When editing this story for EQD, I ended up nearly doubling it in length, and significantly re-envisioning it. This version has had the additional scenes cut, making it much closer to the original vision. I recommend reading the extended version, not this one.

Once you learn what music sounds like, you’ll never stop hearing music. The next time you’re out on a walk, try listening for the music around you. In the heart of Applelacia, it’s the wind rushing through the trees. Out in Jackspur, it’s the chattering of chickens, crows, the occasional dog. In Hooveston, it’s the distant thunder of hoofbeats and voices.

After spitting one last breathful of venom into my face, Follow Spot slammed my front door for what we both knew would be the last time. I didn’t even hear the words; my own ragged breath and the pounding in my ears and my head drowned the words out. Then there came a sharp bang of wood on wood, followed by dense, cold, echoing silence.

Silence is pretty rare, actually. You can’t find silence just by walking around and keeping your ears open–you have to search for it.

Or you could have somepony slam it into your face.

I stared at the inside of my front door for a long few seconds, as if the grain of the wood could answer the questions I couldn't put into words. My ears were ringing, and blood was tingling under the skin on my face.

I thought about throwing that door open and running into the streets after Follow Spot, calling out his name like a damn idiot and begging him to come back to me. I also thought about throwing the door open to yell something along the lines of Fuck you, I never needed you, I hope the next girl gelds you in your sleep. That actually struck me as a good idea, and I almost went ahead with it, except that I had already been standing and thinking about it for a while, so it was too late anyway.

So I just turned around–turned my back on the stallion that I’d foolishly wasted a year of my life on–and tried to dry my eyes and act like a big pony as I headed towards the bedroom. I changed my mind about my destination before I got there, because I knew I would still be able to smell Follow Spot on the sheets. I veered off and headed for the kitchen table instead, which was currently covered with unopened mail.

Shuffling the mail between my hooves to arrange the heap into a series of stacked rectangles felt good. Examining each letter and making myself care about the contents was even better, especially because this was one of those days when there was nothing but horseshit in the mail. An invoice from Mr. Fridge the repairpony. A donation drive for the Westroad Foals’ Hospital. A few bits of junk mail printed with bold, important-sounding words like IMMEDIATE REPLY REQUIRED.

There was only one personally addressed letter. I didn’t recognize the name on the return address, but the intended recipient was “Cousin Fiddlesticks,” so there could be no doubt that the letter was going to contain an invitation to a potluck or a wedding or a funeral that would be crowded with wheezing old farts and yapping little foals.

I sighed as I put the unopened envelope down, setting it in its own category: marginally less impersonal crap. Then, having exhausted the appeal of the mail, I pulled away from the table and started for the hallway closet. There was something there that would help me more than a pillow to scream into or a pile of mail to shuffle through.

Next to the bathroom was a closet, and on the floor inside the closet was a bundle of black cloth, and beneath the heavy cloth was a hardwood carrying case, six spans long and four spans across. The curves of the treble clef on the cover were carved with razor precision, the edges still as sharp as if the carver had just blown the dust off his chisel yesterday. The wood was cool and smooth to the touch–the polish on the surface had stood the years well. Even the way the grooves on the handle fit between my teeth, and way the case’s weight swung when I walked towards the door, were as familiar as the embrace of an old shawl.

~~~~

Sunsets, like music, aren’t really all that special. Celestia gives us exactly one sunset every day, so if you miss one, you can always try to catch the next instead. Even out here in Oatshire Run, where summer evenings are so cloudless that the sunset paints the whole sky in gradients of orange and violet, folks don’t watch the sunset any more than they listen to the breeze. I’m just as guilty, of course–I may know how to listen to music, but I don’t take time out to watch sunsets.

The case opened with a clean click, its latch and hinges gliding as smoothly as ever. I lifted the lid away, and the black satin liner let off a faint hiss as it was exposed to the air for the first time in years. Golden sunlight flashed harshly against the glossy surface of the instrument cradled within: my first fiddle.

A fiddle, not a violin or a viola. A violin is what you play as part of a section, surrounded by identical instruments all standing at attention, with ranks of bows rising and falling in unison with yours. A fiddle is what you play while stomping your hooves on the only table left on the floor of a smoky bar after the rest of the furniture has been cleared away for a hoedown. I’ve never actually played as part of a section, thank Celestia. First off, my training is all wrong–any conductor would cringe at the way a real fiddler wields the bow like a saw, hacking at the strings like a drunken carpenter. Then there’s the fact that most conductors would throw me out for stomping around the nice hardwood stage and breaking into a solo.

I lifted my fiddle from its case without reverence or ceremony; the fiddle and I knew each other too well for such pleasantries, no matter how long it had been. Its weight melted into my body as I braced it against my shoulder, and the bow became part of my hoof, as if I had never put it down.

If only there were a way for us to forget our most precious memories. Memories rob us of experiences, because something remembered clearly is also something lost forever.

The sun was nearing the horizon and the trees were starting to whistle in the cool breeze rolling in from the lake. I saw a few passing ponies stop and look curiously up at me. I’m sure I struck a dramatic figure, at that–balanced upright on the roof of my house, fiddle raised and hat lowered, silhouetted against a gold-on-heather sunset. The wind pulled at my bandanna and mane, and I realized that I was smiling.

Smiling. Yeah. For all that the rest of this day had been all fucked-up, maybe there could still be some beauty in the world tonight.

With bow poised and hat angled to block out the setting sun, I closed my eyes and took a long, deep breath before flowing into the first stroke.

