Feelings Unspoken Are Unforgettable
"It's impossible!" cried Rarity. "I can't do it! I just cannot!"
"But you must," said Twilight Sparkle before taking a sip of her tea.
But do you have to? she thought.
"You're right, I must." Rarity seemed to calm down for a second. "I must... yet I cannot! I cannot, yet I must! What am I supposed make of this situation? How do I find the area where 'must' and 'cannot' meet?"
"You'll figure something out." Twilight couldn't help but let out a giggle.
It was the loveliest thing, to have Rarity visit Canterlot Castle. Much like a holiday, it was an event that came about with anticipation, and all too rarely. The two had been talking for well over an hour now, and the tea had gone lukewarm. No matter, Twilight thought. She couldn't be unhappy if she tried—and, if she were being honest with herself, she tried to be unhappy a lot of the time.
The effort was of no use in this scenario.
Rarity, for her part, looked cozy in her winter coat, which she wore whenever she had to travel to Yakyakistan for a day or two. Such was today of all days.
"But dear Twilight," she said, "you never have to deal with this sort of business. Taking orders from clients that seem to contradict each other. Sometimes I can't figure out for the life of me what they want. It's really something that gives me a headache." Rarity took a hard sip of her tea—ever the tea enthusiast—and gave Twilight an inquisitive look. "Are you sure you ought to keep me company for so long? We both have schedules we should look after, and I'm not sure... Twilight?"
Huh? thought Twilight absently.
Rarity poked her gently in the ribs. "Dozing off so early in the day?"
"N-no," said Twilight, blushing ever so slightly, "I was just listening to you talk." Suddenly she felt that she had to explain herself some more. "Well, maybe I was was dozing off. I didn't get a good night's sleep last night."
"Oh, I know what that feels like!" said Rarity cheerfully. "You know, I've been taking some stuff to help me with my own sleep schedule. It's not prescription medication, it's like... you take a certain dosage of it and it helps you feel all sleepy. It's not a drug, I think. I personally like it, although it does occasionally lead to the truly odd dream—"
I can see your crow's feet through your makeup, Twilight thought with a tinge of disappointment. Not in Rarity, but in what her body was slowly becoming. Rarity had turned forty not long ago, and an observant pony could tell by the chinks in the armor that was her beauty. Of course, she was still as beautiful as ever to Twilight, but two decades of shared history brought out a certain species of beauty in her that would remain unseen to everypony else.
Time was running out.
Ever since Twilight became the sole leader of Equestria, she only used a minute fraction of her attention to mind the fact that she and her friends had been moved to different places. Sure, she had been a princess for several months prior to Celestia and Luna passing the torch, but relations still seemed normal during that relatively short span of time. Indeed, since ascending to her current position, Twilight came to find that time moved in mysterious ways, both her own sense of time and how she perceived her time spent with others.
All her friends... where had they gone?
"—but never mind all my troubles, I just wanted to know if you were doing all right, darling." Rarity voice came to Twilight's ears like clarity rising above early morning fog. "I know you're a big mare, and you can take care of yourself—as you should—but I worry about you sometimes," she said, her voice echoing through the barren halls of the castle, bringing the illusion of life to a stone-dead place.
"No need to worry about me," said Twilight, reassuring somepony, if not Rarity in particular. "I've been thinking about something, though."
"Oh? I can tell just by how you handle your tea." Rarity's smile brightened. "I'm curious as to what you're thinking about, though, if you don't mind telling me."
A frown made its way to Twilight's lips. I might reveal too much, she thought. "Have you ever thought about how... how do I put this... how slowly everything happens now? Back in the day—"
"'Back in the day'!" Rarity guffawed. "You sound like my mother with that sentence. But please, continue."
Twilight's lips curled upward. She couldn't pretend to be annoyed. "A very long time ago, everything happened at a really fast pace. We had to fight this, we had to help somepony with that. Feels like every day there was something we had to do."
"Hmm," Rarity hummed. "Perhaps more like once a week?"
"Sure," Twilight said, almost giggling. "You know what I mean. Now it's... wake up... sign some papers... listen in on a boring court case." She started to snore at an unreasonably loud volume, and the resulting laughter from Rarity seemed like nicely plucked chords to her ears.
"I understand your plight, dear," said Rarity. "I have a routine of my own, but at least I get to leave Ponyville often. Not that I don't love my hometown, but it's nice to go out and see the world."
Prompted by this, Twilight decided to bring up a worn-out topic. "Is that why you haven't found a special somepony yet? All that traveling you do?"
Rarity sighed, and for a second Twilight worried she had crossed some line, but then she said, "I've come to terms with not marrying, I think." She tightened her hefty coat around her, as if keeping warm against a coldness that did not exist within the castle. "Don't get me wrong, dear, I adore what marriage looks like, but I have a hard time imagining how it could feasibly work with the business I'm running." Half-seriously, she raised a brow at Twilight. "Too busy being needed in Canterlot to find your special somepony?"
"I guess," she said.
We've had this conversation before, she thought. And every time, I never ask you how you feel about me. Sometimes I feel like I get a hint, but I don't know what that hint could mean. After all my years as the Princess of Friendship and I still don't know what you mean.
Talking with Rarity—or anypony, for that matter—was like listening to a song on a cassette tape, and as time went on the tape became more dulled and the quality of the music less vibrant, yet it remained basically the same. How had their relationship changed? Had it changed?
She had grown numb to having her best friend call her by her name. Maybe it would be better if instead of "Twilight," or "darling," or "dear," Rarity called her by a pet name, like Twily, or—even better—Sparky. Yeah, she thought, it'd be nice if she called me that. She managed to keep her cheeks from reddening at the image of such affection. If she called me by a pet name, and then kissed me. What would that be like? I've never kissed anypony. I've never loved anypony else like this.
They would make a cute couple, yet there they were, both single.
It was just the two of them now. Practically every one of Twilight's friends had found a special somepony. Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Fluttershy, Starlight Glimmer...
Even Moondancer had settled down with a lovely mare, now that Twilight remembered. How many years ago did that happen? she wondered.
It didn't matter.
She could already see with her mind's eye how they would go their separate ways, as usual. They would say their goodbyes at the train station, where Rarity would head off to a land which felt distant to Twilight's sense of time and place. Twilight would yell, "I love you!" and Rarity would reply with, "Love you too, darling!" Yet this usage of "love" was not ideal for what Twilight felt in her chest on some nights, or how she regarded her middle-aged friend at any point in time.
Nevertheless, she fulfilled her duties as Princess with little regret. She didn't have the time—so she told herself—for romance when her kingdom and her subjects needed her so dearly. Celestia and Luna lived contently enough without special someponies of their own, so why should her solitude bother her so much? The answer, of course, remained nestled in every moment where she saw Rarity's eyes or heard her laughter.
I wish I could love you more, she thought.
"Would you like more tea?" she said.
