It Was the Worst of Timesby SleepIsforTheWeakChaptersChapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Chapter 1She looked at Rarity from across the bedroom, dressed in a long, white, nightgown with blue trim, leaning into the vanity to brush out her mane into utter perfection, and couldn't help but feel an overwhelmingly intense surge of emotion – a pang of love so strong she thought she’d faint with its force, mixed with an aching longing that pierced her chest acutely. Applejack wanted nothing more than to touch her, press her face into her styled mane and inhale the scent of her shampoo, her warm neck and wrap her forlegs protectively around Rarity and hear her giggle in response as she snuggled against her – but she knew that none of those things, now only a sweet memory, would happen even if she tried. So, she remained rooted to her spot on the other side of the room with the bed between them, and tried to focus on smoothing out the covers through a nervous habit. Nevertheless, her gaze still insisted on drifting back to her, drinking in her beauty. Her throat ached and she was suddenly overcome with a strong urge to cry, but she blinked back her tears. Rarity met her gaze in the vanity mirror, over her shoulder, and granted her a small smile. Applejack felt her heart give a small leap for joy – Rarity hadn't smiled at her in so long. Most ponies would have probably said that it had been so long they'd forgotten what it looked like, but she could never forget Rarity’s smile and how it lit up her whole face, making her even more beautiful than she normally was – if that were even possible. "You look beautiful, Rarity," she whispered reverently. She hadn't meant to. The words were there and she simply couldn't stop herself – she didn't want to stop herself. Immediately after, however, she tensed, wondering if she’d made a mistake. Her compliments hadn't succeeded in doing much lately other than aggravating her. She held her breath, awaiting the inevitable snippy retort, or, worse yet – far worse – silence. No acknowledgement at all. Continuation of the cold war that raged between them all day and night, every day for the last month and a half. Since the loss. But it seemed tonight there would be a truce. Rarity turned to look at her, and her blue eyes were shining with what Applejack could've sworn was love and tenderness, but was too afraid to hope anymore. Experience had taught her not to get her hopes up when it seemed Rarity was having a "good" day – because, irrevocably, her disposition would change just as quickly as it had come to begin with and she’d be back to stony silence and cold distance. "Thank you, dear. So do you." Rarity had never meant anything so sincerely, but she knew Applejack was afraid to believe her. And despite not being able to blame her, Rarity couldn't help but feel hurt. "Do…do you need help with that?" Applejack’s voice was tentative, hedging. Rarity glanced up at her, once again meeting her eyes over her shoulder in the mirror, and there was no mistaking the fear in her lover’s voice. She swallowed hard, licked her lips, and nodded. Even if the help was completely unneeded. "Thank you." Applejack gingerly stepped up behind her, taking the comb from her magic and softly, slowly, running it through her mane. The warmth of her skin emanated from her, the scent of her mane and her perfume bathing Applejack with memories of what it felt like to taste her skin, touch its softness, and feel her mane against her cheek. A lump formed in her throat that she forced herself to swallow back down as she worked gently to brush out non-existent tangles. Rarity closed her eyes, lost for a moment in the touch, and in that one, brief moment, she remembered the same thing. The feel of orange lips against her neck and shoulder, Applejack’s softly whispered words of adoration in her ear, her scent surrounding her, her hoofs smoothing over her stomach and down to cup her hips, reaching down between her legs… When she opened her eyes again, she saw that the orange mare had stopped the brush, and was now staring at her in the mirror once again. The look of pain and longing on her face, in those emerald eyes, was like a physical ache to Rarity’s heart. She swallowed hard and whispered her name, so softly she feared she might not have heard. "Applejack..." With a shaking hoof, clearly afraid of rebuke but unable to stop herself, Applejack reached up and gently skimmed it over her shoulder. Rarity stiffened at the touch, her breath hitched in anticipation of what her lover would do next. Applejack watched her intently, and when she didn't shove her away as she normally would these days, the need became too great and she leaned in, pressing a soft kiss to the side of her neck. Rarity felt her eyes sink closed as teeth nibbled their way down her neck and across her bare shoulder, Applejack pressing her body closer to hers, enveloping her in warmth. Despite herself, Rarity arched her neck in a gesture of unconscious invitation, a tiny moan escaping her lips when Applejack hit the particularly sensitive spot below her ear. The orange pony’s hoofs gently caressed her shoulders and collarbone, before she straightened to press her lips into a styled mane. "I love you, Rares." Rarity’s eyes shot open, and she looked at their reflection, seeing Applejack so blissfully buried into her. Her stomach lurched. Suddenly, without warning, it was back – the wave of apathy and resentment, ice-cold and nonsensical and unforgiving, her intense desire to shove the farmpony away battling with her equally intense desire to hold her close, pepper her face with kisses and never let her go. At her silence, emerald eyes fluttered open, meeting hers in the reflection. Instantly, uncertainty and doubt bloomed across Applejack’s features. She swallowed hard and whispered again. "I love you, Rarity." The tone was different this time, a mixture of hope and desperation and fear. In that moment, she knew how badly Applejack needed her to say it back. But despite her best efforts to force the words out, they just couldn't seem to release their claw-like grip on her lips. I love you too, Applejack. I miss you so much. I'm so sorry for everything. I've been so awful. Please forgive me. I need you. I can't live without you. I don't want to. The hurt in her green eyes darkened, and Rarity could see the tell-tale glossy sheen filling them with lightening speed. Applejack looked as though someone had just stabbed her in the stomach. When she spoke again, her words were garbled with tears. "Do…do you love me, Rarity?" The question was as painful as a physical blow. The guilt and shame that had been rising up within her like steam in a pressure cooker popped, and before she knew what she was doing, she whirled around to face Applejack, her own eyes filling with tears and her countenance at nigh hysterical levels. "How could you ask me that?!" Her voice was shrill, hoarse and cracking with self-loathing. Applejack flinched, stepping back from her slightly. When she responded, she could barely choke the words out. "Is it really so hard for you to say it back?" "That question was completely unfair and you know it!" She knew she was deflecting, knew she was avoiding, knew she was in the wrong, but, as per the pattern she'd been following for weeks now, she kept digging herself deeper and deeper. The tears fell over Applejack’s lashes now. She made no effort to hide it. Despite it, Rarity could see that anger was coming to the farmpony’s defense; and she had every intention of calling her on her avoidance. "It's not the slightest bit unfair when you consider the way you've been treating me! You've done nothing but push me away for weeks! That is not love! I never know what to think around you anymore, so yes, Rarity, I need to ask! This right here? That was the first time you've let me touch you in over a month! Ever since the baby!" Rarity instantly snapped erect, as though she had been slapped. Applejack’s complete fearlessness to shove the elephant in the room, the one she had been so desperately trying to avoid, right in her face nearly took her breath away. "That's not true!" The second the words were out, she knew Applejack would shoot them down instantly. Rightfully so. She did not disappoint. She gaped, stunned by her outright lie. "It is true! You know it's true! You barely even look at me, let alone speak to me! You won't let me touch you or kiss you or hold you, you snap at everything I say and do, and no matter what I do it's always wrong! It's like you can hardly stand to be under the same roof together! I don't understand! You won't tell me anything you're feeling since the miscarriage or what I've done to deserve this! You want to know what's 'unfair?' That's what's unfair!" Her tears finally spilled over as well, her teeth clenching together. "Oh, well, I'm so sorry that it's been so difficult for you to deal with me! Please, forgive me!" "Don't you dare!" Applejack snarled, startling her with the ferocity. "You're not going to do that, Rarity! You're not going to turn this around on me and make it out to be as though I'm the bad guy! Stop avoiding everything I say! Why won't you answer the question? Why won't you tell me what you're feeling?" she gripped Rarity desperately by her shoulders, forcing the other mare to look into her eyes. "Why won't you let me help you? What did I do? I can't fix it if you won't tell me!" "You wouldn't understand!" Rarity sobbed, her voice breaking. "How do you know if you won't let me try?" Applejack shot back, sobbing as well. "You can't fix it Applejack!" Rarity’s words were now almost incomprehensible, drowned in tears. "Nopony can! Nopony can fix it! It's gone! It's all gone, and I can't get it back!" She didn't need her to clarify what "it" meant. She knew. The baby. The future they'd hoped for with it. Rarity’s life as she knew it. Her passion, her emotion, her strong-willed nature, the fire within her that had captivated Applejack so intently to begin with. She watched as Rarity buried her face in her hoofs, crying so hard it looked as though she were being ripped in two. Instantly, the fight drained out of Applejack and her heart broke on her wife’s behalf. She reached for her, praying to the spirits that she would not push her away. Thankfully, she didn't. "Please, Rare," she wept hoarsely against her temple, holding her shaking body as tightly as she could. "Please, please talk to me. Tell me what you're feeling. Let me comfort you. Let me grieve with you. Let me in. Please." Applejack’s anguished plea was Rarity’s undoing, and she looked up at her, her bright, blue eyes wet with sorrow. She tried to form words, but nothing came at first, her mouth moving soundlessly. Then, finally, she managed to tear them from her throat. "I feel nothing," she confessed brokenly. "Nothing, Applejack. I don't feel anything. About anything." Applejack looked at her, blankly at first, and then her tear-stained face clouded over with dread. Despite her obvious terror, she asked the question anyway. "Including for me?" There was a horrible, awful, billowing silence. Rarity blinked at Applejack, her wet blue eyes welling anew with unshed tears. She wanted nothing more than to reassure her, swear that she still adored the other mare as much as the day she had married her, that she felt deeper for her than anything in her life, but once again, her words chose to betray her and stay buried within. It was clear that the farmer took her silence for her answer. Applejack's forelegs fell limply to the floor, and she swallowed hard, her throat bobbing spasmodically with her tears. In that moment, she was certain that nothing had ever hurt as much in her life, and that nothing would ever hurt as much again. Suddenly, Applejack felt as though she could not breathe here in this room, this room that had always been such a haven of love and comfort. She slowly stepped back from Rarity, doing her best to ignore the wild panic darkening in her azure eyes. Please don't go, please don't leave me, stay, I love you, I love you so much, I don't mean any of it, I'll always love you, it's all my fault – "Oh," Applejack whispered. And with that, she turned on her heel and walked out. Chapter 2“Ugh! Why won’t this stupid thing work?!” Applejack paused her unenthusiastic scaling of the porch steps when she heard the voice of her youngest daughter. Brow furrowing in anxious worry, she wound around the side of the house, only to be greeted with the disheartening sight of her daughter absolutely sobbing into the grass. Immediately, Applejack crossed the small distance between them, and sat next to the distraught foal, nuzzling her softly. Her daughter instantly clung to her foreleg, her tears not subsiding, and matting her mother’s fur as she convulsed with anguish. Applejack dropped a kiss to the top of the filly’s head, rubbing her small back soothingly until the filly was finally able to gain some composure and look up at her mother. Her brilliant orange eyes were red and watery, and her cheeks were flushed. “You wanna tell me what’s wrong, Little Gem?” At the question Opal seemed to shrink into herself, almost as if she was afraid of something, pulling away from her mother’s foreleg and looking away, and brushing her cannon with her hoof. “Mommy, did… did I do something wrong?” Applejack was taken aback by the question. Of all the statements she had been expecting, that was not one of them. Her brow furrowed. “No! Of course not, baby, why would you even ask something like that?” Opal reached up to wipe at her muzzle noisily. “Then… why doesn’t Mom like me anymore?” It felt not unlike being stabbed repeatedly with a rusty, dull knife. Applejack felt her insides being ripped apart, and a breath wheezed out of her in surprise at the pain. It became almost impossible to breathe. She forced herself to be calm, but her stomach turned to lead. Absentmindedly, she brushed her hoof through Opal’s platinum blond mane, and tried to keep her voice calm. But she was unsuccessful; her voice shook tremendously when she opened her mouth. “Sweetie, your mother could never not like you.” She whispered. “She loves you more than anything in the entire world. Where in Equestria did you get an idea that she doesn’t like you?” Opal’s reply was muffled against her mother’s foreleg. “Then why doesn’t she ever want to spend time with me anymore?” her voice was gargled, and Applejack felt hot, fresh tears on her coat. “We… we used to always do things together… but ever since she got sick that one time… it’s like she doesn’t want me around anymore. She won’t play with me or practice magic with me or read me stories or sing to me and Topaz like she used to. She’ll feed Jasper, and that’s it. And,” the filly’s voice began to tremble and the rusty, dull knife doubled its thrusts. “Since we don’t practice together, my magic has gotten worse. I can tell.” Opal sobbed, just once. Just one, heartbreaking sob, and her next words killed Applejack. “Maybe… maybe I did something to make her mad at me.” Applejack had to take several deep, calming breaths to regain her senses. Something inside her was beginning to bubble, pitch, rage. When she was certain she could speak without losing control, she nuzzled her daughter nickering into her mane, but didn’t pull back, instead keeping her muzzle pressed against Opal’s head. “Opal,” she whispered hoarsely into her daughter’s poll. “You have done absolutely nothing wrong. Nothing at all. Please, please don’t think that you have, okay, sugar? None of that is your fault.” Opal blinked her orange eyes up at her mother hopefully. “It’s not?” Applejack closed her eyes, fighting against the rage flowing in her blood. “N-no. Mom has been… feeling really bad lately. For several reasons. She’s still… pretty sick. And it’s probably going to take her a while to get better.” She opened her eyes and completed her nuzzle, playfully tugging at some lose hairs of Opal’s mane with her teeth, bringing forth a small giggle, albeit a gurgling one. “But why is she sick? What happened to her?” Applejack hesitated for a moment, trying to sort out her explanation, and fighting the rage flowing through her. “Sweetheart, we all have things inside of us… they’re called hormones. They’re little things that can control how happy or sad we are. And sometimes, for girls especially, those hormones mess up, they get better, of course, but it can take a little while. But that’s what’s wrong with Mom. Her hormones aren’t working right. And that’s why she’s so sad and tired all the time.” She