Author's Note
To whom it may concern,
You inspired me to reply via fanfic. It's more engrossing that way, at least for mesa. Just know that your message was completely cool and positive, but this is how I tend to tackle the matter. Bless Flash's heart.
And, sure, there's another source of inspiration for this too. Consider this a cathartic attempt at commentary. It's only "personal" in terms of how I chose to expound upon stuff. All in all, I'm pleased to see the state of things this week. Literarily, that is.
See you on the other side of the downvotes~
-Anon-a-Missy
(Needs More Parentheses)
"...and so she takes it in stride, y'know?" Sunset Shimmer said, sitting cross-legged on the far end of the sofa. "She smiles whenever he wants her to smile. She laughs whenever he says something that he thinks is funny. But—until Timber gets serious and decides he's going to have to respect her concerns—it's ever only going to be an act. At least, that's the impression Twilight's given me. And I don't know what's sadder? That she's willing to go through with all of this—or that she's conscious of it and will even admit it! To me, at least."
Flash Sentry nodded.
(And now to me.)
He sat perpendicular to her on an easy chair, giving her plenty of room alone on the comfy sofa. Across the living room of his apartment, the television flickered between exterior shots of the USS Enterprise and a Ferengi Marauder. It was an episode both of them had seen a million times: the perfect backdrop to a game of conversational catch-up.
(They really squeezed Deanna Troi into that tight-as-hell jumpsuit, didn't they?)
(Poor girl.)
"Twilight's just... such a Celestia-damned cinnamon roll," Sunset Shimmer said through an exasperated sigh. She leaned back along the length of the couch, running a hand through her long fiery threads, kicking a leg up once or twice as her eyes chiseled deep emotional ravines into the ceiling above. Even half a decade after graduating from high school, she still looked as lithe and youthful as her Rainboom days. Beauty to match brains, with such tenuous feelings stretched nebulously between. "She wants to make everyone happy. Most especially Timber. They've been together... what... six years now? Seven?! For oats' sakes, Flash, Timber was her first boyfriend! Ever!! How is she to know that there isn't anyone better out there? Someone whom... she d-doesn't have to work so hard to be all smiles and giggles around? Sure, it wasn't an act at first—but it totally is now. The joy ran out, and now it's all just... tedious labor. I know she'll never outright admit it. Twilight can hide the truth from others, but not from me."
Flash nodded. The a/c kicked in, sending a low bass hum through the flat. Lieutenant Worf suggested something in the conference room and was immediately shot down.
"I mean... I guess she's settled. But isn't it rather early in her life for settling? I know it'd be early for me. I mean..." Sunset rolled her eyes with a bitter sweet smirk. Cool air from a vent above the couch kicked at her scarlet bangs. "...the first key is finding somepony... er... someone. But... that's just not so easy." A solemn sigh, and her turquoise eyes fell to the plush carpet between them. "...not when I'm around her."
Flash nodded. He'd say something—had this not been the same lecture that Sunset had given countless of times before. He knew better than to interrupt her when she got started. Sunset may have changed for the better in a lot of ways, but he—more than anyone—knew the unmistakable lava lake of anger that bubbled thinly under the veneer.
(Damn, if Beverly Crusher doesn't have the sexiest, most womanly voice.)
(What I'd kill to sound like that... just for one day...)
(It's the only thing she has over Pulaski, really. But Pulaski also has a good voice—for her age, I suppose.)
(It'd be really... lovely to sound like that in one's golden years. Hell, even now.)
Sunset was already halfway through the rant that Flash had long memorized: "...the struggle gets harder each and every day. I thought I'd learn to shrug it all off years ago. But—then again—I thought she'd tire of Timber years ago. Shows how much I know. And... let's be fair... it's not like Twilight Sparkle's completely ignorant. She knows I'm bi. She's known for a long time. She's... known about a few o-other things too. Mrmmm... but... uhm... b-but I told her multiple times that I'm... h-happy for her and I'm moving on myself. And... I know that she believes that. Because of course she does. When there's enough emotion and friendship and trust applied... she can and will believe anything. Even science bows. That's... goddess..."
