Avalon

I eyed the spot. It's a lot harder than one might think, picking the right spot at a Canterlot bar. It says something about a pony. It also shows how smart one is, really. Normally, one might expect a full-blown introvert with social anxiety coursing through his veins like pure poison such as myself to sit at the edge of the bar. That won't do. In fact, only somepony wanting to play it coy would park their flanks onto that fluffy white chair and lean up against the perfectly polished marble wall. Somepony there at the edge attracts attention just like how the really sexy mares always speak quietly-- it makes me, paradoxically enough, listen even better than if they were shouting.

My spot was two spaces from the edge, a spot that always made me truly something close to anonymous. I knew that a good third or so of the other regular patrons of the Avalon recognized my face as I sat down, knowing the unicorn with the skinny, brownish-grey body, plain white collared shirt, and short mane. Maybe a tenth of them knew my name, Cinnamon Breeze. Sure, I might have been as distant and separate from the crowd as the massive griffon statues across the nearby restaurant tables. (By the way, it's always been real diamonds in those statues' eyes. I've always been obsessed with faking status and making fronts rather than being true to yourself, and those ponies at the Avalon took actually being posh pretty blasted seriously.)

That night was April the seventh, quite a while ago. I had a date with a champagne glass, like basically every other night for weeks upon weeks before then. As the old song goes, "sharing the drink called loneliness is better than drinking alone". Although, that was pretty overly poetic. The cold, honest truth was that I felt alive sitting there as part of the scenerym with Canterlot ponies enjoying themselves around mem while I felt truly dead just sitting at my apartment with nothing but a fish-tank and a box of wine (I'll be blasphemous and say some some good Canterlot boxed wine is on par with club wares) in front of me.

The resturant area besides the bar seemed averagely packed that night. Familes with foals came in and out as well as tourists and the standard club types. What made the Avalon distinct besides the name (and, Praise Celestia, I loved that name-- so blasted mysterious and smooth that it just rolled off your tounge, Aaaaaaaavvvaalon) was the open atmosphere. Anypony dressed decently could walk right in and receive the same kind, friendly treatment as anypony else, just like this big dreamy white haze of emotional smoothness enveloped anything. That club served as a dreamland, where cream soda and white chocolate scents seemed to fill the air 24/7 and the sophisticated piano playing could only be matched by the gentle crooners.

I waved Spring Fresh over to my spot, propping my hooves against the brilliantly smooth grey stone counter. It didn't matter much that I had seen it all countless times. I still had a little pang of wonder as I gazed above me, the stretches of white marble columns leading into intricate golden indentations and then to slick ceiling tiles with an endless grey on white geometric puzzle going through them. Wooden spires stuck out amongst the tables, with the finest china you'd see outside of a Princess led event, and shone out with smooth, yellow lighting.

I knew that Fab Factory would start singing at the little brownish-grey riser, at the opposite corner of the club floor from myself, at around one thirty in the morning. The clock beside me said 12:41. "Good evening," I said to Fresh. He smiled. As much as I had to be one of the most socially thick, tone deaf ponies on the planet, I knew that he had a genuinly happy smile. He probably welcomed my bits and politeness rather than me as a pony, but a freakishly intense introvert such as myself had to take social approval where I can get it.

I ordered the sparkly white usual. Fresh got it for me in just a matter of seconds, turning to that amazing array of bottles, vials, boxes, cups, little gray pipe-like things that almost seemed sinister, and everything else that the bartenders had at their immediate disposal. I nodded, picked my full glass up, and took a little breath. Fresh trotted over to a cute little brownish white filly in a sharp red dress on my far left. Our eyes met, and I took in her general facade.

She wanted a daddy-type. I was most emphatically not a daddy-type. I gave her one glance, surveying her as a fly would to a hungry spider and her nearby web, and I turned around, facing the restaurant crowd once again. My face had the same characteristic flatness as a moment ago. She acted more dramatically, curling her long, golden mane over her shoulders and wiggling her ears in a "like I'd be interested in a creep like you" gesture.

I picked it all up in my preiphical vision. I hardly cared. In what felt like a microsecond, a set of rowdy colts filled out the empty chairs in between Miss Red Dress and myself. They had university shirts on. One of them displayed a large number one with red embossment, and said stallion immediately made it clear from his movements that he just knew he'd be number one in this bar tonight. I tuned it all out pretty quickly.

