Lies and Lyres

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Spike sat on his little stool behind the check out counter of the library, his forehead pressed firmly against the wood in a desperate attempt to become one with the tree.

It had been over a week since he’d broken up with Rarity, the mare that he’d spent half his life courting. A year ago she had finally given him a chance to prove himself to her. At first they’d been happy. It had been the kind of happiness that came from a new romance, but as the excitement of the newness of their relationship had begun to grow dim, they realized that their passion had been a trick of the heart born of the romantic tension of years of chasing and being chased. Of course Spike thought Rarity was beautiful almost beyond compare, and Rarity knew Spike to be an intelligent, handsome, even desirable, young drake; but they didn’t actually love each other in the intimate way necessary to maintain a healthy romantic relationship.

It had been an amicable break up: no hard feelings, no loss of friendship, and no real regrets except that things just never seemed to get past the awkward opening phases of a courtship.

He did regret their one trip to the Manehattan Opera Playhouse, though. Musicals were okay, but listening to minotaur ladies sing about the Three-Hundred Year Winter of their legends was… it was death. Even she had hated it, but that didn’t stop her for yelling at him for falling asleep in front of her high society friends.

In the end they’d decided to part ways. “See other ponies,” as she had put it.

Spike wasn’t sure exactly what that meant. Well he knew what the phrase meant, but not the concept. It was difficult, bordering on impossible, for him to consider what it might be like to even attempt to woo another mare. He’d spent so many of his formative years chasing Rarity that her influence on him would never truly be gone.

His sense of fashion and taste for first class cuisine? Both picked up from her.

His dance skills? He took lessons to impress her.

His knowledge of wines from Prance? C’etait pour elle.

He’d been born a square peg, and Rarity had been his round hole. He’d spent years shaving off his rough edges, reshaping himself to fit that round hole, but all it did in the end was make him a weird peg: one that hadn’t fit in Rarity’s hole and probably wouldn’t fit in another hole either.

Spike frowned at his own weirdly sexual analogy for his predicament, but convinced himself that it was both apropos and all in his head where nopony else could hear what he was thinking anyway.

An intimately familiar rumble built up in his gut, signaling the imminent arrival of a magically transmitted letter. He reluctantly sat up and straightened his back so he wouldn’t belch flames into his own face or set the tree on fire. He held his lips tight and belched into his closed mouth, another habit he’d picked up to please Rarity, and blew a puff of green smoke that coalesced into a letter.

He had expected to find a scroll bearing a royal wax seal from one of the princesses, as the number of ponies that knew the spell to transmit messages through his fire could be counted on both claws. Instead he found a plain white envelope, sealed with glue, and bearing a regular, store bought postage stamp.

“Oh, no,” he whispered fearfully.

Only one pony ever forgot that his fire didn’t require postage, and there was only one reason why she would be writing at this of all times. He snatched the letter out of the air and sliced the envelope open with a claw.

“Sweet mother of dragons…” he muttered as his eyes flew over the page.

She was coming. She was coming to Ponyville. She was coming to Ponyville and he had to get out of town.

Spike leapt into action. He dashed around the library, shutting all the storm windows and closing curtains. He reached for the front door lock, only to have the handle glow with the bright blue glow of a unicorn’s magic as the door flew open.

“Little Spikey!” the mare shouted as she lifted him in her grip, bringing him to her chest in a hug that tested the very limits of his draconic fortitude. “You’re getting so tall! Soon you’ll be as tall as your mommy!”

“Hey mom,” Spike greeted through clenched teeth. “I wasn’t expecting you so soon.”

The gray coated mare released her grip and quickly primped her white and purple striped mane.

“My darling, darling, darling baby boy,” Twilight Velvet cooed maternally as she held his cheeks with her hooves. “You have, have, have to tell me all about what that horrid little girl did to you.”

Spike stepped aside to let his mother into the library and sighed at the matching suitcases in the doorway.

“I thought you liked Rarity, mom,” he stated as he drug the heavy luggage in.

“Past tense, Spikey, nopony hurts one of my children and stays on my good side,” she explained. She walked over to a bookshelf and ran a hoof over it, peering at the appendage for signs of dust. “Too heartbroken to even clean, tsk-tsk… oh, mommy got here just in time.”

“That bookshelf is spotless,” he pointed out uselessly. “And Rarity and I both agreed it was time to end things. From what I heard she’s taking it kind of rough, too. Nopony got hurt more than anypony else.”

“Nonsense,” she replied. She trotted to her bags and began removing cleaning supplies from one of them. “My little Spikey is a perfect, beautiful, flawless little gentledrake; so if things didn’t work out it must have been her fault.”

Spike leaned on one of the bags and frowned thoughtfully. His mom had been staying in the Crystal Empire last he’d heard; had been ever since the news reached her that Cadance was finally going to be giving her a grandchild. From what Shining Armor had said in his letters, their mom had been commanding the staff like she was the acting princess.

So it begged the question: why was she here?

“How’d you even find out that Rarity and I broke up anyway?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. “I hadn’t sent a letter about it yet.”

“A mother has her ways,” she responded with a mysterious grin.

“Twilight told you, didn’t she?” Spike asked, referring to the younger Twilight, his older sister.

“Well, yes,” she frowned, “but first I overheard Shiny and Cadance talking about it. They were being very loud outside my door. Honestly, those two, airing out family business where the help could overhear. Anyway, after I heard, I immediately went to Canterlot to talk with Sparky and she told me the whole thing.”

Spike’s brother and sister had sold him out. Two could play that.

“Honestly, I’m fine!” he insisted as gently as he could. “Shining and Cadance need you much more than I do. They have the new baby and everything. That little filly needs her grandma around!”

Velvet held a hoof to her mouth and chuckled giddily.

“I must admit I do enjoy being a grandmother,” she stated with steadily peaking enthusiasm. “It’s like some kind of wonderful drug, and every hit just leaves me wanting more, more, more grandchildren!”

Spike didn’t like the hungry gleam in his mother’s eye, or the general direction the conversation seemed to be heading, so he quickly changed tactics.

“Well what about Twilight? It’s been so long since her last date. Maybe you should go set her up with some eligible stallions.”

“Oh, she’s busy all the time,” Velvet muttered half-bitterly as she began her cleaning in earnest. “I suppose I can’t be angry about it, since Celestia delegates so many responsibilities to her. Shiny and Cadance didn’t start ruling the Crystal Empire until after they’d already found each other; they had much more time for dating. And besides, your brother and sister have all those assistants and aides and servants catering to their every whim.”

She let her magic take over the rag and spray bottle as she dashed to Spike’s side and held his cheeks once more. “But you, Spikey… your sister moved out years ago and left you all alone, in charge of this big drafty library. My only solace was that you had a good mare to take care of you, but now what? Who do you have? Who?”

Spike shrank a little under the intensity of his mother’s glare. He was briefly reminded his childhood and being expected to answer difficult questions like, “Who ate all the cookies,” and, “What did your father get me for Hearts and Hooves Day?”

“Um… I have you…?” Spike was compelled to answer by her powerful motherly stare. He really wanted to say that he didn’t need anypony, he really did, but that gaze made him say exactly what she wanted to hear.

“Darn right you do,” she said with a nod as she went back to the task at hoof.

Spike’s jaw hung limply as the gravity of the situation sank in.

***

Spike sat on the park bench, his face pressed against his claws, trying desperately not to cry publically. It was the later half of the afternoon, and it would only be a few more hours until sunset. His mother would be expecting him to return by sunset for dinner, so at most he only had another hour and a half of quiet solitude.

“Yo, move over, cap’n,” a gruffly feminine voice commanded, interrupting Spike’s precious solitude. “You’re hogging the bench.”

Spike looked up into the frowning face of a minty green coated unicorn wearing a beat-up old straw hat. He scooted over and returned to his wallowing. He sighed into his claws dejectedly, but watched the mare out the corner of his eye.

“Thanks a bunch, pal,” the unicorn muttered.

She leaned to one side and let her saddlebags drop off her back, rather than use her magic the way a unicorn would normally do. She removed a lyre from the bag before shoving the empty container beneath the bench and out of the way. Finally, she tipped the hat forward with a showy swipe of her hoof, flipping it over her horn and onto the ground where it landed open side up. The unicorn climbed up on the bench and took a seat with her legs dangling over the edge of the bench. She reclined against the back rest and played her instrument lazily.

“So what’s with the face?” she asked conversationally while she played. “You sad or somethin’? Or do you always look like that?”

Spike chuckled weakly. “No, I don’t always look like this. I’m just stressed out.”

“Well, tell me about it, maybe we can cheer you up,” she said.

“No offense, but why do you care?” Spike asked.

The unicorn shrugged. “Well I’m here trying to make money, but your sourpuss is going to drive away all the marks. I can’t exactly ask you to leave, since the park belongs to everypony, and you got as much right to sit here doing your moping thing as I do to do my music thing. But it’s also my spot, and I ain’t moving just to accommodate you… not that I could.”

