The party ended for me a lot earlier than everyone else.

I'd almost convinced myself at first that it wasn't going to be that bad. It was a lot more subdued than the one on Princess' birthday, with a proper chaperon this time, and no pressure to be the center of attention. As soon as Shining Armour had appeared, my plan became to attach myself to him and not let go until the crowd dispersed. But just twenty minutes in he caught sight of something across the gym and excused himself, leaving me hovering alone on the edge of the crowd.

For a few minutes I just shifted uncomfortably. The dress I was wearing had been made to fit Princess, and would have flattered her figure a lot more than it did mine. Princess herself drifted around the room like a swan among geese, sunning herself in the adoration of everyone around her. Four of her friends mingled expertly, and no matter which way I looked, Pinkie Pie seemed to be trying to run everything at once. And the more I watched, the more they all started to blur together. Everyone here looked exactly the same, excited and sad and happy and completely in love with the star of the show. There was no one here who didn't have some history with her, who didn't owe their life to her in one way or another.

And then there was me.

A song ended. Another one began. I fumbled for a snack on the table beside me, just for the pretense of having some kind of role, but found that my stomach was so tightly wound that even a single celery stick made it seize up in protest. There seemed to be nothing to do but teeter on the edge of everything else, watching the rest of the world spin through an elaborate social dance that I would only screw up if I made an attempt to step into it. Vice-Principal Luna sternly overlooked everything from near the stage; I considered joining her there, but decided against it. We'd never been close, and from the stories I'd heard about her and her "condition" as Celestia had called it, I didn't think that I wanted to be. In this crowd of love and support, I was on my own.

Then, just as I thought I'd found a position that I could maintain for the next two hours while staying invisible, the inevitable happened. Those inescapable words that I'd been hearing over and over all night. "Twilight Sparkle! Twilight! Hey, Twilight!"

I looked up and tried to shrink, but it was too late. A pair of girls were rushing straight for me, and, just as I'd expected, I had absolutely no idea who they were. The grey one grabbed my hands with a huge smile plastered on her face, completely oblivious to my warning squeak. "Twilight," she gushed. "I just wanted to tell you..."

That was as far as she got before her friend yanked her back and started whispering rapidly in her ear. Even among the noise, my brain couldn't help but follow her lips and pick up the words 'fake' and 'boyfriend'. Instantly, the grey girl's face fell. "Oh," she said. "That girl." Then the two of them turned away with their noses in the air and stalked back across the floor, vanishing into the crowd.

Suddenly, my exclusion from the dance started to take on a different air. People were... looking at me. Sideways glances, sneers from across the gym, prolonged stares that disappeared when I saw them. I bit my lip to stay down panic. How had the news gotten out? A careless word from Pinkie Pie? Sunset and Shimmer trying to ruin my life once again? Or did Princess simply not care who knew, now that she no longer had to deal with the consequences?

The atmosphere got more and more sour as I fidgeted through each successive song, drawing more attention to myself. My presence seemed to dominate the room, tainting the party worse than if I'd spiked the punch with poison. Every eye could see my ill-fitting dress, my flushed skin. My warm, gulpy breaths drowned out the music. I caught sight of Flash Sentry and almost fell over trying to hide behind myself. I cringed and clenched my legs, still feeling phantasmal drips of him clinging to me even after scrubbing myself raw. It felt like the whole room could smell him, and could smell how my stupid slut parts got moist just thinking about him. Everything about me was evidence of what I'd done. Everyone knew. Everyone knew I was a freak.

But I wasn't a little girl any more. Those days of being taunted were long gone. And I knew exactly what I had to do to make everything better again.

Willing my legs into motion, I took small, teetering steps around the edge of the table. I walked with purpose, keeping my back straight, making sure everything looked perfectly natural, until I was on the far side. Then, with one last scan of the room to make sure nobody was looking, I ducked down and darted under the tablecloth.

It wasn't any quieter under the table. It was barely even any darker. I could see people's shoes filling the place that I'd left, dangerously close to kicking me. I folded myself up among the metal spars and rested my head on my knees. I didn't cry. It wouldn't have accomplished anything.

I wasn't here. I wasn't here. I wasn't anywhere.

It was better this way.

The party went well. There was a lot of dancing. People made toasts. Princess gave a speech. So did Spike, whose voice unnerved me. Pinkie Pie managed to round up a thirty-person game of Pin the Tie on the Postman; it defied logic that that game somehow never went out of style.

