Later, she supposed that it was just simple nostalgia that made her decide to take an evening stroll through the orchards of Sweet Apple Acres. The historic home of the Apple Family was so vast in its acreage that the clan of earth ponies didn’t mind one bit if their neighbors decided to take a walk amongst the apple trees. Cheerilee had dozens of wonderful memories of these hallowed trails, most dating back to when she was nothing more than a little filly. It was a special, untouched place where the air smelled of apples and good memories.
The sun was just setting when she stepped off the main road and into the orchards proper. The small saddlebag she’d packed with a sheet, a bottle of wine, and a selection of cheeses jostled only slightly as she left the smooth dirt road and started down the slightly bumpier old trail. As she trotted along, a small smile on her face, she looked around at the ancient apple trees in the dying light. There was something comforting about their presence. Some had been here for generations before her and would likely be here for generations after. She inhaled the sweet smell of apples and felt a flood of old memories rush through her. From scraped knees on exposed tree roots to giggling with old school friends about cute colts to bitter tears when she’d hidden here after her mother had passed away.
Her hooves carried her further, almost of their own accord, as decades of muscle memory took over while she reflected on the atmosphere and her memories.
The trees faded into darkness with the setting sun. As she always had, she stopped and waited. It was the magic moment, the one she had loved since her earliest days. She just had to…
There! A singular flash of light!
Flash! Another!
Her smile grew until it stretched across her muzzle as swarms of fireflies began their evening dance. There were hundreds of them around her, their lights creating a field of stars that floated silently around her. And speaking of stars…
She craned her neck up and took in the blanket that had settled over the world. Here fireflies of a different sort, of burning white light remained wholly stationary but managed to dance all the same in their own little way. The ancient stars sang their ancient song of fire and danced across the sky, just as they always had. Just as they always would. The bulbous full moon waxed into view, the faint glow of Princess Luna’s magic just barely visible as she did her nightly work and moved it across the sky.
She looked to the stars for guidance, to tell her where to head next on the path of life. She silently begged them to guide her to her future…
No answer came… but light did.
The shining moonlight returned the path and the trees to her sight and she set off once again at a brisk but easy trot, her earlier crisis shoved to the back of her mind for now. The fireflies followed her, blinking and flashing as they desperately sought out mates…
That thought brought new memories rushing to the forefront. Memories of chaste kisses early in life and kisses later of a much lesser chaste variety. Dances with a colt who grew into a stallion beneath the starry sky and between the flashing fireflies. She remembered holding him as he wept after a terrible tragedy and thinking how strange it was to see a stallion so strong reduced to…
“Beautiful night.”
She froze and stared at her surroundings. Her wandering hooves had taken advantage of her reminiscing mind and carried her to a place she had not been in years. It was a clearing, almost a perfect circle of grass, surrounded by some of the oldest and most weathered trees in the orchard. Just off center of the clearing was a stately tree all by its lonesome. Hanging from one thick branch, suspended by a series of old rusted chains, was a swing made of polished apple wood.
Sitting in the swing as it creaked in the night was the stallion she had just been thinking about. She could see his smile, even in the darkness. She returned it at once. “Hi, Mac.”
Macintosh Apple, Big Mac to his friends (which was just another way of saying everyone), waved her over and patted the space on the swing beside him.
She accepted the invitation and crossed the clearing. She climbed up onto the swing and settled comfortably next to him. “How have you been? I feel like we haven’t spoken in ages.”
“Eeyup.” He looked up at the moon. “Been good. You?”
“Wonderful, thank you for asking.” Her smile faded somewhat as a sudden tension fell between them. “Um… how’s the farm?”
He coughed. “Doin’ alright, I guess. How are those colts and fillies treatin’ you?”
Cheerilee unconsciously smiled at the thought of her students. “They’re all doing very well this year. I have a feeling Apple Bloom is going to be quite the scholar."
"Brains had to go to somepony in the family I guess.” His ears perked up as the implication of his statement sank in. “Uh, don’t tell AJ I said that.”
They laughed like two old friends and then lapsed into a more comfortable, contemplative silence.
Mac ran a hoof along the wood of the old swing. “Do you remember when we first found this place?”
“Goodness yes.” Cheerilee smiled at the memory. “We couldn’t have been more than ten.”
“Nine, actually. It was right around Applejack’s second birthday.”
“If I remember right, it was her birthday. We snuck away from the party so you could show me the trunk your fath…” She stopped and looked at him quickly, checking for the tell-tale signs of old pain. She watched for a wince, a frown… but no. His face remained blank and staring. He was still remembering. “So you could show me what you’d found in your father’s old trunk.”