A dramatic motion.
Flash looked out the corner of his eye to see that Sunset had draped an arm over her face.
She sighed profusely.
"... ... ...that's so very shitty of me." She gulped. "Being emotionally manipulative like that? I'm no better than Timber."
The television flickered to commercials. Flash wondered why he didn't just turn on Netflix. He channeled the mild frustration out the side of his mouth.
"You don't have the same chin," he muttered.
"Snkkkktt—hahahahaha... heh... hell no, I don't!" And just like that, Sunset's complexion rosied to such a degree to match her crown. "It's not like I ever tried to make a move on Twilight. Even after all this time. But... like... I-I guess if I really considered myself her best friend, I would voice my concerns over her and Timber. But... there're just too many wires, crossed? In the end, I want what's best for her. But I also want what'll best satisfy her. And... it gets confusing, Flash. It vexes me: what's best for her, what's best for me, and what's best for us."
A commercial flickered on. It was advertising tea. Or flavor water. Maybe tampons...?
Whatever—it had a business woman rushing through public transit with a bottle in her hand and a purse in the other. She wore a pencil skirt and a tight blouse. Lots of gray. No visible panty lines.
(She'd look much better in blue. Especially with matching heels.)
(I'll never understand the world's obsession with pencil skirts. Yes, they accentuate the figure, but they look so damn restrictive and uncomfortable.)
(Her hair's pinned up. I bet a million bucks that she'll unpin it and toss it free at the end—there it is. Twenty seconds in.)
(And it's a Tic-Tac commercial. Too bad. I was hoping for a cheeky 'Tampax Was Here' slogan at the end. Whatever. You go, gyrrrl.)
"....I think I'm starting to understand how you felt, Flash."
The young man snapped out of it. His eyes wandered over to the redheaded specimen of beauty draped across his couch.
"Huh?"
"After Princess Twilight stopped coming through the mirror," Sunset Shimmer stated, her eyes reflecting him compassionately. "And you Twilight Sparkle transferred over from Crystal Prep—became a member of the clique and everything."
Flash Sentry blinked.
(I got over her at that one summer stay at Camp Everfree.)
(And even then, I wasn't entirely sure what to make of her. I think I just wanted to bury the hatchet. Thankfully, you were there to talk sense into me. That's all I needed.)
(Or... so I thought. So I told myself...)
(I guess I needed more. I wanted more. I didn't know how to ask for it. I wasn't certain that I should.)
(Maybe I thought it'd just come to me if I wished for it enough. Like all of those princesses in animated movies. They'd sing about 'something more,' and bide their time. All patient and beautiful. And then it came true. Their dreams, that is.)
(But, as it so happens, the only thing that comes is more wanting. And that's all I am these days. Nothing but want. It's selfish. It's stupid. And if you knew how much of it bubbled inside of me, you wouldn't talk to me.)
(You wouldn't even talk at me. But that's okay too. I'll take any little I can get.)
"You had just gotten over the Princess, but then her very doppelganger showed up every day." Sunset gulped, then produced a fragile smile—almost apologetic in its sheen. "Even became the apple of your ex-girlfriend's eye. That couldn't have been easy."
(It's kinda gross...)
(Actually, it's super super gross... ...)
(... ... ...but for the briefest of moments, I savored the fact that it pained you so much.)
(I knew that it was painful for you to be squeezed so deeply in there—tight as a worn brake pad between Timber and Twilight—as the best friend with the secret-but-not-so-secret crush on the fair maiden in question.)
(But I got over such a gross feeling... probably because the sheer grossness of me—as a person—and my life as a whole overwhelmed everything else. What was the point of barfing further onto the pile?)
(I know a thing or two about being on the outside, yet also on the inside. But I've also known it for so long that the pain of the matter is long diffused. The space where it used to be has been filled up by something number than apathy. It leaves very room for shame, which is how I've been able to afford the customs I adopt to get by without jumping off a roof.)
(So far, at least.)
