Author's Note
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The AfterParty
Pinkie Pie brushed her hooves against Sugar Cube Corner’s mess-driven floor. Pieces of paper, plastic cups, and the carcasses of deflated balloons littered the room; the morning was on the horizon,
“It was fun,” Pinkie smiled, snapping herself out of the daze that grabbed her attention, “At least it ended well. . .”
She paced around the room, eyeballing the scraps of confetti,
“They won’t forget me, right?” She hesitated, breaking her circle to find a plastic trash bag, “Sure, they’ve known me forever, but they could still forget. My parties are always a blast.”
Pinkie’s face remained stone cold as she said those words; there was something wrong. She clenched her jaw as her lips cracked from the late night parch; her eyes sagged with fatigue. She would’ve done anything to hit the hay, but there was cleaning to do.
“There’s always another time, isn’t there?” Pinkie sighed, grabbing a broom that leaned against the cashier’s counter.
“There’ll be more guests, right?” she frowned, taking in the reception’s golden glow of Celestia’s gift. The windowpanes glistened diamonds of light against the sleepy dance floor, warming the stagnant face of party debris.
“I’m sure I can throw another one. It doesn’t have to end all at once, right?”
Pinkie’s ears fluttered to the sounds of peaceful butterflies feathering outside. The birds that flew practiced their somber tune, singing it with their young in a sense of moving on. A caterpillar, catching the eye of the pink mare, crawled along the windowsill, desperately trying to make his way to the outside world that waited. Pinkie’s hooves wrapped around the thin, wood broomstick as she swept away the dust. Her collecting ears caught the sweet sounds of cluttering plastic as each cup scraped against the floor; she sighed, sweeping a pile into a large, black lawn bag, watching as her memories fall down a spiraling drain of waste.
“We can’t hold on forever, right?” Pinkie sighed, dragging her hooves across the bakery’s foyer to reach a portrait of her friends taken long before the party.
As Pinkie’s gaze caught in a torrent of memories, she smiled, taking out the photograph from its original frame. Chuckling, she spotted a large brown stain on the purple-mare’s chest.
“I remember that!” Pinkie giggled, dropping the frame to the floor, its glass shattering in a ring around her.
“It was the day Twilight was late for our picnic. Hehe,” she snorted, “Twilight was so tired from studying, she spilled her hot coco all over herself, what a mess! We all laughed and helped her clean; what a day!”
She paused, looking at the picture more closely, “This. . . this was the day Dashie said she was leaving Ponyville. . .”
A tear, the size of a pearl fell free from Pinkie’s eye, landing upon the photograph.
“Th-The Wonderbolts s-said they had a better place for her. Sh-She had no choice. . .”
Her eyes draped, crumbling the photograph into a condensed ball of tears, dropping it into the lawn bag. Pinkie looked around the room; there was still a lot of sweeping to do,
“There’ll be time for thinking later,” she assured, returning to her rote activities,
“I’ve only got a few more things I need to do.”
The pink pony wiped her forehead, looking at the work she had done. The bag rested on her left hoof, filled to the brim with the garbage of last night’s venture. She stepped into the kitchen carrying the bag and noticed a small white note resting on the table. Without hesitation, she read the note aloud to herself, the only pony at Sugar Cube Corner.
“Thanks Pinkie!
We had a blast! I’m sure you have big plans for next time!
Love,
Twilight Sparkle”
Pinkie sighed once more, tossing the note into the bag before dumping it outside.
“Just a few more things,” she muttered, trotting upstairs to check her room. She reached out, grabbing the handle and listening to the bedroom door crack against the hardened paint; it had been a while since she’d been in there.
Hundreds more frames lined the walls top to bottom, featuring only pictures of Pinkie Pie. She hoped someone would find this place the way she remembered it, for it was just that, a place to remember. Pinkie grabbed a stack of planks from her bedside, carrying them back downstairs to hide her past. Her aching hooves stumbled down the creaking stairs as she opened the front door, closing it behind her. With a heavy heart, Pinkie hammered the planks, sealing the shop she worked in for so many years. The ponies she met there would stay locked away in the vault of memories she contained. The thoughts she kept would live on, but only for those willing to uncover a dead trend.
Pinkie sighed, looking back at the le ole, “Sugar Cube Corner”, and smiled.
“I remember the first customer,” she began, chuckling, “that was the start.”
She sat down, pressing her buttocks against the paved gravel roads, heavily trotted by the working ponies who once roamed this part of town.
