The light.
The light is the first thing you notice when you take the stage. Not the audience. Not the piano. The light. It blinds you. The heat becomes unbearable just as you're halfway through the performance. The skin feels like it's ripping apart beneath the tuxedo. The bow tie strangles you. It becomes hard to breathe.
Frederic took a deep breath, bracing himself for the light. Checking his bow tie, he took the first step. Onto the stage.
The roar of the crowd was nothing short of deafening. The clopping of hooves beat upon his ears like the shattering sound of hell's drums. He trotted towards the huge black piano. The crowd fell quiet. The solitary coughs of the attendees splashed against the silence like tiny droplets of rain. A familiar percussion.
Take a deep breath. They can't touch you now. When you're under the piano's protection. Music shields you better than any armour. Take another breath, a shallow one this time. Good. Calm down.
"Frederic Horseshopin, selected nocturnes. Performed by the composer," the announcer, a sweet female voice coming from the above - a speaker concealed somewhere beneath the ceiling of the huge concert hall - claimed.
Frederic lowered his hooves to the shiny keys of the piano and began to play.
***
"Freddie, you'll be late for school!"
Awakened by his mother's voice, Frederic opened his eyes, rolling off the narrow bed onto the carpet. Getting up from the floor wearily, he trotted, staggering, out of the room, and straight into the kitchen.
"Brush your teeth before breakfast!" his mother called out without turning her head, on top of her lungs, as she worked the pan, not noticing that her colt was already sitting at the slightly crumbled breakfast table. "Frede- Oh, you're here."
Frederic nodded simply, waiting for his breakfast. Fried cabbage had never been quite to his taste, but he knew better than to offend his mother by refusing her cooking.
"Sorry for the oil." The cabbage, charcoal-burnt at sides, made its way to the plate and the plate made its way to the table. "Your idiot of a father bought the wrong type again. Olive oil, damn it."
Frederic nodded simply, chewing into the food after throroughly scrubbing it of black crusts with a fork. The oily vegetable reeked of gag-inflicting, nauseous heat that could only come from ill cooking. Frederic pushed the plate away, hungry and disgruntled. He slid away from the table cautiously, so as not to get noticed. He made his way to the corridor easily.
"Not gonna say good-bye to your old man?"
Frederic picked up his saddlebags, putting on a sour, deeply artificial, sickly-trembling smile, and turned towards his father. The big, gruff stallion approached him, his breath reeking of yesterday's wine, his fur tangled, the pores on his skin the most scary sight in the world. "There ya go." He patted Frederic on the back painfully, each pat like a hit. His back would ache for half a day, Frederic concluded as he went through a terrible hug from that father of his and left the little cosy house.
Walking down the alley, he braced himself for the day ahead. Small, fast steps, don't break in a trot. Have some dignity, at least. You can't have dignity at home, you aren't allowed to have dignity at school. Have some dignity in the street.
"Well, lookie who's here."
Frederic didn't stop. Filthy Rich, a chubby, evil colt with a witty grin and a dumb conscience, blocked his way. "If it isn't Poor Freddie from the Poor District."
Frederic tried to move on. "Has your mother made you lunch, Poor Freddie?"
Frederic stepped aside. "Has you dad spent all your bits on booze?"
Frederic took a step forth, but there he was, blocking his way again. "Here." Filthy Rich smiled a vomit-cringing smile and tossed a bit to Frederic's hooves. "Daddy says I have to share with the poor." He paused. "Aren't you going to thank me?"
Frederic averted his eyes, looking at the school builiding, so near and yet so impossibly far. "So long, Poor Ungrateful Freddie!" Filthy Rich gave him a well-estimated, powerful punch to the gut. Frederic cringed, getting straight gradually. He looked at his hooves. The shiny bit smiled at him - one more luxuy he wasn't allowed to have. He picked up the coin and moved on.
The schoolday had begun.
***
"Well, I'm going away, you lying, filthy whorse, and don't ask me to come back!"
Frederic ran out of the room just as his father, wine-soaked, vodka-fuelled, whisky-driven, stormed out of the room. The teenage colt escaped to the kitchen, taking a sharp, pointed knife, his heart hammering away in his chest. I won't let him leave, Frederic thought madly. He'll die here, at my hoof. He'll die, and I'll inherit... whatever he has. Even at a mad, insane time like this, he still thought crossly of debts and investment, future and law. Everything at once, in a whirlwind of stagnating emotion.
Just as he emerged from the kitchen, he saw his mother blocking the door to the outside - the perfect world of the perfect Equestria, with perfect houses and perfect families and perfect parents and perfect foals - and saw, in adrenaline-soothed slow-motion, his father push her aside roughly, open the door and leave.