Fresh brought me another drink. He was always good like that. I mentally kept pace with my tab, in pretty good standing around that particular time of the month, and I drank it down, not taking the time to savor the taste. That wasn't like me. In truth, I didn't quite feel like myself. I usually spent a Thursday night trying and failing to find a sane mare that liked me for me and came to the bar with a genuinely open mind about what to do, somepony that would want to walk besides the ducks with me outside of the Equestrian Enterprise Institute campus.

Of course, my success rate reminded me of when my little sister talked about sailing a balloon straight up to the Lunar surface: basically impossible but for a crazy hope and dream. That particular Thursday night at the Avalon, I didn't feel like talking to a nice mare at all. It didn't help that I looked like a six out of ten in the attractiveness department. It didn't help that I tended to view compliments as assaults, recoiling at them as if the only served as warning shots for the insults about to come, as well as that every other word out of my mouth came right out of left field.

All of that had been true my entire life, though. Equestrian life for normal ponies has always been a social life where partying served as oxygen-- getting bumped by strangers in crowded, tight spaces with no idea who put what limb where while smoke ekes everywhere and bright flashing lights rain down on your head, mares bringing you to tears just for being a gangly long-maned freak. Social life, like that, was what you had to do or else you might as well just live as a hermit alone in the wilderness.

That fateful night in the Avalon, I didn't just feel isolated and tense, just wanting to observe the crowd rather than join it. I felt angry somehow, with unusual subconscious thoughts. How dare these university colts bump into me over and over again, calling out their boorish idiocy their already half-drunk voices. How dare they feel so bucking entitled to just get acquire the pretty mares like some kind of pack rat picking up a shiny thing.

Another drink seemed to materialize behind him. I gulped it right down. I tried to calm myself down. The prettier the mare on the outside, the more rotten and decrepit their souls always were on the inside, anyways. The ones with the red dresses demanded expensive, basically worthless trinkets from bracelets to necklaces one a regular basis for . Out and out prostitution would be more honest.

I gazed out at a young unicorn family, their foals as cute as buttons, as they took a seat on the restaurant table across from me. They shuffled awkwardly in their seats, not sure how to put their hooves on the table or what silverware to use. The littlest foal, a sweetie pie with a short, frizzy pink mane and a cascade of freckles, couldn't take her eyes off of the intricate ceiling tiles. I smiled. I knew that I had to look away in a moment to keep from seeming creepy, but I still found such joy from merely seeing other ponies happy. I loved the Avalon for that.

Some commotion sounded off from the side entrance besides me. I shifted around in my seat, eyes looking over my shoulder. A tall, bluish-grey stallion, with a lanky curl in his step that immediately just seemed obnoxious, hopped around a shorter, smaller grey pegasus. The girl's head twisted back and forth, ears drooping. A stubby bluish-black stallion with a chiseled, handsome face wreaked by a smarmy expression leaned up against the pegasus' side.

"Please, just, just tell me where the side gate to the hotel is," she stammered, her blond mane flopping across her face. The two stallions kept on hopping around her-- looking less like ponies and more like imps. I noticed something unusual about her eyes, but the colts kept getting in my line of sight.

"Well, you can always head up this way," the tall one said to the mare, sticking up his front right hoof above his head. He giggled. "Or, you can always go straight down that way." He moved his front left hoof downwards. "Oh, I guess by your eyes that you haven't made up your mind yet." He snorted, in love with his own joke.

"Yeah, very bucking funny," the mare replied, leaning down and wiggling her head. "Like I haven't heard that stuff a million times before."

"How does a backwoods bumpkin get a hotel reservation here anyways?" the stubby one muttered, sticking a shoulder against his tall friend. Their mouths twisted up, horrible smiles going on both of them.

"I guess she wrote it herself, grabbing a few crayons," the tall one cracked. "Only way she'd ever come across the Avalon."

The mare tired to walk away, heading straight over towards the restaurant area. The stallions suddenly shifted over to the side, blocking her. She let out an angry sigh, and she pulled her head back. I spotted a few tears along her cheek.

"Awww, I didn't know that those types of ponies could cry," the tall one said.

"I thought they just opened their mouths and let out some drool," muttered his friend, wiping a hoof against his right cheek.

That's it. I slammed my hoof against the counter and hopped out of my chair. That. Is. Bucking. It. I marched across the empty floor over to the ornate, marble spire surrounded doors. The colts paid no attention to me. I jumped back and smacked my hooves hard against the floor, making a loud clap. The stallion and the mare all turned to glare at me.

