And Wine (or suitable substitutes for those a bit low on funds) was Given
So there’s a lot behind the school, right? Just a bunch of nothing, no buildings or signs. Just like, this hill that separates the school from the woods. Once you reach the hill, you’re officially off-campus, but not yet on park land, at least not as far as the ranger’s concerned. When the seniors started calling it the Smoking Hill and chilling up on top of it, he decided that chasing them off every day wasn’t worth his time, so it’s ours now.
See, that’s what I like about Baltimare. This isn’t like Canterlot, where it’s all stuffy unicorns and old stuff, but it’s way more chill than Manehattan. Yeah, big cities are great, but sometimes you just want to sleep in without the noise waking you up, you know? Baltimare’s just big enough to have stuff to do, but just small enough to be chill. I can appreciate that. Any other city, the park ranger would be chasing us off. Here? Eh, as long as we keep on the hill and don’t leave trash everywhere, he couldn’t care less.
I can see the hill from the street as I walk past school, making sure to stay on the other side, closer to the student apartments. The school technically has rules about having stuff like this around, but just as the ranger doesn’t care as long as we’re not leaving a mess behind, the one campus cop the school keeps around is older than like the friggin’ school and even if he wanted to he probably can’t even see well enough to figure out who I am. I’m actually pretty sure that’s him sleeping in his little steamcart. I grin. He probably thinks nopony’ll notice him, tucked in between Aven and Summerhill hall, but from the street you can kinda see him.
Baltimare School For the Musically Gifted isn’t such a bad place, really. I mean, I gripe about it, but it could be a lot worse. The school my parents sent me to in Manehattan after I got into a fight at PS 21 was awful. I’ve never seen a collection of snotnosed rich kid brats that bad since, and I’m grateful for it.
The plastic bag in my magic’s grip sways a bit in time with my step, and I can’t help but hum. Songs get stuck in my head and burrow deep. I hear the drum beats for days, sometimes, in a constant loop, and I imagine every little variation on them. The melody twists and becomes something else. I can’t explain it. I’m that kid who is always singing harmony with the radio, making up a part as she goes, below and above and all over the place.
My song carries me down the road, and I see her at last. Octavia is sitting up there, prim and proper, all her feathers in place. She doesn’t have feathers, actually. If she did they would be in place. Or something.
I’d wave, but I always end up losing my grip on whatever I’m levitating when I do that, so I’ll just say hello when I get there. I know she sees me, though, because when I cross the street she waves at me herself.
“Vinyl! You’re late,” she says. God, that accent is just omnipresent, isn’t it? No escape.
I trot quickly across the grass like it’s red hot and climb the hill. I give her my best grin.
“Yeah, well, I had some preparations to make, y’know?” I say. When I talk to Tavi, I try to give as good as I get. I know she can talk without using her Trottingham accent. I’ve heard her do it. No way you live in Baltimare like this for as long as she has and not have it rub off on you.
“Yes. Well,” she paused, and then cocked her head to one side. “Now what is in that bag, Vinyl?”
I may roll my eyes at it usually, but I love what that voice does to my name. It sounds all musical when she says it. “Aw, nothing,” I say, and reach the top of the hill.
It’s flat up here, more like some sort of levy than a real hill. It used to be, somepony told me, back when the river wasn’t dammed and the woods used to be floodplain.
“It’s obviously something,” Tavi argues.
I chuckle. “A surprise? I dunno. C’mon.” I keep going, going down the other side and laying in the grass. It’s perfect--nopony can see you here from campus.
“Why exactly are we here again?” she asks, following me. “I have a perfectly good dorm with a perfectly good bed and a futon if you wanted to see me…”
“Yeah,” I say, not bothering to really answer. Not yet.
Instead, I set the bag down and lay in the grass. It’s soft and springy, the way grass should be. If I close my eyes, and I usually do when I first lay down here, it’s kinda like being back in my bed. The breeze picks up, and I sigh.
“Vinyl?”
