Memories
It was a quiet, cloudy day. The sun was completely blocked from the sky making it fairly dark even though it was a little past noon. The ponies in Ponyville were going about their usual business, shopping at the market, chatting in their usual groups, or just getting lunch at one of the restaurants lining the streets.
Octavia walked down the crowded street, no pony really paid attention to her. Just the way she liked it. Ever since the incident, she preferred to keep to herself and, for the most part, everypony respected her wishes… Almost everypony.
“Hey, Octavia!” A sharp voice came from the door of a very familiar building. “What’cha doin’?”
The gray mare looked up at the obnoxiously perky voice and glared at the pony from which it originated.
“Pinkie Pie… I’m not in the mood right now. Please, leave me alone.”
“Okey dokey Loki!” Pinkie replied with a bright smile then, lowered her voice in a conspiratorial manner. “If you’ll tell me what you’re doing with your cello.”
“Pinkie!” Octavia grumbled.
“Please!” Pinkie begged, drawing out her plea as long as her breath would let her.
Octavia sighed and gave the pink party pony a sour look. “You know exactly what I’m doing with my cello. I’m going to the hill. You have asked me every time I go, though why? I cannot tell.”
Pinkie gave Octavia her most comforting look. “It’s ‘cause I feel you just need to laugh or at least smile. It’s been six months since-“
“I know how long it’s been Pinkie Pie! I don’t need you to remind me!” Octavia snapped before turning her head to look at the ground sadly. “I remember everything, no matter how much I try to forget.”
At this outburst, many ponies turned to look at what was going on. Pinkie shook her head gently, signaling to them all to pay them no mind. Seeing just who it was that was yelling, many of the ponies gave Pinkie a knowing look and turned back to their friends or their food.
When Octavia lifted her head again, she had tears running down her cheeks and her eyes were slightly red. Pinkie Pie tried to give her a reassuring smile but Octavia wouldn’t have it. Before Pinkie could say anything else she ran, tears still flowing from her eyes.
She didn’t stop running until after she passed the Golden Oaks Library. Knowing that Pinkie was far behind her was a comfort to Octavia. She really hated how she would stop her and ask her what she was doing every time she wanted to go up to the hill with her cello, considering she had been doing it every week for the past six months. At first she had been fine with it, stopping to talk for a minute on her way there wasn’t a welcome distraction but it wasn’t something she absolutely dreaded, unlike now. She thought that she had taken a detour to avoid that place but while her mind was elsewhere, her hooves took her down the more familiar path.
Octavia smiled weakly, she had just gone past Rarity’s boutique, it wouldn’t be long before she reached the hill.
She looked back. Rarity was standing in front of the door to the boutique with a very sharply dressed stallion. She stopped and squinted to try to see him better. He looked familiar…
He was a musician friend of hers from Canterlot. He played the violin in her old orchestra which she had been kicked out of thanks to the very same perky pink party pony as had annoyed her this morning.
Octavia gritted her teeth angrily. Just thinking about Pinkie Pie angered her. But then, her thoughts turned. If it hadn’t been for Pinkie Pie ruining her performance at the Grand Galloping Gala then she never would have met the mare she so loved and cherished. She began to remember the first time they met.
It was dark and cold outside. Octavia had just been kicked out of her apartment, her landlord having begrudgingly been forced to evict her. He wasn’t bad, he had tried to let her stay as long as he could extend her payment deadline but in the end, the interest grew to a point that it was very unlikely, even if she had found a job, for her to be able to pay it all.
Octavia sat in the alleyway between two buildings, hiding behind a dumpster, under a cardboard box. She was thankful she had the box for it had just started to rain.
She sighed and looked down at the ground. She had given up finding a job a while ago and she wondered why she even struggled this long. Without a job, without a home, without even a family, all was lost to her. There was no real reason for her to keep going. Even when she had a job, the only thing that kept her going wasn’t the income, or the social life that came with it. It was the music; it was always the music that kept her going. Knowing that her music could bring a whole building to tears or leave them with an overwhelming sense of calm was what drove her.
