Cheese Sandwich dreamed that he was at a party, facing a great table loaded with sweet treats: cakes, pies, candies, and best of all, cupcakes. Plates of fresh, warm cupcakes topped with fluffy, bright pink frosting that smelled of sugar.
He opened his eyes, awoken by the wondrous scent of baking from downstairs. He was laying in a bed, covered in a sheet that was decorated with green and white squares, each with a pink or purple balloon in the center. More balloons, covering every color of the rainbow, surrounded the bed and were scattered around the room. The walls of the room were colored sunshine yellow, which was accentuated by the light of the morning sun filtering in through the window.
Rising with a contented groan, he stretched, loosening his joints with a series of pops and cracks, then swung himself off the bed. His trademark yellow shirt was laying on the floor, amongst the scattering piles of confetti and sheets of notepad paper littered with sketches and incomprehensible notes. He flipped the shirt up over his shoulders and onto his body, tugging it down. A squeaking noise caught his attention, and he turned to see a small, toothless alligator with bright purple eyes, its mouth held around a rubber chicken wearing a bowler hat with the number 2 painted in bright red upon its chest.
“Thanks, Gummy,” Cheese said, taking Boneless 2 in his mouth and gently prying him from Gummy’s grasp. He swung his companion up onto his shoulders. “Well, Boneless, what do you think? Should we go investigate that smell?”
Boneless’ reply was to droop his head forward. “Yeah, I think so, too,” Cheese agreed, pushing the bedroom door open. The floorboards creaked beneath his hooves as he descended down the stairs, following the enticing scent into the kitchen of Sugarcube Corner. The odors that tantalized his nostrils were joined by a melodious voice in his ears:
“‘Cause I love to make you smile, smile, smile, yes I do,
“It fills my heart with sunshine all the while, yes it does…”
The familiar lyrics, sung at a slower tempo than usual, but no less upbeat. How could it be otherwise with that voice? He peeked around the corner, and there she was. Her cotton candy tail swung from side to side as she carefully extracted a tray of warm cupcakes from the oven, steam rising from the chocolate baked goods. Placing the tray, she continued to sing as she pulled out a bowl of pink frosting and dipped a rubber spatula into the mix, swirling it around. As she turned, the sunlight through the window caught the golden ring held around her neck with a silver chain. The pink jewel impressed into the band shimmered, casting a small rainbow over her chest.
A smile spread across Cheese’s face, and he glanced down at his own neck, which was adorned with an identical necklace and ring. Pinkie took the spatula up in her mouth and began to spread frosting on each of the cupcakes, humming the melody as she did so.
Walking forward on tiphoof, Cheese made to creep up on Pinkie. She continued to frost the cupcakes, seemingly unaware of his presence. Pausing just a few inches behind her, Cheese took in a deep breath.
“Surprise!”
Cheese leapt back with a startled yell, Boneless 2 falling off his back and striking the floor with a squeak. Pinkie giggled at Cheese’s expression, dabbing some frosting onto his nose. “Gotcha!”
Cheese chuckled merrily. “You got me good, Pinkie!” He looped his forelegs around her neck and pulled her in, kissing her deeply. She started for a moment, then hugged him around the chest and kissed him back. Breaking the kiss, Cheese nestled his cheek against Pinkie’s, contentedly humming. Her body was warm and soft, and her cotton-candy hair tickled his nostrils, which were filled by the aroma of the frosting.
“Cheese,” Pinkie giggled, wiggling in his grasp. “Cheese...Cheese…”
“Cheese? Cheese Sandwich?”
Cheese opened his eyes. He was still standing in the kitchen of Sugarcube Corner, and there was a batch of cupcakes fresh from the oven sitting on the countertop, the bright pink frosting melting onto the chocolate cake. But instead of Pinkie Pie facing him with her glowing smile, Cup Cake was standing there with a look of concern.
“Are you all right, dear?” she asked. “You were just staring straight ahead for a full minute.”
“Just thinking, Mrs. Cake,” Cheese replied.
“Cheese, it’s been four years,” Cup Cake chastised gently. “You know you can just call me Cup.”
Cheese nodded and felt a ghost of a smile tugging at his lips. “Right, sorry, Cup.”
“I was just saying, do you think that these will be enough?” Cup Cake asked, looking over the countertops, which was laden with cakes, cookies, cupcakes and other treats. “There will be a lot of ponies there.”
