Scooter took a deep breath as he casually coasted towards his house. After his conversation with his friends, and their departure for their own jobs, the pegasus had gone to his job, clearing the skies.

Weather team was almost an absolute for an able pegasus around Ponyville. With no magic to help with the skies, the pegasi had to work diligently to keep everything running smoothly. It wasn't too tough, really. He had to make sure that the weather patterns needed for the day were up to par, and to make it so in a decent time frame.

The work today was harder than usual, but he liked it. It gave him time to think things over. Since yesterday, it seemed as though everything was happening so quickly. One moment, he was getting settled end for what would have been his most perfect day in weeks, the next, he was rushing to Silver's house as quickly as his hooves and wings would take him in a desperate attempt to help the mare who'd made his life Hell years ago.

Now he was trying to get her out of his head, and for once, not because of something objectively bad. His thoughts were, thankfully, interrupted by the sight of his house just in the distance. He smiled softly as he rounded the last corner, the full house coming into view.

It was about that moment when he noticed something peculiar. He swore he saw a light pink figure near his house, though he was still far enough away that he knew it could be anypony, but as he came closer, his eyes widened in recognition. He'd hoped his eyes were just playing tricks on him. As he grew closer, however, he knew that what he was seeing was actually there.

He came within a few feet of the nearest side of his house and stopped before kicking his skateboard up and grabbing it. He gave the best smile he could, but his expression was obviously nervous as he looked to the very familiar earth pony before him. "Uh, hey, DT. I thought you were going home with your dad. Did you forget something here?"

Diamond Tiara shook her head. She was blushing slightly, though why she was entirely escaped Scooter. She spoke softly, almost hesitantly. "I just, I've been thinking about things, and I felt maybe we should talk about things. If that's okay, that is." She looked around the empty street. "I would prefer if we talked inside."

Scooter seemed a bit confused, but something told him that whatever was going on, she was obviously sincere about wanting to talk. He figured he had plenty to talk with her about and nodded, giving a much more convincing smile as he unlocked his door and opened it for her.

The mare smiled and stepped in with a soft 'Thank you.' Scooter closed and locked the door behind him before setting down his board and taking a seat beside Diamond Tiara on the couch.

"So, what did you want to talk about exactly?"

Diamond sighed and looked to Scooter before looking back down. "I just, I wanted to apologize."

Scooter smiled a bit. "Look, I would've done it for anypony, you weren't any inco-"

The mare stopped him with an upheld hand, but quickly drew it back. "Scooter, I mean for the way I treated you all those years ago."

The pegasus's expression fell a little. He wasn't sure exactly what to expect the talk to be about, but this was definitely not on his list. "What do you mean?"

Diamond Tiara looked to the stallion, her eyes soft, practically pleading. "I mean just what I said. I treated you so badly for so long. I insulted you, I humiliated you at every turn, I did everything I could to make you miserable. I did you so wrongly, but..."

Her voice trailed off for a moment before she started back up. "But nothing. There's no flip side to this. There's no hidden sunshine or siliver lining. I was simply horrid to you. I know I could never make up for what I did and I know that you have no reason to forgive me, but I guess I felt like I owed you so-"

This time it was Scooter to cut Diamond off, though not with a raised hand, but with a hug. Diamond was entirely shocked. She didn't expect anything at all really, maybe a pat on the shoulder and a good bye, but nothing more.

"I forgive you," Scooter said softly, holding the mare tighter.

"Wh-what?" was all Diamond Tiara could manage to say.

"I said, I forgive you. I'm not saying what you did was right, or even okay, but I'm not mad, and I'm not upset. I'm not holding it against you. You're not that same filly you were, and I see that. Yeah, you treated me like crap. Yeah, it hurt, but we all have to move on from the things we did in our youth or we'll never get anywhere."

Scooter pulled away slowly and looked to see the mare tearing up. "Y-you mean, you're r-really not mad at me? Even after I t-treated you like that for so long, y-you can just forgive me?"

The stallion looked at her sternly for a moment, but he quickly softened up. "We were foals, Diamond. If I held all that against you still, I'd be no better than those stallions who attacked you. They couldn't handle themselves against another stallion. That's why they attacked you. That's also why I made sure they knew they'd messed up."

Diamond's eyes grew wide. "What do you mean? What happened?"

Scooter sighed and looked down. "I uh, I kinda bumped into them when I went to meet up with AB and Silv. Good thing they were there too. I screwed up pretty badly, but it could've been much worse."

Without any real thought about her words, Diamond Tiara spoke with great and obvious concern in her voice. "What? Did they hurt you? Are you okay?"

Scooter was taken back a little by this, but kept his tone as casual as possible. "Yeah, I'm fine, Diamond. Are you sure that you're okay?"

