I bobbed down the Ponyville road, right up to my coltfriend. And gave him a big kiss. He gave me a small smile, but kept on engaging in his conversation with his friends.
I had grown used to this, I didn't care. The big purple colt talked about his usual things: other people, myself, his sports, inferiors, and mares. Mares were always the topic of choice, among his grotesque friends. It made me slightly uncomfortable, but I got over if soon enough. I didn't want to make him stop talking about a silly topic. I could always change. So I did.
This was his graduation day, the day he graduated from his Unicorn Academy training. I assumed I should let him talk about anything he wanted to, especially if this was going to be the last time he saw some of his friends.
I was so proud, I even got to travel with his family for the ceremony. His extended family even came, and I saw my best friend once more. She was his cousin, and they were rather close friends. But she was closer to me.
After the ceremony, we were alone.
"Hey cutie?" He started our conversation. That in itself was a little odd. He never started conversations. He wasn't much of a talker in general.
"Yes?" I looked to the freeing skies just beyond the tree we were under. I looked back into his purple eyes.
"What do you plan on doing? For the rest of your life?"
"Well," I started, "I was thinking about opening up a bakery in Ponyville," I shyly said. "You've known it's been my life-long dream..."
"What?!"
I kept going on, oblivious to what he was saying. "With you obviously there with me, doing what you love doing, your magic thing."
"Cutie..."
"Yes?" I smiled at my pet name.
He let out a big dramatic sigh. "Are you okay with a long-distance relationship?"
"What do you mean?" I was rather sad and concerned, as I probably should have been.
He looked back at the trunk of the tree, clearly trying to avoid my eyes. "I probably won't be able to find a job in Ponyville. I won't find a job there that I can use my schooling with, at least. If we kept this us, we'd only be able to see each other on the weekends."
"And what are you proposing?" I think I let more concern show on my face than I wanted to.
He sighed. "Well, I've already got a job there. That's why I'm bringing it up. I think we should try the long-distance relationship thing. Besides," he faked a smile, "we can send cute love letters."
I half smiled to show that I was at least somewhat strong. I hoped to the bottom of my heart it would work out. I took a few steps back towards the group.
"Hey," he said, trying to get my attention one last time. "We're going to make this work, aren't we? We always do." He gave me a big hug, that practically smushed me.
I gave him a small kiss on the cheek, and tried to smile. At least he did.
On the train ride back to Ponyville, I talked with my best friend about it.
"Belle... What am I going to do?" I leaned on Belle Chapeau's shoulder. "He's practically leaving me." I looked outside the train car.
"Excuse me, but I do believe you guys said you'd make this work! Pull yourself together. Seriously. You're going to do this. I promise."
"But what if I find someone? Someone that isn't him?"
"Then you tell him girl! This isn't rocket science." Belle Chapeau could always shrug little things off. Didn't she ever have time to be a little dramatic?
"What if he finds someone... Someone better?" The thought scared me. I may have been a drama queen, but I definitely knew I wasn't the best pony out there. Besides, he seemed to be so much more mature than myself. Maybe he'd find someone just as mature... Someone who could keep him happier than myself. The thought almost brought me to tears.
"Then you break up with him. Cup Batter, this isn't hard!"
I rolled my eyes and looked at her. "Belle, you obviously have NOT been in a relationship before. It's almost like looking at me and telling me I'm not your friend anymore because I mess up!"
"Well, I do believe that if he cheats on you, that gives you a legitimate reason for breaking up. I'm no whiz or anything."
"Can't I even give him a chance? What if he doesn't even tell me?"
"Make up your mind, sweet pea! If the colt cheats on you, you let him go! There's no use letting him drag you through the mud by your nostrils! No, you are strong, independent mare, and you will make this relationship work if you want it to, gosh darn it!"
"But- what if he doesn't want the relationship to work?"
"I'll tell you what to do, Cup. You stand right up, and you say, fine. You accept it. Nothing good came off of dwelling on things you cannot fix. You stand up, and you find yourself a new man. Or you let him come to you. Either way works. But regardless, if he leaves you you're going to give him a reason to come back, and when he asks to come back, oh no. No no no. You will not."
"Thanks," I said half-heartedly. I love Belle's chit chats, but sometimes, they were too much to take in all at once...
When I got back to Ponyville, I knew the one place I would be going to. Ponyville's one and only pancake house, owned by my best friend's aunt and uncle. Me and my two closest friends Fanny Pack and Carrot Cake all met in the pancake house, not for pancakes, but just to meet up. We always did.
I rushed back to our table, like I always did. I collapsed onto the table. A tear fell out of my eye, as their card game scattered everywhere.
"Jeeze Cup Batter, what's up with you?" Fanny Pack bent down to collect all of the cards that fell off the table. Carrot Cake looked equally as confused and concerned.
"Is it... Him?" Carrot Cake looked deep into my eyes.
I bit my lip and nodded.
I could see in Carrot's eyes the pure sadness... He didn't know what I felt, but he sure knew how to grieve with me...
"What did he do?" He backed away, slightly tearing his attention away.
