It Was the Worst of Times

Rarity’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.