“Well, this idea was crap,” I muttered to myself. I tossed the now crumpled paper behind me onto the large pile already present, and then proceeded to practically slam my face into my desk. I groaned. “Surely I didn’t have this much trouble last time!”
The sound of a door opening and closing downstairs interrupted me. “Honey, I’m home!” a voice called.
“Upstairs!” I yelled. I levitated a new paper over to my desk as the pony trotted upstairs.
“Hi, Velvet.”
“Hi, Nighty,” I said to my husband. “Just trying to think of a non-crappy idea.”
“You’ll be fine, Velvet.” He trotted over and gave me a peck on the cheek. “How long have you been sitting here?”
I shuffled through the day in my head. “Uh… nine hours?”
Nightlight frowned. “And did you eat anything?”
I couldn’t meet his eyes. “No.”
He sighed. “Velvet…”
“I know, I know. ‘Don’t ignore your stomach.’”
“C’mon,” Nightlight said, guiding me out of my writing room, “let’s eat. It’s seven o’clock.”
“But I need to stay,” I whined.
“No, you don’t.” He practically dragged me out and down the stairs. “Just to make things easier, we’re having soup, okay?”
I muttered something unintelligible under my breath.
◊◊◊◊◊
“Is the soup good?”
I grunted as I grumpily ate, levitating my spoon mechanically.
“Velvet, you should be thanking me for the break.”
I snorted. “A break? I was ‘in the zone!’”
“You call trying to think of an idea ‘in the zone?’”
“Yes!” I said stubbornly.
Nightlight shook his head.
I set down my spoon. “Okay, it’s because I told the publisher I’d be ready with a first draft by next week, but I don’t even have an idea!”
“And that’s why I pulled you away,” Nightlight said. “You need to think of things other than the book or the publisher. You have to stop worrying so much.”
“But… Daring Do—“
“Can wait.”
I sighed in defeat and continued to eat.
“So… how are you liking the weather?”
“Haven’t seen it, too busy trying to write.”
Nightlight looked up in thought. “Have you… heard about the hoofball team?”
“Daring Do wouldn’t allow herself to be distracted by hoofball,” I muttered.
“…Hear anything funny today?” my husband tried.
“I should have stayed at the newspaper.”
Nighty was getting irritated now. To an outsider, he might have seemed calm, but after being his wife for thirty-some odd years, I knew his every tic.
He had that look around his eyes from suppressing an eye twitch, something he and Twilight shared. The slight movement in his foreleg, resisting the urge to paw at the ground. And the miniscule motes of magic around his horn, threatening to blast if he got too angry. Amazingly, though, he always managed to keep the irritation from creeping into his voice. “Velvet, I can’t help you if you keep blocking me.”
“Who said I needed help?”
Nightlight nearly threw his hooves up in the air. “Fine. Be stubborn.”
At first, I sat blissfully, savoring the silence. But then it got heavier and heavier, and so I was very glad when Nightlight broke it.
“I still can’t believe our little Twily is a princess.”
A wistful smile came upon my face. “Our Smiley Twily is a princess,” I sighed. “Who knew? And she’s so young! How old is she again? I just had a brain fart.”
Nightlight quirked an eyebrow. “‘Brain fart’?”
“It’s something I picked up from the younger fans. It means you had whatever you were thinking of in your head, but then it swiftly exited your brain, like a fart.”
“Okay then… Well, she’s eighteen.”
“Eighteen! And a princess! Oh, I feel old.”
“And Shining’s a prince.”
I laughed. “Our children are royalty! I’m still not used to it: Prince Shining Armor. Princess Twilight Sparkle. Thanks, now you’ve really made me feel old,” I said teasingly.
“How does that make you feel old?”
“It took me until the two of them were out of the house and out of school to publish the Daring Do series and be recognized by a majority of Equestria, albeit under a pen name. And my children are able to be nationally recognized within a few short years.”
“And?” my husband prompted.
“And Twilight’s dress made me wish I were younger so I could wear it.” I sighed blissfully, remembering. The pink of the bodice of the dress against her purple fur, the white on the skirt, the pale yellow collar, short sleeves, and skirt. All playing off the colors of her crown. Wonderful.
And then I remembered Shining’s wedding day. He looked dashing in his uniform; I always told him that. And I could never believe that he was marrying Twilight’s old foalsitter. Made me think of when Nightlight and I were young.
I was almost done in college, and he had just started at the Royal Observatory as an intern. Both of our noses were stuck in our books, and we collided.
“I’m sorry,” we both said at the same time, not meeting each others’ eyes because we were still reading! We ended up bumping into each other a couple more times in a row until we both lost our concentration, which caused the books to stop levitating and fall. We looked up, and our eyes met. I said hello, what’s your name, the usual. He said that he was at the Royal Observatory, and I decided to interview him; why not?
I took a sip from my bowl, thinking about all of this, and something clicked in my brain.
“That’s it!” I exclaimed, jumping out of my seat and racing upstairs. The gears in my head were spinning and whirring rapidly with excitement. I couldn’t sit down and write fast enough.
Daring Do and the Fountain of Youth
Daring Do was contemplating.
She didn’t normally do so; in her line of work, contemplating at the wrong time could get you killed. However, she was safe in her classroom, teaching her students, so she could afford to think.
She was contemplating about youth.
