Contrails/Haunted Places/Refuge
Soarin took a deep breath, and then took the plunge.
He fell from the cloud and his body carved a path through the air. Behind him, contrails of water vapour began to electrify, ionise, sparks borne from the liquid heat of friction creating a light show which dazzled and inspired. But Soarin didn’t notice, he simply kept his eyes forward and tried to make sure he didn’t deviate from the flight path.
When he came to join his teammates, falling effortlessly into formation like it was nothing, the crowd’s cheers went unnoticed by Soarin. By it wasn’t nothing, and it most definitely wasn’t effortless.
No. The strain of keeping himself flying at the precise speed and angle needed to execute that maneuver would have wrenched a lesser flyer’s wings from the sockets. Soarin’s wing muscles screamed in a boiling rapture that most of the team always said they loved. Spitfire lived for that sweet agony, but to Soarin it was just that. Agony. He scrunched his eyes closed, he didn’t need them at this point with how much he’d done this routine, and kept his mind on making sure his wings remained coordinated.
It would have been so easy to simply let go. Relieve his wings of the strain and plummet from the sky. Maybe settle on a cloud somewhere soft. Maybe with someone soft. But then the crowd could jeer and boo and heckle. Then he’d lose his place in the squad. Then he’d end up destitute and forgotten.
No, it was better to simply push himself. Keep himself righted and flying true because this was what Soarin did. He opened his eyes and noted that his teammates were all in formation for the big finish. Rainbow climbed higher and higher while the rest of them gathered as much vapour as they could. They spun, making what looked to the crowd like a large, idle gathering of cloud.
Little did they know that the sheer rotating momentum they conjured had turned the inside of that cloud into a churning tornado. Soarin’s breath quickened, and he desperately locked his wings so as to keep flying round and round. But not so far to the right as to be thrown from the formation. And, of course, not far enough to the left as to be sucked in and thrashed around, his body and wings battered and broken by the furious storm within. The balance was less than a hair’s breadth.
But, once again, Soarin managed to make it look easy.
Rainbow descended like a falling star, and finished her rainboom perfectly within the centre of the cloud less than a tenth of a second after entering it. The blast destroyed it, imbuing the misty debris with a million million colours. The wonderbolts all pivoted out of the way of the incredibly dangerous blast that made it look like a simple afterthought, and moved into a line to take their bows to the now roaring crowd.
Soarin was hyperventilating. He looked to his teammates, and saw they all looked satisfied with a job well done, as ever.
But Soarin just felt relief.
Soarin took a deep breath, and then took the plunge.
He used to worry that this could upset his diet. After all, being a flyer of his calibre meant keeping a high level of physical fitness. But then, he’d been coming here for months now. After every show, in fact. At this point, he could only assume his diet could accommodate this little post-work indulgence.
Or it couldn’t. He didn’t care much either way.
The doughnut was perfect. They always were. Lightly crispy on the outside, but still moist. The inside was fluffy around the perfectly distributed jam. He turned to the counter as he ate, and watched them being made.
Soarin knew the process by heart by this point anyway, he’d stared for long enough. Joe leant over the fryers, peering into the murky liquid. Soarin might have had an idea of the overall process, but Joe? He knew the exact right amount of time to leave them in there. He knew the exact amount of time to leave them before icing, before filling. He knew the perfect doughnut to serve to Soarin each time.
It was like he could read the knotted muscles and worry lines on Soarin like a book. He’d scan them and know the remedy for the worry and exhaustion each time. Like words on a page. That was how it seemed, anyway. But Soarin preferred to imagine it like braille, and picture hooves moving across the burning wing joints and wound musculature on his back and reading the secret messages. Hooves that were so strong and yet moved with a gentleness one couldn’t fathom until they were tracing you.
Joe looked up suddenly, their eyes met, and Soarin quickly looked down at his doughnut.
He didn’t know why he came in here sometimes. He wasn’t relaxed, in fact he was breathing faster than he was during the routine.
Hoofsteps rang out, and the booth shifted as someone joined him.
That was a lie, he knew exactly why he came here.
Soarin’s breath managed to quicken, and he looked up. Joe was smiling down at him, taller than Soarin by a clear head. The fur on his face was damp with sweat from working in the kitchens, and his breath moved over the table and tickled Soarin’s muzzle.
Joe’s horn lit, and a serviette was levitated to mop his face dry. Soarin stared until he finished, at which point he looked back down at his doughnut.
“Hope you don’t mind some company?” Joe asked, and Soarin felt his lips curl into a smile. It was reflexive, automatic, as natural as pulling his hoof away from a burning stove, or the oily heat of a fryer.
“No! Not at all,” Soarin replied, knowing as he did it how desperate he might have sounded. But, as Joe smiled in return, and that breath tickled Soarin’s muzzle again, he didn’t really have it in him to feel embarrassed.
“I don’t know how you do it, Joe,” Soarin began, taking another bite.
“Well, you’re not the first stallion to come in here needing something sweet,” Joe replied, laughing in that full-throated, boisterous way of his, “At this point I know what doughnut someone needs just by the look on their face. Helps if we’re familiar, too.”
