The Perks of Being a Wonderboltby Dennis the MenaceChaptersFriend ZoneSmoke and MirrorsHot MailFriend ZoneBefore we get started, lemme just say that I ripped the title of this off of some stupid book on my shelf. It sounded kinda interesting and didn't make any sense, so I figured it was a good book. Then I remembered that I had to read it in high school and that it sucked major horseapples cause it was about this loser in high school coming of age. I think my title makes much more sense. I was originally gonna call it, The Things I Want by Soarin', but it didn't sound that great. It took me a while to come up with a title before I actually started writing, seeing as you can't start without coming up with a title. I've been writing for a long time. In my head, I mean. Let's just throw this out here now. Girls are dumb. So dumb. Or maybe I was the dumb one, since I couldn't even talk to one of them. Trying to talk to a girl is kinda hard. You gotta act all cool and sound like you're bored even though in your head you're trying to plan out the rest of the conversation and making sure that you don't say something stupid. So pretty much 75% of the time you can't even enjoy the fact that you're talking to a girl because you're so worried about saying something dumb that afterwards, you can't even remember what you were talking about in the first place! Or her name. I'm bad with names. Can't remember any of them. Maybe it's because ponies all have names made up of nouns and verbs and adjectives, and I think pronouns, if I remember anything from high school. My name is easy to remember, since I'm so unforgettable, ha-ha. Soarin'. Just Soarin'. There aren't any other Soarin's in all of Equestria. Now that I think about it, I'm not too sure that's such a good thing. I mean, what if I royally mess up? If somepony asks I can't just play it off like, "Oh, you must be talking about another Soarin' that infiltrated a pie factory and ate all the pies." Did I mention I like pie? I love pie. Almost as much as girls. But you already know that, since I'm so famous. I bet you already know a bunch of things about me. Like how awesome my mane is. So long and silky, flowing in the wind. Spitfire. Stupid, sexy Spitfire. I could write a poem about her, which is weird since I hate poetry. I could go on and on about her voice, which wasn't very girly at all. She didn't have the voice of an angel and couldn't sing for her life, but that didn't matter, 'cause her rough, scratchy voice was enough to make me shiver. Or I could talk about her streaked fiery mane that smelled of cinnamon (no, I don't sniff her hair, you creeps). Those brilliant eyes that hypnotized me, orange and dazzling. Those flanks, oh sweet Celestia, those flanks. Honestly, I think I fly better when I'm positioned behind her, since I pay much more attention to what's in front of me. You've probably guessed that Spitfire is smoking hot. And that I liked her a lot. Yeah, I was trying to think of a more subtle, romantic way of doing it, like talking about how my heart kicked up a notch every time she walked by, or how I'd start talking like a dweeb. I don't pay attention to my heart when the mare of my dreams trots by. That's one thing that bugs me about romance novels. Nopony ever talks like a normal pony! I should probably start this at when this all began, my crush on Spit, I mean, but that'd mean I'd have to go back all the way to when we were foals. Plenty of potential for prequels and sequels to this epic story. So I'm gonna do something with in media res (which is just a fancy way of starting things at the middle) and flashbacks. A cold winter day in Cloudsdale. No sun, only snow-covered clouds, white, wispy, and stretched out, like cotton candy. I think they were called cirrus clouds. Not at all fun to play in. They weren't very bouncy either, like a cumulus. Picture this: a playground built out of clouds on top of a cloud. Pegasi foals flying around and playing. It was cold. Most ponies would be freezing, but we were used to it, us pegasi. And then there's me, playing on the swings, a striped navy blue scarf around my neck, keeping me warm as I swung up and down, kicking my hooves as hard as I could to get higher and higher into the air to experience the sensation of flying for a brief second as I reached the peak before the swings brought me back down. Up and down I swung. My mind was more preoccupied with counting how many more swings before I had to get off. "My turn, Soarin'!" I stuck my tongue out at Thunderlane and jumped off, spreading my wings to float back down. In that moment, I saw her. The new filly in flight school. What was her name again? Right, Spitfire. She was weird, I thought. A bit like Fluttershy (who could hardly fly), except Spitfire could fly. I was just a kid back then. I didn't