(Oh, right. She's expecting a reply—)
"She was never my girl," Flash said with a shrug. "Hell... she was never anybody's girl. What matters the most is that Twilight's happy. And I knew she'd never be happy if I tried to color her with the same crush I had on someone else. Even more—I wouldn't be happy about it." He ran a hand through his hair and looked back at the t.v. The USS Enterprise floated back through a star field, and somehow that gave him an ounce of contentment. "Who knows—maybe I would have gone down that terrible road of mixing up two different but similar-looking people, but I didn't. I owe a lot of that to you, Sunset. You talked some sense into me."
She was already shaking her head. "Nah, I think I just reminded you of the sensibility you obviously have in yourself."
"I doubt I'm the only one," Flash said. "Maybe the reason Twilight has stuck around with Timber so much is that she knows he deserves the benefit of a doubt. If a lughead like me can turn around, maybe he can too." His eyes darted over towards Sunset briefly. "I think it's a commendable thing that you've been so faithful and supportive of Twilight for so long. In the end, it's her decision and hers alone."
Sunset's features softened upon hearing that. If she was pure horse-lady at that moment, Flash imagined she would have stomped her hoof in cathartic euphoria. Instead, she rolled to her side and hugged a pillow to her chest while bestowing a bittersweet smile.
"I can always rely on you to be such friggin' wise council, Flash."
Flash shrugged. Commander Data was talking to LaFore in Engineering. "I learn from the best."
"Bullshit." She giggled. "You don't give yourself enough credit."
"In this economy, it's simply setting myself up for practical expecations."
"And just like that—you fall back on cynical humor." She hugged the pillow tighter, her eyes looking sad. "It's a pattern with you, Flash. One can see the wind-up and the pitch from a mile away."
"Easy for you to say," Flash replied. "You're a mind reader."
"The geode doesn't exactly work that way."
"Doesn't it?"
"We're still human beings." She blinked, then briefly rolled her eyes. "On this side of the mirror, at least."
"Uh huh."
"I've spent enough time rambling about myself. Why don't you take the mic?"
"And talk about what?"
"Anything. Nothing." Sunset's legs kicked playfully on and off the couch cushions behind her. "What's on your mind as of late?"
He shrugged. "Not much."
"Work treating you right?"
"As well as it treats anyone."
"Been seeing your old band mates as of late?"
"Most of them have moved out of town."
"What about that... uh... that online game you were getting hooked on?"
"I unsubscribed years ago."
"Been... writing any songs to shred the guitar to?"
"I haven't even tuned that thing in months."
"... ... ...has Fiona been around lately?"
Flash's eyes twitched—right as Starfleet and Ferengi were exchanging phaser fire. He threw Sunset a crooked glance, eyebrow arching to break the ceiling above them. "The Hell's that got to do with anything?"
She giggled—a mix of mischief and power. The power of knowledge, both sacred and forbidden—like the fruit as well as the tree it fell from. "It worked in throwing you out of your taciturn state, didn't it?"
"I really... truly haven't been up to much, Sunset," Flash emphasized. "My life's been rather dull lately."
"I'm no longer asking you about your daily life." She kicked her legs some more, gazing smokily at him. "I'm asking about Fiona."
Flash's nostrils flared. He turned his gaze once more towards the space battle. "It's nothing worth talking about."
"Come on, Flash... sweetie," she used that word with all the deliciously venomous bliss that she knew it inflicted upon him. "When are you ever gonna talk about it, otherwise? We're both adults here! What's more, we're friends. You can talk to me about anything... tell me anything."
"It's nobody's business but my own," Flash muttered. "Besides—don't you think that's kinda private?"
"Only if you force it to be."
He sliced a squinting expression back at her. "Why would you even bring that up?"
She blinked—as if genuinely surprised at his resistance. When she next spoke, it was in a curiously melancholic tone: "A long time ago, you tried telling me all about it." A hefty gulp. "A-and I brushed you off."
"You said I was 'silly' and 'perverted.'"