She sighed, looking over at her cello which was the only thing she really wanted to take with her, it was the only thing she owned that had sentimental value to her, that, and a picture of her and her mother when she was just a filly. Her mother was a beautiful mare; she too was a cellist and had taught Octavia how to play when she was only four.
She gently caressed the picture with her hoof as tears began falling from her face. She kissed the picture and then turned back to her cello.
Octavia began playing a very beautiful and somewhat sad song her mother had taught her long ago. It had been meant for her father’s funeral but she never finished it. Her mother taught to her in the hopes that she would finish it for her mother’s funeral.
The sounds of the strings vibrated throughout the alleyway and onto the dark, wet streets of Canterlot, causing many ponies to look around, curious as to where the beautiful song was coming from.
She stood there, playing her mother’s requiem. Tears streaming freely from her eyes as her foreleg moved the bow swiftly across the strings with such fluidity that anypony who had seen her play could swear that it was just like watching the ocean.
The strings hummed her melancholy melody, the vibrations hitting her in the heart. The only thing she was accomplishing by playing the song was making herself even sadder. She slowly pulled the bow across the strings towards her to draw out the final note of the song. As she finished she felt a longing for something, anything to come and make her happy again.
“Whoa! That was some sweet melody you were sliding there. What’s a beautiful mare who can play such sweet music doing back here under a cardboard box?”
Octavia jumped, letting the bow fall from her hoof to clatter against the ground. She turned to see who had just spoken.
A white unicorn mare with an electric blue mane and tail and a pair of sunglasses perched above her horn was standing at the entrance to the alleyway, a half smile, half quizzical look on her face.
“I… I-I uh…” Octavia sputtered. “I’m, well…”
“Don’t tell me you’re homeless?” the white mare asked with a tone of disbelief. “How can you be homeless with a sound like that?”
Octavia didn’t feel like explaining herself to a complete stranger. “I… I-It’s none of your business,” she said indignantly.
“Whoa whoa!” the mare said, taken aback at the reaction. “It’s okay, I’m a friend, that is… if you’ll let me.”
Octavia stared at her, examining her, considering her. “I don’t need any help, thank you. Now please, go away.” she said, with more strength in her voice than she expected.
“Okay, Okay. I’ll leave you alone.” The white mare walked back into the street and turning her head back in Octavia’s direction, she said, “If you do ever need any help, I’ll be around for the next week. Look for me yeah? Name’s Vinyl, Vinyl Scratch. See ya around.”
Octavia huffed and laid back down on her little cardboard bed she had made for herself under her box and slowly, stubbornly, fell into an uneasy sleep.
The next night Vinyl Scratch had come again and left Octavia a few bits while she slept, or at least, she could only assume it was Vinyl, nopony else knew she was there so that was her logical conclusion. She had done this the next couple of nights as well. But Octavia refused to use anything she received from charity or as she called it, pity. The pile only grew bigger each night.
The fourth night Vinyl visited, Octavia was sitting there, waiting. Vinyl walked up and Octavia gave her a sad look.
“Thank you very much for the bits. But I don’t want them,” she said as she shoved the pile back at Vinyl. She gave her an apologetic look before continuing. “I did however use some yesterday for lunch…”
Vinyl looked down at the pile before saying, “That’s okay, it’s what I gave them to ya for,” and picked them up. “If you’re not going to take my bits for nothing then consider the one’s you used as payment for that song the other night.”
Octavia raised her eyebrow at Vinyl. “Alright then.”
They sat there for a moment, neither one saying anything.
“Y-You said…” Octavia stuttered, breaking the silence. “You said you were going to be around for the week… Does that mean that you’re going to leave Canterlot soon?”
Vinyl looked at her, thinking for a moment, then, her ears perking up with a brilliant idea said, “Yeah I will. You know, if you’re willing to keep playing me some songs then I’ll take you with me, it can be your payment for renting out my spare room back home.”
Octavia’s ears perked up as well before drooping again. “I-I don’t know… I’ve never left Canterlot before. I don’t even know what I’d do anywhere else… Where is it that you live anyway?”