“Eeyup.” He smiled. “And that’s where we found the map.”
“The map says it should be right around… here!”
“Oh wow!” The fuchsia filly in pigtails and glasses ran through the clearing and right up to the old swing. “This is so cool!”
Her companion, an already tall but still lanky red colt ambled up behind her. “Cool? I thought we was gonna find some treasure or something.’”
“You thought we 'were' going to find treasure.” The filly corrected him.
The colt rolled his eyes at his best friend and looked around the clearing. “Treasure or not, I wonder why Pa never told me about this place.”
“You could ask him when we go back.” The filly bent down and sniffed at the grass. It smelled sweeter here than other patches in Ponyville, somehow. “Then again, maybe not. Maybe it’s a secret place, like in that book Miss Glow-Worm let me borrow from the library last week.” She nimbly leaped up onto the swing and settled in. “Come swing with me!”
The colt sprang up next to her and the two youngsters rode the swing in comfortable silence for a few minutes, the only sound the gentle creaking of the chains.
“I like it here.” The filly sighed.
“Eeyup.” The colt examined the woods surrounding them. “Quiet. Peaceful like.” Something caught his eye on the trunk of the tree that held the swing. Something had been carved deeply into the ancient apple wood; a stylized heart surrounding a set of letters. “R plus S?” The colt muttered. “The hay does that mean?”
The filly gasped as the colt’s hooves slapped up to his mouth. “You said a bad word!” The colt was still trying to blabber an apology when the filly saw what he had been examining. She gasped even louder. “I knew it! It is a secret spot! It’s just like in my book. Some stallion brought his marefriend here a long time ago and they fell in love!”
The colt frowned. “I outghtta tell Pa about this. If there’s one thing Rome Apple don’t stand for, it’s vandalism.”
The filly grabbed his shoulders and stared into his eyes. His latest grammatical mistake was all but forgotten. “Mac! You can’t tell anypony about this!”
“And why not?”
“Because it’s against the rules of a secret!” She glared at him. “If you tell anypony but me about this place, I’ll tell your Miss Silent that it was you who dipped Spoiled Rotten’s mane in the inkwell last Wednesday.”
“You can’t say she didn’t deserve it, Cheerilee. She was makin’ fun of my accent!” He grabbed her shoulders now. “You can’t tell mama! She won’t understand!”
Cheerilee removed her hooves but did not avert her gaze. “Do you promise to never tell anypony about this secret spot?”
Mac nodded and let go of her shoulders. “So long as you promise to never tell my Mama about Spoiled and the inkwell.”
She nodded back.
As one, the two little ponies stuck out their right hooves and spit on them. With a final determined look, they clopped their hooves together, sealing the oldest and most honored of childhood traditions. They wiped their hooves clean on their coats and continued to swing in the quiet clearing.
After a while, Cheerilee looked over at her best friend. “You know… this could be our secret spot, too.”
“Eeyup.” Mac muttered, half asleep.
Before she could give herself the chance to reconsider, Cheerilee’s face darted out and kissed Mac lightly on his cheek. Not letting him react, or to see the blush on her face, she jumped off the swing and ran back towards the woods. “C’mon, let’s go back! Before they start getting worried.”
Mac followed a moment later, his progress slower with only three usable hooves. The fourth was still pressed against his cheek where the filly’s warm lips had just been.
“I never broke that promise.” Mac smiled directly at Cheerilee for the first time since he’d first seen her that night.
Cheerilee sheepishly smiled back. “Uh… I kinda did.”
Mac gave her an exaggerated look of shock and horror. “What? It was you that told my Mama about Spoiled Rotten and the inkwell? Who woulda guessed?”
Cheerilee giggled. “It was your own fault, you big goof. That’s what you get for gossiping to Time Turner about my kissing you on the cheek.” She reached into her saddlebag for the wine and cheese. “Spoiled found out and spent the rest of the year trying to convince the school I was some kind of floozy.”
“Well, weren’t ya?” He chuckled. “Goin’ around and givin’ out cheek kisses like that to any colt who happened to say ‘How-de-do.’”
She laughed again as she started working at the cork of the wine bottle. She stopped and smiled at him in embarrassment. “Sorry, I only brought the one glass.”
“’Salright.’” Mac cracked his huge neck. “I don’t mind sharin.’ ‘Specially when it’s you I’m sharin’ with.”
She finished opening the bottle and poured a fair amount in the one glass she’d packed. She sipped the sweet liquid and passed it to Mac who accepted graciously. As she watched him take his own sip, she started talking before she could stop herself. “Do you remember the first time we drank wine out here?”
