Late-Night Phone Call

There was a phenomenon that Sunset liked to dub "insomnia o'clock." The exact time that this mythical hour struck tended to vary by night, but tonight it was about midnight, and with it came all the implications that the name entailed.

Sunset stared up at the ceiling of her shitty little home's shitty little bedroom, laying sideways across her mattress with her legs hanging off the edge. As she laid there unmoving, her eyes traced the innumerable mini-patterns in the crackled and chipping caulk of the slowly disintegrating ceiling over her head. The shadows obscured most of them, and to her the exact layout of the designs shifted and wobbled subtly as her eyes attempted to see into darkness they simply could not see into, allowing her imagination to fill in the blanks with markedly poor consistency. It was a doomed game, yet play she did, because while it was impossible to win, it was a low-energy, monotonous activity to partake in while she waited for sleep to find her. It usually worked eventually.

The issue, of course, was that the hour hand on the broken clock in the corner had struck insomnia o'clock some time ago. No matter how many laps her eyes did around the room, nothing seemed to bring her mind any closer to stillness. The quiet frustration that came with knowing of the futility of her situation was not helping with the lack of rest, and as it grew, it only served to agitate the tension hanging over the center of her chest like a fist loosely gripping her rib cage - no doubt a contributing factor to why insomnia o'clock had come in the first place.

It was going to be a long night, it seemed. On the bright side, she had a few options available to her on how to make the night pass easier...assuming they worked.

Sunset reached into her jean pocket and retrieved her phone, bringing it to her face in a practiced motion. Naturally her fingers guided her to her texts, where she found a very familiar name, gave it a tap, and asked the ever-important question.

You
You awake?
Today at 1:02 AM

There was little else to do after that but do some more waiting. Mercifully enough, she wouldn't be waiting for long.

Rarity
Yes
Today at 1:04 AM

A little hope came to life in Sunset's smile.

You
Same
Happy insomnia o'clock
Today at 1:04 AM

Rarity
What’s keeping you up?
Today at 1:04 AM

You
Idk
Stress I guess
You?
Today at 1:05 AM

Rarity
Same
A pinch of anxiety for good measure
Today at 1:05 AM

You
No sleep for us, huh?
Today at 1:05 AM

Rarity
No rest for the wicked
Today at 1:05 AM

Sunset cracked a small grin at this. Rarity replied before she’d begun typing a response.

Rarity
Call?
Today at 1:05 AM

Took the words right out of her mouth.

You
No complaints here
Sweetie around?
Today at 1:05 AM

Rarity
Sleepover night at Applejack's
No rogue listeners for us
Today at 1:06 AM

You
Good. I prefer you all to myself
Today at 1:06 AM

Rarity
That makes two of us
Today at 1:06 AM

Sunset broke into a wide smile at this. After only a moment more of reading that text over, she thumbed the Home Screen button, quickly found her contacts, and tapped on the picture of Rarity’s smiling face beside her name.

She got only a single note from the dialing out sound before Rarity picked up, sing-songing fondly, “Hi darling~”

“Hey hey.” The welcome had Sunset smiling just as fondly. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“I know, right? It’s really quite something. You come here often?”

Sunset shrugged coyly like Rarity could see. “Once or twice. There’s this bombshell of a girl that comes around here every once in a while, and gonna be real? Can’t resist the chance to catch a glimpse again.”

“Oh my.” There was a faint creak of a mattress, and Sunset could clearly envision Rarity laying on her front with a playful grin, chin in hand. “You sound positively smitten, miss Shimmer.”

“Hey, I’m a simple mare. I see beauty, I want beauty.”

A minxish little giggle chimed from Rarity’s end. “A girl who knows what she wants, mm?”

“Something like that.” Sunset’s legs gently swung where they hung off the edge of the bed. “How about you? Bet you want plenty.”

Rarity hummed quietly. “Maybe one or two things…”

“Like?”

“Oh, I don’t know…” A second or two of deliberate pause preceded the response of, “You.”

Sunset smiled a little wider. “Well, you got me. Lucky you, huh?”

“Lucky me indeed.” Then, speaking through clenched teeth, she added, “Don’t even have an audience this time.”

