Addressing Old Wounds
It was late at night in the town of Ponyville, a time when most ponies and non-ponies alike would already be fast asleep. But for one pony sleep was not possible just yet. There was something she needed to do first and it was something she didn't want anyone else to be around to see.
Trixie was writing a letter to her father with only the flickering light of a candle near her writing desk to serve as illumination. She still wasn't quite sure how she was going to phrase this letter or even what she was going to say. But she had been putting it off and putting it off for so long, and the issue refused to leave her alone. The only way she was going to again know peace was if she wrote this letter, and got a reply back (or so she hoped).
The young magician who was one of Starlight's best friends could still remember when she had been forced to come clean about her family situation. How it had all started shortly after the two unicorns had met Starlight's father, Firelight Glimmer.
After Firelight had left to take a tour of Twilight's castle, Starlight had decided to turn the subject of family to Trixie. And Trixie had become strangely withdrawn and tongue tied, which baffled Starlight to no end. "Well, Trixie?" She asked. "Do I have to guess?" Then she realized. "Or maybe this is a bad time for you?"
But Trixie swallowed a lump in her throat as she forced out. "N-no, Starlight. Trixie... er I suppose it was inevitable that we'd have this conversation," Letting out a deep sigh she explained. "My dad left when I was very young, before I even got my cutie mark. I was mostly raised by my mother, Sunlight. She was... a decent mother, but after Dad left she was never the same. She became more withdrawn, except for when she tried to get me enrolled in Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns."
Starlight blinked in surprise, appearing to take the news quite well. "You attended that school too?"
"Briefly," Trixie willingly confessed. "It wasn't really for me and I could never perform the kind of magical feats that other students were doing with ease, so I dropped out. Trixie's magical talent always lay more in the world of performing rather than direct magical ability."
"No wonder you were so jealous of Twilight when we first met," Starlight realized. "Seeing her must've brought up old wounds."
Trixie reluctantly nodded. "Wounds that were in part due to Trixie's upbringing. For you see, Trixie's father was no ordinary unicorn. Trixie's father was none other than the Great and Powerful Jackpot, the greatest magician since Hoofdini himself!" Then she showed a picture of a unicorn stallion who looked like Trixie if she were bigger and older. It was almost impossible not to see a resemblance. "In fact he was so great that he decided he wanted to focus on his magic career instead of his family. I became a magician in the hopes that someday I could find him, impress him and then finally ask why he could just leave behind his wife and daughter for his own goals."
Starlight looked at her friend, noticing the anger that was starting to boil up inside of her. "Trixie, are you sure you have the whole story? Maybe your father left because he wanted to find a way to support you and your mom?"
"We were getting by just fine, and we continued to get by just fine after he left!" Trixie snorted with narrowed eyes. "But it doesn't matter anymore. Trixie has given up trying to find and impress her father. Now Trixie has friends like you and Sunburst, and her traveling magic act has nowhere to go but up! I don't need to even think about my father."
Starlight wasn't so convinced. "I thought the same way about my dad for the longest time, especially with the way he always treated me. But after I was... forced to go back to Sire's Hollow and see him again, I came to realize that I was wrong to cast him out of my life the way I did. In his own weird way he was trying to show how much he loved me. Sure, maybe it was misguided, but that didn't justify treating him like he didn't exist."
"So what are you saying, Starlight?" Trixie inquired with a quirked brow. "That Trixie should accept her father for who he is? Let him into her life if she has the chance?"
"I'm not saying that. I don't know what exactly is the deal between you and your father. I'm just saying that you shouldn't be so quick to cast him out of your life. Have you even been in contact with him at all?" Starlight tried to question. "Maybe if he knows how much his departure hurt you, he'll change his ways."
"And how do you propose Trixie even go about contacting him, Starlight?!" Trixie humphed and snorted. "Trixie's father is currently living it up in Las Pegasus. He's even found an assistant named Big Bucks that he does all his magic tricks with. He's probably too busy to even consider leaving, even to see his only daughter."
Starlight proposed to her fellow unicorn. "Well, why not write him a letter? I hear that on their most recent trip to Las Pegasus, one of the Golden Horseshoe Gals actually got an autograph from Jackpot. Maybe they could help you find his address."
"The Golden who now?" The young magician questioned. This was the first she'd ever heard of such gals.
"Applejack or Rainbow Dash should be able to explain better than I can," Starlight told Trixie. "Why don't you go ask them? Right now, I've gotta catch up with my dad and make sure he hasn't gotten lost somewhere in the castle. Or worse, started sharing embarrassing stories of me with Twilight."
The Golden Horseshoe Gals turned out to be Granny Smith and a few of her elderly cousins from across the Apple family. And it was Applesauce who had the autograph of Jackpot. Unfortunately, the autograph was only the first step on a long and tedious journey to obtain Jackpot's current mailing address.