~~~~

Feeling its small weight against my hoof and shoulder, smelling the lacquered wood for the first time, was a moment of electric intimacy that I still remember clearly. I angled my head and felt the smooth, cool wood against my cheek while the too-large pad dug into my jaw and collar. The bow was also too big for me, but in my hoof it was a magic wand, a medium through which I could interact with this new world that I was discovering.

“Very nice,” said my instructor’s distant voice. “Most fillies take a lot longer to learn how to hold a fiddle properly. Now, turn to the first page of the music book...”

I wasn’t listening. I was too busy exploring the thing’s body with the tip of my hoof, tracing delicately from head to base and then back again. At the time, I didn’t know what to call the curves and indents of the instrument’s body–I only knew that they were beautiful. The neat, flowing edges, the way the taut strings hovered low over the face, suspended by their ends, tightly controlled but free to hum.

The sound that came from the fiddle as I drew the bow across its strings was an unabashed wail of pure, dissonant glory. It sounded like the blare of a horn crossed with the yowl of an old tom defending its territory. The bow shuddered as it tasted the strings with tentative firmness, and the fiddle vibrated into my shoulder in return. I stretched the note out as long as I could, filling the room with raspy joy that felt like it was coming directly from my heart. When I reached the end of the bow, I started pushing back towards the other end, gliding across the strings haphazardly and drawing out another hoarse, keening cry.