She was hired only a few days before she served her first customer. After a year of working in the kitchen, Mrs. Pie was convinced she was ready to work “upfront” and handle the responsibilities of the counter. Thrilled, Pinkie took the position and happily dreamt about it all night, imagining the different kinds of pastries she’d sell. Early that morning, she pulled together enough materials to create a one-of-a-kind cookie that would guarantee a smiling face. Carefully, she mixed all the ingredients and managed to bake a small batch of seven; it would be very special and, in time, had hopes of being a signature masterpiece to help the pastry shop. When it was time to open, she was jittering about the floor, hiding her newfound recipes within her fluffy tail. That afternoon, a colt with a sunny face waltzed his way into the bakery, asking for Sugar Cube Corner’s Standardized Sugar Cookie.
“Ookie Dokie Loki!” Pinkie grinned, turning around to stuff her own “special cookie”
into a small white paper bag,
“Here you are!” She smiled, spinning around, holding the bag. The colt sniffed, but couldn’t recognize the smell, he questioned and grew worried.
“But, this wasn’t what I ordered!” He shook, refusing the order. Pinkie checked the coast and leaned in with a sly smile,
“Just eat it. You’ll like it, trust me,” she winked, giving up the bag. Hesitantly, the skeptical stallion took a bite, grinning for the most part,
“It’s good, but I think I could still go for my sugar cookie.”
A grin was all she wanted; so, she gave the colt the cookie and accepted his money.
“I never knew it would get so out of hoof. Nopony would ever have guessed the sales would climb so quickly.”
The next morning, Pinkie opened the shop, and to her surprise, met with the colt from the day before.
“Oh! There you are! I was just wondering if you had anymore of those cookies!” The colt gleamed.
Pinkie checked behind her, “Yeah, I’ve still got them.”
The colt grinned, “Great! I’ll take three! I want to share a few with my friends! These cookies have an amazing aftertaste!”
It was the grin she was looking for; who was she to argue? Without a second thought, she whipped up a second batch and sold the three for a quick ten bits, watching the stallion gallop out the door with the bag high above his head. Pinkie paid no special attention and resumed business as usual. Little did she know, days later, more ponies would return for her cookie; the entire town was hooked on Pinkie’s recipe.
“Who knew they would’ve gone so crazy over the cookies? They weren’t anything special. It was just the right amount of sugar mixed with the proper measurement of flour.”
Pinkie’s cookies became the top ordered items on Sugar Cube’s uncharted menu, though; it didn’t take long for the Cakes to see what was going on, especially when customers continued to request Pinkie’s “Special Treat Surprise”. Mrs. Cake, after a longer shift, demanded to see Pinkie when she counted twelve orders of treats she hadn’t ever heard of. Pinkie, afraid for her job, tried her best to explain,
“I-I just figured I’d help out the business. I-I gave the money to the shop.”
After a heated debate, the “Special Treat Surprise” found a home on the real menu, giving further publicity to Sugar Cube Corner’s overall success. After a while, however, ponies began to catch on by creating their own competing pastries modeled after Pinkie’s, leaving Mrs. Cake furious in a rage that would often leave smaller companies broken with bankruptcy and legal issues that damaged the opposing baker’s name.
“Everyday, there was another hundred ponies from all over Equestria. From Canterlot
to Manehattan, Vanhoover to Phillydelphia, everypony was waiting in the morning. The Cakes, though surprised and upset at first, soon came to accept it as a good thing. It meant a better revenue, and they were no stranger to the art of business.”
The now famous baker paced around her room, thinking of a new recipe that would blow the first out of the water. It took all night, but she eventually came up with an idea that assured an awe-dropping reveal. Under candlelight, she wrote her recipe and checked it over until a filly could bake it with ease. That morning, when opening the shop, she presented the new batch and word spread quickly. Ponies who admired Pinkie’s skill began to create posters for Sugar Cube Corner, drawing in huge crowds from Canterlot and beyond. Though Pinkie dreamed of her success reaching only the simple mares of Ponyville, she soon came to realize anyone could enjoy a cookie.
She met her six friends shortly after that second cookie, and; after a while, they came to know about her business. A couple of them were supportive, but the rest continued to question why. They didn’t understand what was so special about her cookies and continued to think lowly of her pastries.
“It’s just a cupcake, Pinkie Pie,” grunted Rainbow Dash, “There’s literally nothing special about that!”
Pinkie Pie, though hurt, hardly knew Rainbow; there wasn’t a time to judge.
“It’s a cookie!” She growled, “I’ll bake you into a cupcake. . .”
“Rainbow Dash never really got why ponies would travel across Equestria for a cookie; but after awhile, she just stopped asking and I was okay with that. Maybe she was jealous; then again, I couldn’t understand why she would want to leave her friends for the Wonderbolts. I suppose what comes around goes around. . .”
