Flitter's Day Off

Flitter woke up this day and saw how dark and gloomy it was outside. The rain distracted her from the fact she may have had to call in to tell Rumble's mother she would not be able to make it today. She knew that it was Cloudchaser's turn for weather duty, and she was appointed to make it rain at 12:00p.m., Flitter was supposed to be at Rumble's on the dot of 11 o' clock. Oh well, she thought, I didn't really feel like foalsitting today anyways... She rubbed her eyes and stretched outwards, yawning quite loudly as she fell out of bed. She caught herself and then proceeded to stretch her wings. "I guess today is a rainy day... thanks to Cloudchaser... I ought to find something to do."

She had some plain oatmeal to eat for breakfast, and that was pretty much it besides some chocolate chip cookies she had been saving up for a girl's night out that Rainbow Dash promised her... five months ago... She wondered if the cookies were still any good, and upon biting into one, the pain the cookie left on her tired muscles said otherwise. It was as hard as a rock, and Flitter did not want to give them up. She poured a bowl of milk, as her glasses and cups were all dirty, and dipped the cookie into the milk, then biting into the cookie. The milk was rancid and spoiled. She coughed and gagged and blamed herself for not paying attention to the expiration date on the carton. She sighed as she used the oatmeal to get the taste of nasty, spoiled milk out of her mouth, but the oatmeal tasted no better, as it was stale and unmercifully assaulting her taste buds with its painfully normal after taste. She began to cry softly as she started to regret her choice of sleeping in. Her alarm failed to go off, and she feared what reaction Rumble's mother would have due to Flitter not being able to make it to her job today. The sound of the pouring rain and sounding thunder masked her sobbing, and she jumped upon seeing the flash of lightning arch across the sky through her window as it was followed by a sharp crack of thunder to whip at her ears. She looked on to her sorry breakfast on her table; her stale oatmeal, the rock cookies, and the horrid milk of last month's visit of timely death. The spoon with which she ate the oatmeal was one that Rumble had made her in school when the class was assigned to work on making something out of clay. She smiled at the memory, remembering the wide smile delivered to her by the young colt. He was so proud of himself, and he had the right to, as the spoon was so finely glazed in an iridescent coat that Flitter mistook his work for a professional's. Engraved on it's handle was "Thank you, Flitter! I wish you were really my sister!" Though, he had to write really small and it took up both sides. Now that she thought about it, it kind of rhymed. Flitter...sister... If said right, then surely. She began to miss him. His cheerful nature and pleasure to see Flitter at the door once again. How so would he react if his favorite foalsitter was gloomy as the day was with these bags under her eyes? He would definitely try to cheer her up though, as even a rainy day could not put a halt to his energy, and Flitter knew that from experience. It was just that would be how he would react if she were there... but she was not.

Flitter screamed and flipped her table over, spilling her terrible breakfast all over her tiled kitchen floor. The oatmeal in the milk, and the cookies scattered, rolling around the floor still, as some were crushed under the table. She lay down on the floor and stayed there for a half an hour, pulling at her mane and asking herself over and over how could she be so stupid? Rumble's mother barely wanted to be around him, and that's why she always had Flitter be his foalsitter. And she enjoyed it! She loved the joy and playfulness of Rumble, seeing his face light up when she occasionally brought him a gift, and how much he talked about his experiences at school.

The colt was only happy when she was there, and he never got to see his brother much anyway. Heck, he did not even understand why he did not live with him and his mother. He told Flitter that Thunderlane probably moved out before he was born, and that because of this he and his mother did not get along well. He told Flitter that whenever he asked about his brother, his mother would hit him or just leave the room crying and cursing. A falling out had to have happened between the two. Flitter knew that Rumble was too young to know, and she herself was too scared to question Rumble's mother on the topic. She always seemed to tense and angry, so approaching her was hard, if not impossible. She remembered when Rumble had asked his mother for some money at a fair so he could get Flitter a sparkly bow. His mother not only rejected him, but began yelling at him, how he did not know how hard it was to get money, how much she struggled just to keep food on the table just so he could stay alive. She threw the money in her saddle bag at him, telling him that if he took the money he would have to live on the streets like his brother and end up dead like his father. Flitter only wanted to say "hi", but walked upon this instead. In pure disbelief, she turned away as quickly as possible and flew off before Rumble and his mother could see her.

Flitter was always reminded of that day whenever she saw Rumble, and concluded the only way to make him happy was to always be there for him... but she had been working herself for so long that it became so hard to keep up with the demands for her service. She immediately felt Rumble's pain and confusion... the cruel fate which came upon him today... it rained, and surely the rain represented the weeping of a pegasus. She walked over to her kitchen drawers and open one, picking up a long knife. She looked on to her life as it was falling apart. She only worked for Rumble's mother and occasionally did the weather. She never really asked for help when it came to things. She was always giving as much attention as she could to Rumble, taking him out to eat, to Pinkie's parties, to the beach, and even once blew her entire week's revenue to take him on a trip to Cloudsdale. She only knew now how her kindness was affecting her. She had no money, she could barely pay her bills, and food was a miracle here. Her only enjoyable times were the one's she had with Rumble. Maybe she should have not forgotten how much she needed him. She did as much as he needed her. She was a fool... She took the knife and cut her right foreleg. Watching the blood roll down, she remembered how she helped Rumble when he sprained his wing. They still managed to make fun out of that, and Rumble managed to laugh at his own pain. Feeling her very own pain, she slit her right foreleg again, and laughed at her pain.

It barely even hurt.