could tell that the explanation, while not exactly comforting Opal, proved to give her some relief and context as to what was happening with her mother lately. Applejack breathed a sigh of relief at the fact that her explanation had not gone over the filly’s head. “So,” Opal smiled hopefully up at her. “I didn’t do anything wrong? She’s not mad at me?” “No, Little Gem, she’s not mad at you. I’m so sorry if she—that you felt like she did. Mom loves you, and so do I. She just... needs to get better, okay?" Despite her sage words, Applejack found the anger inside of her rolling and pressing. White and hot and fierce and violent. “But hey,” she said, leaning down and winking at her daughter. “Until Mom gets better, there’s no rule saying that only she is allowed to teach you. How about we go visit Auntie Twilight and see if she can give you lessons, hmm?” Opal’s eyes lit up hopefully at the suggestion. “Really, Mommy? Yes!” “Sure,” Applejack smiled back, despite the monster of rage inside her gut roaring at the fact that she even had to rely on her friend for something like this. “Let’s go see right now.” Applejack walked back towards the house, having dropped off Opal at the library, with no small avoidance of Twilight’s worried, questioning gazes. With every step she took, her breathing became shallower and shallower, harsher and more ragged. Her blood pounded in her ears. Her muscles constricted, every inch of her tense with pure rage the likes of which she had never quite felt before. In her entire life, she couldn’t remember being so incredibly, irascibly livid. It was a foreign sensation. As if something primal and animalistic had been ignited inside of her, something with claws and teeth, something on a mission to annihilate anything that reduced her precious little girl to such anguish. It just so happened that this time, that anything happened to be her wife. By the time she slammed open the door it was as if an unknown force was pushing her into the living room, where Granny Smith sat in the rocking chair by the window, staring at the gardens. Applejack paid her no attention even when she looked up at the bang of the closing door, moving faster than she thought possible she rounded the corner and barged into the master bedroom with all the ferocity of a spitting, hissing lioness. Tears stung her eyes, and her heart slammed itself against her ribs, and she knew this was it. The breaking point. That awful, horrible place where she couldn’t even hold herself together anymore. Last week’s horrendous altercation in their bedroom, Rarity’s inability to voice her love for her—if there was any left—had left Applejack sobbing into the soft hay in the barn beside the house where she had slept that night. Even that paled in comparison to this, this nauseating, white-hot rage that seemed to utterly eradicate her easy-going and friendly nature. “You need to do better.” She snarled as soon as she caught sight of Rarity on the bed. Rarity didn’t even flinch. For a moment, Applejack wondered if she had even been heard. Growling, she made her way around the bed to stand in front of her wife, and the second her eyes fell on that face, she felt her resolve shaking a bit. So beautiful, yet so sad and lost, eyes staring past Applejack’s shoulder, but clearly not seeing anything. Clearly, she was not even in the room. Applejack was torn between knowing that yelling would only make the other mare close off more, and thinking that she had already closed herself off as much as she could and perhaps yelling would be the only way Applejack could get through to her. “You need to do better.” She repeated forcefully, and Rarity blurred in her vision as droplets of tears stuck to her eyelids. “This cannot go on this way, Rarity! You can’t keep doing this! You want to check out of this marriage? Fine! You don’t want me anymore? That’s fine too! But you don’t get to check out of being their mother! You don’t get to toss them aside like they don’t exist!” “You know what I just walked in on? Opal, crying her eyes out because she thinks her mother hates her!” That statement managed to do what nothing else had. Rarity snapped her head to Applejack, and those blue eyes finally zapped into the present and met green. Rarity opened her mouth and moved it around, trying to say something, but only succeeded in shaking her head, and finally reaching up and plugging in her ears in a desperate attempt to block it all out. And just like that, Applejack felt her rage finally break. It was like a bursting dam; a crack followed by waves and waves of rage, and then a small final trickle before complete silence and stillness. Seeing Rarity there on the bed, her ears plugged desperately and her head shaking in a half-aware state finally made her break. She felt her legs buckle and give out, and she caught the bed to keep herself partially upright, but her knees met the floor. “Please, Rares.” She begged, and finally her own tears fell freely. “Please tell me how to fix it. I’m begging you. I’m on my knees before you, begging you, please tell me what to do. I’ll do it. I’ll do anything. I know you’re angry at me. I’m angry at myself too. But I need to know why. I need to know so I can fix it. I have to fix it. I can’t lose you, Rarity. Please.” She whispered something unintelligible and Applejack shook her head. “I can’t hear you, sugar.” “You couldn’t bring it back.” She repeated, and although the words were accusatory in and of themselves, the tone was anything but. It was saturated by guilt and shame. And suddenly it hit her like three tons of brick. This was why she was angry with her. Not because of hormones. Not because of the depression over having lost the foal. But because Applejack herself couldn’t bring the foal back. The only sound in the room was Rarity’s muffled sobs. Applejack worked her mouth fruitlessly for a total of five minutes before she managed to speak around the block in her throat. “You blame me.” She croaked. “You’ve blamed me all this time. That’s why you keep pushing me away.” And suddenly the room felt suffocating. She couldn’t be here. She had to… she—she had to… Applejack pushed herself up off the bed, nearly scrambling away. It’s all your fault. “Okay, Rarity.” She croaked. “You want me to stay away? You win. I’ll stay away.” She turned and left the bedroom, forcing herself not to run or fall apart completely until she got to the barn, where she knew she would be spending the night again, and probably for a long time. As she walked, she prayed to Celestia that Rarity would run after her, call her back, or anything. Anything at all. But she never did. Chapter 3Rarity’s head pounded as she rolled out of bed late the next morning. She slipped on her dressing robe and headed down to the kitchen without a single look in the mirror. She knew what she looked like; mussed mane, dark and bloodshot eyes, the skin under her fur sallow and sickly. She hadn’t slept a wink, and she knew without even laying her eyes on her wife that it had been the same for her. One glance at her confirmed it. The kids had already been shuffled off to school by Granny Smith, and Applejack stood at the window holding Jasper and feeding him his bottle. Her eyes were dead and empty as she stared off into the orchard. The mare sensed Rarity’s presence near the door, shuffling awkwardly in her disheveled state, and for a long time, the farm pony would not look at her. When she finally met Rarity’s eyes, it was like a thousand miles separated them, when in reality it was only six feet. Jasper began to squirm for his mother as usual, and Applejack placed his bottle down on the window sill, and dutifully stepped up to her wife. The air was thick with sorrow between them, and Rarity tried to meet the other mare’s gaze, to let her know everything, anything, but Applejack sharply looked away as she placed Jasper into Rarity’s grasp. She clutched him to her, and he cooed and snuggled into the fur of her chest. She gazed at Applejack, her mouth slightly ajar with the words that lived there constantly, but she could not speak for some reason. “I’ll be out in the fields.” Applejack whispered gruffly. Without further elaboration, she pressed a kiss on Jasper’s head, stepped around them, and headed down the hall and to the front door. For a long moment, Rarity simply stood there in the kitchen, holding her son, and drowning in the thick silence that was very nearly suffocating her. Then she sat down at the kitchen table, tucked the infant closer against her chest, and cried as if she was being ripped in two. “Can I use the knife?” Rarity looked up from lighting the gas burner on the stove to see Applejack at the far end of the counter with a large bowl in front of her and surrounded by fresh vegetables. Rarity swallowed hard, surprised that they were addressing each other at all without the kids in the room. The last two weeks had proven to be very quiet between them, giving each other a wide berth altogether. Applejack gestured to the large cutting knife lying next to the stove. Rarity picked it up with her magic and floated it over to her, laying it carefully next to the bowl. “Thank you.” Applejack said hoarsely, and then forced herself to look away from blue eyes as she began to chop the cucumber. She couldn’t look at her. Having her right there, while not really having her at all, was too agonizing for words. Rarity turned away as the other mare chopped and worked, the silence between them louder than cannon fire. Numbly, she prepared the sauce for dinner, and stirred the noodles boiling next to her, and in that moment, hearing Applejack slice and dice behind her, she found herself almost ready to say it. All of it. Uncertainty and not knowing why and not being able to explain it all be damned; anything to fix the broken bridge of communication between them that had crumbled in the last week. She ceased working, focusing only on the sounds of Applejack slicing behind her. She slowly turned to look at her, her face twisted with anguish, guilt, and fear, clutching her wooden spoon to her chest protectively, not unlike a child clutching her favorite toy for comfort. She choked Applejack’s name in a broken whisper. She looked up, pausing her salad preparation, her eyes full of anticipation, and even a minute amount of hope. “Yes, Rarity?” Rarity looked at her, those warm green eyes, the naked longing and hope etched into her face, so beautiful, and tried to force out the words. Say it. Just say it. She loves you. You can work through it together. Say it. “You’re making the salad wrong. You know I can’t stand green peppers.” There was a long moment where she just looked at her, and Rarity could not remember saying something that she regretted more. Something in Applejack’s eyes seemed to break, then, and she gently set down the knife. Without a word or so much as a glance towards her, she turned and left the kitchen, leaving Rarity and her cowardice. “AJ?” Applejack snapped out of her dazed reverie, glancing across the table at her brother, only to find Mac looking at her with an expression that was half confusion, half forlornness. She sighed and straightened in her seat, trying to force herself to be in the present. “Sorry. I’m listening. Go ‘head.” Mac sighed in return and slumped in his seat, and Applejack tried not to notice the empathy etched into every line of his face as he did so. “No you’re not. You haven’t heard a word I’ve said since we sat down to lunch.” The words were wry, but free of censure. Mac stood up and moved to the counter, putting his plate in the sink and then moving around doing something else. Applejack watched him regretfully before dropping her eyes to the floor. Moments later, Mac placed a glass in front of her. Applejack stared at the caramel colored beverage for a long moment before looking back at Mac, who was nursing his own drink. “Brandy?” Mac shrugged. “Looked like ya needed it.” He drawled easily before taking a small sip and sighing. Applejack nodded absentmindedly and then drained the small amount of alcohol in one gulp, barely feeling it go down. Silence fell over them, and Applejack knew Mac was waiting for her to open a vein, but she was so mentally and even at this point physically fatigued that she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Instead she looked to the side at her small son, who was having way too much fun squeezing the daylights out of his stuffed lion, and swallowed the ache of misery in her throat. “How are ‘Shy and Autumn?” The words just came out, but it was the only thing she could think of to say that wasn’t the issue obsessively filling her mind—her wife. Mac seemed to know what she was doing, but complied nevertheless. “They’re… fine. Doing much better.” He worded carefully, and Applejack winced. Fluttershy’s pregnancy had been a practical nightmare. Complication after complication had left Mac coming over to Sweet Apple Acres night after night to cry into his sister’s shoulder. The birth was even worse, and the doctors had nearly lost both of them. But both made it. Autumn Glory was a gorgeous filly, but would forever wear the mark of her complicated beginning. “Better?” she asked, feeling a stabbing flash of guilt for not stopping by to see her long time friend. She’d been so buried in her own despondency, her own marital problems, that she hadn’t even thought to. “Yeah,” Mac said gruffly, staring hard into his drink. “Much better. It was… rough there, in the beginning. But we’ve settled into a routine.” “I—” Applejack sighed, looked down to her own son, cooing and rolling around on his soft, baby blue blanket that was a present from his Auntie Dash. He was such a perfect mix of both her and Rarity, with his white coat and green eyes, with an extra bit of his aunt thrown in there in the form of a soft, crimson mane. For some reason it made her eyes sting. “Sorry, Mac. I’m sorry.” She nearly snapped, looking away from her foal. “You had problems of your own,” was all Mac said. “Don’t excuse nothing. I should’ve…” She sighed. “Sorry,” she said again, because it seemed like the only thing she could say. There was a long silence between them, one that Mac filled by taking an even longer sip of his drink. “Are you two still not talking?” Applejack sighed and immediately, tears stung the back of her eyes and her head dropped forward. She glared at the old wood of the dining table, her throat constricted. She cleared it once, twice, and when she spoke, her words were garbled. “We talk when the kids are there,” she confessed brokenly. “If it has to do with them, we’ll talk. The bare minimum, but we speak.” She paused, drawing in a shaky breath. “But aside from that…” She looked up at Mac, whose eyes filled with pain on her behalf. “Aside from that?” Applejack shook her head, feeling tears cling to her eyelids precariously, dangerously close to spilling over. “I’ve… I’ve been sleeping outside. In the barn. Ever since…” She trailed off, remembering her confession the week prior. The words were still so raw, so visceral, that thinking them again was like a physical blow to the chest every time. You blame me. You’ve blamed me all this time. You couldn’t bring it back. “I can’t sleep in the bedroom with her,” she croaked. “She’s completely shut me out, Mac. I mean, physically I could, but having her there close enough to touch but not having her at all is… agony. I can’t sleep next to her and not touch her. So I just don’t sleep next to her anymore.” Mac closed his eyes, groaning in commiseration. Applejack saw his throat bob spasmodically, which he covered by taking a final gulp of his drink. It was a long time before he found words. “Do you still love her, ‘Jack?” Applejack’s head snapped up. Despite the wetness on her cheeks, her sorrow was quickly replaced by shock, dismay, and even anger at her brother for daring to ask such an absurd question. She opened her mouth to retort sharply when suddenly she remembered not even two weeks prior, standing in their bedroom, asking the same thing. How could you even ask me that?! That question is completely unfair and you know it! She groaned internally, suddenly understanding all too well her wife’s devastated reaction to her inquiry. She swallowed hard, looking Mac straight in the eyes. “She’s my entire world, Mac. You know she is. She’s been my entire world since I fell for her. And she always will be.” She paused, not sure how to word her next bit. “I just… I don’t know if I can make her happy, anymore.” Her voice broke on the last word and finally the tears began to flow. She wept openly, her