The beads on the ceiling spinner went round and round, always moving but never getting anywhere.
Izzy stared upwards from the couch, anxiously drumming her forehooves on the floor. Then she shifted position to anxiously drum her hinds instead. Somepony was breathing heavy through their nose, and because she lived alone Izzy concluded the nose breather was her.
The job she had to do was simple. Only little ponies felt afraid to do simple stuff, and Izzy wasn’t little, right?
Right?
Well… she hadn’t measured herself in awhile. Nor stood next to another unicorn to compare. Not since… gee, not since she was still young enough to know for a fact how little she was. So much for simple stuff.
A tea kettle whistled from the other room. Loud enough to make thoughts seem quiet in comparison. Izzy bolted to the kitchen and was soon examining her stash of dippy bags. There were many. Too many. She was only one pony with one kettle.
Chamomile flavor? No, that’s for bedtime, not going-out time. Lemon? No, Izzy didn't need sour on top of stress. She chose one with no label. Uncertainty can be fun sometimes, right?
Right?
Horn into the bag, bag into the mug. The label-lacking tea sat stewing and so did Izzy.
"Just popping in for a mail call! Anything cool coming down the pipe, Hardwater?"
"Stop coming in here, Isabelle. If any letter is addressed to you, it's placed in your dropbox at the end of your property."
"Oh yeah absolutely, but I was free today and this is the closest building to where I live, so uh... ya know, I figured I'd check out what everyone else is up to. Maybe make chit chat with the local plugged-in postmaster pony."
"There's a bulletin board out front. With all the planned town events for the next month on it."
"Yyyyyeah, I saw that. It's blank and no one was nearby, so- "
"If it’s blank, then there are no planned town events for the next month."
"Oh."
"I don't see any saddlebags on you, Isabelle. Can I assume you don't have any goods you want to drop off?"
"I um... I don't."
"And you aren't here to buy another ad space on the back of the local paper."
"Well, I guess I'd need money to do that, right? And seeing as none of my crafts from the last ad got any buyers-"
"Are you here for any real reason?"
"Do I... do I need a real reason to just make small talk?"
"Yes. You do."
"Oh."
"Goodbye, Isabelle."
"Right. Right, sorry. Goodbye. I guess."
Last week's exchange at the post office hadn't gone at all like Izzy wanted. Never mind that it ended up being the longest conversation she'd had in months. The other unicorns didn't like her, Izzy was mature enough to admit that. But they didn't seem to like most most things.
Izzy liked most things. She liked way the rain sounded and the sun felt. She liked the music that came out of glass bottles when she blew on them just right. She liked foraging the forest floor for the straightest sticks to make more crafts because maybe, just maybe she'd eventually make something that would get a reaction from another pony. Some days her searches found more than just sticks. A certain search this morning had found a lot more than just sticks. For better or worse.
Horn into the mug, bag out of the mug. Bag into the trash can, with a couple open and shuts on the lid. Not for any reason other than to fill the house with a few seconds of sound.
Yes, Izzy did like most things, but quiet wasn’t one of them. In fact,-
“I hate quiet.”
Izzy buried her shameful muzzle into her mug, pretending as hard as she could that those awful, nasty words didn’t just come out of her. She shivered, which was odd because she didn’t feel cold at all.
Izzy was not a bad pony. The other unicorns didn’t like her, but that didn’t make her a bad pony, right? She hated a thing, but that didn’t make her a bad pony, right?
Right?
Izzy sipped her tea. Then she gulped it. Isabelle Moonbow chugged and chugged her mug until there was nothing left in it. The mystery dippy bag had definitely had a taste, but Izzy didn’t recognize it. If she had a friend with their own cup maybe they could have told her what the taste was. They'd swig from their own drink, share jokes as well as tea, point to the hoofmade decor all around, and compliment all the hard work Izzy clearly put into making her house feel like a home.
But Izzy's house didn't feel like a home. And she didn't have anypony to share her afternoon with.
Izzy had her empty mailbox and the quiet and too many teabags and the quiet and the ceiling spinner whose beads never went anywhere and that lantern from the woods yesterday and the note that was attached to it and the quiet. Izzy had lots of things. But she didn’t have any friends. Not in Bridlewood.
Though if the lantern note was telling the truth, she had friends in Maretime Bay.
Izzy rinsed her mug out in the sink.
Where was Maretime Bay? Absolutely no clue.
Izzy dried her mug with a towel she’d crocheted herself.
How many friends did she have there? No clue there either.
Izzy put away her cup and stepped back, seeing how spotless the kitchen was. Like nopony lived here. Izzy ate and slept, but did she really live?
Izzy was tired of having to answer her own unspoken questions all the time. It twisted her tea-filled stomach into knots, the thought of going out to search for the lantern's origin all by herself. But even worse was the thought of staying here, in this cottage. By herself.
Possibly forever.
The slam of plywood on drywood told Izzy she’d left her house and was trudging out of Bridlewood Forest. She blinked at the sunlight before noticing the quiet all around was being filled with the eager thumps of her own hoofsteps. Then her rhythm sped up as the trees thinned.
Across the open plains, Izzy was galloping for all she was worth, legs pumping like pistons as her uncombed mane trailed behind. She wasn’t a bead on a ceiling spinner, or an ignored ad in a newspaper. She was Izzy Moonbow, the grinning, laughing, hopeful unicorn.
And she had friends waiting in Maretime Bay.
Author's Note
Pinkie Pie's pep
+
Autumn Blaze's lonely soul
A hopefully compelling interpretation of Izzy.
