“You’re letting your hair grow out again!” Sonata said brightly, half-muffled by the surplus of pancakes that were stuffed inside her mouth.

“I am,” Adagio said carelessly, though she gave a small shiver so as to let the returning length take a wave in recognition. “What of it?”

“Well it means you’re wanting to act like your old self again! You’ve kept it shorter ever since Aria ran-”

“And that’s enough, Sonata!” Adagio said dangerously, very much tempted by the thought of throwing the hot oatmeal she was eating into her sister’s yapping face. “Jeez, why do you insist on continuing to talk so much?”

“Because I’m happy and I like talking. You know that!”

“Yes, and you like doing all of that very loudly,” Adagio muttered. Why do you care what I do with my hair, anyway?”

“Because you’re my sister and I love you, so of course I’m gonna care,” Sonata replied, not an ounce of her over-bubbly personality quelled by her sister’s sour mood. “You’ve actually been making a friend these past couple months since you started working at Rarity’s boutique and I’m really happy because even though you’re on probation for the next four months you’re still trying and-”

“Yes, I get it! Ease off. And…” Adagio bit her tongue, wondering if she was even sure of what she was about to say. “She’s not my friend. Not at all.”

Rather than be perturbed, the words seemed to spur Sonata to a sudden gasp and she cried out, “Oh, you like her don’t you? That’s so cute, I love it!”

“Sonata!” Adagio hoped her face wasn’t red, or that at least it would be misinterpreted as anger. “I don’t like her, she’s not my friend, and I am about to throw my breakfast in your face. Why are you doing this?”

“Because it’s so sweet and I’m glad you found somebody even if you still wanna be a sourpuss all the time. You’re even making an effort to look pretty to impress her, that’s just ado-”

“Finish that sentence and you’re wearing this bowl, Sonata.”

The young Siren giggled and return to her pancakes, finding that more syrup was necessary for her complete and total satisfaction. But she kept glancing up at her elder sister with a knowing smile that was sure to drive her sister mad.

“What else do you have to do today but work?” Adagio asked, trying to steer the conversation away from more dangerous waters. “Will you be out with Pinkie and Sunset tonight, or just coming home straight from work?”

“I dunno, we haven’t decided. Why, are you wanting to bring Rarity back here tonight? She’s pretty formal nowadays, Dagi, I don’t think she’ll sleep with you that quickly.”

The sensuous Siren looked down at her bowl and wondered if she would really miss its contents all that much if she did indeed throw it in her sister’s face.

Adagio was used to stares as she went about her business. The form she beheld now was not an unattractive one, curvaceous and lovely to the eye. More than once she would catch people gawking, and it was not unusual to find one that didn’t want to look away even after being spotted. It wasn’t quite the strength and sustenance of magic from older days, but the feeling of power that came with such control had been one that she enjoyed. Her career path hadn’t been any sort of accident; she wanted people to notice, like bait on a hook to a fish.

Nowadays, Adagio had an issue she hadn’t found herself certain of how to deal with: the one and only person she wanted to notice unequivocally refused to! Every day she spent at the boutique was torturous, constantly spent in the presence of the one thing she couldn’t touch, couldn’t have, and yet so desperately needed. To see that beautiful fashionista awakened a hunger in her bones; to be close and let the scent of that resplendent perfume fill her nostrils turned her skin to gooseflesh; to gaze into those deep, soft eyes for as long as she could made her ache… perhaps in places she wished to keep unnamed.

To the sullen Adagio, it was little more the torture of a denied pleasantry and little else. She refused for it to be seen as anything but, even in her own mind. Yet…

“Ms. Dazzle?” Rarity’s voice came from her office and immediately the Siren felt something flutter in her stomach. Still so formal, even after months of work.

“I’m here,” Adagio said in a voice of forced calm.

“Do you mind helping me sort through these invoices? I’ve let myself run behind on them, I need to see which have been paid or not.”

“And leave the floor unmanned?” It wasn’t like Rarity to allow such a thing.

“I believe we’ll manage, so long as we make sure to listen. Come back here, and we’ll get started.”

Adagio left her place at the desk and turned to the back rooms where Rarity’s office was, entering and seeing that elegance now encased in a more business-forward adornment, a professional top and skirt that gave Rarity the look of a premiere businesswoman. How does she always look like this, just- just-

“Is something wrong, Ms. Dazzle?” Rarity’s gaze was searching, though her voice remained polite.

“Yes, sorry. Just drifted off for a moment,” Adagio answered, forcing her gaze to look elsewhere. “Where do I start?”

