. We were just going to go see a movie and sneak candy (not heart chocolates) into the theatre and laugh about it. It could be called a date, I guess… but not a gross date. That was planned for after school and I didn’t have any classes with you that day.

Maybe that was why so many people were asking me when we broke up. Okay, three, but still! It was weird that it happened three times. It was so funny. I didn’t see why people thought dollar store chocolate and grocery flowers meant love. You know, loving someone would be love. Nevermind, that was gross.

It was very unlike Rainbow Dash to walk slowly, especially on purpose. The word dash was quite literally her last name, being fast was a given. But now alas, Rainbow Dash was walking slowly. Step after step through the blossoming orchard and towards Applejack’s door. The closer she got the slower she went, slowly, slow, slower. Even so, the door still grew bigger in sight. She stopped, took a deep breath, and sprinted towards it before she could run away.

This dude from math even thought he had a chance with me. First of all, I barely liked men. Second of all, no, gross, yuck, he tried to give me roses. Third of all, I have a girlfriend? Even if he’d thought we’d broken up, no way could he have thought that I’d wanna date that soon. I had literally kissed her yesterday. Besides, him? I had spoken to him five times, maybe less. He had helped me a few times with questions but that was it. Egghead. Some of the rose petals were dried up too. If he was going to offer me flowers, at least get good flowers.

I may or may not have laughed before walking away. You scolded me for that when I told you about it at the movies, apparently I should have been nice to him because he liked me. Whatever, loyal to you always.

Rainbow Dash had already knocked on the door. She had knocked on the door. Applejack would get there and they’d have to talk. Rainbow Dash would have to talk to Applejack. It was happening, it was happening. Footsteps approached the door and Rainbow Dash squeezed her eyes shut with anticipation.

She was surprised to be greeted with a deep, baritone voice questioning her name. She opened her eyes, one at a time and looked him up and down. Big Mac. She quickly straightened up and fiddled with the split ends of her ponytail. Of course Applejack wouldn’t be the one to answer the door. What luck.

“Oh! Uh– hey, hi! Is– Um, Aj home?” Rainbow Dash couldn’t tell from his demeanour, whether Big Mac hated her or not. He didn’t seem mad? But he didn’t seem thrilled either. “Eeyup.” He responded. She couldn’t help but smile, she used to always be around the Apple family household and eeyup was all she’d hear.

“Is she busy?” She questioned. Big Mac shook his head. “Nope.” Rainbow Dash nodded slowly, hand abandoning the ponytail and pressing her fingers against each other.

“Cool…” She took a deep breath and held it for a second, she felt embarrassed. “Can I… talk to her? Please?” Big Mac smiled. “Eeyup” Maybe he didn’t hate her after all.

She came quicker than Rainbow Dash expected. Apparently, the four months since she had last made eye contact with Applejack was not enough time to prepare because as soon as blonde hair and a plaid flannel appeared in the doorway, fear. Rainbow Dash was scared. It helped a little bit that the look on her ex’s face wasn’t one of distaste. It wasn’t one of immediate thrill either though. That seemed to be running in the family. Rainbow Dash held up a shy hand to wave, quickly breaking any eye contact there had been. She cleared her throat quietly.

“Talk?” She said, trying to hide a nervous quiver that had placed itself in her throat. Applejack nodded, not too slowly but not too eagerly either, her face remained neutral, Applejack had always had a good poker face.

Rainbow Dash felt a big flood of deja vu when Applejack disappeared for a moment and then returned with her slides. That was why she was glad when Applejack walked past her and gestured for her to follow behind and into the orchard. Something different.

The walk began in silence. There was awkward tension, undeniably. But it didn’t seem like angry tension, and there wasn’t nearly as much of it as Rainbow Dash had predicted. It was just step after step past tree after tree. Contrary to last time, Applejack did not seem to be in a time crunch and didn’t rush her to say anything. Silence remained for around seven minutes of quiet steps.

Fallen Apple Blossoms coated the dirt pathway they were on, big, strong apple trees lined both sides, it made Rainbow Dash think about a time where they were walking down one of the other segways through the acres and acres of trees during flowering season, she couldn’t help but laugh.

“Remember the time you totally fell and got us covered in petals?” She said, still avoiding eye contact, she hoped that starting on a high note would maybe make things a little less awkward, even if her version of things weren’t fully the truth…

“Last year.” She added, it would be embarrassing if Applejack didn’t remember it at all. Rainbow Dash yelped when an elbow jabbed her, lightly in the ribs. Rose met stem as they met each other’s eyes. Rainbow Dash was relieved to see a smile plastered on Applejack's face.

“Bull, Dash. You tripped over the root.” Rainbow Dash shook her head, sighing. Her plan seemed to be working, either that or Applejack wanted her back. “Well you were the one who kicked up all the petals into my hair!”

You also landed on top of me, slamming my head into the said root, yikes, that took days of Tylenol to stop being a pain. I didn’t even tell you about that detail. Never will.

“Cause you didn’t let go of my hand, yanked me down with ya!” Applejack retorted, rolling her eyes. Rainbow Dash sighed. “Well it happened too fast.” Applejack shook her head.

After a few moments on the ground, you got off of me and reached out a hand, I took it and you pulled me to standing. You started picking petals out of my hair, I gave into the urge to shake them all out as if I was at a rock concert. My head started pounding. My fault. I was opening my eyes when suddenly your lips were roughly pressed into mine. Man, did my eyes close again faster than ever. I blindly took small steps forward, attempting to avoid stepping on your feet until I had you backed against a tree. That only lasted a second before I was spun around. Before I knew it, I was the one backed against the tree. Of course you just had to steal Top from me. I was not having it, I grunted and spun us back around. My turn. You refused to give it up though, because once again I was woozily swept off of my feet and placed against the tree. I felt the force that time, it knocked more flowers off of the tree and onto my face. I decided to stop fighting for it, it wasn’t like I hated it.

Rainbow Dash knew for a fact that Applejack probably remembered what happened after the fall because she was looking down at the ground and smiling. Rainbow Dash knew that Applejack always did that when having steamy thoughts. While they were dating, she would have acted upon those thoughts for the enjoyment of both herself and her girlfriend, like their last Halloween together.

Applejack as Poison Ivy and her girlfriend as Harley Quinn, the only time Rainbow Dash would ever wear pigtails. The costumes were much better than the year prior, hotter too. Aliens and astronauts were cool but Rainbow Dash was also a huge superhero fan. Applejack didn’t mind as long as she was happy.

Applejack was practically dragging Rainbow Dash home from a halloween party that Rainbow Dash had dragged Applejack too. The latter was barely drunk, unlike the former. As soon as Rainbow Dash hazily caught that look on her girlfriend’s face, sloppy kisses it was.

This time she didn’t act on it.

The kiss ended and I was still a little dizzy, whether it was from the tree root or your lips, I couldn’t tell ya. You picked out more little petals from my knotted hair, after what I assume was the last one, you held it up next to my face. “They match your eyes.” You said, looking at the petal rather than my face. I would too if I had ever said something so utterly cheesy, which I wouldn’t. I snickered and shook my head, slowly this time. You let go of the petal and blew it towards me. I scrunched up my face. I opened my eyes and scanned yours for a second.

“Yours are like… Grass!” You sighed and smiled, unpinning me from the rough bark.

Author's Note:

one more to go!