think too hard about walking over and waving hi. I think I was more worried about catching cooties. "Hi!" Her mane was a disaster. She looked down at her hooves and mumbled, "Hi." Somehow, my brain managed to work out the fact that Spitfire was cold, judging by the way she shivered. I thought it was kind of funny how her name had "fire" in it. "You wanna wear my scarf?" "That's okay," she said. "No, really! Have it!" I thrust it out at her. Spitfire looked at me for a bit. "Won't you be cold?" I was going to be cold. "How about we share it?" She smiled. "Okay." Two foals sitting on a cloud, sharing a single scarf wrapped around their necks. I felt awfully proud of myself, being so nice. She scooted a little closer to me. I think we touched. I got that feeling for the first time. That weird, butterflies-in-your-stomach feeling, which sounds gross, by the way. I felt light. A little jittery. As you can see, we became best friends after that. Friends. Just friends. Friends. It was injustice. A crime against nature. Me, being so handsome! Being so...me! Being friendzoned! I mean, I only asked her out once for prom, so maybe it didn't count. This relationship stuff makes no sense. I mean, just look at me! My glorious mane! My chiseled jaw, these toned muscles! My nice, big wings! I was the pinnacle of pegasi! A specimen of grace and beauty! Okay, that's a bit of a stretch. But my mane! I could have any girl I wanted, but they were just low-hanging fruit. There wasn't even a relationship to be had with those other girls. I think they wanted my body more than me. Or maybe just the fact that I was a Wonderbolt. Enough about the past. The past was stuff in history books and things that weren't happening anymore. All said and done. I wasn't going to worry about things like "what if" and "maybe", since it was totally not my style. Like I said. The present. And in the present, everypony was glaring at me. I couldn't tell, since we all had our goggles on. But just by the way they were standing, I knew they were glaring at me. I'd probably done something wrong. I couldn't exactly remember. I was busy thinking about other things. What to do about life, and love. Somewhere in the middle of my philosophical ramblings while pulling off a stunt, all the other Wonderbolts trailed away from me and landed down on a nice, big cloud. "Soarin', what the hay!" And Spit was mad. You could tell because her eyebrows would get all wonky and then she looked like she was gonna deck me or something. Come to think of it she'd been getting mad a lot lately. Mostly at me. Then I noticed how cute she looked when she was mad. "Soarin', are you even listening?" Smile and nod. I'd probably messed something up during the routine. I was easily distracted. And then that got me thinking about this quote I read a while back. "This is the fifth time you've been out of form!" Hell hath no fury like a mare scorned. "Soarin'? Earth to Soarin'!" "He's prolly thinkin' about pie again, boss." Spitfire sauntered up to me. Was she going to kiss me? Instead, she plucked my goggles from my face, making sure they snapped against my head. "Ow!" I said, rubbing my head. "Did you hear what I said?" she asked. "Uh-huh." "What did I say?" I hated these kind of questions. But I figured I was getting good at answering trick questions. "I'm getting distracted?" "Yes! You can't keep getting distracted! What are you even thinking about anyways?" "Pie," Rapid Fire answered for me, and everypony got a good laugh out of it. And as always, I played dumb. Actually, I was dumb. And pretty funny, I liked to think. That was probably why they kept me around. For my personality. And my flying skills. I shrugged. Spit let out this adorable groan. "Ugggh! Soarin', you're not gonna be on the Wonderbolts much longer if you keep this up!" "Sorry," I apologized. "Don't say sorry. I want to see an improvement." Let's be honest. Nopony in real life ever says sorry the way they do in those cheesy movies and stuff. Nopony ever wants to take the time to sit down and have this long, meaningful discussion about how sorry they are and put on this phony act that'll make anypony roll their eyes. And when ponies do say they're sorry, it's really quick and they probably didn't mean it anyway. "Sorry." "What did I just say? Stop saying sorry." "Sorry!" I watched them all fly off without me. I slumped, and let out a sigh that I'd been ready to let out two weeks ago. Good job Soarin'. Messed up again. You're so good at it. I rubbed under my eyes. Why was I so tired? I wasn't sure when it started. During, or after the Grand Galloping Gala? I was starting to get fed up with it all. We were always doing shows and panels and signing autographs. There was no time to talk anymore, no time to enjoy the bits we made or spend time with each other. Things