The unicorn stuck out her chin and indicated an earth pony mime a little ways down the park’s dirt road. The mime stood in front of an elderly couple on a bench who clapped loudly at the idiotic capering of the noiseless clown. The mime looked in their direction and pretended it was hanging dead from the end of a noose.

“Street law,” the mare stated simply. “You try to muscle in on another performer’s turf, you get got. It’s the Everfree out here.”

“Are you serious?” Spike asked with a raise of his eyebrow.

He’d adventured with the mighty Elements of Harmony. He’d battled evil demigods and half-mad ancient sorcerers. He was as well read and cultured as any scholar in Canterlot or beyond. As such a dragon, he could not fathom with one hundred percent of his mental faculties a world wherein a grown stallion in white face paint and black spandex could be considered threatening.

“Anyway,” the mare continued. “My name’s Lyra Heartstrings. Tell me why so glum, chum? Is it mare troubles? Guy with a face like that usually has mare troubles.”

“I’m Spike, and it’s kind of that,” Spike admitted, tilting his claw side to side noncommittally. “See, I broke up with my mare about a week ago…”

“Anypony I know?” Lyra asked, peering into her hat at the bits a passing pegasus had tossed in.

“Do you know Rarity?”

Lyra nodded. “My roomie Bon-Bon buys stuff from her sometimes. I got dragged to that place a couple of times and that chick tried to put me in a dress: a big frilly one. I tell you it’s black cocktail or nothing for this gal.”

“That’d be her. We broke up and decided to be friends still; the whole bit. Things were going good, hearts were mending… then my siblings threw me under a bus and told our mom.”

“Ooph, mom troubles are worse than mare troubles.”

“You’re telling me,” Spike groaned. “She decided to come to town and take care of me because I’m so heartbroken.”

“Is it working?” Lyra asked with a raised eyebrow. She nodded thankfully to a jogger who listened for a minute before dropping some coins and continuing on her way.

Spike looked up and furrowed his brow in thought. “Well I’m certainly not thinking about Rarity anymore. So I guess in the most perverse way possible, it is working.”

“Not so bad, then,” Lyra chuckled. Her hoof froze on the strings of her lyre and she sat up, scanning the skies alertly. “Wait… There’s a dragon around here…? Besides you, I mean.”

“No,” Spike sighed. “I mean my pony mom.”

“Oh, that’s right, I remember hearing you were Princess Twilight Sparkle’s little brother, so of course you’d have a pony mom. You work in the book tree don’t you?” She relaxed and continued playing from the note she’d left off on.

“It’s called a library,” Spike replied incredulously. Had she really not known who he was? He’d given his name earlier out of politeness, but there weren’t many other dragons in Ponyville, and in the past few years he had become sort of famous... “And yes, I’m the Ponyville librarian; have been since Twilight started taking her princess duties seriously.”

“Cush gig,” Lyra whistled. “You get to work out of the house… or live out of the office… tomatoes-potatoes.”

“Tomatoes-tomahtoes,” Spike corrected.

“The hay is a tomahtoe?”

Spike barked with laughter. “You’re so weird,” he shouted between fits of laughter.

Lyra’s face grew redder with every chuckle from Spike.

“Quit laughing,” she groused.

“No, no,” Spike soothed as his laughter dwindled. “It’s cute, really. Thank you, I needed to get my mind off things.”

“I’m so happy for you…” Lyra conceded half-sarcastically. She was at least a little happy that she’d managed to cheer him up, even if it was at her own embarrassment.

They sat in silence for a bit, Lyra playing and collecting tips, while Spike closed his eyes and just enjoyed the company and good music. Lyra may have been a little rough around the edges, but she played her lyre like an angel.

The music stopped abruptly and Spike opened his eyes to see what was wrong. He watched in concern as Lyra’s eyes narrowed dangerously and her lips curled into a sneer.

“Hey! You! Yeah, you with the fat flank!” she shouted, removing her hoof from the strings to point angrily at an earth pony who was dressed for an evening jog. “You listen for more than twenty seconds, you put a bit in the hat!”

The pony turned to glare right back and make a rude gesture with her hooves.

“What was that!?” Lyra screeched. “Don’t make me get off this bench! Yeah you better slowly jog away!”

“Ugh,” she fumed. “I need to start getting to the park earlier; I ain’t got time for these broke mares out here…”

Spike shook his head incredulously at the antics of the mare. She was so lively that he couldn’t help but feel a little of the weight on his shoulders slide away.

“Anyway, I was wondering, what’s so bad about having your mom come around and do some housework?” Lyra asked.

“Besides the fact that I’m an adult and I can take care of myself?”

“Yeah, besides that,” she nodded.

“She’s kind of controlling, to tell the truth,” Spike answered. He sighed and stretched out on the bench like a couch. “She’s got to have everything just so, wherever she is. She’s only been here six days and she’s completely rearranged my kitchen, which is a pain because I love to cook, and surprise, I have trouble reaching my spices if they’re on the upper shelves.

“But I guess that doesn’t matter, because she insists on making all my meals. She’s not a bad cook, per se, but everything – everything – has to be healthy with her. If I want to eat a big bowl of chilled sapphires and Rocky Road for dinner, I should be able to. Then there’s the lack of privacy. I barely managed to convince her that I didn’t need her coming with me on a walk around the park. She watched me brush my teeth last night, and tried to tell me that I was doing it wrong. I’ve been doing it the same way for twenty-three years! We don’t even have the same kind of teeth and she’s telling me she knows better!?”

Spike paused from his venting to take a few short breaths to calm down.

“That sounds pretty bad,” Lyra grimaced. “But it’s just a lot of little things; just moms being moms…”

Spike sat up and stared into her eyes with the haunted look of a war veteran.

“My brother had a baby a while ago, and now she won’t stop asking when I’m going to find another mare and start giving her more grandkids. ‘I talked to Sparky about it, she said she did research and dragons can breed with almost anything,’ she says. Have you ever had a frank, open discussion with your parents about the cross-species viability of your sexual organs? Because I did. Last night. It lasted three hours… and included diagrams my sister drew.”

Every muscle in Lyra’s body went slack at the very thought of reliving the horror of The Talk with her parents, with hoofmade visual aids no less. But the idea of having The Talk, this time with her parents encouraging sexual activity, made her drop her lyre.

She caught it in her magical grip just inches from the ground.

“Screw that,” she whispered. “Screw that so hard.”

She slid off the bench, packed away her instrument, and emptied her hat into her bags. She levitated the dragon off the bench and led him away like a balloon on a string.

“Where are you taking me?” Spike asked nervously.

“We’re going to get blasted,” she said simply. “We’re going to kill whatever cells in your brain remember last night. Don’t fight me, this is an act of mercy.”

Spike considered telling the mare that pony liquor didn’t really affect dragons the same way.

“And if alcohol won’t do it I’m dropping a coconut on your head until you get amnesia,” she added.

He wisely kept his mouth shut.

***

Spike opened the front door of the library and tiptoed inside. It was very weird, to be sneaking into his own house like a rebellious teenager, but he definitely didn’t want his mom waking up.

Lyra had taken him to a bar on the far side of Ponyville, far enough away from the town square that Spike had never actually been to the tavern. He and Lyra had spent the evening laughing and playing games; he’d destroyed Lyra at darts but her poker face had proven unbeatable and several rounds had come directly out of his pocket. Big Mac had even made an appearance and had a drink with them before heading over to his usual high-stakes game of horseshoes in the backroom.

The lights suddenly flared up with an audible click of the switch.

Twilight Velvet sat at the table in the center of the library, her face a stern, maternal scowl of disapproval.

“Where have you been, young dragon? Do you know what time it is?”

“It’s like eleven?” he guessed. He looked at the clock and noted that he was only a few minutes off.

Velvet got out of her seat and trotted over. The smell wafting off of Spike stopped her cold. She flinched away and scrunched her nose at the sour stink.

“Have you been drinking!?”

“Yeah, a little bit,” he frowned.

“This is what you do when I’m not around, is it? You go out and get drunk?”

“Mom, you know alcohol doesn’t work on me,” he sighed. “And also, no, I don’t. I only went out because I got dragged to the bar by this girl that I met at the park.”

Twilight Velvet blinked.

“You met a girl?”

Spike’s eyes went wide. “No! I mean, yes! But it’s not…”

His mother’s scowl flipped into a manic grin.

“Goodness, picked up a girl at the park? That’s my son. I bet she was putty in your claws!” she gushed happily, prancing around the room, alternating between talking to Spike and muttering to herself. “Oh, but is it too soon? You’re still recovering from your last relationship. But no, this is good. If you fall off the scooter, you need to get right back on again. Yes, yes, this is good. This is wonderful even!”

Spike shook his head and climbed the stairs tiredly. His mother would be in her own world for a few more hours at least.

***

To say Spike was nervous was something of an understatement. The butterflies in his stomach had butterflies in their stomachs. He sat on the same park bench where he’d met Lyra the day before, his claws drumming silently on his knees in a vain attempt at keeping his nerves in check.

He glanced up at the tower to check the time: just about two hours until sunset, around the time he knew Lyra would be arriving.

