Like Sisters, Probably

Over the next few weeks, Dash started dropping by a lot. I was wondering about that, because I knew in about a month or so it’d be getting into summer and the Wonderbolts’ really crazy performance season, and it was that later part of the spring when training got the most intense because of that. And with Dash being in the Alpha Squadron, I was pretty sure the training would be even crazier for her than it usually was. I didn’t know for sure though, because she didn’t really seem to want to talk about the Wonderbolts with me all that much, and when she did, she seemed just totally drained.

But I was fine with that—if I could be her break from all that crazy training she must have been doing, then that was awesome. I could get all the details once she was through her performance season. I knew she probably just didn’t want to take it home with her just then, or whatever. And besides everything else, she was dropping by to hang out a lot, and that was awesome.

In a lot of ways, it wasn’t that much different from how it always was when we were hanging out. We generally just did the same stuff as usual, like going out to eat and messing around racing through town or doing tricks or whatever. I thought Dash would be sick of doing tricks, but she said as long as I didn’t make her do the tricks she was working on for the Wonderbolts then it was fine. It was pretty rough not seeing those tricks, but I went with it. Not that it made any sense to me. “Work” and “fun” for her, when it came to doing tricks, seemed too subtle a difference for me to figure out what made it one or the other. It was always the same with Sweetie Belle, now that I’m thinking about it. What counted as singing for fun versus saying it was a bother because it was work didn’t seem any different to me, but she insisted they were completely different things.

In any case, things with Dash were pretty much the same when we were out. It was after hanging out that things were totally different. We’d either go back to my place or her place and make out a bunch, or we’d sleep together or whatever. And sometimes we wouldn’t even hang out first—like, I’d open my door, and we’d already be kissing before she was even inside.

Way back I had told Sweetie that me and Dash’s relationship was just like it always had been except with a bit more—and that really was what it was like, and it was perfect. It’s like this thing that I’d always wanted but didn’t think even made sense, much less was actually possible, and suddenly it wasn’t just possible but something I actually had. Those weeks really felt like the best weeks of my life up to that point, and though everything between me and Dash wasn’t exactly confirmed or anything, it was happening, and that was amazing.

I knew things couldn’t stay forever like that, though. I didn’t want to do anything to change anything, but there were things coming up that were going to change things anyway. Dash’s intense training would be done eventually and she’d start touring with the Wonderbolts on-and-off for a month or so during their performance season, and I wondered if whatever we had would keep going on after that. As well, the day the lease on my place would end was coming up so I was going to have to make some kind of decision about that. And I still hadn’t talked to Sweetie about it. I really didn’t talk to Sweetie much about anything during those few weeks.

Actually, if I’m being honest, I was avoiding her. It was just that every time we were together, whatever we were talking about always seemed to come back around to being about me and Dash. Like, it wasn’t so bad at first, but it really started to wear on me. I really was stressing about me and Dash’s relationship, and Sweetie wasn’t helping at all. What I wanted was to just be able to hang out with her and talk about nothing like we always used to, especially when I was really feeling unsure about stuff, but she’d just start drilling me on exactly how things were between me and Dash and make everything worse. It was starting to really piss me off.

It still wasn’t very fair to her, though, I knew. And I felt pretty bad about some of the stuff that happened. Like once Sweetie and I were hanging out one evening and Dash showed up, and Dash started kissing me before she realized Sweetie was there, and it was pretty awkward all ’round. And I guess Sweetie was the one who ended up leaving so me and Dash could hang out. Stuff like that.

It really came to a head one weekend, about a month and a half since the Pinkie party. Sweetie came to see me earlier in the week and make sure I was going to be free that Friday, so I made sure to tell Dash I was going to be busy that day.

Right as Sweetie came to the door that Friday, I could tell she was there to start a fight. “Since when do we have to schedule out time to hang out like this?” she snipped at me without even a “hi”.

“Really? That’s your opening comment? You’re barely inside yet—sure you wouldn’t like to sit down before tearing into me?” Even with how pointed she could get when she was saying stuff about me and Dash around that time, she usually put on at least a friendly pretense first.

She scowled as she brushed past me coming inside, floating a brown paper bag beside her. At least she’d brought wine. “I’m not ‘tearing into’ you! We just have to talk about some things.”