forehead falling onto the table, feeling her bruised heart constrict painfully. Seeing her distress, Jasper whimpered from the floor, and Mac moved over to pick his nephew up, nuzzling him comfortingly. “Applejack.” She managed to lift her head to stare at Mac through the tears; to find her brother staring at her with what could only be describe as intense certainty. She wiped her eyes to better look at him, briefly appreciating how natural he looked with her own son clutched to his chest. Jasper actually kind of looked like his uncle. Just around the eyes. “Listen to me.” Macintosh said gently. “Rarity loves you. Ya know she does. She adores you. Lives for you. You’re everything to her, anypony in the entire town can tell you that because it’s as clear as day.” Applejack shook her head, her throat in knots. “She couldn’t say she loved me, Mac.” She chocked out. “I asked her not two weeks ago, and she couldn’t say it.” Mac was already shaking his head. “Sometimes, AJ, we can’t bring ourselves to say what we want to. How we really feel. It’s probably why she’s so angry.” Applejack sniffed, taking several long, deep breaths to try and calm herself down. Mac waited patiently, stroking Jasper’s mane absentmindedly as the colt’s eyelids drooped. “Sorry, Mac, I—” she exhaled again and smiled at her brother. “Thanks.” “No problem, sis. Gotta look out for my own, mm?” He hummed, smiling back. Then his smile turned into a thin line. “You hang in there, AJ. She’ll come around.” Applejack nodded, her crumpled conviction rebuilding itself just a bit. Chapter 4It was a good day. Rarity had learned in the past two months that her days more often than not fell into one of two categories: “good” days or “bad” bad. There were also, at an alarmingly growing rate, more and more “nothing” days—days where she felt nothing at all, good or bad. Those were the ones she dreaded the most. She actually preferred to be bitter and angry or broken and sad than total apathy; at least when she felt any of those other emotions, she had proof that she was still alive. Today, however, was a “good” day. She’d woken up feeling content, even energetic, and had enjoyed having breakfast with her kids and sending them off to school. She had surprised Applejack by pulling the other mare into a spontaneous kiss when she announced her usual departing to the fields, and even managed not to feel overly hurt by the cautious hope in the other mare’s eyes, especially when she smiled at her adoringly before going out the door. Her good spirits continued as she cleaned the kids’ rooms, picking up dolls and blocks and stuffed animals and rearranging Topaz’s tossed-aside bedspread, smiling at how much their eldest child resembled her mother. She hummed a soft tune to herself as she worked, so lost in her task that she didn’t even hear Granny Smith come up behind her, holding Jasper to her chest. “Someone’s hungry,” she mused. Rarity jumped a little and turned around to see Jasper cooing for her, a big, gummy smile on his lips. She laughed, reaching for her son. “Well luckily I can help with that,” she cooed back, sifting her lips across the foal’s soft head and nuzzling his cheek. “You hungry, sweetheart? You need some yummy milk?” She sat on Topaz’s bed, and as she began to undo her silk robe, Granny Smith came and sat beside her. “He’s getting so big,” she remarked, staring lovingly at her great-grandson. Oh the blessings of living long enough to be around three whole generations of foals. “Always hungry, it seems.” Rarity laughed. “Well he’s a growing colt,” Granny Smith murmured adoringly. “Can you believe he’s eight months already?” Rarity nodded in acknowledgment. “I know. It’s incredible how fast time travels.” There was a lull in the conversation, and for a moment, Granny Smith just watched her granddaughter-in-law. Her heart ached at the sight of her nursing her foal, her besotted expression. She looked so happy at that moment that Granny Smith almost chickened out about broaching the subject she’d been planning on raising with her for a few days now. Ultimately though, she knew it had to be done. She took a deep breath, and made sure to keep her voice gentle and free of censure. “Sweetheart… I’ve been meaning to ask. Is everything… okay? With you and Applejack?” Rarity glanced up at her, her brow furrowed. “What do you mean?” Granny swallowed roughly. She knew she was treading dangerous waters here, and Rarity seemed to be in such good spirits today that she didn’t want to ruin it. But at the same time, she knew that if she didn’t do it now, while the other mare was in good spirits, it would never get discussed. “I’m not blind, youngin’. I was married twice, once for over forty years. I know there’s tension between you two.” Instantly, Rarity’s expression became shuttered. She seemed to retreat back inside herself a bit, clutching Jasper to her a bit more tightly in an unconscious effort of self-protection. Shame seeped forward from every pore in her body, but she didn’t bother deny the charge. Sighing in empathy, Granny reached forward and stroked her foreleg. “I ain’t criticizin’ you. I know how hard it’s been since the baby. And you know sometimes mares have miscarriages… there are hormones. It’s biological. Ya can’t control it. Ain’t a reason to feel ashamed.” It was a long time before Rarity could speak and when she did, her tone was thick. “I… I know,” she admitted gruffly. “I just… I can’t explain it. One moment I just want to take her into my arms and hold her forever and then others I just feel so… I don’t know… and… I get so angry and I… I can’t even look at her.” “Rarity,” Granny Smith interjected softly, “all this? What y’all are saying to me now? You need to be sayin’ it to her. She’s scared, and she’s confused, and all she wants is to be there for you and for you to be honest about what you’re feeling.” She reached out and turned her granddaughter-in-law’s watery stare towards her own. “You know what an incredibly lucky mare you are. The way that mare loves you is…” “I know,” Rarity whispered brokenly. “And you love her the same way,” Granny Smith finished. “You owe it to her to not shut her out. Let her grieve with you. Let her help you. That’s all she wants. If you’re angry about something, tell her. She can’t make amends if you don’t, and it’s not fair to expect her to be able to.” Granny Smith wasn’t telling her anything she hadn’t told herself before, a thousand times over. But despite Granny’s insistence that she not feel ashamed, that she open up to Applejack in the way that she always had, she felt more ashamed than ever. “You’re breaking her heart,” Granny finally whispered. “I hear her. Every night she sleeps out in the barn. My room is directly across from the barn, and I hear her cry herself to sleep almost every night.” Rarity lurched, looking like she might be sick. “I’m not saying this to guilt you,” Granny Smith said soothingly. “I’m saying this so that you can see that what you to have is worth fightin’ for. No one cries over each other the way you two have been unless there is an incredible amount of love between them.” “I… I know I’ve been awful,” Rarity responded brokenly. “Not just to her, but to the girls, and you and my friends.” Her throat closed off completely and she dissolved into tears, burying her face into her hoofs. Granny immediately drew her forward and into her, and Rarity gratefully flung her arms around the old mare. Granny Smith stroked her hair, soothing her until the storm passed, and when Rarity was finally able to regain enough control to speak again, her words were barely understandable, laced with agony. “It’s like… it’s all gone,” she wept bitterly. “My will to do anything, show my wife how much I love her, be with my children, care about my life… it’s just gone! It’s like it left with… with the baby! And I’ve been so awful to her, a horrible friend and a horrible wife and a horrible lover, and she’s totally right to stay away because I pushed her there! But even though I pushed her there, I’m angry at her for staying away! How sick is that?!” Her shoulders shook again with the force of her muted sobs, and Granny Smith very gently reached down and cradled her face in her hoofs. She tilted her gaze up to her own, softly whispering her name. “There was nothing you could have done that night to prevent it. Nothing at all. It was completely beyond your control, and berating yourself over and over is not going to make that any less true.” Rarity looked down shamefully, unable to concede the point. But Granny’s next words were like an arrow hitting the center of a target with expert precision: “And there was nothing she could have done to prevent it either, or undo it.” For a moment, Rarity felt as though the wind had been knocked out of her. She whipped her head up at the elder mare, who was looking at her knowingly, and felt her face burn with shame and guilt. She had no idea how the other mare had deciphered her secret, her irrational blame towards her wife, the true reason she was staying away, but the knowledge was unbearable. She knew denying the charge was futile, so she simply nodded, gazing down at the floor. When she spoke again, her voice was very suffocated. “I miss her so much, Gran,” she confessed. Granny Smith sighed, drawing her back against her, offering tender comfort. “I know, sweetheart,” she muttered. “She misses you, too.” When Applejack cautiously stepped through the front door that evening, she steeled herself for the first interaction with her wife. Despite Rarity’s sunny disposition that morning as she’d left for work, she knew better than to count on that still being the case by the time she got home. It was starting to get to the point where she never knew at any given moment which Rarity she was going to get – and there were many to choose from these days. So when she heard Rarity’s laughter tinkling from the living room, she instantly wilted in relief. The kids’ voices mixed with hers as Applejack rounded the corner and glanced into the room, bursting into a large grin at what she saw. Rarity was seated on the rug with Topaz and Opal lying against her. Jasper was just off to the side on his blue blanket, playing with his soft toys and cooing to himself adorably. Rarity was reading one of Topaz’s favorite books out loud to them, making sure to include all the silly voices, which her two oldest children seemed to find hilarious. When they would explode into a new burst of laughter together, Rarity’s smile seemed to light up the whole room. She had just taken to tickling Opal, who was squealing and trying to writhe away from her but was laughing too hard to do so. She finally succeeded in pulling the filly into her lap, along with Topaz, and pressing an enthusiastic kiss to each rumpled head. Just then, Topaz noticed her mother standing in the doorway. “Ma! You’re home! Oh, thank the goddesses, we can finally eat!” She bounded up out of her mother’s lap and threw her forelegs around one of Applejack’s forelegs in a massive hug. Applejack clutched her eldest daughter to her, pressing a kiss into the crown of her head just as Opal finally managed to extricate herself from her mother’s hold and go running to latch onto her leg. “Mom said you were going to be home for dinner tonight so we waited for you, Mommy,” she chirped, angling a toothy grin up at her. Applejack smiled back warmly and pressed a kiss to the filly’s forehead. “I can’t wait, Little Gem. What are we having?” “That vegetable rice pasta thing Mom does really good,” Topaz inserted. “Really well,” Applejack corrected gently. “Yeah, that. I’m gonna go set the table!” She bolted off to the dining room, Opal following hot on her heels. “‘Paz, wait for me! You always get to set the table, I wanna do it tonight!” Their bickering faded into the kitchen as she turned back to her wife, who had finally stood up and placed Jasper into his crib for a short nap before crossing the room to take Applejack into her arms. She enveloped her in a warm embrace, laying her cheek against Applejack’s cheek lovingly. Applejack’s eyebrows rose in delighted surprise, but despite her shock she returned the embrace with enthusiasm, pressing a kiss to her temple. Rarity had had her moments of good moods, but nothing even remotely close to this. “You look happy,” she whispered into her hair. Rarity grinned. “You’re home. I am happy,” she whispered back, tilting her gaze up to Applejack’s with a loving smile. She was so encouraged by Rarity’s pleasant demeanor that she couldn’t resist dropping a kiss to her lips. “I’m glad,” she murmured. “I love seeing you happy.” Rarity grabbed her left hoof in hers, pulling her out into the hallway to lead her down to the dining room. “You make me happy, Applejack.” She stopped, her gaze suddenly turning serious. “You know that, right?” Truthfully, recently, there had been moments where Applejack didn’t know anymore. She also knew, deep down, that despite Rarity’s warmth at that particular second, it was probably a mistake to get her hopes up that it would last. But in that moment, looking at Rarity, standing there with her blue eyes so full of love for her, she found that she couldn’t stop herself. She felt hope blooming in her heart anyway. “You make me happy too, Sugar,” she whispered, reaching up to cup her cheek. “More than anything in the world.” Applejack rolled over onto her side, stirring her body into a long, languorous stretch, before gazing over expecting to find Rarity sound asleep next to her. However, when only a cold mattress and empty pillow greeted her instead, she immediately bolted upright, her stomach clenching. Oh no. Please, no. Not again. But she knew no amount of internal begging would change the reality she was absolutely certain to be the case. Tears of frustration burned in her eyes. It didn’t make any sense! She had been fine when they’d gone to bed! She’d even snuggled up against Applejack and fallen asleep with her head on Applejack’s chest like she always used to do before. She had been so happy all day long! What could have possibly happened in her sleep? Had she dreamt about it? She bolted from the bed and immediately crossed the room to where, sure enough, the bathroom door was closed. She could already hear sobs, gut-wrenching and racking, on the other side, and she reached for the knob frantically. It wouldn’t open. She froze, then tried again, this time with more force. The door remained closed. It was then that it hit her like a ton of bricks: the door wasn’t just jammed. It had been locked. Rarity had locked it. Rarity had wanted to keep her out. For a moment, for a few brief seconds, Applejack literally could not breathe. She felt as though she’d had the wind kicked out of her. Hearing Rarity’s sobs was bad enough; that she’d taken deliberate measures to shut Applejack out was excruciating. “Rare,” she croaked, her voice trembling. “Sweetie, open the door. Please. Please open the door.” No response. Just more sobs. She pounded on the thick wood, her voice taking on a frantic, desperate tone. “Rarity, you’re scaring me! Please, open the door! Let me in!” Rarity still did not answer. Her own tears began to fall now, of fear, of frustration, of hurt. She sank down onto her knees, now on the verge of a full-out panic attack. “Sweetie,” she whispered, brokenly. “Please.” One word, so simple, yet holding so much, and all she could find within her to say. The door remained shut. “Is Mom staying home today?” Applejack and Granny Smith traded a meaningful glance over the top of Topaz and Opal’s heads before Applejack forced a smile down at her daughter, placing a bowl of oatmeal in front of her. “She is, hun,” she answered. “Mom… Mom isn’t feeling well today and needs to stay in bed, and there’s a lot of chores to do around the house.” Opal looked skeptical. “Mom’s sick? She seemed fine yesterday.” “I know, honey. She got sick during the night.” She felt a stab of guilt at her stretching of the truth, even though it wasn’t a total lie. Topaz scrutinized her from across the table, Rarity’s blue eyes narrowed in suspicion and confusion. “Are you sick, Ma? Your eyes are all red and puffed up.” Applejack froze, feeling her stomach dip at the realization that she hadn’t been very successful at all in hiding her shattered emotional state from her children. In hindsight, it wasn’t very realistic of her to expect being able to do so. She knew she looked horrific. After spending another half hour weeping and begging for Rarity to let her in to the bathroom, she’d finally given up and crawled back to bed. Rarity didn’t emerge from her solitary confinement until a full two hours later, which Applejack knew because she was unable to sleep at all. It was obvious that Rarity had been waiting for her to fall back asleep to finally come out and come back to bed, in hopes of avoiding the inevitable confrontation. However, she hadn’t needed to worry. Despite the fact Applejack had been wide awake she remained turned away from her wife, her chest tight with rage, fury and despair. If Rarity wanted to be alone, wanted her away from her, then that was just fine. That was exactly what she would get. They hadn’t spoken for the remainder of the night, and when Applejack finally gotten up to tend to the kids, Rarity lay in a pathetic lump on her side of the bed, looking pale and stricken, almost like a ghost. Jasper started to whimper for his morning feeding, and as Applejack scooped him up from his crib, she turned to look at her wife. Or at least, the shadow of her that remained in their bed. “Rarity, Jasper’s hungry.” She winced at how the words had come out – much rougher and angrier than she’d intended. Rarity hadn’t responded, and despite every effort to arrest her rage, Applejack found that it augmented more and more with each passing second anyway. “So that’s how this is going to be, now? He needs you. You’re going to just lie there and ignore him?” Rarity curled herself tighter into a ball, shaking her head, and she whispered something, but Applejack could not hear her. “And what about Topaz and Opal?” she pressed on. She knew she was only making it worse, knew she should stop, knew that she should give them both time to cool down and talk rationally later, but at that second she found she didn’t care about being rational. “You’re not going to come out and help me get them dressed and make them breakfast? You’re not going to kiss them goodbye? Tell them you love them?” Rarity whispered again, and this time it was like something inside her snapped. “I can’t hear you, Rarity.” Her retort was sharp and jarring, too harsh even to her own ears. Rarity knew what she should say. But, just like always, the words were there and they were not budging. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I hate myself for doing this to you. “I said I’m sorry that I’m such a horrible burden,” she snapped back, loudly this time. “I don’t want you to be sorry!” Applejack threw back immediately. “I want my wife back!” There was an absolutely horrific silence, and Applejack’s vision began to swim with tears. Jasper’s cries became more strident, and Applejack closed her eyes, swallowing down the lump in her throat, and then took a deep breath, composing herself. “I’ll give him a bottle,” she murmured gruffly, before turning and leaving Rarity there. She remembered all this as she watched the kids scamper off to school with Granny Smith. Granny would be back soon to help with the washing and cleaning while she tended to the fields and the stables, but she suspected that her grandmother was well aware of what had happened and knew she needed some space. Hours ticked by slowly, and the usually soothing work dragged on and on for her. None of her kicks had the power they usually did, and her distraction made even walking the fields to see how some of the slower-blooming trees were holding up, very nearly impossible. Finally giving up, she loped back out of the fields and headed back into the house. Without even consciously making the decision to do so, she found herself heading back down the hallway towards their bedroom. When she stepped inside, Rarity still lay in a muddled heap under the blankets, almost entirely motionless. With a sigh of resignation, she sat down on the bed next to her, defeated, gazing down at the duvet. Rarity started to cry, then, reaching over for her hoof. And despite all of her hurt, all of her anger, Applejack stretched out next to her to take her into her arms while she sobbed, for reasons she still did not know, and Rarity refused to tell her. Chapter 5Rarity could not sleep. Truthfully, she hadn’t been sleeping well at all since Applejack had taken to sleeping out in the barn practically every other night. It was an odd paradox; she was resentful of Applejack’s presence, but then when the other mare wasn’t there in the bed with her, she found sleeping without the warmth of her body and the safety of her arms was nigh impossible. The days that Applejack did choose to stay in their bed with her, it was as if they were in two separate beds anyway – none of their regular cuddles or talking or touching (and often much, much more than that). As a result, Rarity often ended up taking small cat-naps throughout the night, deep sleep constantly eluding her. She rolled over, looking at Applejack’s side of the bed, empty, and suddenly was overwhelmed with such an ache for her she thought she would evaporate into cinders. She wanted her warmth, her skin, her kisses, and her strong but incredibly gentle hoofs twisting in her hair, sliding over her stomach and hips, reaching down to stroke her slit. Rarity wanted Applejack’s mouth on her throat and against her ear, whispering how much she loved her, wanted to feel her head between her legs, her warm tongue buried so deeply within her as her hoofs smoothed their way down every inch of her cutie marks. And afterwards, she wanted to lie in the circle of Applejack’s arms, her cheek pressed against Applejack’s chest, listening to her heartbeat as it lulled her to sleep, safe and protected and warm, so very warm. She finally sat up, swinging her legs out of bed, and without thinking about where she was going or why, just needing to release the energy building inside of her, she slipped on her robe and strode from the room. She gazed down the hallway, just a few doors, and suddenly her destination came to her in a burst of clarity. She knew what she needed to do and who she needed to see. She very quietly glided up the stairs and took the middle door to the left, slipping into Opal’s room. She closed the door softly behind her before crossing the hardwood, picking her way expertly around clothes and blocks and dolls to softly sit down on her daughter’s bed, careful not to wake her. For the first time in two months, she took the time to really and truly surround herself with her daughter’s presence. The young filly was curled into a ball, her long mane disheveled, the coiled waves spilling out over her pillow and her mouth slightly slackened with sleep. Her long, thick eyelashes fluttered spasmodically with her dreams, and the silver light of the moon bathed her features – a perfect mixture of both hers and Applejack’s – with a nearly ethereal glow. Rarity knew without a doubt that as she moved into her teenaged years her daughter would grow and develop into an absolutely striking beauty. Her heart blooming with affection for the first time in what felt like forever, she reached out to tenderly stroke her daughter’s cheek, brushing Opal’s platinum blond mane away from her face. It turned out that her daughter was not as deeply asleep as she’d originally thought, because the gesture was enough to wake her. Her eyelashes fluttered open, and she mumbled in confusion for a moment before her orange eyes, inherited from her great-grandmother and dark with sleep, focused on her mother. “Mom?” Her voice was small, hoarse with sleep. Rarity smiled warmly. “I’m sorry, sweetie,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you.” Opal rubbed at her eyes, still looking bleary and unfocused. “Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be asleep too?” “Yes, I should be. But I couldn’t sleep because I was missing you too much.” Opal clutched her blanket tighter around her against the chill. “You… you missed me?” The naked hope in her voice was like an arrow to Rarity’s heart. She stretched out beside the filly, curling up into a ball next to her so that they were lying face to face. Her throat tight, she nodded as she tucked a few strands of mane behind Opal’s ear. “Yes, sweetie,” she whispered back. “I’ve missed you, so much. I know I haven’t been very good at paying attention to you lately or spending time with you, and I’m so sorry that I hurt your feelings.” “Mommy said you were sick,” Opal confessed. Rarity closed her eyes, swallowing back her tears. “She’s right,” she whispered. “I haven’t been feeling very good lately at all, but that’s not an excuse for how I’ve been treating you. You should know that no matter how bad I might feel, I love you more than anything in the entire world. You and your brother and sister and your Mommy mean everything to me. I’m going to try really hard to do a better job, Opal. Starting with practicing magic together again. Immediately.” Opal favored her with a small smile, reaching out to clutch her mother’s hoof with her own, smaller ones. Rarity dropped a kiss to her forehead, and when Opal smiled back at her, she was both surprised and overjoyed that it was genuine. “It’s okay, Mom,” Opal whispered. “I forgive you. I just hope you feel better soon.” Her unconditional forgiveness only served to increase Rarity’s guilt, but she stamped it back down to focus on her baby girl. Framing her head in her hoofs, she pressed a kiss to Opal’s forehead again. “You know what would make me feel a lot better right now?” She asked. Opal grinned, and in that moment her missing tooth was so adorable it was almost heartbreaking. “What?” “I’d love to sleep in here with you tonight,” she confessed. “If, you know, you’re not too cool to be sharing your bedroom with your mother.” Opal giggled. The sound was like a soothing balm for Rarity’s bruised heart, and her daughter enthusiastically shook her head. “As long as you don’t tell Topaz, I think its okay.” She held grinned harder and silently made familiar motions. “Pinkie Promise?” Rarity laughed so loud she was afraid for a moment that it would wake up Topaz, who was sleeping in the other room. “Cross my heart,” She insisted and then made the motions back. Week Nine Dear Applejack, I love you. I know I have done an absolutely terrible job of showing that lately, but I love you more than anything in this entire world, this entire universe, even. And I hate myself for not being able to just tell you that. But for some reason, I can’t, which is why I’m sitting here at 2 a.m. writing you this letter that I already know I won’t have the courage to give you. I already know why I won’t have the courage. Not because I’m afraid you won’t forgive me, but because I am afraid you will. And I feel like I don’t deserve to be forgiven. Not after everything I’ve put you through the last two and a half months. Tonight at dinner while ‘Paz was telling us about her day at school, there was a moment where I realized that if an outside observer had been present, they would not have been able to tell anything was amiss at all. In front of the kids we’d seem so happy and normal, at least to a stranger. And I’ve been trying really hard to be better with them, I really have. We even speak when we’re all together, and every time you look across the table at me and move to say something and I see that sadness in your beautiful eyes I just want to cry and hold you and cover your face with kisses and tell you how I feel about you and make you believe it again, because I know you’ve begun to doubt it and it breaks my heart to know that. I miss you so much I can’t breathe. You asked me a few weeks ago if I still loved you, and because I’m a coward and a hypocrite, I couldn’t answer, but I love you so much, sweetie, that everything inside me hurts. All the time. Even just being in your presence makes my whole body ache. Every breath you take is like a piercing stab through my heart, and seeing the pain you are in and knowing that I am the cause of that is like a crushing weight constantly sitting on my chest. You are the only thing I truly want in this entire world. I wish I were brave enough to tell you. Love, Rarity Week Ten My Dearest Applejack, I saw you today while I was outside practicing magic with Opal after dinner, and the look on your face just seemed to pull all the breath out of my lungs. We were practicing and we were smiling and laughing and you know something? I was really, really happy. I love practicing with Opal and I’m amazed that I went such a long time without it. But I saw you there and you had this expression on your face that was like a kick to the chest – like you were so happy to see me so happy, but at the same time devastated because you’re afraid to let yourself hope again that maybe I can heal and get better. I want so badly to get better for you and be the wife, friend and lover you deserve. I want you to come inside every night now. I want you to stop sleeping in the barn and sleep next to me, the way it should be. I know I’ve made you feel like you’re not welcome there but you are, Applejack, you are welcome there. I want to sleep with your arms around me. I want to feel your face tucked into the nape of my neck as we sleep, I want to wake up cuddled in your embrace, I want to kiss you until your lips are raw and swollen and have our all-night talks that last until the sun starts to rise and we groan because we know the kids will be up soon and we’re probably not getting any sleep at all for the day at least until that evening. I miss making love to you so much it’s physically unbearable. Sometimes at night I lie there in bed and there’s this awful, horrible heat in my chest and between my legs and I feel like I’ll go crazy if I can’t have you with me, making love to me. I miss the way you’d always lay your head on my stomach afterwards, how you’d kiss each of my hipbones and around my belly button because you know I’m ticklish there. I miss the way you would always blush until the tips of your ears turned red when you’d find a red mark on my neck that you’d left by accident because you didn’t realize in the heat of the moment exactly how passionate you’d gotten. I miss talking afterwards, feeling safe to tell you what I was thinking or feeling, what I was scared of, what made me happy, what I was worried about. I wish we could talk again. The way we used to. Beyond the logistics, beyond the surfacey comments such as passing the salt or asking you to hand me the broom. Always so polite, so polished, so formal. So not us. I want so badly for us to find our way back to that. I’m trying, sweetie. I really am. Please don’t give up on me. Not yet. I love you. Rarity Week Eleven My Love, It helps to write these to you, even though you haven’t read them. I feel like I’m really talking to you again even if it’s not out loud. It comforts me. I don’t know why I can’t just give you these letters, but for some reason I’m still so scared to. I first said that I felt like I didn’t deserve to be forgiven. I still think that, but I think there is also a small part of me that fears your rejection after so many months of me constantly rejecting you. I know that’s ridiculous. You’ve always been able to forgive me anything, never been able to deny me anything I ask of you. It’s your most wonderful asset and probably your greatest weakness, too. I heard you last night, while I was in the shower. I know I was crying again – I don’t even understand how I have any tears left at this point. I heard you open the door and come in, and you stood there, and I knew you wanted to comfort me but you were afraid to because of last time. But I didn’t want to lock you out this time. I wanted you. I wanted you to climb in there with me and hold me and then take me back to bed and hold me there, too. But you didn’t and I don’t blame you for not doing so; I know how deeply I hurt you last time and I’m so sorry. I don’t expect you to keep opening yourself up to abuse you don’t deserve, but I want you to know I wouldn’t have pushed you away that time, Applejack. As more and more time goes by it’s like the anger and resentment is getting less and less and all I feel is a constant ache for you. It eclipses anything and everything else in my life, every other emotion I have. I need to tell you all this to your face. I know. Fluttershy and Mac and Granny Smith keep pushing me to make the first move, but I feel so lost. I don’t even know where to start or what to do. You’ve always been my safe space, Applejack. When I don’t know what to do or when I have a problem or I’m scared, my first impulse is to run to my best friend and ask her what I should do. But in this case, my problem and my best friend happen to be the same thing. What do I do? I love you so much. I miss you so much. I need to fix this. I’m going to fix this, Applejack. I promise. Love, Rarity
