"Why can't you!"

by Corvo

II

II

Chroma Brush stared with an open mouth as a pony behind a street vendor at her stand slowly ground mango and cherry shaved ice together. Taking a ball of the white powder, she began packing it onto a stick, then dipping and pouring flavoring onto it.

Scooping up the dessert, she put it into stands on her cart, and placed them into the magically cooled cart to stay cool.

In all honestly, Chroma didn’t care much for the popsicle itself; he had never been a fan of food that could give him brain freeze. Rather, he was interested in the way the colors of the two flavors blended. The fact that they swirled and created unique designs on each shaved ice cone was cool, to say the least.

Chroma, smiling to himself, turned and opened up his saddle bags. Pulling out a blank paper, and some paints, he sat down on his haunches in the middle of the town’s square. Opening up a red, yellow, and brown bottle of paint, he dipped the tip of his hoof into the red. placing a drop in the middle of the page, he slowly began dragging his hoof around the page in circular motions. He waited a few moments, and allowed the paint to set. Then he repeated the process with the yellow paint.

Anypony walking by could see what he was painting. It was one of the popsicles from the vendor across the street. Within the course of fifteen minutes, a small group of other ponies, had gathered around him as he painted.

They all oohed and ahhed at the picture as it took shape. Soon, he had even attracted the popsicle maker’s attention.

“Say, did you paint that?” she asked with a smile.

Chroma looked up from his drying picture and saw who was talking to him before sheepishly smiling. Holding up his paint covered hooves, he nodded.

The popsicle maker looked from the picture to the colt sitting in front of it. “D’you want to trade?”

“Huh?”

“I’ll give you a popsicle, any flavor you want, and you give me that picture to put on my stand.”

Brush looked down at his picture, then shrugged. He may not like popsicles that much, but that didn’t mean he didn’t like them at all. Plus if he said yes, people would look at his picture! Wouldn’t that be great?

“Yeah!”

__=__=__

Dreamily, Chroma sat down at the park, lemon popsicle in hoof. He closed his eyes and thought back on his day...
He had ditched school completely since it was pretty obvious he was going to that dumb school in Canterlot. He knew there was no way to get his grades up in time for the end of the year. So, the colt had put out a last ditch effort to have a bit of fun.

So far, it had been going great. This morning, he had dumped out his school things and replaced them with things like art supplies, a couple bits, a small lunch, and his little rucksack of nice things. He had played at the pond, catching and watching fish. Afterwards, he’d drawn a picture and, amazingly, had gotten free food for it!

The colt continued sucking on the popsicle when a purple mare, the town librarian, interrupted him.

“Hey, what are you doing outside of school? Is it a holiday?” She asked.

Chroma’s eyes snapped open. ‘Darn! Why does she care? Nopony else said anything, so why is she bugging me!?’

“Umm...Yeah! It is.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Oh really? Well then where are all the other fillies and colts?”

“Sick.” His response was more a question than a statement.

Twilight’s expression went from questioning to skeptical. “They’re all sick? All at the same time?”

“Yep.”

“Do you know how improbable that is?! I could explain it to you, but I doubt you’d understand the calculus, but that’s not the point! If they are all sick, why aren’t you? Are they all so sick they’re bedridden?”

Chroma rolled his eyes. He ditched school because he didn’t want to get lectured. This was worse than math class with Cheerilee! Not only was the unicorn questioning him on stuff he didn’t know, she was yelling at him at the same time.

Growing tired of the dumb game, Croma Brush stood up, and walked away, completely ignoring Twilight.

“Hey! Where do you think you’re going? Ms.Cheerilee’s going to hear about this!”

Chroma froze. Turning around, he ran and dived at the mare’s feet, popsicle still in his mouth. “NOO!”

Twilight backed up a few steps and stumbled backward. “Ahh! What?!”

“Pleasepleaseplease don’t tell her! Miss Cheerilee’ll go to my mom and then my mom will get mad and send me away to that school today instead of next week! I’ll never see my fish or pond again!”

Twilight looked down at the brown colt. “Whoa, OK, Calm down and say that a bit slower.”

Chroma got to his hooves and looked around; the park was empty. “I-Just please, don’t tell her! I-Oh! I know! I’ll give you my popsicle.”

Twilight eyed the colt. “Right...uuummm...I have to go,”

The purple mare scampered off in the opposite direction. The same direction the school house was in. But Chroma Brush was blissfully unaware of Twilight’s intentions. The brown and silver colt simply sighed. The encounter had completely killed his mood, and his perfect day had become sour.

He looked down at his half eaten popsicle and saw it was starting to melt. After a moment of staring, it fell of the stick and splattered on the ground.

“Oh come on!” he shouted angrily.

Muttering to himself, the colt walked over to a trash can and threw his stick into it. The pony, still muttering, decided to visit the small pond in order to calm down. It’d be a nice way to end his last day here.

______

Chroma’s mother sighed as Cheerilee explained how her son had decided to skip class today.

“So he didn’t even show up?” she asked the teacher.

“No, Twilight walked in after class and explained the situation to me. I thought he was home sick. Where do you think he could be?”

His mother got to her hooves and began walking to the door. “I know exactly where he is. In a lot of trouble.”

______

His tongue hung out of the side of his mouth as he waited to pounce on his “prey”. An unsuspecting frog, crouched on a lily pad in the water.

The colt’s lips turned upwards in a small grin. He pounced, splashing into the water. His failed attempt at capturing the frog landed him upside down, soaking his mane and coat. Quickly, he scrambled to his hooves and looked around. No frog.

“Aww, so close! You win this round, Mr.Frog! But I’m going to get you one day!” he shouted to his nemesis.

The colt had been attempting to capture that one frog for quite the while. They had always played like this, Chroma attempting to trap the frog, and the frog getting away. Their relationship was one of tough love. To Chroma anyways, the frog just thought he was, as Fluttershy once quoted from her friend, “loco in the coco.”

The frog watched from behind some weeds as Chroma, flounced out of the water, and shook himself dry. The amphibian, then croaked in what he considered a taunting fashion, and jumped into the water.

Chroma, hearing the croak, giggled, but didn’t pursue it. He was much too tired to go another round with his green friend. Rather, he elected to stretch and sit at the bank of the small pond in order to watch the marine life.

About a half hour of simply staring down at the fish, algae, and other aquatic plants he was snapped out of his trance by the voice of his mother.

“Chroma Brush! Get your flank over here right now!”

The pony’s eyes widened in fear.

“She told on me!” he whispered to himself.

Comments

[Narlepoax III]

I really hate it when I see a story with good reading potential, but then I look under the description and see "On Hiatus", or "Cancelled".

[Corvo]

2542856

It may possibly become come back in the future. I have a plot, but wording and inflection are...difficult for this story, not to mention I have to write some parts with almost child like innocence, something I lack.

[Dry Monkey]

Awww come on!