"He told me he wants to live in Canterlot, where he's already gotten a job. And he wants to have a long distance relationship, where we'd only see each other on the weekends."
"It's not going to last..." Fanny Pack whispered under his breath.
"That's what I'm afraid of!" I wailed loudly.
"Cup, calm down. Get your head on your shoulders and let's think this through logically." Carrot glared at Fanny.
"Did he officially break up with you?" Fanny questioned.
I rolled my eyes. "No."
"Did he mention any other mare?"
"No," I replied, even more annoyed. "Not any more than he usually does."
"You shouldn't have TOO MUCH to worry about..." Fanny said sarcastically.
"Fanny, please stop being a stereotypical colt and having absolutely no empathy for this poor mare. Honestly. She's dying on the inside." Carrot Cake sighed. "He's not very trustworthy... I wouldn't be so worried so much about yourself as him. Can you still have contact with him?"
I nodded.
"If I was you, I'd tell him that you guys should still keep contact, but you should break up for now, and who knows, love always finds away." He sighed and looked at the ground.
"I agree with Carrot. Truthfully..." Now Fanny Pack sighed, "I didn't see it lasting for much longer." He looked at Carrot Cake to further prove his point.
"But..." I tear fell to the ground off my face. "I want to keep it going to see go long it can last. He says he's going to send me a letter first." I stood up to leave. I needed some fresh air.
"Hey Cup... We just want what's best for our best friend." Carrot looked at Fanny. "Both of us."
I got home and sighed. I knew this would be a harder issue to deal with than our relationship had ever dealt with before. Plopping down onto my bed, I wondered if our relationship was strong enough to be put up to the test. "Of course we're strong enough. We've been together for almost a year now. We've both changed, and we're perfect for each other." I tried convincing myself. I didn't know how long I could deceive myself, much less the rest of the world...
"Cup, it's dinner time! Please come downstairs!" My mother called.
"Coming mother!" I yelled back. I quickly fixed my hair up, and then I went down to dinner.
My sister, my dad and my mom were already downstairs. My mom had cooked noodles. Again. She never cooked anything else. Sometimes I wondered if she ever wanted anything else to eat.
"Mother, thank you kindly for these noodles and white sauce." My sister robotically said.
"Yes dear, thank you." My father replied, as if scripted.
"Thanks mom! I should show you a few different recipes sometime." I smiled, trying to be really nice and respectful about it. After all, I was the only one in the family who used the kitchen for more than the same three meals each day.
"Would YOU like to cook dinner?" She glared at me. Everything was offensive to her.
"I could if you wanted me too!" I really wanted to help.
"Fine," she said snobbily, "you can cook dinner every night. Make sure you always follow the recipes exactly. I don't even like cooking, anyways."
"Mom, you know I don't ever follow a recipe..."
"Why don't you? Exact measurements are the way to go."
"Because sometimes, exact measurements aren't... Perfect."
My entire family gasped. I should have expected this, growing up in a family of mathematicians. Everything for them had to precise and exact. It was kind of annoying. I said nothing more on the topic. I didn't want to get them scared or anything. I didn't really communicate with them very much beyond the dinner table. They never were very talkative. They always were finding new calculators, or they were making up problems for each other... I was always the odd one out in my family. And not only was their sense of crazy and their artistic sense hindered, their emotional sense almost never existed.
My father was a black stallion I with silvery highlighted stick-straight hair, my mother, a white mare with bluish- silver hair. My older sister was almost a copy of each of them. Everyone in my extended family too was a deep grey or almost blackish (or some other neutral color), with rather straight hair. I wasn't normal, I was bright blue with fluorescent pink curly hair/bush. Despite being a little pop of color in a grayscale family, I never really got into their interests.
I hated math. When they taught me science, it wasn't nearly as bad, I even found some of the subjects interesting. But when they taught me math, it was the worst. My parents tried to teach it to me at a young age. They said it would be really fun. It was fun for them to teach it. Not fun for me. They taught me addition and subtraction, multiplication and then division. And finally, fractions. That's about as far as I got until I got frustrated. At least fractions helped me with my cooking. I always could figure out exactly how much I needed, even though I rarely ever used the exact measurements anyways. After fractions, however, they did teach me how to use algebra and beyond. I wasn't terrible at it, I just never could find the enjoyment in something so utterly concrete.
I got up to my room. I kept it a fun bright red color, with a little dab or orange. I had about a billion pictures on my walls, pictures of mainly my friends and I. Pictures of Belle and I as filles; painting a picture, making cookies (mine actually looked edible), playing dress up, outside on a playground, the list went on.
To the right of that, I had a little collection of pictures with Fanny Pack, Carrot Cake and I. To my surprise, there were more pictures of Carrot Cake and I than Fanny Pack. I guess he was the one taking the pictures. He always seemed like a photographer. A lot of our pictures looked posed, but they were produced on old black and white film. I guess that's what Fanny Pack loved best, was photography. It was kind of cute, like, small person cute. There were a few pictures of us three together. We were all laughing, it looks like, and Fanny Pack was covered in cake I guess...