Sunset chuckled. They’d barely even been at this, and already she felt significantly more relaxed than when the conversation had begun. “Any idea what started that whole thing?”

”God knows,” Rarity breathed through an exasperated sigh. “I’ve given up trying to figure out what goes through my sister’s head when she and her friends pull their stunts. All I know is there’s no baby monitors in my room now, all the curtains are down, and I just got confirmation from Applejack not that long ago that those little miscreants are all accounted for.”

“So we’re definitely clear.”

“Definitely.” A beat. “Probably.” Sunset heard a faint creak as Rarity briefly sounded more a few feet further away. “At least I’m pretty sure…my room’s clean, at least.”

It was times like these that Sunset was glad she was an only child. “Let’s keep the adventure in the bedroom, then.”

Rarity let out a devious little laugh alongside another stray squeak of a mattress. “An adventure in the bedroom, you say?”

Sunset paused for a brief moment, then let out a sheepish chuckle. “…okay, that one wasn’t on purpose.”

“Sunseeeeet,” Rarity whined. “Don’t get a girl all excited like that!”

“You’re already excited, let’s be real.”

“N- well-“ A little sigh. “Alright, perhaps a pinch. Perhaps a pinch of preemptive excitement.”

Sunset both physically with one hand and verbally finger-quoted as she said, “‘Excitement.’”

The response wasn’t immediate. After a second or two of silence, Rarity peeped, “Is it that obvious?”

“Little bit.” In response to Rarity sounding smaller, Sunset did her best to project extra assurance into her tone to compensate. “Not complaining, mind, it’s just, y’know…just an observation.”

In lieu of words, there was a long, muffled sigh that sounded as though it had been released into a pillow rather than at her phone’s speaker.

“I don’t mind! Honest.” Sunset chuckled gently in spite of herself. “You know me.”

Rarity was barely comprehensible through the pillow she spoke through - it’d be impossible to know the words if they didn’t match the rhythm of ‘It’s embarrassing’ as well as they did.

“I don’t think it’s embarrassing.” Sunset took a second to reposition where she lay, rolling onto her front and leaning up on one arm as she spoke. “It’s not like it’s some big deal or anything. What, you think I haven’t gotten horny before? Cuz I’m not exactly a beacon of purity over here.”

This time the response was completely incomprehensible.

“Didn’t catch that.”

A beat of silence, then a far clearer response as Rarity quit gargling a pillow: “It’s just weird to me. I’m…I-I don’t know, it’s just…”

Sunset smiled a grimace of a smile. “I uh, I probably shouldn’t have like, called you out on it.”

”Nono, it’s just-“ It took Rarity several seconds to put her thoughts together well enough to put them into words. “I’m not used to it. It’s um…”

“New?”

“Yes- well.” A second of silence. “Yes? But also um…well that, and also, um…”

More searching for words. Sunset waited patiently, shifting position again to lay on her side, as she could already feel the tension building in her back from leaning up like this. She then ended up on her back again because that was just easier to do.

Rarity settled on something eventually: “I suppose I’ve never really had the option to address it before. I’m not really sure how to…”

Sunset gave her a few more seconds. When nothing came, she asked, “Does it make you uncomfortable?”

A few moments of consideration passed quietly. “Well…kind of. But not…not like that, I mean. Not with- not with you.”

Sunset cracked a small smile at that. “Just kinda weird, huh?”

“Yeah.” Rarity briefly paused. ”Do you think it’s weird?”

Sunset gave the matter a second or two of consideration, but found the answer not much different than before. “Not really. I mean, I haven’t talked about it at length a ton myself, cuz, yunno,” she chuckled a little. She was quietly pleased that Rarity giggled along with her. “But it’s whatever.”

“Does it make it stranger that it’s with a human?”

That gave Sunset pause. She looked up at the ceiling above her thoughtfully, finding one spot in particular to level a longer than average stare at as she mulled this over. “Not,” she began, and then trailed off, mulling it over further before she found her voice again. “Not really? Cuz I mean…yeah I won’t lie, there’s some weird stuff that comes with uh…this topic in particular for me in particular? But that’s like, cuz I’ve transferred species and that’s kinda bucked no matter which way you look at it. In general…no, not really, I don’t think. Sexual stuff is just kinda sexual stuff when you get down to it.”

