I hate interviews.
Just the thought of sitting down, of doing nothing, for ten minutes whilst a pony asks me questions just makes me want to itch.
It’s gotten better over the years, as my job demands. I take on a more reserved approach when working with my clients but I still have the occasional urge to burst out into song, just to see how they would react. Sometimes, when I get home, I do. Though nopony is happy about it; my neighbours especially. Oh do I miss the days I could go out into the streets and sing my heart out, but that’s all changed now. Now I have to hide who I am, for both my own sake, and for those who rely on me.
~ ~ ~
DING
The bell atop the entrance rang as two new ponies entered the scene, a news stallion with a thick trench coat and bowler hat, and a familiar pink mare in tow, though Pinkie had not noticed this as of yet.
The hero of our story, Pinkie Pie, as we’ll be referring to her, paid them no mind. There were always ponies coming and going this hour. The diner always got a rush for dinner and she had long since grown used to it. She folded her ears and tucked herself away into the corner, nestled neatly below the diner window looking out on the busy metropolis street. She pulled a yellow binder and a chocolate milkshake close, then flipped the binder open and began to review her latest case. This week it was another theft, a Ruby from the Museum of Equine Equity. No witnesses, it said, and no evidence either. It was as if the pony had disappeared into thin-
“Thank you, for allowing us this interview, Miss Pie.” Pinkie Pie halted her reading upon hearing a familiar name. That name. She hadn’t heard that name in a long time, too long. Not since-
She looked up in time to catch a glimpse of the stallion walking past her stall.
A pink mare followed him with a spring in her step. A pink coat, a darker pink and rather messy mane, and a cutie mark she couldn’t mistake. The mare answered the news stallion with a wide smile on her face and without a break in her step, not so much as glancing in Pinkie’s direction either, “Oh, it’s a pleasure! I’m always happy to help,” and the two took a seat in the stall directly behind Pinkie’s.
Pinkie Pie could feel her heart beating against her chest and clutched for her milkshake. Taking a long draw on the straw, she tried to steady her nerves. M-maybe it’s not her. She thought to herself, May- She gulped, her mouth suddenly dry and her tongue stuck to the top of her mouth like on a hot summer’s day with nothing to drink, Maybe I was mistaken.
She grabbed her fedora from where it sat beside her on the bench and secured it firmly to her head, being sure to tuck as much of her mane away as possible— thereby hiding the curly mound from view. She took another moment to compose herself and then stole a glance over her shoulder. The other mare had already ordered several servings of pancakes and had just gulped down the latest batch. How long had it been? She didn’t know.
There was no questioning it. Pinkie ducked back behind the bench. This was her, But why here? Why now? Pinkie felt her jitters returning. She reached for her milkshake and found it already empty. She looked around frantically for the waitress. Catching Penelope’s eye, she waved a hoof to call her over, all the while trying to stay as inconspicuous as she could. So far it seemed to be working. Nopony had noticed her thus far, that is, except for Mr. Haberdash, the brown stallion with a black handlebar moustache that sat at the bar every night. But he didn’t count; nopony ever took him seriously anyway.
Penelope arrived at Pinkie’s stall with her notepad in hoof and a pencil stuck in her mane. She was a tall, thin unicorn, with a thick layer of mascara and a white apron tied around her withers over her thoroughly over starched waitressing uniform. She arched an eyebrow at the mare crouching low in the bench before her, and looking as if she’d just committed murder. “Ai’t, is everything a’right here, Pinkie?” She asked in that distinctive Manehattan accent, the one that always made Pinkie think she ought to be chewing gum— or rocks—the first of which she happened to be doing right now.
“Shush!” Pinkie shushed the waitress, and then rushed to get up. Waving her hooves, she hurriedly led the mare towards the washroom.
~ ~ ~
The two burst through the door, Penelope first and Pinkie directly behind as she pushed them forwards into the bathroom. Inside was a row of empty stalls and grimy sinks, with equally grimy looking mirrors. The incandescent light bathed the room in a bright white, made only sharper by the conservative white tiles covering most of the walls and floor. It was a stark contrast from the finely crafted atmosphere that the diner liked to keep outside. But, most importantly, it was empty— a fact for which Pinkie gratefully thanked Celestia.
They slammed the door behind them and Pinkie ducked around its side whilst Penelope watched with contempt. Pinkie held the door slightly ajar as she glancing around frantically.
Penelope, with her hooves crossed, leaned against the wall beside her. She blew a bubble with her gum and let it pop. She then gathered it back up into her mouth before speaking, “What’s the problem then?” She was giving Pinkie a look, the kind of look a friend gives you when they’re concerned, but at the same time not quite sure why they put up with this horse apples to begin with, “You actin’ like ya saw a ghost.”
She was right, of course. Pinkie had turned several shades paler that day and was sure she’d lost at least another month of her life. She ignored Penelope as she scanned across the stalls. After a moment of looking, Pinkie spotted her target. The two ponies from earlier were still seated at their stall, engrossed in an avid conversation about- What? Pinkie couldn’t quite remember; something about saddles, but that was beside the point. The Pink mare said something, and then broke out of her conversation for a moment to turn their way, seemingly looking directly at her. Pinkie Pie felt her stomach sink into a kind of void she feared it may never return. They locked eyes for just a moment before she pulled herself away to address Penelope. “Look out there and tell me what you see,” Pinkie grabbed Penelope by the fetlock and pressed her muzzle against the open gap in the door.