“C’mon,” I say, patting the grass beside me with a hoof. “You aren’t gonna get dirty, you know. Enjoy the breeze, enjoy the scenery, chill a bit.”
I close my eyes again and I hear her plop down beside me. I grin.
“This is a bit peculiar…” she says, but I know she doesn’t mind.
If Tavi minded, she wouldn’t be here. If Tavi minded me, she wouldn’t have lasted nearly this long. I mean, yeah, I’m pretty great. I’m well aware of how awesome I am. But I can be kind of… I don’t know. My mom calls it abrasive, which I guess is as good a word as any.
The best way to get over pulling a bandaid off is just to rip it, and the same goes for surprises. I don’t wait a bit. As soon as we’re both in the grass and out of sight, I pull the six pack out of the back and set it down with a smirk. I hold out a hoof.
“Ta-da!”
Octavia gasps. “What on Earth--”
“C’mon,” I say, cutting her off. I laugh and tug one off carefully with my magic. It’s good old Ponyst Blue Ribbon, cheap, terrible, and a student’s best friend. My magic envelopes the still cool can and I concentrate on it, cooling it further, feeling without feeling how the beer inside reacts. Magic is great. I don’t know how Tavi gets by without it.
I wave it in front of her. “Don’t be lame, Tavi! Just chill with me and a niiiice cold one.”
“Vinyl, honestly, this is hardly the place…” Octavia begins, but I’m quicker to the punch. Always am. It’s part of my charm.
“You know you’re curious. ‘Sides, where else you gonna go? I know for a fact you don’t have homework, and you’ve only practiced music while I’m chilling in your room, so I’m gonna guess you get lonely. Why not chill with me? You were gonna do that anyway.”
“I suppose I was…” She trails off. Got her. “But I don’t… well, I haven’t really tried this whole drinking thing.”
“Everypony tries it for the first time,” I say, waving it off. “See, I even made sure it’s cold, so it’ll taste better. And it’s not that bad. Don’t make a face, it’s not gross.” I pause. “Okay, make a face if you have to.” In front of her eyes, the can makes little lazy circles, captured in my blue aura. She looks at it with disgust, just like it’s the grossest thing she’s ever seen, but she’s looking, you know? Got her. Tavi can’t stand not knowing things. She also can’t stand the idea that I win at anything when it’s a competition between us. Not without giving me a fight. Music, school, anything. She won’t be competitive until it’s with me.
I friggin’ love it.
Especially right now. I sigh dramatically. “Well, I mean, if you’re gonna be lame, just more for me.”
She huffs. “No, I’ll not be falling for this again. I know what you’re doing.”
I pick up a second can and start cooling it off. I really should’ve got here quicker, so I wouldn’t have to do this. “And what am I doing, Tav?” I ask as I pop the first can open take a sip. “Hm?”
“Taunting me,” she says.
I just sort of hum, careful to keep smiling as I let the can go back to hovering. Ouch. Put that way, I almost feel bad about it. Like, I’ve always said it was more like teasing, you know, something you do to a friend. Taunting is mean, man, and that isn’t me.
She growls, “Give me one, then,” but she smiles right after. I let go of a breath I hadn’t been realizing I was holding. Geeze, why was I nervous? Or whatever that was.
“Here you go,” I say, sort of singing it as I pass the can along.
“Um… Ahem. You drank out of this one, Vinyl,” she mumbles.
“Oh, uh, right.” She’s blushing. I might be. God, what am I, eight? I give her the other can, glad that it’s cold by now, and focus on my own. Beer doesn’t say awkward things or accidentally give you the wrong can. I mean like, it actually can’t. It doesn’t have magic or hooves or like any of that. So.
I sit up on my haunches and wait until Tavi’s fumbled around with the little pull thing and opened hers, and then float my can over. “Cheers?” I say, grinning at her. Put on the charm, Vinyl, do what you do.
“I suppose. Cheers,” she says. Not exactly thrilled, no, but she does kind of smile.
