Askew

by Cackling Moron

Rating: teen
Tags: Derpy Hooves, Slice of Life, Human, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Second Person
Length: 4361

Reclusive human is woken up by clumsy pegasus. Offers ice, receives thanks.

The local human is not especially happy being stranded where he is, finding the natives too brightly coloured and too friendly and all-in-all a little daunting. He is rarely seen outside the house on the edge of town. They give him space.

One very early morning an especially loud, house-rattling sounds draws him outside though, and rather makes his day.

Published 2018-10-11 23:30:01 UTC
Last updated 2018-10-11 23:30:01 UTC

Anyone would have done the same

Author's Note

Out of boredom and whimsy I figured I’d give one of those ‘second person’ style things people here seem so fond of a shot. Who knows about the results?
I don’t know much about Derpy (Or Ditzy. Or Muffins? I’ve seen variants) other than the eye is cute.
My tenses are all over the places because my tenses are always all over the place because I have a shaky grasp on the passage of time.
Also I’m dyslexic and drunk and I typed all of this in one go with my eyes closed. Honest.
Excuses now concluded.

Anyone would have done the same

Bang. Or rather, BANG.

It was the right kind of morning and early enough in it for you not to be sure whether you’d dreamt the noise or not. The incredibly early, slightly murky kind of morning that had it so when your eyes opened you couldn’t really see anything. You just felt warm.

Were you still asleep?

Then the dust that had been dislodged in the impact - and what an impact! - tickled your nose at this point and you sneezed. Definitely awake. And awake enough to know that you wouldn’t be getting back to sleep, either. You could feel it in your bones.

Not the best start to any day, and as much as you would have liked to just stay in bed and ignore, well, everything the sheer volume of the bang and the way the whole house had reverberated nagged at you. You couldn’t ignore that. It might become a Problem later. And the fewer Problems you had to deal with, the better.

So, groaning and creaking, you swing your legs out of bed and staggered downstairs. You very nearly stumble doing this, and you curse. The stairs were not made for you, but then again neither was the house or indeed anything in it, and while everything was familiar everything was also just-so-slightly different enough to throw you off. Still, after all your time here.

You’d only actually been here - ‘Equestria’ being the name of the land generally, which still seemed a bit weird to you, along with the endless puns none of the locals seemed to notice - for two months, if that. It had felt a whole lot longer, of course, with you being on your own with nothing to fill the hours with, but in the scheme of things it had barely been any time at all.

You did your best not to think about it anyway.

Yawning and opening the door you ducked outside ready to go and have a look for what might have been the cause of all this, only to stop. Because you’d spotted the cause of all this.

A pony.

Now, you don’t go out of your to avoid the ponies. They were here first, after all. This is their world. You’re the interloper. But that doesn’t make you feel any less uncomfortable around them or want to spend more time interacting than you strictly have to.

They’re lovely, yes. Very lovely, most of them. Friendly to fault. But they’re just so unlike anything you as a, poor, beleaguered human had ever really encountered before and it always felt as if your brain was desperately trying to catch up with the world it had found itself in.

You were not cut out for this place, and talking technicolour magic ponies still seemed to touch a nerve somewhere you hadn’t even known existed. One that made you skittish without really understanding why.

They scared you, basically, because they made you feel like you stuck out. Which you did. Which was why they scared you. That, and they weren’t like you, which was disquieting. Consciously you knew it shouldn’t matter and they were perfectly pleasant and sapient and you could get on with them famously if you so wanted to, but unconsciously some primal part of you screamed anytime you got to chatting. You wished it wouldn’t.

At least they were nice enough to respect your privacy and leave you in relative peace and quiet.

Up until right now, apparently.

This particular pony didn’t immediately strike you as one of the handful you recognised. While the dimness made the exact details difficult to pick out she appeared grey, you assumed, she had wings and her tail was so blonde as to be basically yellow. The mark - Cute Mark? You always forget - looked to be bubbles, the meaning of which was vague.

You also knew she was a she because, well, she had her rear facing you. Very, very much facing you. So to speak. Full-on.

