From the Tree, To the Tree
— The Apple Never Falls Far —
A day of remembrance, a day of regret. A day of recollection, a day to forget. This is the day my parents died.
“I hate you, Pa.” The last words I ever said to him ring out inside my mind again, playing themselves over and over again in the silence that seems to like to hang around me. It’s funny how loud a place can be when you’re thinking about normal things like the amount of bits in the family stores and how much time it’ll take to harvest the West Orchard; and it’s scary at how silent a place becomes when you’re brooding about things you’d like to forget about. “I hate you, Pa.” It shocked me, the words, especially the fact that even after all this time, I could still feel and hear the sheer truth in them. I hated my father.
I remember when I had turned eighteen, the party had been full of balloons and cake that tasted just like last year’s cake: delicious. I had gotten a ton of different presents, typical “coming of age on a farm” sort of stuff: A brand-new plow-hitch, a set of horseshoes for when I’m “needing some help plowing the fields”, a few bits here and there to buy things on my own, and multiple allusions to the fact that I’m still without a marefriend whilst everypony else around me has one. If only they knew what kind of ponies I really wanted to be with.
Of course, none of this could account for all of the excitement that I felt on that particular day. The real reason I had a bounce in my step and sparkling eyes was because I became eligible for the Ponyville Scholarship. Despite my Pa’s repeated insistence that I wouldn’t ever get into college, and that it would be better if I stayed on the farm anyway, I went straight for the tall building that was the town hall the next day when I was out running errands.
Needless to say, all of my time spent studying in secret in the barn at night paid off. I got my acceptance letter in the mail just a few days later, though not in the way I wanted to find out. When I got home from my daily errands about town, I was welcomed home by my furious-looking Pa. Now, when a pony like him gets angry at you, you’re in deep trouble. He was always a slow-to-anger stallion, but never before had I ever seen him this upset.
Boy, he sure was upset, and for a whole bunch of reasons. He said that he needed help on the farm, said that he needed another stallion around to help take care of Granny Smith and Applebloom, two ponies that definitely needed watching nowadays. He also said that he didn’t want me hanging around any of those “prissy unicorn colts” that the Canterlot Academy mostly consisted of. That alone was enough to send a thrill of fear down my spine, but then he said another thing. “Figurin’ was anythin’ but a mare’s job to do.” I always had a hunch that my Pa knew how I felt about colts, but now I was almost certain. I never really did find out if he really did know or not.
What made him the maddest wasn’t even the fact that I did it on my own, it was the fact that I had gotten accepted. He had thrown the letters down onto the table, already open, and ordered me to read them. Of course, I didn’t have much choice in the matter other than to comply. I had only gotten halfway down the page when he ripped the papers from my hooves and tossed them towards the bin in a fury, missing due to the fact that he had neglected to wad them up first and sending them flying everywhere. That was the start of the biggest row I had ever been in.
And it all ended with just four words and the slamming of a door. “I hate you, Pa.” And I had meant it to, meant it just as I mean it now, even if it had made little Applejack cry and Granny Smith gasp in surprise. At that point I stopped caring about them, worrying only about myself. As I prepared to leave for what I thought to be the last time, I had scanned the room behind me. Granny Smith sat over by the kitchen door with Applejack in her hooves while my dad simply stared, whether in surprise or grim resolve I couldn’t tell. The sound that the door made when it slammed closed, and the day that I had been the one slamming it, still haunts me every time I close a door.
And so, I left. I even walked all the way to Manehatten just so I could take the train to Canterlot, as there wasn’t a train in Ponyville back then. Funnily enough, they did dorm me up with a unicorn just like Pa said that they would, and just like he would have hated. I’d never forget the first time I met Wave, back in the dorm, we just sort of clicked together. Of course, the first thing we did was talk about our hobbies. He was enlisted as the Captain of the freshman hornball team, a real stunning athlete with mares leaping at him from every direction back home.
Can’t say that I could blame them, even I was taken for a loop by his tall, snow-white legs and his electric-blue mane. After a while, I even got him to play hoofball with me and a few of my other friends that had gotten scholarships from the farms around Ponyville. I’ll admit, I tackled him every chance I got. It was worth running into that wall of muscle just to have him in my hooves, as desperate as it sounds. Guess that’s why it hurt so much when I saw that pretty pink princess of a mare leap into his arms.
Of course, can’t say that I dislike her for it. She was plenty good enough for him. At least he wasn’t taken by some whorse who had a winning smile or a nice flank, though the mare who did steal him away had both of those, but along with a personality to match his almost perfectly. That sort of thinking didn’t stop it from hurting though.
What hurt a whole world worse, however, was getting that letter in the mail.
I’ll never forget the first look I had at the letter, addressed to me in jagged hoofwriting and practically soaked from the still-wet tears that had fallen onto it. There had been an accident on the farm. Pa was in the hospital and Ma was there with him. I didn’t even say goodbye to Wave, didn’t even pack up my bags, didn’t do anything but gallop out to the Canterlot train station that was across town from the school. I didn’t even apologize as I ran through them, didn’t stop until I reached the station and hopped straight onto a train without even buying a ticket. I think the only reasons I didn’t get stopped was both the fact that the doors closed just as I leapt in and the wild look that was in my eyes.
By the time I got back, they were already in the ground with an apple tree planted over their graves, just like every other Apple before them. Half the trees in the orchards were planted to honor a dead family member. Those were always the ones that yielded the best fruit. It was something of a family tradition, growing a tree with your body after you died. It was always a happy thing, to celebrate a new life born from one that had left the earth.
For me, that damn tree holds nothing but spite. It’s like symbol, a mocking last stand of my father, who I never got to apologize to, never got to say goodbye to. A sick reminder of the fact that I would never, ever have a chance to make things right.
“I hate you, Pa.” The tree in front of me doesn’t do much but rustle as I half-heartedly kick it. Eeyup, I still meant every syllable. I hate him, have hated him ever since he told me that I couldn’t leave, and I hate him more than anypony I’ve ever hated.
But the same holds true with how much I loved him. Each time I hear those four words strung together in a sentence, it’s like a whole new knife-wound to my heart, another tackle from a hoofball player, another time seeing Wave holding that pretty little pink princess.
It was like losing him and Ma again.
After Pa died in the accident with Ma following him with grief, I had to take up most of the chores on the farm. It was a lot of hard work from then on with barely any rest in-between tasks. Almost all of my old school friends had stopped by to see how I was doing after they heard where I had gone, but I never stopped working long enough other than to say a few passing sentences before they left out of awkwardness of watching me buck or balance ledgers. It wasn’t easy, squeezing the budget to death just to pass through the winters. It was difficult having to watch little Applejack and baby ‘Bloom go without just so we could have another thing that we needed more than something else. Those years of “fancy mathematics”, as Granny Smith always likes to call them, really paid off as I worked and worked to keep our little farm afloat.
Of course, I never did get to finish my degree, even though I was smart enough to. Never had the chance. I remember the day I got my Cutie Mark, the very first time my mom had shown me the farm budget and I had organized it better than she had in years of doing it. I thought the half-apple with sparkles surrounding it meant that I could go far. But in all my years of running this farm I’ve learned a little something.
The apple never falls far from the tree.
Author's Note
Just decided to take a jab at writing in first person. I hope it was at least somewhat readable for you!
