Social Sipping and Sinning Soundless
“Afternoon to ya, Cheerilee! We all thought that you'd never show that ugly mug of yours on this most prestigious of holidays. I knew vowy vows,” Roseluck hiccuped, loudly screeching every little thought dripping out of her drunken head. “-oaths, and restraining orders never meant much to you!"
“Come on down, Cheerilee!” She howled, pounding her hoof onto the bar counter as she bounced on her stool. “The chair ain't going to get any flatter! Get it? I'm talking about your ass!”
With such a loud greeting, the few barflies sitting alone and hogging the best tables had the nerve to collectively raise a glass in Cheerilee's direction before muttering, “The second sister returns. We better we drink all we can before she get her rear in a chair!”
Cheerilee on the hand; wearing shades, a aqua blue wig and a faded trench coat, groaned before she took a moment to slam her head into the entrance door a couple of times before assessing the situation.
Of course, it would be Rose who blew her cover.
There wasn't enough booze in the world to make that mare forget her name.
If Cheerilee didn't know better, she'd swear that Rose had a grudge purely based off the fact that Cheerilee had a flower related name that wasn't generic. It was if she'd broke some law among the flower freaks by having a name that couldn't be confused with anyone else in Ponyville.
She wasn't a Violet or a Iris or a ever so exotic Hibiscus which is why she might have set Rose off.
Cheerilee imagined that Rose had in her mind to terrorize her just because her mother or father were too lazy to look pass the third page of a cheap book of baby names. Or possibly was playing bingo with that very book when they let little Rose learn that she couldn't fly by letting her throw herself down a flight of stairs.
But of course, Cheerilee wasn't looking down her nose at Rose's typical associates: Lily Valley and Flower Wishes but one couldn't deny the hostility she got from them as well. It might only be that Rose was a no-good trouble making gossip who knew an easy mark when she saw one. Or that Rose was completely and utterly no-good in general? It might be both knowing her luck and more specifically, Roseluck.
Celestia, give her strength.
As Rose continued to repeat the same greeting as if she had a broken record lodged in her throat, Cheerilee considered heading to another bar. The White Wheel was out of the question. Cheerilee wasn't going to waste a dime from her drinking funds trying to get to the edge of town around this time of day. She couldn't go to Sherry's. Berry and Cherry was still feuding over bales and barrels. Taboo might be open...
Rose rocked her head, showing her crooked whites as she slid a slimy orange slice across her teeth with her tongue. “Great to see you're doing the old ancestors proud but it doesn't mean anything if you don't join in. Come on down, Cheerilee! Join the festivities!” Three knocks in, Rose's glass wobbled as it danced to the edge and jumped. Rose, hardly batting an eye, caught it in her tail's grip as she swiveled her chair around. She rose her forehooves and waved them in the air as she spun, chanting Cheerilee's name.
Why did Cheerilee come here again?
To meet with her sister, Berry. Terrible Berry.
The idiot that couldn't keep her lips off anything. A notorious drunk among drunkards on the national holiday for drunkards everywhere as they all got drunk and drunker as if the rivers were flowing gin and rum! Why would she do this? Didn't Cheerilee have some self-respect? Wasn't she the respectable sister? If Rose was right about one thing, Cheerilee did make a promise to never participate in St. Plethora ever again. And signed off on several packets of restraining orders. But here she was, swayed by Berry and her words mocking her all last night. 'Poor Cheerilee sitting on her knees, drinking mouth wash under the trees.'
The joke was on Berry. Cheerilee had been planning to spend the day drinking ginger ale and eating crackers before Berry teased her out of hiding. So there, you childish filly! She spent the day before yesterday drinking all the mouth wash in her home so she wouldn't be tempted today. That was Cheerilee using her brilliant brain at work!
“Guess what I'm drinking? Here's a hint, let's hope it only comes out of one end, haha.” Rose cackled, pulling the fruit slice out of her mouth and flinging somewhere out of sight. “So Cheerilee, ain't it a bit early for you to be-”
Who cared about promises anyway? Cheerilee was a grown mare. She knew her limits.