With the constant nudity it’s a minor miracle that you’ve seen so little of ponies like this, but then again you weren’t in the habit of looking. Right then, standing in the doorway, you only looked for a split second and only by complete accident before realising and looking away, but even that felt like too long.

Just not right. Not on a tiny cartoon horse. Not right at all.

You made particular effort to not let your eyes slip that way again. Instead, you looked at what she was actually doing, which appeared to be picking something up. Lots of somethings. Letters, you saw, scattered all over and around the path leading to your front door. These she grabbed and shoved into the messenger bag slung around her middle. She was not very good at doing this.

“Ahem. Need a hand with that?” You asked.

She froze.

Very, very slowly her head came craning around to look at you, having to crane upwards because at first she’d been looking far too low.

At that point she trembled. Just a little, but enough you noticed and enough that you sighed inwardly.

As friendly as they are, most are still at least a little nervous around you whenever you do happen to interact. This seems understandable, what with you being a towering, gawky alien and all. Still doesn’t make you feel great seeing it in effect, of course.

“You drop those letters? Need a hand?” You ask. The logic being that the sooner she gathers up what she dropped the sooner she can continue on her way and both of you can forget anything ever happened.

She does not answer though. So you just take the initiative. Kneeling down - and doing your best to smile, something which has never come naturally to you, even back home - you start swiping up any and all letters within reach. She just keeps on staring, doing so with, you notice, only one eye. The other is staring off elsewhere. But that’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened.

“Here,” you say, handing over a fistful.

She stares a little more before grabbing them in her teeth and yanking them out of your hand, cramming them into the bag. In doing this her hair - mane? Damn tiny horses and their close-but-not-quite terminology - shifts aside and you get a good look at the fucking great goose-egg of a bruise on her head. The mere sight of it makes you wince.

“Did you - did you fly head-first into the house?” You ask.

You’re making an assumption that she was the source of the noise in the first place, but given the circumstances it seems a pretty safe one. Not that that hasn’t gone wrong for you in the past.

This time though it seems to bear out, as she does not correct you, instead blushing and looking away. She does this at just the right angle to leave her off-kilter eye still pointing at you. Which makes the whole thing a bit pointless. But what do you know?

“...sorry,” she said, thickly.

Not quite what you’d expected.

“...for what? Are you okay?”

This wasn’t what she expected either, from the looks of things, as she starts and looks up at you again. While you’re not an expert at reading pony faces, from her expression you get the impression she expected something a lot harsher than what you’d given her.

“What?”

“You flew into the house, right? Must have been fast to have been so loud it woke me up. Are you alright? You got a lump on your head. I know you ponies got a high tolerance for comical cartoonish injury but, you know...you alright?”

The ‘comical cartoonish injury’ line might have been a bit too far as after that she’s looking at you like you grew another head. Her eyes narrow - which was an odd look with eyes like hers - and you get the idea she’s trying to work out if you’re fucking with her or not.

You’re not. For as uncomfortable as ponies might make you feel you’re still not such a bastard to just sit back and let one concuss herself against your house and then walk away. You would like to help, at least a little.

That, and this one - while not exactly putting you at ease - isn’t getting your back up as much as the rest do. Probably because you’re still half-asleep.

“Why are you being nice?” She asks, eyes still narrow.

“What? I’m not. Look, you got a huge lump on your head, you just whacked into a house. Come inside, I’ll get you a glass of water, some ice or whatever and then you can keep on doing what you’re doing. I’d feel bad if you just left now. I mean, you did hit my house.”

The implication being that somehow you were at fault for living in the way of where she’d been flying. Which was insane. But you’d said it anyway. The pony was clearly caught off guard, too.

“Come...inside…?”

“Just for ten minutes. I am legitimately worried about that lump. Could be a...pony concussion or something.”

Pony concussions were probably a thing.

She just kept on looking at you, so you cleared your throat and added:

“But not if you don’t want to. I just - little worried about you.”

Why, exactly, were you being so forthcoming? This was probably the longest, most casual conversation you’d had with any of the locals since you got here. You were even keeping eye-contact - at least as much as possible. Normally that big, wide, happy stare forced you to look almost anywhere else.