used to be different, or maybe that was just me making things up in my head. Things used to be fun. It felt like less of a job, and doing something we all loved together as friends. At best, we were just teammates now. I missed that camaraderie. Even during practice we did our own little tricks and got lazy. After practice we'd all get drinks, get dinner, go to nightclubs, hang out. Now it was just practice, practice, practice. It wasn't any fun anymore. Any of it. All of it. Spit and I hadn't had a real conversation in a long time. And every time I invited her for a coffee, or maybe a slice of pie (which I liked to think were dates since it was only us), she'd turn me down. I needed a pie to cheer me up. Thinking back, I'd been eating a lot of pies. Mostly to make me feel better. But maybe one more wouldn't hurt. Smoke and MirrorsI took my sweet time flying back to the lockers. What I was doing could hardly be called flying. More like crawling on the ground in the air. It was getting dark. I couldn't face them. I think it's weird how the sun and the moon always come up, but you never notice since you're too busy to be paying attention to stuff like that. You blink and all of a sudden the moon is up in the sky and the stars are out. You blink again and it's morning. You got barely any sleep and feel like hay. I took a spot in the cloud stadium for a view of the starry night sky, and I just watched the moon inch its way up while far away in the distance, the sun dipped below the horizon as it set. It's like watching grass grow, or looking back on the years gone by. You never notice until it's too late. And then you start feeling a little depressed and prop an elbow up at your windowpane, staring out and sighing forlornly with music playing in the background pretending you're in a movie. I do that sometimes. I think we look for things to make us sad because nothing makes us sad anymore. What was there to be sad about? And then I remember that I'm Soarin' (still single, by the way! And totally hot). Reality comes crashing down, because then I remember how well off I am, and how many other ponies would do anything to be me. I pulled off the hood of my flight suit, fixing my goggles so that they pulled back my mane. Like that Rainbow Dash. It was hard to forget her. I mean, how could I? She'd saved my pie after all. I stood back up, twisting my back a little. A few flaps of my wings were enough to get me through the underpass beneath all the cloud bleachers. The locker rooms, empty. The lights flickered when I came in, and the only sound of my hooves making soft plods on the cloud floor punctuated the eerie silence. The showers came on. Lukewarm water washed over my body, quickly turning hot. I dunked my head under and closed my eyes. "Race you!" I taunted, running forward for a head start. "Soar-in'!" Spitfire called in a whiny way. "Not everything has to be a race!" "Oh." I slowed down until I was back next to her. "Okay." She stuck her tongue at me. "Race you!" In a fiery streak, she flew off, flapping her wings. "H-hey!" Saturdays were truly something to be treasured. No teachers or parents to stop us from flying too fast. Watch out Cloudsdale, Soarin' and Spitfire were on the loose! The water shut off with a squeak. With a toss of my head I flung off most of the water on my mane and shook myself dry like a dog. The other guys got so mad when I did that, heh. Normally, our manes were all messy and spiky because we spent most of the time flying, so the wind kept it like that. I usually kept mine slicked back, using my Wonderbolts goggles to keep them in place. I decided to keep them dangling around my neck. When I left the stadium, Cloudsdale had gone dark. Well, sort of. Even after the sun went down, the lights came on. Cloudsdale never slept. It was always awake and ponies would still roam the streets to experience the night life. I passed by the weather factory. I could have been one of those poor saps, working in the factory 365 days a year making different kinds of clouds. I shook my head, trying to change the subject in my mind. Clouds were weird. How did they work? Even I had a hard time wrapping my head around it. Pegasi used clouds for almost everything! Our entire city had been built by hoof using clouds. We even used clouds as a nice bed occasionally. We obviously could walk on them, probably something having to do with magic (or how light our bones were), and could even mold them into different things. It's kind of like playing with snow, except it doesn't melt. You could pack it together, or stretch it apart and it'd come apart like cotton candy. I kept my wings spread, riding the current as I banked, taking a different direction. I'd changed my mind. The night was still young. I flew down onto another street and landed, trotting