Mac paused but only for a moment. He lowered the glass, his face neutral. “How could I forget?”
“Mac, don’t drink so fast. You’ll make yourself sick.” The mare with the fuchsia coat, now just over fourteen and now sporting a shorter mane-cut that would not see the end of the summer, admonished her best and oldest friend.
The tall red stallion, still quite lanky but already starting to fill out, ignored her and took another long pull from the stolen bottle of wine.
The mare huffed in irritation and snatched the bottle away. A few drops spilled and splashed onto her black funeral dress. She glared, first at the dress and then at him. “Now do you see what you’ve done?” She admonished him.
“Can’t hardly see it.” Mac muttered. “Black dress.”
“Doesn’t matter. Do you have any idea how much that old nag Needle Point charged me for this thing?” Cheerilee took a drink from the bottle herself and settled back onto the swing. “The sooner that old biddy retires and we get a new head seamstress in town, the better.”
Mac loosened his black tie and stared at the ground. “Sorry. I’m just…”
Cheerilee sighed and wrapped a foreleg around his great shoulders. “You don’t have to apologize, big guy. I’m sorry. I know you’re just in a bad place right now.” The sun was starting to set. The funeral would be long over by now. Ponies would start looking for them soon. She took another swallow of wine and offered the bottle back to him.
He took it but just stared at it. “It just…” He shook with a sudden sob. “It just ain’t fair!” The bottle fell from his hooves and landed with a thump on the soft grass. Red wine spilled across the green like a spreading pool of blood. “We just lost Pa! And now Ma…” He sobbed again, the tears starting to flow in earnest now. “Ma… Mama…”
Cheerilee pulled him tight against her as the best stallion she knew began to weep. She stroked his back and told him it was okay, that he needed to let it all out. She wanted to remind him about everypony he still had, about Granny Smith and Applejack and baby Apple Bloom… and her. Instead, she just held him until the tremors passed. He pulled away and she saw his long face, the muzzle caked with tears and mucus. She gently smiled at him and used his tie to clean his face as best as she was able.
Then she brought her lips to his, ever so briefly.
He didn’t return the gesture. He just froze in shock.
She pulled back until their muzzles were just slightly apart and looked deep into his eyes. “Mac. Kiss me.” She leaned in again and this time he met her on equal terms.
“You have no idea how long I’d wanted to do that.” Cheerilee sighed dreamily as she nibbled a bit of cheese.
The two ponies were now stretched out on the sheet Cheerilee had brought along. They lay together, side by side, and stared up into the stars like they had when they had been small and often taken summer camping trips.
“But why’d you do it then?” Mac asked, chasing his own cheese with another sip of wine.
“Because it was the only thing I could think of at the time. Because I think you needed it.” She rolled onto her side and looked at him. “Because you needed somepony to care.”
He rolled to face her and smiled. “You were right. I did need somepony.” He hesitated. “And…”
“And…?”
“And I’d been waiting for you to do it for a while.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You do know you could’ve kissed me anytime you wanted, right?”
“Shucks, Cheers.” He laughed that deep laugh of his, using his special nickname for her that he hadn’t used in years. “You know I wasn’t no kind of Casanova back in those days.”
Cheerilee laughed herself. “Believe me; nopony knows that better than me. I practically had to hoof-lead you through every milestone while we were dating.” She tapped her hoof against the sheet as she listed off events. “Our first date, our first make-out, our first anniversary, prom…” She smirked at him. “After prom.”
Mac blushed and choked on his wine. “Now, as I recall, I was a mite more prepared for that particular milestone than you might be letting on.”
“Only because I had thoroughly educated you on the different bases months before hoof.” She giggled, the wine getting to her head slightly. She was definitely feeling a pleasant buzz. “As I recall, I let you reach first base on that very swing over there.”
“Eeyup.” He matched her grin. “That was by design. This has always been our special spot. All the way up to…” This time it was him who trailed off.
Their smiles faded as Cheerilee finished for him. “Until it ended.”
“Mac? Are you almost done?”
“Eeyup.” Mac responded with the handle of the carving knife still clutched in his teeth. He made one final touch and stepped back to admire his handiwork. He’d taken the liberty of adding a new carving beneath the one left by the clearing’s original occupants. It was another stylized heart, but the message inside was different; M + C. He allowed the knife to fall to grass and grinned. “There. Now there’s a permanent…” He turned and was struck dumb by the sight before him.