The earth pony blushed deep red as she realised how she must've just sounded. She seemed to start thinking up and excuse before apparently giving up. She looked to Scooter and sighed. "I've just, I've honestly always admired you, Scooter."

The pegasus blinked a few times and motioned to clean his ears. "Um, come again?"

The mare spoke more clearly, taking care to make sure it was obvious she knew and meant what she was saying. "I said that I've always admired you. You were one of the last in our class to find your special talent, as well as one of the last of your year to be able to fly. I made your life at school miserable with everything I could, but..."

She took a breath and looked directly into Scooter's eyes. "But no matter what happened, no matter what you had to go through or deal with, you always stayed optimistic. Nothing was ever too much for you to handle. You never gave up on anything. Now look at you. You're on your own, comfortably living in a very nice home, you're an amazing flyer, and even my father seems to look up to you a little bit."

If Scooters eyes weren't as wide as they could get before, they were now. He was completely lost for words at this. He could hardly believe what he'd just heard.

Not sure how to take the stallion's silence, Diamond tried to quickly think up something to do or say. Another one of her father's sayings came to mind: When your mind fails to figure out what's best, listen to your heart; it will always have an answer.

She figured that if they'd helped him enough to be worth telling, then they would be worth giving a shot. Without second thought about it, she let her heart lead her, and it led her straight into a kiss with Scooter.

At first the stallion went rigid. His body tensed merely from the suddenness of the motion. After a few seconds, however, the surprise ebbed and he relaxed. He felt something somewhat familiar. He felt the same thing he had when they kissed that morning. He felt tha familiar touch of her soft lips, he felt the way that the pressed tenderly, invitingly against his.

Without much further hesitation, Scooter wrapped his arms around the mare's waist, tucking his wings in as he fell back onto the couch and pulled Diamond on top of him. He gently returned the kiss, his mind focused now entirely on the lips pressed against his own.

Diamond wasn't sure why she'd kissed Scooter, and definitely not why he'd kissed her back, but what she was absolutely positive of, was that she was happy it happened. Every thought that troubled her before disappeared entirely, leaving her with only the stallion holding her, kissing her, to focus on, and that's just what she did.

Both ponies laid there, lips locked, in silence only broken by the slight, almost nonexistent sounds of their kiss, for what felt to both of them like hours. Upon finally breaking the kiss, however, a quick look outside gave that maybe a few minutes had passed.

The two looked at each other, their cheeks slightly reddened in the aftermath of what they'd just done. Neither knew quite what to say, and so said nothing for a while. After a few moments of silence, Scooter cleared his throat.

"So, does your dad know you're here?"

Diamond nodded. "I told him I felt I needed to talk to you. He said it was fine, and that he didn't really mind when I came back as long as I was with you."

Scooter flushed a bit more at this, but decided to take a chance with it. "In that case, do you think he'd mind if you stayed the night again? He seemed pretty okay with it before."

"He wouldn't mind." The mare spoke the words very matter-of-factly, blushing still, but sounding quite sure of her words.

"Would you like to stay again?"

"I think I would. Should we get to bed then?"

Scooter smiled softly and leaned up to plant a small peck on the mare's lips, making her blush and giggle a little, which only led her to blush worse. Scooter chuckled softly. "Yeah, let's go."

The two rose from the couch and walked together into the bedroom. Once they were both inside, Scooter closed the door behind them and began taking off his hoodie. To his surprise and silent satisfaction, he pulled the hoodie off from over his eyes to see Diamond Tiara undressing to her undergarments again.

So he thought, until the mare removed her shirt enough to show that there was no bra under it, and soon removing her pants to show the same was true for her panties, nothing. His eyes widened as his face lit up.

Diamond turned to face Scooter with a soft smile, to see him removing his shirt, rather slowlywhile it was over his head. "Do you need some help with that?"

Scooter was entirely oblivious to the fact that the mare was steadily walking towards him, as he could neither see nor hear her approach. "Huh? Oh, uh, heheh, nah. I got it, just uh, just stretching my arms a little real quick."

Not long after he'd finished speaking, he felt Diamond against him, more specifically, he felt her warm, soft, bare breasts against him as she reached up and helped him remove his shirt. Upon doing so, she could see the pegasus's cheeks had turned bright red.

Diamond wasn't an innocent little filly, and it didn't take her long to figure out why the usually somewhat cocky pegasus was acting so shy. She smiled a little and kissed his cheek.

"Don't worry, Scooter, I don't bite, and I don't mind you looking at me. Admittedly, I didn't expect to be here right now, but something about you just seems to comfort me and send away all the silly worries I usually have. I don't know what, but that's fine. I'll figure it out."

Scooter was surprised, but not enough to be fazed too much by it all. The surprise of first seeing her bare had all but gone, and somehow what she'd said had eased him up a bit. He put on a soft smile as he pulled her against him and kissed her forehead. "Then I guess I should finish getting comfortable so we can rest, huh?"