“Ah, keep it down.” Cheerilee winced, ducking her head as she skuttled along the creaky floors and diverted her path to make it seem like she wasn't responding to Rose. “Cheerilee is taking a sick day from teaching and the whole town, neither mind the parents of those foals, doesn't need to know that she might be coming here.” She said, sitting down in the stool next to Rose. “Remember last St. Plethora day?”
Rose slowed her spinning to one lazy circle as she tapped on her chin and made a soft hum. “Wasn't your whole legal defense based on the fact that you couldn't be held responsible for things you couldn't remember?”
“That's not what I meant and you know it.”
“Because if you do remember, I've been meaning to get my kitchen redone.” Rose ran her hooves across the counter and began gesturing the shape of a faucet. “I've always wanted one of those island counters. You know the ones with ceramic coating and the stainless steel sink that are easy to turn. I'd get one all on my own but I'd have to get it custom made because unicorns and their stupid zoning codes-”
“Roseluck.”
“That might work with foals and ponies with a teacher fetish but it doesn't work for me. But the way you say my name...” Rose smirked, leaning onto Cheerilee while resting her head in the crook of her neck. Cheerilee groaned. “Have you been practicing late at night? Dreaming of having your perverted way with me as you sleep with substitutes because let me tell you... That's all kinds of creepy, Cheerleek-”
Rose's sentence ended with a squeak as Cheerilee clamped her hoof over the mare's muzzle.
“Don't call me that name. I just told you that I'm not supposed to be here.”
Rose yanked Cheerilee's hoof away.
“Then what do I call you?” Rose snorted. With a cheeky grin, she took hold of the drink resting in her tail and finished if off with one final swig. “And if you put your hoof on me again, I can't promise I'll return it.”
Cheerilee rolled her eyes. Couldn't Rose just avoid using her name in conversation? How often did ponies say each others names in conversation anyways?
“Oh, I don't know. Call me Sugar Stick?”
“Wow, I didn't know that you were a hooker on the side. Let me guess your must haves. You won't take on a customer without them: big words, mommy issues and this is the most important one...”
Cheerile tuned Rose out, choosing to glance around the bar and zoomed in on the yellow candles burning gently in the torch fixtures along the walls.
“How about you call me, Candle Color? Sounds cute. I could be some mare on the run with a mysterious past and a terrible future. What that sound? Could the cops have found me? What will I do-”
“I think I'll call you, Dull Can. Sounds much better and it rolls off the tongue nicely. Besides, have you seen your colors, Dull? You, candle-colored? Ha! Anyways, yo barkeep. Yeah, you with the horn! My new friend here Dull Can needs a drink. She'll have a spring twist, no rocks.” Rose peered into her empty glass. “Make that two drinks!”
Cheerilee adjusted her wig and scratched along the sides. A familiar headache was forming in her temples and she realized that her incoming migraine was one source short. She didn't know why she didn't notice sooner. Wherever Rose was, Berry tended to be nearby with a bottle.
“Hey Rose, where's Berry?”
“Making runs for the night. If she's lucky, it will be nights. As you know-”
Cheerilee and Roseluck repeated together. “The tap never stops while Berry's on the clock!”
“Now I don't know if she's hosting the festivities this year.” Rose leaned over, whispering in Cheerilee's ear. Ah, so that's why Berry had been talking Cheerilee's ear off about coming. Berry wanted a favor. "But she's been twisting tails and calling up debts as if something got her spooked. Between you and me, I hear that some idiot put Pinkie Pie's name in this year's temperance pot.”
“Pinkie Pie, the one who works at Sugarcube Corner? She's from Yieldstone, right? Yieldstone!”
Rose nodded.
“Who would do such a thing?”
“I know, right? A pony from Yieldstone and not only that, a girlie who's crazy about her definition of parties. I'm not one to turn down a invite to Pinkie's parties but there's no way she should get her hooves on St. Plethora. I mean, what does she even know? Yieldstone backwash can't help but be backwash in all things involving feasting and drinking and the great Equestrian liberty! Do they even celebrate St. Plethora around in that dirt of theirs? I bet they don't because they don't deserve to. Any booze they get turns to ash when they go to sip.”
