Chapters You didn’t have to say my name…
Author's Note
Ignite my circuits, start a flame…
You didn’t have to say my name…
It had been a year.
The seasons cycled before these two ponies came across each other again.
Rose was sitting in her usual spot, in a far corner of the cafeteria; however, upon looking up, there was a pony that Rose recognized, though barely.
She saw a nervous pony, trying to hide themselves from the world. A pony that had recently been torn apart and put back together, though the engineer had better things to do than to put the pieces back together perfectly. A pony with piercing ocean eyes.
Rose remembered that gaze.
She walked over to this pony.
The pony looked up, and Rose sat down.
“You are…?” Rose barely recognized this pony. Once confident, brought down to nothing. No longer a comfortable Duke, but a skittish, fragile Honeybee.
“I- I don’t have a name.” The Honeybee was looking around, as if there were ponies just around the corner that would jump them at a moment’s beckon.
“But don’t we all?”
“I-I don’t. Not anymore.”
Rose looked at the Honeybee.
“Surely…” Rose didn’t want to believe anything, but her hopes weren’t very high.
“Rose…”
Rose was shocked by the utterance of her name. This was the pony who had questioned her usage of it a while ago. She knew ponies changed… but there was still that surprise when you found out that ponies did. Logically speaking, this wasn’t even that drastic of a change. It was a logical progression, but that made it even more intriguing.
But still, the Honeybee was talking.
“My parents have very particular opinions on these sort of things… I’m scared. I don’t want a name, they might find me.”
Rose looked at the pony in front of her, recoiling from a sting. She knew what is was like to be in their horseshoes, in a blistering thunderstorm. After all, flowers could die from being overwatered. Was this pony trans, like her? That wouldn’t make sense, considering what happened last time they talked. But still, those words…
“Come on, I can try my best to help you, name or not. Your parents sound awful.”
“I think they still love me…” the Honeybee’s voice trailed off. It was almost like they were trying to reassure themselves as much as they wanted to alleviate Rose’s concern.
“But would they try and prevent you from having your own name?”
“They just want to protect me…”
“By preventing you from living your own life?”
The Honeybee was silent. Rose could almost hear their brain buzzing, trying to come up with some excuse.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the Honeybee collapsed face-first on the table, and started shaking and crying. Rose ran around to try and comfort the pony she saw.
“Look, I can’t really do much…” Rose began, but trailed off.
The Honeybee looked up, ocean eyes moist and pleading.
“But I can really try my best. It’s the least I can do. I know you’re strong, and you saying my name means you’re not afraid to embrace it, which says a lot,” Rose began, slipping in closer to the Honeybee.
“But I’m not a real girl…”
“Then I’m not either, and do you really believe that?”
The Honeybee looked at Rose closer. Ocean eyes still moist and pleading, but now also introspective.
Rose left the cafeteria, likely to do something else in the expansive school.
The Honeybee sat and let their thoughts of Rose pollinate.
You didn’t have to smile at me…
Author's Note
Your grin’s the sweetest that I’ve ever seen…
You didn’t have to smile at me…
The Honeybee and Rose soon met daily. The fragility of the Honeybee slowly receded as they became more attuned to trying to live in their skin.
Most of all, something had begun to complement those ocean eyes. That was the face of a smile. A beaming grin. One that was usually plastered on the Honeybee, always trying to be helpful and grow past the fragility, but the thing with fragility is that it never completely goes away.
As such, when that smile was not on the face of the Honeybee, than that was a cause for concern. Such as today.
Rose, sat down in her usual spot, across from the Honeybee, and asked her usual questions.
“Have you chosen a name yet?”
The answer was almost always “Not entirely.”
“Are you feeling good?”
The answer was almost always “As well as I can be.”
It was practically rehearsed. The responses were natural, no party expected anything else, and they were fine with that.
Today, came a different response.
“Have you chosen your name yet?”
“I— think so.”
Rose immediately looked up. She immediately jumped on the next question.
“What is it?”
Rose was absolutely dying to know.
“I, think I like the name Honeybee.”
