“This is certainly a unique way to start Christmas.”
Standing outside in the cold, frosty air, he watched as the fire consumed his home. He had been out in town when it happened, working in some last-minute shopping for cider and roasted chestnuts. Rainbow Dash had told him what happened, the two of them running back just in time to see the fire engulfing the house.
“Thanks for telling me, even if we didn’t make back to put it out. At least it gave me enough time to get some of my things.”
“Yeah… no problem,” she said, glancing at the box.
Anon hummed, “The decorations are a nice touch. Whoever wanted to burn my place down sure gave it the festive flair.”
Dash hung her head down. She had been secretly hoarding the decorations, waiting for the right time to surprise him. He had never had a Christmas in their world; Dash had been hyping it up, wanting to get him all ready for the special day. What should have been a fantastic night to share alone with him blew up in flames, quite literally, as an errant spark from old, frayed wire set the place ablaze.
“I’m not sure who would want to burn my place up－” Dash winced, “－but taking me down with the holiday spirit is certainly unique.” He let out a sigh. “What am I supposed to do for the night? Everyone is at their families and the inns are closed.”
“You could stay with me,” Dash piped in. “I’m doing my own thing for Christmas this year.”
“Don’t you live in a cloud?”
“I can lower it for you, easy enough.”
“I don’t want to intrude on you.”
“It’s no problem. It’s not like I had any plans or anything.” ‘Please say yes, I already feel bad enough as it is.’
He rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know what to say. Thanks, Dash, you’re a really good friend.”
She flinched at his words. “N-No problem… what are friends for?”
The snow crunched under them as they walked to her place, snow slowly falling in large flakes. Carolers could be heard in the distance, the laughter of children soon following. The odd silence between the two was disturbing Dash, greatly so after the fire.
He appeared fine, but how hard was he taking it emotionally? He lost his very home and all of his worldly possessions. The guilt ate at her, the quiet walk between the two slowly working the shame she held.
“I, uh, at least you got something out of your house before it all went up in flames.” She grimaced. ‘Stupid, stupid, stupid!’
“I suppose something important did manage to survive.”
“It’s a pretty big box, probably got plenty of clothes and other things in there I hope.”
“No, the only clothes I have left are what I’m wearing. Probably gonna need to get Rarity to make me up some more. That’s going to be a pain to explain. ‘How did you manage to lose your clothes this time? Someone burnt your house down? A funny story if I ever heard one!’”
Anon laughed at his impersonation; Dash gave a half-hearted chuckle before looking away, ears flattened to her head.
“I kid though, she’ll probably pull through when she gets back. I do wish I had some more socks or something, the cold’s going to suck.”
“I’ll make sure to get some magic firelogs to keep us warm!”
“Probably not as warm as the fire back at my place, eh? Eeeh?”
“Yeah, uh… good one…”
The two stood just outside the area where Dash’s place was in the air. She flew up, making her way back down with the house, letting it just hover over the ground as the clouds puffed out of existence.
“There, that should work for now. I’ll have to rebuild the cloud platforms later but there’s always plenty of materials around for that.”
“I sure wish I could do that, it’d be fun being able to rebuild your house whenever things went wrong.”
Rainbow Dash let out a quiet whine as Anon walked inside, looking around the area.
“This is neat, never been here. And you weren’t kidding it’s all made of clouds. I bet this feels great to sleep on. You even got some decorations up. Though I don’t see a tree.”
‘That’s at your house, burning inside your living room.’ “Yeah, I guess I didn’t think to get one this year, oops…”
“Guess we have to pretend you have one this year, maybe I’ll draw one up later.” Anon sat down on the couch, looking around. “Where should I put my box?”
“You can give it to me and I’ll put it up.”
He held the box away from her. “Yeah, no, this stays with me.”
“Is it fragile? Oh! Did you manage to save those limited ciders from Appleloosa? I remember you worked like crazy to get those.”
“No, this is much more important than some drinks.”
“You can’t trick me, you wouldn’t stop talking about that cider when you got them.”
“Sorry to disappoint but that cider’s underneath the wreckage that is my house.”
“O-Oh… I’m sorry.”
Anon coughed, “No, it’s fine. I really shouldn’t get upset, you didn’t do anything wrong.”
Guilt continued to drive at her, knowing she had burnt her friend’s house to the ground. Dash wanted to explain what happened but felt unable to confess, scared of what would happen. Would he scream at her? What if he decided she wasn’t worth being a friend anymore? She just wanted to give him a fun Christmas, just the two of them, and all she wound up doing was destroying everything he held dear.
She looked at Anon playing with her guitar, plucking some of the strings. “Wish I knew some Christmas songs to play. Remind me to bug Octavia about a commission in the future. Pretty sure I could come up with some tunes from my home.”
“Aren’t you upset?”
He paused, looking at her. “What would I be upset about?”
“Your house burning down.” Her mouth felt like it was full of cotton balls, her chest full of lead. “Why aren’t you angry about it?”
Anon placed the guitar down, tapping his legs. “It’s not that I’m not angry, I kind of am. But I’ve learned a lot going through life, especially coming here. It’s not like this isn’t the first time I’ve lost everything before, Dash.
“If I get angry every time something goes wrong, being angry at the world over any little injustice, I’m just not sure what kind of toll that would bring me.”
He gave out a small laugh. “Thank goodness for friends like you. At least I have someone that can help me until I can pick up the pieces.”
