"Now Berry, can you tell me what this word says?" Raspberry Torte said, pointing her hoof at a filly's storybook.
"Bewwy." The three-year-old foal said confidently.
"That's right!" Raspberry clapped her hooves in delight. "Now Cheerilee, you come here. What does this say?" The mare continued, pointing at another word.
"Happy! Happy happy happy happiness!" Pre-schooler Cheerilee proclaimed happily.
"Oh, I'm so proud of my little smarties." Raspberry Torte smiled, patting them both on the head. "You girls are going to become teachers one day, I just know it!"
Cheerilee hopped onto her mother's lap. "I'm gonna be just like you, mommy." The magenta filly said, snuggling up against her mother's soft pink coat.
"Mommy smart!" Berry Punch yelled from the ground as Raspberry scooped her up onto her lap too.
"My girls." The mother sighed contentedly.
Cheerilee smiled slightly as she began to grade the ever-lasting stack of papers on her desk. She was a teacher now, just as she wanted to be from the moment she was old enough to talk.
"Hey loser!" Prim smiled as she walked past the cowering schoolpony.
"Eww, I smell something bad! Oh wait, it's just the little teacher's pet, Cheerilee!" Proper evilly grinned as she hurled insults at the poor filly.
"S-stop it..." Cheerilee whispered quietly.
"Oh look, I think it's actually trying to communicate!" Prim cackled, along with the group that had now gathered around them.
"Yeah, what's it gonna do next, finally -" But Proper's next retort had been cut off by the purple presence in the hallway.
"Leave. My. Sister. ALONE!" Berry Punch roared, striding up to the group of onlookers. All the ponies quickly dispersed, leaving Prim and Proper, pale expressions of fear upon their faces. "So. Ugly and Uglier decided to go picking on my sister." Berry said menacingly.
"W-we didn't mean it!" Prim shouted.
"We swear!" Proper added.
"Okay. Well, you two must be Grade A idiots if you think I'll forgive you with those lame excuses. So what you're going to do is apologize to my sister, tell the teacher what you did, and then await your punishment. And if you don't do this? Well, you don't wanna know what's going to happen to you next. Am I clear?" The purple pony growled, who was now uncomfortably close to Prim and Proper.
The two ponies nodded slowly, shouted "SORRY CHEERILEE!" and ran off hastily.
"Wow... you're like a superhero Berry!" Cheerilee gasped in amazement, looking up with shining eyes at her younger sister.
"What are sisters for?" Berry Punch said, smiling as she did so and bent down to give her sister a hug.
Berry Punch sat on her sofa, staring meaninglessly into some boring documentary on her TV. But she softly giggled as she thought of the looks on Prim and Proper's faces as she came down on them like that.
A sixteen-year-old Cheerilee urged her hooves to go faster as she thundered up the stairs, finally coming to a stop at Berry's room. "Punchie? May I please come in?" She teased politely.
"Come in, you goof." Berry's voice came from the inside of the room.
Cheerilee had an ecstatic smile on her face. "Well? Isn't my littlest sister going to ask me how my day went?" the magenta pony teased again.
"What's up with you?" Berry frowned at the enormous grin on her sister's face. "Okay, how did your day go, my dearest sister?" She shot back.
"Weeeelll, I got up, I ate breakfast, I went to school, I waved good-bye to you as I got off the bus, I went into school, the school counselor asked us what we were going to be when we grew up, I said I wanted to be a teacher, when school was out I left to take care of fillies 'cause I signed up for an assistant teacher's job, I finished the day, the fillies said they loved me, I left the elementary school, I got my cutie mark, I - "
"WHOA. WHOA WHOA WHOA. What in Equestria?!" Berry Punch cut off Cheerilee's story to examine her sister's flank.
"Ta da!" Cheerilee yelled and pulled her tail back from her flank to reveal three smiling daisies.
"Wow! You got your cutie mark!" Berry Punch exclaimed.
"I know, isn't it great?" Cheerilee squealed.
"My older sister, all grown up." the purple teen teased.
"Hey, just because I got my cutie mark later than you still makes me the older one." Cheerilee stated.
"And you're still awesome." Berry smiled at her older sister, pulling her into a hug.