“Oh, we do, do we?”

“Yes, we do!” She spun to look at me. “You’re spending way more time with Dash than with me! We hardly ever hang out any more!”

I let out a breath. It’s not like I hadn’t seen this coming. That didn’t make me want to deal with it, however. “Alright, have a seat. I’m going to go open up the wine.”

I took a few moments opening up the wine and getting out glasses to try and get myself in a way where I wouldn’t just tear right back into Sweetie. I knew that wouldn’t help anything.

I got back into the room and set the glasses on the coffee table for Sweetie to pour. It was easier for her to do with her magic. She made no move to do so, though.

“Okay,” I started, “first I just want to say that Rainbow is an important part of my life right now, too, Sweetie.” It was what I had come up with while opening the wine. I was pretty proud of that answer.

“ ‘Important’? In exactly what way are you two ‘important’ to each other, then?” she went off out of nowhere. “What exactly is there between you two at all?”

That was a low blow. I felt totally wronged after trying to be all diplomatic. All the picking and digging she’d been doing over the last weeks at how things were between me and Dash fully cut through right then. I couldn’t take any more of that. I totally lost it.

“Damn bucking hay, Sweetie, I don’t know what me and Dash are, and you bucking know that!” I burst, throwing my hooves up. She would get her bucking fight if that’s what she was looking for. “You damn well know I’m crazy about Dash, and yeah, it kind of really sucks not knowing what we are—thanks for bringing that up all the friggin time. Cut me some bucking slack, already!”

She huffed and turned away from me. “Oh, don’t you sound like such a wronged victim when you say it like that—so now you can just cut me right out of your life and it’s all fine, right?”

“What?! That’s the bucking dumbest—” I broke off, staggered at how dumb it was. How did she even come up with stuff like that? “Are you impaired?! Just because I’m hanging out with Dash a bit doesn’t mean I’m cutting you out of my life or some shit! Is that what this is about? That’s totally ridiculous. Where’s this even coming from?”

“It’s not ridiculous,” she said, much quieter. “You’re so stupidly in love with her that the whole rest of the world stops when you’re with her.” She was staring at the bottle of wine, still untouched, the two empty glasses beside it. “How do I even compete with that? It’s bullshit.”

I sighed. “No, this is bullshit. Right now. All this. Can’t we just hang out like we used to? I miss hanging out like we used to.”

“What, so because now I’m being weird about things, it’s a bother to hang out with me?”

I rolled my eyes. “How could you say that when you’re obviously such a joy to be around lately.” I leaned forwards and grabbed the bottle of wine, sloshing some into the two glasses. “Come on, let’s just try spending time together like two normal ponies who are friends. Can we try that?”

Sweetie gave me an even stare, then huffed and levitated up her glass of wine. I picked mine up and clinked it with hers.

“See, how hard is that?”

“Like walking on two legs.”

My brow fell straight. “Oh, come on.”

“Well, if you stop ditching me to spend time with Dash, I’ll stop freaking out so much.”

“So I’ve just got to break it off with Dash and things’ll go back to being completely normal between us?”

She hummed. “...Yes. I think that’d help a lot. Let’s give that a try and see how it goes.”

I leaned back on the couch. “But what would we talk about if I stopped sleeping with Dash? What could possibly be interesting enough to fill the giant gap in conversation it would leave?”

Neither of us said anything for a while. It was totally quiet besides the slight humming of Sweetie’s magic shimmering around her glass of wine. The evening sun caught on it, too, shining through the window, annoyingly bright and nice.

“You could start calling me ‘Sweets’ again and we could talk about comic books.”

I glanced at her, and took a sip of wine.

“Hey, Sweets, want to talk about comic books?”

“Not really. And don’t call me that.”

I sighed and lay back on the couch. “Come on, seriously, talk to me. Tell me about stuff.”

“What about you? Why don’t you tell me all the stuff you’re always gushing to Dash about?”

I put my glass down and tilted my head back. “Celestia, I swear you’re more obsessed with that pony than I am.”

“You’ve finally figured it out—I’m just so in love with Rainbow Dash. I can’t bear to see you two together. I want to hang out with you so much in order to keep you two apart so I can one day have Dash to myself.” She took a drink of wine. “It’s crazy, but my insane jealousy drives me to do it.”

