Jared tinkered boredly with the prop governor from the massive radial engine of the Beaver. He leaned against a wooden work bench, turning it end over end, playing with the linkage. Music cooed over the stereo, the end of a Dean Martin song, something about getting kicked in the head.

“Jared, how does this-“ Rainbow Dash began, her head stuck under the dash of the beaver. He heard a muffled thunk as the shock mounted panel suddenly slammed down into the bottom of the dash. “Nevermind... I got it.”

He shook his head and chuckled as the pegasus slipped out of the fuselage, carrying the gyroscope and the DG. She gently sat the instruments on the bench beside him. He looked at the instruments, The gyro was centered, the DG shattered.

“Well both of those look fucked.”

“You can tell just by looking at them?” Rainbow cocked her head at him in confusion.

“This one doesn’t sit in the middle when it’s not wound, this one shouldn’t be shattered.”

“Ohhh...” Rainbow called in acknowledgement.

“God, Change it.” Jared sighed heavily as the song changed to I’m On Fire, Bruce Springsteen.

Rainbow dashed over to the makeshift stereo, tapping the skip button on the iPhone’s display aggressively. The song changed to a modern country beat, a heavy drum sound with piano cutting in between a soft guitar.

“Skip.”

“Why do you keep songs in here if you dont like them?” She asked, a confused look on her face.

Jared hung his head. “I love Springsteen’s music. This song about Springsteen. I love the Wallflowers, I love Def Leppard. They’ve just been ruined is all.” He slowly sat the prop governor down, raising his face to glance at the confused pegasus.

“Ruined?”

“Sometimes you have awesome times with someone close to you, and you associate music with that time... And sometimes you lose those people. And every time you hear that song it’s like going through that loss all over again... But you can’t bear to let go.” Jared explained slowly, shaking his head. He didn’t want to be like this, emotional, useless, dramatic. The heartache that devoured his being was uncontrollable, inconsolable though he tried.

“Oh.” Rainbow sat on the polished concrete floor, looking at the ground. Her gaze traveled up to meet his face. “So what did you have pinned to this song?”

Jared chuckled at first. “Well... It was the fall of 20’, my Summer of 1969 as it were...”

The red and grey bullnose Ford whipped past the roundabouts of the Bogard extension, easily exceeding the 35 Mile Per Hour school zone of Colony. He ripped through the circular path as fast as he could without squealing the tires. It was the beginning of October, in the early evening. The sun rested with a golden light over the Valley as Jared grabbed fourth gear. Windows down, the chilly wind whipping in the cab, his passenger laughed as her brown hair whipped in the wind. The force of the turns pushed them into the bench seat and door panels. Jared grinned stupidly as she laughed. Hannah had left him a year ago, his long distance relationship had crashed and burned, and this girl gripping the frame of the wing window with one hand, the back of the seat with the other, had been his world for quite some time. Bruce Springsteen blared over his stereo, Dancing in the Dark. He sang along, very loudly, very exaggerated for the sake of entertaining his friend.

After bopping along Bogard all the way to Wasilla High school, he haphazardly whipped the wheel of the pickup, careening into the parking lot. The straight piped exhaust gave a subtle roar as he pulled into a spot. The parking lot was packed, this was the biggest event of the season. The annual Palmer High V Wasilla High match. The Potato Bowl. Jared shut off the truck and pulled his door handle.

“Hey Jared?” His passenger asked.

“Yeah?” He looked over with his stupid face to meet her stunning green eyes.

“Nick told me...” She said nervously, looking out the window.

“Told you... What exactly?” Jared pulled his door closed, befuddled as to why they were playing the pronoun game. The door shut with a solid ‘thunk’ and she paused, screwing her eyes shut.

“He told me what you said, how you feel.”

“Hey. Forget it.” Jared smiled. “I know you don’t feel like that, you don’t need me to be that to you anyway. I get it. Don’t sweat it. I don’t give you special treatment because of it, I’m not gonna stop caring. We’re friends, thats what matters.”

“Jeez man, how many girlfriends have you had?” Rainbow cocked an eyebrow

“6.” Jared replied without missing a beat. “Some were the right people at the wrong time... Others just.. The wrong people at the wrong time. I try my best to be competent and caring. Sometimes it’s too much, sometimes it’s not enough.”

“Which was Hannah?”

“3. The first were just... Me being lost and stupid. The 4th was genuine, but so far away, she couldn’t take it anymore... 5th is this story, 6th is the cheater.”

“So why’d you paint Hannah on your plane and not this girl? Clearly you loved this girl a lot, if you knew her for so long but never said anything, just trying to keep her happy instead...”

“I’d had that spare cowling painting of her long before I had the Beaver. Originally it was just garage art. The Beaver is named Hannah now. She never really connected with me, we didn’t last long, but I cared about her a lot. Some of the hardest times... She was there for me even if she didn’t really show much more emotion beyond talking about our problems...”

“So what happened next?”

She slowly looked back to meet his genuine smile, then down at the red carpeted floorboards.

“Cmon, Clay’s had a hell of a time keeping seats for us.” He nodded towards the football field.

She smiled, pulling her door handle. The two hopped from the cab and shut the doors, walking towards the stadium. The made their way to the far side, the Palmer stands. Quickly finding the leather-clad stud that was Jared’s bestie, the pair quickly made their way down the stands to Clay and his fiancé.

“Sorry we’re late, traffic was hell.” Jared called.

“Oh whatever man, there is no traffic on Bogard tonight.” Clay laughed and slugged his friend in the arm. They hugged briefly, before sitting back down.

The game raged on for hours, by the time it ended, the final score was 21-18, Palmer as the winner, closer scores than it had been previous years.