The two women worked in silence, save for a few spare words related to their work that meandered through the shuffling of papers and staples that crunched sheets together. Adagio found herself glancing up at her gorgeous companion, wishing she could let her gaze linger longer. She doesn’t even want to talk to me if she can help it. The thought wasn’t a comfortable one, eliciting an emotion that the Siren couldn’t quite name or perhaps just didn’t want to. She didn’t want it there, but the knowledge of how it would be alleviated wasn’t much easier to bear. But if it keeps going on…

Adagio gave a small sigh and tried to prepare herself for the most unpleasant choice she had ever made in her life. “Miss- Rarity?” It was a voice so quiet she hardly recognized it as her own.

“Mm? Yes, Ms. Dazzle?” Rarity hardly glanced up from her work to look at her assistant, one so fully in control of this world.

“I’m-” Adagio’s voice died as she tried to swallow back down the bitter pill before stiffening her nerve to try again. “I’m sorry.”

Rarity’s efforts to concentrate on her work were set aside and she gave her fullest attention to the Siren. “Sorry for what, dear?” she asked.

“For… for the first day I was here,” Adagio continued. “And what- what I did. I was, I… damn… I didn’t mean- I am sorry, OK? I don’t want you to be mad at me.” It was a terrible effort and she knew it. Futile and stupid, hardly a coherent sentence strung together in the mishmash of awfulness, but it was all she could manage.

“I know, dear,” Rarity said calmly. “And thank you for saying so. I do appreciate it. And if it helps, I do forgive you.”

“I should say something better.”

“One step at a time, darling. We’ll see you get there, in time.”

“Then can-” Adagio faltered, knowing that now she would truly be asking too much. “Then can you not call me ‘Ms. Dazzle’ anymore?”

“Does it bother you when I call you that?” Rarity’s gaze flickered and became tinged with something different.

Adagio gave a small, nervous laugh. “Well, I… can you just call me Adagio instead? Like we’re actually friends instead of whatever this is and-” she could have slapped herself for letting her mouth run off like that, saying things that she didn’t and so deeply meant all at once, even if it were only the tip of the iceberg. Goddamn you.

Rarity appraised the Siren, not a hint of disdain or mockery there to be seen upon her lovely features. It wasn’t as though the embarrassment was completely obvious. “Adagio, darling,” she said slowly, “do you want to be friends?”

Adagio saw herself in a mental mirror and couldn’t believe what she was doing. It was a transgression against everything she had ever believed in for years upon years, what she had clashed over with Sonata and what had caused the end-all, be-all of fights with Aria. But now she was here faced with the next step to take, and she wondered if she was always going to end up here anyway. “Well, I mean, I…” Adagio hoped she wasn’t actually going red in the midst of all of this. “Umm… yes. I’d- I’d like to be friends. With you.”

To call her rusty would have been kind. Yet Rarity, true to her nature, hardly even gave a sign of a mocking giggle, instead letting her full lips blossom into a smile that caused a sunbeam in the Siren’s heart. “I’d be delighted to, darling.”

“Oh- OK, then.” Adagio returned back to her stack of papers and felt herself glowing, a curving of her features speaking to an unbidden smile taking shape. She’s my friend. I don’t even believe myself.

“Why, I do believe you’re smiling, Adagio,” Rarity teased, a jeweled beam on her own glorious features. “That’s the first one I’ve ever seen you wear.”

“Umm- I wasn’t- is it bad or-”

“It looks lovely on you, you should know,” Rarity added. “Truly compliments you wonderfully.”

It looks lovely on me, she said. She even went and said something nice about me. Adagio doubted that her beaming grin would disappear anytime soon.

The transformation was not an instantaneous thing, some switch flipped within the beautiful Siren’s mind and kept righted forevermore. Rather, it was a long and winding path upwards to a faraway mountaintop, each new step forward and further up beset with stones and small things to bring her stumbling. Such things hindered faster progress, slowed her from a run to a weary walk, but the newfound determination was not to be easily swayed, given true staying power as Adagio found herself, unexpectedly, a desire to have Rarity’s approval- and hopefully more than that. It was the strangest thing and not at all a juggling act she knew how to master.

A friend. She’s a friend, Adagio told herself over and over again every day as she continued on in her work at the boutique. You just got your first friend, so don’t try to push things too fast. You don’t want to ruin it. Yet she would find herself watching the young, beautiful, endlessly generous woman with every spare second she was given to do so. So many people would enter into the boutique and, in Adagio’s mind, be nothing close to the kind of customer that suited the place: too snobbish, too poor, too rude or too shy. Yet there would be Rarity, treating the whole lot with the same eager smile and polite demeanor that seemed so unshakeable.