“Yo, Spike-ay,” shouted Lyra as she approached with a grin. “How’s it hangin’? Came to listen to more of my sweet licks?”

She set up shop and plonked herself down next to Spike. As usual, the gentility of her playing clashed horrendously with crassness of her demeanor and language even as she played.

“Had a great time last night,” she beamed. “Haven’t been out like that in years.”

“Yeah it was great, but, uh, Lyra… I have to talk to you about something… and ask you for a favor…” Spike muttered nervously.

“A favor huh...?” Lyra grinned slyly. “I already get where this is going, and sure, I’ll go out with you.”

“Whoa, really!?” Spike exclaimed in relief. “I can’t even tell you how relieved I am to hear that. I was seriously nervous about explaining this to you.”

Lyra’s hoof thrummed a string too hard and severed it with a hard twang.

“Wait what!?” she yelled. She sat upright and stared at the dragon with her mouth agape in shock. “What the actual what!?”

“What?” he asked in confusion.

“You want to go on a date with me!?”

“Well you said you knew what I was going to ask and that it was cool,” Spike replied.

“I was trying to get a rise out of you!” she shouted. “Not get a rise out of you!

Spike opened his mouth to reply but snapped it shut quickly as he realized what she meant.

“No, wait, hold on,” he said defensively. “I think there’s been a breakdown in communication here.”

“Oh, you think, do you?” she snapped, puffing out her cheeks in annoyance.

“Okay look,” he said with a deep breath. “Starting from the top: yesterday when I got home my mom was pretty upset I stayed out most of the evening. I told her I only went out because I met a girl at the park, and before I could explain any more than that, she started getting all these ideas about what I meant by ‘met a girl’ and she kind of freaked out.”

“Freaked out good or bad…?” Lyra asked cautiously. She was still nervous about where this was heading, but began changing out the broken string with a replacement from her bag while she listened.

“First one, then the other, then the first again,” he explained. “She was kind of all over the place about it. Point is that I think it’s a way to prove to her that I don’t need her here taking care of me. I mean, not that I don’t love my mom, but… she needs to go. I’d normally just wait her out, but she went and bought herself some new bed linens, so I think she’s planning a long haul stay.”

“So you’re asking me to pretend to be your marefriend,” Lyra said slowly, trying to follow his train of logic. “Then your mom thinks you’re all better and trundles off to leave you to get more acquainted with your new lady? That’s how this scenario plays out for you?”

“Yes.”

“That’s quite possibly the stupidest, most asinine, featherbrained, fever dream of a crack pot scheme I have ever heard in my entire life,” Lyra said. “Not only is it a temporary fix at best, but if this doesn’t blow up in your face I’ll eat my lyre.”

Spike looked at his feet and tapped his claws together sheepishly.

“So you’ll do it?”

“You bet your teeth I will,” Lyra smirked. “But you have to scratch my back, too.”

Spike looked up and tilted his head questioningly but gestured for her to continue.

She bit the excess off her lyre’s replacement string with her teeth and plucked it a few times experimentally while she considered how to phrase her request.

“You just gotta do the same for me,” she explained.

Spike blinked. “The same what?”

“The same con,” she nodded. “Bonnie is… she’s my best buddy, practically a sister, has been since we were in kindergarten, and she’s always looking out for me…”

“And looking out for you includes your love life, I take it?” Spike guessed.

“Got it in one,” Lyra said with a tap of her nose. “She’s constantly trying to set me up on dates because she thinks I’m too shy or something to find my own. You help me prove I can get a guy on my own so I can get some breathing room, we’ll call this squaresies.”

“That’s fair,” Spike agreed.

“Awesome, but first things first: we’re going to need to have a dry run,” Lyra stated simply. “Now I get you’re on the mends from Rarity, and this is just a couple of friends helping each other in some shady dealings, but let’s be realistic here. Bonnie ain’t easy to fool, and I take it your mom’s pretty on the ball herself, considering she brought up a couple of brainboxes like you and Twilight Sparkle. They’re not going to believe it unless we can make it convincing, and it’s not going to be convincing unless we get to know each other a little better.”

“So a real date as research for our fake dates?” Spike summarized.

“Yup.”

“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard in my life that didn’t come out of my own mouth,” Spike said with a frown.

“Pick me up here at seven?”

“Nah, just meet me in front of Pasture on the Green.”

Lyra stuck out a hoof and Spike gripped it firmly. They shook on the deal, each wearing a grin at the absurdity of the situation they were involving themselves in. The deal struck, Lyra climbed onto the bench and struck a pose, one leg up on the backrest and the lyre held low like a bass guitar.

“Extended lyre solo!”

She began to strum the lyre gently, filling the air with a beautiful rendition of Classical Gas as she gyrated her hips ridiculously.

Spike decided not to tell her that, as she was playing alone, everything she played was a lyre solo.

***

Pasture on the Green was considered a family friendly restaurant, but prided itself on the quality of the food and drink. Members of their staff were known to have been wooed from higher class venues by the skill of the chefs. The restaurant often got the snub from highfalutin Canterlot types, but ponies in the know knew that guests could expect first class service and food without the first class attitudes. It was also one of the few places in Ponyville that served seafood of any kind, as many ponies had digestive issues in regards to fish.

Spike sipped at his shrimp chowder gently, trying not to be rude to the other guests in the restaurant. His table manners were deeply hardwired into his brain after years of courting Rarity.

Lyra, however, had no such handicap.

“This place is great,” she said, slurping at her pasta loudly. Her eyes were wandering around, taking in the ambiance and checking out the other guests. “I always avoided it because the outside is like those really stuffy places in Canterlot, but the inside is more casual-like; I like it a lot.”

“The food’s good, too,” Spike nodded. “So tell me more about yourself, Lyra.”

The minty unicorn tapped at her spaghetti sauce covered chin in thought, staining her hoof carelessly as she did.

“Not much to tell,” she admitted. “Grew up in Canterlot. Met Bon-Bon as a kid. Studied music in a liberal arts school in Canterlot. Got a job playing a full sized harp with the orchestra. Now I do the park stuff.”

Spike blinked. “You work with the orchestra?”

“I did,” Lyra sighed and began to lick the sauce off her hoof. “I got canned, then blackballed from a few other jobs I could’ve taken. I’m just doing the busking thing until the heat dies down, because hey, a girl’s gotta eat.”

“Oh, that’s awful,” Spike exclaimed sympathetically. “What happened?”

“We were doing this concert in Detrot, and the whole orchestra was having breakfast together at a hotel we were staying at,” Lyra grumbled angrily at the memory. “I was just minding my own business eating my oatmeal, and the conductor grabbed my flank. I kind of blew up at him, and well… the board of directors wasn’t happy about it.”

“What!?” Spike yelled. The other patrons all turned to him and he apologized quickly for the disturbance. “That can’t be grounds for dismissal! If anything he’s the one who should’ve been fired.”

“Oh, he got axed, too,” she explained. “I didn’t get fired for being groped; I got fired for throwing my coffee in his face.”

“But that’s an understandable reaction to being grabbed like that. You were startled and you threw what you had at hoof—”

“Then I kicked him in the ribs until security tackled me,” she said as she took another bite of pasta. “He wanted to press charges, but the board convinced him that he didn’t want the reason why he got his ribs cracked going public.”

“Do you…” Spike started to ask nervously. “Do you have a history of that sort of thing…?”

“Hey, don’t go thinking I’m some kind of violent bully or something,” Lyra puffed up indignantly. “I never did more than bop a pony on the nose before that, but that guy crossed a line on me.”

Spike nodded and took a deep interest in inspecting his spoon.

“My turn to ask a question,” she stated. “How’d you end up with a pony mom?”

“Well, that story goes back a while,” Spike sighed. “Twilight was six years old and taking the entrance exam to get into Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns. Now from what I was told, one of the proctors had some kind of grudge against my dad that went back years. He’s the royal astronomer, and I guess this other guy had been up for the same job.”

“Ugh, I hate guys that,” Lyra said with a sour face. “Gotta learn to let go.”

“Right, so, the proctor decides to set up Twilight to fail as a little bit of revenge. They have a bunch of different tests they can use as an entrance exam, but the proctor throws that all out the window and pulls out this dragon egg that’s been sitting in storage for years.”

“Oh!” Lyra exclaimed excitedly. “Was that your egg!?”

“Yup,” Spike smiled. “He tells Twilight to hatch the egg, thinking there’s no way this skinny filly could do it, but she does it right in front of everypony. Celestia found out about it and decided to take Twilight as her student. But then there was nopony to take care of me. Celestia said that since Twilight hatched me, I was her responsibility, but because she was too little, her mom took me home while Twilight stayed in the school dorms.”

“So she raised you until Twilight was old enough to do it herself?” Lyra asked.

“Yeah,” Spike nodded. “Twilight was leaving to stay at the school, and Shining was only around for a couple more years before he joined the royal guard. Mom was excited to have another foal, even if he was a dragon. I lived with mom and dad until I was old enough to start going to school myself, and that’s when I started living in the dorms with Twilight.”

“That’s honestly a pretty cute story,” Lyra chuckled.