Yet even once it had been obtained Trixie was hesitant to use it. She didn't think she needed to send a letter to her father. Why bother when he clearly hadn't made an effort to be there for her at any point while she was growing up? All the missed birthdays, hearth's warmings, major milestones, you name it. Not even his wife falling sick had been able to lure him away from the stage.
So days went by, then weeks and finally months. Yet Trixie never got around to even beginning to write that letter that Starlight wanted her to write. So many other things occurred in the time since then, including a Hearth's Warming road trip with Starlight that included visiting Sire's Hollow (Sunburst had been there too) and Trixie becoming the School of Friendship's new guidance counselor.
Yet only a few nights after that unexpected promotion, Trixie had found herself unable to sleep. Her thoughts continuously drifted towards her father. What would he think of his daughter now that she was finding a new calling away from the stage? Would he approve?
Reluctantly realizing that there was only one way to know for sure and only one way to put the dozen or so other nagging questions in her mind to rest, Trixie rose from her bed in her wagon and set to work on creating a small writing stand, which included carefully lighting a small candle to provide a source of illumination.
The words seemed to flow from Trixie's mind to the paper quite easily. Years and years of stored up resentments and longing poured out onto the parchment. By the time the young magician had finished the letter read something like this:
Dear Jack Dad,
It's... weird that I'm even writing to you like this in the first place. But I guess this was bound to happen sooner or later.
You'll probably be happy to know that I've moved out and am living on my own, even if it's in a wagon that is cramped cozy. And I've managed to make some friends, real friends and not the imaginary ones from when I was growing up. Heck, one of them is the student of Twilight Sparkle, the Twilight Sparkle!
I really wish you could be here to see how great and powerful of a magician I've become. You were my inspiration almost as much as Hoofdini himself. The biggest motivation for me to become a magician in the first place was so that I could one day meet you. But now, I don't know if that will ever happen or if I even want that to occur.
The thing is... I took up a new calling recently, one I never would've imagined ever considering when I was little: Guidance Counselor. Since my best friend Starlight Glimmer is going to become the new headmare of the School of Friendship, I was appointed to fill her old position as guidance counselor. I only originally took it because I wanted to be close to my best friend while she's at work, but I'm starting to actually enjoy the job on its own merits even if it means I have less time to practice my magic acts.
Maybe it's because I actually went on the road with Starlight at one point, but I'm starting to feel like being a magician maybe isn't my calling in life after all. The only reason I even wanted to become one was because of you, and because of how suddenly you left.
Perhaps you had a good reason for leaving. Maybe I didn't know things about your marriage with Mom because I was too little to understand. But it seems to me like you basically performed a disappearing act in front of me before I really got to know you. Heck, I only got my cutie mark and perfected my stage persona because I briefly worked as a neighborhood foalsitter to make enough bits to afford a wagon, that way I'd have some way of storing all the magical props I wanted.
I know you're probably living the dream in Las Pegasus with Big Bucks, who I'm sure is a wonderful assistant in his own right, maybe as great and powerful on and off stage like Starlight is with me. I just wish I knew why, why you left me. It wasn't because of me, was it? If it was you wouldn't have hung around long enough to see me get enrolled in Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns.
You don't have to reply to this letter, you don't have to come see me in Ponyville. Maybe I'll come and see you someday in Las Pegasus, or wherever life takes you. Or maybe this will be the last you'll hear of me. Either way, I guess I hope this letter finds you well.
Sincerely,
The Great and Powerful Your daughter,
Trixie
Almost as soon as she had finished writing that letter and pouring out all the thoughts in her mind onto the parchment, Trixie felt her eyes grow heavy. She only just barely managed to blow out the candle and climb back into bed before she fell fast asleep.
The very next day, Trixie woke bright and early and dropped her letter off at the Ponyville post office.
Said letter was delivered to its intended recipient in Las Pegasus a few days later. Jack Pot was most surprised to discover it in his dressing room after another successful performance at the Flim Flam Entertainment Emporium (it was really just a hotel with a few added attractions, but the owners insisted on giving it that fancy name to make it sound important).
Without looking at the address of the sender, Jack Pot opened the envelope and used his magic to pull the letter close enough for him to read.
Sentence by sentence the old stallion felt his heart sink. He turned towards his nearby desk, eyeing a framed picture of himself when he was younger: Standing besides his lovely wife Sunlight, and their daughter Trixie when she was but a blank flank filly.
"I thought I was following my heart when Big Bucks offered me the partnership of a lifetime," Jack Pot thought to himself as he continued reading, struggling to hold back the tears. "But now I see the only thing I was doing was abandoning that which I should've held dear."
Upon finishing the letter, Jack Pot's resolve was hardened quite firmly. He was going to find a way to visit Ponyville and hopefully reconnect with his daughter while he still had a chance to do so.
His magic career could wait, he'd already built up quite a reputation for himself. Right now there was something far more important that he needed to tend to: Family.