She winced—for that was what she attempted to prepare herself for. The sadness in her voice continued, emboldened by a tinge of courageous empathy: "That was back then. Let's face it, Flash. I was such a horrible asshole. It's easy to brag about how much 'I've changed' and how much I've 'fought for friendship,' but with you... it's always been different. I... I hurt you in ways I've not hurt anyone else." Another swallow. "And it blesses me so much that we're still on such good talking terms... but is also pains me. Because you deserved so much better."
"It wasn't ever as bad as you—"
"Just... stop. Quit while you're ahead, Flash. We both know that's horse hockey. Why else would you remember the stupid words that I said so easily and with such anger?"
The young man sighed, gazing back at the t.v. "I'm sorry."
"No—please. Don't be. It was all my fault, Flash. I never gave you the benefit of a doubt. You did so much for me back when we dated. Tartarus, just being around me must have been penance enough." A nervous chuckle, and she hugged the pillow again, looking at him. "...maybe you were testing me. The day that you told me about Fiona. Perhaps it was a test? To see if I could tolerate as much about you as you could about me?"
Counselor Troi sashayed across the screen again.
But Flash couldn't bear to look at her outfit right now.
He was far too aware of tight and uncomfortable things.
(You wouldn't like to know why I told you about all that.)
(Each and every day... for the longest time... I was so unhappy with you.)
(I loved you... and yet I detested being around you. For as sexy and talented and amazing as you were, you were also just a horrible, bullying, joyless creature. And you made me feel bad—and responsible—at every twist of the screw. Like I was the frontmost phalanx of your campaign of war across Canterlot High School.)
(There'd be days—mornings, lunches, and evenings—where you'd throw shade and threaten to insult my manhood and pride for making the littlest of mistakes or slights against you.)
(So I told you about... things....)
(I told you about Fiona... and all the things attached to her... because I figured that that would be the last straw. That you'd want nothing to do with a so-called "man" that was so deeply immersed in a second life... even if it was just a hypothetical one.)
(I wanted you to be the one to end the relationship. And when Fiona didn't do it, I felt more ashamed than relieved.)
(And when I finally got my wish... and you ended things after all those months of using and abusing me... all I could think of myself was that of a coward. A sissy—but not even in the magical sense.)
(And every day I've lived since... and the larger and more fabulous Fiona grows in the corner of every room... that shame and cowardice increases tenfold... and I love and I hate myself just like I loved and hated you.)
(And I'm starting to think that maybe—just maybe—that's how it will always be for me. Living alone with like-minded souls... in that I will be living with no one.)
(I don't believe I could ever fathom the words to explain that kind of emptiness. And—even if I could—I would not wish that knowledge upon you. Even after all the things you've done in that villainous fugue state so many eons ago.)
"I was a teenage boy, Sunset," Flash said. "Y'know... young. Hormones. Horny all the time." A casual shrug. "Things come and go."
"Do they, though?" Sunset blinked. "All of them?"
(Dear God...)
(You really are pushing this time, aren't you?)
"Why the... uh..." Flash rubbed the back of his head. "...sudden fascination?"
"It's not exactly sudden." She fidgeted slightly. "To be honest, I've wondered about it for a long time, Flash."
The young man felt a tiny flutter in his chest.
He hated himself for it.
(Add it to the pile, I guess...)
"Like, the other day, as I was working, I thought about that one particular scenario you painted so long ago," his ex-girlfriend began—or perhaps she never finished. "I thought about your 'Fiona in the boy's lockeroom' story. When I did, I thought of how unusual your fetishes are."
Flash's fingers tightened on the arm rests of his chair.
Sunset lifted a hand. "Wh-when I say 'unusual,' I don't mean it in any negative sense...!" She bore a kindly smile. "Just that those fetishes are unusual to me. In fact, because I find them unusual, I also find the idea of those things as fetishes fascinating."
He relaxed slightly, but he was finding it hard to concentrate. Or be comfortable.
In his own home.
(Dammit to Hell...)
(...I should have told you I was under the weather or something.)
(But, then again, you had a lot of stuff to get off your chest.)
(It would have been a shame to turn a deaf ear. You're a bright young woman and you do so many good things for so many people. You're also one of the only beings on this earth who still bothers to call me. I may not act like it much, but that's truly a thing of value and I respect that.)
