Still, Life

by MasterThief

II. Southern Accents

“OK, Mac, last one!” Bright Mac said, holding one end of the board as his son lifted up the other end as high as his height would let him. “Now watch closely. This is where good measurin’ pays off.” With two gentle hoof taps, Mac fit the board into place, completing the wall of the new chicken coop.

Little Mac smiled and laughed.

“Okay, buddy,” Mac said, “just four more nails and we call it a day.” Mac hammered in the two at the top, Little Mac hammered in the two at the bottom where he could reach, with his father’s guidance.

“Good job, Mac, you made this go so much easier. Thanks for your help today!” Mac hugged his son close and tousled his mane.

“Mac!” Granny’s shouting came from the house. “You get yer flanks on in here! You gotta be ready to go in less’n forty minutes!”

Oh stuffin’, I got a date tonight! Mac remembered. “Comin’, Ma!” He yelled back and tapped his son on the back. “Welp, you gotta go wash up for supper, and I gotta go get changed.”

Buttercup was waiting for both of them in the living room, wearing her best evening clothes and giving baby Applejack all the kisses she thought the little one needed. Then she saw her husband and son, covered in mud and sawdust. “Ew,” she said. “No kissin’ til’ you get a shower.” She turned to Little Mac. “That goes for you too, young colt.”

“I didn’t think you’d be ready that quick!” Mac said.

“I’m full of surprises,” she said.

“No canoodlin’ til yer ready!” Granny yelled from the kitchen. “I had to call in a heap o’ favors with my gal pals to sit for the younguns tonight, and you ain’t gonna mess it up by missin’ yer ride to town. So scoot!”

Mac didn’t have to be told twice. He went upstairs, showered, shaved and changed into his own finery, leaving his usual outside hat behind in favor of a fine white stetson. Total time, twenty minutes.

Plenty o’ time.

As he was walking down the stairs, he caught Buttercup’s eye, again. “Now there’s the stallion I married,” she said with a smile. Mac came down and gave her a kiss, and one for baby AJ, who cooed with delight. This was going to be Mac and Buttercup’s first night out since AJ was born, and they were both looking forward to it.

“Can ya take her for a sec?” Buttercup handed the baby off to Mac, along with a burp cloth. “I gotta check on a few last things. And don’t worry, she’s changed an’ fed.”

Mac was left sitting on the couch, holding his daughter. He smiled at her. She smiled back. He smiled wider, and so did she, with a happy gurgle. “Hey there, you smiley girl. Mama and Daddy’re gonna go have some fun tonight. But we’ll be back later. You don’t give yer Granny too much fussin, y’hear?” AJ kicked about in her swaddling, still grinning. “Guess I’ll take that as a yes.” He gave her a kiss on the forehead.

A horn came from the driveway outside. “Mac! Buttercup! Yer ride’s here!” Granny said.

“OK,” Buttercup said, striding on over to the door as Mac handed off AJ to Granny. “I left two bottles in the icebox for AJ if she needs ‘em, make sure Lil’ Mac only gets two cookies and one story….”

“Filly, I have it under control,” Granny said. “You two git, and have a good time.”

---

There had never been anything close to fine dining in Ponyville, but that was starting to change. There was a new restaurant in the lobby of the Old Towne Hotel, and Buttercup had heard from all her friends that it was the place for romance. Mac, meanwhile, was confused by the menu.

“I don’t understand half these words,” he said, flipping back and forth.

“They’re Ardennais,” Pear said.

“That’s why I don’t understand them,” Mac replied, to which Buttercup rolled her eyes.

“Oh, I remember enough. Ask me before you ask the waiter.”

Mac went back to the menu, still confused. Buttercup noticed his confusion, and brought down the menu. “Do you trust me?” she asked.

“Implicitly,” he replied.

“All right. Let me do this for you.” When the waiter came, Buttercup spoke to him in Ardennais, with a beautiful lilting accent Mac had never heard from her before. Even the waiter seemed shocked, and then impressed.

“So…” Mac began when the waiter had left.

“Gâteau à l'avoine au poivre,” Buttercup said. “Oat cake with pepper. I think you’ll like it.”

“Since when did you learn to speak Ardennais?”

Buttercup smiled. “It does run in the blood lines, my grandpa and great grandpa spoke it. And I had a lot o’ time to myself when the little ones went down for naps and you were workin’ outside. So… I picked up some hobbies to pass the time.”

“First you gettin’ back to playin’ guitar, and now this?”

“Oh, the guitar’s been mostly for the little ones. Couldn’t do much in my last months expectin’ with AJ, so I started playin’ an’ singin’ for Little Mac. Apparently AJ must’ve heard that, now whenever I play she just goes right to sleep, don’t matter what….”

Mac rested his head on his hooves, and stared at her.

“What?” Buttercup asked.

