The Second Best Place to Start
Time, sequential progression of one day before the next, had ceased to exist. The principle of causality might hold water in the universe at large, but for Twilight there was nothing more than the infinite and timeless now, a disjointed array of consequence without cause and reaction with no discernible antecedent.
A pen was set down, a drink taken, a thought evaporated. A thought formed, a drink was taken, a pen was picked up.
Words on a page, ink to paper and into the eyes and back into thought. There was order to this, she thought. There was order to this, she wrote.
A beginning, she thought, wrote, and thought again, was the best place to start. The second best was now. The second best would have to do.
The problem did not lie with the world but with her answer to it. Her answer which removed her from it and from all things save to repeat the answer. To repeat the process. A drink, a thought, and a pen to paper, the three taken liberally and in any order which most bears repeating.
She reasoned that this was only a temporary feeling, because she could remember always feeling this way and knew that there were things that she could not yet remember. She thought perhaps that she reasoned poorly, but the idea had been thought and therefore was. Cogito ergo something more to drink ad infinitum. E pluribus uno mas. And so on.
Twilight woke to the semi-darkness of her namesake, hidden safely behind lidded eyes. She could feel the emptiness beside her, hear no sound of breath and smell only the lingering trace of a once beloved perfume that she was surprised in a small way to find that she felt nothing about.
Caution to the wind, Twilight opened her eyes to confirm her reality. She was alone, the impression of someone no longer there all that lay beside her.
Light from the window hesitantly prodded at the edges of the blackout curtains – so aptly named – testing the waters before making any real attempt to brighten the room.
With a wave of the hand and a half-conscious thought, she charmed a pen and pad of paper from her dresser, casting the room in a pallid purple glow as they floated to her. The color of magic, she mused, was a visual dirge.
Such were often her thoughts, on days such as this. Bleak and without inspiration. Metaphors and similes, all lacking in beauty what they made up for in ghastly, crunching truth.
A bottle was in her hand, no magic necessary. No, this must be close to hand, never hidden but always discretely tucked away. To hide was to be ashamed, so not to hide hid the shame. In sight, but not plain.
A sip. A swallow. A drink.
Pen to paper. Thought without grace. Wretched poetry.
Another night
another morning.
No goodbye.
Mourning.
If not resentment then what's this recurring sentiment?
Every spoken word was meant and I was
Silent.
Is this the end?
But every end begets a start
and there's no love within this heart.
Is this the end?
When will it end?
A frown marched across her face from brow to mouth and back again to the rhythm of a heartbeat she felt in her temples as she waved an open palm over the fresh ink, and she felt wetness on her cheek as the words crackled and shrank under iridescent flames of that hated color.
“Shitty poem.” She said aloud, grimacing to hear the dry crack in her own voice, so like a strangers.
Twilight climbed out of bed and out of her jeans to put on her pyjamas. One more drink and her slippered feet had no trouble navigating the stairs to the wold below, from which the smell of domesticity wafted, dressed in the trappings of scones and maple and coffee, the flavors of happiness in other homes that felt as out of place as they were familiar in her own.
Rarity was there, of course, at the table by the window, breakfast already finished. Her back was to Twilight, and she did not turn at the sound of Twilight's approach.
Twilight sat across from her, avoiding eye contact in a casual, practiced way as she filled her coffee from the French press with another wave of her hand and the grotesque glow of purple. At a last second thought, unbidden but immediately welcomed, a twist of her hand and a sudden extrication of consciousness from presence and into familiarity changed the magic by a powerful subtlety and the level of the liquor in the bottle in the closet dropped an inch as the coffee filled her mug. Her mug, the gaudy pink one with a nightmarish typeface declaring “I smile because coffee”. Her mug, now containing more than coffee in a way not hidden, but not declared. There was no attempt to hide the smell of the liquor, no reason to be ashamed. But there was no reason to flaunt the bottle.
She wasn't delusional if she didn't believe the lies she told herself. It wasn't rationalization if there was no attempt at being rational. It simply was, and it was simple.
Rarity looked away from the window and met Twilight's gaze. A look passed between them in a skipped heartbeat, time playing games of memory and thought, and for a lifetime of a moment all was well. Rarity was only Rarity. Twilight was only Twilight.
Then reality closed back in like air after a lightning strike and the thunder of it shook Twilight to the soul. Rarity hadn't been crying, but it wasn't for lack of trying.
Perhaps that was well enough for a beginning. Perhaps that would have to do. Tears poured out as if to make room for the memories that flooded in, and Twilight smiled through them. A smile not of happiness. Twilight smiled, welcoming the memories that she lived in now as she lived in then. Time in tandem, then and now and both with the same answers. A pen. A glass. And a thought. Ad infinitum. And so on.
Author's Note
I'm hoping to continue this for myself, but any feedback at all would be appreciated!