Mrs. Tones ended the lesson early and sent me home to practice. I left in such a hurry that I forgot to thank her–all I could think about was the new world of music that I had just discoevered. Mrs. Tones didn’t even tell me that when I turned my back and trotted giddily out the door, I also flashed her a freshly earned pair of cutie marks: a blue treble clef on each haunch.

~~~~

There’s a reason everypony makes fun of Applelacia: Applelacia sucks. If somepony tells you that they grew up in Applelacia, then right after you crack a joke about sisters or cousins or something, you ask them what kind of farm they grew up on. If somepony tells you that they grew up in a small town in Applelacia, you tell them they’re lying, because there aren’t any towns in Applelacia, just slightly denser clusters of farms.

The kind of farm I grew up on was a wheat farm. Wheat is one hell of a business. Farming wheat is one part being in touch with nature, like what you’ve heard about earth pony farmers, and three parts operating heavy machinery. My dad could tear an automatic thresher down to a clanking pile of components in minutes, and then have the whole thing back together and running better than new by the time most ponies would be figuring out which screw to remove first. I learned a little from my dad, but seeing as my destiny was to be a musician, I don’t think anypony could blame me for not being very handy with a wrench.

Along with automatic threshers, the ponies who live in Applelacia have somehow invented a way to live way too damn close to each other no matter how many miles apart their farms are. I swear, aunties and uncles from the opposite end of the county managed to annoy my family by dropping by too often with huge smiles, gifts of pie and fruit, and breathlessly excited news about Aunt Whoever’s baby and Uncle Whatsisface’s in-laws. Entertaining all those aunties, uncles, and cousins could get exhausting, which tells you how prolific my family was–still is, actually–when it comes to aunties, uncles, and cousins. Still, no matter how much mom and dad complained about having to clean up for company, they always greeted Aunt Somethingorother with genuine smiles, and they always sent her off with a genuine “come back soon.”

Aunt Sugarplum was a perfect example of an Aunt Somethingorother. She was the kind of auntie who never failed to comment on how much bigger the little one had gotten. Every time she flounced in through the front door, she’d play out the entire act, sure as sunrise: cheek-pinching, baby-talking, obnoxiously sincere surprise at goodness me, she’s gotten so big!

I was fourteen when Aunt Sugarplum married into the Apple clan through a tremendously tall, blunt-faced, shaggy-fetlocked fella named Plowshares. After getting married, Aunt Sugarplum started showing up on an almost weekly basis to remind us that bringing in-laws to at least one Apple Family Reunion (the capitalization was audible) was a long-standing Apple Family Tradition. The next reunion, she told us time and time again, was being hosted right in the next county over, so it would be a perfect opportunity to bring everypony to meet their new family and oh the Apples were such lovely ponies and we were sure to like them, so we should hold the date and oh my goodness look at this little one she’s gotten so big!

So I had plenty of time to dread being dragged along to the reunion. As Aunt Sugarplum got more and more excited about the event, I stopped trying to find a way out of having to go, and instead started wishing that the stupid reunion would come sooner, so that I wouldn’t have to listen to Aunt Sugarplum talking about it any more.

~~~~

I’ve never really lived down the fact that I met Mahogany at a family reunion. Every time Mahogany comes up, my friends like to remind me of the fact that I grew up in Applelacia. I keep trying to tell them that it was his family reunion and not mine, but that’s never stopped any of my friends from teasing me.

The first thing I noticed about the reunion was the staggering number of Apples who had made it to the event. This was no ordinary family gathering–this was an inter-county farming convention! I had seen fairgrounds less crowded. At their worst, the reunion’s gathering-places were packed shoulder to shoulder with earth ponies laughing too loudly and giving off too much body heat.

Aunt Sugarplum took it upon herself to greet every single Apple who crossed our path, and of course that included introducing the rest of her entourage, especially her darling little niece Fiddles. My parents did nothing to help. If anything, they used me as a kind of decoy. The more the assembled Apple family fawned over me, the less hoofshakes and “pleased-to-meet-ya” exchanges my parents had to go through.

As for Mahogany, I like to think that I loved him before I saw his face.

My respite from the torture of being shown off to the Apple clan came in the form of music. Practically as soon as the melody tickled my ear, I made my escape by ducking behind a heavy-built yellow fellow and diving into the crowd, leaving my parents and Aunt Sugarplum in my wake. I tracked the sound of thumping and whistling like a dog tracking a scent, nudging my way through crowds, jumping bales of hay, even sliding under tables. Near the property's gate was a stage that looked like it had been hammered together at the last minute before immediately being trampled into oblivion by hundreds of muddy hooves. On that stage was a band, and at the head of that band was a fiddler.

The band’s music, what they played, what they did, was everything that I was afraid of not getting to do with my music. The fiddler danced and played in equal measure, sweeping his fretboard across the audience, pointing it towards a horizon made of music. He raised his head to lift his song to the skies, then bowed it down again to pour his sound and his heart out to the teeming herd gathered around the stage. I stomped and whooped to rival the loudest stallions in the crowd with my filly soprano, attracting a few smirks and approving nods from older cousins and uncles. I hardly noticed them–I only had eyes for the fiddler and his band.

Mahogany caught my eye mostly because they had him playing Applelacia’s unique idea of what constitutes “percussion instruments.” When I first started watching, he had a stick and a washboard. After that it was a xylophone, then an overturned metal bucket serving as a makeshift snare drum. By the time he moved on to the cowbell, I realized that I was starving. I’d been watching the band play for what might have been two solid hours.