“That’s good!” Rose looked down at her food. This was a momentous occasion! But… where was Honeybee’s smile?
Naturally, she had to ask the question. Where had Honeybee’s smile gone?
“I’m just… scared,” Honeybee said.
“Of what?” Rose asked, hoping for something different from the answer she expected.
“Everything else…”
That was the answer Rose expected.
Rose looked down at her food again as she tried to think of a response that was more than ‘sorry about that’. She tried her best, always, but sometimes she didn’t have an idea to do so with.
“…I know, I know the ponies you’re scared of have power.”
Rose still tried to think of something, beyond that, but she figured she should set the record straight first.
“I’m just scared of what my parents will think. What happens when they learn their stallion is a mare?” Honeybee was dejected, panicked, worried about her quality of life. She wanted to live on her terms, but she knew she very well couldn’t. Not as long as her parents still believed in words that were never spoken.
The table went silent. Both parties went silent. Rose eventually spoke up.
“I say go for it. Keep it on the down-low. Try something different at this massive school, even that should be good enough.”
Rose tried to sport a smile, but Honeybee looked up as her ocean eyes prepared to cry a river.
“What if I’m not really a mare. What if my parents were right?”
“That’s fine. However, let me tell you that you are whoever you are. Parents don’t get a say. Some ponies are trans, and that’s how they’ve always been. You might not be one of them, you might be, but don’t let your parents decide that for you. Follow your heart.”
Rose concluded, finally stringing together words into sentences, stitching together an elaborate blanket.
“But…”
Rose cut Honeybee off, “I’ll be here whenever, alright?”
Rose once again looked up, and tried to sport a smile of her own.
Then, even though it was broken, and it hid a world of hurt…
Honeybee smiled.
You didn’t have to offer your hoof…
Author's Note
Say you know me, with this as the proof…
You didn’t have to offer your hoof…
It was a day like any other. Rose sat down, sitting at the same table she usually sat at. Honeybee was across the divide, smiling.
Rose couldn’t keep herself from smiling along, as happiness was paramount in any good friendship. The happier the ponies with each other, the closer the bond.
Sure, Honeybee didn’t exactly smile all the time anymore, but it was wonderful when she did. Today, it seemed especially happy.
“Having a good day today, Honeybee?” Rose just had to ask, there were things she was dying to know.
Honeybee nodded. “Haven’t felt happier.”
“Comfortable in your own skin?”
Honeybee looked away, then back at the table. “Yeah! Parents are still a problem, but I’m feeling like that’s almost all behind me.”
Rose laughed along, hoping that what Honeybee was saying was truly right.
“Always nice to be your own pony,” Rose declared. “And good on you for overcoming those who have power over you.”
Honeybee once again looked away, but she didn’t look back immediately this time.
Rose thought nothing of it, instead thinking that Honeybee was skittish, just like her namesake. Buzzing from flower to flower, idea to idea, waiting to find an idea to pollinate and make her own.
When Honeybee finally looked back, she said a simple thing, “I suppose it is, isn’t it?”
Rose nodded vigorously.
“We’ve both figured it out ourselves, now it’s time for you to make your move.” Rose motioned toward Honeybee, extending her hoof.
Honeybee grasped the hoof tightly, and looked directly into Rose’s eyes.
“I… will.”
“I’d suggest trying on makeup, maybe new styles. Magical transitioning is obviously out of the question right now, but keep your hopes high for later.”
Honeybee heard Rose’s words, but she was plagued with a thought. She knew she wouldn’t ever be doing that, not in her current environment. She let go of Rose’s hoof.
Rose realized that there was something up with Honeybee. She was hiding herself away.
“Then again, you… could run? Just do so safely. We don’t want any ponies here to get hurt.”
“But… you won’t see me…”
“That’s fine. Your life comes before some arbitrary meeting.”
Honeybee looked down at the floor. That was her idea, but she didn’t know if she could do it. It took a lot of confidence to run away, but she was prepared to do it or at least try her best, like Rose.
“I’ll see what I can do. That… was the plan.”