When the success of the second cookie was on a rise, ponies started wondering if there would ever be a third, and that left Pinkie unsure of what to do. It seemed like day after day, she would receive questions and letters about her next big piece of work, but she had nothing to show for it. With pressure pushing her down, she gave the reigns to the Cakes in hopes they would do what was best; Pinkie Pie was done with the publicity. The popularity took time away from her friends, and time away from herself; she was just one of those ponies who didn’t want that kind of attention.
“It was a nice run,” she’d say, “but I’m afraid I’m not the right mare for the job.”
When the ponies of Equestria discovered the change, many abandoned the shop’s name and never returned; those who accepted the new change of hooves, found the future quality to be lack-luster. Pinkie found everything to be upsetting, but she had other plans, and her friends were more important.
Pinkie's gaze slowly broke from the rusted metal hinges of Sugar Cube Corner's welcoming doors.
“I held a party for my friends because Sugar Cube Corner was shutting down. The Cakes realized the cookies weren’t the same after I left, and decided to shut down my originals. Soon as they did, nopony wanted the pastries and Sugar Cube Corner filed for bankruptcy. It’s a shame, but they gave me the honor to close up shop for the last time.”
Pinkie Pie stood up, rubbing her aching thighs. She looked back at the bakery one last time, watching as her memories slowly drifted away from her reach.
“It was fun,” Pinkie muttered, in hopes that someday another pony like her could muster the courage and open Sugar Cube Corner for a second time.
The sun was setting on a burnt horizon, but Pinkie didn’t fear the dark. She always learned to keep her head high above the crowd, and high above her fears. As the gloomy pastry shop grew smaller in the distance, Pinkie’s ears began to fill with the sounds of a crying filly echoing through the calm night sky. The pink mare stopped, looking down at the filly with motherly eyes,
“What’s the matter?”
The filly, without hesitation, held up a toy, broken in half like the child’s heart whom carried the toy’s former glory. Pinkie sat beside the filly, eyeing the toy,
“How did this happen?”
“I-I,” sniffled the child, “I dropped it. I-It fell, but then it broke.”
“It’s alright,” she smiled, “Come on home; I’ll fix you something new.”
The filly slowly stood up, holding Pinkie close like a golden angel who descended to save her. With tears in her eyes, the filly smiled,
“Th-thank you,” and showed her new friend the way to her home. Pinkie eyed the curious child, watching as she skipped through the dark, back-alleys of Ponyville’s rejected.
“How old are you?” The child wondered, looking back with her broken train close in her hands. Pinkie laughed, putting a careful hoof on the young one’s head,
“That’s not an important question. It’s not right to ask a mare how old they are!”
The child shrugged, presenting a cardboard box before her. Her smile melted, but through her eyes, Pinkie could still see the childish attributes that possessed the filly’s loving nature. Pinkie leaned closer to the ground,
“Is this your home? Where are you parents?”
The young filly’s head sank to the blacktop concrete streets,
“I don’t know my parents; they never came.”
Pinkie tried to hold a smile, but she could feel the pity overflowing within her. She grabbed a small cardboard box from a large, green dumpster and proceeded to fold it. Throughout the alley, the collective sounds of folding cardboard resonated between the towering apartments. Under a single, broken streetlight, Pinkie continued to fold with a tear or two falling into the mix of shredded paper and deformed pieces of cardboard. One by one, the blissful sounds of creation attracted the alley’s children. At first there was two, then there was three, but Pinkie quickly lost count. Forty fillies encircled Pinkie, watching as her hooves quickly zipped
from one side to the next. When she was done, she presented a model home, made completely from the garbage lying around her. The children were appalled, and they flooded Pinkie with requests. Pinkie, though skeptical, saw her creation was good, and continued to make them through the night. There would be no failure here; she liked helping the children.
As Pinkie ventured toward her own home, a colt from the city stopped her. He brushed his mane back, but did not introduce himself. Instead, he just looked at Pinkie and presented a piece of paper. Though he had a nice smile, his jet-black suit would say otherwise; he was here for business.
“It’s for a toy company,” the gentlecolt would say, eyeing Pinkie’s delicate, hard-working hooves, trodden black with the back-alley’s grease.
Pinkie looked over the paper, noticing it’s format in an instant. It was a contract.
“I don’t know. . .” the mare cautiously doubted.
But the colt grinned widely, forcing the paper on Pinkie as he gracefully walked away,
“Think about it a night or two. I saw what you did in the alleys. I think you’ll like what we can offer. We could always use someone . . . creative.”
Pinkie stared blankly at the contract, watching it as it slipped from her hooves and fell to the floor. She rubbed the tar off her hooves and opened the door to her apartment building, leaving the paper outside in the puddles of early morning dew.