Chapter 1She looked at Rarity from across the bedroom, dressed in a long, white, nightgown with blue trim, leaning into the vanity to brush out her mane into utter perfection, and couldn't help but feel an overwhelmingly intense surge of emotion – a pang of love so strong she thought she’d faint with its force, mixed with an aching longing that pierced her chest acutely. Applejack wanted nothing more than to touch her, press her face into her styled mane and inhale the scent of her shampoo, her warm neck and wrap her forlegs protectively around Rarity and hear her giggle in response as she snuggled against her – but she knew that none of those things, now only a sweet memory, would happen even if she tried. So, she remained rooted to her spot on the other side of the room with the bed between them, and tried to focus on smoothing out the covers through a nervous habit. Nevertheless, her gaze still insisted on drifting back to her, drinking in her beauty. Her throat ached and she was suddenly overcome with a strong urge to cry, but she blinked back her tears. Rarity met her gaze in the vanity mirror, over her shoulder, and granted her a small smile. Applejack felt her heart give a small leap for joy – Rarity hadn't smiled at her in so long. Most ponies would have probably said that it had been so long they'd forgotten what it looked like, but she could never forget Rarity’s smile and how it lit up her whole face, making her even more beautiful than she normally was – if that were even possible. "You look beautiful, Rarity," she whispered reverently. She hadn't meant to. The words were there and she simply couldn't stop herself – she didn't want to stop herself. Immediately after, however, she tensed, wondering if she’d made a mistake. Her compliments hadn't succeeded in doing much lately other than aggravating her. She held her breath, awaiting the inevitable snippy retort, or, worse yet – far worse – silence. No acknowledgement at all. Continuation of the cold war that raged between them all day and night, every day for the last month and a half. Since the loss. But it seemed tonight there would be a truce. Rarity turned to look at her, and her blue eyes were shining with what Applejack could've sworn was love and tenderness, but was too afraid to hope anymore. Experience had taught her not to get her hopes up when it seemed Rarity was having a "good" day – because, irrevocably, her disposition would change just as quickly as it had come to begin with and she’d be back to stony silence and cold distance. "Thank you, dear. So do you." Rarity had never meant anything so sincerely, but she knew Applejack was afraid to believe her. And despite not being able to blame her, Rarity couldn't help but feel hurt. "Do…do you need help with that?" Applejack’s voice was tentative, hedging. Rarity glanced up at her, once again meeting her eyes over her shoulder in the mirror, and there was no mistaking the fear in her lover’s voice. She swallowed hard, licked her lips, and nodded. Even if the help was completely unneeded. "Thank you." Applejack gingerly stepped up behind her, taking the comb from her magic and softly, slowly, running it through her mane. The warmth of her skin emanated from her, the scent of her mane and her perfume bathing Applejack with memories of what it felt like to taste her skin, touch its softness, and feel her mane against her cheek. A lump formed in her throat that she forced herself to swallow back down as she worked gently to brush out non-existent tangles. Rarity closed her eyes, lost for a moment in the touch, and in that one, brief moment, she remembered the same thing. The feel of orange lips against her neck and shoulder, Applejack’s softly whispered words of adoration in her ear, her scent surrounding her, her hoofs smoothing over her stomach and down to cup her hips, reaching down between her legs… When she opened her eyes again, she saw that the orange mare had stopped the brush, and was now staring at her in the mirror once again. The look of pain and longing on her face, in those emerald eyes, was like a physical ache to Rarity’s heart. She swallowed hard and whispered her name, so softly she feared she might not have heard. "Applejack..." With a shaking hoof, clearly afraid of rebuke but unable to stop herself, Applejack reached up and gently skimmed it over her shoulder. Rarity stiffened at the touch, her breath hitched in anticipation of what her lover would do next. Applejack watched her intently, and when she didn't shove her away as she normally would these days, the need became too great and she leaned in, pressing a soft kiss to the side of her neck. Rarity felt her eyes sink closed as teeth nibbled their way down her neck and across her bare shoulder, Applejack pressing her body closer to hers, enveloping her in warmth. Despite herself, Rarity arched her neck in a gesture of unconscious invitation, a tiny moan escaping her lips when Applejack hit the particularly sensitive spot below her ear. The orange pony’s hoofs gently caressed her shoulders and collarbone, before she straightened to press her lips into a styled mane. "I love you, Rares." Rarity’s eyes shot open, and she looked at their reflection, seeing Applejack so blissfully buried into her. Her stomach lurched. Suddenly, without warning, it was back – the wave of apathy and resentment, ice-cold and nonsensical and unforgiving, her intense desire to shove the farmpony away battling with her equally intense desire to hold her close, pepper her face with kisses and never let her go. At her silence, emerald eyes fluttered open, meeting hers in the reflection. Instantly, uncertainty and doubt bloomed across Applejack’s features. She swallowed hard and whispered again. "I love you, Rarity." The tone was different this time, a mixture of hope and desperation and fear. In that moment, she knew how badly Applejack needed her to say it back. But despite her best efforts to force the words out, they just couldn't seem to release their claw-like grip on her lips. I love you too, Applejack. I miss you so much. I'm so sorry for everything. I've been so awful. Please forgive me. I need you. I can't live without you. I don't want to. The hurt in her green eyes darkened, and Rarity could see the tell-tale glossy sheen filling them with lightening speed. Applejack looked as though someone had just stabbed her in the stomach. When she spoke again, her words were garbled with tears. "Do…do you love me, Rarity?" The question was as painful as a physical blow. The guilt and shame that had been rising up within her like steam in a pressure cooker popped, and before she knew what she was doing, she whirled around to face Applejack, her own eyes filling with tears and her countenance at nigh hysterical levels. "How could you ask me that?!" Her voice was shrill, hoarse and cracking with self-loathing. Applejack flinched, stepping back from her slightly. When she responded, she could barely choke the words out. "Is it really so hard for you to say it back?" "That question was completely unfair and you know it!" She knew she was deflecting, knew she was avoiding, knew she was in the wrong, but, as per the pattern she'd been following for weeks now, she kept digging herself deeper and deeper. The tears fell over Applejack’s lashes now. She made no effort to hide it. Despite it, Rarity could see that anger was coming to the farmpony’s defense; and she had every intention of calling her on her avoidance. "It's not the slightest bit unfair when you consider the way you've been treating me! You've done nothing but push me away for weeks! That is not love! I never know what to think around you anymore, so yes, Rarity, I need to ask! This right here? That was the first time you've let me touch you in over a month! Ever since the baby!" Rarity instantly snapped erect, as though she had been slapped. Applejack’s complete fearlessness to shove the elephant in the room, the one she had been so desperately trying to avoid, right in her face nearly took her breath away. "That's not true!" The second the words were out, she knew Applejack would shoot them down instantly. Rightfully so. She did not disappoint. She gaped, stunned by her outright lie. "It is true! You know it's true! You barely even look at me, let alone speak to me! You won't let me touch you or kiss you or hold you, you snap at everything I say and do, and no matter what I do it's always wrong! It's like you can hardly stand to be under the same roof together! I don't understand! You won't tell me anything you're feeling since the miscarriage or what I've done to deserve this! You want to know what's 'unfair?' That's what's unfair!" Her tears finally spilled over as well, her teeth clenching together. "Oh, well, I'm so sorry that it's been so difficult for you to deal with me! Please, forgive me!" "Don't you dare!" Applejack snarled, startling her with the ferocity. "You're not going to do that, Rarity! You're not going to turn this around on me and make it out to be as though I'm the bad guy! Stop avoiding everything I say! Why won't you answer the question? Why won't you tell me what you're feeling?" she gripped Rarity desperately by her shoulders, forcing the other mare to look into her eyes. "Why won't you let me help you? What did I do? I can't fix it if you won't tell me!" "You wouldn't understand!" Rarity sobbed, her voice breaking. "How do you know if you won't let me try?" Applejack shot back, sobbing as well. "You can't fix it Applejack!" Rarity’s words were now almost incomprehensible, drowned in tears. "Nopony can! Nopony can fix it! It's gone! It's all gone, and I can't get it back!" She didn't need her to clarify what "it" meant. She knew. The baby. The future they'd hoped for with it. Rarity’s life as she knew it. Her passion, her emotion, her strong-willed nature, the fire within her that had captivated Applejack so intently to begin with. She watched as Rarity buried her face in her hoofs, crying so hard it looked as though she were being ripped in two. Instantly, the fight drained out of Applejack and her heart broke on her wife’s behalf. She reached for her, praying to the spirits that she would not push her away. Thankfully, she didn't. "Please, Rare," she wept hoarsely against her temple, holding her shaking body as tightly as she could. "Please, please talk to me. Tell me what you're feeling. Let me comfort you. Let me grieve with you. Let me in. Please." Applejack’s anguished plea was Rarity’s undoing, and she looked up at her, her bright, blue eyes wet with sorrow. She tried to form words, but nothing came at first, her mouth moving soundlessly. Then, finally, she managed to tear them from her throat. "I feel nothing," she confessed brokenly. "Nothing, Applejack. I don't feel anything. About anything." Applejack looked at her, blankly at first, and then her tear-stained face clouded over with dread. Despite her obvious terror, she asked the question anyway. "Including for me?" There was a horrible, awful, billowing silence. Rarity blinked at Applejack, her wet blue eyes welling anew with unshed tears. She wanted nothing more than to reassure her, swear that she still adored the other mare as much as the day she had married her, that she felt deeper for her than anything in her life, but once again, her words chose to betray her and stay buried within. It was clear that the farmer took her silence for her answer. Applejack's forelegs fell limply to the floor, and she swallowed hard, her throat bobbing spasmodically with her tears. In that moment, she was certain that nothing had ever hurt as much in her life, and that nothing would ever hurt as much again. Suddenly, Applejack felt as though she could not breathe here in this room, this room that had always been such a haven of love and comfort. She slowly stepped back from Rarity, doing her best to ignore the wild panic darkening in her azure eyes. Please don't go, please don't leave me, stay, I love you, I love you so much, I don't mean any of it, I'll always love you, it's all my fault – "Oh," Applejack whispered. And with that, she turned on her heel and walked out.
Chapter 2“Ugh! Why won’t this stupid thing work?!” Applejack paused her unenthusiastic scaling of the porch steps when she heard the voice of her youngest daughter. Brow furrowing in anxious worry, she wound around the side of the house, only to be greeted with the disheartening sight of her daughter absolutely sobbing into the grass. Immediately, Applejack crossed the small distance between them, and sat next to the distraught foal, nuzzling her softly. Her daughter instantly clung to her foreleg, her tears not subsiding, and matting her mother’s fur as she convulsed with anguish. Applejack dropped a kiss to the top of the filly’s head, rubbing her small back soothingly until the filly was finally able to gain some composure and look up at her mother. Her brilliant orange eyes were red and watery, and her cheeks were flushed. “You wanna tell me what’s wrong, Little Gem?” At the question Opal seemed to shrink into herself, almost as if she was afraid of something, pulling away from her mother’s foreleg and looking away, and brushing her cannon with her hoof. “Mommy, did… did I do something wrong?” Applejack was taken aback by the question. Of all the statements she had been expecting, that was not one of them. Her brow furrowed. “No! Of course not, baby, why would you even ask something like that?” Opal reached up to wipe at her muzzle noisily. “Then… why doesn’t Mom like me anymore?” It felt not unlike being stabbed repeatedly with a rusty, dull knife. Applejack felt her insides being ripped apart, and a breath wheezed out of her in surprise at the pain. It became almost impossible to breathe. She forced herself to be calm, but her stomach turned to lead. Absentmindedly, she brushed her hoof through Opal’s platinum blond mane, and tried to keep her voice calm. But she was unsuccessful; her voice shook tremendously when she opened her mouth. “Sweetie, your mother could never not like you.” She whispered. “She loves you more than anything in the entire world. Where in Equestria did you get an idea that she doesn’t like you?” Opal’s reply was muffled against her mother’s foreleg. “Then why doesn’t she ever want to spend time with me anymore?” her voice was gargled, and Applejack felt hot, fresh tears on her coat. “We… we used to always do things together… but ever since she got sick that one time… it’s like she doesn’t want me around anymore. She won’t play with me or practice magic with me or read me stories or sing to me and Topaz like she used to. She’ll feed Jasper, and that’s it. And,” the filly’s voice began to tremble and the rusty, dull knife doubled its thrusts. “Since we don’t practice together, my magic has gotten worse. I can tell.” Opal sobbed, just once. Just one, heartbreaking sob, and her next words killed Applejack. “Maybe… maybe I did something to make her mad at me.” Applejack had to take several deep, calming breaths to regain her senses. Something inside her was beginning to bubble, pitch, rage. When she was certain she could speak without losing control, she nuzzled her daughter nickering into her mane, but didn’t pull back, instead keeping her muzzle pressed against Opal’s head. “Opal,” she whispered hoarsely into her daughter’s poll. “You have done absolutely nothing wrong. Nothing at all. Please, please don’t think that you have, okay, sugar? None of that is your fault.” Opal blinked her orange eyes up at her mother hopefully. “It’s not?” Applejack closed her eyes, fighting against the rage flowing in her blood. “N-no. Mom has been… feeling really bad lately. For several reasons. She’s still… pretty sick. And it’s probably going to take her a while to get better.” She opened her eyes and completed her nuzzle, playfully tugging at some lose hairs of Opal’s mane with her teeth, bringing forth a small giggle, albeit a gurgling one. “But why is she sick? What happened to her?” Applejack hesitated for a moment, trying to sort out her explanation, and fighting the rage flowing through her. “Sweetheart, we all have things inside of us… they’re called hormones. They’re little things that can control how happy or sad we are. And sometimes, for girls especially, those hormones mess up, they get better, of course, but it can take a little while. But that’s what’s wrong with Mom. Her hormones aren’t working right. And that’s why she’s so sad and tired all the time.” She could tell that the explanation, while not exactly