“Me next,” Spike grinned. “What’s your favorite wine?”

“I don’t know, whatever’s cheapest or comes in the biggest box,” Lyra said with a frown. “It’s all just wine anyway.”

She punctuated her statement by levitating her glass and downing half of it, giving Spike an unimpressed face and a shrug. It had been the first instance of her using her magic all night, having instead chosen to oddly, for a unicorn, hold the fork with her hoof.

Spike stared for a moment in mild shock before he raised a claw and made eye contact with the sommelier across the dining room. The unicorn wine expert approached and Spike ordered an expensive dessert wine to replace the simple table wine Lyra had just polished off.

“You, uh, speak Prench?” Lyra asked.

“Yeah,” Spike replied. He hadn’t even realized he had switched languages when ordering the wine. “Sorry, I just ordered you something a bit better. It’s a nice chilled white wine, very sweet.”

“I guess you know a lot about wine, then…?”

“I picked it up over the years,” Spike explained. “Rarity had a thing for that sort of stuff and, well, you know…”

Lyra nodded mutely and pushed around the remnants of the pasta with her fork.

Spike frowned at the wall that had somehow come up. It was confusing to him, for her to have so suddenly closed off. He tried desperately to think of some topic to switch to, in the hopes that all he needed was a change of discussion. Music was out of the question, as most of their trip to the bar had been loudly arguing the merits of different classical composers over their mugs of watered down beer; it would just be treading old ground, and the point of this dinner was to learn something new.

“What about books? You have any favorite authors?” Spike ventured.

“I have some magazine subscriptions,” Lyra admitted with a sigh. “I like to read but… I don’t know. I just don’t do it often.”

“Okay…” Spike sighed. “How about plays? Seen any good plays?”

“Think the last thing I saw like that was the Hearth’s Warming Eve pageant a few years ago,” she replied.

“Hey, I was in that!” Spike exclaimed. “I was the narrator for a few years!”

Lyra nodded sedately. “Yeah, I think I might’ve caught one of your performances. It’s been a few years, though, and I only went with Bonnie and some of her friends because I didn’t have any other plans.”

Spike resisted the urge to groan. Things were quickly slipping downhill. To this point, he had never realized how little he and Lyra had in common.

“Spike!”

Lyra and Spike both jumped at the sudden exclamation next to them. They looked down and saw a young filly with an action figure riding on her back. She was beaming an enormous smile at Spike.

“Well hello, little missy,” Spike said with a welcoming smile. “Who’s that you’ve got there?”

“It’s you!” she exclaimed excitedly. She stood and held the little plastic Spike figure proudly above her head. She rocked it side to side in a childish attempt to animate it and roared loudly. She gently flicked a little switch on the back that made the mouth open and close. A green plastic flame popped out of the mouth whenever it opened.

“Wow, that’s a great one!” Spike laughed. “That one’s one of my favorites. Do you still have the wagon that it came with?”

“Sure do!” she nodded joyfully. “But my mom wouldn’t let me bring it.”

The filly slowly moved a hoof closer to Spike. The dragon and unicorn watched in amusement as the little girl jabbed softly at his arm. “I can’t believe you’re real!”

“Well of course I am,” he answered with a tousle of her mane. “What, did you think I was just a toy?”

“My friend Sea Skipper said you were real but I told her she was dumb,” the filly said with a frown.

“Well then, when you see her again you can tell her you met me and apologize. It wasn’t nice of you to call your friend names, so you should take this as a lesson that sometimes it’s good to give your friends the benefit of the doubt,” Spike lectured her gently.

“Glittershine!”

The filly shrunk nervously as an adult mare approached with a disapproving look on her face.

“Mommy told you to wait at our table while she used the restroom,” the mare chided. She looked up to Spike and Lyra and smiled abashedly. “I am so, so sorry about my daughter. We’re visiting from out of town and she got excited when she saw you come in. I told her to let you enjoy your meal in peace, and I thought she understood, but it seems somepony wants to be a Little Miss Misbehaves.”

“It’s fine, seriously,” Spike soothed. “It wouldn’t have been any bother at all to come over and say hello.”

The mare smiled gratefully. “She’s just such a big fan of your toys. I swear she owns them all.”

Spike leaned down and stage whispered loudly to the filly. “Don’t tell your mom, but I own them all, too.”

“Sorry again,” the mare said with a slight bow. “We’ll let you get back to your date.”

“Bye, Spike!” the filly shouted as her mother nudged her from behind towards their own table. “I think your marefriend’s pretty!”

Spike looked up and saw that some of the other patrons had taken notice of his exchange. Several of them smiled and tipped their glasses to him.

“Aren’t you popular?” Lyra teased.

Spike blushed lightly. “Well, I get around. I’ve gone on a few adventures and stuff, saved the day a time or two, but it’s weird that I’m most known for those toys. Guess the kids think dragons are cool.”

A few years before a small toy company had decided to manufacture a line of toys commemorating Equestria’s greatest heroes from history. While some of the heroes from antiquity had been hot collectibles, the line for the Elements of Harmony had been the one that really took off. And of that line the ‘Assistant to Princess Twilight Sparkle: Spike the Dragon’ toys had sold so well that they’d spun off into their own series.

“Not that I mind,” he chuckled. “Some of those toys actually are pretty cool. And I love seeing the little fillies and colts smile.”

“Do you even get any money out of those?” Lyra asked curiously.

“Of course,” Spike nodded. “All the royalties for using our images go to charity, though. We don’t get a bit into our own pockets.”

“That sucks,” Lyra groaned sympathetically.

“Nah, it’s what we all wanted. It was the only way we’d all agree to it. Just another day in the service of Mother Equestria,” Spike proclaimed as he puffed out his chest and gave a mock salute.

Lyra laughed and saluted back with the wrong, sauce-stained hoof.

The lightness of the evening had returned after the interruption by Spike’s little fan. Lyra had been especially surprised to hear that Spike was an avid reader of the Power Ponies comics. They talked long into the evening, breaking the conversation occasionally only long enough to order more of the dessert wine that Lyra had, despite her remarks to the contrary, simply fallen in love with.

***

What worried Spike wasn’t necessarily getting caught in a lie. Rather, he was worried about his mother’s reaction to him putting together such a duplicitous scheme just to get her out of his house. He loved his mother dearly, but with the stress of his breakup still weighing on him, he needed time alone. And it wasn’t a big lie by any means. He and Lyra weren’t playing their relationship off as some great, blooming romance. They were just a drake and a mare that had recently met and wanted to get to know each other better. That wasn’t too far off from the truth.

From the start, Spike had no illusions about the night going smoothly. The butterflies in his stomach had returned and begun carving a nice little bleeding ulcer into his nigh-indestructible dragon stomach.

Luckily, things had gone smoother than he could’ve imagined.

There had been a few hiccups at the start. When Lyra had arrived, promptly at seven o’clock, his mother had almost dashed to the door in her excitement. She’d cooed and fretted over Lyra the moment she’d entered the door.

“Oh, a unicorn, how wonderful, and so beautiful,” she had complimented, much to Lyra’s fluster.

After the initial once-over, Lyra had managed to acclimate to the attention and they’d settled in around the table for a lovely dinner his mother had cooked. Thankfully, she’d opted for a few of Spike’s favorites instead of the usual bland, boiled fare.

“Are you enjoying the meal, dearie?” Twilight Velvet asked cheerily.

“Sure am,” Lyra replied. “I don’t know why Spike complains, this is some top notch grub!”

Spike glared at Lyra with a wide-eyed look that tried to communicate, “Are you serious?”

Lyra returned the look with one of her own that silently replied, “What? You were totally complaining.”

Velvet covered her mouth and laughed into the back of her hoof. “Oh yes, that’s my little Spikey. He’s not fond of my boiled cabbage surprise, but he’s a growing boy and it’s good for him.”

“If you wanted me to grow you’d give me more gems,” Spike grumbled under his breath as he chewed his stuffed eggplant.

“Don’t mumble, Spikey, it’s rude,” she reprimanded. “Especially when your mouth is full.”

“Sorry, mom…”

Lyra snorted loudly. “Big tough dragon, Spike, getting browbeaten by his mommy,” she teased. “Or should I say Spikey-wikey~?”

Velvet chuckled as well. “Equestrian national treasure or not, he’s a good boy and good boys know to listen to their mothers.”

“I didn’t know what to think coming over here,” Lyra admitted, “but I gotta say you’re one impressive mare, Miss Velvet.”

“Oh, please, do go on,” Velvet laughed. “Really, you yourself are a refreshing young lady. Not to bring up hard feelings so early in your acquaintance, but you are quite different from the last mare he brought home.”

“I’ve met Rarity a few times,” Lyra nodded as she took a sip of cider. “She’s honestly a lot like you.”

Spike coughed loudly and beat his chest to make his eggplant go down.

“Well I suppose all boys do tend to look for girls like their mothers, whether they realize it or not,” Velvet assessed with a wry smile. “There’s some psychology that supports it, I believe.”

Spike began to sweat, his face slowly shifting to a sickly green color.

