In Ponyville, Pinkie Pie was hosting a ‘Smiley Day’ party at Sugarcube Corner and invited just about everyone in town.
Pinkie had in the past made up parties for pretty obscure holidays, or became overly excited over certain incidents like having a kernel removed from one’s teeth.
In fact, at this point Colgate was sure that she was making most of these up now just to have an excuse to throw a party, regardless of the celebration.
That girl had a problem, Colgate mused to herself as she sat alone at a table with a plastic cup.
Colgate’s real name was actually Minuette, but an odd stallion calling himself ‘The Doctor’ took notice of her mane a few years ago and began calling her ‘Colgate’ as a nickname, according to him it looked like a brand of toothpaste from wherever he originated.
Soon enough, the name caught on and it stuck…it also helped her discover that the Cutie Mark she possessed, which was in the shape of an hourglass represent the two minute minimum recommended by The Equestria Dental Association for brushing.
Subsequently, this lead Colgate to discover her destiny in the career of oral hygiene…or as she often had to simplify it for others; she was a dentist.
Her best friend, Berry Punch had left her in search for some Apple Family cider-the special kind with alcohol in it.
Colgate was actually getting pretty worried about her friend, a few weeks ago they were sitting on a bench in the park carrying on a casual conversation when the mailmare; Derpy reached into her mailbag and pulled out a letter for Berry.
At first they were having a pretty good time, but when Berry broke the seal and read the letter to herself silently, her upbeat expression quickly became crestfallen before she got up from her seat and began heading home, Colgate asked what was wrong, but Berry merely looked back at her sadly before continuing on her way.
She had been gone for a few days, when she returned Colgate once again asked what the letter was about only to receive no response.
Colgate then asked Berry where she had been for the past few days, at which point she merely grunted “Canterlot,” before heading back home.
That had been over a month ago, and now Berry was drinking more excessively and perform stupid stunts that resulted in-thankfully minor,-injuries.
Whenever Colgate tried asking why she was submitting to such self-destructive behavior, Berry would literally push her away, and reply to her quite hatefully.
Bitch, Slut, and variations of stupid where the most frequent, but the one instance that stung Colgate the most was when Berry instead of pushing, turned away from her.
“Berry, please…just tell me what’s wrong!” Colgate pleaded.
“What do you care?” Berry hissed, coldly.
“B-because…” Colgate replied, trying to steel herself against the sting of Berry’s words in her inebriated state. “I’m your friend, I care about you and I want to help!”
Berry merely grunted in response and turned her back on Colgate before heading home.
Colgate’s mind returned back to the present, to see Berry standing on top of the serving table while dancing and shaking her flank to the party’s obnoxiously loud music.
Right now, Berry was in one of the early phases of her intoxication, where she laughed, danced, sang, and generally had a good time. That was likely to change any moment, though. Before too long the darker parts of her inebriated state would surface, which was more or less just a roulette between apathy, depression, and anger…but, all three always managed to make an appearance.
Colgate wanted to talk to her right now, but talking to her or even the act of approaching her could set her off into one of these darker moods prematurely.
Looking around at the party, she realized that wasn’t going to be able to do this alone…that was when an idea sparked to life; an intermission!
It was perfect, even if Berry chewed her out again, there would be others there to support them and help Colgate get her best friend back to her old self again.
First, she needed someone sober, a look at The Doctor with his necktie wrapped around his head like a bandanna immediately ruled him at as it would seem hypocritical to be lectured on drinking by someone so drunk they thought they were in a frat house…or something.
Honestly, she had no idea what that was…or what he thought he was doing.
Twilight Sparkle herself from what Colgate understood had more or less been a social recluse before coming to Ponyville and stayed mostly to make her friend happy and chaperone her parties to make sure they never got out of hand.
“Twilight!” Colgate called over to the unicorn, who was standing beside the door with two plastic bags; one white for recyclables and one black for miscellaneous trash.
“What is it? What’s wrong!?” Twilight asked, her ears perking up as her eyes darted around the shop for anything amiss, anyone passed out, or ponies breaking into a fight.
“I need help with Berry…” Colgate sighed. “She got a letter over a month ago and just took off for a few days…and when she came back she completely shuts down when isn’t drinking...which is just about all the time, now.”
“An intervention!” Twilight exclaimed as her eyes lit up. “I’ve just finished reading up on dealing with addicts and their addictions a week ago; I can finally put my theories into practice!”
“Um…yeah, great…” Colgate muttered, unsure if she should be excited or frightened of Twilight’s enthusiasm towards socially experimenting on her severely depressed friend.
Next, she would need somebody who could really cheer people up, in case Twilight became so absorbed in the doctor/patient dynamic that she lost sight of the personal aspect and main goal of this intervention-to make Berry feel better.
“Hey, Pinkie!”
Luckily, Pinkie’s entire existence seemed dedicated to happiness and spreading it to others-which meant she agreed to participate in a heartbeat.