the rest of the way to a sizable cloud house. I rang the doorbell politely. Five seconds later, I rang it again. And again and again and again... "Alright, hold your horses!" The grumpy resident tore the cloud door open and glared. "Oh. It's you." They slammed the door shut. I rolled my eyes, pounding my hoof. Pegasi only knocked to be polite. I could have just have popped my entire body through whenever I felt like it. "Thunderlane," I hollered. "Open up. It's Soarin'." A pitter-patter of hooves. The door came flying open again and I was tackled by a grey blur, landing painfully on my back. Ow. "Uncle Soarin'!" The charcoal Pegasus with the electric-blue mohawk sighed at the doorway. "Rumble, he's not your uncle." "Thunderlane, don't be dumb!" I grinned. "Yeah, Thunderlane, don't be dumb." I glanced down at the small colt, grinning and mussing his mane. "How's it goin', Rumble?" The precocious colt beamed and hugged me tight. I tried to get back up, but Rumble had me pinned. "Rumble, you can let go now." "Uh-uh," he mumbled into my chest, shaking his head. I grabbed him and held up at arm's length. He shot back, clinging to my leg. I sighed, trying to pry him off. He was like cling wrap. I eventually gave up and let him ride on my back. Thunderlane let the both of us in. As usual, their house was a mess. "New interior? Nice." Since pegasi could mold clouds, it was inevitable that they would want to build their own houses and be their own architect. The only problem was that it wasn't regulated, and there was a huge problem with random houses floating all over the place. Nowadays, all you had to do was purchase some property space and build it yourself or hire somepony else to do it. "Nice?" I said, "Yeah. It's, uh, spacious." The entire place was an absolute mess and in disarray. "You didn't come over here to admire my hoofwork," Thunderlane said. "What's up?" We bumped hooves, like colts usually do. "Just came to say hi to Rumble." "Hi, Uncle Soarin'!" Rumble wrapped his hooves around my neck. I smiled. "And I thought I'd just visit you." Thunderlane rolled his eyes. "What gotten you all sentimental?" "Best buds can't hang?" He stared. "You okay?" "Yeah, I'm fine." "What's gotten into you?" "You keep saying that," I said irritably. "Soarin', we can always hang. We're best buds, but..." he trailed off, pointing at a clock, "it's almost nine. What about the Wonderbolts?" I didn't want to talk about the Wonderbolts. "Yeah, yeah, everything's swell. Wonderbolts, practice," I said breezily. "Oh, that reminds me. it's almost nine. Rumble, time for bed." The colt on my back stuck out a tongue. "Make me." "Rumble," Thunderlane said, his tone dangerous. Rumble immediately dashed off upstairs. Thunderlane waited for a few seconds before turning back to me. "You look tired." "I do?" Thunderlane pointed. "Bags under your eyes. You been sleeping?" "I dunno," I said, looking away. "C'mon. I think we still got a pie in the fridge." We trotted into their cramped kitchen. I sat down. Something squeaked underneath my haunches. I pulled the toy out from under me. It was a stuffed toy, more specifically, me in my Wonderbolt suit and goggles. "Hah, Rumble loves that thing. Sleeps with it every night." I smiled. "Gave it to him for his birthday." I slicked my mane back, arching my eyebrows. "I'm pretty handsome." "Oh please." Thunderlane set a plate down in front of me, a slice of apple pie with some whipped cream on top. I blinked a few times, not feeling too hungry. I pushed it away. I swear, his jaw dropped to the floor. "No thanks." "Dude." All of a sudden, Thunderlane was up in my space, touching a hoof to my head. "Are you sick?" "Get offa me!" "Are you dying?" "Thunderlane! I'm fine!" "You don't want pie?" "Nah." "Soarin', be straight wit' me for a sec. What happened?" I sighed and pretended to think it over, looking around. "Spit got mad at me today." "What'd you do?" "I messed up during one of our routines. I got...distracted." "That's it?" He looked relieved. "You still like pie, right?" "Thunderlane!" I snapped, snorting angrily. "I was thinking a lot today, and I thought about you and Cloudchaser. You guys going steady?" "Four months," Thunderlane said proudly, puffing his chest. "She's awesome. Best filly I ever met." Personally, I thought she put on too much makeup. "Congrats," I said glumly. "You have a special somepony." "You don't?" he asked, surprised. Now that was just offensive. "What's that supposed to mean?" "Nothin'. Just surprised is all," Thunderlane stammered. "Why?" "Well, I mean, you're Soarin'." "So?" "You're a Wonderbolt, dude! You should be rollin' in girls!" "I want something more out of a relationship than that," I said. "Well, who do you like?" "I don't like girl." He gave me a questioning look. "Whoa." "Spitfire's the only one I really