Not now though. Why?

Far too early in the morning to think about that sort of thing. Far too early to think at all. That was probably why. Still trailing sleep, that was you. Later you’d look back on your behaviour and shake your head and cluck your tongue and wonder what you’d been thinking.

For now though, uncharacteristic friendliness and concern.

Stepping back you pushed the door open and stood aside. An unspoken invitation. For a moment it looks as though the pony might turn tail and fly off but then - with about as much confusion about the situation as you were feeling - she came inside.

Letting the door swing shut again you gesture towards the sofa.

“Just, you know, go sit down. I’ll be back in a second.”

Apart from the sofa there wasn’t really anything else in the room. A table and chair - both woefully undersized for you - an empty bookshelf and that was about it. The bed upstairs of course, too, and a wardrobe. Also empty, and also too small. All of this had come with the house.

A fair amount had come with the house, which had been a surprise for you, but then again so had being given a house in the first place.

At the time you’d been shocked. You’d been shocked in general from having found yourself in a magical land of talking ponies and wondrous sorcerous adventure, which was one thing, but being welcomed with sincere warmth and open arms - legs? Hooves? What? - provided with shelter (for free! As a gift!) and treated as a guest was simply too much.

You felt undeserving of such friendly treatment. Which was another reason why you tended to hide.

But that was by the by. You had a glass of water to fill and ice to provide, for lumps.

The water was easy enough and you set it by the kitchen sink as you wondered how you meant to do the other bit. Back home you might have had a clue, but you were not back home. You scratched your chin and pondered.

The fridge - or weirdo-ponyland equivalent, presumably something running off of magic or whatever - had come with the house as well. It sat across from you in the kitchen. Obvious, really.

Opening the top-most part of the fridge you retrieved some ice, chipping a chunk of it off the side. Ice was all there was in it right now. The chunk you wrapped in a tea-towel. Better than nothing.

Taking both glass and ice-chunk you moved back out from the kitchen into the main living area, stooping the whole while. Every step taken inside the house was taken stooped. You’d got used to it by now, and the bruises on the back of your head were mostly gone.

“Here you go,” You say, stifling another yawn and handing both over.

She dropped the water.

“Sorry!” She said, dropping the ice and tea-towel as well in her haste to try and tidy up the mess. You quickly wave her off, having somehow caught the ice before the hit the floor and holding up another hand to keep her in place.

“No no no, don’t worry about that, I’ll get that. Just - just hold that,” you said, giving the ice back.

She did. In her lap.

“On the lump?” You venture.

“Oh,” she says, grinning sheepishly and raising the tea-towel in both hooves and pressing it to her head.

As unsettling as it actually is to be confronted by brightly-coloured talking quadrupedal faux-horses (the theory of it is simple-sounding enough, the reality jarring against your brain), you can’t deny they’re cute as anything, as her grin reminded you. You even found yourself grinning a little too.

The glass had smashed on hitting the floor, unsurprisingly, and had got water everywhere. Fortunately, it had shattered into at most three or four fairly big, obviously chunks and these you carefully picked up and held in the palm of your free hand before depositing them - gently - in the kitchen sink. You’d deal with those later.

For the water you just grabbed another two tea-towels. You had fistfuls of the things. Why? You’d never asked. Taking them you dabbed at the water a little to soak up as much as possible then just left them there, damp lumps. Again, you’d deal with that later.

“You’re the hyoo-man, aren’t you?” The pony asked.

Why did they all pronounce it like that? ‘Human’ was not a difficult word. Where did that ‘y’ sound even come from? You weren’t adding it.

“What gave me away? It was the accent, wasn’t it?”

She does not get it, at least not immediately. Then, as the light breaks, the grin spreads across her face again along with what looks an awful lot like a blush. She looks away.

“I like that,” she says, quietly.

And then nothing. You appear to have killed the conversation.

You’re also waking up, and the possibility of being able to go back to sleep as and when you returned to bed struck you as more and more remote. That, and you’re now being confronted with the very obvious reality that you invited a pony into your home. Of your own free will, no less.