In my defense, Mahogany was adorable–a wiry thing with a dark autumn coat, a thick wildfire mane, and watery evergreen eyes. The way he swayed to the music as he played, staring into the distance and nodding to the beat with a determined expression on his face, you would never guess that he had been volunteered for the position by his aunties.

Back then, though, I was much more interested in the fact that he was neither a yapping foal nor a wheezing old fart. I waited patiently, despite my grumbling stomach, for the performance to end so that I could snag Mahogany for his company. I only had to wait through one more song of cowbell, and then the band took a bow, packed their instruments, and melted into the crowd to enjoy other parts of the reunion.

I ambushed Mahogany nearly as soon as his hooves came off of the dirty stage and onto the ground. I can’t remember exactly what I said. I remember telling him that I loved the music, and I remember seeing him go from beige to sunset with the first of many blushes I would get out of him. I also remember us laughing together about the fact that I had been dragged along. He said that he was jealous–I was only getting dragged along this once; Mahogany was doomed to be conscripted into the reunion’s band every time for the rest of his life.

We initially assumed that we were cousins, but as it turned out, Mahogany was actually Aunt Sugarplum’s new husband’s second cousin. So, technically, it would be more accurate for me to call Mahogany my “uncle,” despite the fact that he was younger than me.

Like I said: still haven’t lived it down.

I was as excited as anything to have Mahogany as a partner for the seven-legged race. We started off determined to show the other pairs who was boss, but we ended up falling so many times that we crossed the finish line with bruised haunches and scraped knees. I would move half a beat too slowly when he tried to push our pace to catch up with the other racers, or he would start with the wrong hoof after we picked ourselves up and got ready to move again, or sometimes it would be nothing at all–just him collapsing onto me, or me collapsing onto him, sending both of us crashing into the dirt in a heap of flailing limbs and exasperated huffs of breath.

They let the racers out of their hoof-ties after the race, but they might as well have left Mahogany and me tied together. We got ready to wander off, but practically before any of the kids had a chance to stretch out their freed legs, the lanky brown stallion who had been refereeing the race tried to usher the gathered fillies and foals off to some other group activity.

I wanted to bob for apples and help with apple fritters, but every time I urged Mahogany towards a cluster of Apple cousins gathered around an activity, he rolled his eyes and stayed aloof, watching me having fun and dismissing me with a wave of his hoof when I invited him to join in. I learned that every activity that was the Apple family’s idea of “fun” was a standing tradition dating back hundreds of years–in other words, Mahogany had seen it all, and was going to see it all a whole lot more times.

He wanted to get away from the adults and explore. I wanted to eat apple fritters, but I wanted to follow Mahogany on his little adventure more. So when a call went out to rustle up all the little’uns for a good fun time, Mahogany and I disappeared again, like bandits slipping away into a forest of Apple family legs and cutie marks.

I don’t think anypony actually told us that we would get in trouble if we got caught sneaking away from the main gathering places to poke around the host family’s property, but damn if it wasn’t fun to act like outlaws. We darted between hooves and ducked under tent flaps in order to evade the adults who might try to herd us into some horribly boring game meant to keep the little foals busy and out of everypony else’s way. We jumped fences, wove patterns between the legs of silos, even slipped into a barn door that had been left ajar so that we could climb into the loft.

Mahogany could never stay in once place for long–every time we discovered a new little nook or cranny, we only stayed for long enough to rest our legs before tearing off again on another little adventure. We ended up so far from the rest of the party that we couldn’t even hear the bustle of voices any more. That’s how we ended up getting left behind when the entire “fairground” emptied out, leaving behind only the truly decrepit old-timers fossilizing in their chairs.

I hear the event that we missed was a cart ride around the fields. Mahogany and I, meanwhile, were scrunched together in the shade behind a stack of hay bales. Neither of us knew that what we were doing was called “cuddling.” All I knew was that I liked sitting side by side and hoof over hoof with Mahogany. I liked the weight of his head against my shoulder, and I liked the way it felt to curl my foreleg around his back while his chest rose and fell with his deep, rhythmic breaths.