“I live in Ponyville. There’s a lot of good ponies there, nice, calm, and quiet,” Vinyl said, then eagerly continuing. “As for what you could do there, I know a mare who is always playing a harp in the park for tips, she makes enough to get by. You could play for tips too, just play in a different part of town, or, I dunno, maybe she’d let you play with her and you could share the tips.”
Octavia looked down, considering. She had never even considered playing for tips; she was used to filling concert halls just by the mere mention of her name. Compared to that, playing for tips was a pittance… but it was still better than having no job and no place to live.
“A-alright,” she shakily agreed. “How are we getting there? The train?”
Vinyl laughed. “Yes the train, but we won’t be leaving ‘till after tomorrow night. I’ve got a gig tomorrow so we can go back to my hotel for now. You can have some money for food tomorrow too, so long as you play me another song tonight.”
Octavia gave her a nervous look but agreed. The two mares walked out of the alleyway, Octavia carrying her cello on her back and her picture in her mouth, and made their way to Vinyl’s hotel.
Octavia stopped on her way to the hill and shook her head; her eyes had begun to flow freely with tears again. She had never thought that she would ever in her life sleep with another mare.
But that night, after she had finished her song, Vinyl was sitting on the bed in tears. She sat down next to her to comfort her. After a long while, they ended up falling asleep together.
The next morning, she nearly jumped out of the bed after realizing that she was lying next to Vinyl. But something kept her from moving; she just looked at the peaceful, sleeping face of Vinyl Scratch. It was… cute.
She smiled at the memory and continued on her way to the hill.
A sudden sound drew her attention over to a familiar house. Inside she saw Lyra and Bon Bon cuddled up together on their couch. She grinned at the two, how cute they were together. Long ago she would have thought it wrong to love another mare but these two had taught her otherwise and it wasn’t long after that she noticed her own feelings for a certain mare…
It seemed a simple enough night. Octavia was lounging on the couch after a day in the park with Lyra, playing a beautiful piece the two made together. She had the day’s newspaper open in front of her, looking over the day’s events, when Vinyl burst in with tears in her eyes. Octavia rushed over to her, asking her what was wrong. After several attempts to get her to talk, she calmed down and revealed that an old coltfriend had been hassling her, attempting to sabotage her performance that night. Octavia hugged her tightly and assuringly and said, “It’s alright. I’m here for you. As long as I’m here, he can’t bother you.”
Vinyl looked up at Octavia and gave her a tearful stare. She sniffed and buried her head into Octavia’s shoulder and hugged back as tight as she could. After a few moments of crushing, she let go and planted a soft, gentle kiss right on Octavia’s lips. She was taken aback and thought for a moment of resisting, but she enjoyed it, she leaned into Vinyl and returned the kiss.
They had been together ever since.
Octavia continued her trek up to the hill. Just past the Apple farm was a tall hill overlooking a lake out in the middle of nowhere. It was that hill that she was making her way to with her cello carefully laying across her back.
As she walked by the gate to the farm, she glanced over at the big, red barn. Applejack and Apple Bloom were out there, arguing about something she couldn’t hear. It was reminding her of how she and Vinyl used to fight. And the last fight they had, six months ago.
Octavia shook the thought out of her head. She could feel her eyes were very puffy and she needed to get to the hill before she couldn’t see where she was going.
It started to rain, the clouds finally releasing the scheduled downpour. Octavia began to trot, breaking into a full run; she didn’t want her cello to get ruined from the rain.
After another five minutes of running, she could finally see the lake, the sound of water splashing as the rain hit the surface of it came to her ears. She could see the hill as well.
There was a single, solitary tree there, standing at the very top of the hill. She didn’t know what kind of tree it was, she just knew that once, it bore the most beautiful, pink flowers she had ever seen, though, it would never bloom again. The tree was long since dead, left devoid of life after a bolt of lightning struck it a while back, catching it on fire. Nopony was around to see it so it was left to burn to it’s now eerily beautiful state.
Octavia sighed as she reached the tree, looking up at the long, thin braches, reaching out in thin air, as if reaching for the leaves it once displayed.
She looked over towards the lake and found what she had come here for. Without saying a word, she pulled the cello off of her back, set it up in the grass, pulled her bow out and readied herself to play, setting the bow on the strings, holding the neck of the cello gently yet firmly with her other hoof. The wind blew through her mane and she smiled weakly.