Cheerilee, his marefriend of the past five years, was stretched out on her back and wriggling in the fresh green grass. She nickered with pleasure at the feel of the soft plants on her coat. All four of her legs kicked in the air lazily. To Mac, she appeared to be nothing less than some goddess basking in the warmth of the summer sun.
She caught him staring and smirked at him with hooded eyes. “See something you like, big guy?”
Mac could only nod, struck more mute than usual by the sight.
The fuchsia mare rolled onto her stomach and sent a wink over her shoulder. “Well, come on then.”
Mac did not have to be told twice.
They made love there in the grass as earth ponies had done in the days long passed. Their breathy whispers and cries joined the sound of birdsong and the wind in the apple trees. They finished together (Cheerilee slightly before. Mac was a gentlestallion, after all) and lay on their sides in the grass to catch their collective breath.
Cheerilee snuggled into Mac’s chest, a cat-like grin of satisfaction on her face. “I’m going to miss this.”
He buried his muzzle in her mane and inhaled the scent of sunflowers. “What? The snugglin?’ Or…”
She giggled and kissed his foreleg. “Both. But I’m really talking about all of this. The smell of the apple trees, our secret spot…” She felt the telling pin-pricks in her eyes. “You.”
“Ah, Cheers…”
“No. No.” She tried to laugh it off as she hurriedly wiped at her eyes. “I told myself I wasn’t going to cry.”
He pulled her tighter against him and kissed the back of her neck. “It’ll all still be here when you get back. Me included.” He smiled against her skin so she could feel it. “And yer gonna write, aintcha?”
“Of course. Just because I’m going to school doesn’t mean we’re done. I love you, Mac.”
“And I love you, Cheers. And I always will. And I’ll be right here waiting when you get back. And then…”
Cheerilee rolled over so they were face to face. She saw the troubled look in his eyes and tried to calm him with a smile. “I’ll be more ready to give you a proper answer once I’m a certified teacher. I promise.”
His proposal had been perfect, the kind that every mare dreamed of. He’d even offered her his mother’s ring, the only item if hers he’d kept since she passed. It had broken her heart a little to tell him that she wasn’t ready to say yes or no. But her destiny called to her. Miss Sunbeam would be retiring soon and Ponyville would be needing a new teacher. If Cheerilee wanted the job, then she needed to get her degree. And soon.
Mac had said he understood but he had been unable to hide the pain in his face. The uncertainty.
She stroked his face and kissed him. “I’ll be back before you know it.” She kissed him again, more heated this time. They parted and she put her forehead against his. “Can you… can you go again?” She panted. “Before my train leaves tonight?”
“Eeyup.”
As it turned out, he had enough left to go twice more before she waved good-bye to him, and all of Ponyville, later that night.
“So what happened?” Mac absent-mindedly chewed a blade of grass as he looked up into the starry night. “You never told me that.”
Cheerilee had rolled away from him and was now staring into the woods. She could not bear to look at the stallion she had once called her own. “I was lonely.”
He stopped chewing. “So you found somepony else?”
“Not until after I broke up with you. Not until a long time after.” She sighed. “School was harder than I ever thought it would be. I couldn’t give it my all if part of my mind was always back here with you.” She looked back at him. “The selfish part of me hoped you’d still be waiting when I came home.”
Mac resumed chewing. “I was with Roseluck when you came home, wasn’t I?”
“Yeah.” She sighed again. “You never hinted that you still felt anything for me, so I… I just let it go, I guess.” She curled into herself. “I didn’t think you even wanted to be friends anymore. You were chasing every tail that crossed your path and it just felt like you were mocking me after a while.”
“You hurt me, Cheers.” He rumbled lowly. “You hurt me deep. Some stallions crawl into a bottle when a mare breaks his heart. I chose to crawl in the beds of a few mares instead.”
“A few?” The wine made her words more cutting than she’d meant them to sound. She started counting mares like she’d been counting dating milestones earlier. “Roseluck, Lily, Aloe and Lotus, Rarity, Twilight Sparkle, Derpy Hooves, Pinkie Pie, Pinkie Pie’s sister, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie’s other sister…”
“Maud don’t count.” Mac muttered, getting irritated. “That mare was like a statue in the sack.”
Cheerilee just kept naming names, no longer minding the vindictive tone in her voice. “…Daisy, Fleetfoot, Trixie…”
Mac threw his hooves into the air in exasperation. “Like I keep tellin’ everypony; I didn’t sleep with Trixie! I wanted to, Celestia above I wanted to, but she was drunk as a skunk and that don’t do nothin’ for me.” He sat up and glared at her, spitting out the grass. “It’s not like you’ve been Miss Polly Pure these past few years.”