I knock it back, chugging that bittersweet nectar of the gods. And by that I mean four bits for a six pack cheap as Tartarus pisswater. I always close my eyes when I do this. No idea why. Just reflex, I guess. Chug chug chug.
I hear Tavi cough, but ignore it. First sip is always the worst. Well, no, the first time you drink the dregs is the worst. I think.
I lean forward, swallowing with a sigh. Wonderful. I glance over at Octavia to find her making the stupidest face, just sticking her tongue out and looking at the can like it tried to bite her, and I bust out laughing. I can’t help it. She just looks ridiculous, her face all screwed up like that, just glaring at this stupid little can like it called her mom fat.
“Oh gods, Vinyl, how can you sit there and drink this as if it were water? It’s positively horrifying.”
I manage to stop laughing long enough to answer. “Easy. I’m used to it, and I like it. Besides, it’s not so bad.”
“I’m not sure I can finish…” She holds the can a bit away from herself.
“Ah, c’mon,” I say, prodding her with a hoof.
“Don’t pressure me,” she say with a frown. I shrug.
“I’m not. If you really don’t want to, you don’t have to. Wouldn’t force you into anything,” I say, and smile at her. “But sometimes it’s good to try something new, you know?”
She blinks. “I hadn’t thought of it like that.”
“That’s my girl,” I say, and finish the first one off.
I end up drinking four and a half them. One and a little bit more is enough for Octavia. She ends up not hating it, but there’s a limit to what someone with no experience can do. I get that.
We lay in the grass, watching clouds go by. Usually, I’m all about action. I’m the first one to wanna go do stuff. I get bored and just wander around town all the time, like every day. Back in Manehattan I was sneaking into clubs and picking locks just to see if I could out of sheer boredom. I had to wander.
But sometimes I just sit in the grass, too.
“Vinyl,” Octavia says after awhile.
I look over at her lazily. Four is enough to get me buzzed, easy. I smile at her. “Whatcha need?”
“I’m curious.”
“Hehehe, I bet you are. ‘Bout what?”
“Why all of this? And that… well. Horrid is too strong a word…”
“Well…” I roll around in the grass. God I love grass. It’s so soft. “I mean, we were gonna hang out anyway.”
“Right.”
“We hang out like every day.”
“Yes, yes, I know this, Vinyl,” she says.
“And we always hang out in your room. Like, when I’m not with you I do other stuff. But it’s not with you.” I blink up at the sky, which is reddish or orange. Skies shouldn’t be red. That’s dumb.
“I know you like to party,” Octavia says.
“It’s not that. Like, I always miss being around when I go off to do that stuff.”
She’s quiet and I roll over to look at her. She’s just looking at me, her head cocked to one side.
I continue. “Like, I really like hanging out with you, but we’re always doing what you want to do, and I have all this stuff you don’t ever see or know. I kinda just wanted to…” I look at her, concentrating on how to say this.
“Share something that was yours?” She finishes.
I blink in confusion. “Yeah. Wait, how’d…?”
“I think fast,” she says. She smiles down at me. “I like spending time with you too, Vinyl.”
I look away. I’m not really sure how to respond to that. I mean, I don’t know what to say. I smile, though. Not where she can see, of course. I’ve got a reputation.
We just lay there.
Like I said, usually, I want to go and do. Like, not just want. I need to. The only exception’s when I’m hanging with Octavia. I’m in the corner of the room when she practices--I stopped listening to music when I study so that I could listen to her play her cello. Having her around is about the only way I can be still enough to study. We’re together like every day. She’s my best friend in the world. I’m really glad I brought her out here. I’m really glad she came.
I’m really glad I came to this place.
I laugh, and she looks at me with a half-smile. “Whatever is so funny?” she asks, in that dumb accent, and it just makes me laugh again.
“Nothin’,” I say, and smile back. “I’m just happy, I guess.”
And you know, now that I’m looking, I’ve never noticed how pretty her eyes are, or how nice her smile is, or how happy it makes me. Not until now.