I trotted down the hallway of the school, squeezing through the walls of ponies who haven't gotten to their lockers yet. I was eager to get to my locker, shove my things in it, and get home.
It was a sunny Thursday in October, and my brother, Blackhoof, was walking with me. He was a pitch black unicorn, with insanely amazing magical ability and was extremely intelligent. Frankly, I was smart as well. I was ahead of my accelerated math class, and excelled in almost every class. However, if organization and not being flaky for a day were subjects, I would be having two F's on my report card among the A's and high B's.
"So Soprano, your friend, what's his name, Guns?" Blackhoof began to say.
"What about him?" I asked, cocking an eyebrow.
"I've been thinking about him, and I sort of think he likes you."
"He'd never. We're just friends, and it's gonna stay that way. He knows that. Plus, he's said before that he doesn't like me like that."
"You know that he's full of crap, Soprano. Deep inside, you know he has a crush on you."
I scoffed. "Yeah, right."
I really didn't believe him. In fact, I dismissed the thought entirely when I laid eyes on my locker number, 1196. I sat down on my haunches and started using my magic to unlock my locker. Once I did, the locker opened, revealing a tangled mess of paper and pencils, binders and other random stuff.
A different yet familiar voice sounded behind me. "You should really clean out that disaster area sometime."
It was Guns N. Roses. I sighed in amusement. "Sure, I'll clean it out when I have the chance."
I was, in a way, right. We only had fifteen minutes of homeroom, and who would have the time to clean out a mess like this one in that short amount of time? And we had only three minutes between classes, and that isn't even a twelfth of the amount I need for cleaning out something like this. It was this reason why I would fail organization class if it were a subject.
I couldn't stand ponies who weren't smart. A colt named Hooper made F's in three classes last year, but my history teacher had me tutor him when we both had the time, because I was the most intelligent pony in her classes by far.
He was extremely hard to work with.
Guns nudged me on the shoulder. "You okay?"
I caught myself staring at him. I shook my head violently to snap out of it. Why was I doing this? Why wasn't I paying any more attention? I had no idea, but it was awkward.
When Guns walked away and Blackhoof kept droning on about how he and I would make a cute couple, I glanced back at my best friend, who was sitting at a table with a couple of other friends now. I sighed, listening to Blackhoof blabber about it. Maybe he was right.
I began to think about how we first met.
Star was picking favorites again, and every pony was tired of it. I trotted away from the table, levitating my lunch behind me. I found a table with one seat open. I slowly walked up to it, then asked, "Excuse me? May I please sit here?"
A light yellow earth pony colt looked up at me. He had a small mustache, almost as if he were held back a couple of years. He spoke after a few seconds. "Yeah, you can sit here. We're all for new friends."
Everyone else smiled at me, waving their hooves and beckoning me towards an empty seat. All except one, named Ball Zip. He simply looked away, not saying anything.
Then, he looked back at me and grinned. "Just kidding, go ahead, sit down."
I chuckled, sitting in the empty seat. I simply acted as a normal pony would do. But, they stared at me and laughed when I tried to use long words like an intelligent pony. They all introduced themselves. The filly with the red hair and purple fur was named Pencilla, an artist who loved to draw whatever her mind thinks up.
The filly with the short brown mane and dark blue fur was named Night Mars, a pony who had a horrible sense of humor but nobody told her because they never wanted to hurt each other's feelings. Ball Zip was a colt with short dirty blond hair and red fur.
Another colt, named Champion Touchdown, was a member of the hoofball team, but wasn't really recognized by the other members. There was a shy filly at the opposite side of the table from me, with black hair and pink fur. She had glasses. Her name was Academia Smartie, the valedictorian of the entire school pretty much. She had been working on math, specifically the order of operations.
Another colt also wore glasses, and had orange hair with light green skin with the name of Apple Bake. He was a baker, just some information that I happened to overhear. It seemed to be obvious, since he worked with Pinkie Pie in a bakery across the street.
I introduced myself, a unicorn filly named Soprano Song, with purplish-pink fur and brown and blonde hair. Everyone at the table seemed to accept me as a part of the group as soon as I got to know all of them. From then on, Guns N. Roses was my best friend out of all of them. Therefore, ponies all thought we were dating. But, that was ridiculous.
As it turns out, Guns was eleven years old, like me at the time.
In the car, my mother asked how my day was, as usual. I told her about everything that happened throughout the day, and she kept nodding as if she wasn't listening.
My sisters and younger brother were in the car, so it was chaos, as expected every day. I checked my phone for any notifications, then went to the Messages app and started texting my friends. I texted, "Hey."
When I sent the message, my phone issued three vibrations, indicating that there were texts being sent. One was from Pencilla, one was from Night Mars, and one from Guns. They said "What's up," "Heller," and "Hi". I texted back, "Guns I have an awkward dare for you", and sent it.
He replied, "What's that". My hooves shaking, I tapped the letters in order of "I dare you to say 'hay and oats' to the filly you like". Sent it, and got a reply. "Hay and oats".
Who did he direct that to? Two more texts showed up, one saying "OH MY GOSH" and one saying "Oh god, can't wait to see where this goes... Break a leg, Guns!"
I was confused. So, I sent a question mark.
I got another text from Guns. "That was directed towards you, Soprano Song."
My heart was thumping in my throat. He likes me? That's crazy! I replied, "Is this some kind of prank?!"
Four others, one from each of the other ponies in the group text, all said "no."
I was blushing hard, and my phone was shaking in my magic's grip. Soon, I let go of it, letting the phone drop to my lap. I covered my face with my hooves and blushed, the redness heading up to my ears, my neck, and even my eyelids, and soon my whole face was turned from purple to red.
I shook like a rabbit in the middle of a winter storm. My mother looked back at me, and thought I was crying for some reason. "Honey, are you okay?" she asked me. I didn't move, didn't respond. Not because I didn't want to, but because my throat was too dry to make words.
Soon enough, I choked out the words. "My best friend has a crush on me..." But apparently it was inaudible to everyone in the car.
"What was that dear?" Mom asked, reaching to touch my hoof.
I looked up at her. She looked surprised that tears weren't rolling from my eyes, but instead said eyes were widened, and my face was red all over. I talked louder. "My best friend has a crush on me."
It was still too quiet, considering my sisters were being loud, yelling and fighting. My mother asked me what I said again, and this time I almost yelled. "My best friend said he likes me... As in he wants to me more than friends."
Mother gasped, then covered her mouth with her hooves as she pulled the car to a stop in the driveway. "Go for it," was all she said before paying more attention to my sisters and brothers.
What did she mean? Should I ask him out or something? What did Mom want me to do about this?
There was only one thing to do. I texted a winking ponemoji, then said "I guess we're dating now." I did kind of like him back, anyway. Besides, it might not be so bad. But one thing was for sure; I would never look at Guns N. Roses the same way again.
