A She-devil in Plain Sight

When the final bell signaling the school day's end had rung, Rarity had let out a sigh of relief, sure that- after a brief stop at her own house to lunch- she was going to get reprieve from her thoughts. In fact, her mind had stopped to harrass itself, allowing her to think about less distressing topics again.

It helped that, as she walked inside the richly-decorated atrium of Twilight's large villa, in-between walls decorated with antique paintings of men and myths alike, up bronze and red marble copies of statues from a far past time, pottery works shining for the polish- one clearly given often- given to them, up granite stairs with lavishly-decorated sides; Rarity could not help but feel herself overwhelmed by the display opulence, diverting her consciousness from the rotting and noxious thoughts of her sick mind, to the nearly Platonical contemplation of the pieces of fine art in display inside that gallery inside Twilight's house.

However, as Twilight guided Rarity away from her improvised gallery to the solid oak door that divided the rest of the house from the family's library, she felt her attention slipping away from the arts' beauty and going back to the repugnant idea about herself. She clenched her left first and lightly bit her teeth, as she slowly entered in the library, which had the left and the right wall covered in wooden shelves full of books that widely ranged in age, with the odler books far away from the door and the most recent ones very close to the door.

Twilight walked in two steps towards a shelf on her left and, after a few seconds passed in scanning the avaible books, picking up a rather large and thick brown book.

"Here it is something that might handy for your book," Twilight said with a small smile, as she bowed slightly and extended the book to Rarity, who swiftly took in her hands,

"Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of Mental Illnesses." It read. Rarity muttered it to herself, before raising her head to face Twilight, a nervous grin on her face.

"T-thank you very much, Twilight," Rarity looked left and right rapidly while she set the book under her right armpit. "I will make good use of this, I promise."

Twilight chuckled, her cheeks reddening somewhat.

"My pleasure. When you will finish your story, will you let me read it?"

"Oh, yes, of course Twilight, I will do it for sure, definitely, absolutely!" Rarity bowed a little. Deep inside, she was torn between the desire to seek an answer to her nagging and worrying question and, thus, taking the book away with herself, and force herself to supress her curiosity and pray that ignorance's bliss was going to strangle and cover her question- thusly resulting in her immediately giving the manual back to Twilight.

"Buutttt..." Rarity said, biting her lip.

"But?" Twilight reclined her head and looked at Rarity. "Is there anything wrong with it? Perhaps you wanted something less complex about the same topic? I can try to look for it, if you want to."

Rarity looked around herself again, hyperventilating and feeling her heart racing inside her chest. The mere thought of discovering an unwated answer to her question or to explain her actual situation to her friend broke the tounge inside her mouth, it created a cold and creeping fire that burnt under her delicate skin, it almost caused her eyes to stop seeing. It also made her start to sweat, to quiver, to turn greener than grass, and, in the end, to almost feel as if she was close to death and going to exhale her last breath.

"Not that revealing myself would end any better." Part of her thought said to herself.

"But one can endure everything. I must brave this, and seek the answer, no matter how nasty the truth will be."

Twilight broke Rarity from her trance, asking "Rarity... are you okay?"

Rarity immediately shook herself all over, blubbering gibberish before looking back at Twilight with an uneasy grin on her face.

"Oh, yes, I am perfectly fine. I was just.... a bit thoughtful. Yeah, thoughtful."

"Well, if you say so..." Twiligth said, adjusting her glasses while frowning a little.

After hastily saying goodbye to Twilight, Rarity had quickly rushed back home with the book under her armpit and oppressing thoguths inside her head. In order to relieve part of her tension, Rarity had quickly showered herself, before covering herself in just a white silky light dress.

Rarity sighed, as she looked at the book on her desk's top. She took a deep breath. Then another, deeper, one. Then she slowly moved her right hand on the cover, gulping as she did so, before slowly opening it to the book's index.

"Oh, silly me. It is in alphabetical order." She stated, chuckling nervously as she did so. After skipping past several pages, Rarity arrived at the "O" section, at which point she started to leaft throught pages with shaky hands, lightly biting her tender lip while she did so. Her mind flashed with images of her fantasies again, calling her to either forget her quest to understand them and just go by their orders, or twisted in way that would have caused Rarity to swear off any kind of pleasant contact until she met with a suitable partner.

Neither worked, however, as she marched forward, slowly but steadily, going past several other pages until, in the corner of her eye, she saw the term she was seeking.

"Pedophilic Disorder."

Rarity's heart started to beat faster, as she slowly moved her eyes downwards to the definition below.

"Diagnostic Criteria:" she read, slowly and nervously, to herself. "First Criterion, over a period of at least six months, recurrent and intense sexually arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviours involving sexual activity with a prepubescent child or children. The Second Criterion is, the individual has acted onto these sexual urges, or the sexual urges or fantasies cause marked distress or interpersonal difficulty. Finally, the third criterion is, the individual is at least sixteen years old and at least five years older than the child or children in the First Criterion."

Rarity felt her ribcage nearly caving in on her heart and lungs, as guilt pervaded her. But she forced herself to keep going in her reading.

"Specify whether the attraction is an exclusive or an inclusive type." She read, forcing herself to hold back her tears. "Specify if the individual is sexually attracted by children of their own sex, of their opposite sex, or both. Specify if limited to incest. Specify if violent or non-violent."

Rarity looked up at the ceiling, away from the book.

"Boys? Definitely. Girls? Pretty sure I never had fantasies about them. Incest? I-I do not recall any time I have thought of my younger cousins like that... for the most part..." Rarity fidgeted with her fingers and legs uncontrollably while she evaluated herself, running over months -- if not years -- of recent fantasies in her mind, until, unconsciously, she took the hem of her sleeve into her mouth to slowly suck on it. "Violent? Never!"

She paused, as she pondered on the honesty of that answer, on its actual meaning in the context.

"I mean... I have never thought about beating up a child a-and..." she gulped and cringed slightly. "B-but technically... H-had those been done in r-real life... then it would've been violence... right?"

Rarity massaged her temples, feeling further anguished by her own answers and the ugly truth she was not sure she was hiding or revealing as she went on.

"B-but... I never t-thought of them e-ever suffering, it has always been playing a game or just being rather affectionate while..." she sighed. "Cleaning up... but that can't happen, ever, so, what have I thought about? W-what kind of she-devil am I?"

Rarity slammed the book close and hopped away from her chair, stumbling backwards onto her bed.

She sighed. She sighed again.

Then, she let out a small sob, followed by another and then another, increasing the rate, until she broke into full-on crying, covering her eyes and curling up onto herself.