care about," I said. "Then ask her out." "You make it sound so easy." "It's not that hard. You walk up to her and ask, 'Hey, you wanna go for a cup of coffee', and take it from there." "But what if she doesn't feel the same way?" "Whoa, whoa. Slow down. I said ask her out to a cup of coffee, not asking her to be your girlfriend. Those are two completely different things." "Ahhhh," I said, waving a hoof, "she always says she's busy." He gave me a look. "How long have you been crushing her?" "I don't know," I said hastily. "Depends at how you look at things." I tried not to look at things. "Since last week, or maybe since flight camp," I admitted. "That's...not healthy." "Shut up." Thunderlane socked me. "You should be out there, looking for somepony who really likes you." "That narrows it down a bit." "That's the point of this game, Soarin'." "What game?" "You know. The game. Trying to find that special somepony." "Did I lose the game?" "You only lose when you want to," Thunderlane said wistfully. Pause. Our eyes locked. We stared. "Whoooooooooa," we both intoned together. "Deep," I added. "Well, night." . "You should move on, Soarin'." "Some help you are," I said, jumping off the chair. So in the end, I got my best friend from flight camp lecturing me on how relationships worked. I didn't know why I came there in the first place. Ponies go to their best friends to hear what they want to hear, and I didn't like what I heard. I landed on the balcony of my penthouse, sighing. I propped an elbow up on the edge, studying Canterlot from my view. A penthouse was already too much. In my high school days all I ever wanted was that dream that every other pony thought they wanted. The fast life, the party scene. I got my penthouse, and the parties were fun at first. Now I just had a pool and concierge service I rarely used. Most of the other Wonderbolts had multiple penthouses, sometimes in other cities. Sometimes they'd even pay rent even though they hadn't been back in years. Some had vacation home in Canterlot, or even in Manehattan or whatever. Maybe a ranch in Ponyville, just because it looked nice. Huge mansions the size of castles. I didn't see the point. They had to spend even more money to fill the place up with junk just so that it wouldn't look so empty, spend money on giant parties with thousands of ponies just to make it feel alive. Big places made me feel...lonely. Lonlier than I already was. Isn't it funny, how you can be surrounded by your teammates and ponies who act like they like you, but they're never there? Thunderlane, now he was my best friend. Spitfire, she was too. I wanted it to be more. I slid the glass door open. It was still the same. Nice, clean, and if you looked carefully, you could even see the white cloud floor. A mess. It looked like a tornado had raged through the apartment. "Just the way I like it," I said sarcastically. I never got around to cleaning it. A pizza box on the coffee table, some of my Wonderbolts uniforms on the floor. The counter top of the kitchen was a cluttered mess, much like the rest of the place. It was an apartment, but bigger. Mine was styled really simple. They had all kinds of interior styles you could pick from, and you could have someone come over and remold your home. I kept mine really simple. "Real cozy." I popped open the fridge. Nothing. I wasn't hungry anyway. The last thing I remember doing was just flopping onto my cloud bed. I had a headache. Hot MailThat sickeningly sweet, bubbly voice. There was only one pony I knew that practically radiated sugar in her voice besides that baker in Ponyville who I get all my pies from. "Derpy Hooves?" "Hiya, Soarin'!" The Pegasus poked her head in. "Wow. Nice place." I rubbed my eyes. "Uh, thanks." "So anyways, do you want your mail?" "Uh, yeah, sure. Sure." I blinked. "Wait, WAIT, NO NO—" A torrent of fan mail flooded the entire room. I howled, sticking a hoof up in the sea of paper, practically drowning. "Don't worry, Soarin'! I'll save you!" In the process of trying to dig my way out of the fan mail, a hoof dragged me out. I gasped for air, filling my lungs were desperation, coughing. I hacked up something terrible. "Soarin'?" I wheezed and coughed, struggling for air. "Oh no! You're choking!" And of course, I was trying to say, "I'm not choking!" Except I think I actually was choking on something. Maybe I'd swallowed a letter. "Don't worry! I know CPR!" "CPR?" I coughed, except it came out like, "BLAGARAGHAH", on account of me choking. I figured that Derpy was at the very least, going to try and help me breathe. If she was going to lock lips with me, I would try and at least enjoy it OW! "BREATHE!" Derpy screamed, pounding my chest. "BREATHE, I SAY!" For the love of all that is holy, she really knew how to punch. I was 120% sure that you weren't