Author's Note
Wow, my first story published on here in eight months. More importantly, at least for me as someone who can occasionally be forced to put something out, this was the first time I wrote horse words on my phone, after several years of scribbling horse words the normie keyboard way. I think it came out fine, but hopefully you'll enjoy it regardless.
The Gift of the Magician
Starlight was always calmly surprised by how Trixie’s caravan seemed to be bigger on the inside than the outside, and truth be told she was a passenger aboard this train of thought even now.
Snow had arrived just in time for Hearth’s Warming, appearing the previous night when Trixie herself had not yet. Another missed day for the couple, which Starlight kept track of in her head; those days, although sprinkled throughout the year, no period of absence too bad by itself, amounted to death by a thousand cuts.
But while it continued to snow outside, the flakes falling slow like feathers, the interior of Trixie’s caravan was nicely warm, as if kept heated by a fire when in fact there wasn’t any.
Two mares, two wrapped boxes. “Should we switch them around at the same time?” asked Starlight. “I’m sorry, I’m not used to doing this.”
“Oh,” said Trixie coolly, “am I led to believe you’ve never shared presents with a special somepony before?”
“Have you?”
Trixie’s face screwed up. “Trixie must admit that she has not.”
Asking the question in the first place seemed to sting Starlight in some unseen place. “S-sorry about that.”
“Let’s not think to harshly on it. After all, with you being my first, and I being your first, it does strike me as quite adventurous!”
“Just wish I had a better frame of reference,” Starlight murmured. “When I was growing up I was used to my parents just showering me with presents on Hearth’s Warming. Especially my dad. I never asked him to, but he went the extra mile anyway.” Suddenly she thought about how Trixie was a lot like her dad, whenever they got really invested in something. “And yet I never gave anything back to him,” in a more melancholy tone.
“Only child?”
“Of course.”
A sly smile on Trixie’s lips. “Ah, that makes two of us!”
“Funny how we never talk about our families,” Starlight pondered. “Then again, Twilight knew her friends in Ponyville for like six months before they found out she had a brother.”
“She does?” Trixie paused for a moment, perhaps a brain fart. “Oh, right.”
“Yeah, I don’t really know him.”
“Trixie forgets about these things sometimes.”
A smile on Starlight’s own lips. “She does.” Looking back down at the pin-striped wrapping of her present, she wondered if what was inside would be good enough. “What I’m wondering is how we’re gonna do... this.”
“Shall we swap and open on the count of three?”
“Count down for the swapping or the opening?”
Starlight’s brow furrowed, but then she imagined a lightbulb popping to life over her head. “On the count of three we switch, and then as soon each of us gets the present we open it.”
“Are you known for being a little too eager about opening presents on Hearth’s Warming morning?”
“Not too bad. You?”
“Ferocious.” Trixie grinned with a shine in her eye.
A giggle. “All right then... who should count?”
“Trixie would like to do the honors,” she said proudly.”
“Let’s go for it, then!”
In these last seconds Starlight’s eyes darted subtly between the presents, her pin-striped one against Trixie’s... well, it would be fair to call incredibly gaudy. But also delightfully so; Starlight expected nothing less.
“Three...”
But at the same time Starlight couldn’t help but think about what she really wanted to get for her girlfriend.
“Two...”
But it would have been so expensive. Maybe more importantly, it would have been too early in their relationship to commit to such a thing.
“ONE!”
But then would it have been...?
As if hearing a cannon fired right next to her, Starlight jumped and then froze as she held Trixie’s present in her hooves. She didn’t notice Trixie tearing her respective present to shreds, nor did she set to opening her own. In that moment, or it may have been a few moments, she didn’t know what to do.
Trixie’s rang in Starlight’s ears. “You got me a couple books?”
Starlight blinked, her heart tearing at itself. “Y-you don’t like them?”
“Nay, it isn’t that!” Trixie rushed to reassure her in her usual campy way. “It’s just that... um... aside from books on famous magicians and stuntponies, Trixie must admit she doesn’t read much.”
Starlight let out what sounded like a sigh and a giggle simultaneously. “I took away that much.” She happily scooter over to Trixie’s side, almost touching flanks, and picked up the books with her magic. “I wanted to get you into more story-centric stuff but wanted to go for something on the safe side too. So I got the first books in the Daring Do and Fission Chips series.”
“Ah,” said Trixie. “I’ve heard of the Daring Do novels. How many are there?”
“Too many.”
“And what is Fission Chips...?”
“This one,” said Starlight, waving the little paperback in the air, “is more espionage. Ya know, cloak and dagger stuff, secret organizations controlling the world and all that.”
“That sounds delicious,” Trixie cooed. “Have no fear, my dear Starlight, I’ll be getting around to enjoying these. Hopefully.”
“Sure,” said Starlight, then half-seriously, “and if you don’t then I’ll be hounding you until you give in.”
“Very threatening.”
Their noses touched and they nuzzled each other, trying to hold back more giggles. Or at least that was the case for Trixie; for Starlight’s part she went back to thinking about what Trixie’s gift could be. As much as she wanted it to be like anything else she would get on Hearth’s Warming, a secluded part of her hoped it would be something more than ordinary.
It was strange. When they nuzzled and kissed and did other things together, Starlight felt like she could take on the world, like the weight of loneliness had been lifted from her. Yet, given Trixie’s business as a traveling performer, Starlight found herself not much less lonely than she had been when she was single.
Were letters enough? Because it wasn’t like she and Trixie didn’t talk much; if anything they became surprisingly chatty with each other, exchanging letters multiples times a week. It was one thing, though, to talk, another to see and feel.
Starlight hated her body and all that it required sometimes. If she could live happily with just talk she would, but on some days she discovered in harsh terms that she couldn’t.
“Say,” said Trixie, her breath on Starlight’s coat, “weren’t you supposed to open yours?”
Starlight took a deep breath. “Do I have to? Can’t we just stay like this for a bit?”
“We can, but only after you open your present. Trixie thinks you’ll adore it.”
“The one and only? The great and powerful Trixie?” She smiled, but she didn’t exactly feel like smiling.
“The very same.”
With her magic Starlight started to unwrap the present, although she did so in a distracted way. “Do you have to leave the day after tomorrow?”
“I shan’t be gone too long,” Trixie’s voice said, although her lips seeemed to say, “I understand how you feel.”
Once the wrapping had been shredded Starlight gazed at the midnight blue box before her, large enough to fit shoes, or a fancy scarf, or maybe something unexpected. Hesitantly she grabbed the lid of the box with her hooves and slowly lifted it, thinking about Trixie and how close she was right now and how far away she would be in the near-feature; buried within this thought she also considered what the gift could be.
She hoped it was worth it.