She sat up and matched his glare’s ferocity. “A couple stallions compared to half a village’s worth of mares? That’s a laugh.”
He actually did laugh. It was a harsh, barking sound. “A couple? Time Turner, Thunderlane, Blues, Bulk Biceps…”
Now it was Cheerilee’s turn to throw her hooves up. “So I have a weakness for stallions with muscles! Sue me!”
Mac leveled his eyes with hers and raised an eyebrow. “Filthy Rich.”
“I did not sleep with Filthy Rich! That scum of a stallion propositioned me. I turned him down as politely as I could, and the next thing I know half the town thinks I’m some kind of lurking husband snatcher!” She stood on all four hooves and glared at him. “Why do you care anyway?!”
“Because yer my mare!” He roared. “You’ve always been my mare!”
“And you’ve always been my stallion!” She roared right back at him.
They stood there a moment, tensed and panting.
She rushed him and he caught her as she collided with him. The impact drove him onto his back and they lay there, sloppily making out like a couple of teenagers. A decade’s worth of emotion poured out of them as they rolled from the sheet to the grass and back again. They kissed and nipped and licked and bit at everything their mouths could reach. They caressed every inch their hooves could touch and relished in the long forgotten sounds and smells and tastes of each other.
They rolled into position and he took her roughly, her poufy mane clutched in his teeth. Her tongue lolled out and her hooves pawed at the ground for desperate purchase as he went at her with all the strength he had in him. It was quick and hard and over in a matter of moments. He pulled away from her to try catching his breath but she pulled him back to the ground with a growl. She pushed him onto his back, clambered atop him, and gave everything back to him just as hard and fast as she was able. They clutched each other tight, hips rolling and breaths quickly taken when they could bear to let their lips come apart from the near constant kissing. This time they finished almost simultaneously and collapsed in a heap of sweaty limbs, desperately doing their best to remember how breathing was supposed to work.
The sheet was now rumpled and lay both under them and over them as well. The wine bottle was gone, kicked out into the woods somewhere. Her saddlebag was flattened beneath Mac’s great back.
He didn’t care. The only thing that mattered was the mare panting on his chest. He kissed her sweaty forehead.
She smiled weakly and licked his cheek, thrilling at the salt of the earth taste that was her Macintosh. “I… I missed this.”
He chuckled. “Missed what? The snugglin?’ Or…”
She giggled and rubbed her mess of a mane against his chin. “Both. But I’m talking about this. All of this. The smell of the trees, our secret spot…” She inwardly squealed at the squeeze he gave her. “You.”
He stuck his muzzle in her mane and breathed deep, swearing to never lose that sunflower smell ever again. “All those mares… you know they didn’t mean nothin.’”
She gave him a dry look.
“Okay, maybe Marble Pie meant somethin.’ But we never would’ve lasted.”
“And why’s that?”
“Well, for one thing; she ain’t you, Cheers.”
She buried her face in his coat and laughed. “Any other reasons?”
“Our conversations weren’t nothin’ to write home about.”
She started shaking with laughter. “You think she was bad? I dated Bulk Biceps. You can keep saying ‘Eeyup’ as long as you’d like, big guy, but I don’t need to hear ‘YEAH’ again until the day I die.”
His chest rose and fell as he started laughing with her.
They laughed until their chests hurt and then simply snuggled. The fireflies emerged from the woods and danced around them.
Cheerilee looked up at him. “Mac?”
“Yes, Cheers?”
“I never stopped loving you.”
“Me neither.”
She sighed happily. “Oh, we’re a mess, me and you.” She traced a circle on his chest with a hoof. “What do we do now?”
He ran a hoof through her mane. “We can start over. Or…”
“Or?”
“Or… we can pick up where we left off.”
Cheerilee considered the implication of his words. She considered her age and calculated how many years she had left if she still wanted foals of her own. She considered her steady employment and the degree that now held a place of honor in the classroom where she intended to keep teaching until she was too old to continue. She considered the fact that, finally, she had everything she’d ever wanted.
Everything… except somepony to share it with.
Everything… except for the stallion who was holding her now.
She glanced over at the trunk of the tree that held the swing. Even in the moonlight, she could clearly make out the markings that Mac had left there so long ago.
M + C
Really, there was only one answer she could give him. “Mac?”
“Yes?”
He looked down at her and she looked up at him. She looked into his eyes and saw what she’d been searching the stars for.
She saw her future.
“Kiss me.”
Author's Note
