After the incident, Hoofbeats swallowed her pride and wrote a letter to Rug Burn. She explained that she had over-estimated the supplies she had available and she would not be able to produce five hundred units before the agreed-upon deadline. She then requested a time extension and pre-emptively thanked him for his time. She slipped the letter into her mailbox the following morning, and trotted off to school.

The journey to school was a relaxing one, and it allowed her to focus on her thoughts. She recalled what a hardass Corn Flake was and she imagined how miserable it must be to live under his rule. She had been avoiding Brightray for the past few days, but she decided today she would make amends.

She found Brightray at lunch, sitting with her religious friends. Hoofbeats was appropriately beskirted, but there were still whispers throughout the group as she approached the table.

“Brightray,” she said to the very embarrassed mare, “I wanted to talk to you about what happened the other day.”

Brightray nodded and said, “Ok, but we’ll go outside and talk in private.”

Once they were alone together, Hoofbeats initiated the conversation. “I just wanted to make things better between us. I know you’re going through a lot right now.”

“Are you saying you want to apologize?” Brightray asked.

Hoofbeats was stunned. “I’ll be honest; I’m not sure what I did wrong.”

“I hate it when people give me that ‘you’re beautiful and perfect just the way you are’ crap. If everything was perfect, I would be happy. I turned to you for help, and you seem to think that if I just suck it up and love myself, then all my problems will magically go away. You don’t understand how I feel.”

Hoofbeats pondered this for a moment. “I’m sorry; I misunderstood. You’re not good at expressing what you want.”

“I don’t even know what I want.”

Hoofbeats remembered an applicable quote from the great philosopher Hay Cart.
“Give her the dick.”

She looked her friend right in the eye and said, “You need a good dicking.”

“What?”

“The dick. You need it.”

Brightray gave a skeptical and confused look. “So, am I gay or not? Make up your mind.”

“Oh, nopony can really know but you. What I meant was I can give you one of my toys and you can do it yourself to take the edge off.”

The pony squirmed awkwardly. “I’m not sure. I don’t know how.”

Hoofbeats groaned. “Really? Are we really gonna…You know what? Fine. I don’t even care anymore. Come to my house after school and I’ll teach you.”

“Like, for real this time?”

“I’m just going to talk you through it. Don’t get your hopes up for a relationship or anything. I told you before I’m not into mares.”

“It’s a deal then.”

They shook hooves on it and Brightray turned to leave. On her way inside, she called back to Hoofbeats, “If my friends ask, I was proselytizing.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

Author's Note

This is my shortest chapter so far, and the shittiest. I was going to include the next part as well, but it's not written yet and I haven't posted in a long time, and I guess I just want to put something up there to let you know I'm still active. I've just not been writing as much.

I feel bad posting such an insubstantial chapter, but I'd also feel bad not posting anything and making internet people wait longer for an update. I'm sorry.

Oo oo oo! And comments! I love comments! I want to know what you think, positive or negative.