“That’s not that funny.”

“What, does me making fun of your life-long Dash obsession offend you?”

“No, it just actually wasn’t that funny.”

“Whatever. I’m not apologizing either way.” She tossed back all of what was left of her wine and dropped the glass back down on the table. We sat in silence for a while. “I really am jealous, though,” she said quietly after a moment. “And not about Dash.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty obvious.”

“No, really—I’m really jealous.”

“Yeah, I get it.”

She turned to look at me, her brow set straight. “No, I don’t think you properly do. Seriously, I mean it. I’m really—”

“Yeah. No. Really. I got it.” And I did. All at once, I did, and a whole lot of things made a lot more sense.

Suddenly, all I could think about how she’d never actually told me before if she was into mares or not. I’d never asked. I didn’t know the type of pony she liked, whether she wanted to get married and have foals one day, or if she wanted to live somewhere other than Ponyville at some point. I hadn’t even asked her if she wanted to be roommates after my lease expired. It hit me that we’d probably never be roommates, and it made me really depressed suddenly.

Sweetie looked away from me. “Well, okay. Then you get it. So you know that I’m not going to be able to be normal around you while you’re seeing Dash.”

“That sucks.”

“Yeah. It really does.”

We both just sat there. Suddenly, it was excruciating. I was so depressed and also so mad at Sweetie I could barely stay there. I knew that wasn’t fair, but I was.

“Go ahead,” she said. She glanced over. “It’s killing you to sit here.” She lay back on the couch. “If you’re waiting for me to start on about how I’m just so obsessed with you, and go on and on about how long I’ve felt that way or something, I’ll save you the time by saying you’re not going to hear it.”

“Sweetie...” I trailed off. She just looked at me, giving plenty of time for me to say anything if I was going to.

“See? There’s nothing to say. Neither of us is going to apologize or something like that, because neither of us is sorry or wants to hear an apology. So go to Rainbow Dash.”

Sweetie was kicking me out of my own house and also being infuriatingly assumptive, and I couldn’t even say anything because I really was going to fly off to Dash’s place the moment after Sweetie would’ve left. It really pissed me off, but what pissed me off more was that I couldn’t tell if I was pissed because she knew that, pissed because of the way she was acting, or pissed because of the fact that all I wanted to do was to fly off to Dash. So I just left.

As I flew into the sky and away from my place, I couldn’t get over how much it felt like we’d just broken up. She’d probably collect all her stuff she usually left at my place and everything. I wondered if we wouldn’t have to sit down and divide up the comic books, even.

I realized we had been kind of like ponies dating. Like, it was exclusive, in a lot of ways. I’d say it didn’t even have to be Dash, specifically—if I’d gotten in any kind of relationship with a pony, I bet almost the same thing would’ve happened. I didn’t know if it was her fault or my fault that our friendship had become like that, but what I did know was that I really kind of felt like crying.

Dash had said she’d be coming down the next day, and, as crazy as staying at her place waiting for her to get back was, it was what I was going to do. I suddenly wished I could just drop in on Rainbow Dash as easily as she could always drop in on me.

I flew across Ponyville till I got to Dash’s cloud home. I knew where she kept a spare key, so I let myself in. Right as I got inside I started feeling better. I knew it was a bit nuts, and sounds pretty nuts, but I really did start to feel better right away. I think a lot of it was just the distance from Sweetie. Like, I was up in a cloud where she couldn’t come. I needed to be away from her right then.

Once I was inside, though, I couldn’t really focus on anything. I just kind of went spot to spot listlessly—picking up a book and putting it down again, pouring a glass of water and leaving it on the counter. I thought about pulling out some of Dash’s cider, but I was pretty close to feeling pathetic about sitting around Dash’s place while she wasn’t even there, and getting on the wrong side of a bottle or six of cider would’ve been more than my self-image could handle just then. I thought about going back out and running some tricks or just flying around to get my mind off things, but as restless as I felt, it was still just comforting to be in Dash’s house.

I somehow killed enough time until it was late enough that I could make an argument for going to bed. It was a bit weird being in Dash’s bed without her there, but nowhere near as weird as it was just totally comforting or something. Even though it was still pretty early, I fell asleep no problem.