I was agonizingly conscious through the whole thing. My attempts to disappear into a sleep-like trance of self-loathing failed; so did my efforts to recite my textbooks from memory. I was forced to endure every second of listening to the world have fun while I stared a hole in the floor between my feet. It was, I figured, a fitting punishment.

Ironically, this hyper-awareness of my surroundings ended up becoming like a trance in itself, as when I heard things start to wrap up around me I found that I couldn't move. The panic was there, the drive to escape before I was discovered was there, but somehow my body... felt right. Like a warm bed on a lazy summer morning, the legs of the table caged me in, leaving me uncontrollably clinging to immobility for as long as possible before I had to face the world again. Even when Pinkie Pie obliviously bounced past and cleared the table with unnatural speed, I stayed curled up in the place where I belonged, ignoring every order I gave myself to run.

Some of the gym's lights had been turned off, but I was still fully exposed on the floor, with only shadows covering me. Luckily, no one was looking in my direction. At the far end of the room a long line had formed out the door, with Princess waiting at the head. Everyone heading out had a chance to give her a last goodbye. Judging by the rate the line was moving, her departure meant a lot to a lot of people. I watched them resentfully out of the corner of my eye, not daring to turn my head.

Suddenly, the metal bars behind me bumped hard into my back. A moment later, a face poked into my peripheral vision, then withdrew with a faint gasp. "O-oh! I'm sorry," the intruder squeaked.

Both of us quietly eyed each other, waiting awkwardly as we tried to figure out the etiquette for this situation. "Is... is it okay if you move?" the girl hazarded. "You don't have to, b-but I'd like to move this table."

And once again, I was causing an inconvenience to people just by existing. Great. I sighed and rolled forward, feeling my muscles crying out after uncurling from McCarthy-knows-how-many hours coiled up. I crawled out and faced the wall, then sighed again, this time in relief, when my emergence didn't cause a stir.

The girl kept watching me. "Would you like to help me?" she asked nervously.

I turned to her. She was short and slightly mousy, with a colourful flower perched delicately in her hair, and even though she looked about my age her face wasn't ringing any bells for me. Maybe Princess had more friends outside Canterlot? "Sure," I croaked, then swallowed hard and tried again. "Sure."

Together, we folded up the table and started to carry it over to the storage area. Pinkie Pie waved cheerily at us from the sound booth, which I pretended I didn't see. The strange girl kept averting her gaze, which slowed us down. "Don't you have anything to say to Twilight?" I said, almost grunting it out.

"Oh... not really," she responded, shrugging. "We've never spoken to each other. I don't really understand what's going on tonight. I'm just... here." She finally gathered the courage to look me in the eyes. "Um... you're Twilight too, right? I mean, this world's Twilight? I'm sorry, this is all new to me."

I looked down at my hands. "Yeah."

"Oh." She paused. "So, um... why were you hiding? Isn't this your party too?"

The monster inside me growled. "We're like mirror images," I said, keeping it simple. "She's the good Twilight. I'm the bad Twilight. Everyone hates me."

"...Oh." She took a moment to take this in. "You don't seem very bad to me."

I sighed. "I know."

We reached the storage room and laid our cargo next to a stack of tables. It was tempting to just continue in silence, but curiosity wouldn't permit me to leave a thread untied. "So what are you doing here?" I asked as the girl turned to go. "I thought this was invitation-only. I mean, with Princess Twilight being such a secret."

"My friend Rarity brought me." She stopped and clasped her hands, smiling at some hidden recollection. "It... it feels so good to call her that. I know I've only known her for a couple of days, but she's already shown me so much, and..."

Her face fell, along with her gaze. She tapped her toe against the floor and twisted it back and forth nervously. "I..." She stopped and glanced at me, checking to see if I was going to stop her. I just slouched silently. "I used to think I had a lot of friends," she said. "I had Suri and Shimmer and Mr. Fault and Overcoat and Hearts and Shining Armour and Underwire and... and even Card Counter. He would always smack my butt and laugh, and then everyone else laughed, and I felt like I had to laugh too... I thought that's what being friends was. Now that I know the truth... how can I go back?"

I shifted angrily, letting her words roll over me, refusing to absorb them. "Why are you telling me this?" I snapped.