It was something that the wayward Siren marveled at, and in the depths of night where she found no way to escape her thoughts, there she would find herself wondering: why did she find Rarity, someone who had once brought her down so low, now someone so wonderful? There was beauty about her, yes, but that was hardly something new. Adagio had seen plenty of that in her years. Thousands of pairs of eyes, and in Rarity’s she saw a lively grace tempered with hard-forged wisdom. A voice as smooth as honey to the ear, made all the sweeter by the words of affirmation and kindness that it spoke. Hands so soft and delicate that were so willing to be dirtied in service of others, to reach out in the hopes of giving. It was remarkable, leaving Adagio feeling giddy and yet so ashamed of herself. Thought of older days would tell her to manipulate and coerce, find that semblance of control yet again, only to be battered back down by the growing desire to do otherwise. She didn’t want to control her at all; she wanted Rarity to really like her.

A late night came and she parted from her first friend and crush she had in the world, Adagio taking her time to drive through the night as she went homeward bound, thoughts and memory filled with the sound and feel of Rarity. It had swiftly become her favorite subject, keeping her to such distractions that she walked right into her darkened apartment and onto her room before taking notice that Sonata’s door was still open and the young woman wasn’t present within it. “Sonata?” Adagio tossed her bag on her bed and peered into the cheerfully decorated, though very much dark room and assured herself that it was empty. “Odd, I thought she wasn’t going anywhere tonight.”

The jolt of fear that came from the silhouette in the living room was a fierce one, taking her breath from her lungs in a shortened gasp that was stoppered by recognition as she saw the ponytail of her younger sister- the fear promptly disappearing as unease took its place. Her hyperactive sibling was not one who was easily stilled even when sleepy.

“Sonata? Are… are you OK?” Adagio settled down at the opposite end of the couch, making sure the woman wasn’t asleep, or worse. “What are you doing out here? It’s late.”

“I know. I’m not OK,” Sonata answered, her voice thick and clueing her sister into the tears she had been shedding. “I didn’t want to go to bed yet.”

It was not territory Adagio was used to being in, and no prior experience was going to be of much use in dealing with any of what came next. “Umm… OK. Why?”

“I tried calling Aria again. She still doesn’t answer.” The ponytail drooped even further and a small shudder coursed across small shoulders.

Oh. Adagio sighed. “Sonata, don’t try again. If she wanted to talk to either of us, she’d have done so already,” she counseled. “You’re only making yourself feel bad at this point.”

“Aria didn’t want to talk to you. She wasn’t mad at me,” Sonata said, her misery turning her naiveté to a vicious bluntness. “I thought maybe if I called alone she might pick up.”

Adagio wanted to reach out and- and do something to close the gap. Sonata may as well have been a thousand miles away, having moved so far ahead that the only thing tying her to her older sister was her older sister herself. The young Siren needed someone far better at this sort of thing than she was. “You tried. Sonata, I don’t think… I know… she’s not coming back. Ever.”

Sonata gave a real sniff at that one. “I know. I was hoping maybe I’d be wrong and she might miss me enough to try it.”

The intentional exclusion hurt, even if it was completely justified. “Would you rather I have gone instead, Sonata?”

“No. I wish both of you were here instead of just one of you.” Sonata paused, turning to look at her sister from the great distance. “Did you mean everything you said to her? Did you want her to leave?”

It was her turn to be painful, though it was not something she relished in doing. “I did when I said it,” Adagio admitted. “But I wouldn’t say all that now. I guess it doesn’t matter though, does it?”

“It doesn’t.” Sonata’s voice trembled as she spoke, “Everything she said about you was right, too.”

“It was.”

Silence, then more of it. “I’m… I’m going to go to bed now,” Sonata said. She rose to her feet and left Adagio there in the dark, looking out into the depths of it all and wondering if she would one day be able to see such a sight and not feel so terribly alone.

She could hear Rarity rummaging about in the back room, searching for what Adagio couldn’t quite fathom. She tried to let her eyes stay closed, even if it was the last thing she was supposed to do while on shift. It wasn’t like she had been able to manage any sleep last night. Another sound of frustration and she cracked open a solitary eye to peer out at the world, finding it damp and unwelcoming outside as the world fell under threat of a late fall rain. She desperately wanted to ignore the sounds and sights of the world around her, but couldn’t find the strength to focus on much of anything else.

“Rarity, what are you doing?” she at last called, turning from the desk to call back into the rooms behind her. “I swear, you’ve been scrambling through something back there for like an hour now.”

