Shutup, Debra, My Cubicle is Awesome (But Needs More Ponies)
Hypnagogia
Chapter One
Shutup, Debra, my Cubicle is Awesome (But Needs More Ponies)
Front door slammed, and intoxicated giggles slithered across the kitchen. Despite investing in a new pair of noise-canceling headphones, Charlotte could still hear the blunt return of her roommate (and her roommate’s chosen mate for the evening). With a sigh, she jammed the volume up on her laptop. It was just a fact that her roommate, Kristen, had a voice about ten decibels higher than the average human being. With Augustana now pleasantly coiling in her ears, she continued typing her thesis. Several windows were tabbed on her screen, ranging from databased English articles to a Wiki How on the best method of cleaning up human vomit. The last several times Charlotte (or Charlie, as she was usually called) cleaned up Kristen’s party residue, the smell lingered for a few hours more. Surely some chemical or perfume could remedy the problem? If not, Charlie smirked, there was always a flame thrower.
She glanced at the clock. Shit. 3:46am. Two hours later than she had wanted to go to bed. Charlie comforted herself knowing she had just bought a fresh bag of K-cups. Caffeine was what woke her, pushed her, and lulled her to bed. Charlie sipped the last bit of green tea from her pale blue mug -- cold now -- before closing out of each window and shutting down her HP. She cursed herself quickly, though. With the music gone, she could hear the sexual wailings punching through the wall between the two bedrooms. She tripped as she dashed to her bed and clicked her iPod into the headphones. Shuffle songs. She sighed and collapsed onto her bed.
It’s Sunday night. Sunday. How does she even … Charlie groaned and rolled over. Kristen bedded more men in a month than most saw in years. Charlie wondered if it wasn’t just the low cut dresses and alcohol -- maybe Kristen had a pheromone that made men fall before her.
In that case, Charlie chided, I must have the pheromones of a dead cat.
She stretched her arm out and clicked her nightstand lamp off. Just as she moved to unclip her iPod, a new song shuffled into her ears: Pinkie Pie’s Smile Song. She settled her head on her pillow and closed her eyes. She let herself stop thinking, and just listen. She pulled her sheets closer, threading them into a jumbled cocoon. As the song cut out, she slipped off her headphones and sheathed the iPod into its charging cradle. The moans from the other room had ceased, and silence settled itself in the apartment.
Why do I listen to a song from a children’s show? God, am I regressing into some little girl? Charlie reprimanded herself mentally. Even still, as she drifted off to sleep, she was smiling.
The splishing stream of the Keurig helped Charlie pry her eyes open. She refused to look at a clock until at least half a mug of coffee was pumped into her stomach. Beams of morning clawed their way into the apartment, trying to snatch Charlie from her half-awake reverie. The morning wouldn’t be able to sink into her for at least another ten minutes. As Charlie sipped the mocha coffee, she noticed for the first time the trail of clothing splattered across the kitchen and living room. She groaned, particularly when she found the unknown man’s pants hung over the toaster. With tongs, she tossed them aside lightly.
Maybe we should just have a hamper in every room of the house, Charlie thought sharply. With half the coffee gone, she allowed herself a glance at the analog on the microwave: 7:58am. The bus would arrive in a half hour. Looked like she only had time to wash her mud-brown and faded blue-tipped hair. Did she have any more long pants available? Hopefully, because she was not going to show off her unshaven calves.
Charlie quickly dressed herself and jogged down to the bus stop, headphones snug on her ears and purse hung high on her shoulder. It was a twenty-minute ride to Chance and Folly’s Publishing Firm. The clouds threatened rain, and Charlie was umbrella-less. She began to systematically pray to every deity in each pantheon that she vaguely remembered had something to do with weather. Apparently, none of them liked her -- it began to pour, and the bus was running late.
And of course the rain just has to fall at an angle the day I didn’t bring my umbrella, Charlie thought. By the time she got on the bus, her shrug clung to her plush frame like a flabby second skin. She combed her short hair with her fingers in a half-hearted attempt to fix her appearance.
This is gonna be a great day, she thought sarcastically. She took the window seat and pushed the volume high on her iPod to block out the morning chatter and groans on the bus. The pneumatic hiss of the bus’s door punched through her Monday playlist at times, though. A smile finally curled itself on Charlie’s face, however, when Twilight Sparkle’s voice began singing B.B.B.F.F.
The song reminded Charlie that she hadn’t heard from her brother, Aiden, in a couple weeks. He usually checked in with his younger sister more often. Then again, Charlie thought, he had just landed himself a job with an electrician just outside their hometown. The song faded out. Charlie clicked her iPod, and listened to the song again.
Although never said aloud, Charlie felt happier since she had started watching the children’s show My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic several months before. She had, of course, heard of the brony phenomenon. Barely ever on Facebook, she noticed that each time she did log on, more profile pictures of people she vaguely knew in college were ponyfied. Curiosity got the best of her -- and she quickly zipped through season one and followed season two as it was released.
