The Heart is the Body's Strongest Muscle
This is the story of how I fell in love.
It’s probably an all-too-familiar one. Storybook, even. The brave hero swooping in to rescue the pony in distress. Perhaps there’s a dragon or a tower involved. I’m overselling it, but… that’s what it seemed like to me, to have somepony stand up for me. It’s no surprise I’d feel something more.
Before that we were… acquaintances at best. We knew each other’s names. After all, we had gone to flight camp together, long long ago, though it’s not like we were any closer then. We had our own worlds, and thoughts of love and attraction never came up. It was only natural. We were so different. Can the flower of the field love the songbird in the tree?
But I’m waxing poetic. And making this into something it’s not, and perhaps never will be. I’ve always been a shy pony – no, really – and the thought of actually taking action, of speaking what I feel and pursuing my love in earnest… Well, that’s more than a little terrifying. As much as I wish otherwise, we can’t all be Rainbow Dash, full of self-confidence and plunging headlong into uncertainty without a care. Some of us are just scaredy-cats at heart.
And that’s what got me in trouble to begin with.
It was just my luck to be walking through the market when Hoops and Dumb-Bell came to town. I knew them from flight camp as well – and desperately wish that I didn’t. They were bullies in every sense of the word, only seeming to find joy in making other ponies’ lives miserable. Everyone there knew it, except the adults, and I was a common target for their abuse, given what a weak flyer I was.
The years hadn’t changed things much. Most kids go through an unpleasant phase at some point, but going out into the real world had only made things worse. The petty vindictiveness hadn’t served them so well, but instead of turning over a new leaf, they had hardened into a bitter grudge against the world at large, and an even stronger focus on taking pleasure in the misery of others.
I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Score wasn’t there, meaning they were down one member of their standard trio – and since they knew me and figured I was an easy target, they decided that I would be their ‘guide’ around Ponyville for the day instead. Really, it just meant I was their designated victim.
And what other choice did I have? I went along with it, hating myself the whole time. If not me, it would be someone else. At least I was used to the abuse.
So I showed them the town, a tour that mostly consisted of hearing them insult just about everything and everypony we saw. That’s how we ended up loitering around the fountain at Ponyville Park.
“This is boring,” Hoops complained, trying in vain to scratch some message into the rock of the fountain.
Dumb-Bell grunted in response, and kept sucking on the straw of his hay until a slurping sound indicated it was empty. “Ugh,” he said. “That was gross. We should go get our money back.”
“You didn’t pay for it,” I said. “I did.”
He rolled his eyes. “Well, then we should get a replacement.” He squinted and tossed the cup through the air at the trashcan, missing by about a foot.
I waited for a moment for him to go pick up his trash, but he wasn’t even looking in that direction. He had picked up a small rock and was tossing it from one hoof to another as he stared out into the park. Sighing, I trotted over to throw away the cup, getting some sticky hayshake on my hoof.
That’s when I heard the thunk of something hitting a tree.
I turned to see Dumb-Bell already stooping to pick up another rock. Hoops was chuckling to himself in that empty-headed way he had, copying his friend. And in an oak tree at the edge of the fountain square, a squirrel was angrily chittering.
The second rock bounced off the trunk, several feet away. Thankfully, the two had crappy aim.
The third flew through the leaves much closer, and the squirrel scampered off just as I managed to gallop in between them and the tree, rearing back and throwing up my forelegs.
“Hey!” I said. “Thats… that’s not cool!”
Dumb-Bell blinked, and then turned to smirk at Hoops. “You know,” he said, drawing out the words, “I have an even better idea than trying to hit some dumb squirrel.”
“What’s that?” Hoops said.
“Trying to hit some dumb turkey.” Dumb-Bell grinned and hefted the pebble in his hoof.
I realized what they meant immediately, the old insult still hurting, but didn’t think they would actually go through with it until the stone whizzed past my left ear. Hoops’s throw was more on the mark, and a rock slammed into my face. I felt a sharp pain as blood dripped from the fresh gash above my eye.
I turned away, my hooves springing up to protect my face. I could hear the stones flying past me and feel the ones that found their mark as I hunched down, uselessly trying to hide myself away.
“C’mon turkey! Fly!”
My wings flapped jerkily and I tried to get airborne, hoping that if I played along they’d knock it off, but a particularly large stone hit me in the side and I fell back to earth, gasping for breath.
I closed my eyes, clenching my teeth and waiting for the pain to stop.