Rarity let out a small note of a sigh, then replied in a tone that almost sounded wistful: “It must be nice to be so confident.”

Sunset found herself shrugging helplessly, briefly fumbling for a response to this. “I…guess? Idunno, it’s just…it’s just a thing, I don’t see the point in making a big deal out of it if you don’t gotta. Cuz we can just talk about it, right? Like…it’s just us.”

There wasn’t a response to this. Silence fell where the conversation lapsed, slightly more awkward than Sunset was accustomed to.

Sunset listened to the silence for a little while. At some point she began to wonder if perhaps it would be better to talk about something else, though she wasn’t sure what to talk about at that exact moment. She lifted her phone from her ear, stealing a glance at the screen briefly to see the time. 1:19 AM.

Rookie numbers.

As Sunset went to remark on this aloud, Rarity beat her to the punch. “Darling, would you find it at all odd if I asked you something?”

Sunset shook her head, like Rarity could see. “Not at all.”

In a smaller voice, Rarity added, “It’s a mite personal.”

And again, Sunset shook her head with a shrug. “No harm in asking. Whatcha wanna know?”

The delay was brief. “Have you ever been attracted to a human?”

Sunset couldn’t help but smile to herself. Gonna be one of those nights, huh? After a moment more, she decided she was fine with that. “In what manner?”

“You know.”

“Sexually?”

A brief hesitation. “Any, but…that too, yes.”

“Yeah, I have. Fairly frequently, I’d say.” A beat. “I mean like, sexually. But yes, in general I’ve felt attraction. It’s uh…it’s a little bit weird? Cuz you know- humans? Human faces? Bodies? Like- like I don’t need to tell you humans and ponies are built a little different from each other, right?”

“I assumed so,” Rarity giggled.

”Yeah, kinda different. Apples and oranges. So I don’t always like, know why I find things attractive like that, but uh,” she tilted her head as though to lean slightly closer to Rarity, “the body works? Yeah. Yeah uh, all the parts in this thing work just fine, and it knows what hot is for humans.”

“So if you saw someone naked, you’d…react.”

“Yyyyyup.” Sunset hesitated to say what she thought of next, but proceeded anyway. “I can confirm that much just with you alone.”

Rarity sputtered slightly, then began to laugh. “Oh, y- oh dear. So you did like that picture.”

“I uh…” She chuckled, sheepishly scratching the back of her neck. “I wasn’t kidding. Felt a thing or two.”

“So you…liked it.”

“Kind of a turn-on, yeah.”

Rarity squealed at this and once again broke into laughter - a giddy kind of laughter that betrayed a certain nervousness beneath the mirth rolling freely from her. Even so, it didn’t sound like she was uncomfortable, so Sunset just put her arm behind her head, swayed her legs, and smiled to herself as she listened to the lovely sound that was Rarity’s laughter.

After a little more of that, Rarity let out an airy, cheerful sigh. “There are so many reasons I’m glad I’m alone in the house right now.”

“No idea what you mean,” Sunset quipped, legs gently swaying off the edge of her bed. “Just a perfectly family-friendly conversation going on at–“ A brief glance at the phone, “–one thirty in the morning. PG at best.”

“I feel like the ratings department would have some words of disagreement, darling.”

“Yeah well, maybe they should rate deez nutz.”

An ugly, most-unladylike snort burst through the speaker from Rarity, followed by a slightly more distant, “For God’s sake.”

“I can assure you that God has nothing to do with what’s transpiring here tonight.”

“Stooooooop.” Rarity had begun to laugh again. “You’re so bad.”

"It’s what I do~ Comes with the territory.”

“I could have sworn your name was Sunset Shimmer, not Sunset Shameless.”

“Now see, that," she flicked a finger as though tapping it against the matter, "you can blame the marketing department for. They had absolutely no faith in my vision.”

“And what vision, pray tell, would that be?”

It was practically free. “A vision of deez nutz.”