“I’ve been going through some…” a grunt of effort and her words dissipated like sunlight in a storm. “I’ve only just received my designs back.”

“Your designs?” Adagio began to walk back to where the sound of her desire continued to exert her effort. “I thought you made all your items yourself.”

“I do, darling, when I make the preliminary design,” Rarity said, appearing in view amidst a throng of boxes. “When I need a large number of them, however, it is more… cost effective! To have them made by another company. So here we are.”

“Do you… do you need my help, or anything?” the Siren asked.

“Oh no, I don’t think so,” Rarity replied. “I do appreciate the offer, but all I need now is for my models to arrive so I can get some promotional photographs done to sell the line.”

“You know models?” She couldn’t help but feel a tinge jealous. Of course she knew other beautiful people.

“Well, a few small-time models in town. And a friend of mine, who’s been willing to help me out now and then,” Rarity admitted. “Perhaps not true professionals, but always so willing to give me a hand. Now if I can just…” she turned from Adagio and set to her phone, dialing up a number as quickly as she could.

Adagio wanted to ignore her and move back to the front desk, but found herself beset by an emotion that somehow made her feel worse than she had before. Rarity’s attentions had no reason to focus on her, and still here she stood desperately wanting them. It was the stupidest thing that she felt, and couldn’t shake the slightest drop of it away. She wanted that eye for beauty, that fixation held in the loveliness of form, to focus only on her- even if it was for something as harmless and pointless as this. Idiot. Go back to the desk.

Adagio tried to ignore the words she heard filtering from the back room. She ignored the tone, the sound, every aspect that she could manage to dispel. She even managed to drown out the sound of footsteps that came from behind her until the sensation of physical touch came upon her shoulder in the form of gentle, prodding fingers. She jumped at the feel-

“I’m sorry! Goodness, darling, I didn’t mean to scare you so badly!” Rarity cried, stepping back in her own fright of Adagio’s sudden jump. “I’m sorry, are- are you alright, dear? You seem ever so distracted!”

“I’m fine!” Adagio gasped, now mildly distracted by the beautiful creature before her. “What do you need?”

“Well, I have an…” she paused. “An awkward request, darling.”

Adagio wasn’t quite sure how to react to that. “What do you mean?”

“Well…” Rarity looked away from her subject, clearly embarrassed. “So it would seem that one of my models- a girl named Fleur, very polite and charming, really- she’s been so useful to me over the years and now she’s not- not here. At all.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Of course you don’t! Goodness, I’m explaining myself horribly,” Rarity replied. “So she’s out of- out of town right now, and I’d like to have these pictures done as soon as possible. So they can be made for sale sooner. And if I have a model, it would be… easier. Would- would you mind helping me, dear?”

The exquisite Siren wasn’t sure she had actually heard her employer correctly. “You want me to… Um- you want me to do what?”

“I’d like- if you would be so kind as to model a few outfits for me, dear,” Rarity said hesitantly, “I would be most appreciative. You have such an elegant- graceful sort of figure. Fleur is something of the same, just maybe not- I would be extremely grateful. It won’t take long.”

Graceful. Elegant. Adagio was taken aback. Yes, she’d been dressing more casually, less sensuality in everything she did. Her figure was considered something admirable.

She just hadn’t thought Rarity had noticed.

“I mean, I… I’ll do it,” she answered, in a voice so very small.

“You mean it?”

“Yeah, I will. Sure,” Adagio said. “What’s the worst that can happen-”

Her next words were immediately thrown aside as she herself was thrown aside, Rarity pulling her along and into the changing rooms, the now not-so-elegant woman practically tossing her into a dressing room in a feverish excitement. “Just hold on a moment, darling, I’ll have the first outfit on your door soon! Oh, I could just kiss you for this! Thank you so much, we’ll be sure to sell dozens!”

Adagio focused only on one word and hardly paid any attention as she adorned herself with the first outfit, walking out in a daze that wouldn’t even allow her to notice what she was even wearing. It was something Rarity had created, so she knew it was beautiful, at the very least.

“Oh good heavens, that’s simply wonderful, darling!” Rarity exclaimed, her voice sounding rapturous now. “Just hold still and pose as I tell you to, I’ll try to make this as quick as I can- I know this isn’t something your particularly enjoy very much.”

On the contrary. Adagio wanted to revel in the fact that such a beautiful woman was so singularly focused upon her, even if it was something out of pure professionalism and not anything particularly special. That was enough for now, even if every ounce of her spirit craved more. It was spectacular, wondrous, heavenly- if only Aria could see it now! She’d be so deeply wrong, and it wouldn’t- wouldn’t…

Adagio tried to keep her spirits up as they went further along. The thought didn’t leave her be. It grew more and more, gaining strength with each passing outfit, taking power from each opposing thought that could not prevail against it. She was beginning to struggle now- openly.