He ran, swiftly, after him, but his mother, a crying, rustled mess, grabbed him by the hind leg, wailing into his fur. "Freddie, please. Don't. Freddie. My co-olt."
Her voice breaking, Frederic felt tears rush to his throat, tingling there, up his nose they went and - and nothing. He embraced his mother gently, dropping the knife aside.
His father walked up the alley. Up the alley he went, staggering in the night light. A cab passed by. Frederic prayed that it'd hit him and kill him. Please. It didn't.
Frederic closed the door.
***
"Freddie, you and I need to have a talk."
Frederic sat down at the kitchen table, his heart fluttering, his knees trembling slightly, hidden mercifully by the solid wooden lid of the table. The most beautiful mare in the world - his mare, her coat a delightful grey, her mane a divine charcoal, her pink bow tie crowning her slender, rose-perfumed neck, the neck that he'd kissed with such fervour and passion - was sitting opposite him, a strange expression on her face: all at once, it was sad, and happy, and hopeful. It was an expression of a bird leaving a cage on its way to happiness. Frederic knew what was coming. So, he did what he had done all his life. The only thing he could do. He braced himself for whatever Octavia was going to say, and do.
"I..." Octavia took a deep breath. "I'm breaking up with you."
Frederic smiled. "Just like that?" His heart was leaping out of his throat. "No 'I think we should see other ponies' or anything?" He felt a strong urge to vomit aside. See the breakfast made by her hooves splash against the tile of the floor, nopony to clean it up. A green, oily blotch of a reminder.
"It's not about you," Octavia said. "It's about me."
It's never about me. Frederic kept up the smile. His heart rate was dropping back to normal. "Oh."
Octavia fell silent, looking aside, her eyes fixed firmly on the white ticking clock. Great. Now we're playing the asking game. Why was it never easy with mares? Instead of telling him straightaway, crushing his feelings with a mighty sledgehammer, she was going to torture him involuntary by poking at his emotions with a needle. I fear the mares, even when bearing poisoned daggers. Especially when bearing poisoned daggers.
"Is it because of money?" The first, most reasonable question. "My scholarship covers my uni studies, and they've already given me-"
"No."
Great. Now, even his slight chance to boast about a side job was slaughtered. Just you wait, Octavia. Some day, I will become a famous composer, a great pianist, and I'll have my fame and fortune and WHERE WILL YOU BE?! "Is it because of how I treat you?"
"No." Octavia smiled, looking at him with those deep, wonderful pools of lavender. "You have always been a perfect gentlecolt to me." She frowned. Here it comes. Finally. "That's the pont, Freddie. You are a... colt. Well, a stallion." And so, Octavia averted her eyes once again with a blush.
Frederic blinked. Now this is interesting. "I don't get it," he confessed.
"I'm a filly-fooler!" Octavia blurted out, turning a thick shade of pink. "I... I didn't know it, but then I met this mare..." The grey mare smiled dreamily. "She's so nice. She's cocky, and irritating, and... and she's the best mare in the world. You might have heard of her, she goes under the stage name DJ Po-"
"I don't want to hear about her." Frederic fell silent. So did Octavia. After me, every mare wants to become a filly-fooler. After me, everypony is a more fitting match. "Are you sure you are not, you know... going through an experimental phase?" There was no hope to his words. Just a vain questioning tone.
"No." Octavia's voice was firm. Unwavering. Steadfast. "I love her."
"So you said about me." Frederic smiled again.
Octavia sighed. "Listen, Freddie. I don't want to lose you. You are an important pony to me. Just... I love another pony. That's it." That's it. "We'll still remain friends, right?" She smiled. "Nothing can ruin our friendship, right?"
"Right." Frederic smiled a sickly smile. "Nothing."
***
"Freddie!"
Frederic blinked, the daydreams vanishing in the wake of his boss barking his oily, salivating mouth at him from the doorway. He jumped up at full attention immediately, grabbing the dull triple-sealed package from the old, creaky table in the corner of the equally old, creaky, dusty room.
"Have you been thinking about mares again, boy?" the boss, a fat-waisted, greasy-lipped, ill-tongued stallion guffawed, showing off his ridiculously white teeth that barely had any place in a mouth like his. "I knew it, boy, haha! Now get your ass to deliverin' that package, and then go home and clop or whatever your colts do." Laughing, he left, chuckling to himself, coughing his wet, snot-brown coughs.
I'm thinking about my music, Frederic said to himself, clutching his teeth around the package, as he left the cosy and warm room. I'm thinking about how I will write an exquisite suite and get rich and famous. And spit on ponies like you. While he could not say that aloud, he found certain perverted solace in mental arguments with his employer, whose name he did not care to learn, and who would still vanish under the pressing hoof of foreverness. Foreverness, yet, nourished composers.
