Only in the minutes after returning from the family plot did I learn how oppressive silence can be.
There was at least some relief in the gentle sounds of breathing from my aunt, Tender Crust. She was leaning against my right side, her head rested on my shoulder, and the evidence of tears mars her pretty face. A gentle sob issues forth from somepony in our clan and is choked back.
I whisper to her as softly as I could, but the whole room seems to echo with the sound of my impropriety. “Excuse me.”
She opens her eyes and sits up straight, looking at me and nodding gently. I flash her a pathetic half-smile and lift myself up. Mom looks back at me from across the living room full of kin. She was hugging poor Grandma in a forlorn tangle of hooves and black dresses and wet eyes.
I can’t take this right now.
I walk. Every shod hoofstep sounds like a hammer banging against the wood floor until I finally reached the front door. I nose it open and step out into the grey afternoon. There is no wind to buffet my coat or mane, and only the chirping of birds to chip away at the silence.
It’s not easy growing up as the only unicorn in an extended earth pony family. At least the only unicorn around. I have a distant cousin who I’d see at family gatherings. I've another estranged family member who’d moved to Manehattan who has had not only one, but two unicorn foals recently. I’d heard Mom gossiping about “the Snapdragon twins” with Grandma. These ponies aren’t close to us though, and I certainly didn’t grow up around them. Grandpa Ringer was who I turn to when I need support. When I need understanding. When I need a dad.
That’s what everypony called him. His name wasn’t really Ringer. It was Stout Steady, which is something of a misnomer. He was tall, leggy, exceedingly thin, and if anything, a little unsteady at times. He made some excellent beer as his living, and if he liked to enjoy a bit of it after a long workday, he was not begrudged for this behavior. Whether is was earth pony magic or just a lot of hard work, nopony was ever really sure why it never showed on his frame. It never made him surly, he just laughed easier and longer, and his smiles came even more quickly.
My mind’s eye opens and I vividly remember a time he scolded me for avoiding my chores.
“There’s no I in Equestra, Nubbin. We all have our part to do around here.”
When I was a foal, I used to think it was a stupid name. Equestra. Somepony was bound to think we’re all a bunch of dumb dirt ponies who never learned how to spell correctly.
Later, when I came to realize how much respect the local townsponies had for Grandpa, and the way he did business, the name of his estate didn’t sound so foolish anymore. It became a matter of family pride, and one of innumerable small lessons that I’ve been privileged enough to have been given.
Alone with my reminiscences, I trudge on. I’m not even sure where I’m heading until I see the sign:
EQUESTRA
HORSESHOE PITS
It’s only been a few days since he’d passed, but already the perfectly manicured grass in his beloved play area is getting a bit longer than Grandpa would have ever allowed. I’m tempted to go to the shed and get the push mower he kept there. I’ve magically shoved it around this area hundreds of times. Sometimes more than once in a day, if I didn’t do it right the first time.
But not right now.
I close my eyes. A few tears leak out, warm and wet.
* * * * * *
Grandpa halted mid-toss when he saw me galloping up with Mom trotting behind.
“Nubbin! Come here you cute thing you! Well, will you look at that cutie mark!”
I proudly stuck my flank out. “It’s two horseshoes!” I paused, trying to remember the word my teacher used. “...intertwined!”
Grandpa took the shoe that he was about to toss and held it up against my flank for a moment before placing it on the immaculate lawn. He laughed, a huge booming laugh from such a wisp of a pony. “A chip off the old block! I’m so proud of you!” I felt his thin legs embrace me.
Mom caught up to us, almost as excited as I was. “Lilac Blossom at the school said he’d broken up a fight among two schoolfillies and got them to settle their differences! All by himself, during recess. I guess Lilac was busy inside the schoolhouse with another student and didn’t even realize the fight was going on at the time.”
Grandpa ruffled my mane with a hoof. “I’m so proud of you, Nubbin.”
I danced around the pit. It was one of the happiest moments of my life. I stood on the backstop and sang. I twirled around the pole, holding on with a forehoof, as I warbled off key. I barely noticed Mom and Grandpa talking.
Grandpa watched my antics briefly before turning to Mom. “I should start taking him along when I buy supplies. Might be good learning for him.”