supposed to punch a pony in the gut if they were suffocating, but hey, might as well go with the flo—ARGH! MY LIVER! And then, I felt something soft on my lips. She was trying to help me breathe. It wasn't quite as glamorous as in the movies, on account of all the saliva. I took a huge gasp and hacked up a stamp. "Thanks, Derp—mmgh!" She was still trying to help me breathe. Or was she trying to kiss me? My mind was still groggy from having just woken up and the lack of oxygen to my brain, but I was pretty sure that you didn't use tongue in CPR. I didn't really mind. I think she just stole my first kiss. Kisses on the cheek definitely don't count. I couldn't really judge Derpy on her resuscitation (kissing?) abilities, but I would have given her a 10/10. She was really getting into it. Not that I was complaining. Derpy was smothering me with her lips. Now I was starting to complain. I gently pushed her off of me, panting, blushing redder than a tomato. She, on the other hoof, looked completely fine. Not fine, like as in, a fine flank. I mean, her flank was very nice, but I didn't look, I swear. You know what I mean! Sure, she looked a bit concerned. "Are you okay?" I nodded, a little dazed, trying to process what had just happened. I could taste...something. I ran my tongue along the inside of my cheek. I could still feel the warmth of her lips on mine. That was definitely a kiss. I think. It wasn't like, mind blowing, like a Sonic Rainboom or anything. It was just...nice. She didn't taste like muffins, surprisingly. I think she brushed her teeth. "Yeah, sure. Thanks Derpy," I said, trying to be cool. "You know, you're supposed to deliver the fan mail to the stadium." "Oh!" Her golden eyes moved slightly. "Whoops." "It's okay." I scratched my head with a hoof. "I thought you worked in Ponyville." "I do!" Derpy chirped, puffing out her chest a little. "But Cloudsdale is short one mailmare, and they said I was just the pony for the job." She paused. "Actually, I think I'm the only pony available, so they didn't have much of a choice." Now it was just plain awkward. We were standing in the middle of a room flooded with letters and we'd just swapped spit. "So," I clucked my tongue, "How are things?" "Good!" she chirped. "It's been a while, huh?" It took me a second, but it clicked in my head that she was talking about flight camp. "Oh! Oh yeah, huh." "How are the Wonderbolts?" "Great," I said without thinking. Things weren't really great, but something weird about ponies is that sometimes they don't really mean what they say. Like, if somepony asks you how you're doing or how things are going, they don't actually want you to tell them. Going through the motions, or something. Imagine if every time you asked a pony, "How's it going?", they actually told you. Derpy was just somepony I knew. We weren't close at all. Not even friends. I rarely ever saw her and the only time I ever heard about her was when she kinda messed things up. Catastrophically. I felt a little bad for her in flight camp, 'cause she got made fun of for her eyes. "I'm gonna go wash up, okay?" I told her. "Just uh, clean up." "Will do!" She saluted. I wasn't sure if I wanted to wash the taste of her out of my mouth. It occurred to me that I couldn't exactly just smooch any hot piece of flank anywhere I went. I mean, I didn't really go about doing that kind of thing anyway. I was trying to save my first one for Spit, but Derpy kinda stole it. If any of the tabloids got this, there could have been some serious consequences. It's not like I was gonna lose my job, but ponies would think we were together. When I came out of the shower all wet and steamy with my mane down, Derpy had finished gathering all the letters. "You sure get a lot of fan mail," she said, not looking at me. When she did see me, her wings popped out and her eyes were wide. I wanted to laugh. Just to tease her, I said, "Hey there, "my eyes half-lidded in the most sexy way I knew. She folded her wings with some difficulty, her face flushed. Did I really look that good when my mane was down? "I-I think I'll go now," Derpy said woozily, dragging the bag of letters behind her. "Um, bye, Soarin'!" "Bye," I said, giving her my best winning hotshot grin. "See you around. We'll talk sometime, huh?" "Um. Um." She bolted in a streak of gold. She probably flew through the floor. I smirked a little, swallowing. Still no trace of muffins on my tongue. I shook my head. "Just a little CPR," I muttered, trying to convince myself. "She was giving me CPR. That was it." Thunderlane's words last night really bugged me. He was basically telling me to forget about Spit and find some other pony. But I couldn't just forget about her! I remembered why I was so distracted yesterday. I was thinking about stuff, but it was also the weekend the next