Cheese pondered the arsenal of sweets for a few moments. “You know what, Cup? I think...I think we could use maybe a little more.” He grinned, a familiar twinkle in his eyes. “I mean, everypony knows you can never have enough cake, right?”
Cup smiled, although the expression did not quite reach her eyes. “Indeed. I think I’ll make the Marzipan Mascarpone Meringue Madness. It...it was her favorite.” She wandered off to the ovens, wiping at her eyes with her apron.
Cheese turned back to look over the baked goods once more. Lightly dabbing some of the pink frosting off of one of the cupcakes, he examined the little dollop of cream, then licked it off. He closed his eyes, allowing the taste to dissolve on his tongue.
“Can we help, Uncle Cheese?” a voice asked.
Cheese turned around and saw two young ponies looking up at him. Pound and Pumpkin had grown up quite a bit in the past four years, turning into prototypes for the fine stallion and mare that they would one day become. But right now, they were just a colt and a filly, flanks bare and eyes wide as they stared up at him.
“Sure you can help me,” Cheese smiled at them, crouching down so that he was at their eye level. “You can help me find my glasses!”
“Your glasses?” Pound asked, his brow creasing in confusion. “But you don’t wear your glasses much any—”
“Oh, what’s that?” Cheese asked, reaching forward behind Pound and Pumpkin’s ears. And miraculously, he pulled out a pair of glasses, one from behind each of the youngling’s ears, each of them full to the brim with chocolate milk. “Thanks!” Cheese grinned, downing both of them in an instant.
Pound and Pumpkin giggled. “You’re so silly, Uncle Cheese,” Pumpkin said.
“You know it!” Cheese grinned and stuck out his tongue. The mouse on the tip of his tongue launched into a tap dance, playing a little ditz on a tuba. Pound and Pumpkin laughed again.
Carrot Cake watched the scene from the door to the kitchen, a pensive frown on his face. As Cheese turned away from the two, he made eye contact with the party pony. Cheese’s green irides normally glowed like finely cut emeralds, but right now, they seemed more like dark, hollow tunnels that held a great tiredness that could not be put into words.
“Cheese, can I speak to you for a sec?” he called out.
Cheese turned towards him, a smile stretching across his face. “What can I do you for?” he chirped.
Carrot had lived with Pinkie Pie long enough to know the difference between a genuine smile and a false one. The false one on Cheese’s face was as thin as paper-mache.
“Are...are you sure you’re all right?” Carrot asked, cursing the feebleness of his sentence as it tumbled awkwardly from his mouth.
“Mmmm...nope,” Cheese shook his head, his expression suddenly serious. “I’ve got a left side, too, see?” He waved his left foreleg at Carrot, grinning cheekily. This paper-mache mask was even thinner than the one he had put on before.
Carrot forced a chuckle. “Ah, that’s a good one,” he sighed, before dropping his own mask and allowing his face to fall. “Listen, Cheese, you know you can talk to me and Cup if you need to. We’re your family too, right?”
“I know,” Cheese nodded, his smile falling into a smaller, sadder gesture. “But I’m okay now. I just...I need to go do some more thinking. I’ve got a lot of planning to do for tomorrow.” His mouth fell into a serious line and he looked down at the floor, reaching his hoof up to play with the ring around his neck. “It’s got to be perfect, y’know?”
“Don’t worry too much about it,” Cup reassured him, placing a hoof on Cheese’s shoulder. “It’ll be great, I’m sure of it. Just—”
“I need to go,” Cheese mumbled, turning around and climbing up the stairs, each step creaking beneath his hooves. Carrot half started to follow him, but stopped himself with a sigh.
His head bowed low as though a great weight was crushing down on his shoulders, Cheese walked down the second-floor hallway and entered the last door on the left. The walls of the room were the same shade of sunshine yellow that it had always been, and there were the same bright shades on the carpet and the bedsheets that adorned the double bed in the corner, but almost everything else had changed. The balloons that normally hung on every available surface had deflated and were now floating halfheartedly just inches above the ground. There was no longer any confetti or candy wrappers littering the floor, and the party cannon tucked against one wall had a thin layer of dust laying upon it. Gummy sat on the windowsill, blinking sullenly at Cheese.
Cheese closed the door behind him and slumped to the floor, staring straight ahead as though the room wasn’t there. He tightly clutched the necklace about his neck as though it were a lifeline, the one thing keeping him from falling into the dark depths that yawned beneath him. His body convulsed with sobs as he curled up into a ball, tucking his head between his legs as though to hide from the world.