Nopony really expects their first kiss. Even for those who try their best to choreograph the perfect scene, the perfect moment, things never go exactly as planned. The first kiss is scary, forbidden even–the first kiss is the first step into a world of heat and desire that foals spend their lives hearing about but never understanding. Even an experienced kiss between lovers is an organic thing, a conversation in the language of love.

Mahogany thrust his head towards me and bumped me with the front of his muzzle, pinching my lips painfully against my teeth. I remember a split second of confusion at the sight of him lunging his face towards mine, and then I remember tensing up with a sharp intake of breath when our lips met. His hooves dropped to the ground, leaving him in an awkward stance with his neck jutting forward, extending his face towards mine. I remember his rapid, halting breath against my face, and I remember the soft pressure against my lips.

He pulled away after doing little more than touching his mouth to mine. I pulled him back towards me almost immediately, burying my face in his fur and holding him as tightly as I could so that I could feel the warmth of his body while I shivered from some unknowable something, some bizarre and terrifying feeling that I would someday learn to call love.

Mahogany and I missed the Traditional Apple Family Photo. When the adults finally found us in the shade of a stack of hay bales, laying side by side and staring up at the sky as we talked about nothing in particular, my parents weren’t mad–they were just pleased that I’d made a friend.

Aunt Sugarplum, on the other hand, was pretty upset. Fortunately, she ran out of huff and puff after only thirty minutes of telling me how ashamed she was that I missed the most important part of the whole day. For the rest of the cart ride home, she pouted in silence while I stared out the window, thinking about the little Apple cousin out there who had just given me my first kiss.

My parents suggested sending him a letter, so I did. Two days later, the mailpony brought a reply. I can't remember what the first couple of letters were like, but they turned into love letters real quick. We sent those love letters back and forth across the Applelacia-Jackspur county line with hardly an hour of delay between reading one and sticking a reply into the mailbox. I've still got a box full of those letters somewhere in the house. It's a big box.

Mahogany and I promised each other “forever” a hundred different ways; we swore sacred vows at least once a month. When sentiment ran out of words to use, our letters stopped being wistful and turned into a contest of juicy innuendos and wild superlatives. We needed each other, we burned for each other, we were sure that our lips would crack and crumble to dust from our attempts to kiss the night breeze and let it carry a token of love across the vast distance.