Her stop came up, and she got off with a smile despite the rain. Chance and Folly’s Publishing Firm was on the fifth and sixth floor of the Bank of America building, just outside of the South Side Farmer’s Market. She waved politely to the receptionist, nodded to passing businessmen, and apologized as she bumped into and swerved around bustling workers. Charlie received nothing in return.
Why can’t I be invisible when I wanna be? She lamented as the elevator rose. She slipped her headphones and iPod into her purse. The doors parted, and in seconds, she had orders.
“Miss Allen! I need you to go through yesterday’s invoices -- the account is missing a receipt and we need to submit a batch-out by noon today,” the receptionist, Helga, said.
“Yes, ma’am,” Charlie said softly. She took the three-pound folder of invoicing. Before she reached her grey cubicle, she got two requests for coffee from assistant executives Dave and Wayne, a deadline for proofreading a new short story due to be published in the literary magazine next week, and a complaint from Debra that Charlie’s cubicle was getting too crowded with ‘stuff’.
Charlie nearly collapsed into her office chair, indented with an impression of her butt after hours of intense sitting.
Debra is the principal example of why everyone needs a free fist-to-face pass once a month, she thought angrily. Her cubicle wasn’t crowded with just stuff, it was her stuff! The stuff she acquired carefully and lovingly! As George Carlin put so well, her junk was stuff, and other people’s junk was shit. As Charlie ran to the kitchen to get Dave and Wayne’s coffee, she began to think about her stuff. Why was Debra so involved in how she decorated her cubicle? Debra’s desk was full of pictures of her two screaming devil-children and their crappy macaroni art. How was that possibly better than a companion cube paperweight or an origami replica of Captain Reynolds’ ship Serenity?
After dropping off the mugs of hot, black coffee, Charlie slipped back into her cubicle and began to sift through the invoicing. While reading, she realized she forgot her reading glasses back in her apartment. She cursed herself. She was in for a long, headache inducing day. Throughout the routines and assignments, Charlie amused herself with thoughts of adding her McDonald’s Applejack keychain to sit on her Mac. Then Charlie remembered how much a pain in the ass Debra was, and realized adding any brightly colored pony to her cubicle by double the misery. She sighed.
I bet there isn’t any shitty invoicing to do in Equestria, Charlie thought. She had majored in English to edit, publish, and write -- not do accounting and meager temp-job tasks. It was money, though, and that was something she sorely needed.
It was seven o’clock by the time Charlie found herself back in her apartment, wet and cold and hungry. Kristen was sitting on the couch, sipping on a strawberry shake and watching television.
“Hey,” Charlie greeted. She flipped off her shoes into the boot tray and went straight for the medicine cabinet.
“You’re home late,” Kristen said emptily.
“Work,” Charlie said.
“You’re still working at that printing place?”
“It’s a publishing firm,” Charlie corrected. She popped open a bottle of ibuprofen and shook two pills into her palm.
“You get paid shit. I’m not spotting you for rent again, y’know.”
“You spotted me five months ago, and I paid you back!” Charlie said. She swallowed the pills dry and glared at Kristen. The blonde bombshell refused to let Charlie’s financial state rest. She had scraped by for one month, and now Kristen saw her as a cash parasite.
“Well, I’m not a fillanfothist, so I’m not taking any charity cases. I have my own bills, y’know,” Kristen said. Charlie didn’t bother correcting her. After all, Kristen was watching a re-run of Keeping up with the Kardashians -- and not making fun of them.
“Whatever,” Charlie said. She wanted to diffuse the conversation now -- she knew where it was going, and didn’t want the conversation. Again.
“Y’know what you should do?” Kristen said. Subtle segues were not her forte. Charlie groaned and didn’t answer. She opened the fridge and tried to find some food.
“You should really look into a second job. Bobby told me that his restaurant is hiring,” Kristen said. Charlie stuffed a cheese stick in her mouth and started to boil water for some ramen.
“It’s a cleaning job, so you don’t have to worry about, well,” Kristen looked at Charle’s frumpy-wet outfit, “looking good.”
“No, Kristen,” Charlie said between chews of the mozzarella.
“But you can barely get by now, I can’t see how you’ll make it when we have the heating bill.”
“It’s the summer,” Charlie said flatly.
“Yes, but you need to look ahead!”
Charlie sighed and finished her ramen. She poured half the flavoring packet and dumped the rest. She repeated her well-used mantra in her head: you need Kristen to pay rent. You need Kristen to pay rent. And even the mantra dug under Charlie’s skin; Kristen always talked as if the lease was in her name, but it wasn’t. Charlie had posted an ad for a roommate, and Kristen was the only one who could afford it.
“Charlie, you can’t avoid this problem forever!”
“Challenge accepted,” Charlie said, and closed her bedroom door.
