I was looking for you in the garden.
The sound of birds and rustling leaves echoing across the garden, your name gliding across like a rock skipped over water. You were waiting on the bench where we first met, the one beneath the great oak tree. I was impressed that you knew its name, and you were amused that I thought you didn’t.
You wouldn’t know it, but I started paying attention to these kinds of things.
I bought a book from the used bookstore, across from the shop where we had our first date. I would read it in between customers and during downtime at the store. It always smelled of sweets and fresh doughnuts, but the more I read the more I could smell those trees too.
A customer asked about it once. Said it was good reading. He nodded when I mentioned your name, and said that any pony who understood nature was a pony worth knowing.
I remember the way your eyes lit up on our fourth date when I said I tried writing poetry. I confessed that I wasn’t great, because I didn’t know all too many words. And you said that it wasn’t about how many words I knew, but how I used them.
That thought kept me for many nights after.
Your lips pressed against my own. The scent of your cologne that lingered in my room for many nights after.
When I found you, you were waiting under the tree. “Hello, love. You reek of sugar.”
“You love it.”
You smiled and leaned into me, your warmth burning into mine.
Years later, I watched a shooting star pass over the place where we used to live, stars blinking in and out like distant, tiny lights. What were the chances?
“What are the chances?”
“Chances of what?”
“That I’d fall for you.”
I remembered our walks through the park, staring at the clouds. Counting all the birds. Sharing embraces, stealing kisses beneath the moon. The words you said to me that would stick in my head forever after, stronger and more potent than anything I could ever hope to capture.
“Why do you say that?”
Why was the sky blue? Why did I love the way you said my name? Why did things have to end this way? Did good things always give way to bad?
You just smiled, in the same way that enraptured me the first time I saw it. “I thought of you as a pony who kept many secrets, Celestia knows that I do myself.”
“So you’re saying I’m simple?”
“I’m saying you’re open. That’s a good thing. Equestria needs more ponies who don’t clutch their pearls.”
That’s a good thing. You’d say that a lot over the years. You’d say it when I said you worked too hard, draping a blanket over your shoulders as you slouched over at your desk. Smiling in the flicker of candlelight.
When did you fall asleep? Why are there more bad things than good ones?
“Oh, chin up, Joe. You ask too many questions.” You leaned back, patting the seat next to you. “Come, sit. Enjoy the world for a moment. Try not to worry so much about why things are the way that they are.”
“Why should I?”
You laughed. “Of all the ponies in this city, I’ve never met one like you, Joe.”
“And I’ve never met a stallion like you, Marble Black.”
Your name escaped my mouth, diffusing through the trees. Lost to the wind.
I never thought that it could bear such weight. Each time after it would feel heavier. Darker. Losing its substance like a ghost in the daylight.
The heaviest it came was when I spoke it to that guard, who stared out listlessly with a thousand-mile stare.
“Black Marble. His name is Black Marble.”
“.”
“What?”
“I’ll let you know if we find something.”
Long after I moved out, I found myself skipping the third stair, the one that’d always creak when you put weight on it. It started as a habit, then became a superstition. I know you never put much faith in those kinds of things.
“Do you believe in ghosts?” I asked you, as we split a plate of greasy fries in a suspect Fillydelphia diner.
You shook your head, dabbing the corners of your mouth with a handkerchief. “I do not.”
“How come?”
“.”
The answer kept me up at night. I couldn't remember what it was.
“I have to go to Manehattan next week.”
I sighed. I wish I hadn’t said anything, because I could tell that it upset you.
You frowned. “Joe, I know how much it means to you tomorrow, but I told you. Loving me comes with the job.”
“I know,” I said, but you weren’t convinced.
I hadn’t really thought about it much until it became a problem.
“I’m an appraiser for the Fancy Pants Jewelry Association,” you told me on our first date. “He’s a fine enough fellow, but I do wish he’d provide us with just a little more foresight. I often don’t know where I’m headed until the day before!”
“I run a donut shop.” It felt so plain, so wrong to say, but your eyes lit up just the same.
“Oh, lovely!”
“It’s nothing much.”
“I’ve been trying to get him to rearrange, but I’m not sure if I can without putting my promotion in jeopardy.”