We turned our longing into a game and learned to laugh at ourselves as we wrote about things like building a house made of our wishes, then burning that house down with the way we burned for each other like raging bonfires in the dead of night. We laughed, and thanks to our laughter, we only occasionally realized how badly the longing hurt.

~~~~

After a year and a half, I still wasn’t tired of counting the hairline ridges of Mahogany’s irises while trying to see into the depths of his pupils. Mahogany was starting to fill into a muscled frame befitting an Apple cousin, and his coltish face was starting to harden, but his coat was still soft, and I still liked listening to his deep, rhythmic breath.

“I love you, Fiddles,” he said in a chesty murmur. I lost sight of his eyes as he leaned forward to nuzzle me, but I felt his fluttering breath against my neck. I nuzzled back, an awkward motion when the two of us were crammed into a storage shed. We nearly bumped chests with each other even while braced against opposite walls.

“I love you too, Mahogany,” I whispered.

For a little while–hard to say how long–the only sounds in the air were the expectant heartbeats of a mare and a stallion, and the hesitant breathing of a filly and a colt.

Breathing. Both of us breathing, just breathing, neither of us with anything to say. We both knew what we wanted, and now it was just a matter of taking it. I felt both of our hearts pounding. I felt both of us trembling.

I was the one who made the first move. I scrunched my body backwards so that I could face him again, and then I kissed him. A sweet kiss at first–then I pressed forward and locked into a furious kiss that was like nothing I’d ever given him before. I wanted to breathe my soul into him, to pour my being into him with lips, tongue, and lungs until there was nothing left in me and he had all of both of us. I felt him explore the side of my face, then my neck with the tip of his hoof, tracing delicately from head to shoulder and then back again. I didn't know the name of the heat that lanced through my body from nose to groin at his touch. I only knew that it was beautiful, and that I wanted more.

Somewhere in the middle of that kiss, I decided that I was finished waiting. I pulled back, leaving Mahogany mouthing at empty space, then somehow managed to twist a full hundred eighty degrees in the tiny shed without knocking anything over. I backed towards Mahogany until my rear nearly touched his chest.

“Come on,” I panted, flashing him my cutie marks. “Come on...”

He finally understood when I flicked my tail at him, first to the left, then to the right, like a single sweep of a metronome. Before the second beat, he almost knocked me over with a botched attempt to mount me, a crookedly aimed lunge that ended with him trying to drag me down sideways. He let go of my midsection just in time to catch himself against the wall with his left forehoof instead of his face.

He managed to squeeze back into the same position as before, and this time, his jump landed his forelegs squarely on my sides. We both gasped as something of his brushed against something of mine.

“I love you,” he whispered, directly into my ear.

“Do it!” I whispered back.

I heard and felt Mahogany take a deep breath, like a singer about to belt the first note of a song.

Unlike a singer, he held that breath as he flowed into the first stroke.

He entered me.

It hurt.

I wanted more.

I sang a harsh, keening cry as his body tasted mine with tentative firmness, sliding into me and through me with a halting, broken rhythm. When he reached the end of my depth, he pulled back again, and I felt him glide agonizingly, wonderfully, across places on my body that had never been touched before. He shuddered love and fear into my ear while he pressed lust, flesh, and fire into my body.

The night went on long enough for both of us to learn our first lessons about how to touch and be touched. He slowed, accelerated, and rested unfettered by skill or expectations; I didn’t know if our game had any rules, and neither did he. Sometimes he touched me almost reverently, exploring my body with the innocence of a curious foal. Other times he plunged me without restraint, daring to loose his primal instincts upon both of our bodies. With breath, body, and soul, Mahogany showed me a new world that night, and I thanked him with an unabashed wail of pure, dissonant glory.

After that, the love letters we wrote to each other took on a different tone. Our little game of words ended, because Mahogany and I never again ran out of longing to send each other.

And that longing couldn't ever really be funny again.

If only there was a way for us to forget our most precious memories.

~~~~

The last note from my fiddle echoed through the streets for a few moments, and then was gone. The melody was picked up by the hiss of the wind in the darkening post-twilight. It played a swaying motif, firm and constant so as to harmonize with my own panting breath. I realized that I was sweating, and that my forelegs were faintly burning from how frantically I’d been playing.

I lowered my head and let my bow hang limp at my side, but I still balanced the fiddle on my shoulder with my free hoof as I looked out from under the brim of my hat at the slowly darkening town. Beneath the thrumming legato of the wind, I could still hear it: a very old, lingering silence that could not be drowned out.

I wondered if the rutter who’d slammed the door on me earlier had heard me play. I envisioned him stopping in the middle of the street, then turning to look towards the roof of the house he’d stormed out of. He might see my silhouette, but he wouldn't understand the music that I played.

And then, before I could stop myself, I dared to imagine that Mahogany had heard me play. I imagined him wandering Jackspur Hills doing this or that–and then he’d stop as the breeze brought him, impossibly, the voice of a fiddle playing a song that he had been intimately familiar with once, so long ago. He’d look up, and my silhouette against the evening sky would somehow reach his evergreen eyes, and somehow he would see me here, fiddle raised and hat lowered...

And maybe he’d turn back to his mare and keep on leading her home. “It’s nothing,” he would say. “I just thought I heard something. A song that I used to like.”

Or maybe his breath would catch in his chest, and he’d drop whatever he was doing and start running towards where he’d heard an echo from his past, rushing to join in singing this song that had always been about him and him alone. He would run to my door and knock three times without a second thought, only then stopping to catch his breath. Then I would come to answer the door, and I would see Mahogany’s autumn coat and wildfire mane, and he’d look up at me with his eyes shining in the dying sunlight–evergreen eyes that still belonged to the blushing little colt from all those years ago. We would stare at each other through my open door for a few long moments, and then I would step aside to let him in, and...

The sun disappeared behind the horizon, and all was silent.

Author's Note

As you can see, this version makes much stronger use of allegory. The added parts told the story, but lost touch with the way music was a common thread throughout the story, driving the metaphor of music = love.