It was 1:23a.m. when Charlie finished the draft of her thesis. She was working on getting her master’s degree in English online, and the time management was proving to be more difficult than she anticipated. She e-mailed the draft to her professor and rewarded herself with an episode of MLP. Season Two was over, but Charlie had no problem re-watching episodes. She leaned back in her chair and watched Suited for Success.
"It's...nice.”
"Nice?"
"N-nice."
"If you don't like it, you should just tell me."
"Oh, but I dooo like it."
"Like it or love it?"
"Ummm...both?"
Charlie yawned and paused the episode. She rinsed her empty mug and filled her water bottle up with tap water. She loved the episode she was watching -- not for Fluttershy’s freakish knowledge of fashion, or Rainbow Dash’s 20% cooler, or even the song. No, it was the introduction of the fan-famous DJP0N3. Charlie loved that pony. She loved the style, the way the fanbase virtually created her, the fan art, the fan music (although the more Skrillex-sounding ones still hurt her ears), and the fan videos. Charlie had always been fascinated by DJs in real life, anyways, adding more to her admiration and adoration of Vinyl Scratch. Charlie had read only a handful of fanfictions, as her eye for detail tended to make her nitpicky about fans’ grammar and syntax. Even still, she enjoyed the character a great deal.
Charlie finished the episode, popped two more ibuprofen to tame a brewing headache, and crawled into bed. She fell asleep with the dread of another bus ride, another work day, another confrontation with Kristen. She just wanted an escape.
Charlie groaned as Kristen jabbed her. She vowed to murder her later, but for now, she feigned deep sleep in hopes her roommate would go away.
“Hey! Hey, you alright?”
Charlie felt a shock run down her spine -- that voice wasn’t Kristen. It didn’t have nearly the same, high-pitched auto-tune quality that hers did.
“Hey! You okay?” Another cautious jab. Charlie opened her eyes and was assaulted by bright sunlight. She groaned again and covered her eyes.
“Haha, I getcha. Too much punch at Pinkie’s, huh?”
“Wha?” Charlie mumbled. She was too tired to have her lips work right. She realized she couldn’t feel her fingers -- and if her palms were covering her face, they were extraordinarily rough and calloused. Charlie slowly lowered her “hands” and found herself looking at a familiar pony.
“I haven’t seen you before, though. What’s your name?” Vinyl Scratch asked. Her purple shades were precisely balanced above her horn. Her smile was congenial and slightly crooked. Staring at her scarlet eyes, Charlie saw the reflection of an ash-grey unicorn.
“Huh?”
Vinyl laughed. “Pretty strange name. I’m Vinyl Scratch, better known as the wicked DJ--”
“--P0N3,” Charlie finished.
“Hah! Even a new pony knows of me. Where’d you hear of me? Canterlot? Manehatten?”
“Umm, from Rarity’s fashion show, actually,” Charlie answered meekly. She felt awkward staring at the alien reflection in Vinyl’s vibrant eyes. She looked away and swallowed a gasp at the bright Equestria landscape before her. She was a ways outside of Ponyville, tucked beside a path from the Express Train Station. Charlie stumbled awkwardly onto her hooves. She looked at her forelegs pleasantly.
An MLP dream! Finally! Charlie thought -- the reality of it finally sunk in. She grinned widely and flicked her head. Her mane, a layered mess of green and blue, pushed out of her eyes.
“Um, where are you going now, Vinyl?”
“Just got here from Canterlot. Pinkie asked me to DJ a party she’s throwing for BonBon’s birthday. I didn’t realize she had a party last night too -- I woulda come sooner!” Vinyl said, laughing.
“I wasn’t actually at a Pinkie party last night. I was just here, taking a, uh, nap,” Charlie said. Despite it being her dream, she felt awkward and out-of-sorts in front of the indomitable charisma of Vinyl.
“Oh, man, sorry then! You just looked, well, dead,” Vinyl chuckled nervously, “and I got a little worried that something bad had happened to you.”
“Oh, no, I’m fine -- great, actually,” Charlie grinned. She inwardly prayed to Morpheus and the Sandman and other gods that ruled over dreams that she would remember this one when she woke up.
“So, you heading to Ponyville?”
“Well, yes!” Charlie said over-enthusiastically. Vinyl’s horn began to glow with a light blue aura. The magic wrapped around a large suitcase that she had set down behind her. The huge bag hovered a few inches off the path.
“Then let’s go! Huh, was it?” Vinyl smirked. Charlie began to walk next to the white mare, focusing on the sensation of walking with four legs.
“Oh, haha, no. My name is Charlie.”
“Charlie? As in Charlie Horse?”
“What? Oh, no! My real name is Charlotte, but I go by Charlie.”
“Charlie it is, then. I like it,” Vinyl said. Charlie followed her on the path to Ponyville, desperately hoping her alarm or roommate wouldn’t disturb her for a few years.
Author's Note: This story will likely have at least ten chapters; it's an idea I have had for several months now, and hope to write well. I will be updating this story and The Stolen Child periodically, with at least one update a week for each. Constructive criticisms and comments are welcomed! Thank you for reading!