“Sure is. I mean really: unicorn, purple and white coloring, very proper and fashionable, ladylike manners, likes to call him Spikey…” Lyra looked down at Spike and smiled at his wide eyed, increasingly horrified face. “You did say that Rarity used to call you Spikey-wikey, didn’t you?”

Spike leapt out of his chair and rushed out the room and up the stairs. “Bathroom!” he shouted as he disappeared.

“It’s the first door on the left,” Velvet shouted up at him.

“I know where the bathroom is in my own house!”

The two mares laughed uproariously together.

“He’s going to make me pay for that later,” Lyra wheezed. “I hope you don’t think I’m picking on him too much.”

Twilight Velvet waved off her concern with a motherly smile. “The line between teasing and flirting is very thin. A strong boy like that needs a strong mare to keep him in line; keep him from getting too big of a head.”

Spike returned a few minutes later to find the two mares getting along like old sorority sisters. He sat at the table in a halfhearted attempt to finish eating while trying to make himself as small as possible, lest he make himself a target of their frighteningly girlish chatter.

“Lyra, can I ask why you don’t use your magic much? I’m sorry if it’s too personal, but I was just curious.”

That question got Spike to look up. Since he’d met Lyra he could count on one claw the number of times he’d seen her use her magic. It was odd to see a unicorn make do with her own hooves.

Lyra squirmed in her seat uncomfortably for a moment, her eyesight fixed on the plate in front of her, before answering.

“It’s not too personal, no,” she began. “I’m just… peculiar. My magic isn’t weak or anything, I’m just really comfortable using my hooves. My best friend is an earth pony, so that might have something to do with it, but it’s just how I am.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” Velvet assured her with a smile. “Everypony has their quirks.”

Lyra nodded bashfully but didn’t look up.

“Well I’ve certainly had my fill,” Velvet announced with a clap of her hooves. “How about we retire to the reading room? There are some very lovely cushions in there.”

Lyra and Spike stood to help remove the dishes but were waved off by Velvet. She levitated the dishes into the kitchen and told them she would take care of it later herself.

“How about drinks? Maybe some wine?” Velvet asked.

Lyra perked up a little. “Spike got me some wine I’d never heard of when we went out to eat last night. I wouldn’t say no to a glass of that stuff.”

“Oho?” Velvet snickered. “Well then go fetch us a bottle of the same wine, Spikey. I’m sure you have some in that wine rack of yours in the basement.”

Spike frowned and scratched at his chin. He did have a small rack downstairs among the back stacks of the library’s collection. The cool, dry storage cellar was perfect for keeping wines. But those were mostly reds that he’d kept around for when Rarity visited.

“I actually don’t have any,” he admitted. “I’ve got a lot of red wine, but no dessert wines.”

“Do you know where to get some?” Velvet asked.

“Well… yeah, but it’s all the way across town, and kind of expensive.”

“Nonsense,” Velvet declared. “Your marefriend has asked you for something, it’s your duty to get it for her.”

Velvet’s magic levitated a bit purse from upstairs and shoved it into Spike’s claws.

“Now go, go,” she commanded as she nudged him towards the front door. She slammed the door and rounded on Lyra with an eager glint in her eyes. “Now that he’s gone, it’s time for girl chat.”

Lyra swallowed the lump that had suddenly formed in her throat. She followed Velvet into the reading room on the second floor without a word.

“Come on now, sit with me, dearie,” Spike’s mother beckoned as she settled onto the large pile of cushions in the center of the room. “We simply haven’t a moment of this precious opportunity to waste.”

Lyra plopped herself down on a large cushion at the edge of the pile, trying to keep her distance from the mare out of nervousness. It was one thing to carry on a conversation when she had Spike to take a little of the heat off her when she started getting uncomfortable, but now she was in this without a safety net.

The cushions scattered in a flare of magic, clearing a path for Lyra’s cushion to slide closer to Velvet’s.

“I won’t bite,” the older mare smiled. She met the younger girl’s eyes and held the gaze for a few moments. She nodded with satisfaction and let herself roll onto her back bonelessly. “Ah, to be young again. I really do envy you, you know. To be so freshly in love… there’s nothing quite so much like it in life.”

“L-l-love?” Lyra sputtered. “Spike and I only just met!”

Velvet chuckled. “Well, an old mare knows these things.”

She reached a hoof up to Lyra’s chin and turned her face to meet eyes again.

“I can see it in your eyes,” she explained. “There’s that glassy, lovesick look in there for anypony to see. And the way you two look at each other... More than once I noticed you talking to one another without saying a word, sharing some conversation I couldn’t hear. I’m not as clever in the ways of love as my daughter-in-law, but I’ve seen a thing or two about a thing or three. It’s new, to be sure, but it’s there, and it’ll grow strong, given time. I have no doubt about that.”

Lyra shook her head in denial. “Can’t be love… we just met…”

“You keep telling yourself that, hon,” Velvet said as she let her arm fall back to her side. “Why so afraid to admit it? Still have reservations?”

Lyra shrugged uncomfortably. “Something like that. We’re just two very different ponies… creatures... whatever.”

“So you’re worried that you don’t have much in common?” Velvet asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Well yeah. I mean… he’s so smart and cultured, and I’m so…”

“…rather like me.” Velvet said.

“Miss Velvet, no offense, but we’re nothing alike,” Lyra scoffed.

“I meant when I was younger, you silly filly,” Velvet explained with a lighthearted shove of Lyra’s shoulder. “My children take after my husband, and that includes Spike, adopted or not. Night Light’s very much as he was when we were young: serious minded, worldly, bright, and eager to learn.”

Velvet scratched at an itch on her flank openly and without shame as she sifted through her memories with a smile.

“He was a real stick in the mud, that one,” she laughed, “and I was a little bit of a hellion; a lot like what I see in you, despite your attempts to hide it tonight. No, no, don’t look so shocked. Age and love will leash you down too, one day, and probably soon.”

Lyra worked her jaw in shock, unable to come up with a reply. Velvet reached up and closed her mouth for her with a smirk.

“You’re young, and right now you probably think to yourself that the difference between the two of you is such a very, very large obstacle,” Velvet mused. “When I met my husband the only thing we had in common was the stars. He was studying astronomy and would come out to the very edge of Canterlot, away from the streetlights and noise, to watch the stars.”

Velvet closed her eyes and crossed her arms tightly over her heart.

“I also loved the stars, but I didn’t know much about them. He taught me all about the constellations, and I introduced him to rock music.”

“You like rock!?” Lyra blurted in shock.

“Of course!” Velvet said. “As I said, I was a little wild in my day. I spent lots of time sneaking out of my parents’ house to see my favorite bands. I remember taking weeklong trips to see far off music festivals and such.”

Velvet rolled over and sat up, wearing a serious, but kind, expression.

“The point I’m making is this: having things in common is wonderful, but only as a starting off point; something to catch the eye. And I’m certain you have a few things in common, or the two of you wouldn’t have progressed this far. What makes a relationship worth keeping is the differences between you two. He’ll show you new things, and you’ll show him new things, and every day will be another opportunity to surprise one another. It’ll be a journey, and as you go along on it, you’ll find new things to love together. When love is real, when it’s healthy and built on respect and admiration, it changes you.”

“It’s just an old mare’s guess, but I think that’s what might have happened with Rarity…” Velvet explained sadly. “Poor boy spent so long changing with her, that when they were ready to take that journey together to grow their love into something that could hold them together the rest of their days, there was no journey left to be made. There were no surprises, no discoveries… they were an old married couple before they were even a new one.”

Lyra huffed in a mix of emotions: embarrassment, confusion, even guilt. The conversation had become astonishingly sober once Spike had left the room, and Lyra wasn’t exactly comfortable even in a casual setting discussing such lofty ideas as the meaning of love.

Lyra struggled with herself internally. She had promised to see this through with Spike, she’d shaken on it, and she knew it wouldn’t be easy from the start; but things had become so very real. It was easy to agree to the deal when the mare she was fooling was just ‘Spike’s Mom’. But Twilight Velvet had opened herself up this evening, and Lyra couldn’t help but like the older mare. It felt wrong to continue lying to her, to deceive her and play on her earnest wishes for her son’s happiness. In that moment, she desperately wanted to come clean about the whole situation.

But a deal was a deal.

“You’re getting ahead of yourself,” Lyra muttered as she turned away so Velvet couldn’t see her pained expression. “We could break up tomorrow, for all anypony knows. It’s not love. Don’t get your hopes up, please.”

Velvet sighed and batted at a cushion tassel.

“My son has been brave,” Velvet said. “I know he’s in pain, despite what he says. You can’t lose a love you’ve held for so long and not be shaken. But… his eyes haven’t been so sad since that night he came home late from having met you. I know I must sound pushy, trying to convince you to admit things you’re not ready to admit to yourself. But I wouldn’t be saying these things if I didn’t see that there was a real spark between you two. I’m just being a very selfish mother who wants happiness for her children. And please, if things don’t end up working out between you, just consider everything I’ve said as general life advice, from one friend to another.”