Mom chuckled. “Maybe we could let him deal with the tax ponies.”
* * * * * *
I trotted to the pits just before sundown. The rays of the lowering sun were in my eyes as I crested the slight hill and saw the thin stallion there, bathed in the dying orange light.
“Hello, Grandpa. Cousin Bright said you were asking for me?”
He had a couple shoes in his mouth and he laid them at my forehooves. I picked one up in my hoof, eyeing the badly chipped red paint. I knew better than to pick them up in my magic. Grandpa didn’t like that. He said it put horrible luck on the shoes for him.
“Tell me about this filly,” he said, lofting a perfect shot that cradled the post. There was a reason ponies called him Ringer.
“Her name is Mountain Laurel. She’s in my class. We went on a few dates. We went to the candy store in town after school a couple times. I really like her.”
I took my shot. You got good at tossing horseshoes when you live on Equestra, but nopony was as good as Grandpa. Still, the arc resolved into a respectable toss. Just a tiny bit left and a hoof short. I watched as the kicked up dust dissipated on the gentle evening breeze and the sun started to hide behind the horizon.
“Why’d she leave you?”
I sniffed a bit, but I tried not to let it show. “She found somepony who she thinks is more handsome.”
He paused, ears twitching slightly. After a pause he nodded, letting his shot fly. It landed directly behind my first shoe, striking it with a dull clang and pushing the poor chipped thing under his own previous shot and right onto the post.
He looked away from his toss and right at me. “Whenever you let a pony into your life and you love them, you’re taking a chance. It’s worth it to take that chance, though. Your mom took that chance with your dad, and every day we’re blessed with you because of that.”
I blinked. Grandpa almost never brought up Dad. I never knew him… I was a newborn when he’d died and Mom returned to Equestra to raise me. I waited a respectful moment and when nothing else was said, I decided to gamble with a question.
“What was he like?”
“He was very strong. It’s hard work to pull a cart all day. You’ve seen the pictures your mom has of him. Was the blue of the sky on a fine day, and his mane the color of wet straw. He was a very, very handsome fella. I think that’s why your mom liked him at first. But he became much more than just a handsome face. They loved each other very much.”
“He loved to pull the hay ride wagon for foals. He grew tomatoes that were as big as any I’ve ever seen.”
He stopped for a moment, but I knew better than to speak. Either he’d continue with his story, or he’d drop it. You couldn’t prod Grandpa Ringer into a discussion he didn’t want to have.
He sat down and took a pull off of a jug of his latest batch that he’d brought with him. He wiped the foam off his lips with a fetlock and stared at the vessel for a moment longer.
“When Sparky came running, and told us that the road on Whirlwind Hill had washed out and swept your dad away, we all were in shock. I collected your mom and we ran to the scene, but there was nothing we could do. Some of the medical ponies were at the bottom of the cliff already. It took myself and the sheriff to hold your mom back from trying to climb down there… she’d have gotten herself killed. Your father was already gone.”
“Sometimes, Nubbin, the world takes away from us what we want. It’s just how it is. We can’t change it, no matter how much we wish, or we beg, or we cry. But we make do anyway. Because that’s what it means to be strong.”
Grandpa stood back up. He swatted me playfully on the rump. “Now take your shot, and then we’d better trot back to the house for dinner before your grandma gets angry with me.”
I honestly don’t remember the result of my final shot that day. I was pretty choked up at that point. But in my mind it would always be a perfect ringer.
* * * * * *
I open my eyes and things are blurry. I feel the prickly coolness of grass on my belly as I lay there, under the overcast sky, and look over the field. I listen to the birds. I imagine Grandpa standing by the pit, smiling, collecting his two almost always perfect throws.
I watch an ant carrying a bit of leaf twice as large as it was, dodging clumps of grass. A tear falls and I watch it soak into the earth.
I have a lot of work to do. I need to head back to the house. My family is going to need me. I’m good at pulling ponies together at a tough time, and poor Mom might have looked a little lost when she watched me leave.
But there’s something that I want to do first. It won’t take long.
I wipe my eyes and head over to the shed, opening the door with my magic.
After all, the grass wasn’t going to cut itself.