day, so no practice. Could you really blame me for being excited about Saturday? Amidst the chaos known as my flat, I paused in between bites of some pumpkin pie, scanning the room. What kind of stallion did Spit want? After all these years of being close friends, I hardly knew. Did she go for the bad colts? Nice guys? I was a nice guy, I think. Why do people always say that nice guys finish last? Well, in any case, I figured she wanted a guy with a clean house. With that, I resolved to begin cleaning up, starting with all the junk on the floor. I mean, it wasn't that bad. Some books on the floor here and there, scattered everywhere. Those went back on my dusty bookshelf in the back of my room. Some takeout and pizza boxes went into the trash, and my Wonderbolts suits went up on a coat hanger. I surveyed my hard work, biting my lip. It looked more or less the same. I sat down, picking up a newspaper, remembering a fond memory. It wasn't what was on the newspaper that got me. "Tally ho, Soarin', away!" I wheezed, carrying the heavy, squirming yellow filly on my back. "Spit, you're too heavy!" "Be silent, my noble steed! We must go on to fight the dragon!" she cried, jabbing a hoof out with a ridiculously large newspaper hat on her head. The dragon roared. "Rawr." "That's not a good roar," she said. "Why do I always have to be the dragon?" Thunderlane grumbled. I cracked under pressure, dropping completely, panting, sinking into the cloud floor. Spit poked me a few times with her "sword". "Wanna be pirates instead?" Thunderlane suggested. "Yeah!" Those were the days. Now what had Thunderlane said? Ask Spit out to coffee and take it from there? I reached for the phone, pausing. She probably wouldn't like it if I asked her on a date through phone. Best to see her face to face, right? "Look out, world! Here comes Soarin'!" I struck a pose and ran out the door with a skip.
Friend ZoneBefore we get started, lemme just say that I ripped the title of this off of some stupid book on my shelf. It sounded kinda interesting and didn't make any sense, so I figured it was a good book. Then I remembered that I had to read it in high school and that it sucked major horseapples cause it was about this loser in high school coming of age. I think my title makes much more sense. I was originally gonna call it, The Things I Want by Soarin', but it didn't sound that great. It took me a while to come up with a title before I actually started writing, seeing as you can't start without coming up with a title. I've been writing for a long time. In my head, I mean. Let's just throw this out here now. Girls are dumb. So dumb. Or maybe I was the dumb one, since I couldn't even talk to one of them. Trying to talk to a girl is kinda hard. You gotta act all cool and sound like you're bored even though in your head you're trying to plan out the rest of the conversation and making sure that you don't say something stupid. So pretty much 75% of the time you can't even enjoy the fact that you're talking to a girl because you're so worried about saying something dumb that afterwards, you can't even remember what you were talking about in the first place! Or her name. I'm bad with names. Can't remember any of them. Maybe it's because ponies all have names made up of nouns and verbs and adjectives, and I think pronouns, if I remember anything from high school. My name is easy to remember, since I'm so unforgettable, ha-ha. Soarin'. Just Soarin'. There aren't any other Soarin's in all of Equestria. Now that I think about it, I'm not too sure that's such a good thing. I mean, what if I royally mess up? If somepony asks I can't just play it off like, "Oh, you must be talking about another Soarin' that infiltrated a pie factory and ate all the pies." Did I mention I like pie? I love pie. Almost as much as girls. But you already know that, since I'm so famous. I bet you already know a bunch of things about me. Like how awesome my mane is. So long and silky, flowing in the wind. Spitfire. Stupid, sexy Spitfire. I could write a poem about her, which is weird since I hate poetry. I could go on and on about her voice, which wasn't very girly at all. She didn't have the voice of an angel and couldn't sing for her life, but that didn't matter, 'cause her rough, scratchy voice was enough to make me shiver. Or I could talk about her streaked fiery mane that smelled of cinnamon (no, I don't sniff her hair, you creeps). Those brilliant eyes that hypnotized me, orange and dazzling. Those flanks, oh sweet Celestia, those flanks. Honestly, I think I fly better when I'm positioned behind her, since I pay much more attention to what's in front of me. You've probably guessed that Spitfire is smoking hot. And that I liked her a lot. Yeah, I was trying to think of a more subtle, romantic way of doing it, like