Diamond blushed a bit but giggled as she nodded before walking to the bed and sitting on it.

Scooter took off his pants, but chose to leave his boxers on, which seemed to be just fine for Diamond Tiara as her smile never faded. He walked over and took his place in the bed as she followed suit, laying beside him and snuggling close as he pulled the covers over them. This time, Scooter didn't hesitate for a moment to pull her tight against him, holding onto her body and again embracing the soft warmth of her form.

Though there were plenty of thoughts to cross both of their minds, the two were more focused on getting some shut-eye. They happily held on to one another and slipped into the realm of Artemis, the realm of dreams.

Come the next day, the two awoke to see each other smiling softly as they held onto one another. Their eyes met for a moment before closing as the two ponies leaned in for a kiss. Their lips met in the usual, soft fashion. They were fresh from slumber, and looking forward to the same calming, familiar feeling from the two kisses they'd shared before.

There was only one problem, something wasn't the same, and the kiss reflected it. It was subtle at first, barely noticeable, but a strange warmth from the touch of one another's lips grew and grew between them. The first thing to truly tell them both that something was truly different, however, was when Scooter's wings started to twitch behind him.

Both ponies noticed it and the kiss was quickly broken as the looked at each other. For some reason, their minds could not at the moment figure out quite what was going on, but after a minute of silence, Scooter's eye widened and he quickly rose from the best shaking his head in his hands. "Oh no, no, no, no, no, no! This was not supposed to go there!"

Diamond Tiara, apparently sobered entirely from her slight sleepy haze by the sudden movement of the pegasus quickly caught up, recoiling slightly at the thoughts in her head.

Her recoil was apparently physical as well as mental, as Scooter seemed to take notice. "I'm sorry. It's, it's not what you're thinking, I-I think. Ugh! I don't know. I just, I don't know what to say." He was visibly nervous and distraught in the wake of what Diamond Tiara thought was a much more simple matter than he seemed to.

"Scooter. Please, calm down and tell me what YOU think happened. Why are you so upset?" The mare sat up, the covers falling to lay over her waist and legs, thought leaving her chest now exposed.

Scooter barely took notice of them as he took a deep breath and tried to calm down. After a few good breaths and a moment or two with his eyes shut, he seemed to manage it. As he opened them, however, he suddenly found his eyes drawn to Diamond's exposed breasts. He blushed but shook his head a bit as his gaze met hers. He sighed and walked to the bed, taking a seat on the edge of it.

"I don't know to be honest. I guess I just felt that, ya know, since the first two times we kissed, there really wasn't anything like, well, that, that it would stay that way." He heaved another, more exasperated sigh. "Maybe I just feel like I shouldn't feel that way about you. That maybe you're only acting like this because, well, because I helped you out."

Diamond Tiara sat quiet for a moment, which was apparently much too long, as Scooter stood from the bed and walked to his closet before she could speak up. He searched for a pair of jeans and a shirt as he spoke. "Look, I get that you're glad I helped you out and everything. Honestly, I do. Blitz really helped me out, personally. If it weren't for him, there's no way I'd be as good a flyer as I am now. The thing is, though, that you don't owe me anything."

He pulled on a pair of pants and a shirt before picking out a light blue hoodie and sliding it on. After he was dressed, he turned to the still undressed mare. "I just, I think we need to take a few days to get that whole incident out of our heads." Diamond started to object, but Scooter hardly gave her a chance. "I think you need to get dressed and head back home for now. In a week, I'd like to meet back up if you still want to see me. I'll be heading up to Canterlot around then with AB to see Silver perform. So we can meet there or something."

Diamond Tiara again opened her mouth to object, but decided against it. She was, afterall, in his home, and his bed. Not to mention everything he truly had done for her in these two days' past. The least she could do was give him the space he asked for, and she gave a nod before getting up and dressing herself.

Before she left, she turned to the stallion. "Could I get a hug? Just to know this isn't on bad terms?"

Scooter couldn't help but smile slightly. He pulled the mare into a hug, which she returned without hesitation. It was rather quick, and neither pony lingered much after it. Diamond Tiara gave a nod and a small 'thank you' before leaving.

A few moments passed after she left, and Scooter slumped and walked to his couch before falling onto it with a low groan. He looked up at the ceiling and sighed. "What exactly did I just do? I'm pretty sure I just shot myself in the foot." He blinked as he looked down at the slight bulge that had formed in his pants not long ago. "Correction, I think I just basically kicked myself in the balls." He groaned as he lay back and tried to get the thought of Diamond Tiara out of his head, though he soon found his efforts to be in vain. "Great."

Author's Note

Dear Celestia, please let me not have royally screwed this up. I'm not comfortable with this going by too quickly. I want it to take a little time, have some build up. Too much? Not enough? Criticise this! Please?