(I respect you. Or at least... I wish to. I always do. Somehow, considering all that's gone down, it feels kinda criminal. Isn't this still September...?)
"I want to get a better understanding of why those appeal to you," Sunset continued, lassoing Flash back to the current situation. Namely: that a sexy young woman whom he's been blessed to know all these years is currently draped all sensuously over his couch and is asking a man his age to 'fess up about his dirtiest, most secret kinks. There's no way that Flash wasn't the luckiest masculine soul alive in the universe at that moment.
But he'd been there more than once before.
(How can I even pretend to tell you about those things?)
(Where would I even begin?)
(Isn't it enough that I've dropped hints here and there—and everywhere—as much as I can and as often as I can?)
(Like the selfish little prick that I am?)
(All those online handles of mine that are more than facetiously "girlish." All those Disney references that I drop. All of the pinker-than-pink images from Instagram that I spam you and your friends via social media to remind you that something about me is "off." All the times that Rarity or Fluttershy have met me in public for lunch and they still giggle when asking me to remind them who my "favorite princess" is. That one time that Pinkie Pie went so far as getting me a tiara and a sash for my twenty-second birthday while everyone giggled and laughed and even the frosting on the cake was pink.)
(I really do shove it into everyone's eyeballs, don't I? How very typical of a horny dude such as myself to exteriorize my obsession and project it onto others. Or—at the very least—if I've only ever just assumed the extent of it, the gravity still pulls all of my senses down—inward and imploding. I live it so damned much in my head and in my heart that it must bubble and sparkle on the surface from time to time. Maybe this is why you're asking me—to make it all stop. Cuz it's too much for you and the rest of the girls to bear, but you're just being nice enough to keep mum about it and find other ways of stealthily deflating the matter... so that it'll stop. It'll all stop. Please, God, sometimes I just wish it would friggin' stop.)
(Sometimes, I think it was first birthed within me as a meme. I was in high school. Someone or another linked me a page to "futa" comics... among other tags that I shudder to name in the presence of civilized human beings. It wasn't long until I realized that the thing I loved the most about pornographic situations was the same thing that was attached to me: el pito chico. This was the first of many collapsing dominoes, and I learned to attach the beauty I saw in women to the arousal I saw in myself. At some point—I don't know where—the line of demarcation dissolved, and both halves became whole... and something was awakened within me that had been asleep for a longass time.)
(When I was little, like really little, I had nebulous and hard-to-explain fantasies about being a male-coded individual "forced" into feminine-coded situations. They were too early in my youth to be sexualized, or perhaps Freud might disagree. Whatever the case, there was a strange euphoria to be had in crossing the culturally-marked line and frolicking into the fluffy land of pink, pink, pink. But this was only because I felt, sensed, and identified a rigid coding within myself... something that I adhere to even now. This seed was planted deep within me—along with the tantalizing inversion of it—and while I know that it meant something blissful for me on some joyful... even non-sexual level...)
(...when I grew up and I discovered the things that aroused me, the long-buried joys of the past became fused with the erotic depravities of the present. From this tempestuous mixture, Fiona was conjured, my vicarious vessel for an explosive renaissance in crossdressing and forced-feminization fantasies.)
(A "sissy"—that's what I called her. For it was the hardest and truest tag I knew to differentiate Fiona from the post-modern battle of the sexes transpiring all around her... and me... around all of us. Because I discerned the difference... the separation. In many ways, I willed it... even forced it. Because knowing and recognizing that contrast—even going so far as to revel in the dysphoria—is the only thing that gives the fetish power.)
(Yes, "fetish." For—despite all the power over me that I bestow it—I do not want to live it each and every day... even if I obsess over it each and every day... and even fantasize about being submissive to it each and every day.)
(It's a fetish... because the struggle for identity is not a personal one for me. It does not define the way I wish to live until I die. It's not how I wish to be remembered long after I've returned to stardust. It does not spell the numbers that conjure me inside and out, but rather allows a splinter of a being to leap out of the cake and sing and cavort until her time has passed and she must sleep... sleep for a long time.)