Her heart wrenched inside, feeling sick from his words. “Y-Yeah…”
“This is unquestionably going to be a memorable Christmas this year. I wasn’t planning on doing much tomorrow other than invite you over to my house since you told me you were staying here for the holidays. Guess that’s not happening.
“We’ve got to do some things out in town tomorrow, just the two of us, having some fun. Maybe go sledding or find some festive food in town.”
“That, that sounds nice.” Dash turned away, slowly made her way toward her stairs. “I-I-I think I’ll… I’m going to lay down for the night.”
“Don’t want to stay up for a bit?”
“I’m… I’m kind of tired.”
“Alright then. I’ll probably stay up for a little bit longer before laying down, the excitement of everything still has me buzzing.”
Walking up to her bed, Dash fell on top of it, draping her covers over her, curling herself into a ball. She laid awake, thinking of the fire that had happened, unable to fall asleep as tears drifted from her eyes.
With a groan, Rainbow Dash rubbed her eyes. Morning light shined through the window, wakening her from her tireless sleep. No matter how hard she tried, nothing could take her mind off of the fire.
“What a stupid idea for a gift…”
Pushing the covers off she got out of bed. Dash had to tell him the truth, how she had managed to ruin Christmas and burn his house down, even if he would hate her afterward. No matter how much it would ache her heart, knowing such a wonderful person would be gone from her life, she couldn’t pretend it didn’t happen.
Slowly walking down the stairs, she could see Anon was on the couch, a light blanket covering him. Arriving on the ground floor, Dash inched her way toward him, pushing herself forward.
She paused, looking off to the sidewall, only then noticing what Anon had done. He had drawn up a Christmas tree, placing it on the wall alongside some crumpled pieces of colored paper for decoration. Underneath it was the box he was carrying with him the other day.
“Oh hey, you’re awake!” Anon sat up, stretching his arms. “Merry Christmas Dash!”
“A-Anon… there’s something I need to tell you.”
“Before that, I want you to open up your present!”
Her heart jumped before plummeting inside her chest. “...What?” she squeaked out.
“Yeah, so funny thing. Running back into my house last night, the only thing I grabbed was my present for you. I’m not sure why I took that out of everything else, but I’m glad I did. Sorry, it’s not wrapped or anything.” He motioned for her to the box. “Go on, open it up!”
Unable to deny him, Dash slowly made her way to the drawn tree, staring at the box. She sat down, holding the box in her lap. It was agonizing for her, knowing she held the one thing that he kept from his house, ultimately, was for her.
“Come on, I want to see what you think!”
She could feel her eyes prickling, looking at the present. Her present.
Opening it, she could see two items inside. The first one was a finely crafted wooden statue, made to look just like her, flying off into the air with a confident smile. Each section was painstakingly worked on as if chiseled over time. A small plaque was on the base: Living Life With Style. She could already feel tears streaming down her face, feeling an emotional knife digging into her heart, looking at her gift.
“I had to have someone teach me how to whittle wood to make that, though the plaque came from a shop. You have no idea how long I had to learn how to stain that either.”
She gently placed the lovely statue down that, clearly to her, Anon had lovingly put his heart into making just for her. She then looked at the second item. It was a picture frame of the two of them out in the town, Anon holding Dash as she posed for the camera, him not looking too pleased in the image.
“That’s our first week together out in the town, hanging out. I remembered how much fun we had that summer, playing pranks or watching the stars. Thought it’d be nice to frame that up. I hope you like your gifts. Merry Christmas!”
It was as if a dam had broken loose inside her, sobs coming out in convulsing gasps.
“I, I, I’m soooorrry.” She crawled over to Anon, shoving her face into his chest. “I’m the one that burnt your house down! I just wanted to decorate it for Christmas and, and, and it all burned up! I didn’t mean to, I swear!”
Anon couldn’t understand her words, her crying making it difficult. He held her, trying to help calm her down.
“Are you okay?”
“No. I… I’m the one that burnt your house down! I just w-wanted to decorate it as a surprise!”
“Oh.” He hummed, rubbing her back. “Well… I’m sure you didn’t mean to.”
“I, I understand if you want to hate me or never talk to me again, I’m a bad person.”
“Hey, don’t say that about yourself. I could never hate you, Dash. So you burnt my house down. Big deal.”
“W-W-Why aren’t you angry? I don’t get it! I ruined Christmas!”
“It’s just a house, Dash. I can always get that replaced, but I can’t replace an awesome person like you.”
All she could do was cry into him, her guilt laid to bare. Anon held on to her, giving her all the time she needed. Before very long, she had found herself crawled up into his lap, sniffling to herself.
“Are you feeling better?”
“No.” She wiped her eyes. “It’d be easier if you hated me.”
“It’s Christmas, we should be having fun and enjoying the holiday. I’d rather go out and get some cocoa than be angry with you.”
“But what about after Christmas? What then?”
“Then I go out and try to get a new house, and you can help me. It’s not the end of the world, Dash. No one got hurt so that just means there’s always a new day to make things better. Though, there is one problem.”
“...Yes?”
“I kind of need a place to stay, at least until I find a new home. You’ll be fine with me staying here?”
Thoughts of having him live with her started to fill her mind, flushing her face. “Y-Yeah, that’s fine. Stay as long as you’d like!”
Dash let out a squeal, feeling herself being lifted into the air.
“Now that that’s over with, let’s go out, forget this all happened, and do something fun!”
He carried her out of the house, intent on doing something festive and cheerful for the two of them. Rainbow Dash gave a small smile, wondering what she deserved to have such a great friend.
~End~