“StOP!” Rarity half-shrieked, and began to laugh again. ”Sunset!”

Sunset now joined in with the laughter this time, cackling to herself in the darkness.

If not for her obvious cheer, Rarity would sound positively petulant as she grumped, “You’re lucky you’re hot. You wouldn’t get away with half of this if you weren’t.”

“Sexy bitch privileges! Gotta love ‘em.” Sunset glanced to her left toward her pillow, and decided to go with her impulse at the sight of her bed, both for the bit and because she wanted to anyway. “And on that note, I’m taking my clothes off.”

Sunset didn’t hear precisely what was said in response as she moved the phone from her ear, though it had a distinct “are you kidding me” energy to it. She pulled her shirt up over her head and flicked it aside before she brought the phone back up and heard the latter half of what was being said. “-and now I know you’re trying to torment me. You can’t just have the conversation we’ve had and then hit me with that!”

“The important part is if it’s working.” She reached back and unclipped her bra with one hand. She then faux-hastily corrected herself in a deliberately unconvincing tone, “I mean I would never do that. That would be mean and unfair?”

“And slightly hot.”

“And slightly hot.” Jeans: unbuttoned. “We don’t do that here.”

“Truly not.” A beat. “You’re not actually undressing, are you?”

“I said I was,” Sunset replied, in a ‘what did you expect?’ tone.

“Why now??”

“Cuz I wanted to!” Sunset shrugged helplessly with her one hand, momentarily pausing her wiggling out of her pants to do so. Damn tight jeans were difficult to remove one-handed. “I wanted to be comfy. That, and it was funny.”

“Ah yes, the funniest of all practical jokes,” Rarity deadpanned. “Stripping to nothing when you know your friend is already wrestling with her share of friskiness.”

“Absolutely. Also gimme a sec cuz it’s cold in my room and my pants are stuck.”

Rarity gave only an exasperated ‘ugh’ in response.

Sunset put the phone down, smirking, and proceeded to un-stuck her jeans where they’d caught around her thighs and, after another moment’s consideration, called it good at that. She collected the phone again, pulled back the faded covers, and quickly put them over herself to shield her from the brisk air of her unheated room. “Aaaand done.”

“Great, thank you,” Rarity monotoned dryly. “Your contribution is greatly appreciated.”

“Here to help!” Sunset beamed at the ceiling as she pulled her covers over herself tightly while tucking into a ball beneath them. “Now we can skip over my half of the ‘So what are you wearing?’ exchange.”

“Making plans, are we?”

An innocent shrug. “Just being prepared. You never know.”

“Mhm…” Sunset could envision Rarity with her eyes half-lidded by tone alone. “Sounds dangerously close to trying to tempt a girl, to me.”

Sunset smirked. She went to make a joke, then admitted, “I’d be lying if I said my intentions were entirely pure here.”

“Mhm,” came the knowing chuckle. The confidence in her tone wavered a little as Rarity then went on. “Then I guess it’s only fair that I confess that I’m a little tempted.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” She’d been keeping them on for practical purposes, but Sunset decided to shed her underwear beneath the covers without making note of it. “It’s kinda funny, though. I’m not used to…” She paused. “Well, frankly the idea of stripping down for someone is kinda weird in the first place, but that’s just cuz like, I didn't really do clothing back home.”

“Or now, apparently.”

“Or now!” Sunset chuckled. “I don’t do this often, is the point.”

“Believe it or not, this is somewhat foreign territory for me as well. It’s a rare day when someone’s so eager to undress for my benefit.”

Sunset tisk’d. She hugged her knees under the covers with her one arm. “Sounds like you’re missing out.”

“Quite…”

"Maybe we should do this more often."

The eye roll from Rarity was audible. "Oh please, I can already barely keep you in your clothes, never mind now that you're weaponizing it against me, absolute scoundrel that you are."

Sunset shrugged beneath her covers in a 'whattya gonna do?' manner. "I'll get dressed if you tell me to. Just say the word."

From Rarity's end came a long, thoughtful noise. It ended with a disdainful little click of her tongue. "You know what, actually? I'm going to call your bluff."