And that’s when she arrived.
“Hey! What are you doing?!”
One of my eyes cracked open and, though my vision was blurry, I could see her clearly as she galloped up, breathing heavily. She looked like an angel. My angel. Only, most angels didn’t have squirrels peeking out of their flowing manes.
“I said: What are you doing?” she repeated, her unmistakably feminine voice backed by steel.
“What business of it is yours?” Dumb-Bell snarled, dropping his rock to strut forwards.
“Yeah! What business?” Hoops echoed.
“Hazel here says you were throwing rocks at her!” The squirrel in her mane nodded its head. “And now I see you’re throwing rocks at… at this poor pony!”
“So?” Dumb-Bell said. “Hey, aren’t you…” He turned to Hoops. “Look at what we got here. It’s Klutzershy!”
Hoops guffawed. “Klutzershy!”
I propped myself up on one hoof, still feeling a little woozy. “Wait guys—”
“Excuse me?” Fluttershy said. She marched forward, right up to Dumb-Bell. Her eyes were terrifying to behold, even from the half-glimpse I got. Dumb-Bell and Hoops got it full-on, and they involuntarily took a step backwards as she bore down on them.
“You can make fun of me,” she said. “But you are not allowed to be mean or hurt any other creatures here. If you can’t be nice, then you’re going to have to leave.”
Hoops and Dumb-Bell couldn’t look away. I heard Hoops whimpering slightly and couldn’t help but smile, even while sure that things were about to get a lot worse.
And then… Dumb-Bell shook his head. “Fine. This whole town is stupid, anyways.”
I couldn’t believe it.
The two of them kept backing up, trying to save face by not turning around until they took to the air and flew off, but they were moving pretty quickly as they winged their way back to Cloudsdale.
I couldn’t help but stare as they disappeared into the clouds.
“Are you okay?” a soft voice said.
“Y-y-y—” The surprise got the best of me, and I defaulted to what I knew. “Yeah!”
She winced a little at my volume, but nodded as I blushed. I think my heart just about stopped when she raised a hoof to touch my biceps. “You really shouldn’t let them push you around,” she said, ever so slightly reproachfully. “I would think a pony like you wouldn’t have any trouble standing up for yourself.”
I swallowed. “I— Just because I’m—” My shoulders slumped. “I never know what to do. What if I get in a fight? I don’t want anypony to get hurt.”
I heard a soft flapping as her wings fluttered and she rose to gently touch the cut above my eye. It still stung, but somehow her cool hoof made it feel better already. “You got hurt.”
“I’ll be okay,” I said. “Better me than anyone else. Even if it were one of them… they’d just take it out on someone else even weaker when I wasn’t around.”
She smiled, that simple motion managing to do some crazy things to my heart. “You sure are brave.”
I didn’t have an answer to that. I stood there with my mouth hanging open.
She fluttered in a circle around me, looking me over. “Hey, you know what? I have a great idea. The Equestria Games are coming up soon and we’re looking for a third for the aerial relay team. You should join us!”
A goofy smile bloomed on my face but immediately fell. “I, uh. I’m not a very good flyer.” And that was an understatement. It hadn’t even been a year since I had flunked out hard from the Wonderbolts Academy. And I had only gotten in there because of family connections in the first place.
She giggled softly. “It’s less important what’s here,” she said, as she her hoof brushed against one of my undersized wings, “and more important what’s… here.” She moved her hoof to press against my chest, right where my heart was. In fact, she could probably feel it beating at a hundred miles an hour.
“Really?” I said.
“Really,” she replied firmly. “If you want to, that is.”
“Yeah!” I shouted. She winced again and I felt like an idiot. “I— I’m sorry. I get excited sometimes and—”
“Don’t worry,” she said. “It’s cute. I’ll see you at practice on Saturday.”
I didn’t even have a response as I watched her trot away. The squirrel in her mane popped up to shrewdly size me up, but nodded and waved goodbye, and I dumbly raised a hoof in response.
She called me cute?
I’ve been called many things. A lot of them ugly. A lot of them hurtful, even when intended to be nice. And, let’s face it, I am a little weird. A little too big, too intense, too intimidating. I’m insecure at heart, and my attempts to make up for it always wind up in overcompensation that makes me look goofy and drives others away. I’ve never been called cute.
I’m still not sure about flying in a race.
But if that pony thinks I’m cute? Thinks I’m brave? Then I feel like I can do anything.
...Except maybe tell her how I feel.