comforting Opal, proved to give her some relief and context as to what was happening with her mother lately. Applejack breathed a sigh of relief at the fact that her explanation had not gone over the filly’s head. “So,” Opal smiled hopefully up at her. “I didn’t do anything wrong? She’s not mad at me?” “No, Little Gem, she’s not mad at you. I’m so sorry if she—that you felt like she did. Mom loves you, and so do I. She just... needs to get better, okay?" Despite her sage words, Applejack found the anger inside of her rolling and pressing. White and hot and fierce and violent. “But hey,” she said, leaning down and winking at her daughter. “Until Mom gets better, there’s no rule saying that only she is allowed to teach you. How about we go visit Auntie Twilight and see if she can give you lessons, hmm?” Opal’s eyes lit up hopefully at the suggestion. “Really, Mommy? Yes!” “Sure,” Applejack smiled back, despite the monster of rage inside her gut roaring at the fact that she even had to rely on her friend for something like this. “Let’s go see right now.” Applejack walked back towards the house, having dropped off Opal at the library, with no small avoidance of Twilight’s worried, questioning gazes. With every step she took, her breathing became shallower and shallower, harsher and more ragged. Her blood pounded in her ears. Her muscles constricted, every inch of her tense with pure rage the likes of which she had never quite felt before. In her entire life, she couldn’t remember being so incredibly, irascibly livid. It was a foreign sensation. As if something primal and animalistic had been ignited inside of her, something with claws and teeth, something on a mission to annihilate anything that reduced her precious little girl to such anguish. It just so happened that this time, that anything happened to be her wife. By the time she slammed open the door it was as if an unknown force was pushing her into the living room, where Granny Smith sat in the rocking chair by the window, staring at the gardens. Applejack paid her no attention even when she looked up at the bang of the closing door, moving faster than she thought possible she rounded the corner and barged into the master bedroom with all the ferocity of a spitting, hissing lioness. Tears stung her eyes, and her heart slammed itself against her ribs, and she knew this was it. The breaking point. That awful, horrible place where she couldn’t even hold herself together anymore. Last week’s horrendous altercation in their bedroom, Rarity’s inability to voice her love for her—if there was any left—had left Applejack sobbing into the soft hay in the barn beside the house where she had slept that night. Even that paled in comparison to this, this nauseating, white-hot rage that seemed to utterly eradicate her easy-going and friendly nature. “You need to do better.” She snarled as soon as she caught sight of Rarity on the bed. Rarity didn’t even flinch. For a moment, Applejack wondered if she had even been heard. Growling, she made her way around the bed to stand in front of her wife, and the second her eyes fell on that face, she felt her resolve shaking a bit. So beautiful, yet so sad and lost, eyes staring past Applejack’s shoulder, but clearly not seeing anything. Clearly, she was not even in the room. Applejack was torn between knowing that yelling would only make the other mare close off more, and thinking that she had already closed herself off as much as she could and perhaps yelling would be the only way Applejack could get through to her. “You need to do better.” She repeated forcefully, and Rarity blurred in her vision as droplets of tears stuck to her eyelids. “This cannot go on this way, Rarity! You can’t keep doing this! You want to check out of this marriage? Fine! You don’t want me anymore? That’s fine too! But you don’t get to check out of being their mother! You don’t get to toss them aside like they don’t exist!” “You know what I just walked in on? Opal, crying her eyes out because she thinks her mother hates her!” That statement managed to do what nothing else had. Rarity snapped her head to Applejack, and those blue eyes finally zapped into the present and met green. Rarity opened her mouth and moved it around, trying to say something, but only succeeded in shaking her head, and finally reaching up and plugging in her ears in a desperate attempt to block it all out. And just like that, Applejack felt her rage finally break. It was like a bursting dam; a crack followed by waves and waves of rage, and then a small final trickle before complete silence and stillness. Seeing Rarity there on the bed, her ears plugged desperately and her head shaking in a half-aware state finally made her break. She felt her legs buckle and give out, and she caught the bed to keep herself partially upright, but her knees met the floor. “Please, Rares.” She begged, and finally her own tears fell freely. “Please tell me how to fix it. I’m begging you. I’m on my knees before you, begging you, please tell me what to do. I’ll do it. I’ll do anything. I know you’re angry at me. I’m angry at myself too. But I need to know why. I need to know so I can fix it. I have to fix it. I can’t lose you, Rarity. Please.” She whispered something unintelligible and Applejack shook her head. “I can’t hear you, sugar.” “You couldn’t bring it back.” She repeated, and although the words were accusatory in and of themselves, the tone was anything but. It was saturated by guilt and shame. And suddenly it hit her like three tons of brick. This was why she was angry with her. Not because of hormones. Not because of the depression over having lost the foal. But because Applejack herself couldn’t bring the foal back. The only sound in the room was Rarity’s muffled sobs. Applejack worked her mouth fruitlessly for a total of five minutes before she managed to speak around the block in her throat. “You blame me.” She croaked. “You’ve blamed me all this time. That’s why you keep pushing me away.” And suddenly the room felt suffocating. She couldn’t be here. She had to… she—she had to… Applejack pushed herself up off the bed, nearly scrambling away. It’s all your fault. “Okay, Rarity.” She croaked. “You want me to stay away? You win. I’ll stay away.” She turned and left the bedroom, forcing herself not to run or fall apart completely until she got to the barn, where she knew she would be spending the night again, and probably for a long time. As she walked, she prayed to Celestia that Rarity would run after her, call her back, or anything. Anything at all. But she never did.
Chapter 3Rarity’s head pounded as she rolled out of bed late the next morning. She slipped on her dressing robe and headed down to the kitchen without a single look in the mirror. She knew what she looked like; mussed mane, dark and bloodshot eyes, the skin under her fur sallow and sickly. She hadn’t slept a wink, and she knew without even laying her eyes on her wife that it had been the same for her. One glance at her confirmed it. The kids had already been shuffled off to school by Granny Smith, and Applejack stood at the window holding Jasper and feeding him his bottle. Her eyes were dead and empty as she stared off into the orchard. The mare sensed Rarity’s presence near the door, shuffling awkwardly in her disheveled state, and for a long time, the farm pony would not look at her. When she finally met Rarity’s eyes, it was like a thousand miles separated them, when in reality it was only six feet. Jasper began to squirm for his mother as usual, and Applejack placed his bottle down on the window sill, and dutifully stepped up to her wife. The air was thick with sorrow between them, and Rarity tried to meet the other mare’s gaze, to let her know everything, anything, but Applejack sharply looked away as she placed Jasper into Rarity’s grasp. She clutched him to her, and he cooed and snuggled into the fur of her chest. She gazed at Applejack, her mouth slightly ajar with the words that lived there constantly, but she could not speak for some reason. “I’ll be out in the fields.” Applejack whispered gruffly. Without further elaboration, she pressed a kiss on Jasper’s head, stepped around them, and headed down the hall and to the front door. For a long moment, Rarity simply stood there in the kitchen, holding her son, and drowning in the thick silence that was very nearly suffocating her. Then she sat down at the kitchen table, tucked the infant closer against her chest, and cried as if she was being ripped in two. “Can I use the knife?” Rarity looked up from lighting the gas burner on the stove to see Applejack at the far end of the counter with a large bowl in front of her and surrounded by fresh vegetables. Rarity swallowed hard, surprised that they were addressing each other at all without the kids in the room. The last two weeks had proven to be very quiet between them, giving each other a wide berth altogether. Applejack gestured to the large cutting knife lying next to the stove. Rarity picked it up with her magic and floated it over to her, laying it carefully next to the bowl. “Thank you.” Applejack said hoarsely, and then forced herself to look away from blue eyes as she began to chop the cucumber. She couldn’t look at her. Having her right there, while not really having her at all, was too agonizing for words. Rarity turned away as the other mare chopped and worked, the silence between them louder than cannon fire. Numbly, she prepared the sauce for dinner, and stirred the noodles boiling next to her, and in that moment, hearing Applejack slice and dice behind her, she found herself almost ready to say it. All of it. Uncertainty and not knowing why and not being able to explain it all be damned; anything to fix the broken bridge of communication between them that had crumbled in the last week. She ceased working, focusing only on the sounds of Applejack slicing behind her. She slowly turned to look at her, her face twisted with anguish, guilt, and fear, clutching her wooden spoon to her chest protectively, not unlike a child clutching her favorite toy for comfort. She choked Applejack’s name in a broken whisper. She looked up, pausing her salad preparation, her eyes full of anticipation, and even a minute amount of hope. “Yes, Rarity?” Rarity looked at her, those warm green eyes, the naked longing and hope etched into her face, so beautiful, and tried to force out the words. Say it. Just say it. She loves you. You can work through it together. Say it. “You’re making the salad wrong. You know I can’t stand green peppers.” There was a long moment where she just looked at her, and Rarity could not remember saying something that she regretted more. Something in Applejack’s eyes seemed to break, then, and she gently set down the knife. Without a word or so much as a glance towards her, she turned and left the kitchen, leaving Rarity and her cowardice. “AJ?” Applejack snapped out of her dazed reverie, glancing across the table at her brother, only to find Mac looking at her with an expression that was half confusion, half forlornness. She sighed and straightened in her seat, trying to force herself to be in the present. “Sorry. I’m listening. Go ‘head.” Mac sighed in return and slumped in his seat, and Applejack tried not to notice the empathy etched into every line of his face as he did so. “No you’re not. You haven’t heard a word I’ve said since we sat down to lunch.” The words were wry, but free of censure. Mac stood up and moved to the counter, putting his plate in the sink and then moving around doing something else. Applejack watched him regretfully before dropping her eyes to the floor. Moments later, Mac placed a glass in front of her. Applejack stared at the caramel colored beverage for a long moment before looking back at Mac, who was nursing his own drink. “Brandy?” Mac shrugged. “Looked like ya needed it.” He drawled easily before taking a small sip and sighing. Applejack nodded absentmindedly and then drained the small amount of alcohol in one gulp, barely feeling it go down. Silence fell over them, and Applejack knew Mac was waiting for her to open a vein, but she was so mentally and even at this point physically fatigued that she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Instead she looked to the side at her small son, who was having way too much fun squeezing the daylights out of his stuffed lion, and swallowed the ache of misery in her throat. “How are ‘Shy and Autumn?” The words just came out, but it was the only thing she could think of to say that wasn’t the issue obsessively filling her mind—her wife. Mac seemed to know what she was doing, but complied nevertheless. “They’re… fine. Doing much better.” He worded carefully, and Applejack winced. Fluttershy’s pregnancy had been a practical nightmare. Complication after complication had left Mac coming over to Sweet Apple Acres night after night to cry into his sister’s shoulder. The birth was even worse, and the doctors had nearly lost both of them. But both made it. Autumn Glory was a gorgeous filly, but would forever wear the mark of her complicated beginning. “Better?” she asked, feeling a stabbing flash of guilt for not stopping by to see her long time friend. She’d been so buried in her own despondency, her own marital problems, that she hadn’t even thought to. “Yeah,” Mac said gruffly, staring hard into his drink. “Much better. It was… rough there, in the beginning. But we’ve settled into a routine.” “I—” Applejack sighed, looked down to her own son, cooing and rolling around on his soft, baby blue blanket that was a present from his Auntie Dash. He was such a perfect mix of both her and Rarity, with his white coat and green eyes, with an extra bit of his aunt thrown in there in the form of a soft, crimson mane. For some reason it made her eyes sting. “Sorry, Mac. I’m sorry.” She nearly snapped, looking away from her foal. “You had problems of your own,” was all Mac said. “Don’t excuse nothing. I should’ve…” She sighed. “Sorry,” she said again, because it seemed like the only thing she could say. There was a long silence between them, one that Mac filled by taking an even longer sip of his drink. “Are you two still not talking?” Applejack sighed and immediately, tears stung the back of her eyes and her head dropped forward. She glared at the old wood of the dining table, her throat constricted. She cleared it once, twice, and when she spoke, her words were garbled. “We talk when the kids are there,” she confessed brokenly. “If it has to do with them, we’ll talk. The bare minimum, but we speak.” She paused, drawing in a shaky breath. “But aside from that…” She looked up at Mac, whose eyes filled with pain on her behalf. “Aside from that?” Applejack shook her head, feeling tears cling to her eyelids precariously, dangerously close to spilling over. “I’ve… I’ve been sleeping outside. In the barn. Ever since…” She trailed off, remembering her confession the week prior. The words were still so raw, so visceral, that thinking them again was like a physical blow to the chest every time. You blame me. You’ve blamed me all this time. You couldn’t bring it back. “I can’t sleep in the bedroom with her,” she croaked. “She’s completely shut me out, Mac. I mean, physically I could, but having her there close enough to touch but not having her at all is… agony. I can’t sleep next to her and not touch her. So I just don’t sleep next to her anymore.” Mac closed his eyes, groaning in commiseration. Applejack saw his throat bob spasmodically, which he covered by taking a final gulp of his drink. It was a long time before he found words. “Do you still love her, ‘Jack?” Applejack’s head snapped up. Despite the wetness on her cheeks, her sorrow was quickly replaced by shock, dismay, and even anger at her brother for daring to ask such an absurd question. She opened her mouth to retort sharply when suddenly she remembered not even two weeks prior, standing in their bedroom, asking the same thing. How could you even ask me that?! That question is completely unfair and you know it! She groaned internally, suddenly understanding all too well her wife’s devastated reaction to her inquiry. She swallowed hard, looking Mac straight in the eyes. “She’s my entire world, Mac. You know she is. She’s been my entire world since I fell for her. And she always will be.” She paused, not sure how to word her next bit. “I just… I don’t know if I can make her happy, anymore.” Her voice broke on the last word and finally the tears began to flow. She wept openly, her forehead falling onto the table, feeling her bruised heart constrict painfully. Seeing her distress, Jasper whimpered from the floor, and Mac moved over to pick his nephew up, nuzzling him comfortingly. “Applejack.” She managed to lift her head to stare at Mac through the tears; to find her brother staring at her with what could only be describe as intense certainty. She wiped her eyes to better look at him, briefly appreciating how natural he looked with her own son clutched to his chest. Jasper actually kind of looked like his uncle. Just around the eyes. “Listen to me.” Macintosh said gently. “Rarity loves you. Ya know she does. She adores you. Lives for you. You’re everything to her, anypony in the entire town can tell you that because it’s as clear as day.” Applejack shook her head, her throat in knots. “She couldn’t say she loved me, Mac.” She chocked out. “I asked her not two weeks ago, and she couldn’t say it.” Mac was already shaking his head. “Sometimes, AJ, we can’t bring ourselves to say what we want to. How we really feel. It’s probably why she’s so angry.” Applejack sniffed, taking several long, deep breaths to try and calm herself down. Mac waited patiently, stroking Jasper’s mane absentmindedly as the colt’s eyelids drooped. “Sorry, Mac, I—” she exhaled again and smiled at her brother. “Thanks.” “No problem, sis. Gotta look out for my own, mm?” He hummed, smiling back. Then his smile turned into a thin line. “You hang in there, AJ. She’ll come around.” Applejack nodded, her crumpled conviction rebuilding itself just a bit.