“Adagio… darling?” Rarity let her camera fall from before her lovely visage, able to clearly see Adagio’s growing distress even through the view. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine! Come on, we’ve got other stuff to do than this, right?” It was not much of a reply.

Rarity look at her assistant and friend with a look that seemed to pierce her soul and suddenly left the room for a moment, returning back in a flash and saying, “so now we’re closed for the day.”

“We’re closed-”

“What’s on your mind, dear?” Rarity asked plainly. “You’re upset. It’s the first time I’ve seen you this way.”

“I’m fine,” Adagio said swiftly. “What does it matter, anyway?”

“Because you’re my friend. And I want to care about you.”

Adagio began to actually take in her surroundings this time. She was wearing a dark-purple gown that fell to the floor in an elegant train. It was a beautiful thing, really. So contradictory to the ugliness she felt inside.

“Adagio? Darling?”

“Just- just thinking. That’s all,” she said. “Nothing special.”

“Oh.” A pause. “Thinking about what?”

“Nothing special,” Adagio said again. “Just Aria.” Oh damn you. “She’d be laughing herself to pieces, seeing me like this. With a friend, looking pretty. On purpose. She’d have been able to have the last laugh after all.”

The memory was so clear in her mind that it was sharp enough to turn to daggers and pierce her heart in a way it had never been able to before. It was torture, pain, agonizing feeling that she could not find a means to get away from. There had to be something, anything she could do to free herself from this. She had done it alone once before, hadn’t she? Now she would try again-

“Adagio? Darling, please look at me.” Rarity’s voice cut through the miasma and Adagio was flung away from the thousands of memories and emotions that were so inseparably tied into that fateful day, looking instead into the face of a beautiful woman who truly seemed to care. “Adagio, where is Aria?”

So she knew. “Why?”

“Sonata never mentions her without crying. Pinkie and Sunset told me that once. She never says a thing.”

“Because she doesn’t know where Aria is,” Adagio said flatly. “So of course she can’t.”

“Do you know where she is, then?”

“No. And I don’t think I ever will,” Adagio said, her voice whimpering away into a weak-willed sigh. “She’s not dead, if that’s what you’re asking. At least not that I’m aware of.”

“What happened? Please tell me.”

“Nothing special. Just me making a mess of it.” Adagio’s words were so cold, so detached from the person that spoke them, free of the weight of emotion they bore. It was something she had to marvel at.

“Do you want to tell me?”

“No.”

“Will you please tell me anyway?” A feeling against her hand and Adagio felt warmth that she knew wasn’t her own.

“I- I guess.” She took a slow breath of air. “It wasn’t long after you and… and the others- had thrown us out. We were struggling. I’d started working for a pimp, Sonata wanted to try something different, and so did Aria. I acted like the parent and told them no.”

“Was this when Sonata started being friends with Pinkie Pie?” Rarity inquired. “When she first started working at the Cake’s bakery…”

“Yeah. I told her not to. Aria was on her side. She said we needed to have a way to survive that was actually going to work. After all, I hadn’t actually been able to guide them both to something safe after all those years.” Adagio’s vision was misty now and she wondered where that stinging was coming from. “So we both got angry. I told her to leave, she yelled at me and said she never wanted to see me again. And- and other things.”

“Oh… what- what other things, darling?”

“Nothing special. She told Sonata to run away from me. That I deserved to be alone. Things like that.” Adagio took a shuddering breath. “I would always be alone because it’s all I could manage. I lead people wrong and don’t do what it takes to actually be… safe.” Her vision was well and truly clouded now. “What I did worked in home. It doesn’t work here. So Aria said I tried to get them all killed.”

“And of course you didn’t mean for that, darling.” Another warm presence on her flesh.

“I don’t think I did. But it happened anyway. So I messed it up, anyway. I said worse things to her before she left,” Adagio admitted. “And now she’s gone, so I can’t take it back.”

“I’m sure you didn’t mean them, my darling…”

“I did when I said them. Now I just can’t take them back,” Adagio whispered, finding herself struggling to speak. It was coming now, and she didn’t know quite what it was that she was so desperately fighting against. Her eyes stung, Rarity held her all the tighter, and she couldn’t find a way to relieve herself of it all.

So she just let it happen. Maybe Rarity’s warmth would help it go away faster.

Author's Note

Part Three tomorrow. Trust.