“Are you really sure that this is a good idea?” Rainbow asked as she passed underneath a great banner. The banner was painted in pink with golden and blue accents, and a great picture of Pinkie Pie’s smiling face in the center. Balloons were tied to both of the posts that the banner was hanging from, dancing slowly in the wind.
“No, that’s why I wanted you to talk to him,” Carrot said, walking alongside Rainbow down the street. Tables laden with food and sweets stood on either side of them, with ponies helping to set up decorations on trees, lamps and poles. The color pink was everywhere, but always in subdued tones, not the bright, sharp hue that stung at the eyes.
“He’s been throwing himself into this,” Carrot explained as they walked past an enormous fondue fountain. “He barely sleeps, doesn’t eat much, and he almost never talks to us. Cup and I are worried.”
“So are we,” Rainbow nodded. “We’ve tried to talk to him, but planning this party has been taking up all of his time.” She looked up at the enormous cake that six ponies were carrying in on their backs. “Yeesh, how big does this need to be?”
“Pinkie…” Carrot stopped, his throat convulsing as though he were trying to swallow a great rock, then closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “She said that she wanted it to be a big party, for everypony in Ponyville. She just...wanted everypony to be happy.”
“There he is,” Rainbow pointed. Cheese Sandwich was standing in front of a stage, looking over a checklist.
Carrot hesitated, looking nervously up at Rainbow Dash. Rainbow looked between the two stallions, then approached Cheese. “Hey, Cheese?”
“That’s my name, don’t wear it out!” Cheese cried, spinning around with a broad grin. “Hay cheese...that’s not a bad idea! Maybe I should try serving that?”
“Cheese, are you sure you’re okay?” Rainbow asked, fixing him with a serious gaze.
“I’m fine,” Cheese answered, wandering away from the stage and towards a horseshoe game field, checking that there were enough red and blue horseshoes evenly divided between the two posts. “I’ve just got until tomorrow to finish preparing this party.” He paused, his smile momentarily flickering. “You think we should use blue or pink for the theme?”
“Cheese, listen,” Rainbow pressed. “I know this is important for you; this is what Pinkie wanted for her, after...after all…”
“Pink. Definitely pink,” Cheese nodded, walking away as though he had not heard.
“Cheese, wait!” Carrot shouted, trying to block Cheese’s path.
“I know that this is important for you,” Rainbow continued, laying a hoof on Cheese’s withers. She felt his body trembling slightly. “This party is for Pinkie, after all—”
“That’s right, it’s for Pinkie!” Cheese said, his smile strained and cracking, his voice unnaturally high and as tense as a rubber band stretched to the breaking point. “And Pinkie is a party pony like me, so she would want ponies to be as happy as possible. So I have to make this party perfect for her—”
“Cheese,” Rainbow interrupted, grabbing his shaking shoulders. “Pinkie’s dead!”
The word impacted Cheese like a sledgehammer; he staggered back, his eyes widening and his mouth dropping open in shock.
“She’s been dead for over a week now! And I know it hurts!” Rainbow continued, tears leaking from her eyes. “And I know that you’re working hard on this party for her, and she...she would want you to be happy, b-but you don’t have to pretend that you’re happy when you...when you…”
Cheese’s face settled into a neutral mask, all joy fading from it. He slowly released himself from Rainbow’s grip and walked away, all bounce removed from his step.
Rainbow stayed where she was, tears still streaming down her eyes. Carrot reached out and hugged Rainbow, allowing her to sob on his shoulder.
“I miss her, too,” he whispered.
The day of the party had arrived. A banner stretched across Ponyville Square, with a cameo of Pinkie’s smiling face beaming down at the visitors who had gathered in her name. She had insisted in her will that this party not be called a funeral or a memorial; “A crossing-over party” were the words she had used in her will. Even as the sudden illness stole the life from her, she had been determined to make ponies happy.
And of course, everypony in Ponyille had been invited. The citizens milled about the party grounds, sampling the baked wares, partaking in provided games, dancing to the energetic music that the band on the stage was providing, and sharing memories.
“I remember the day that she showed up in Ponyville,” Carrot was saying, holding a half-eaten muffin in his hooves as he reminisced. “We were thinking about closing up the shop for good, remember, sugar cookies?”
“I do,” Cup Cake nodded with a smile. “Business was very hard for us, and we were struggling to make ends meet. We’d decided that we would have to close the shop if things didn’t change. And then out of the blue, she came into the store and said that she loved our wares. When she heard that we would have to close, she started doing song and dance routines to attract attention. It was because of her that we were able to stay open!” Her smile wavered, but a few tears leaked from her eyes. “We owe so much to her.”