"Problem?" the stubby one said, standing up straight and jutting out his chin. I had a hard time keeping myself from smashing a hoof into his smug mug.

"Yeah, there's a problem," I mouthed. My teeth gritting, I leaned forward. My short grey mane pointed over at them like a spear ready to be chucked. "That's not the kind of things that we say to each other here at the Avalon." Somehow, the arching columns and white upon gold furnishings around me pumped me with strength. Those morons could get away with a lot of horseapples around Canterlot. Not here. Not in the Avalon.

"Really?" the tall one sarcastically asked. He stepped away from the mare and lined up besides his comrade, eyes narrowing.

"And that's the kind of way you're going to act if you want ponies to see you as anything but a foal," I said. I sounded a lot more intellectual than threatening, but I didn't care. Those colts felt like ugly stains upon the beautiful, flowing dress of the Avalon. I wanted to just blot them out into nothingness. "So, I suggest you both make your leave. Now."

The tall one stepped forwards, right hoof lined up squarely in the air. Sweat dripped from his face, and his mouth shrank. His stubby comrade sat down instead, suddenly feeling deep in thought. The pegasus that they had picked up had already braced herself against the wall, her mane over her face and her hooves around her chest. She looked totally withdrawn from the world.

"You... little..."

"Autumn," the stubby colt said in an oddly calm voice. He waved a hoof in the air, making a sort of spiral motion. "We're going." I knew it. He had to be the smart one in the relationship. He wouldn't jeopardize their posh club-hopping with an illegal fight, finding the two of them banned for life. He knew that I knew that, and the fact made him even more pissed.

Autumn couldn't believe what he had just heard, eyes bulging. His hoof moved back down to the floor, and he pointed his head away from mine. "Fine, fine. Come on, Fall." The stallions arhced their backs up, trying their best to pose as class-biogted Canterlot elite rather than young punks with a posh front, and they trotted out the door.

"Enjoy your new retard squeeze, nerd," Fall whispered, just loud enough for me and the girl to hear. He slammed the door.

I took a deep breath. Thank Celestia I didn't actually have to tussle with them, and get creamed beyond all recognition! Although I stood pretty tall for a pony, I barely had the strength to lift a TV, and my coke-bottle black frames seemed to almost crack from the thought alone of a hooffight. I leaned down, and I walked over to the pegasus.

"Are you okay, miss?"

"Miss Derpy, Derpy Hooves," she muttered. She slid her back upwards along the wall, and she opened up her legs. Her hooves pointed out at me, swatting the empty air. "Now, you... you..." She leaned her mane to side, spreading it over her cheeks. She strained to put the torrent of emotions in her mind into concrete words.

My body seemed to freeze as I saw her for the first time, taking in all of her without any goons in the way. My heart felt as if somepony had filled it with sugary caramel or something, joy going out across every inch of me. Her curly blond tail seemed to wave me closer. My eyes ran up from her delicate, soft hooves to her incredibly pretty cutie mark-- an image of bubbles-- on her shapely, delicious looking flank. I gazed across her back at those fluttery, cuddly looking wings-- already fantasizing what those feathers would feel like going all over my fur-- and then at her slender, pretty body.

I saw her face. My mind rattled through every cliche in the book. Her wonderful blond mane, looking more like a goddess' frizzy locks than a mere pegasus' hair, complemented her adorable face perfectly. Her eyes had attracted those horrible bullies, and I finally realized why. The eyes pointed out in different directions, something rare enough I supposed. Inside those eyes, she seemed to have these golden beacons. I loved those open and welcoming eyes from very first second.

I had seen plenty of "perfect tens" in the Avalon. She was the first perfect eleven.

"Hello!" Derpy shouted, clopping her hooves upon the floor.

"Oh, yeah, right," I muttered, snapping back to reality. I felt pretty sheepish for shamelessly ogling her.

"Well, thanks... thanks a lot..." she sarcastically said, digging her hoof against the marble spire besides us. Her eyes narrowed. "I guess you just had to be my knight in shining armor just now. Huh?" She slanted her head to the side, a pained chill over her face. "Well, there you go. You did it. You got your rocks off, playing your little role. Well, news flash mister."

"Okay," I replied. I didn't like where this had gone at all, and my flat expression had returned.

"I can take care of myself!" Derpy called out, wings flapping as she put power in her voice. "I don't need another pity run from some demented white knight that wants to get into my flanks, thinking that my eyes make me easy." She put venom into that last word, spitting it out.