I stared down into the black sludge they called coffee and didn’t answer. “I don’t think I’m hungry anymore.”
“.”
The first time you left, it nearly caught me off guard. You had left a message so suddenly that I barely had time to make it to the station to wish you well.
But I had a plan for when you returned.
“What’s your favorite so far?”
“The chocolate glazed ones,” you said without hesitation.
“Really?” I smiled. “I’d have thought you’d like the more daring ones.”
“Simplicity is often overlooked,” you replied with a wink.
Every time you returned, I’d have a warm plate ready for you.
But that first night, that first night was the hardest I’d ever worked. Things had to be perfect, nothing less would do. I must have made dozens of batches before settling on one I deemed to be good enough.
I’ll never forget the way your eyes lit up that night.
I was looking for you in the garden. It was raining, the setting sun blocked out by thick gray clouds. Nothing but the sound of falling water to fill the air.
You didn’t show, and I got upset.
“I’m sorry, love.”
“It’s four in the morning, why did he wait until now to tell you?”
You sighed quietly, rummaging through your drawers. “I don’t know, but I can’t tell him now.”
“You can! Just come back to bed.”
“.”
“Fine,” I said. “Go, then.”
“.”
I was surprised to see you at the store. “Aren’t you meant to be in Manehattan?”
“I spent all night fighting for him to grant me leave,” you said with a frown. “Not that it matters, I see.”
I wish I could’ve seen clearly then. I wish I had kept my mouth shut. “I don’t care. You know how much this meant to me.”
“And you know how hard this would have been for me to make this work!”
“It’s not every day that there’s a Royal Wedding!”
“You’re acting like I didn’t try to make this work!”
“Did you?! Did you really?!”
“.”
“.”
Words blur, thoughts fade. Crossed out like notes in the margin. I don’t remember much of it. I only know how hurt you were, and how you slowly turned to leave.
No more birdsong. No more wind. Just a distant ringing, and the cutting of music from the radio to a dull, constant tone.
A flash of light and it was over.
I was looking for you in the wreckage, covered in debris and dust. The store turned into a derelict warzone. Sirens ringing outside. The only response to a call was the ringing in my ears, the shouting in the streets.
Neither of us should have been there then. I should have been at the palace, ready to serve the wedding patrons. You should have been cities away, working on sealing one more deal for Fancy Pants.
I remember the last sad smile you gave me before you ducked away, lost to the throng of the train station crowd.
I saw you lying there, crumpled on the floor. The smell of blood and smoke hanging in the air.
“.”
You didn’t answer to the cry.
Shapes moved past, my eyes blurring as my throat tensed up. I don’t know how long it was before a young guard seized me, panic in his eyes. Tearing me away from you.
“.”
I tried to fight him, to get to where you lay. “.”
He dragged me down the street, littered with ponies that looked like you, laying still on the street. “.”
I was looking for you in the garden.
The tree we met under was gone: nothing more than a smoldering trunk. The birds have all flown away. In their absence I can only hear a distant ringing. Sirens, screams and cries in the distance.
The only response to a call was silence. A city still healing from what it had seen. A hundred questions hanging in the air.
How could this have happened? When would the bleeding stop? How can we remember what we lost?
How can I ever trust anyone I ever see again?
Visions creep at the corner of my mind. A shut hospital door. A blanket draped over a bed. A still and silent heart monitor.
I still don’t know what happened. I went back to the store to find a pile of rubble waiting for me.
The place where we went on our first date is gone now. It’s been replaced with a flower store. My store, the book of trees, everything. The memories haunt me, pulling me from my sleep in tears. I claw and reach for your body, but it isn’t there.
The years have passed all the same. I don’t remember any of them.
It hurts to think about. The memories come in a rush, shattered and disjointed. Scenes flashing by in a random order.
How do we move on from what weighs us down? How do you condense a story of love that ended in an awful way, in a few thousand words? Why am I here, and you aren’t?
I was looking for you in the garden.
I didn’t know what I was expecting back then, so I took the first bench I saw, too fearful to do anything else, until I heard your voice. “Hello. Are you Joseph?”
“Call me Joe. Are you Black Marble?”
You smiled, and it was unlike anything I had ever seen before. “.”
“The honor’s all mine. Um… shall we go somewhere?”
“.”