“Vinyl,” she said as she turned to face the tall, grey stone, a lump forming in her throat. She swallowed it and continued. “I know I always play you my mother’s requiem, but I’ve been working on a song, just for you. I finished it last night… I hope you like it.”
She began sliding the bow across the strings, making them hum out their tune with ease. The sounds of the cello resounding over the lake, the rain making it appear as though it were the sounds of the music making the ripples in the surface.
She closed her eyes and let her music flow out freely from her foreleg, into the bow, and off of the strings. The sound of the rain hitting the lake seemed to have vanished just to allow her song the spotlight. The rain fell and the wind blew silently, the cello vibrating with sadness in its strings.
Octavia was in her own world. Remembering the times she and Vinyl had spent together. The happy days and the sad ones. She remembered the last night she saw her love.
”Come on Tavi, just come with, we’ll have fun.”
They were in their living room, arguing. Vinyl had a gig in Canterlot and she wanted Octavia to go with her. Even though it had been years since she was there, she still did not want to go. She hated Canterlot with a passion since she left it, or as she saw it, left her to die.
“I will not go back to that place!’
“Tavi… Come on. We can just chill during the day, do whatever you want to do. Then, after the gig, I’ll take you to the fanciest place in town for dinner. What do ya say? Sound good?”
Octavia still refused to go. Vinyl’s persistence angered her so much she had kicked her out of the house the night before she left to Canterlot.
Octavia had no idea then that that was the last she’d ever see of that beautiful white mare.
After she had heard about what happened, she spent almost all of her time in the nearby bar, drinking her sorrows away. It never helped, if anything it only made her think about it more.
She suddenly stopped playing. She felt the last of her strength leave her and she fell into a crying heap on the sodden ground.
“If only we hadn’t fought that night. You wouldn’t have been drinking and you wouldn’t… You wouldn’t. That bastard!” She screamed at the top of her voice across the lake. “If only I went with you then we could have been happy for the rest of our lives. But I wasn’t… I wasn’t there and he… he… I should have trampled him when I saw him, I should have beaten him to a pulp! It’s all his fault… all his fault… All my fault.
“If I had known, what you planned to do… But then, they never do say anything about it. They always keep it a secret and surprise it on you when you least expect it… They never found the diamond… but the ring was still there… They let me have it after everything was settled. We could have been so happy.
“What am I doing, I’ve told you all this probably a hundred times now.” Her voice dropped to a solemn tone. “Not once have you answered back. Not a single time have you ever been able to answer back. Oh, Vinyl… I wish you were still here.”
Octavia put her head into her hooves and began to sob openly, her cello lay beside her on its side.
“She’ll always be there, in your heart and in your memories.”
Octavia jumped up and turned to the voice. She looked in amazement to see Pinkie Pie standing there, halfway out from behind the tree.
“I’m sorry I followed you. You seemed especially unhappy today.” Pinkie said with a weak smile.
Octavia just stared at her. For what felt like hours, the two stared at each other, then, remembering what happened the last time she had stared at another mare this long, quickly dropped her gaze and let out a small chuckle.
“I-It’s fine, Pinkie… I guess,” she said and looked back up to see Pinkie’s smile brighten a little.
“I-I uh… I didn’t know, all this time, that she was going to propose to you,” Pinkie said awkwardly.
Octavia stared at her again, debating whether or not she was up to talking about it with her.
“I-I didn’t either,” she said finally. “Not until after the accident. She was going to surprise me with it during dinner in Canterlot, after her gig, but I made her go without me so, instead of going out to dinner that night, she went drinking. While she was there, a stallion came up to her and began flirting with her… he wasn’t able to take the hint and when Vinyl left, he tried to follow… He stopped her just outside and tried to force himself on her. She managed to push herself away but neither of them had seen the chariot coming down the street…”
Octavia broke out into renewed sobs. Pinkie Pie stood next to her, putting her hoof over her shoulder.
She said in her most comforting tone of voice, “It’s okay, I’m here for you. As long as I’m here you don’t have to worry about the pain.”