“Rose, calm your tongue." Cheerilee wigged her nose. "We're in a public place and Pinkie Pie deserves more than to be called Yieldstone backwash.” It was a good thing Pinkie Pie had come to her senses and left that mud hole. What kind of pony in their right mind would want to live Yieldstone with their overbearing hatred to all things good and sane?
“And the worse thing is that she's actually in the running. A recognized candidate.”
Cheerilee blinked. “Pokey Pierce isn't going to stand for that.” She blurted out before face palming. “Why are we even talking about this? Every year, there's a joke candidate. Last year, it was Bloomberg. This year, it's Pinkie Pie. I don't think Berry would have called me out because of this.”
“I don't think he even knows. He's flying back today from Trottingham with a relative and the sharpest kegs of brewed whiskey he can get from that side of the country.”
“He isn't trying the old Flask and Mask maneuver, is he?”
“It's suspected but I wouldn't put it pass him to have another trick up his sleeve.” Rose sighed, the tip of her hoof running along the rim of her glass. “Stop thinking about Pierce. What we should be really be worried about is Pinkie Pie. What if she gets the nomination? St. Plethora deserves respect and dignity and I'll never accept a mare who hasn't woken up with a dick drawn on her face. Never!”
“Hmm, sounds really interesting. Are you talking about Pinkie Pie and um... Santa Plateau? Plethor?” said an intruding voice that belong to a bartender Cheerilee had never seen before. No, that wasn't exactly right. Cheerilee knew a mare that she resembled. One who stayed in the library and hardly spoke to anyone. A curious mare who hid within the tree with her curious son and had yet to respond to any of Cheerilee's letters.
But this couldn't be that mare. It couldn't be her doing something so reckless and setting a bad example for her son who wasn't even enrolled in school and-
The unicorn awkwardly balanced the drinks that rested on a tray upon her back. She took slow steps on the other side of the bar, counting aloud numbers as she made her way across. Each of the mare's steps seemed to resound in Cheerilee's head as she took in the unicorn in question.
The mare had a purple coat. Check.
A purple mane with a single pink and purple streaks which was tied firmly into a bun with a midnight blue hairband in front. Check.
Her eyes were the color of rubies as Cheerilee squeezed her face into a shaky, welcoming smile as the unicorn stumbled closer. Between the folds of her skirts and apron, Cheerilee couldn't make out her apron but Cheerilee found her mind spinning to a nasty conclusion.
This stranger could be a dead ringer for-
The young bartender upon reaching where they sat, tried to lift her hind-legs to slide the tray on to the counter but was off by a few inches. Instead, the tray would collide against the counter before the glasses titled the tray to the other side, threatening to fall over. Right before that happened, the unicorn would buck her hips on one side, keeping the tray firmly on her hindquarters and tried again.
The bartender bit her lips. Spilling blood from her cracked mouth as she tried over and over to slid the tray onto the counter. Cheerilee found herself standing up, her mouth opening with words somewhat choked in her throat. She wanted to say something. Help in some way but she couldn't think of what to say. At the last split second of her seventh try, the unicorn's horn glowed and the tray was levitated onto the counter.
“Caffeine Mix, we've talked about this.” Tonic, the main bartender strolled on the scene with a curt nod to Cheerilee and Rose before turning his voice, sounding like gravel roasting on a open burning field, on to the mare. “This is why I suggested we put off today's practice since you're unwilling to use the null ring in public.”
“Hehehe, I thought I could move the tray. It was broad and wide and I thought I could keep my magic field from touching the glasses.” The mare apparently known as Caffeine Mix admitted, looking everywhere else but the no-nonsense glare Tonic was aiming at her. “And don't call it a null ring. Nobody wants to walk around with an inflated tube on their heads.”