Cheerilee was getting down to the last few papers and softly recalled her joy. She also recalled how much of it her sister shared with her, even though it was her cutie mark and not Berry's.
"Well squirt, you've done well," Punch Drunk said as he drank the small glass of wine. "And what is that you've added in there? Cinnamon? Mint?"
"It's called vanilla, and thank you." a proud Berry Punch smiled at her father.
"You were always the confident one. Maybe a little cocky, too." Punch snorted at her as he ruffled her pink mane.
"I take that as a compliment." The mare stated simply.
"Alright, I already know my sister's cocky! Let me try the wine already!" Cheerilee said impatiently.
"Okay, hold your ponies." Berry said as she poured a glass for her older sister.
"Wow! Punchie, this has to be the best wine I've ever tasted! You have a gift!" Cheerilee said emphatically.
"Aww, you're making me blush," Berry mumbled, and indeed a spot of pink was starting to appear on her violet cheeks. "It's just my first time anyway."
"But you really are good," Cheerilee prompted. "Even if this is your first time" she said slyly, poking Berry with her elbow.
"You should listen to your older sissy. You've got some talent." Punch Drunk said, evidently proud of his daughter's work. "In fact, I'm so proud of you that I've decided to give you my wine company."
"What?! This is insane? You're actually giving your company to me?" The purple earth pony gasped.
"T'was Cheerie's idea. Thank her." The white colt grinned, nodding towards Cheerilee.
"Our dad does not lie. I really remembered how much you wanted to brew wine, and sometimes (a little blush formed on the mare's cheeks) I snuck into your room to taste your wine samples. They were so good!"
Berry Punch Chuckled at her elder. "So that's why I kept finding some broken seals on my wine bottles! I had no idea my goody-two-hooves sister was capable of such a thing."
"Anyway," Cheerilee said, brushing off her sister's remark, "I think you really deserve this. Congratulations Punchie!" Berry Punch even did a little squee as she pulled her family in for a group hug.
Berry Punch had long since grown bored of the impossibly long documentary and had begun to pick at a spot on her tattered green couch. Her life was in ruins now, but somehow, she felt good remembering the memories she and her sister had made long ago. And she missed that. She wanted it back.
Cheerilee was finished grading her papers and began to pack up her things to go home. As she walked home in the rain, she pondered her mind as to why the sudden memories had been coming back to her. Maybe it was because she was getting lonely, with no company except for her students and the occasional passerby. Thinking about Berry made her life better. And she missed that. She wanted it back.
Author's Note
Hey, just wanted to say that if you came looking for clop by the name of the title, you were wrong. Not a clop story, just a story about the sisterly love between Cheerilee and Berry.
As Cheerilee walked home from the schoolhouse, she couldn't help but let her mind wander over to the thoughts that she had tried so hard long ago to destroy. The ones about Berry Punch. Her mind began to sync to her footsteps. Berry Punch is my sister. I loved Berry Punch. So what happened? DRIP. Suddenly, Cheerilee was forcefully jerked back to reality with a cold raindrop on the tip of her nose. "Oh no..." she muttered. The little drop began to rapidly multiply into hundreds. "Buck..." Cheerilee growled as she pulled her saddlebags over her head and ran.
Berry Punch scratched her ear, finally turned off the documentary, and got off of her couch. The weird, sudden stream of foalhood memories puzzled her a lot. Berry didn't do much thinking anymore, ever since her spiraling descent into darkness. She tried to hold back those memories all her life - but for some odd reason they were all coming back to her. She frowned and walked over to her refrigerator. Maybe another drink will get rid of those bad memories, she thought. Pulling out a bottle of whiskey, she plopped down at her little mini-bar next to the kitchen. This was the eighth drink she had had tonight. "Maybe this... w-washn't shuch a... gud... idea." she managed to get out before passing out on the floor.
