Broken strings

After a moment of silence, Vinyl clapped her hoofs slowly with respect; and shaking her head, "Octavia, I thought you were good, but I didn’t expect you to be THIS good!"

Octavia blushed slightly from being praised by some pony other than her family for the first time in her life. She held her bow hoof to the side and did a little classical filly bow.

“Thank you very much, Vinyl.”

“Hey, do you have time after school today? We should totally hang out! I’ve got something I’d like to show you as well!”

As appealing as it sounded, Octavia knew that she had to refuse. First of all, she still had a lot of stuff to unpack and sort from the moving. Secondly, she didn't feel comfortable to visit the home of some filly who she had just met today. It wasn’t that she didn't trust Vinyl (in fact, she sort of liked this filly who was nice to her and also, unlike her, had some guts to speak up for her). Octavia just wanted to take it slow and gentle, like a classical cello piece. She didn't want to rush things too quickly.

Vinyl looked a bit disappointed, which made Octavia feel a bit sorry. So she said in a cheerful tone:, "Hey. Would you like to hear something that I have been working on lately?”

“Sure!” Vinyl said with a wide smile on her face; Vinyl's  joy-filled tailed wagged from side to side like that of a puppy, making Octavia giggle a bit. Then she quickly went back to being a professionally serious performer and held her bow and cello in place. She placed the bow gently on the strings and then slowly slid it down to play an open D, then an A, then a B, and then a C… Streams of notes began to flow into the room from Octavia’s cello.

For little Octavia, she thought that very instant, on that Tuesday afternoon, was the most precious moment of her entire life.