Tonic merely bit down on her tail and pulled her backwards. His words were muffled but Cheerilee heard them clearly as Caffeine's ears flattened and an annoyed whine came out of her nose.
“I'm not calling you out because you were wrong in your thinking. I'm calling you out because you used magic. Learn the basics first and then you come up with new tricks. Bring their drinks back and let's try again.”
Cheerilee was gobsmacked.
“That pony.” She breathed out.
“Your type?”
“That was Twilight Sparkle!”
Caffeine shushed the both of them.
“You have your own identity” She pointed to Cheerilee's askew wig which Cheerilee quickly fixed, flushed. “I have mine. Please call me Caffeine Mix.” And with that she circled back to Tonic, carefully balancing each step as if she was wearing some cumbersome on her hooves.
Twilight couldn't be part of his trainees, could she? That was a six month program of strutting around this pigsty of a bar. And Tonic had a type. Impulsive. But here she was, wearing that atrocious, inappropriate rag. The skirt was too short and a lace trim for Celestia's sake! Her top was low cut and it was all red. She looked like a slutty maid dipped in red ink.
“I didn't mean to embarrass you.” Tonic said, taking the drinks off the tray and putting it aside. He quickly made a new batch and set the fresh glasses on the tray.
“But I have to stop using my horn if I don't want to tamper with the taste of a drink.”
“Exactly.”
“It won't happen again.”
Tonic gave her a crooked, ugly smile.
“It won't happen often.” Caffeine amended, bowing her head a little.
Cheerilee shuddered.
He set their drinks aside right before another bartender came up to him. The two talked quietly before Tonic smacked the stallion upside the head. The bartender muttered his apologies before darting over the counter and running out.
She wondered what that was about.
Caffeine waited nearby, moving to stand on her hind-legs and rested her fore-hooves on the counter. Cheerilee recoiled at the sight of what was on her hooves. They were platformer boots, a bright red with white strips along the heel. The white lines looked like arrows, calling attention to Caffeine's scanty hidden plot.
Didn't anyone tell her not wear such things in public! She couldn't just let this farce go on any longer!
Cheerilee stood up, trying to compose a speech when Rose sent her a flat, uninterested look. A shiver went down Cheerilee's spine. Rose was never not interested in Cheerilee causing a ruckus. At a loss, Cheerilee sat down and stared at Rose. The mare simply made a tight lipped smile. Eyes growing darker as she rested her cruel head on her hoof.
What was Rose going to do?
Tonic nodded to Caffeine, suggesting to the mare that she stick to sliding the tray along the counter until she was able to perfect the 'love tap'. Cheerilee nearly swallowed her tongue. Caffeine took the news in good spirits, possibly returning a naughty smile of her own. Oh Celestia!
The tray was brought and the two of them had their drinks. Cheerilee took hers trembling, hardly able to scoop the glass out of the tin. She wasn't sure what ate at her more. The disgust or the guilt. Twilight was a single mother working at a library. Of course, she didn't make enough money. Of course, she would have work a such a back-end place like this. She needed guidance and not let that stallion take advantage of her!
Cheerilee glanced at Rose, already chugging her drink down. Maybe Rose wasn't going to do anything? What if she'd read the signs wrong? But she knew Rose and- Cheerilee forced her eyes to Caffeine, watching as her skirt floated ever so close to revealing her purple behind.
The girl should be naked! Not wearing those, those things.
The front door slammed open as the bar began to fill up with the late comers. There were quite a few new faces she couldn't pick out but she noticed Pinkie arrive with four almost familiar mares. They took up the seats next to Rose and Cheerilee and jeered at Twilight. As the bar grew louder, it got harder and harder to make out their conversation.
According to their back and forth, Twilight had worked with drinks in college?
As a elective?
Mixology?
Cheerilee wasn't sure if she was relieved or not.
Pinkie Pie said something funny about her home, Yieldstone and both the orange mare and the blue pegasus stared roaring in laughter. They laughed and laughed and accidentally knocked their drinks over to the floor and started laughing harder. Light weights. Caffeine had to go around the counter and cleaned it, using her tail to preserve her modesty which Cheerilee hated.