Sunset raised an eyebrow. "My bluff, huh?"

"Indeed. I think you may be misleading me, miss Shimmer."

"Do you now?"

"Quite." There was a small challenge in Rarity's voice. "I think that you are not in fact undressed. A cruel game, truly, playing with my heart like this, but that is my belief."

"Heh." It wasn't exactly difficult to see where this was going. "So what I'm hearing is you want some proof."

"Oh," Rarity audibly began to inspect her fingernails with a disinterested air, "I wouldn't say that, though if you absolutely insist on defending your claim, I suppose I can't stop very well stop you..."

And there was the request. Disguised as a challenge, but a request it was.

Sunset paused. She tapped her index finger slowly on the case of her touch phone, appraising the task in her mind.

She had taunted Rarity with it, so there was an argument to be had for putting her money where her mouth was. Furthermore, and perhaps most pointedly, Rarity had sent her a picture of similar nature a little while ago, and she had never thought to reciprocate - something which had periodically found its way into her thoughts as something akin to a regret about the whole exchange. It was only fair, right? It's not like Equestrians had much of a concept of nudity to hold her back.

They didn't need one, though, because this was a different beast from anything back home, with different implications and baggage to boot. This was a smaller task for her than it would be for most humans, but she was not blind to the implications, which were enough to make her hesitate.

"...you don't have to," Rarity reminded in an uncharacteristically small voice.

"I know." Sunset made her mind up at that moment. "One sec."

The phone left Sunset's ear, and she thumbed the home button, swiping over to the camera. Naturally it was pitch black, so she had to get the flashlight on…which nearly blinded her, making her squint harshly at the sudden stab of light. "How do you work this stupid thing," she muttered to herself, twisting the device about this way and that as she tried to work out the logistics of a selfie - something she had not done in many moons, and had not done particularly often during that time.

She managed, eventually. Once she'd worked it out, she peeled back the faded maroon comforter as she stretched out across her mattress, exposing her bare skin to the cold room's air that immediately made her shiver and goosebumps start to work their way up her arms and legs. At least it'd be brief.

Sunset did not really know what to do with herself for the picture. She deliberated for a few seconds, looking down at herself as she weighed her options, and opted to go for something simple: one leg over the other slightly, more so to preserve heat than anything, with her arm snaking down her torso ending with her hand cupped between her legs. One breast was covered by her arm, though the other was not. She flashed the camera lens a smile she hoped was less awkward than it felt, and took the selfie.

...off-center. Whatever.

Into the texts it went, and sent to Rarity. She then brought the phone back up to her ear as she swiftly pulled the covers back over herself. "Special delivery."

"You actually did it?"

In contrast to Rarity's incredulity, Sunset sounded quite casual. "Yeah, why not? You sent me one earlier. Fair's fair."

Rarity giggled timidly in response. "I guess that's true..."

As Sunset curled back into a ball beneath the covers, she had a small smile on her face. The anticipation of the message's arrival was not just Rarity's.

It was not hard to tell when Rarity opened the photo, because she let out a noise like someone had placed a cold hand on her bare back and she was trying to suppress it. "Oh gracious me."

Sunset's smile bloomed into a wide grin. "Like it?"

"You're gorgeous, you know that?"

Somehow Sunset smiled wider. She curled up on herself a little more as a tickle of giddiness rippled through her. "Thanks."

It was quiet for a while after this. Sunset felt a little wiggly as she huddled up under the sheets, a big smile plastered on her face as she basked in what she perceived as admiration beaming in from Rarity's side of the line. She felt very pretty all of a sudden - something she hadn't felt in quite a while - and it was...nice. It was very nice. It felt good to be admired. Felt good to be pretty.

Rarity piped up eventually. "Sunset, I have a confession."

"Mmyes?"

"This is making me wonder if I like girls again."

A laugh burst out of Sunset's throat like the cork of a thoroughly shaken champagne bottle. She smacked her free hand over her mouth in response, halfway startled by its suddenness, and she was powerless to stop the girly stream of giggles that poured out of her. The most she could do was muffle them, but stop them? Noooooo.