The door downstairs slammed open loudly, announcing Spike’s return with a bang. Velvet sat up and straightened out her coat and mane just as Spike burst into the room. He held a large bottle of wine and panted heavily, sweat pouring down his face.

“Rah… rah… ran all the way…” he wheezed. “Gah… got the guy… to chill it with magic…”

Velvet clucked her tongue reproachfully. “Oh dear, dear, dear… look at you, all sweaty on a date. I raised you better. And you forgot the glasses.” Velvet lifted the bottle in her magic and trotted down to the kitchen to fetch the glasses. A damp washcloth from the restroom flew into the room and landed on Spike’s head.

“Sorry about leaving you,” Spike apologized as he regained his breath and toweled off. “Everything go okay? Is she still buying it?”

Lyra stared sadly out the door Velvet had left through. “Yeah… you could say that…”

She looked at Spike as he rubbed his face vigorously with the towel. “I didn’t know dragons could sweat, aren’t you like lizards or something?”

“Well yeah, we’re kind of lizardy, sure, but we do it anyways,” Spike snickered. “You’ve got a lot to learn about dragons.”

“I guess I do…”

***

What worried Lyra wasn’t necessarily getting caught in a lie. Rather, she was worried about looking like a total dorkus in front of her best friend.

Spike had arrived at their small, two bedroom cottage for lunch promptly at noon, bringing with him a nice big cake from Sugar Cube Corner as an after lunch dessert. Bon-Bon of course had gushed endlessly over Spike’s manners and conversational skills. It was strange to Lyra to be in the place that Spike had been the night before: trying to make herself as unnoticed as possible to avoid becoming the target of teasing, even if she did have some teasing coming her way after the way she and Velvet had carried on.

“You’re a really great cook, Bon-Bon,” Spike complimented the mare on her roast water chestnut and pea salad.

“Thank you very much, Spike,” she said with a blush. “That’s one hay of a compliment coming from you. Unlike Lyra, I pay attention to the news, so I know how worldly you are. And please, I told you to call me Bonnie.”

“I’m not so worldly,” Spike said humbly. “There’s still a lot of places I’ve never been.”

“Do you like to travel much?” Bon-Bon asked.

“I do, but I’ve mostly only traveled as a part of a diplomatic entourage or on some mission from Celestia,” Spike explained. “Travelling is fun, but it really makes you appreciate home.”

Bon-Bon chewed on his words thoughtfully. “That’s very interesting,” she said. “I’d love to hear more about your adventures some time. Hopefully now that you and Lyra are seeing so much of each other, I’ll get that chance.”

Spike smiled and nodded respectfully. “That’d be great. And actually I hear that you’re taking a trip yourself in the near future.”

“Sure am!” Bon-Bon gushed excitedly. “I run a small mail order candy business out of the house. Next week there’s a candy convention in Seaddle where a lot of industry big wigs will be attending. They’re known for buying recipes from the small time confectioners, so it’ll be a great opportunity for me.”

“I’d love to try some of your candy later,” Spike said.

Bon-Bon got up from her chair and went into the kitchen, returning with a small candy dish balanced on her head. She dropped it on the table, went back to her seat, and waved a hoof in welcome.

“Help yourself to as much as you like.”

Lyra smiled gleefully and reached for the dish. Bon-Bon slapped her hoof away sharply. “Those are for your drakefriend, you need to start watching your figure.”

Spike bit the inside of his mouth to hold in the laughter at Lyra’s fuming glare. He reached for an emerald green candy at the top of the pile, popped it into his mouth, and bit into it. He closed his eyes and hummed in satisfaction as he crunched up the sour ball.

“Delicious,” he complimented as he reached for another.

“You know, I was really surprised when Lyra mentioned she was seeing somepony,” Bon-Bon said with a grin as she watched Spike. “I was really getting worried about this girl.”

All at once, the table jumped, Bon-Bon yelped, and Lyra upgraded her glare to a furious scowl at her friend.

“Yes, well,” Bon-Bon laughed tiredly as she rubbed the spot on her flank where she’d been kicked. “Regardless… when she told me exactly who it was she was bringing, you could’ve knocked me over with a feather.”

The table jumped again as Lyra tried to kick Bon-Bon a second time. The kick was deflected by the pink and blue-haired mare and the two girls exchanged heated glares of annoyance.

“Everything okay?” Spike asked nervously, pushing away the candy dish slowly.

“Of course, why do you ask?” they answered in stereo.

Spike coughed sheepishly and sipped his water, pretending he didn’t notice anything odd.

“So how did you two meet, again?” Bon-Bon asked.

“I was having a little evening stroll and stopped to take a load off,” Spike explained. “I was sitting on the bench that Lyra likes to busk on, and she just walked right up and told me to shove over.”

Bon-Bon snorted loudly. “Yeah, that’s Lyra. Rude to anypony and everypony. I love her dearly, but there’s no manners on this one.”

“You seem to not mind her lack of manners,” Spike chuckled.

“Well that’s just how she is,” Bon-Bon explained. “You just learn to love her.”

“Or die trying,” Spike said with a wry grin.

Spike and Bon-Bon laughed as Lyra’s face flushed bright red and she sunk into her chair, trying to disappear beneath the table.

Spike shot Lyra a quiet look that told her that they were even for last night’s cracks about his mother and Rarity. His joke wasn’t remotely as mean as when she’d said that if he was a dinosaur he’d be called ‘Oedipal Rex: The Terrible Mother Complex King’, but Spike wasn’t petty; he’d walk away with his small victory and call it square.

“I know it might not be appropriate conversation, but…” Bon-Bon began to say.

“Rarity?” he hazarded as a guess. He received a nod in confirmation and waved off her concern. “It’s fine, Bonnie, she and I are still friends.”

Bon-Bon smiled. “Yes, I’m a frequent customer of hers. Have you seen her lately? Does she know about,” she lifted hoof and waved it around vaguely, “about this?”

“This,” Spike waved his claw in imitation, “is new enough that, no, I haven’t had the chance to tell her or anypony else yet. And no, I haven’t seen her. We’re taking a little time away from each other to let the tender feelings scar over a little.”

“I heard about your breakup a couple of days after,” Bon-Bon said with a nod. “She’d closed up shop for a bit. She was very… listless. But she’s doing better. I saw her yesterday, in fact.”

Spike smiled wistfully. “Our friend Fluttershy dropped by the other day and told me something similar… It’s great to hear…”

Lyra sat up straight in her chair and reached over to give Spike a rough, reassuring tap on the shoulder. He looked up and she gave him a supportive grin that he returned.

“You’re so cute together,” Bon-Bon said with a giggle.

Before Spike or Lyra could respond, Bon-Bon was already clearing away plates.

“Tea and cake time!” she announced happily.

“Finally!” Lyra declared with childlike joy. She quickly levitated the plates off of Bon-Bon’s head and rushed into the kitchen.

“She does love sweets, that girl,” Bon-Bon said over her shoulder as she went to prepare the tea.

Lyra carried the cake box out and set it on the table. She opened it and inhaled the scent of chocolate frosting and freshly baked cake that wafted out.

“That explains why you liked that wine so much,” Spike said. “You’ve got a real sweet tooth.”

“How do you think me and Bonnie met?” Lyra asked. “We were in kindergarten, she had a bag of candy, I asked her to be my best friend so I could get some. Rest is history.”

“Oh dear,” Bon-Bon exclaimed from the kitchen. She came out a moment later with a frantic look on her face. “We’re out of tea!”

“Good, then we get straight to the cake!” Lyra said with a giddy clap of her hooves.

“No, no, no!” Bon-Bon said sternly. “Cake demands tea!”

“But we don’t have any tea!” Lyra snapped.

“Then go get some!”

“Why don’t you get some if you want it so badly!?”

“Because I have to stay here and entertain Spike!”

“He’s my guy friend, so why should I go!?”

“Because, for one, left to your own devices you’ll eat the cake while I’m out!” Bon-Bon shouted. “And for two, the point of this lunch is so that I can get to know Spike better!”

“Whose stupid idea was that!?” Lyra barked.

“Yours!”

Lyra narrowed her eyes dangerously and grit her teeth. “Why don’t I just go get that tea…?”

Lyra trotted out the front door, slamming it for good measure on her way out.

Bon-Bon’s angry grimace dropped as she turned to Spike. “Well, now that we know the tea’s on the way, let’s just have a nice chat while we wait.”

Spike panicked a little as the scenario he found himself played out the same as it did the previous night at dinner, but with his and Lyra’s positions reversed. When he’d returned from his impromptu errand, Lyra had been shaken by whatever she and his mother had talked about in his absence. He steeled his resolve and sat at the table with the same diplomatic reserve he would use at a banquet with heads of state.

“Of course,” he replied. “What do you wish to talk about?”

“Oh, you’re all tensed up,” Bon-Bon said with a playfully exaggerated shiver. “No need for nervousness. We’re just a couple of new friends having a chat.”

A kettle whistled loudly from the kitchen and Bon-Bon left to attend it. She returned a few moments later carrying a tray with a tea pot and three cups sitting neatly in saucers on her back.