Chapter 4It was a good day. Rarity had learned in the past two months that her days more often than not fell into one of two categories: “good” days or “bad” bad. There were also, at an alarmingly growing rate, more and more “nothing” days—days where she felt nothing at all, good or bad. Those were the ones she dreaded the most. She actually preferred to be bitter and angry or broken and sad than total apathy; at least when she felt any of those other emotions, she had proof that she was still alive. Today, however, was a “good” day. She’d woken up feeling content, even energetic, and had enjoyed having breakfast with her kids and sending them off to school. She had surprised Applejack by pulling the other mare into a spontaneous kiss when she announced her usual departing to the fields, and even managed not to feel overly hurt by the cautious hope in the other mare’s eyes, especially when she smiled at her adoringly before going out the door. Her good spirits continued as she cleaned the kids’ rooms, picking up dolls and blocks and stuffed animals and rearranging Topaz’s tossed-aside bedspread, smiling at how much their eldest child resembled her mother. She hummed a soft tune to herself as she worked, so lost in her task that she didn’t even hear Granny Smith come up behind her, holding Jasper to her chest. “Someone’s hungry,” she mused. Rarity jumped a little and turned around to see Jasper cooing for her, a big, gummy smile on his lips. She laughed, reaching for her son. “Well luckily I can help with that,” she cooed back, sifting her lips across the foal’s soft head and nuzzling his cheek. “You hungry, sweetheart? You need some yummy milk?” She sat on Topaz’s bed, and as she began to undo her silk robe, Granny Smith came and sat beside her. “He’s getting so big,” she remarked, staring lovingly at her great-grandson. Oh the blessings of living long enough to be around three whole generations of foals. “Always hungry, it seems.” Rarity laughed. “Well he’s a growing colt,” Granny Smith murmured adoringly. “Can you believe he’s eight months already?” Rarity nodded in acknowledgment. “I know. It’s incredible how fast time travels.” There was a lull in the conversation, and for a moment, Granny Smith just watched her granddaughter-in-law. Her heart ached at the sight of her nursing her foal, her besotted expression. She looked so happy at that moment that Granny Smith almost chickened out about broaching the subject she’d been planning on raising with her for a few days now. Ultimately though, she knew it had to be done. She took a deep breath, and made sure to keep her voice gentle and free of censure. “Sweetheart… I’ve been meaning to ask. Is everything… okay? With you and Applejack?” Rarity glanced up at her, her brow furrowed. “What do you mean?” Granny swallowed roughly. She knew she was treading dangerous waters here, and Rarity seemed to be in such good spirits today that she didn’t want to ruin it. But at the same time, she knew that if she didn’t do it now, while the other mare was in good spirits, it would never get discussed. “I’m not blind, youngin’. I was married twice, once for over forty years. I know there’s tension between you two.” Instantly, Rarity’s expression became shuttered. She seemed to retreat back inside herself a bit, clutching Jasper to her a bit more tightly in an unconscious effort of self-protection. Shame seeped forward from every pore in her body, but she didn’t bother deny the charge. Sighing in empathy, Granny reached forward and stroked her foreleg. “I ain’t criticizin’ you. I know how hard it’s been since the baby. And you know sometimes mares have miscarriages… there are hormones. It’s biological. Ya can’t control it. Ain’t a reason to feel ashamed.” It was a long time before Rarity could speak and when she did, her tone was thick. “I… I know,” she admitted gruffly. “I just… I can’t explain it. One moment I just want to take her into my arms and hold her forever and then others I just feel so… I don’t know… and… I get so angry and I… I can’t even look at her.” “Rarity,” Granny Smith interjected softly, “all this? What y’all are saying to me now? You need to be sayin’ it to her. She’s scared, and she’s confused, and all she wants is to be there for you and for you to be honest about what you’re feeling.” She reached out and turned her granddaughter-in-law’s watery stare towards her own. “You know what an incredibly lucky mare you are. The way that mare loves you is…” “I know,” Rarity whispered brokenly. “And you love her the same way,” Granny Smith finished. “You owe it to her to not shut her out. Let her grieve with you. Let her help you. That’s all she wants. If you’re angry about something, tell her. She can’t make amends if you don’t, and it’s not fair to expect her to be able to.” Granny Smith wasn’t telling her anything she hadn’t told herself before, a thousand times over. But despite Granny’s insistence that she not feel ashamed, that she open up to Applejack in the way that she always had, she felt more ashamed than ever. “You’re breaking her heart,” Granny finally whispered. “I hear her. Every night she sleeps out in the barn. My room is directly across from the barn, and I hear her cry herself to sleep almost every night.” Rarity lurched, looking like she might be sick. “I’m not saying this to guilt you,” Granny Smith said soothingly. “I’m saying this so that you can see that what you to have is worth fightin’ for. No one cries over each other the way you two have been unless there is an incredible amount of love between them.” “I… I know I’ve been awful,” Rarity responded brokenly. “Not just to her, but to the girls, and you and my friends.” Her throat closed off completely and she dissolved into tears, burying her face into her hoofs. Granny immediately drew her forward and into her, and Rarity gratefully flung her arms around the old mare. Granny Smith stroked her hair, soothing her until the storm passed, and when Rarity was finally able to regain enough control to speak again, her words were barely understandable, laced with agony. “It’s like… it’s all gone,” she wept bitterly. “My will to do anything, show my wife how much I love her, be with my children, care about my life… it’s just gone! It’s like it left with… with the baby! And I’ve been so awful to her, a horrible friend and a horrible wife and a horrible lover, and she’s totally right to stay away because I pushed her there! But even though I pushed her there, I’m angry at her for staying away! How sick is that?!” Her shoulders shook again with the force of her muted sobs, and Granny Smith very gently reached down and cradled her face in her hoofs. She tilted her gaze up to her own, softly whispering her name. “There was nothing you could have done that night to prevent it. Nothing at all. It was completely beyond your control, and berating yourself over and over is not going to make that any less true.” Rarity looked down shamefully, unable to concede the point. But Granny’s next words were like an arrow hitting the center of a target with expert precision: “And there was nothing she could have done to prevent it either, or undo it.” For a moment, Rarity felt as though the wind had been knocked out of her. She whipped her head up at the elder mare, who was looking at her knowingly, and felt her face burn with shame and guilt. She had no idea how the other mare had deciphered her secret, her irrational blame towards her wife, the true reason she was staying away, but the knowledge was unbearable. She knew denying the charge was futile, so she simply nodded, gazing down at the floor. When she spoke again, her voice was very suffocated. “I miss her so much, Gran,” she confessed. Granny Smith sighed, drawing her back against her, offering tender comfort. “I know, sweetheart,” she muttered. “She misses you, too.” When Applejack cautiously stepped through the front door that evening, she steeled herself for the first interaction with her wife. Despite Rarity’s sunny disposition that morning as she’d left for work, she knew better than to count on that still being the case by the time she got home. It was starting to get to the point where she never knew at any given moment which Rarity she was going to get – and there were many to choose from these days. So when she heard Rarity’s laughter tinkling from the living room, she instantly wilted in relief. The kids’ voices mixed with hers as Applejack rounded the corner and glanced into the room, bursting into a large grin at what she saw. Rarity was seated on the rug with Topaz and Opal lying against her. Jasper was just off to the side on his blue blanket, playing with his soft toys and cooing to himself adorably. Rarity was reading one of Topaz’s favorite books out loud to them, making sure to include all the silly voices, which her two oldest children seemed to find hilarious. When they would explode into a new burst of laughter together, Rarity’s smile seemed to light up the whole room. She had just taken to tickling Opal, who was squealing and trying to writhe away from her but was laughing too hard to do so. She finally succeeded in pulling the filly into her lap, along with Topaz, and pressing an enthusiastic kiss to each rumpled head. Just then, Topaz noticed her mother standing in the doorway. “Ma! You’re home! Oh, thank the goddesses, we can finally eat!” She bounded up out of her mother’s lap and threw her forelegs around one of Applejack’s forelegs in a massive hug. Applejack clutched her eldest daughter to her, pressing a kiss into the crown of her head just as Opal finally managed to extricate herself from her mother’s hold and go running to latch onto her leg. “Mom said you were going to be home for dinner tonight so we waited for you, Mommy,” she chirped, angling a toothy grin up at her. Applejack smiled back warmly and pressed a kiss to the filly’s forehead. “I can’t wait, Little Gem. What are we having?” “That vegetable rice pasta thing Mom does really good,” Topaz inserted. “Really well,” Applejack corrected gently. “Yeah, that. I’m gonna go set the table!” She bolted off to the dining room, Opal following hot on her heels. “‘Paz, wait for me! You always get to set the table, I wanna do it tonight!” Their bickering faded into the kitchen as she turned back to her wife, who had finally stood up and placed Jasper into his crib for a short nap before crossing the room to take Applejack into her arms. She enveloped her in a warm embrace, laying her cheek against Applejack’s cheek lovingly. Applejack’s eyebrows rose in delighted surprise, but despite her shock she returned the embrace with enthusiasm, pressing a kiss to her temple. Rarity had had her moments of good moods, but nothing even remotely close to this. “You look happy,” she whispered into her hair. Rarity grinned. “You’re home. I am happy,” she whispered back, tilting her gaze up to Applejack’s with a loving smile. She was so encouraged by Rarity’s pleasant demeanor that she couldn’t resist dropping a kiss to her lips. “I’m glad,” she murmured. “I love seeing you happy.” Rarity grabbed her left hoof in hers, pulling her out into the hallway to lead her down to the dining room. “You make me happy, Applejack.” She stopped, her gaze suddenly turning serious. “You know that, right?” Truthfully, recently, there had been moments where Applejack didn’t know anymore. She also knew, deep down, that despite Rarity’s warmth at that particular second, it was probably a mistake to get her hopes up that it would last. But in that moment, looking at Rarity, standing there with her blue eyes so full of love for her, she found that she couldn’t stop herself. She felt hope blooming in her heart anyway. “You make me happy too, Sugar,” she whispered, reaching up to cup her cheek. “More than anything in the world.” Applejack rolled over onto her side, stirring her body into a long, languorous stretch, before gazing over expecting to find Rarity sound asleep next to her. However, when only a cold mattress and empty pillow greeted her instead, she immediately bolted upright, her stomach clenching. Oh no. Please, no. Not again. But she knew no amount of internal begging would change the reality she was absolutely certain to be the case. Tears of frustration burned in her eyes. It didn’t make any sense! She had been fine when they’d gone to bed! She’d even snuggled up against Applejack and fallen asleep with her head on Applejack’s chest like she always used to do before. She had been so happy all day long! What could have possibly happened in her sleep? Had she dreamt about it? She bolted from the bed and immediately crossed the room to where, sure enough, the bathroom door was closed. She could already hear sobs, gut-wrenching and racking, on the other side, and she reached for the knob frantically. It wouldn’t open. She froze, then tried again, this time with more force. The door remained closed. It was then that it hit her like a ton of bricks: the door wasn’t just jammed. It had been locked. Rarity had locked it. Rarity had wanted to keep her out. For a moment, for a few brief seconds, Applejack literally could not breathe. She felt as though she’d had the wind kicked out of her. Hearing Rarity’s sobs was bad enough; that she’d taken deliberate measures to shut Applejack out was excruciating. “Rare,” she croaked, her voice trembling. “Sweetie, open the door. Please. Please open the door.” No response. Just more sobs. She pounded on the thick wood, her voice taking on a frantic, desperate tone. “Rarity, you’re scaring me! Please, open the door! Let me in!” Rarity still did not answer. Her own tears began to fall now, of fear, of frustration, of hurt. She sank down onto her knees, now on the verge of a full-out panic attack. “Sweetie,” she whispered, brokenly. “Please.” One word, so simple, yet holding so much, and all she could find within her to say. The door remained shut. “Is Mom staying home today?” Applejack and Granny Smith traded a meaningful glance over the top of Topaz and Opal’s heads before Applejack forced a smile down at her daughter, placing a bowl of oatmeal in front of her. “She is, hun,” she answered. “Mom… Mom isn’t feeling well today and needs to stay in bed, and there’s a lot of chores to do around the house.” Opal looked skeptical. “Mom’s sick? She seemed fine yesterday.” “I know, honey. She got sick during the night.” She felt a stab of guilt at her stretching of the truth, even though it wasn’t a total lie. Topaz scrutinized her from across the table, Rarity’s blue eyes narrowed in suspicion and confusion. “Are you sick, Ma? Your eyes are all red and puffed up.” Applejack froze, feeling her stomach dip at the realization that she hadn’t been very successful at all in hiding her shattered emotional state from her children. In hindsight, it wasn’t very realistic of her to expect being able to do so. She knew she looked horrific. After spending another half hour weeping and begging for Rarity to let her in to the bathroom, she’d finally given up and crawled back to bed. Rarity didn’t emerge from her solitary confinement until a full two hours later, which Applejack knew because she was unable to sleep at all. It was obvious that Rarity had been waiting for her to fall back asleep to finally come out and come back to bed, in hopes of avoiding the inevitable confrontation. However, she hadn’t needed to worry. Despite the fact Applejack had been wide awake she remained turned away from her wife, her chest tight with rage, fury and despair. If Rarity wanted to be alone, wanted her away from her, then that was just fine. That was exactly what she would get. They hadn’t spoken for the remainder of the night, and when Applejack finally gotten up to tend to the kids, Rarity lay in a pathetic lump on her side of the bed, looking pale and stricken, almost like a ghost. Jasper started to whimper for his morning feeding, and as Applejack scooped him up from his crib, she turned to look at her wife. Or at least, the shadow of her that remained in their bed. “Rarity, Jasper’s hungry.” She winced at how the words had come out – much rougher and angrier than she’d intended. Rarity hadn’t responded, and despite every effort to arrest her rage, Applejack found that it augmented more and more with each passing second anyway. “So that’s how this is going to be, now? He needs you. You’re going to just lie there and ignore him?” Rarity curled herself tighter into a ball, shaking her head, and she whispered something, but Applejack could not hear her. “And what about Topaz and Opal?” she pressed on. She knew she was only making it worse, knew she should stop, knew that she should give them both time to cool down and talk rationally later, but at that second she found she didn’t care about being rational. “You’re not going to come out and help me get them dressed and make them breakfast? You’re not going to kiss them goodbye? Tell them you love them?” Rarity whispered again, and this time it was like something inside her snapped. “I can’t hear you, Rarity.” Her retort was sharp and jarring, too harsh even to her own ears. Rarity knew what she should say. But, just like always, the words were there and they were not budging. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I hate myself for doing this to you. “I said I’m sorry that I’m such a horrible burden,” she snapped back, loudly this time. “I don’t want you to be sorry!” Applejack threw back immediately. “I want my wife back!” There was an absolutely horrific silence, and Applejack’s vision began to swim with tears. Jasper’s cries became more strident, and Applejack closed her eyes, swallowing down the lump in her throat, and then took a deep breath, composing herself. “I’ll give him a bottle,” she murmured gruffly, before turning and leaving Rarity there. She remembered all this as she watched the kids scamper off to school with Granny Smith. Granny would be back soon to help with the washing and cleaning while she tended to the fields and the stables, but she suspected that her grandmother was well aware of what had happened and knew she needed some space. Hours ticked by slowly, and the usually soothing work dragged on and on for her. None of her kicks had the power they usually did, and her distraction made even walking the fields to see how some of the slower-blooming trees were holding up, very nearly impossible. Finally giving up, she loped back out of the fields and headed back into the house. Without even consciously making the decision to do so, she found herself heading back down the hallway towards their bedroom. When she stepped inside, Rarity still lay in a muddled heap under the blankets, almost entirely motionless. With a sigh of resignation, she sat down on the bed next to her, defeated, gazing down at the duvet. Rarity started to cry, then, reaching over for her hoof. And despite all of her hurt, all of her anger, Applejack stretched out next to her to take her into her arms while she sobbed, for reasons she still did not know, and Rarity refused to tell her.
Chapter 5Rarity could not sleep. Truthfully, she hadn’t been sleeping well at all since Applejack had taken to sleeping out in the barn practically every other night. It was an odd paradox; she was resentful of Applejack’s presence, but then when the other mare wasn’t there in the bed with her, she found sleeping without the warmth of her body and the safety of her arms was nigh impossible. The days that Applejack did choose to stay in their bed with her, it was as if they were in two separate beds anyway – none of their regular cuddles or talking or touching (and often much, much more than that). As a result, Rarity often ended up taking small cat-naps throughout the night, deep sleep constantly eluding her. She rolled over, looking at Applejack’s side of the bed, empty, and suddenly was overwhelmed with such an ache for her she thought she would evaporate into cinders. She wanted her warmth, her skin, her kisses, and her strong but incredibly gentle hoofs twisting in her hair, sliding over her stomach and hips, reaching down to stroke her slit. Rarity wanted Applejack’s mouth on her throat and against her ear, whispering how much she loved her, wanted to feel her head between her legs, her warm tongue buried so deeply within her as her hoofs smoothed their way down every inch of her cutie marks. And afterwards, she wanted to lie in the circle of Applejack’s arms, her cheek pressed against Applejack’s chest, listening to her heartbeat as it lulled her to sleep, safe and protected and warm, so very warm. She finally sat up, swinging her legs out of bed, and without thinking about where she was going or why, just needing to release the energy building inside of her, she slipped on her robe and strode from the room. She gazed down the hallway, just a few doors, and suddenly her destination came to her in a burst of clarity. She knew what she needed to do and who she needed to see. She very quietly glided up the stairs and took the middle door to the left, slipping into Opal’s room. She closed the door softly behind her before crossing the hardwood, picking her way expertly around clothes and blocks and dolls to softly sit down on her daughter’s bed, careful not to wake her. For the first time in two months, she took the time to really and truly surround herself with her daughter’s presence. The young filly was curled into a ball, her long mane disheveled, the coiled waves spilling out over her pillow and her mouth slightly slackened with sleep. Her long, thick eyelashes fluttered spasmodically with her dreams, and the silver light of the moon bathed her features – a perfect mixture of both hers and Applejack’s – with a nearly ethereal glow. Rarity knew without a doubt that as she moved into her teenaged years her daughter would grow and develop into an absolutely striking beauty. Her heart blooming with affection for the first time in what felt like forever, she reached out to tenderly stroke her daughter’s cheek, brushing Opal’s platinum blond mane away from her face. It turned out that her daughter was not as deeply asleep as she’d originally thought, because the gesture was enough to wake her. Her eyelashes fluttered open, and she mumbled in confusion for a moment before her orange eyes, inherited from her great-grandmother and dark with sleep, focused on her mother. “Mom?” Her voice was small, hoarse with sleep. Rarity smiled warmly. “I’m sorry, sweetie,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you.” Opal rubbed at her eyes, still looking bleary and unfocused. “Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be asleep too?” “Yes, I should be. But I couldn’t sleep because I was missing you too much.” Opal clutched her blanket tighter around her against the chill. “You… you missed me?” The naked hope in her voice was like an arrow to Rarity’s heart. She stretched out beside the filly, curling up into a ball next to her so that they were lying face to face. Her throat tight, she nodded as she tucked a few strands of mane behind Opal’s ear. “Yes, sweetie,” she whispered back. “I’ve missed you, so much. I know I haven’t been very good at paying attention to you lately or spending time with you, and I’m so sorry that I hurt your feelings.” “Mommy said you were sick,” Opal confessed. Rarity closed her eyes, swallowing back her tears. “She’s right,” she whispered. “I haven’t been feeling very good lately at all, but that’s not an excuse for how I’ve been treating you. You should know that no matter how bad I might feel, I love you more than anything in the entire world. You and your brother and sister and your Mommy mean everything to me. I’m going to try really hard to do a better job, Opal. Starting with practicing magic together again. Immediately.” Opal favored her with a small smile, reaching out to clutch her mother’s hoof with her own, smaller ones. Rarity dropped a kiss to her forehead, and when Opal smiled back at her, she was both surprised and overjoyed that it was genuine. “It’s okay, Mom,” Opal whispered. “I forgive you. I just hope you feel better soon.” Her unconditional forgiveness only served to increase Rarity’s guilt, but she stamped it back down to focus on her baby girl. Framing her head in her hoofs, she pressed a kiss to Opal’s forehead again. “You know what would make me feel a lot better right now?” She asked. Opal grinned, and in that moment her missing tooth was so adorable it was almost heartbreaking. “What?” “I’d love to sleep in here with you tonight,” she confessed. “If, you know, you’re not too cool to be sharing your bedroom with your mother.” Opal giggled. The sound was like a soothing balm for Rarity’s bruised heart, and her daughter enthusiastically shook her head. “As long as you don’t tell Topaz, I think its okay.” She held grinned harder and silently made familiar motions. “Pinkie Promise?” Rarity laughed so loud she was afraid for a moment that it would wake up Topaz, who was sleeping in the other room. “Cross my heart,” She insisted and then made the motions back. Week Nine Dear Applejack, I love you. I know I have done an absolutely terrible job of showing that lately, but I love you more than anything in this entire world, this entire universe, even. And I hate myself for not being able to just tell you that. But for some reason, I can’t, which is why I’m sitting here at 2 a.m. writing you this letter that I already know I won’t have the courage to give you. I already know why I won’t have the courage. Not because I’m afraid you won’t forgive me, but because I am afraid you will. And I feel like I don’t deserve to be forgiven. Not after everything I’ve put you through the last two and a half months. Tonight at dinner while ‘Paz was telling us about her day at school, there was a moment where I realized that if an outside observer had been present, they would not have been able to tell anything was amiss at all. In front of the kids we’d seem so happy and normal, at least to a stranger. And I’ve been trying really hard to be better with them, I really have. We even speak when we’re all together, and every time you look across the table at me and move to say something and I see that sadness in your beautiful eyes I just want to cry and hold you and cover your face with kisses and tell you how I feel about you and make you believe it again, because I know you’ve begun to doubt it and it breaks my heart to know that. I miss you so much I can’t breathe. You asked me a few weeks ago if I still loved you, and because I’m a coward and a hypocrite, I couldn’t answer, but I love you so much, sweetie, that everything inside me hurts. All the time. Even just being in your presence makes my whole body ache. Every breath you take is like a piercing stab through my heart, and seeing the pain you are in and knowing that I am the cause of that is like a crushing weight constantly sitting on my chest. You are the only thing I truly want in this entire world. I wish I were brave enough to tell you. Love, Rarity Week Ten My Dearest Applejack, I saw you today while I was outside practicing magic with Opal after dinner, and the look on your face just seemed to pull all the breath out of my lungs. We were practicing and we were smiling and laughing and you know something? I was really, really happy. I love practicing with Opal and I’m amazed that I went such a long time without it. But I saw you there and you had this expression on your face that was like a kick to the chest – like you were so happy to see me so happy, but at the same time devastated because you’re afraid to let yourself hope again that maybe I can heal and get better. I want so badly to get better for you and be the wife, friend and lover you deserve. I want you to come inside every night now. I want you to stop sleeping in the barn and sleep next to me, the way it should be. I know I’ve made you feel like you’re not welcome there but you are, Applejack, you are welcome there. I want to sleep with your arms around me. I want to feel your face tucked into the nape of my neck as we sleep, I want to wake up cuddled in your embrace, I want to kiss you until your lips are raw and swollen and have our all-night talks that last until the sun starts to rise and we groan because we know the kids will be up soon and we’re probably not getting any sleep at all for the day at least until that evening. I miss making love to you so much it’s physically unbearable. Sometimes at night I lie there in bed and there’s this awful, horrible heat in my chest and between my legs and I feel like I’ll go crazy if I can’t have you with me, making love to me. I miss the way you’d always lay your head on my stomach afterwards, how you’d kiss each of my hipbones and around my belly button because you know I’m ticklish there. I miss the way you would always blush until the tips of your ears turned red when you’d find a red mark on my neck that you’d left by accident because you didn’t realize in the heat of the moment exactly how passionate you’d gotten. I miss talking afterwards, feeling safe to tell you what I was thinking or feeling, what I was scared of, what made me happy, what I was worried about. I wish we could talk again. The way we used to. Beyond the logistics, beyond the surfacey comments such as passing the salt or asking you to hand me the broom. Always so polite, so polished, so formal. So not us. I want so badly for us to find our way back to that. I’m trying, sweetie. I really am. Please don’t give up on me. Not yet. I love you. Rarity Week Eleven My Love, It helps to write these to you, even though you haven’t read them. I feel like I’m really talking to you again even if it’s not out loud. It comforts me. I don’t know why I can’t just give you these letters, but for some reason I’m still so scared to. I first said that I felt like I didn’t deserve to be forgiven. I still think that, but I think there is also a small part of me that fears your rejection after so many months of me constantly rejecting you. I know that’s ridiculous. You’ve always been able to forgive me anything, never been able to deny me anything I ask of you. It’s your most wonderful asset and probably your greatest weakness, too. I heard you last night, while I was in the shower. I know I was crying again – I don’t even understand how I have any tears left at this point. I heard you open the door and come in, and you stood there, and I knew you wanted to comfort me but you were afraid to because of last time. But I didn’t want to lock you out this time. I wanted you. I wanted you to climb in there with me and hold me and then take me back to bed and hold me there, too. But you didn’t and I don’t blame you for not doing so; I know how deeply I hurt you last time and I’m so sorry. I don’t expect you to keep opening yourself up to abuse you don’t deserve, but I want you to know I wouldn’t have pushed you away that time, Applejack. As more and more time goes by it’s like the anger and resentment is getting less and less and all I feel is a constant ache for you. It eclipses anything and everything else in my life, every other emotion I have. I need to tell you all this to your face. I know. Fluttershy and Mac and Granny Smith keep pushing me to make the first move, but I feel so lost. I don’t even know where to start or what to do. You’ve always been my safe space, Applejack. When I don’t know what to do or when I have a problem or I’m scared, my first impulse is to run to my best friend and ask her what I should do. But in this case, my problem and my best friend happen to be the same thing. What do I do? I love you so much. I miss you so much. I need to fix this. I’m going to fix this, Applejack. I promise. Love, Rarity