“Well, she’d be happy to see all this,” Rainbow commented, looking about the party. The smiles on every pony’s face was genuine, although most were not without a hint of sadness. But there was one face that was not present.
“Where’s Cheese?” she asked, looking about. Sure enough, Cheese Sandwich, the party pony himself, was nowhere to be seen.
“Oh, dear,” Cup said, raising a hoof to her mouth. “I was afraid of this. You think perhaps the strain finally got to him?”
“We should go looking for him,” Carrot suggested, dropping his cupcake onto a table. He led Cup Cake and Rainbow Dash back to Sugarcube Corner, which had been closed for the day in observance of the party. Cup unlocked the door, and they proceeded inside, each of them worried of what they might find.
The bakery was empty, floating dust twinkling like stars in the sunlight streaming through the windows. As soon as the ponies entered, each of them was greeted with the scent of baking, accompanied by a quiet song:
“‘Cause I love to make you smile, smile, smile, yes I do,
“It fills my heart with sunshine all the while, yes it does…”
The familiar lyrics, sung by a different voice and at a slower tempo, guided them forward to the kitchen. Pausing at the hallway, they peeked around the corner. Cheese Sandwich was standing at the oven, his bushy chocolate tail slowly swinging from side to side as he carefully extracted a tray of warm chocolate cupcakes from the oven and setting them down on the counter.
“Now can we decorate them, Uncle Cheese?” Pumpkin asked eagerly as she and her twin brother bounced up and down in anticipation.
“Gotta wait for it to cool, kiddos,” Cheese grinned, tussling their manes. The jewel bouncing against his chest cast a rainbow on his yellow shirt.
“Cheese?” Rainbow asked, approaching. “Why aren’t you at the party?”
Cheese and the twins looked up at their approach. “We were making cupcakes!” Pound told his parents proudly.
“Yes, we see, dear,” Cup smiled, her eyes focused on Cheese.
Cheese shifted slightly, then looked up, his expression now serious. “Hey, Pound, Pumpkin, I guess they’re cool enough to decorate now,” he said. Both the twins cheered and tossed themselves at the bowls of icing, syrup and sprinkles spread out on the counter.
Now that the kids were occupied, Cheese approached Cup, Carrot and Rainbow and began to speak. “I was thinking about what you said yesterday,” he told Rainbow. “And I realized that you were right; I’ve been focusing so much on trying to make other ponies happy that I forgot that I wasn’t happy.”
His hoof went up to the necklace and he began to slowly flick it back and forth. “I’m a party pony, and Pinkie was, too. And one thing you learn quickly when you’re a party pony: parties don’t last forever.”
“Oh, Cheese,” Cup said softly.
“But that’s okay,” Cheese continued, a small, sad smile crossing his face. “Because parties wouldn’t be special if they lasted forever. And it’s okay to be upset when the party’s over.” His lips parted in a faint chuckle. “So I decided to take some time off today to think...about what happened, about how I’m feeling.”
“Oh, sweetie, you didn’t have to go off on your own!” Cup cried, gently pulling Cheese into a hug. “We were worried about you!”
“I’m sorry,” Cheese said, backing out of the embrace. “But I needed this time to myself.” His smile widened slightly. “I’m better now. I’m not really okay yet, but I think I will be.”
“We’ll be here to help if you need us,” Carrot declared, laying a hoof on Cheese’s shoulder.
“I know,” Cheese nodded. “Thank you.” And with that, he pulled all three of them into a warm hug. They held him in return, holding him up as a few tears fell from his eyes.
“Uncle Cheese, look!” Pound and Pumpkin both cried, holding up their freshly decorated wares, both of which were slathered in icing and covered in far too many sprinkles.
“Those look great, kids,” Cheese grinned.
“Let me help with those,” Cup said, joining the kids at the counter along with her husband. Rainbow and Cheese eagerly followed a moment later.
This party would not last forever: the sweets would be consumed, the tabletops and dishes would be washed, the booths taken down and the trash cleaned up. But the memories that would be made on this day would last forever. So rather than crying because it was over, the ponies would be able to smile because it happened.
Author's Note
Tragedy and Comedy, two sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other.
Magic Step commissioned this sad little snippet of a story, so if this brought a tear to your eye, then you can blame her, not me. If you did enjoy it, please leave a like and a comment!