When she had the ability to speak again, Sunset had to force past the giggling to finally proclaim, "Corrupted another one!"

"It's not fair," Rarity whined. "Darling it's not fair, why do you look like that? Why do- oh Christ this is-" Rarity’s growing horror sounded muffled, like she was speaking through her hands, "oh it's the sleepover all over again."

Interest piqued. Sunset propped herself up a bit on one arm, chin in her hand, and declared, "That sounds like a story."

Rarity didn’t respond immediately, though when she did, it came out all in one go, with one breath. “So- ok so a long while back, we had a sleepover and Pinkie misplaced her pajama pants, so she had a pair of tights on that night instead- I don’t know, I don’t know if it was the tights, or- or how loose it made her shirt look by comparison? It really made it look like- like, there was overhang, and then waist down it’s almost skin-tight, like- god that whole thing, oh it was-”

"Hot."

"It was!" Rarity cried, sounding distraught. “God, and she’d sit like- she’d do that thing where her- legs spread, feet flat together? The fabric was so tight.”

"Very hot."

”It was!” This came out equal parts shriek as whisper, and Rarity let out a drawn-out groan that echoed into her hands. “Ooooughhh and it was late, and there were others in the room and oh god it was so hard to manage. You could see everything every time she sat and I wanted to do positively unholy things. It was torture.”

Sunset couldn’t help but laugh, equal parts at the mental image and the energy Rarity was putting out. The giddiness from before had most definitely greased the wheels of the laughter engine as well. "Too bi for your own good!"

"I'm not even bi!" Rarity wailed, despair in her voice. "At le- at least I don't think I am! Am I??"

"You sound extremely bi right now, won't lie."

"But I don't like- th- that many girls! This barely happens! It's basically just you and Pinkie..."

"Aaaaand we are girls," Sunset casually drawled. "Soooooo if you do the math, you'll find that thaaaaat's a little gay for a straight girl. Soooo, y'know...bi!"

"I'm so confused." Rarity's voice once again became muffled and echo-y from behind her hands. "It's not fair."

Sunset let out a single taunting laugh as she pointed across her bed where she imagined Rarity to be while speaking to her. "Bi."

"Shut up! This is your fault!"

"Nah nah nah," Sunset refuted through the next bout of laughter, pointing at the space where she had assigned Rarity's imagined presence, "it's your fault. You doubted my power level here, you've got no one to blame but yourself."

"Curse you," Rarity whimpered, sounding like she'd curled up into a ball. "Curse you and your stupid sexy body..."

It was at that moment that Sunset knew precisely what act of evil she was meant to perform that night.

About thirty seconds passed. As far as the call was concerned, both sides of the conversation were quiet, though eventually Sunset spoke up with deviousness thick in her voice. "Hey, Rarity. Check your texts."

"My what?" There was a slight delay, and the exact moment that she found her texts was marked with a hard, "No."

Sunset burst freely into laughter as she threw her covers back over her bare skin. "What, what's the matter? Something wrong?"

"No."

"Check your texts! What did it say?"

"Sunset Shimmer, I'm going to smother you in your sleep."

"What's the matter?" Sunset could not stop laughing. "What's wrong, Rarity? Need another one?"

"Like a hole in the head, damn your eyes!"

"C'mon, need another one?" Sunset threw her comforter off herself again. It was worth the cold. "C'mon, I'll take a quick one, it'll be great-"

"CEASE!"

"Just one more!" Sunset wasn't even sure she had taken a picture of herself so much as she had the mattress next to her with how unsteady her arm was, and she fumbled with her phone to try to send the resulting photograph to Rarity as fast as possible. "Just one more, for old time's sake, c'mon, it's on me!"

"I'm going to bury your stupidly pretty body, Sunset Shimmer!"

"Hang on, redo, that one didn't get my good side, I got this-"

"StOP!"

Sunset, in fact, did not stop. She sent a total of seven more nude pictures herself of varyingly atrocious quality until Rarity hung up on her, at which point Sunset nearly died laughing. The two would then remain in conversation through text for the next three hours until Sunset's phone ran out of charge.

When Sunset finally went to sleep that night, she felt prettier than she had in years.