Tasting Fame On Her Tongue

by FriedMangoSlushies

Rating: teen
Tags: Rarity, Tragedy, Sad, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 1804

Fame is fleeting, and Rarity needs an escape.

After a chance encounter, Rarity's designs get the recognition she's always dreamed of, but hand in hand with fame is criticism, something she's not quite prepared for. Collection after collection is regarded as "boring" or "unoriginal," and she needs to find an escape route soon.

Published 2012-06-12 04:14:02 UTC
Last updated 2012-06-12 04:14:02 UTC

Chapter 1

(a/n): So I was listening to Angels Get To Sing by Jessie and the Toy Boys and I had so many feels and needed to write them. This is actually part of something which was going to be a gihugic death fic, but I don’t have the attention span for that kind of thing and just wrote out Rarity’s portion of the fic like this. Hopefully it’s not too horrible.

This is my first FiM fic and I’m trying out a new writing style here so yeah.

. . .

Why is she doing this?

This isn’t her. She doesn’t just go around trying everything she can to forget until she can’t stay awake anymore. She doesn’t just lie around on the floor, staring at nothing, trying to pretend she’s still the same person. She doesn’t do this
.
She doesn’t care.

. . .

Where was she when Chiffon Lace came by Ponyville and changed everything? Well, that’s a stupid question; of course she was in the Carousel Boutique, but still. How long ago was that? Maybe four years ago? God, it feels like everything happened a thousand eternities ago.

Chiffon had been passing by on her way to her dinner reservations when the paparazzi were beginning to swarm, so she took an alternate route that took her right past the boutique, noticed the glittering skirts and gowns and boots and immediately proclaimed that those designs just must be featured in her upcoming shows that would be touring across Equestria.

She couldn’t say no to that.

So she received nearly a thousand bits that evening - enough to pay the bills for almost a year and buy the fabric for at least a dozen dresses – and sure enough, once those tours started up, the critics took note of her designs, and sure enough, when asked who made those gorgeous heels and stunning corset Chiffon answered appropriately, and sure enough, within the hour the boutique was packed with fans and celebrities alike clamoring for a chance to buy those clothes, to feel what it’s like to be a princess.

It was perfect.

But then the next review came out - she still remembers the day and the author and the section and where she was in that precise moment when Twilight burst into the shop and shoved the editorial in her face – and some reporter, some “Ink Blot” insists she’s nothing but a copycat, taking inspiration from some “Indigo Chaser” whom she’s never even heard of in her entire life.

But there were pictures. They took her glittering blue sundress, the one that had attracted Chiffon in the first place, and compared it to one of this Indigo Chaser’s design, and they looked nearly identical. The square neckline, the gems lining the sleeves, the spotted fabric that slowly fades to aqua…

Twilight offers her apologies, but she refuses to accept them. This just won’t do. She won’t be shown up by some hoity-toity reporter with expensive taste. She stops Twilight mid-sentence to rush over to her desk and grab some paper and the closest pen, then sets it down on the table, hastily shoves a few stray pencils and coasters out of the way, and begins to sketch clean, flowing lines.

Except, three hours later, she’s still at the desk, trying to come up with an idea. She glances at the rack of fabrics in the corner, the ribbons and lace and sewing machine and can’t think of anything. Maybe she could- no, she did something similar to that a few years ago. What about- no, it would be stylish but wouldn’t hold together very long and the practicality of making it last longer would ruin the stitching on the back.

With a frustrated sigh, she slams her head on the table.
. . .

Four more articles have been published since the last one, all finding some obscure designer and comparing some design she made for various tours to theirs, scrutinizing every seam, every color, every gem to ensure they can find the most similarities publish. And on top of that, there was the horrible headline declaring a “SCANDAL – HIGH SCHOOL FLAME STRIKES BACK ON COPYCAT DESIGNER.”

This time, it’s Pinkie who finds the story and gives it to her. “I found this article and thought you should see it! I think it’s about you!” she proclaims with her normal chipper tone, but one look at her eyes, which have lost their usual sparkle, makes it clear whatever’s been printed can’t be very good.

She glances inside the newspaper, almost not daring to peek, and sees the face of some hoofball player in Washingtrot staring back at her. A more careful look helps her notice the caption under the picture- “Glory Rush, 31, hoofball player for the Washingtrot Winners, tells all about his encounters with Rarity.”