The cold, rusty wind shot snowflakes at his face as the young stallion made his way towards his destination, slowly, estimating his power. He hadn't eaten today, and he had to keep some energy in that body of his. Holding a quill, too, was hard work for a starving artist. Just you wait. Frederic knocked at the door, stopping before the old building that seemed to be coughing with snow and sneezing with old, dull plaster. When I sell that suite, I'll quit your damn job. And buy myself a whole bag of chocolate.
Through the yells of a rustic quarrel, the door opened, a mare of broad bone and scary disposition glaring at him. "What?"
"Your package, ma'am," Frederic said, his teeth clacking from the cold. Usually, he was thankful when ponies let him, the courier, inside. Now, he was thanful he was not let inside as he heard the sound of dishes breaking against the wall. Or cupboard. Or something equally hard.
The door slammed shut before his face.
He knocked again.
This time, a stallion opened, his misshaved face of a long-term covinct scaring him to no avail. "Your package, sir."
The stallion grabbed the package and threw it at the courier. Frederic evaded the blow by chance. "So that bitch ordered some shit with my credit card?!"
The door slammed shut before his face, this time for good.
Frederic picked up the package and walked away.
***
Frederic placed the quill on the table, the parchment dirty and crossed-out, a mezzanine of ink crowning the wild array of rushing notes, a dribbling, senseless scribble to anypony else, but a vast, meaningful composition to him.
He lowered his head to the point that his chin was pressed firmly into his chest. Here it comes. Here it comes, and it's unstoppable. The plight of every true artist. It's more than a condition. It's more than madness. Inspiration takes its toll.
Frederic took the paper and crumbled it harshly, the imperfect ball crushing against the wall. Here it comes. That feeling that commands you. The nervous tingling in your hooves. Your knee dancing by itself. Nerves cracking. Mind igniting with streams of consciousness. Fear, hope, anxiety, all the wonderful stuff. Born when you're working too hard. Likewise, born when you're not working hard enough.
When you're not good enough.
Following the wild, strangling fit, Frederic got up, pacing the room back and forth. Why wasn't I good enough? Why didn't I like this passage? Because it was bad. But how the hell can I know it, how the hell can I know what's good and bad?
Frederic grabbed a paperback that was resting peacefully on the table and threw it against the bookshelf. Why are my thoughts disobeying me? Tingling, dispassionate fear. Elusive, wavering harmony. Where are you, my muse? Why are you hiding? Reveal yourself!
Frederic clutched his head, collapsing on the floor. Here it comes. The migraine. What did Pilate ask for? Poison? Give me poison, my muse! Celia? Celia? Who is this lovely mare, that all her swains commend her?
Frederic shut his eyes, shapes dancing before them, notes swirling from temple to temple, from cheek to cheek, from tongue to tongue. The church I've been building, my church was burned, and here I stand, unable to do anything. The pianist groaned and tried to stand up. The blind, searing pain in his head made him fall back to the floor, the carpet softening the impact.
That A-sharp. It has no place there. I shouldn't have placed it here. Without the A-sharp, the passage is perfect. No notes. Just mark it a pause. Yes. Yes. Who am I, to break the key? A mind that's weak and a back that's strong. That A-sharp.
Frederic stood up. The pain backed away. The notes froze before his gaze just as he opened his eyes. A little victory. For a while. Enough to write it down. Until the next passage when it will take hold again.
Frederic took the quill.
***
Frederic withdrew from the piano.
Take thick, saturated breaths. Eyes closed so that the light can't hurt you. Ears braced for the impact.
A wild, thunderous applause struck the hall, hooves stomping against the floor in a weird, distorted unison. The crowd was pleased with the show. Their hunger had been sated, and now he was finally free to go. Until the next performance.
Frederic stood up, taking a bow - more of a nod. A few mares brought flowers. He accepted them graciously. It's always a problem, the flowers. There are always too many. It's hard to carry all the bouquets. Must be easier for unicorns, Frederic mused as he walked away from the stage. Must definitely be easier for them.
His walk to the dressing room did not go uninterrupted. As usual. Reporters, with their usual grins on their usual faces and their usual cameras, their usual microphones and their usual scribbles in their usual notepads. "Maestro Horseshopin!" "Maestro Horseshopin!"
Toss them a smile - they like it. It looks good on a photo, a smile. Don't show them that you don't give a damn. Ponies don't like to know that you don't give a damn about them. Answer a few questions. Let them feel special.
"Maestro Horseshopin, how hard would you say it was for you to reach this level of piano skill?"
"Maestro Horseshopin, was it hard to achieve such fame?"
Frederic smiled, as intended, holding out the door to the dressing room. "It was easy," he said, looking at the crowd of reporters.
He closed the door behind him and leant against it, still smiling.
"Easy."