* * *

The next day I woke up really early. I made breakfast then just sat around holding a book open in front of me in case I managed to focus enough to actually read it. It was all I could do to stop myself thinking about how the buck I was going to try and explain to Dash what in Equestria I was doing, because I don’t think I could’ve explained it to myself.

Dash didn’t get back till the evening, and my nerves were completely shot by the time I finally heard her coming in the door. I just kind of jumped up and went to go see her before she really got inside.

“Uh... hi,” I said. She looked surprised for a second, then said “hi” back. “Um, stuff happened. I mean, it’s no big deal, except it kind of is, and I think I’m kind of freaking out or whatever. I stayed here last night. I hope that’s cool.”

She tossed off her saddlebags and took a few steps towards me. “Oh, yeah, for sure. You come whenever you want,” she said. “What’s going on? Something happen yesterday?” She looked a bit worried.

“Yeah, it’s—I’m actually feeling better about stuff now.” And I really did. “Uh, can we talk about it later?”

“Yeah. No problem. But hey, you should’ve just come to my Cloudsdale place,” she said. “Uh, unless that was too much trouble, or whatever.”

“Oh. No, that—I don’t know where you place is.”

“Shit, really? Well buck, I’ll give you the address, definitely.”

“Isn’t—aren’t you busy there? Isn’t it a bother if I drop in on you in Cloudsdale?”

“Well, I don’t exactly have lots of free time, but I do gotta come back at some point. You know, if you just need to see me or whatever.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“Yeah. I mean, I totally owe you, anyway.” She glanced to the side. “You’re always around when I drop in on you.” She snapped back to look at me. “But even if I didn’t owe you, it’d be fine, I didn’t mean, that, uh—”

“Will you kiss me?” I asked.

“Yeah.” She leaned in and her lips touched mine. I felt her move to break away after a moment, and I reached around the back of her heard with my forelegs to pull her back into the kiss. I flared out my wings to stay balanced on my hind legs, and dragged her over to the couch, still kissing. We flopped onto it, and just lay there making out. Everything was Dash’s lips and her body pressed against mine, and my mind went mercifully blank. After a while, we stopped kissing and I just lay against her. I still felt kind of pathetic, but I felt way more calm. And Dash didn’t say anything and just held me back.

Eventually we got up and got something ready for supper, neither of us really saying much, but it was really comfortable. After supper, Dash suddenly looked up at me with a smile. “Hey, let’s go flying!”

“What, really? The sun’s already down.”

“Yeah, I know. There’s somewhere I want to go. Come on!”

I really couldn’t put together a response to that, and kind of just stared at her.

“Seriously, let’s go.” She reached out her hoof and smiled at me—this captivating smile that took me completely away from anything making me feel shitty. I took her hoof.

Soon we were out flying over Ponyville. Just as we reached the edge of the town, she banked and descended. I glanced at her as we landed.

“Well, I’m not about to fly around the trees out here at night.” She winked. “I’m not completely insane.”

I came up beside her and we started walking. She bumped up against me. “Plus,” she said, “walking’s kind of nice, too. Sometimes.” I couldn’t help but grin and nuzzled up to her as we walked.

I still had no idea where we were going, but I was fine to blindly let her lead me. It was a warm night with only a hint of a chill left in the air—just enough for it to be sort of refreshing or something.

I couldn’t say how long it was, but soon I recognized where she was taking us, and a few moments later we came to a clearing where the pond where we used to go swimming sometimes was.

Without a word, Dash slipped away from me and flew up into the air, hung for a moment, then dropped into the water. The splash cut out through the quiet night, trailed by the rippling slosh of the wake. She broke the silence again as she reemerged, tossing her mane out of her face and throwing drops of water glittering through the light of the moon. I kind of wanted to just stay where I was and watch, but after a moment she waved me in.

I stayed on the ground, walking to the edge of the water and waded in. The icy bite of the water nipped at my legs, slowly climbing up as I went. Once it was past my knees I lowered myself in and spread my wings. The way water went over my wings always felt sort of like flying, but drawn way out, so much thicker as it tugged through my feathers than air during flight. Like flying in slow motion.

