I gazed up at Princess Luna’s beautiful moon, pondering my strokes of good fortune. I was blessed to be able to see the night sky clearly in the normally blizzarding frozen north of the Crystal Empire. I was thankful for my friend, former mentor and faithful confidant, Twilight Sparkle, for convincing me to make the trip up to the Crystal Empire for New Year’s. Truthfully, anxiety was still an undercurrent in my mind whenever I would come here. I needed a good prodding to come up here. I had a lot to be thankful for. Twilight had told me countless times that I should be proud of myself because in the end, I was responsible for my reformation. Her friends had congratulated me with incredulous enthusiasm upon my graduation! Rarity had given me a fancy gold watch, which currently dangled from a chain around my neck for the occasion.
My heart was racing now. Sitting next to me, up on a high balcony of Shining Armor and Cadance’s castle, was my first friend and, known only by me, myself and I, my first crush. Sunburst. The orange stallion was rivaled by few in terms of magical skill. He was smart, funny once he opened up to somepony, and a nice mixture of cute and handsome—in a nerdy sort of way.
I was curious about Twilight’s recent research with Sunburst as the sole reason. Twilight had been meeting and corresponding with Cadance a lot more frequently in recent months, studying the deep connection between love and friendship.
Even the concepts of the Elements of Harmony could be applied to love just as well as friendship. Why were they researching this? Let me break the fourth wall, talk directly to my audience and tell you that your guess is as good as mine. Something about how she’ll never run out of things to learn for the rest of her seemingly eternal life. I digress. This evening was perfect. The northern lights seemed to curl around the moon in the starry sky. The silver light of the full moon was radiant, but not overbearing.
“What a perfect New Year’s Eve,” Sunburst was the first of us to speak since we had come out onto the balcony. He turned his head and beamed at me through his glasses. Sweet Celestia, part of me wanted to let out a Fluttershy-style squeal under the calm warmth of those blue eyes of his, which held a gradient in shade that, in all our years together, I had never noticed. When you take out how long he was away at school and how long I tried to get on with my life, coupled with how few and far between our visits were, how long were he and I ever really together?
I met his gaze and felt heat well up in my cheeks. It was hard, being away from him. If our friendship ever turned into something more, it would get so much harder to be away! Focusing on his gaze and that off-white stripe going down his muzzle, I replied, “Yeah! Princess Luna must be delighted with how many ponies stay up during the night on New Year’s Eve!”
“The aurora is magnificent! I’ve tried so many times to replicate one with magic back in school, but it never quite turned out right. Their formation actually has a lot to do with the magnetic field of this region, so I thought continuing my studies here independently would help, but…” Sunburst explained until his voice trailed off and his ears drooped in disappointment. His gaze trailed from my eyes down to the space between our hooves. He didn’t have to say it and I didn’t have the heart to finish it for him. He had failed. I rattled my brain for something encouraging to say when he started to speak again. With a sigh, he told me, “I want to try again, now more than ever.”
“Now? As in now? Right now?” I asked, suddenly afraid he would leave. Was he growing bored of me? Was it something I said? Was it something I didn’t say?
“Well, not immediately, but…I guess you could say I’ve found my muse again,” Sunburst chuckled sheepishly and smiled warmly at me. I couldn’t help but start smiling again. “Starlight, the reason I want to try again is because of you.”
“M-m-me?!” I stammered, the heat in my cheeks intensifying.
“The colors,” Sunburst went on to elaborate, looking to the sky once more, “reminded me of your mane. I wanted to perfect the spell and show you on Hearth’s Warming Eve or Hearth’s Warming Day, but… Well, the time has passed. I still want to try, though.”
Sunburst was trying to perfectly duplicate a natural phenomenon because of me. My heart melted. I turned my head up to the sky to look at the aurora dancing like flowing ribbons across the sky. My life was rich with goodhearted ponies. I spoke up, not even thinking about the words as I said them, “It’d mean more to me if you let me help you perfect it. We used to do stuff together all the time when we were foals. Sure, things may be different now, but…I need something to hold onto! Sunburst, I feel like we’re growing apart! Then, it subsides when we’re together and for a little while afterwards and…”
“A longing starts to come back?” Sunburst guessed.
Letting out a wry chuckle, I reply, “You took the words right out of my mouth.”
“Only because I think I know what you mean,” Sunburst informed me. Okay, if he didn’t have my attention before (which, for the record, he did), then he definitely had it now. “When you’re gone after visiting with Princess Twilight, I feel like I’m missing something. It started affecting my mood and my appetite. I went to Cadance for some advice, and her answer really interested me when I bombarded her with an embarrassing amount of questions.”
“Answer? Singular?” I asked, seeking clarification. He nodded. My eyes widened. “Well, what did she say to you?”
“She said I had strong feelings for somepony and told me that the best thing I could do is build up my courage and…” Sunburst trailed off. I felt like I knew what he was going to say, but he had trouble with the words. Nopony could blame him, least of all me. Opening up to somepony was a matter of weighing risk and reward in a split second. Upon getting a better look at him, I saw a warm blush spread across his face, most prominently in the pale-yellow stripe going down his nose. It was at this time that I was reminded of my own stubborn blush.