“Have I told you lately just how gosh-darned much I love you?”

“Oh. And here I just thought you were usin’ me for my good looks.” She had a playful look in her eyes.

Her beautiful eyes.

“Well, there is that,” he said. “But every day I see somethin’ new to you and I can’t help but think how lucky I am.” Mac laid his hoof across the table, and Buttercup took it.

Tell her, something told him.

But he didn’t, not during the meal. Instead they just talked, and gossiped, and swapped stories of their younger days, and how her bestie Chiffon Swirl was talking marriage to the bakery manager.

“Sugar Cake?” Mac said. “Huh. Never would have figured those two for an item.”

Buttercup made a face. “Oh hush, you. I suppose your pal Burnt Oak’s been fillin’ your head with all kinds of Army stories.”

“Well, he did say that was part of the attraction when he joined up,” Mac said. “He just made sergeant, though, and his term’s almost up. Got enough money to come back here if he wants to…”

---

Dinner was perfect. So was the movie, Some Like To Trot. So was the ride back. And even though it was late at night, Buttercup whispered as they were headed up the road home that they should stop and check in on their tree.

Their trees.

And so they did. A pear tree, and an apple tree, crossing into each other, over the stone in which they had carved their declaration of love, the glade where they were secretly married, the glade in which Buttercup had to let her father go off in his anger, only to be welcomed as an Apple.

They sat, side by side, for a very long time, wordless.

Then Mac finally spoke. “I’m… sorry. I know I should be around for you more, and not just as Daddy. I know you got a life of your own, and I want to be there, it’s just…”

Buttercup reached out and squeezed his hoof. “You do so much for me. For us. And I love being a mother, and I love that you’re always there to support me and the little ones and your Ma. Whatever I ask you, you just do. And that’s wonderful. And I don’t ever want you to feel guilty about it..”

Something welled up inside of Mac, but he forced it back down.

“But just remember,” she continued, “there’s a difference between surviving and living. I know, I had to learn it myself when Pere-Pear left.”

Mac nodded. All these years, he thought. Old man still owns the farm next door, and he’s never once come back, not even for his daughter.

“I went over to the old house, the other day,” Buttercup said. “Not trespassin’ or anythin’ funny, just seein’ if anyone had been livin’ there. If anyone knew how to get in touch with him out in Vanhoover.”

“And?” Mac asked.

“No one but some hired hands and a boss. Boss just says he was hired by letter, draws pay and expenses from a bank in town.” Buttercup sighed. “I don’t even know what I was thinking, hoping that I could write something that would get him to change his mind about…” She paused. “About us.”

“Your old man’s a damned fool, and he doesn’t deserve a moment’s thought for what he did to you,” Mac said, with an anger that surprised him.

“But that’s just it,” Buttercup replied. “I don’t think he did it because he hated you, or your family. I guess I’ve just been thinkin’ about it differently since I had Little Mac and AJ. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost one of them, or if I lost you,” she continued. “I remember how devastated after the plague he was, losing Mama and Bartlett and Bosc and Concorde and Grannyberry all at once. Then Auntie Quince left as soon as she was able. It wasn’t until later I found out she did a mail-order bride thing.”

“What?” Mac said. “That was it?”

Buttercup nodded. “Chiffon’s mama kept in touch with her for a bit. Turns out Auntie wanted to stay but she felt like she didn’t have a choice. She didn’t know the first thing about farmin’, that she was just goin’ to be one more mouth to feed. She thought that my daddy could handle it, that it was for the best. ‘Cept it wasn’t. Pere-Pear–Anjou–was a proud stallion. But losing all of his family but me… I mean, he’d never gotten on with anyone in Ponyville, not even the other farmers. Everything from boundary stuff to his gettin’ his hackles up about the dam project to all kinds of slights and disrespects. But losing pretty much all his family… I think that just broke him. After what happened he spent many years drinkin’ himself to sleep.”

“I never heard anythin’ about that,” Mac responded with concern.

“He made me promise I wouldn’t say anythin’. He never did anything to hurt me, I think… I think he was just hurtin’ too much inside and that was the only thing would make it stop. He’d just gotten sober when my Uncle offered him the land out near Vanhoover. And I guess that was that. He said there was nothin’ for us here, and if it weren’t for you, I’d have believed him, too.”

Mac bowed his head. “Still doesn’t make up for how he hurt you, even if he was hurtin’ himself.”

Buttercup looked up at the trees, and the stone, and all they had made and signed and created from their love. “I ain’t sayin’ I’ve forgiven him. Still not sure I can. I just… well, I guess I just understand him now.”

Then she threw her hooves around him, kissed him, and nuzzled him. “But don’t you dare go anywhere. You hear me?”

Mac heard her voice quaver, but his remained resolute. “Never. I said I’d keep you as my wife, right here. And we Apples keep our word.”