(Because I still want her... need her to be a bastion of depravity. Because I was raised—for better or for worse—to believe that going against the grain was inherently "naughty." And while life and growing and wisdom has learned me otherwise, removing that "naughtiness" deprives her of power, and thus fun... and ultimately the underlying bliss and contentment.)
("Unusual" is an interesting choice for it all. But does it still hold sway? We live in a dramatically growing world, and the proverbial butterfly of western society is just now starting to burst out of its long-held cocoon, but even that is a fragile thing at best. To the left and the right of me, people are changing. Actually, no—they're not changing. They're just becoming themselves, having fought long battles for the metamorphosis to complete. I see occasional remnants of the war when I re-connect with long lost acquaintances and accidentally mis-gender them. And while the guilt of innocent mistakes last for only a short blink, a new shame grows on and on within my own cocoon.)
(In a world where people are coming out of their shells and flying unclouded colors of euphoric freedom, who am I to continue to fetishize the very foundation of their meteoric climb? One person's food is another person's poison, but my kinks really truly take the cake. In a complex universe full of Wachowski sisters, I'm sitting hairy and horny, believing in a simple dome populated by Corporal Klingers in drag. The very obstacles and hurdles that have caused so many people heartache are the same things that get me hard. You were right to call me a "silly pervert" way back when, because that's the fullest extent of a person too stubborn to exorcize such depraved hang-ups in the name of progress and change.)
(I remember the day that I first discovered that Rarity's assistant—Coco Pommel—was trans. Like any sane person, I complimented and supported her and held her interests in respect. There were a few times when we hung out with her and you and the rest of Rarity's friends, and I couldn't help but think how wonderfully she embodied true feminity. But, at the same time, there was a very real part of me—held shut and tight under the same iron lid that Fiona lives beneath—that had to admit that Coco was the very epitome of my wettest and hottest dream. I hated myself for that—and rightfully so, even if I kept quiet about it on the outside. It was nonetheless screaming on the inside.)
(And then another thought hit me. Just why didn't I allow myself to fantasize about Coco? Why did I suddenly feel like treating her differently than any of the other people I knew and thought about? For the longest time—and even now—I go out of my way, mentally and psychologially, to exclude trans people from the hornier hovels of my head. This is a hollow exercise at best, necessitating the exploitation of such banal tags as "futa" and "sissy" and "femboy" and... other words that I shudder to even think about in the presence of you, but still shamelessly type into multiple search engines when it's late on a Saturday night and I'm tirelessly massaging the third hemisphere of my lonely brain. Am I happy to just pretend that trans people can't be the objects of attraction? That they're not even "allowed" to be sexual or sensual in nature, despite whatever gender they identify with? Or maybe the truth is far darker: that I only ever want to distance myself from the reality of transgendered life, because I'd otherwise have to face the weight of all my endless fetishization of them, despite attempts to fantastically remove it all from immediacy.)
(That's not even touching upon the aesthetics of Fiona and all things attached to her. "Unusual" may have sufficed until now, but at least it wasn't frightening—bordering on sickening. Yes, you obviously remember that fantasy I told you ages ago about myself in a feminized state being "taken advantage of" by the high school football team. But you don't even know the kind of states Fiona has been in since... that she's oftentimes exchanged her cheerleader outfit for juvenile school clothes. That she's replaced her long sassy hair for twin pigtails. That she's even hopped out of her sexy lacy panties and put on diapers.)
(These days, Fiona is looking less and less for hot football players to call "stud," but rather people to call "Mommy" and "Daddy." And it's not like she herself has changed much at all; the wires have crossed, not melted. She sleeps surrounded by pink softeness, only to be fucked senseless by the meatiest of meats. At some point, the blissful fantasies of my childhood oozed into the carnal desires of my adulthood and asked: "why not have both?" Who doesn't want to be cuddled, pampered, adored... as well as reamed, spitroasted, and glazed over? As long as we're all consenting adults with safe words, we can play multiple roles with no fear of psychological damage or jailtime, right?)
