Just One Mistake

Chapter 3: Breakthrough

Over the following weeks, Pinkie, Rarity, and Fluttershy had visited Twilight many more times, each one ending with the same results. At this point, Pinkie’s mane had gone completely flat and had lost most of its color.

“Pinkie, you know this is all your fault. Why do you insist on still coming?” Twilight asked during Pinkie’s last visit.

“What? Twi, how is it my fault? What did I do? That day I sold you a cupcake! Did Dashie break up with you because of a cupcake? Come to think of it, you only did buy one, was Dash really that upset about not getting a cupcake? I can make her a cupcake, and then you can be happy again!”

“Oh Pinkie… you’re so ignorant. Just leave me alone.” Twilight stated deadpan.

And so, Pinkie left with a fake smile even though her mind was running at a thousand miles a minute. A similar, but not quite the same, conversation took place between Fluttershy and Twilight. Just this one had more yelling and Fluttershy was on the verge of tears once she left for the final time. On her way out, Fluttershy ran into Applejack. It wasn’t a very long conversation, but the strong farm pony told Fluttershy about Dash’s corrupted side of the story, and it only confused the shy pegasus more.

Spike had attempted, and failed, to help Twilight. With countless hours spent on helping her and no success, he was the first to give up. Spike never seemed to understand love between two mares and couldn’t relate to the saddened unicorn. With much reluctance, Pinkie and Fluttershy soon followed the dragon’s path, and the strong farmer pony was never once spotted near the library since the whole fiasco began. But Rarity still kept trying her hardest, and she refused to give up on Twilight, even if the others did. Rarity visited every other day. She had tried to force Twilight into a bath on many of her visits, but had only succeeded a few of them.

Rarity strode into the Library. This time she didn’t bother talking to Spike, as she was in a hurry. She was tired of Twilight being depressed and it needed to change. Now. Rarity walked right up the steps and into the other unicorn’s room. “Twilight Sparkle, I’m here again. How are you doing? Any better?”

“No, Rarity. I’m not any better. Why would I be? Do you see Rainbow Dash anywhere around here?”

“No, no I don’t. But I can tell that some of your friends have stopped by. And my guess is that you just shrugged them away. Why do you do that? Rainbow Dash is not the only pony that cares for you. You’re friends all miss you dearly, Twilight.”

“Maybe. But I only care about Dash.”

“Now, darling. We both know that that is not true.”

“What do you know about me, Rarity?”

“I know that you loved Rainbow and she went and broke your heart. Trust me, I know how a broken heart feels. I know that you do love your friends, even if you don’t think you do right now. And I also know, for sure, that you need another bath.”

Rarity walked into Twilight’s bathroom and filled up the tub. She laid out certain coat, mane, and tail shampoos. Once she was satisfied with the collection the white unicorn trotted back to the depressed pony’s bedroom. “Darling, you know how I am about this. Now you go take a bath.”

Twilight knew exactly how Rarity was about this. After a few moments the violet unicorn came to the conclusion that she had no other choice. She sighed and got up, but once she stood she almost fell to the floor.

“All this sitting isn’t good for you.” Rarity said to her as she helped get the violet unicorn settled on her hooves. She guided Twilight into the bathroom and then left her alone. Rarity went about cleaning up Twilight’s room while the violet unicorn was bathing. She tidied up the bed, rearranged some things on a desk, cleaned up the floor, and overall made Twilight’s room look nice.

After a while, Twilight came out of the bathroom wrapped in towels. She was surprised to see her room cleaned and Rarity sitting on the bed, waiting for her. Rarity patted the bed space beside her and waited for Twilight to sit down. Once she did a blue aura wrapped around the towel on her head, exposing Twilight’s mane. A brush floated over and began brushing down the violet unicorn’s mane.

“Rarity?”

“Yes darling?”

“Thanks…”

“For what?”

“For everything you’ve done. I know that I’ve forced all of the others away from me. That’s exactly what I was trying to do… But you stayed. Maybe I just wanted to see if anypony would truly care if I left…”

“Twilight, dear, Pinkie and Fluttershy only stopped coming out of your best interest. You wanted them to go, so they did. I just refused to leave you like this.”

Twilight sighed.  “Maybe you’re right. Now I feel really bad. Worse than I did before.”

“Oh darling, there’s no reason to be hard on yourself. Let’s just go and see them, then you can talk. I’m sure they’d be thrilled to hear from you!”

“I don’t think I’m ready to see them, Rarity.”

“I suppose that that’s fine. But you should at least go talk to Spike. I believe he’s in the kitchen.”

“I guess I can…” Twilight said reluctantly. She was coming around, and for the first time in five weeks, Twilight Sparkle stepped out of her room for reasons other than using the bathroom. And it was all thanks to a very persistent white unicorn.

Twilight walked down the steps and into the kitchen. Spike looked up from the book he was reading. “Oh, hi, Rarity. How’d it go with-” the dragon stopped mid sentence as he saw who was standing in the room, smiling weakly at him. It was none other than Twilight, the last pony he thought he would see. “Twilight?” the young dragon muttered. “Twilight! You- you’re out of your bed!” He ran up to the violet unicorn and gave her a hug. Rarity stood in the doorway beaming at the dragon.