“Yeah,” I piped up, taking the pressure to speak off of his haunches, “I think I know what you mean. You don’t have to spell it out for me, you know.” It was amazing. Magical. Miraculous. Even with the rather sudden tension of the subject and the awkwardness of our handling it, we could still talk to each other like the old friends we were. There was no tepidness like there had been with our initial reunion. The words I wanted to say were in my head and they crept into my throat, but I was afraid to say them. I hoped that nopony was watching us.
“Then…what do you think?” the orange stallion asked, making sure to look me dead in the eye. His focus on me was intense, but not overbearing. The words needed to come out. The floodgate that was my mouth burst open.
“I feel the same way,” I admitted, not thinking twice about it. I didn’t have to think twice. I loved him. I really did feel the same way about him that he had heavily implied to feel about me. I cleared my throat and let out a sheepish chuckle.
Sunburst had a cheery gleam of delight and relief in his eyes. He seemed to lean closer to me. Or was I leaning closer to him? It didn’t matter. I was lost in those eyes, those blue eyes beyond glass lenses. I let out a shaky breath onto his muzzle as I felt his horn cross with mine. I felt his warm breath on my nose in response. I was sure of it this time; he leaned in and our lips collided. Closing my eyes, I gently pushed forward and returned the kiss. It was a simple kiss and lasted not more than four seconds. To me, though, it was four seconds of pure bliss. There was nothing warmer or more comfortable in all of Equestria; not that I could fathom, anyways. It made me thankful that Twilight had taken me under her wing and gave me a chance to become a new version of me. I didn’t simply keep the loneliness in my heart at bay like I had done in the village; I conquered it with friendship!
Then, an idea struck me like a hammer to a nail. When we broke the kiss, while my lips still tingled, I told him, “Try casting that aurora spell again!”
“But there’s already—” Sunburst tried to protest, but was cut off by my excited smile. I was grinning ear to ear. He sighed and the corners of his lips curled upward as his horn glowed a soft yellow.
I touched my horn to his, feeling the flow of his magic. The spell he was preparing was well-constructed, but there was a sort of substance to it that he was missing. Activating my own magic and keeping my horn on his, our powers collided and shot upward in the form of a gold and teal ball of light. The ball of light exploded into ribbons of color in the sky, complementing the pre-existing aurora. The night sky was now just as bright as the day and twice as vivid. Glancing down at the streets below, I saw the fascinated Crystal Pony civilians look up in bedazzlement and awe at the shimmering, iridescent sky. It filled my heart with a warmth not unlike a hearth.
“How did you—I mean, did we—what was—why did it—” Sunburst stammered, not sure which words to put together.
“I think what the spell was missing was…somepony to share it with,” I answered the question he wanted to ask. A thought occurred to me. Using my magic, I lifted my watch to check the time. It was midnight. The new year had begun.
“Hey, I want to ask you something,” Sunburst muttered to me, a bit more confidence in his voice now than before. His soft voice firmly grasped my attention. With a shaky breath, he asked, “Would you be my special somepony?”
“I would love that, but…the distance…” I replied, weighing out the pros and cons aloud.
“I know that us being far apart would be hard, but I feel like it’s hard because it’s worth it. After all, what kind of relationship would it be if it was easy to be away from each other?” Sunburst pointed out. I had never looked at a long-distance relationship like that before. I realized that he was absolutely right. Of course, it would be harder for us to be apart as a couple; it was supposed to be difficult because we cared about each other.
That had renewed my faith and my confidence. Wrapping my forelegs around his neck, I pulled myself against his front and cried out, “Yes! Yes… I would love that more than anything.”
“I’m glad… Starlight, until the Crystalling, not a day went by without me wondering if I would ever see you again,” Sunburst admitted to me.
I kissed him again. I didn’t think about it. I didn’t want to. All I wanted to do was live in this moment with him, with no extraneous thoughts to distract me from my dear friend and now, my lover. I hoped Twilight would be happy. I was proud of the new me she helped me come. If that hadn’t been so, then I never would be where I was or as happy as I was. If friendship is magic, is love a miracle? All I can attest is that both are real, and certainly more tangible than a wish made by throwing some bits into some old wishing well.
“Because of you, it’s going to be a good year,” I told him when I broke the kiss. Like the celestial body he was named after, he beamed brilliantly at me. I flashed a smile at him that I hoped rivaled the dazzling gleam of the stars in the sky. The two of us blushed and, together, gazed up at the double aurora, a masterpiece of nature, magic and love.
Author's Note
This is my first MLP fic ever and I wanted it to be about Starlight and Sunburst because it's a story meant to reflect on and inspire long distance relationships. I'm currently in a long distance relationship with my girlfriend, who is also one of my best and oldest friends, and being away from her is so hard. We get through it together and I know that it's worth the heart ache. I know that this is a few days early, but I have plans on New Year's Eve so I'm putting this up now.