"Fine..." I muttered. Like ninety percent of all social situations, I had no idea what to say, and I felt sure that whatever I said would be counter-productive. I played it silent.

"So, mister..."

"Cinnamon, Cinnamon Breeze."

"Cinnamon," she said, walking closer to me as our faces became just inches apart. I had mixed emotions, feeling the pain in her voice and her contorting face. I also couldn't believe such an incredibly pretty mare would stand so close to me. "I'll bet that you think I should thank you, grovel for you right now? I'll bet that you expected to rescue me and find me happy for you?"

You've got a lot of... issues in your past, don't you? I took a little breath. "No."

"No?" She looked genuinely surprised at my answer.

"No," I went on, "Because you could probably take care of yourself. I acted because I felt like I had to for me. I couldn't just sit there, for me, because I wouldn't be able to deal with it later. I knew that you could probably handle it yourself, but I didn't want to let you. I guess I was a little selfish."

Derpy, taken aback by what I had said, simply sat down. I had no idea what to do next, like most of my social interactions. On the other hoof, while it's true that I rushed in-- and I did it mostly for myself-- you did look like you might not be able to take care of it yourself. You were just lined up against the wall, sucking in insults.

"Uh, right," Derpy said. She glanced down and back up at me. We locked eyes, and I felt like she started to really size me up for the first time. A tense twenty seconds of silence passed. She apparently liked what she saw. "I should say thanks. Thanks. Really." She stuck out a hoof. "I guess I kind of snapped a second ago and took it out on you."

We shook hooves. "No worries." She stood in place. She glanced up at the ceiling, lost in thought. I realized that she had totally forgotten what she had been doing, and it somehow made me happy. Somepony else that's SOCIALLY AWKWARD! Hooray!

"You were looking for the adjacent hotel of the same name, right?"

"Yes!" Derpy made a little bounce and landed even closer to me. Her smiling face, all of her worries from just a moment ago totally melted, made my heart feel like exploding. I could barely handle being with somepony so beautiful.

"You'd want to go to the end of the bar and go through the large gray ramp for that," I replied, gesturing the way. "But you don't really want to do that."

"What? Why?"

"Fab Factory is starting to sing." I motioned her to sit back over at the bar. She hesitated, face looking blank. "Come on, take a chance with me. It's criminal to pass through the Avalon at this time of night and miss out on hearing the best singer in Canterlot." Best singer that's not royalty, anyways. I didn't want to give short thrift to Princess Luna's daughter Midnight, who could give Fab a ride for his money.

She followed me over to the bar, sitting down next to me. She found my bouncy smile infectious, and we both lazing put our hooves upon the counter. I pointed at the stage directly across from us through the club. Derpy leaned back, letting out a little happy noise at how snugly the frilly white chair fit her flanks. She turned to me.

"Why are we all the way over here if he's over there."

"Better acoustics over here, believe it or not." I gestured at Fresh to come over. He brought two of my regular champagne. Derpy twisted her head over to me, and I silently nodded. She did that back, picking up a glass. Praise Celestia, we didn't have to go through that bucking stupid "Like a drink?", "Like a seat?", etc dance. "As well, now we have a clear sight of him. Up there, we'd muscle through a mass of ponies and not be able to see a thing besides the backs of heads."

Everything I sad was perfectly true. However, the real reason I wanted Derpy over at the bar at me was two-fold: to keep my social anxiety rush from getting too many ponies around me from giving me a gasping-for-breath attack and to be with her in a more intimate setting. Either way, the pegasus with the beauty of a goddess gazed at the stallion with the slick black hair and sharp black suit going onto the stage.

"I can't wait," Derpy said. She leaned naturally to the side as the band started up. Her shoulder and hoof brushed up against mine. I felt like screaming in pleasure, tingles going through my sides and erupting bursts of joy in my mind. There's cute, and then there's 'marry me at first sight' beautiful...

"Everypony having a good night, tonight?" Fab asked in that smooth as silk voice of his. Cheers erupted around him. He ran his slate grey hoof through his swave mane, and he leaned back. The band slowly built up their chill, cool background around him.

Fab swayed left and right to the music, his suit rubbing up against his chest. I couldn't help but move as well. I glanced to my right. Derpy moved so gracefully as well in tune, hooves curling through the air like whips of the summer wind. I vowed that, at the very least, I'd try to get a chance to dance with her.

Fab opened his mouth with his head going back, the crowd sputtering out some scattered applause, and he started to sing.

To Be Continued