The girl flinched. She hunched slightly and looked up at me, like she was afraid I was going to lash out at her. "I... I don't know," she said. She turned her gaze back to the floor. "I... don't have anyone to talk to," she admitted. "Rarity's been so wonderful to me. She's put everything on hold just to look after me. If I go back on her now and tell her how I really feel, then..."

Her voice became pleading. "Twilight... do you think friendship can really fix anything?" She went back to twisting her foot, squirming as she forced the words out. "Rarity seems so sure that it can. She told me you... Twilight helped her. She keeps saying as long as I'm with people who care about me, everything's going to be okay. And I want to believe her. I really, really want to. But..." She took a deep breath. "My old friends, back in Manehattan... they made me feel so... used. So small. Like I was just a toy to them. And if I ever tried to fight back, they'd just remind me that... I needed them, and I'd be nothing without them. I spent so long believing them, and the way Rarity talks... it's like I'm supposed to already be okay. If I'm not... are we even friends? And what if she just makes me feel used all over again? Am I... am I ever going to stop being afraid of that?"

She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. I bit my lip. She really has no idea who she's asking, does she? part of me snarked to myself. I tried to glare, but couldn't even muster the energy to do that. Irritation just bubbled under my surface, the dull grouchiness of an animal unduly disturbed mixed with the indignant panic of being being asked to solve a problem I hadn't studied for.

Still, though. She looked so sad.

Friendship... I mused over the word. A lot of feelings were attached to it. Anger. Resentment. Pain. Patches of relief and joy, just enough to fuel an even larger bitterness. A pit in my stomach that wouldn't close. I thought of my study group and the party they'd thrown for me. I thought of my months at Sunset's side and the certainty that we'd be together forever. I thought of Rarity. No answers there. I thought of Princess and all her love, all her hurt, and her absolute faith that friendship was the bond that could fix anything. Her destiny. My destiny.

"I think..." I said. The girl looked at me. "I think... when it comes to friendship... I think..."

I faltered. She was staring at me wide-eyed, and I knew I couldn't lie to her. "I don't know." I sighed, and we both deflated. "I'm sorry," I told her. "But I can't help you. I just don't know all that much about friendship."

My heart broke as the girl seemed to collapse in on herself. "What am I supposed to do?" she asked.

"Just... just talk to Rarity," I said, giving up. "She knows about this stuff. She'll have an answer. And I mean really talk to her. Tell her exactly what you just told me. If she really wants to help you, she'll understand. And if she won't let you tell her how you feel, then she's no better than any of your old friends."

She nodded faintly. "I'm scared," she whispered.

Part of me wondered if I was supposed to put a hand on her shoulder. I just shrugged. "That's life."

A shadow passed by and suddenly Applejack loomed in the doorway, sighing in relief when she saw me. "Twilight! There y'are. Shimmer's lookin' for you. Coco," she added with a nod to the shorter girl.

My stomach coiled. "What does she want with me?" I asked.

"Don't know. But I thought it'd be best if someone else found you 'fore she did." She reached out a hand toward me. "C'mon. It's almost time."

Hesitantly, I accepted the proffered hand. Applejack wrapped her arm protectively around mine and led me out of the storage room, into the encroaching darkness of the gym. The line leading up to Princess had shortened to only a few people, with some of her closest friends forming a semicircle around her. Pinkie Pie skipped past us with the rest of the tables, somehow carrying four under each arm. I stopped to stare, but Applejack pulled me on ahead. "Don't question it," the farmgirl said. She must have noticed my slouch deepen, because a moment later she slowed down and gave me a comforting grin. "Ready, sugarcube?" she said.

Was I ready? How could I even begin to answer that? Behind us, I could hear Coco talking. "Is, um, is there anything else I can help you with, Ms. Pie?"

"You caaaaaaaaaaaan... givemeabighugrightnow!" Pinkie Pie yelled, leaping and smothering the poor girl.

Despite myself, the corner of my mouth twitched up. Coco was in good hands. They all were. This whole group - this whole school obviously cared about and looked after each other. They would be fine. With or without Princess, friendship would prevail. And I took some comfort in knowing that come what may, nothing I did would ever be able to tear those friendships apart.

"Yeah," I said quietly. "I'm ready."

It was time.

Author's Note

The next chapter's been sitting at 90% done for many months. So, to ease back into it, I thought I'd chop off the first part into its own chapter. It looks better this way, anyhow.