Polyamory in D Minor

His mind had been running a mile a minute since the phone call.

Neon tripped on a stray brick, hooves stumbling over themselves before he desperately righted himself. What muscles didn’t feel too tight felt far too loose, turning him into a quivering mess of pony.

And still, he pressed on.

The idea of what he was asked to do mere days ago just felt off, it really did. Maybe this was some kind of joke, a prank of sorts, an invitation into a good old-fashioned bait and switch. Sure, Vinyl and Octavia weren’t the kind to make a colt travel all the way from Ponyville to a far stuffier Canterlot neighborhood for a prank, but in his state of disbelief and shock, Neon was willing to believe anything.

It wasn’t as if he could have said no. He didn’t want to disappoint them. Besides, he could probably work this out so that it was just a bunch of old college friends getting back together and teasing each other the whole evening. A few laughs over drinks. They were still young, after all. Things like drugs and booze and sex and…

Neon shook his head. He didn’t want to think about the last one, considering the call.

“‘I have a proposition to make.’”

Neon echoed those words that had summoned him here to the empty streets of Canterlot, hearing them bounce off of the bricks and echo across the buildings. He took a deep breath through his nostrils, taking in a deep sniff of the scent of rainwater.

“A proposition to make. A proposition to make. And I said I’ll think about it. Neon, you fucking idiot, you couldn’t say no?”

He jumped into a puddle, feeling the water splash up into his hooves and make his muscles go stiff at the cold refreshment from the overbearing summer air.

A lamplight above him flickered in a wet summer breeze. His eyes were drawn to it, and Neon took the opportunity to take off his sunglasses and slip them into the collar of his shirt. His eyelids tightened as the dull brightness of the flame of the lamp above pushed into them, but he forced himself to slowly loosen and open them to look up at the lamp-post. He checked himself over, straightening his posture, catching his breath, trying to stop himself from sweating so hard and to, desperately, relax.

“I couldn’t, no, I couldn’t,” he murmured. “Had to go out. Had to go and meet them. Haven’t seen them in a while.”

The lamp-post didn’t respond.

“Ugh, I’m out here talking to myself in the middle of the street on my way to a friend’s house. I must look like a total tool, huh?”

The lamp remained silent. It made him sigh.

“I just… I don’t know if I can do it. I’m nervous. Stage fright, I guess. Heh, the DJ getting stage fright? Who’da thunk it? And in front of a small audience, too! Just two mares. Two… lesbian mares.”

His gaze focused on the flame. “One of them is my best friend. Or was. I haven’t seen her in a while. I don’t even know if she really wants us to, y’know…”

Neon chuckled and looked at himself in the rippling reflection of the puddle. His mane was a mess, but it was always a mess, and his eyes were wide and frightened, but they’d recover. He looked like he had run away from something. Neon was half tempted to run away from this. He was caught off guard. Completely and utterly unsure. His entire existence wasn’t really going to be defined by this eventual encounter, but it still felt important enough to worry about. In his reflection, the lamp-post pointed towards the cloud-darkened sky and kept silent, waiting for him to speak.

“I guess I just don’t want to be... used.”

His mouth moved slowly, his words cautious, his tone wavering. He was off in the middle of the night to the house of a few old friends, but what he was being asked to do… He didn’t want to be used, no, not at all. Not even by old friends, who time had made strangers. That was what he was afraid of. Strangers. Afraid of how they would react, the rumors they could spread, the loss of a once-valuable friendship. He feared them because they represented the unknown, and that made every potential mistake all the more costly.

He stomped his hoof and splashed cold water against his legs, biting his lip.

“Fuck it,” he muttered. “Fuck it, I’m going.”

So he went.