Honeybee’s only response.
“Well, when you get to safety, send a letter, will you? If… you decide to do that, that is.”
Rose was practically pleading. She wanted to keep Honeybee safe, regardless of what it took.
“I’ll try to remember you,” Honeybee said.
Rose laughed. “You better… or else.”
To her surprise, Honeybee laughed, too. But her smile was no longer beaming. It was broken.
“Is there… something wrong?” Rose looked up, incredibly concerned, waiting for a response.
Honeybee stood.
While it was true that honeybees were skittish, playful, and necessary… they were also incredibly fragile. Honeybee simply couldn’t take living in her environment anymore.
Soon, Honeybee left the school.
She never saw Rose ever again.
Honeybee had flown away.
You didn’t have to look my way…
Author's Note
Your eyes still haunt me to this day…
You didn’t have to look my way…
They met by chance.
A fleeting chance it was.
One, relishing in a life newly found, the other living happily in a life they’ve always known.
One, a Rose, trying her best to be her best, the other a Duke, comfortable in the life he currently led.
All it took was a single glance at school.
The Rose sat there in the cafeteria, a place where she usually didn’t sit. The Duke incidentally sat across. The two ate their food in silence. Then, the Duke looked up with piercing ocean eyes, trying to break up any silence like a king would in a meeting of lords. He asked a simple question.
“What’s your name?”
“Rose.” What else was Rose going to reply with? It was, after all, her name. Recently chosen, yes, but a name nonetheless.
“I thought the teachers—“
Rose looked up at the pony sitting across from her. Confident, happy in his position. Everything she wished she could be. This was the energy of somepony truly happy, or truly ignorant.
“It’s my name?” Perhaps, a little more forceful than necessary. Rose, however, was tired. The fact that ponies asked these questions frustrated her. She’d gotten them a million times.
Meanwhile, cogs turned in the Duke’s mind, preparing for a royal proclamation. They didn’t understand the idea yet, but they knew about the concept. However, such a forceful response often coaxed out a defense.
“Hey! I was just asking! The teachers call me Duke! That’s my name!” Again, more forceful than necessary? Perhaps, but sometimes even a rhetorical question asked for a good answer.
Rose realized her outburst, and went back to playing passively.
“Sorry, it’s just that Rose is my name, and the name the teachers call me isn’t. At least, not one I like to use.”
Duke, likewise, decided to cool off. “I’m still trying to understand that whole thing.”
“Me?”
“You know…”
Rose finished chewing her food. Swallowed it. Then, she set her gaze back on Duke, who was a little thrown-off, but otherwise, happy, smiling.
“You know I’m trans, right?”
“Yeah. It’s just. Religion hasn’t helped. I’m trying to get better!” Duke sat straight up, trying to defend what he’d just said, like any high-ranked noble would.
Rose knew that predicament too well herself. Fights with her parents regarding such an idea. The dividing line between mare and stallion, and all the other things that old practitioners of words of Celestia she likely never said believed in. Rose had taken her own path, and was given the freedom to do so. Others were not so lucky.
“Hey, an honest try is all you need. At least you are.”
Duke relived the tension in his limbs, and let himself slouch. Rose did likewise. The two looked at each other.
They both continued eating. The same food they’d eaten dozens of times. The lunch was routine, but these ponies were breaking theirs by deciding to talk with each other. Rose decided to break up the silence with the seeds of a conversation.
“You know, I wish you luck.”
“We’ll see.”
The two finished their food. The next day, Rose went back to her own little world. Rose and Duke never saw each other again.
Not for a year, at least, and certainly not ever the same as they met right then. As in most games of chance, the dice only roll a certain way once.
However, they never forgot each other completely.
Dear Rose;
I’m alive.
-Honeybee
NO RETURN ADDRESS
Author's Note
So here’s my most recent story. Tried something new. You be the judge of how well it worked.
Same rules as A Little Louder , slurs will be deleted on sight, and if you’re debating, take it to DMs.
Don’t expect anything like this again, it was really, really hard to write.