"Ugh. Finally I'm home." Cheerilee said after slamming her door in the face of the storm. She placed her saddlebags on her dining table and tiredly slumped down on her white sofa. "What a night!" she sighed. Another storm. Sometimes Cheerilee wondered if Ponyville even knew what the sun was. She hurriedly made a bowl of cucumbers and daisies before shoving the contents into her mouth. As Cheerilee ate her dinner, her mind began wandering again. She had lived alone for a while, not unhappily. She was okay with the position she was in. So why did her subconscious begin to long the companionship of her sister? She began to delve deeper into her thoughts:
"Berry. Can I come in? Cheerilee called tentatively outside of the bedroom door.
"No. Leave me alone."
"I'm coming in anyway." Cheerilee said as she shoved on the door. It fell open, revealing a pony that was no longer truly herself.
Cheerilee cringed at the fading memory as she remembered the things that had unfolded that night. No. I'm not doing this tonight, Cheerilee told herself firmly. Shaking her head vigorously, as if that would get rid of the memory, she shoved the remnants of her dinner aside and started off to her bedroom. She was still in a sort of daze as she climbed into her bed with her novel. Cheerilee just couldn't shake the strange feeling inside of her. "Maybe I'll just go to sleep tonight." She said to herself, dropping the book on the floor and turning out the light. But that night, Cheerilee had the worst sleep of her life. She drifted into a dream, falling deeper and deeper into the clutches of sleep.
Berry Punch was hunched on the floor, her back to her bed. She had her legs folded, with one forehoof encircling them, and the other halfheartedly grasping an unmarked bottle. All around her, the floor was littered with pieces of paper, random labels, and bottles, bottles, bottles. Cheerilee's eyes took in the room and her sister. Her gaze froze on Berry. Not a thing was physically out of place on the pony, her mane and fur looking groomed, and perhaps a little flushed in the cheeks, but she appeared perfectly fine. However, the true change lay in her eyes. The gleam in them that Cheerilee well remembered had disappeared. She scanned Berry's face urgently, trying to find just a hint of that familiar sparkle.
"Berry...?"
"I said, leave me alone, Cheerilee." Berry Punch growled as she unsuccessfully tried to push Cheerilee out of the room.
"What are you doing in here?"
"What does it look like I'm doing, writing foals' books? I'm trying to stop Dad's business from being a colossal failure. Stop me from being a colossal failure." She said sadly, the bottle in her hand drooping.
"Berry, maybe you should take... a break?" Cheerilee said, unable to find a solution.
"A break? A break? Of course, Cheerilee Cheerful, always the optimist, and never practical. Ever. I would love to take a break," She spat, dragging the words out sarcastically. "But if you haven't noticed, I'm trying to keep this family from crashing and burning! The Punch Winery hasn't had a good wine in months now! No one's buying anything from us! And since Dad..." She trailed off, depression blurring her features. "Since Dad... isn't here anymore, Mom's in no state to work, so I have to do everything around here. What are you doing, Cheerilee? Wasting time on your stupid foalhood dream of becoming a teacher?" She said in disgust. "There's no money there. You're just a selfish little brat who only cares about herself and not her family. If you actually cared about any of us, you would suck it up and get a job that pays." Berry finished, swinging the bottle in Cheerilee's direction.
The older pony stood, shaking with a mix of rage and heartbreak. "I'm the selfish one? I'm trying to find a legitimate job that I can keep and really enjoy, and you just sit here all day, claiming to work but really just drinking your health into destruction!"
"I'm testing flavors!" Berry screamed, scattering some of the bottles around her.
"Sure, you're testing flavors." Cheerilee mocked. "I can't believe you have the nerve to say I'm the selfish one while you're creating a monster that's tearing our entire family apart. Don't act like you're the only one affected by Dad's death. Grow up, Berry. Get yourself together."
"You know what?" Berry Punch said, standing up. "I've always hated you, Cheerilee." She choked out the words in her anger. Pointing an accusatory hoof at her sister's face, she stared her dead in the eyes. "I hate you. Get out. Now."
Cheerilee's world came crashing down around her as she slowly comprehended the hateful words and hateful eyes in front of her were truly her sister's. Tears dripping from her eyes, she galloped out of the room, slamming the door behind her and let her sobs of anguish pierce her heart, flooding with sorrow at her sister's words.
Berry Punch lay on the floor, still passed out from earlier. She lay motionless, the drugs inside of her body silencing her thoughts, actions, and feelings.