As soon as it was deep enough I dove under. I lazily beat my wings and kicked with a hoof to push me through the water. Opening my eyes, I could make out the form of Dash and propelled myself towards her. I resurfaced about a wing’s length from where she was treading water.

Dash’s mane clung to the side of her face, the colours muted to almost grey in the night except for the sharp white highlights of the moonlight on her wet hair. I waded closer and put my forelegs around her neck. The water slapped and splashed around us for the few moments it took to match up the rhythm of our wing-beats keeping us afloat. Our bodies softly jostled together, the water lapping at our necks, and I could feel her breath, cold against my wet coat.

It was soothing and entrancing, and I hardly knew where I was. I’d left behind everything real or bothersome. Real and bothersome. It was just Dash and the water and the moonlight and we kissed. There was the warmth of her lips and her body against the chill of the water and the night air and the constant movement of our wings keeping up afloat in the absolute stillness of the night.

Time kind of ran into itself, and I have no idea how long we were kissing. At some point we separated, swam around, dove underwater and kissed some more around a storm of bubbles streaming up to the surface. At some point we found ourselves lying on our backs at the edge of the pond, our back legs still in the water. We both had our wings splayed out ridiculously to the sides to dry.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Yeah,” Dash said back. It was the first either of us had spoken since we got there.

“Sorry for being all weird.”

Dash half sat up, propping herself up on her foreleg. “Hey, I’m weird around you all the time. You be as weird as you want.”

“What am I to you?” I asked out of nowhere. “What are we?”

She blinked, and opened her mouth to speak but hesitated. My heart was pounding like mad.

“Well, you’re my girlfriend,” she said. “Like, we’re dating, right? Like lovers.”

“Lovers?”

“Yeah. I mean, I... yeah. Lovers.”

I could feel my heart beat right up in my head. I glanced over. Dash was looking at me. Our eyes met and Dash looked away, then met my gaze again after a moment. With the moon throwing sharp shadows from its spots of light I couldn’t really make enough sense of Dash’s face to tell what expression she had on. I wondered if she was blushing as crazy as I was.

“I’m... happy,” I said, plainly. “It’s—that makes me really happy.”

“Oh,” said Dash, and after a pause she said, “I’m glad.” She lay down on her back. We just lay there, drying out waterlogged wings.

“I had a fight with Sweetie.”

“Ah.” She was quiet for a moment. “Was it about me?”

I almost felt like making a crack about her ego and her assuming that it was about her, but I realized pretty quick that it wouldn’t really be funny, and actually was the most obvious answer as well as the truth.

“Yeah,” I said. “But really, I think it would’ve been about the same if it was anypony, not just you.”

“Somehow that doesn’t make me feel better.” The way she said it, I got the feeling she’d started it as a joke but it’d turned itself into a statement halfway through.

“I just mean that me and Sweetie had—well, I don’t know. But there wasn’t room for anypony else, probably. So I’m glad this isn’t—I’m glad we’re lovers.”

I rolled over and climbed up the rest of the bank, pulling my back legs out of the water. I closed and opened my wings—they were still a bit damp.

“But I guess there’s no way me and Sweetie are going to be roommates now. It’s funny, I just always had thought I'd be renewing my lease and she'd be moving in. Like it was a done deal. Even though neither of us even mentioned it once. I wonder what I’m going to do about my place.”

Rainbow Dash got up, too. She started to talk, then broke off and shuffled her wings. She opened her mouth again. “You know, if you want, I think you could probably stay at my Ponyville place.”

I blinked. “Like, until I find a new place?”

“No, like, for living there. You could live there. It could be your place, too.” She spread her wings and beat them a few times. Little drops of water sparkled from them. “I mean, you’d have it to yourself most of the time. It’d be really convenient because it just sits there empty, and I am still paying the mortgage on it.” She looked over at me. “Oh, I wouldn’t charge you much or anything though!”

“And the rest of the time... it’d be like living together?”

“Yeah.” She looked back at her wings as she closed them. “If that sounds too crazy right now, no problem, I was just thinking—”

“Yes. I-I really want that. I want to do that.”

“Oh. Okay. Awesome. Sounds good.”

We caught each other’s eye and both started smiling. During the walk back towards Ponyville, our wings still held out while they finished drying, neither of us could wipe the smiles off our faces.