“Hi Spike.” Twilight said, as she wrapped one hoof around her number one assistant.  The two sat down at the table as the white unicorn stood in her same position, watching the ‘family reunion.’ After a few moments of silence, the violet unicorn broke into tears. “Spike… I’m so sorry. I treated you horribly… I know I did… But I was just so angry and-and I thought no one could help me… But I see how hard you tried, staying by my side almost every night, even going so far as to ask Princess Celestia what to do. But she’s away on royal duties, of course. Thank you, so much Spike…”

“You’re welcome Twilight, and I forgive you. You have no reason to be sorry, you know. I know you were going through a rough time. You’d think the Princess would drop everything to come and talk to you. Oh well. I’m just happy that you’re happy.”

“I’m not happy, Spike. Far from it. I’m just… seeing a bit clearer.” Twilight turned around, tears still slipping from her eyes. “Rarity, I know I’ve already I said this, but thank you.” She glanced at the teary-eyed dragon. “Thank you both so much.” Twilight pulled the pony and dragon into a tight hug.

“You’re welcome.” Rarity and Spike said in unison.

Over the five weeks that Twilight was dealing with her sadness, the violet unicorn slept only enough to keep her awake the next day. With a large yawn Twilight said, “I think I’m going to get some real sleep,” and with that she trotted up the steps and the two in the kitchen heard a closing door.

“Good job Rarity.” Spike said with even more admiration than usual in his voice.

“Thank you darling. You did a fair job yourself. This isn’t over yet though. I have to go talk to somepony…” With that Rarity gave Spike a quick hug and trotted out of the library.

Rainbow Dash flew among the clouds, happy as could be. She hadn’t though about her ex-marefriend much since the break up. Of course, she wasn’t about to jump up and go on a date with some other pony, but she was too cool to mope over something like that. Thoughts of the Wonderbolts clouded her mind as she did daring stunts in the air. The cyan pegasus’ thoughts were interrupted when she heard an all too familiar voice call her name.

“Rainbow Dash! Rainbow Dash, darling, please come down here! I simply have to speak to you!”  Rarity called out to the pegasus soaring in the skies. She wasn’t sure if Dash could hear her or not, but she tried anyway.

Rainbow did hear the unicorn and flew down with a gust of wind, landing right in front of Rarity. The wind blew through the white unicorn’s mane, messing it up.

“Oh, Rainbow Dash! Look at my mane! You could have landed a bit softer!”

Rainbow chuckled. “Oh, sorry Rarity.” She watched as Rarity pushed her hair back into place with her hoof. “So what did you want to talk about?”

“Twilight.” Rarity said, her face suddenly becoming more serious.

“Oh. Well I don’t want to talk about that”

“I don’t care if you want to or not, you must. Please, just tell me what happened, and why I haven’t seen Applejack come visit Twilight?”

“Well, AJ has been with me! I told her my side of the story and she said that she didn’t want to talk to Twilight at all.” Rainbow said, her face as serious as Rarity’s was.

“Really? So what, exactly, is your side of the story?”

Rainbow told Rarity the same story that she had told Applejack earlier.

“So basically, what you’re telling me is that Twilight stopped caring about you, and you decided that everything was terrible because of a blush? Rainbow Dash, I think you might have over reacted to this-”

“No! Rarity! You’re not seeing it right! She spent all day with Pinkie Pie and came home knowing there was a fire, knowing I was on weather duty, knowing and not caring about it!” Not being restrained, the pegasus’ wings fanned out in her frustration with the unicorn standing in front of her.

“Rainbow… It sounds to me like you were jealous of Pinkie Pie, and thinking that she was going to steal Twilight away from you. And you broke up with her, because she got a little blush? That hardly seems fair!”

“Maybe you’re right, Rarity. But that’s the past. I’m over Twilight. We’re through.”

“Darling, that poor pony has been crying her eyes out for these five weeks. She has hardly gotten any sleep, she’s bathed barely at all, and I don’t think she’s eaten at all. And you’re just flying among the clouds enjoying the day. Do you understand how much pain that pony is in right now?”

“Believe me, I know. I felt the same for the first week. But I got over it. It’s lame to sit around and mope. You have to get out and get things done.”

“Rainbow Dash, you’re missing the point! Twilight is one of my, and your, best friends. You really should just go and talk to her, even if you two don’t get back together. There is still a friendship that can be saved in this mess.”

“I might. But not now. I have to practice for the Wonderbolts!” With that the rainbow maned pony shot off into the sky to resume her daring tricks. The white unicorn only sighed in response. At least there was hope.

A/N: My third chapter is finally here! Sorry for the wait. I got busy. My original plan was the intro, 3 chapters, then an epilogue, but from what i wrote here i feel i need a 4th chapter. So there will (as of now) be 6 chapters all together. I wanted to get this posted before tomorrow since i leave for a week, so i didn't get to comb through it as much as i would have liked to. I will return on Saturday. If you see any typos, come up with small details that could be thrown in, or have any ideas for the story/plot in the future, feel free to comment. I make no guarantee that it will be used, but i will definitely consider it! Thanks for your patience and enjoying this story! You guys rock, especially my editor mevpone!