“No no… well, I mean yeah, that too,” Soarin began, before gesturing to his half eaten doughnut, “I just mean, I don’t know how you do this. They’re always perfect, and you never look anything other than just, so assured in them. Like there’s no chance they could ever be anything but perfect.”
“Shucks, you’re gonna make me blush!” Joe laughed in retort, and Soarin did note that there was a light flush coming through the cook’s cheeks, “That’s how ponies talk about you, you know? Talk about seeing you up there, and how easy you make it look. I tell you what, one of these days, I need to forget the dinnertime rush and come watch you perform.”
“I think you might be disappointed,” Soarin admitted with a laugh, “If you can read me as well as you do, you’ll be able to tell how terrified I always am. I don’t remember the last time I felt anything other than, just like, desperation for the performance to be over. To be able to relax again.”
Joe looked at him inscrutably for a moment, before breaking out into another easy smile.
“You know, it’s not really hot in the kitchen,” he said, and Soarin stared quizzically, “I’ve got that fancy air conditioning in there. I guess I’m always sweating because, well, I’m nervous, you know? Everytime I see a pony bite into one of these, I’m worried that this is gonna be the time I get it wrong, and they’re gonna hate it. And after you’ve been in the business for as long as I have you can tune it out. But it’s different when it’s someone you’re… familiar with.”
“Is that what we are, Joe? Familiar?”
“Well, you’ve been coming here after every one of your shows for months, and everytime we’ve talked. I guess you must like the restaurant a lot, and I feel like that makes us familiar,” he said, his tone sounding oddly strained.
“I’m not sure how much I do like the restaurant. No offense meant, of course. It’s a great place it’s just… everytime I come here, I’m anxious after a show. After a while, I feel like that anxiety can linger in a place,” Soarin said, feeling the need to be honest trumping tact.
“Oh… so, what keeps you coming back?”
The two stared at each other. The redness on Joe’s cheeks had intensified. Soarin dropped his doughnut onto his plate, and pushed it to the side, his expression at once aching.
“Oh, hey now, you got some icing on your muzzle,” Joe said, voice barely above a whisper, and Soarin took a moment to register. He nodded, and went to grab a serviette.
“Hey… it’s alright. I can… uh, you know?” Joe said, as his hoof moved to cover Soarin’s and lightly push it back. He then grabbed a serviette himself, and started to dab at Soarin’s muzzle.
The hoof was as strong, and as gentle, as Soarin had ever imagined, and he allowed himself at least the respite of letting his eyes flutter shut. And when Joe was done, he delicately cupped Soarin’s cheek, as to get a better look at the side of his mouth.
“There we are, all better now,” he said, and Soarin opened his eyes to see Joe staring still at his lips.
Only the hoof wasn’t retracted, and Soarin’s heart was thundering. His brow beaded with sweat. He licked his suddenly dry lips and lied to himself that this time, this was the time that they might need to not be dry because he could stop being so anxious and panicked and cowardly and just lean forward and-
The doorbell jingled as some new customers walked in. Joe withdrew his hoof, but it was a calm easy motion. None of the sudden fright Soarin would have probably felt.
“I… uh, should probably get back to it?” Joe said, his tone oddly questioning.
And Soarin simply nodded, giving his assent insofar as it was even required. Yet he noted that Joe had made no move to leave the booth until he saw that nod.
For the rest of the time Soarin was there, he didn’t think Joe looked as concentrated while making doughnuts again.
Soarin took a deep breath, and then took the plunge.
The cloud formation was growing, he could hear the churning in there.
Sometimes, when the performing made him especially anxious, Soarin would look away and imagine he was somewhere else. And he didn’t know why this day in particular he turned to look at the crowd.
Maybe a lesser flyer, without Soarin’s keen senses, wouldn’t have seen the amber unicorn in the stalls, looking directly at him. They definitely wouldn’t have seen the look of encouragement on his face, the kindness, the yearning.
One second of broken concentration, a single thought of one of those hooves on his cheek, and it was enough to throw him from the flightpath. He careened through the air as the force of the rainboom knocked him off-kilter.
But, eventually, Soarin felt himself enveloped by a soft cloud. He was shaken, but unhurt. He made no moves to look at the prismatic explosion, or to see where his teammates were. He could only notice the fact that there were no jeers or heckles from the crowd. No screams. All his worst nightmares seemed to dissolve away into the gentle white plush of his little refuge.
It almost felt anticlimactic as his heartbeat returned to normal for the first time in a while, and Soarin stared up into the sky in the perfect silence. In the unblemished blue, Soarin longed for something, or someone, down on the ground.
Soarin took a deep breath, and then took the plunge.
The lull in the conversation was calm and easy, and Soarin’s keen pegasine eyes tracked Joe’s expression from yearning to surprised as he pushed through the worry and closed their distance.
The unicorn’s lips were like his hooves, with a softness and gentleness that many would probably think was impossible of a stallion as large as him. And they tasted sweeter than any confectionary Soarin had ever tried.
And when he felt Joe finally react, pushing aside their food to lay his hoof over Soarin’s on the booth table, and bury the other one into Soarin’s mane, it felt like he was on that cloud. In a refuge where his heartbeat could slow to an easy, relaxed pace.
Joe’s breath ticked his muzzle again. It felt familiar.
Soarin hoped it would never end.