As the game ended, the stadium lights were dimmed. The field was opened. Hundreds of people left for the evening, while several dozen more filtered onto the field to congratulate players. As the lights went out completely, fireworks lit up the sky. Jared’s companion nearly jumped with the unexpected, resonating boom. Jared slowly walked to where Clay and his soon to be wife sat in the grass, he held her tight, watching the spectacle. Jared sat behind them, about 6 feet away. His friend sat beside him, she watched the firework’s captivating glow. Brilliant oranges and blues, reds and greens lit up the evening sky.

“Yknow... I never did get to finish what I was saying about what you had felt...” She called to him over the cacophony of reverberations.

“Oh, sorry..!” Jared called, feeling like a moron for having interrupted and never let her finish.

“Well it’s just... We’ve had our differences sometimes, but always managed to stick through it. You mean a lot to me.” She smiled kindly at him.

“Oh... Well.. Thank you.” He smiled softly.

“No... I mean.. Jared I know how you feel, and I know you don’t want to jeopardize our friendship...” She struggled with words, it was like Freshman year all over again, though they were both out of school as of that spring. “What I’m trying to say is..”

She leaned in, quickly kissing him. The gesture only lasted a few seconds, but to Jared it felt like a life time. Illuminated by the light of the fireworks, time stopped as she made her move. His heart fluttered as she pulled back away, looking to the stands and moving a strand of hair from her face.

Jared slowly leaned back on his hands in the grass. After a moment to think, when his companion looked like she was about to sink into the earth, he put his arm around her, his calloused hands laying gently on her bicep. She softly leaned into him, the two watching the explosions of color in the night sky. Music was playing over the PA, Eric Church’s song aptly titled Springsteen. The piano riffs cut deep into Jared’s heart.

“So... Does this mean you want to go out?” He asked, looking down to meet her gaze. She wordlessly nodded. He looked back at the fireworks, his stupid signature smile plastered on his face. “Neat...”

After the fireworks stopped, the stadium lights stayed out, people filed out of the field. The two couples sat, watching the stars for a moment. Clay got up, holding a hand to Jared. Jared pulled himself up before holding his hand to his companion.

“Mcdonalds?” Clay asked, abstractly.

“I should probably be getting home...” The light brown haired girl spoke up, voicing her concern.

Jared checked his phone, it was getting late. He reached to hug Clay “Next time.”

“Alright, you two drive safe.”

“Me? Dangerous?” Jared held a hand over his chest in mock horror, before grinning and dropping the hand, walking backwards towards the gate. “You must have me confused with someone else.”

Clay and his fiancé called goodbye one last time, Jared faded into the crowd, holding the hand of his companion. They made their way to the old beat up Ford, he opened the door for her. The truck wasn’t lifted, but stock trucks from 1984 didn’t need to be. The XLT package on 16 inch rims was much taller than the short girl. Jared climbed into the cab briefly before seeing she hadn't gotten in.

“How do you make it look so easy?” She asked with a laugh, defeated. He slid out of the cab and walked around to her side.

“Take your hand that’s on the outboard side.” He gently took her right hand, placing it on the A Pillar of the doorframe.

“Then step up with your inboard foot, pulling in with that hand. You can put your other hand on the back of the seat too, but if you do it quickly you shouldn’t need to.” Jared smiled gently, holding his hands out on either side, to keep her from falling back. She made a swift hop, and pulled herself in.

“Good job.” He grinned, shutting the door gently and climbing back behind the wheel.

“So you guys got together?” Dash asked. “You seemed so happy, what happened..?”

“She uh...” Jared sniffled lightly, wiping his right eye. “She was going rafting with some friends... I told em’ not to go, but when they refused to stop I decided to go with them, thought maybe I could help if something went wrong... Things were going well, the water was pretty calm, if not fast. She unclipped her life preserver to put her jacket on... I mean, it was only 15 seconds at the most... There was some kind of huge drop in the water, it was swift moving glacial drainage to begin with but... Threw her off balance. Someone got thrown too far to the side or something... The raft flipped. I bobbed back up as everyone was swimming to shore... I was tangled in the line that ran from the Quarter Breast to the Forward Breast.. It caught me by my ankle, kept sucking me under.”

Jared took a heavy breath as his eyes began dripping gently.

“And uh... And I saw her. She wasn’t far... She was struggling, hard... I reached for her... Screamed for her but I don’t think she even heard me... She went under and... And the raft hit some boulders, whipped me right into them... When I woke up, I was all kinds of fucked. Tangled in a logjam six miles downstream from where we flipped. Hypothermia, broken fibula, pneumonia... I managed to find my knife on my belt and cut the damned line now that I wasn’t focusing on keeping my head up... Pulled myself up on the logjam and I saw... Something bobbing in the water on the far side of it... See... The vest is designed to help keep you face up... Well I found her face down...”

His voice actively broke, deep sucking breaths as the tears filled his eyes were the only way to breath.

“Jared...”

“We should have never gone... I should’ve put my foot down, it was April dammit.. It was so cold, it was a bad idea from the start... And now she’s gone, all because I wouldn’t stand up for the smart thing...”

Rainbow Dash was silent. She had no idea what to say to this.

“Anyway...” He sniffed, smearing his hand across his face, wiping the tears. “Sometimes music hurts, even if you don’t want to get rid of it... I didnt think I’d ever move on, when I got lonely ai thought I fell in love but clearly the feeling wasn’t mutual... I’m not gonna look for someone else if I ever get home...”

“But why not..?” Rainbow asked, cocking her head, her ears flat. “Don’t you have a right to be happy..?”

“I had the best... And she’s gone.” Jared remarked. “I’m not going to try and settle for second best. I tried, thought I found it, and it was a mistake...”

“One I do not intend to make twice.”

Author's Note

Filler chapter, its not so good, I’ve been very busy, just trying to keep it alive. Sorry guys.