“I thought you said there was no more tea…”

Bon-Bon smirked. “There isn’t. This is the last bit of it. You don’t really expect to have only one pot for all of this cake, do you?”

Spike frowned but accepted the tea she offered with his thanks. He sipped the tea gingerly and sighed. “Good tea.”

“Mmm, very,” she agreed. “I’d offer to cut you some of the cake but Lyra is going to be mad enough that she didn’t necessarily have to go out for more tea.”

Spike considered telling the mare that it wasn’t nice to lie to a friend like that, but under the circumstances the words felt hollow even in his head.

“So tell me what it is you see in Lyra,” Bon-Bon asked bluntly.

“Excuse me?” Spike asked with a raise of his eyebrow.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Bon-Bon said. “Lyra’s a great mare. But you’re a big time fancy celebrity. You ran in those high society circles for all those years when you were hanging around with Rarity, and you’re related to honest to Celestia nobility. Why not date some foreign princess from an exotic land, or a rich heiress? I’m sure a guy with your type of social capital could date a Wonderbolt if he wanted. You do have an in with them, seeing as a friend of yours is on the team... so why Lyra for your rebound fling?”

Spike stared, aghast at what he was hearing.

“I don’t think you should talk about your friend like that,” he warned, a little anger in his voice.

“I’m not talking about her like anything,” Bon-Bon dismissed with a sip of her own tea. “I even said she was great.”

“You’re implying that she’s not good enough to date me just because she’s not famous, or rich, or athletic,” he growled.

“No I’m not,” she replied coldly. “I’m just saying that you’re good enough to have a lot of options, and I’m just curious; why Lyra?”

“Why not?” Spike snapped. “Lyra’s great. She’s smart, she’s hilarious, she’s exciting, and she’s an incredible musician. Sounds like a first class choice to me.”

Bon-Bon set her teacup down and let her icy demeanor melt into a warm smile. “Very good answer.”

Spike narrowed his eyes. “This was a test?”

“Please don’t be upset,” Bon-Bon said as she shrank away shyly from Spike’s angry stare. “I’m just looking out for Lyra.”

Spike gulped his tea down in a single swallow, the temperature not even registering to his dragon tongue. He poured himself another cup and let most of the edge out of his voice. “Lyra said you always looked out for her like a sister would… not that I’m happy with your choice of test, mind you.”

“Sorry,” she apologized sincerely. “I was just worried, and I had to be sure that your intentions were… honorable. Given your unique position, I didn’t want you taking advantage of her. You didn’t seem the type, but I had to be sure.”

Spike sighed heavily. “Yeah, okay. I get that. But what exactly do you mean ‘unique position’?”

“I’m talking about your notoriety,” she explained. “It wouldn’t be the first time a naïve young girl was taken advantage of by a celebrity she idolized.”

Spike let loose a short bark of laughter. “She didn’t even know who I was when we met, except that I was ‘that dragon that works at the book tree’. Can’t use social clout against somepony that doesn’t even know you have any. And besides, I’m not exactly Sapphire Shores over here. Most ponies know who I am because I’m so close to deservedly famous ponies, and I’m pretty popular with foals because of my toys, but I’m not getting hounded for autographs day and night or anything. You’re grossly exaggerating my fame.”

Bon-Bon seemed to struggle with herself for a moment before leaning forward, lowering her voice conspiratorially.

“I think you need to see something…” she whispered as though they were being overheard. She got up and motioned for Spike to follow.

She led Spike out of the dining room and down the short hall leading to the rear of the cottage. She pointed at two of the doors.

“Bathroom… linen closet…” she explained. She pointed to the other two doors and added, “My room… Lyra’s…”

She trotted up to the door and opened her mouth to pull the handle and open it. She paused and turned to Spike, a glint of seriousness in her eyes.

“Lyra made me promise to keep this a secret,” she explained slowly. “I’m only showing this to you so you know that you could hurt her if you’re not careful.”

She opened the door and stepped inside, turning to watch Spike as he followed her in.

Lyra’s room was messy, very messy, especially for a girl’s room. Spike knew a lot of girls, and none of them kept such messy, messy rooms. A pile of empty and battered pizza boxes was stacked next to her bed, an alarm clock resting atop it like she was using it as a night stand. A mess of empty soda cans was sprawled out against the far wall, amidst the dented cans sat an old sock that was tied up and filled with something to weigh it down like a bean bag. Empty cardboard boxes, junk mail, the odd piece of clothing, all strewn about the floor carelessly.

There were only two clean, well maintained areas of the room: a glass cabinet filled with various stringed musical instruments, and a shelf above her desk with carefully arranged and posed action figures.

Spike stepped over some of the clutter and took a closer look at the figurines. They were all Elements of Harmony toys, and the vast majority of them were his. She had an impressive collection: Hearth’s Warming Spike with Realistic Toy Sack Action, Firefighter Spike with Battle Walrus Mount, and even the ultra rare King Spike AB-8777 of Phantom Planet Metal Space Dragon. The Space Dragon Spike wasn’t even available to the public; it could only have been obtained from the raffle at the Cantercon toy convention.

Above the shelf was a large poster of himself standing next to Cadance, Shining Armor, Twilight, and the rest of their friends; in his claws he was holding the Crystal Heart that he had helped save so many years ago. The picture had been taken to commemorate the fifth anniversary of Shining and Cadance’s rule and turned into a huge woven tapestry that hung in the library in the Crystal Empire.

A golden magical aura wrapped around Spike and lifted him gently from his feet. He was levitated out into the hallway and dropped next to an equally stunned Bon-Bon. Lyra stood in the hallway, her head hanging low, mane covering her eyes.

“I thought you were going to the store,” Bon-Bon said, her voice cracking with shame.

“I borrowed some tea from the neighbors instead,” Lyra answered tremulously. “Spike, I think it’s time for you to go.”

“Lyra, why didn’t you…?”

Lyra’s magic wrapped around Spike again and carried him briskly out the front door. He was dropped roughly on his tail and the door slammed behind him, the locks clicking into place loudly to punctuate the finality of his dismissal.

He stood and knocked on the door loudly, calling for Lyra or Bon-Bon to open up and let him in, but his pleas were drowned out by the sounds of shouting coming from the other side of the door.

***

It was already past sunset by the time Spike got back to the library. He hadn’t been up to facing his mother after the incident at Lyra’s house, so he’d just gone for a walk through the Everfree Forest. It had been years since the return of the Elements had calmed the rampant wild magic of the forest, making it as tame and peaceful as any other place in Equestria. Despite the taming of the Evefree, most ponies who remembered the days when it was one of the wildest, most frightening places in the kingdom tended to steer clear, making it the perfect place for a quiet walk alone.

Spike opened the door to his home and trudged in miserably. He looked up and glanced around the darkened library. He reached for the light switch and flicked it on.

“Mom? You here? I’m home,” he called.

Spike went into the kitchen in search of his mother, and maybe something to eat, and found a note addressed to him stuck to the fridge with a magnet.

Dear Spike,

Sorry I left without saying goodbye, but I figured it would be best for me to take my leave sooner rather than later, seeing as you don’t need me here now. I know you think I can be a bit controlling, and maybe you even think your old mom is a touch annoying, but know that if I’m anything, it’s something I am because I love you and your brother and sister very, very much.

I know how hard it was for you when you broke up with Rarity, and even though it’s not an immediate fix, I’m proud that you managed to pick yourself back up so quickly and put yourself back out there to find such a wonderful young lady.

I’m heading back to Shiny’s to help him out with the baby. I can tell that you’re in good hooves here with Lyra looking out for you. Take good care of this one, okay? Mommy really likes her.

Love,
Mom

Spike reread the note. Then he reread it again, and a third time. His heart sank a little further with each reading.

He leaned against the fridge and slid to the floor tiredly. He stared at the note in his claws, biting back frustrated and confused tears. He didn’t know why he was sad, he didn’t know why he felt so lonely.

All he knew was that he wished his mom was there to give him a hug.

***

Spike sat at Lyra’s bench, watching Celestia’s sun inch steadily towards the horizon.

His only attempt to get Lyra or Bon-Bon to answer the door at their place had ended with him standing on their stoop for hours, listening to the sound of them arguing quietly behind the door.

Five days: that’s how many days in a row he’d come to Lyra’s bench at the time he knew she liked to perform and waited for her. She had never shown up.

The electric streetlights that illuminated the park’s pathways for evening strollers flickered to life as the sun sunk behind the horizon. He’d wait a few more hours before calling it a night and trying again the next day after work.

“Shove over, you’re hogging the bench.”

Spike jumped off the bench and gasped. “Lyra!”

“Yeah, that’s me,” she grumbled as she set down her hat and took out her lyre.

“I’ve been trying to talk to you all week,” he said simply.

“Well congratulations, you lamed it out and here I am,” she quipped. “You must be very happy with yourself.”

“Can you not act like this and just talk to me like a normal pony?” he asked with increasing frustration.

Lyra climbed on the bench and started playing. Spike noted that her music seemed more somber, more sedate, than normal.

“Well?” she asked. “Go on. Say what you want to say.”

“I went to your house and you didn’t answer,” he said. “And I’ve been waiting here every day for you to show up. Have you been avoiding me?”