(Who am I kidding... of course we can't. Not all of us, at least. It is—after all—"unusual." I don't say that with bitterness... but with sobriety. You wouldn't understand it all, even if you wanted to. And of the sparse few individuals I've found in life who can, they exist far beyond a wall of informational vacuum—dwelling remotely online in the digital expanse where we can feel close enough in our interests but wide enough apart to afford our separate, mutual, unspoken awkwardness. I can count them on my fingers—the scant acquaintances I've made in message boards and Discord chats—and every day I count lesser and lesser responses from them: pink-hued image spams that dwindle in both density and enthusiasm, as we re-discover the new demarcations of the maturing world thickening around us, and what limits we can live with in our combined support and catharses. And yet I can't help but feel that we found each other only to drift away—further and further into the far reaches of our niches—like dim rings circling black holes in the heat death of everything, suckling on the narrow streams of joy that we once thought we were completely alone in, but can now be satisfied with the barest ounce above nothing.)
(I've confinded and unloaded and emptied with these souls—and more—and while I can appreciate their candor and uplifting familiarity, the well is never dry. Fiona plunges ever deeper, dragging the pastel warping of light into that event horizon, and like a yardstick that cuts itself in half forever, I don't think I'll ever stop approaching that singularity—instead I'll never reach it. Even if I tell you all the ins and outs of being in and out but never whole, it won't make the destination grow any closer.)
(The journey must be frolicked alone. Just me and Finoa, two halves of the baton, twirling forever in the sacred darkness, safely away from all the real people with their real problems and their real solutions. And while much of the glitter bubbles to the surface, I dare not be seen sweeping it all up—or else it'll draw too much attention. Not just from you, but attention to myself... and how with each progressive year that passes by, I know that I only get lonelier and lonelier, because inviting anyone within this pink bubble will just be too damned complicated.)
(Others have figured it out—I've no doubt. But not me—not me and Fiona. At times, I develop the urge—the urge to tell her off. To cut the appendix loose and scab over and live life to its fullest, even with a few tiny scars to bear. I see the texture of it, lying there on the bed after a particularly lewd session, and I'm feeling wet and shameful in a frazzled state of soiled crinoline, with the sight and scent of intestinal fluid lining silicon to keep me afloat upon the firmaments of guilt... and I just want to break free. I want to break free from the unusual anchor of it all and be stale and predictable and "normal.")
(But both the afterglow and aftergunk are mutually finicky things. A clean wash and a solid drink later, and I'm back beneath Fiona's balcony, asking her to let down her hair, desiring to be cuddled in warm toasty dreams and nothing else. And I think I can do this... I think I can live in the cocoon forever.)
(I deserve no more, after all.)
(I know that's not what you're asking to hear.)
(I know that's not going to satisfy your curiosity in any way.)
(So that's why I'm going to say...)
"It was just a phase, Sunset," Flash Sentry said. He was back in the living room with his ex-girlfriend of seven years. Jean-Luc Picard was making some self-righteous lecture on the television set. Flash decided he alone deserved the platform. "Nothing more. Nothing less."
"Really...?" Sunset Shimmer's eyes narrowed. "Even after all this time?"
"You know me." Flash threw on a smile. It was pretty enough; sparkled enough. "I occasionally fall for fanciful dreams. But I've moved on." A soft breath. "We've all got to."
Sunset stared at him. All it would take was a simple stretch of the arm. A flash of the geode—and she would knew the full extent of his deception. But she stopped being a detestable witch ages ago. She was a good person now, and an even better friend.
Flash was counting on that.
(Add it to the pile.)
"Okay, Flash." A delicate smile, but her eyes were still hungering for a hint of something else. He fed her nothing. "I'm sorry for bringing it up."
"You've got nothing to be sorry for."
"You always say that..."
She was right. He didn't expound upon it.
Flash looked to the t.v. A bunch of Ferengi were threatening to kidnap and strip half of the Enterprise's crew. Ferengi—such cruel, one-sided, objectifying creatures.
Flash felt in good company.