"Guys, what should we do today?" I slumped down onto our table. It was a cold winter day, and the three of us wanted nothing but to stay inside.
The three of us, all without cutie marks, all thoughtfully thought of ideas to fill our day. We were little kids, unable to run around town to our heart's content because of a blizzard raging outside. I myself had been stuck in Iron Pancake House for a day and a half. It had been one of the worst blizzards in Equestria in at least a century.
"Maybe we could..." Fanny Pack looked around. He sighed. "Do nothing." There wasn't much to do around a little bed and breakfast. At least there weren't many people.
"We could..." Carrot Cake looked like he had an idea. "Bake a cake!" He looked particularly enthralled by this. All three of us looked at each other.
Fanny Pack whispered, "But guys, I can't cook..."
"Nonsense! Anyone can cook!" Carrot Cake dragged Fanny Pack back into his aunt and uncle's kitchen to start cooking. I followed quickly behind with a smile.
"Excuse me?" Carrot Cake respectfully approached Waffle Iron, Fanny Pack's uncle.
"What can I do for you today, Carrot?" He responded to him with a bright smile. Waffle iron was a kind colt! and even a kinder shopkeeper. Because it was a bed and breakfast, he sometimes let homeless people stay at his bed and breakfast overnight, giving them a warm place to stay. He also gave them a breakfast, and sometimes a. Lunch, so they could spend their food money on something else. Like getting their hooves back on the ground.
"Do you mind if we baked a cake in your kitchens? We're absolutely bored. And folks have already eaten breakfast. PLLLEEEAAAASSSSEEEEE???" Carrot Cake smiled, trying oh so hard to convince Waffle Iron.
Waffle Iron looked at his wife. She nodded, and he replied to him, "Sure, you just have to clean up any mess you make."
"Thanks Waffle Iron!" I yelled from the back of the group, and the three of us went in.
When we got into the kitchens, the world was open to us. I loved cooking, and making food for others. Carrot Cake agreed with me. Despite Fanny not sharing this hobby with us we still let him watch. Regardless, he would eventually become the owner of this restaurant, unless the Irons gave it to anyone else. But we were just fillies. We didn't know any of that yet.
"So... Do any of you guys actually know HOW to make a cake?" Fanny was skeptical if this would actually work. Then again, Fanny wasn't the ones cooking.
"Wait- you don't know the recipe for a cake by heart? I thought everyone could memorize it. It's not hard." Carrot was made for this. He turned to me. "Do you know the recipe?"
I didn't know the recipe by heart, but this wasn't the first time I've made a cake. "Cakes aren't my forte, but sure, I kind of know it."
Carrot was in charge of this whole production. He knew exactly what to get, and how much to put in. I helped him with a bit, but I did a lot of watching and observing. Fanny looked for the ingredients. After all, he knew the kitchens best, he had grown up around it. He just didn't know how to cook in them.
A half an hour later, and a messy kitchen, it was in the cake pan, oven-ready. Just then, Waffle Iron walked in.
He gave a big belly laugh. "You guys know you'll have to clean all of this up!" He looked around at the slightly trashed kitchen. Even Waffle Iron knew we would spend more time cleaning up that making the actual cake itself. Empty eggs littered the flor, spilled milk, a bit if mixed-up batter was strewn across roughly where the cake pan was, son flour on the floor, the list goes on and on. "How's your cake coming?" He asked, try to ignore the mess.
"It's all done!" I perked up. "Look!" I pointed to our cake pan.
Waffle Iron walked slowly towards the table we had our operation at. A few steps in and-
He slipped. Slipped on flour.
Trying to grasp the table for balance, he accidentally hit the cake pan.
The cake didn't even go flying, it just went straight towards Fanny's face. It just ricocheted towards his face.
It got everywhere else, but nobody seemed to notice, Fanny Pack started whining. "Of all the things that could happen... THIS happens to me!" Fanny smiled. "On the bright side, I get to eat some batter." He licked his face and slightly grimaced. "Ugh. This would NOT of made a good cake. Who's brilliant idea was it to put egg shells in there?"
I was trying to hold back completely laughing out loud. It came out as a snicker, then I looked at Carrot, and his face showed the same thing.
We both burst out laughing at each other.
Cake Iron came out. "What in Equestria is going on--" she laughed, then grabbed a camera.
"Hold it right there guys!" She took a picture of the three of us. And gave a copy to each one of us.
We started cleaning up, talking quickly about the cake and how we almost made it, laughing a lot.
"GUYS!" Carrot yelled at the top of his lungs, clearly extremely jovial.
"What?" Both Fanny and I looked at him.
"I got my cutie mark!" A wide smile was plastered onto his face. "I GOT MY CUTIE MARK!!!" He dropped his broom and danced around with Fanny and I.
It was true: three little carrot cakes were plastered onto his hind.
He could actually say he got his cutie mark now. All three of us were just as ecstatic as he was, it seemed.
I plopped down onto my bed and smiled. I wish things could be like that again.