Apparently this “Glory Rush” described her as “rude,” “pushy,” “conceited,” and “extremely self-centered.” He went on about how unoriginal and stupid and dull she was and claimed to be grateful that he dumped her- wait, dumped her? She doesn’t even know this fame-hogging stallion. How on earth did he even manage to get into the paper?

She shoves the paper back into a confused Pinkie’s arms with a scoff, dismisses it as lies, and goes back to her desk.
No more of this. She will make something to prove she’s better than some target the critics can keep firing at.

She will.

. . .

Alright, so they’re not her best work, but they’re original and stylish and they work. They’ll work until she figures something out.

Within the first few weeks of this new collection being released, she expects the headlines to continue talking about her fashions, raving about her “Back to Basics” designs, unable to find anything she’s copied, finally realizing her potential as a designer. She needed them to give her a big break, finally acknowledge she’s the talented pony she wants to be.
Instead? There’s nothing. Oh, sure, one magazine included her name, but it was in the back in pathetically tiny font. Nopony else even attempted to talk about it. Maybe they were too lackluster. Maybe when she’d been trying to avoid bad press, she’d been subconsciously been avoiding the press in general. Sales declined more than ever, and her name was featured less and less. She was slowly slipping out of the public eye, and she wasn’t sure if she liked it or not.

It was bad enough knowing that she had almost made it, that she was almost there, that she was the next-next best thing.

It hurt the worst when she made an offhand remark about some “Rarity” designer and they replied “who?”

Of course she had to get away somehow.
. . .

She holds the orange bottle filled with strange white pills a few inches in front of her, giving it strange looks.

She’s heard stories of people taking these and having epiphanies, of them sparking their creative senses and making them feel so wonderful. She’s definitely settled into depression and could use anything to wake her up, and she certainly does need a creative boost, so she unscrews the lid and holds a few of those pills in front of her.

For a second, she almost – almost – decides to go to her friends and ask them for help, to see if they could get her out of this, to see if they could inspire her.

Then she shakes her head and downs them all in one gulp.

Help.

. . .

She wakes up the next morning hunched over her desk, surprised to find the usually pristine table with paper crumpled all over it. Ready to disregard the scraps, she picks them up and moves them to the trash can when she sees markings on them, and, confused, examines them closer.

They’re these hastily scrawled vague sketches, almost scribbles, dancing around the paper, spiraling and swirling and insane, lines and circles and zig-zags all over the paper, random bursts of color and patterns all over, and she almost considers them chicken scratch.

But they’re original, that’s what they are. They’re crazy and original and people like crazy and original.
So she moves over to her mannequins and grabs the fabric and tries her best to recreate the scribbles on the papers, and once she’s nearly finished assembling them all it’s nearly night and she wants nothing more than to sleep.

She’s done it.

This is it.

. . .

Upon waking up she calls her friends over to the boutique and asks their opinions on the new designs. They’re regarded with both shock and wonder, and at first she’s worried nopony likes them but it just turns out they’re shocked by the new style and weren’t aware that she had this sort of thing in her, but the change is surprising and if she could recreate more of this style she’d surely get her big break.

So that’s what she does. She ushers them out and sits down with a pencil and paper and tries to recreate the swirls and colors and dots but she can’t. She doesn’t even know how she did it the last time. It must have been those pills talking. She doesn’t even know what they’re called or how they work and she’s still letting them control her and that scares her.

She still pulls two out and swallows them anyway.

Help.

. . .

Many long nights later, the new collection is finally complete and she proudly releases it, defying the critics to compare it to anything else that anypony else has ever made. It’s unique and creative and stunning and if the amazed gasps that she hears when ponies walk past her boutique are any indication, she’s confident that this is what she’s been needing all her life.
And of course the first person to review is the ever-soul-crushing Ink Blot, calling her designs “insane mixes of every color imaginable” and claiming that these look like “she overdosed on every drug on the black market and then decided to throw something together” and she has to stifle a dark chuckle because, hah, he’s kind of right.

And of course this sparks some curiosity in the world and once again ponies are flocking to Carousel Boutique to see these “drug-fueled” designs and while there are some skeptics who call the creations confusing and dizzying, there are others to embrace the clothes and buy them like there’s not tomorrow and business is booming and everything is perfect.

. . .

Late every night, when shop is closed and nopony is around, she locks herself in the bathroom, swallows a few pills, and pretends this isn’t all just completely screwed up.

Help.

. . .