“Okay, okay,” She shook Pinkie off and pulled the door slightly further open and poked her head outside. There was a sudden prod from a hoof in her side, and Penelope was promptly pulled back into the bathroom leaving the door to swing shut.
“Not like that!” Pinkie shouted in a hushed tone, “They’ll see you.” Pinkie then opened the door once again, leaving only a small gap for Penelope to look through. “Like this” She motioned for Penelope to look.
“Pf” The waitress stuck out her lip and tried again, looking through the tiny gap Pinkie had left opened for her.
“Do you see that?” She heard Pinkie whisper in her ear as she looked around the diner, “In the stalls, behind mine.” She directed her attention to the stalls and scanned across them, quickly spotting the one in question, still sitting with an empty milkshake glass—now toppled over and leaking out onto the yellow binder it lay next to. She then turned her attention to the bench to the left, directly behind the one Pinkie had been sitting at. Sure enough, there sat a pair of ponies, one totally unfamiliar though she could tell he worked at one of the local news agencies—they always had that look to them— the other far too familiar for her liking.
“... Is that?”
“It is.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely”
Penelope left the door and turned around to face Pinkie. Her friend looked no better than before, slightly less pale but still very. She had sat against the wall next to one of the sinks, with her tail tucked neatly around her, and was busying herself with her fedora in her hooves, leaving the most extraordinary case of hat-hair she had ever seen. Though, even as she watched, the hair slowly sank under its own weight and was beginning to sag over Pinkie’s shoulders.
“So what you gon’ do?”
“I don’t know”— Pinkie Pie was avoiding her gaze, instead focusing her attention on her fedora. It was now starting to look slightly scrunched from being handled. Her mane was starting to hang limp now, and a misty expression seemed to be coming over the mare.
“Well ya have t’ do something. Haven’t ya said before ya’d give anything for this kind of opportunity?”
“I did” Pinkie nodded, “But I didn’t think it’d actually happen. I mean”— she headed back to the door to look outside one more time. The mare and stallion were still talking. – “I’ve wanted this so much. I’ve thought about what I’d say, what I’d do.”
“Then you know what to do, just go an’ do that” Penelope joined Pinkie at the door to put a hoof on her shoulder, as a show of support and in hopes of comforting the mare. Instead Pinkie flinched at the contact, slinking away slightly before changing her mind and letting Penelope’s touch remain.
“I can’t. I have a life here now. What would Manehattan do without their top detective?”
“We’ll figure somethin’ out,” Penelope smiled.
Pinkie turned to look Penelope in the eyes. She said nothing, but she could tell the mare was asking her: really?
Penelope simply nodded. Really.
“But I can’t just leave them!” Pinkie threw her hooves in the air and trotted around to the back of the bathroom. She turned to face Penelope, now with a scowl on her expression. Her mane had now gone completely lax and hung freely at her sides. The Stetson laid discard on the floor, “And even if I could go back it’d never be the same. I could pretend that I’m the Pinkie Pie I used to be, but it wouldn’t be real, I wouldn’t be real... Do you think I can get back that time I’ve lost with them?” Pinkie realised there was something wet dripping down the side of her face, so she wiped it away with a fetlock.
“Well...” Penelope wasn’t quite sure how to answer this. This was a side of her friend she’d only seen only once before. Back on that day she came across a lone mare walking down the street in the rain, with her head hanging low. The same mare that stood across from her now, the one that had become nothing but confidence and outwards going, the mare that had become her best friend in little under ten minutes.
This was a mare that was strong. Pinkie never got angry; even when dealing with the police-force she would still have an air of calmness to her. But now, now she only saw a filly, and a fragile one at that.
“Whatever you choose”, she began. Penelope could tell her friend was almost to tears. She couldn’t help her with this decision, the only thing she could do was give her the support and encouragement she needed, just like before. Penelope crossed the distance between them and pulled Pinkie into a rough hug, “Just know that I’ll be there for you, always.”
It took her by surprise at first, but once Pinkie knew what was happening she gladly accepted. She wiped another tear from her face and returned the hug best she could, and nuzzled deep into the scratchy, harsh fabric of Penelope’s uniform. Normally she wouldn’t’ like how it felt, how it grabbed at her fur, but just this moment it was exactly what she needed. “Thank you.”
~ ~ ~
And that was it. Yes, I just let her leave. Me and Penelope watched from that grimy bathroom door whilst the pony who’d replaced me, the one pony I’d been hoping to see again more than anything else in my life, walked right out of that diner and out of my life.
She’s gone now, though I know where she is, I could never forget, but I will most likely never see her again.
And you know what? I’m happy.
I’m happy with my life as it is. It may not be anything I’d expected, it may not be the life I left behind, but it’s my life, and that is what’s most important.
Now I have a new destiny.
And I’m not going to let this one fall to the wayside like I did my old one.
That I promise, as Manehattan’s greatest P.I.