Twilight’s other friends all had previous engagements with their jobs, with the exceptions of Fluttershy, who found it difficult to engage in social events with more people than her usual circle of friends, and Spike who Twilight deemed too young to be staying up so late.
Pinkie insisted that they hold the intervention in her room as Mr. and Mrs. Cake would be none too thrilled with the damage that would possibly be caused anywhere else if things went downhill with Berry.
Berry entered the room before sitting on the bed awaiting the ‘special surprise’ Colgate had promised her.
Despite what she had been promised, Berry’s carefree nature had more or less faded with a look of apathy plastered onto her face.
Twilight magically slammed the door and all of the windows of the room shut before magically locking them with a combination extra-strength deadbolt and reinforcement spells in case Berry tried to break out of the room.
At first Berry looked around at this quizzically, but looking back at the three mares in front of her, she suddenly realized what this was.
“Berry, we’re only doing this because we’re your friends and we care about you.” Colgate began delicately.
“Okay, Twilight I get-being a buzz-kill and all…” Berry commented.
“I’m not a buzz-kill!” Twilight exclaimed defensively before looking back at the other two.
“That’s not really the issue here.” Colgate whispered back, focusing on Berry.
“But, what about you Pinkie?” Berry pressed. “I thought you enjoyed making people happy.”
“I do!” Pinkie insisted, slightly hurt by Berry’s implication that she was only taking part in this intervention to kill her fun.
“Well, drinking makes me happy…why are you trying to talk that away from me?” Berry snapped.
“Maybe we should’ve waited until she sobered up first…” Twilight muttered.
It wasn’t like it mattered, it was too late now and if they quit now-they could risk losing her forever.
“Because you’re not really happy!” Pinkie insisted sadly. “You’re only pretending to be! And that’s never good!”
Berry’s only response to this was a dismissive grunt before she turned to Colgate, her next target.
“Your whole life is focused on toothpaste and dental floss, you’re nothing but a dentist.” She hissed.
“You of all people should realize that alcohol kills bacteria.”
“Not as much as you think,” Colgate grumbled in response before looking Berry in the eye.
“And certainly not enough to make a difference…but, that’s not what this is about.”
“Really?” Berry retorted. “That’s funny, because I think the only you three care about is pleasing your precious princess, throwing frivolous parties, and an unhealthy obsession with oral hygiene above everything else, including your friends-consequences be damned!”
“Try to steel yourselves, girls.” Twilight instructed. “I’ve read about this; she doesn’t really mean it, she just lashing out because she thinks we’re trying to hurt her.”
Despite her words, Twilight along with the other two still couldn’t help but feel wounded at Berry’s harsh words.
“This is about your drinking and how it’s gotten out of control ever since you came back from Canterlot.” Colgate replied calmly in a tone that betrayed her inner turmoil.
“You’ve been saying some really hurtful things and just been treating me horribly in general every time you drank and while I’m no expert, I have a pretty strong hunch that whatever happened in Canterlot is what’s causing you to act this way.”
Berry just sat there on the bed in utter silence with an unreadable expression, so Colgate decided to continue.
“We are trying to help you.” She reiterated. “If you don’t want to be friends with us after this-then that’s fine, but we still carry about you and will do our very best to help you whether you think you need it or not.”
The three mares stood there in silence waiting for another outburst from Berry with filled with screaming and a flurry of curses and personal insults…but it never came.
Instead, she broke down into heavy sobs and collapsed onto her side.
“I’m so sorry!” she sobbed. “I’ve been a terrible friend…I…I went to Canterlot because I got a letter that my dad had died….”
Twilight, Pinkie, and Colgate all exchanged shocked glances.
“Before I came to Ponyville I promised him that I would write to him, but I just kept putting it off because I figured I could do it later…” she continued.
“And the next thing I knew…he was gone.”
Colgate slowly moved onto the bed next to her before putting a hoof on her shoulder comfortingly.
“Why couldn’t you just tell me any of this?” she asked.
“B-because,” Berry sniffed. “I didn’t want you to think I was a bad daughter…and I thought if I pushed everyone else I cared about away…it wouldn’t hurt as bad when I lost them.”
“Do you really think this is what your father would want?” Twilight asked.
“Yeah…” Pinkie added. “He’d want you to keep you friends and be happy with them!”
“I’m really sorry about lashing out at you guys, I knew you were just trying to help, but it still didn’t stop me from saying all of those hurtful things…can you guys ever forgive me?” Berry asked.
“Of course!” Pinkie replied, cheerfully.
“Now, can you cut back on the alcohol?” Colgate pressed.
“Yeah, I think I can handle that.”
“Good.” Twilight commented. “Because this was not fun.”
“Ooh!” Pinkie exclaimed. “I just remembered; we still have a party to finish!”
Twilight undid all of her spells as Pinkie gleefully bounced out of the room, leading them back to the party downstairs.
Twilight then took one last look around the room to make sure nothing was out of place before following the others.
“Hey, guys!” she called out. “Seriously; I’m not a buzz-kill, am I?”