Twilight shouldn't even be in this position.
“Candle Color.” Cheerilee looked to Rose who pulled out a flask. She shook the flask in Cheerilee's face before twisting the cap off with her teeth. The drink smelled pungent, thick and delightful to Cheerilee's nose. It had to be at least a hundred years aged if not more. How did Rose get her hooves on such a delicious smelling brew!
“I was saving this for later.” Rose moved the flask to the left. Cheerilee found herself compelled to follow it. Left. Right. Down. Up. “Berry made me promise but she's not better than me. You know exactly why she brought you here.” She said with a sneer. “But I can't help myself when it comes to these things. It's my talent. You understand, don't you?”
“Come on, Rosie. Can I have some?”
“You can have all of it.”
Cheerilee couldn't stop herself from squealing in joy. She snatched the flask out of Rose's hooves and took long, throat scoring gulps.
Woo, her head felt-
Great. So great.
All great.
This stuff, good stuff.
Cheerilee cackled to herself.
Really great stuff.
Wait.
What was that?
A yellow mare strolled right by Cheerilee with a baby dragon on her back. The brew had to be stronger than she thought. That couldn't be Spike? Cheerilee found it hard to turn her head but when she did, Rose was gone. Tears ran down Cheerilee's face but she wiped them away. At least she still had this flask to remind of that stupid, mean, best friend she ever had Rose. Cheerilee howled, sobbing loudly as she struggled to keep her mind afloat.
That baby dragon was sitting on the counter, talking with that unicorn. Twi-right? Twi-mean! She wouldn't let Cheerilee help her! The two talked to fast for her to understand. Only that the sweet little baby was playing with the bottles and pouring juice into glasses. He pushed them out to the mares beside Cheerilee and they all loved it.
Why?
The boy was just playing with grape and apple juice.
Didn't they want some of the hard stuff like Cheerilee?
She turned her eyes onto the bottle the baby favored the most. Ran her eyes along the label several times. Brandy. Cheerilee turned her head, confused. Brandy? She drank more of her flask and the world became simple.
The baby dragon and his mother boasted about one thing or another. Then they clinked glasses. Cheerilee's mind cleared up a little. That was Twilight and Spike and Twilight was trying to make her job into a educational experience for her son. That was nice of her. Cheerilee felt pride expand her belly and let loose a loud belch. The ponies by her laughed and Spike and Twilight drunk their drinks.
Their alcoholic drinks.
Alcoholic drinks.
Alcoholic.
Alcohol.
Cheerilee stood up, her eyes blurry and blind. “Berry should've known better! Bwahahaha!” She saw someone who looked Rose cheer at her as she forced her way out of the backroom, a bag of stolen goods on her back.
The world felt so wrong and Cheerilee's throat was dry.
Alcohol.
Alcoholic.
Alcoholic drinks.
They drunk. Who drunk? Twilight and Spike.
Cheerilee finished her flask and threw it. The container flew straight, hurling itself through the window.
All eyes were on her and her eyes were on Twilight.
Someone had to-
“Did you give that young child alcohol?”
And then.
And then.
And then.
Cheerilee...
She'd...
“Spike, don't!”
“Spike!”
“You drunken whore-”
And then.
“Happy St. Plethora Day!” Rosie. That bitch. “Come on, you little weapon of mass destruction you. We have more places to hit.”
And then.
“Spike!”
“Let Twilight go!”
So heavy.
“Where is Caffeine?”
“Are you insane? You're hurting her. Let Twilight go!”
“She sold you booze. That evil mare dressed you like a slut!”
Crying.
Throwing.
“Twilight, you're just a baby dragon. I'll take you your momma.”
Shrieking.
“Plethora, take me in. I give you this child. Bless me.”
And then...
Gurgling.
“I don't think this rope will hold her.”
“It has to. The whole town's gone nuts.”
“Fluttershy! Watch out.”
Running.
And then...
“Cheerilee, you are under arrest. We need a stun spell. She's-”
Author's Note