“Obviously,” Lyra scoffed. “Thought you were smart. I didn’t answer the door because I didn’t want to talk to you, and I’ve been coming to the park, but every time I came you were here so I just went home.”

“Why come and talk to me today then?”

“Because Bonnie’s at her candy convention thing and I’ve eaten everything edible in the house,” Lyra explained tersely. “Either I work today or I get to go to bed hungry.”

“You could’ve just played somewhere else, you know,” Spike explained. “You didn’t have to starve yourself just to avoid me. Or you know, could’ve just asked me politely to leave.”

“I already told you, the park belongs to everypony,” she said as though speaking to a child. “This is my spot and I’m not about to move just to accommodate you, but I’ve got no right to ask you to leave, either. So I went home. But now I don’t got that choice. A girl’s gotta eat.”

A low gurgle emitted from Lyra’s stomach, agreeing with Lyra’s sentiments about the necessity of eating.

Spike turned on his heel and ran the short distance to town square. Even though it was already early evening, some of the vendors in the square still had their shops up. He quickly purchased a couple of raspberry tarts and hurried back to Lyra’s bench.

He offered the bag of goodies to Lyra who eyed them dubiously.

“Eat,” he told her. “You can be mad at me after your stomach is full. And if it’s not enough I’ll give you some money so you can go buy something to eat. Just talk to me, okay?”

The unicorn’s empty stomach won out in the end. She set down her lyre and took the bag, tearing into the sweet pastries hungrily.

Spike sat on the bench and waited for Lyra to finish eating.

“Thanks,” she said as she wiped crumbs from her mouth. She wadded up the paper sack and tossed it into a waste basket across the pathway. “Two points.”

“You’re welcome,” he said. “Feeling less crabby?”

“Yeah,” she sighed.

“What’s the deal with you pretending you didn’t know who I was when we met?”

Lyra flinched at the sudden question. “Going right for it, huh?”

“It’s kind of been weighing on my mind for a while, yeah.”

Lyra picked her lyre back up and strummed it distractedly. She wasn’t playing loud enough to be heard, but the motion was soothing to her.

“How could I not know who you were?” she asked. “You’re Spike: the only pony-loving dragon in Equestria, friend of the Elements of Harmony, savior of the Crystal Empire, blah-blah-blah. All that and you’ve lived in Ponyville for what, like ten years or something? Who hasn’t at least heard of you?”

“So why pretend?” Spike asked, still genuinely confused.

“I don’t know, I was just nervous, I guess,” she said. “I was trying to play it cool. I mean, I’ve been following the news stories about you for a while, I collect the toys they make of you, I got like a frickin’ shrine to you in my room, for Celestia’s sake.”

“So what, I’m like your hero or something?”

“Dude, no!” Lyra exclaimed in shock. “Don’t put a label on it, it makes me sound like an ultra creeper. I just think… that you’re cool, is all…”

“I knew I had fans,” Spike said with a frown, “but I thought they were all kids.”

“Well, there are adults too,” she stated as a matter of fact. “We mostly just kind of keep it on the downlow. Most ponies don’t understand that an adult can be really into something made for kids, like little toy dragons, and be perfectly normal everyday folks.”

Spike chewed on that for a minute. He could recall that once or twice somepony, an adult somepony, had run up to him excitedly asking for an autograph. They usually said it was for some kid they were related to, but now it made sense that they could’ve just been asking for themselves.

“So… you think I’m cool…?” he asked with a playful grin.

Lyra chuckled a little. “Shut up. Whatever you’re thinking, it’s not like that.”

“What’s it like, then?”

“Well I don’t know about other ponies,” she answered carefully. “For me it’s… I kind of identify with you, you know? I mean, you’re a fire-breathing dragon that doesn’t eat meat and goes on dates with ponies… you go on missions to save Equestria from evil and you’re all super nerdy bookish…. You’re an outsider, a weirdo, like me. But ponies don’t dislike you for your weirdness. They love you for it. You’re successful, not in spite of your weirdness, but because of it. How could I not admire that?”

“You identify with me because of how weird I am?” Spike laughed. “You’re not that weird, Lyra.”

“Are you kidding?” she shot back. “I’m a unicorn that prefers using her hooves to her magic. I have a temper, I’m sarcastic, I’m rude, I’m an adult that plays with toys, and I can’t hold down a job because whenever I’m not putting my hoof in my mouth I’m putting it in some jerk’s ribs. I’ve got a few friends, but frankly, most ponies that have met me for more than five minutes would rather cross the street than say hello to me. I am the second biggest oddball in this entire village, next to you.”

“I guess when you put it that way…” he said with a grin. “So why never come up and talk to me before? We don’t live far from each other. You could’ve just come by the library.”

“Like I said, I was nervous,” Lyra explained. “Then out of the blue I find you sitting here, looking so sad … I wanted to know what was wrong, so I tried to play it off all cool and aloof. Then we got to talking and you weren’t anything like I imagined you would be.”

“How so?”

“You weren’t like a celebrity,” she said. “You were super down to earth and nice, and… you were just a cool guy all around. We went out drinking and I thought to myself ‘I could really see myself being friends with this guy’. I stopped thinking of you as the guy that poses for the front page next to the princesses and started thinking of you as my dorky friend that has mom troubles like any other schlub.”

“I am like any other schlub, though,” Spike told her. “I really don’t think of myself as famous. And other ponies don’t really make that big of a deal about it. 'Celebrity' is a really loaded word, and thankfully it hasn’t become an issue for me. I like living a mostly quiet life.”

“See, that’s what I’m talking about,” she said pointedly. “You don’t care about things like that.”

They sat silently, each mulling over things in their own way now that it was all out in the open. A few late night joggers and couples out for walks stopped to see if Lyra would play for them, but she waved them along.

"When we decided to do this, I had no idea that our little plot might end up with me having... feelings..." Spike mumbled tiredly.

"You have... feelings?" Lyra asked cautiously.

"Yeah, Bon-Bon tried to bait me into getting angry by badmouthing you a little bit, to see how I felt about you, and surprisingly I did get pretty angry about it," he admitted. "Like more than I should've for a friend. And when you kicked me out of your house? I just did not know how to feel about that, but I did know that whatever I felt, it felt bad."

"Your mom gave me this huge talk about the meaning of love and stuff while you were out getting more booze," Lyra said. "I gotta say it shook me pretty bad. Made me question a few things about... the two of us."

"This fake relationship thing got kind of intense for both of us then," Spike laughed mirthlessly into his claws as he pulled them down his face.

“Who could’ve guessed that lying to the ponies most important to us, for entirely selfish reasons, could have blown up in our faces so spectacularly?” she laughed. “Oh wait, I could’ve. Because I did.”

She held up her lyre and grinned. “Guess I don’t have to eat this…” She waved it around in mock celebration and gave a weak, “Yaaaaay~”

“So what do we do now?” he asked.

“I don’t know…” she said. “Your mom thinks we’re in love but we just don’t realize it yet. She said she used her Old Mare-Sense or something. We should probably come clean to her.”

“Or…”

“Or what?” she asked with a questioning tilt of her head.

Spike stood on the bench and closed the distance between him and Lyra.

“We could go on another real date, see if maybe she’s right,” he suggested.

“We could…” she replied nervously. “We do have some sort of feelings for each other, so who knows…?”

“Yeah… who knows…?” Spike whispered, leaning in to press his lips against Lyra’s.

“Whoa!” Lyra shouted as she stuck her hoof in his face and shoved him back. “You put that boat back in the harbor, matey! We haven’t even had our second real date yet! What kind of girl do you think I am!?”

Spike blushed in embarrassment and resisted the urge to dig a hole into the center of Equestria and live among the moles.

“You, uh,” he started sheepishly, “you just tell me when it’s okay to kiss you, okay?”

“Well it wouldn’t be very romantic if I had to give you a permission slip, now would it?” she teased with a roll of her eyes. “At least we know one thing for certain.”

“What’s that?”

“I sure don’t think you’re cool anymore. You’re the hugest dork I’ve ever met.”

Spike blew smoke out of his nose in annoyance. Rarity had always been a sucker for him taking charge like that, but it seemed that his old tricks weren’t going to cut it with a mare like Lyra.

His annoyance was short-lived and gave way to confusion as Lyra leaned in and get him a sharp peck on the tip of his snout.

“Wha!?” he shouted, bringing his claw to the spot on his nose where she’d kissed him. “But you said…”

“I said you couldn’t kiss me yet,” she snickered excitedly. “I never said I couldn’t kiss you.”

She laughed and packed up her stuff, tilting the old hat on her head at a jaunty angle. “Let’s go get some food and take it back to your place,” she suggested. “You said you had all the Spike figures, right? You can show me what rare ones you’ve got.”

“Sure thing,” Spike said as he walked after her. “What are you in the mood for?”

“Hay burgers,” she stated simply. “Extra fries, extra ketchup, lots of cheese.”

“That stuff’s bad for you,” he quipped.

“So’s arguing with your mare,” she replied.

“Hay burgers it is.”