It was highly like that not one hoof had set foot - uh, hoof? Hoof set hoof? - beneath your roof since whoever had put the furniture in for you had done that.

It wasn’t as bad as all that, now you really thought about it. All the normal dread and squirming discomfort you’d felt so far seemed diminished. Absent, even.

And even if it hadn’t been you had invited a possibly injured person - for, really, they were just people, yes? Of a sort - into your home to recover following an accident. It was the decent thing to have done.

You cleared your throat and nodded to the messenger bag still slung around her middle. There was a name for the middle bit of these ponies, wasn’t there? Something, you were sure. Not important.

“You the, uh, local mail, uh, mailpony?” You ask, somewhat falteringly. Take any word and stick ‘pony’ onto it. Always a safe bet. This at least you’d learnt. She nodded.

“One of them,” she said, still looking away.

“Right, right. Uh, is it good?” You ask, fumbling. She nods.

Look at yourself. You’re exchanging small-talk with a pony and you’re failing at it. And you have no-one else to blame for this except your own fool self. This is but one of the many reasons why keeping to yourself is probably the right way to go.

“How’s the head?” You ask, sagging, out of ideas. Throughout all of this you’ve half-knelt somewhat awkwardly in front of her so-as to be on her level and without being presumptuous enough to just sit next to her.

“Oh! Much better, thanks,” she says, smiling more warmly, gratefully now. It’s very pleasant, knowing you helped.

“That’s good. Feel alright?”

“Yep!” She said, nodding, mane flapping. Her smile spread to you, if only a little bit. The flapping was adorable.

“That’s good, that’s good. Don’t feel you have to hang around here if you’re okay. You’ve probably got letters to deliver. Probably important, that.”

Mention of that seems to take some of the wind out of her sails and the warm smile falters. Not completely though, It stays, just, and you wonder what about what you’d said had been the stumbling block.

Could have just been the impression you were turfing her out.

“But, you know, stay as long as you need to,” you blurt, covering up for what you assume your mistake had been. “Or not as long. Or whatever. Just as long as you’re okay, you know?”

This was not an area you had much experience in, comforting the hurt, physically or otherwise. Still, her smile got a little less faded, at least until she fumbled the now half-melted lump of ice and dropped it in just the right way to have it bounce off your leg and somehow end up disappearing underneath the sofa.

She sighed.

“I should probably go, yeah,” she said.

“As long as you’re sure you’re alright,” you say as moves to dismount the sofa. In so doing she somehow gets three legs caught in the straps on the messenger bag and would have landed face-first on the floor had you not caught her. Which you did.

“T-thanks,” she stammered, blushing furiously as you helpfully got her untangled and settled upright and stable. You’d be blushing too if you’d nearly eaten shit like that in front of someone. Who wouldn’t?

With that done she moves - carefully - towards the door. You move ahead to open it for her, being the host. She stops just short of leaving though, and looks up at you, neck craning.

“I’m Derpy,” she says.

Derpy? That seemed harsh.

Still, not your place to pass judgement. So far you hadn’t heard a single name that didn’t sound faintly ridiculous but you were sure that they thought the same of your name, too, only being too polite to say so.

Indeed, when you do give her your name you see that same flicker across her face that all the others had, too, but she keeps her comments to herself . You do wonder what they must think of you, sometimes…

“How come I never really see you around?” She asked.

Your turn to blush, or at least turn a little pink near the ears. You know she didn’t mean it like that, but it felt an awful lot like being called out on being a recluse.

“I just keep to myself. Don’t want to bother anyone,” you say.

“Oh,” she says, walking on through the door.

Stepping outside she stops again and turns back to look at you.

“Somepony said you’d left,” she said.

You hadn’t heard anything about that, but then how would you have done? It didn’t matter much to you anyway. You shrugged. Being reclusive lent itself well to people - or ponies - coming up with their own ideas of what it was you might be doing or where you might be. It didn’t matter.

“Nope, still here. Just...here,” you said.

She looks around and past you, though really with that eye of hers she is always looking around and past you. There’s a moment when she takes the measure of your bare, quiet home.

“Seems kinda lonely,” she says.

You shrug again.

“I’m fine,” you lie outrageously, smiling as you do so.

For a vertigo-inducing split-second you worry she might spot you for the barefaced liar you are. To your immense relief she does not. Instead she hops up until the air and hovers there, swinging around alarmingly enough that you’re now not so amazed that she managed to crash into your house.

“You really didn’t have to help me out like that,” she said. You waved her off.

“Don’t worry about it. Anyone would have done it.”

To this Derpy very deliberately, very obviously said nothing, though only after catching herself. The smile came back, clearly more forced this time. You might have had more time to wonder about that had she not listed alarmingly in the air and very nearly thunked into the doorframe, only stopped by you, again.

“Y-you should come out more,” she said once you’d set her into the air again, a safer distance from the house.

“Maybe,” you say.

The sun’s up properly by now. The whole town is starting to wake up. This you can see because you’re out towards the edge of it. A bird is singing somewhere, but other than that things are pretty quiet.

“See you round, Derpy,” you say, edging back inside, hand on the door.

“I hope so!” She beams, bobbing in the air again before veering around in an arch and disappearing back toward the heart of town. Watching her fly makes you wince.

On closing the door you find the house oppressively, stiflingly quiet.

And lonely. You’d been lonely pretty much the whole time you’d been in Equestria, you knew, and by choice to boot. But it had sort of faded into the background. Something you’d stopped noticing. Actually talking to someone - having a conversation, no matter how awkward and halting - had reminded you how nice it was to just...have someone around.

Even if that someone was a teeny tiny technicolour pony with huge eyes. The kind that’d normally have had you squirming on the spot desperate to be on your own again.

Maybe you’re getting used to the place. Maybe it’s just still too early in the morning.

You don’t know. You go back to bed. Eventually you even manage to get back to sleep. Not like you had anything else to do.

Later - you’re not sure how much later, it still seems bright to you but that could mean anything - something else wakes you up. Another noise, but not quite as violent as the bang from before.

Blinking, you sit up. Should probably get out of bed and see what it was. And you do need a slash anyway. A shower might not go amiss either, even if cramming yourself into that tiny bath and squatting underneath the not-made-for-you-at-all showerhead was never particularly fun. Stinking isn’t fun either.

So you get up again and you go downstairs again to go and stick your head out again to see what if anything hit your house. Again.

There isn’t anything there. Or so you think at first. Then you catch sight of something just out the bottom of your eye. There is a basket, and it is full of muffins.

“Muffins?” You say to yourself. There isn’t a lot else you can do.

Is muffins on your doorstep a good thing around here? Is it a bad thing? Is it a normal thing? You look around but the basket and the muffins are the only things there. No sign of whoever left them, no clue as to why.

Still. You’re hungry. There’s no food in the house and you skipped breakfast and, indeed, dinner yesterday. Perhaps against your best judgement you pick up the basket and before even considering the consequences you’re halfway through a muffin.

“Oh well,” you shrug, mumbling around crumbs. The muffin is good. Very good. It does not last long.

Reaching for another - in for a penny and all that - your fingers brush something that is not muffin. You pull out a note. A clue! Bringing the basket inside and shutting the door you go to sofa, set the muffins beside you and unfold the note.

The handwriting - hoofwriting? - is not great, but you can read it. You see that it addresses you by name. That narrows the suspects down a bit.

And so you read:

“You really didn’t have to help me the way you did. I’m sorry I broke the glass and crashed into your house. I don’t know what kind of muffins you like so I made a bunch. Can you tell me which are your favourite so I can make more of those next time? You’re really nice and you should come out of the house more. If you want. Thank you, Derpy.”

For reasons you can’t put your finger on, you sit and stare at this note for quite some time.

The rest of the muffins are all just as good as each other. You’re not sure which you could say was your favourite if and when you saw Derpy again.

And to your surprise, you find yourself hoping that it is a when, and not an if.