talking about how my heart kicked up a notch every time she walked by, or how I'd start talking like a dweeb. I don't pay attention to my heart when the mare of my dreams trots by. That's one thing that bugs me about romance novels. Nopony ever talks like a normal pony! I should probably start this at when this all began, my crush on Spit, I mean, but that'd mean I'd have to go back all the way to when we were foals. Plenty of potential for prequels and sequels to this epic story. So I'm gonna do something with in media res (which is just a fancy way of starting things at the middle) and flashbacks. A cold winter day in Cloudsdale. No sun, only snow-covered clouds, white, wispy, and stretched out, like cotton candy. I think they were called cirrus clouds. Not at all fun to play in. They weren't very bouncy either, like a cumulus. Picture this: a playground built out of clouds on top of a cloud. Pegasi foals flying around and playing. It was cold. Most ponies would be freezing, but we were used to it, us pegasi. And then there's me, playing on the swings, a striped navy blue scarf around my neck, keeping me warm as I swung up and down, kicking my hooves as hard as I could to get higher and higher into the air to experience the sensation of flying for a brief second as I reached the peak before the swings brought me back down. Up and down I swung. My mind was more preoccupied with counting how many more swings before I had to get off. "My turn, Soarin'!" I stuck my tongue out at Thunderlane and jumped off, spreading my wings to float back down. In that moment, I saw her. The new filly in flight school. What was her name again? Right, Spitfire. She was weird, I thought. A bit like Fluttershy (who could hardly fly), except Spitfire could fly. I was just a kid back then. I didn't think too hard about walking over and waving hi. I think I was more worried about catching cooties. "Hi!" Her mane was a disaster. She looked down at her hooves and mumbled, "Hi." Somehow, my brain managed to work out the fact that Spitfire was cold, judging by the way she shivered. I thought it was kind of funny how her name had "fire" in it. "You wanna wear my scarf?" "That's okay," she said. "No, really! Have it!" I thrust it out at her. Spitfire looked at me for a bit. "Won't you be cold?" I was going to be cold. "How about we share it?" She smiled. "Okay." Two foals sitting on a cloud, sharing a single scarf wrapped around their necks. I felt awfully proud of myself, being so nice. She scooted a little closer to me. I think we touched. I got that feeling for the first time. That weird, butterflies-in-your-stomach feeling, which sounds gross, by the way. I felt light. A little jittery. As you can see, we became best friends after that. Friends. Just friends. Friends. It was injustice. A crime against nature. Me, being so handsome! Being so...me! Being friendzoned! I mean, I only asked her out once for prom, so maybe it didn't count. This relationship stuff makes no sense. I mean, just look at me! My glorious mane! My chiseled jaw, these toned muscles! My nice, big wings! I was the pinnacle of pegasi! A specimen of grace and beauty! Okay, that's a bit of a stretch. But my mane! I could have any girl I wanted, but they were just low-hanging fruit. There wasn't even a relationship to be had with those other girls. I think they wanted my body more than me. Or maybe just the fact that I was a Wonderbolt. Enough about the past. The past was stuff in history books and things that weren't happening anymore. All said and done. I wasn't going to worry about things like "what if" and "maybe", since it was totally not my style. Like I said. The present. And in the present, everypony was glaring at me. I couldn't tell, since we all had our goggles on. But just by the way they were standing, I knew they were glaring at me. I'd probably done something wrong. I couldn't exactly remember. I was busy thinking about other things. What to do about life, and love. Somewhere in the middle of my philosophical ramblings while pulling off a stunt, all the other Wonderbolts trailed away from me and landed down on a nice, big cloud. "Soarin', what the hay!" And Spit was mad. You could tell because her eyebrows would get all wonky and then she looked like she was gonna deck me or something. Come to think of it she'd been getting mad a lot lately. Mostly at me. Then I noticed how cute she looked when she was mad. "Soarin', are you even listening?" Smile and nod. I'd probably messed something up during the routine. I was easily distracted. And then that got me thinking about this quote I read a while back. "This is the fifth time you've been out of form!" Hell hath no fury like a mare scorned. "Soarin'? Earth to Soarin'!" "He's prolly thinkin' about pie again, boss." Spitfire sauntered up to me. Was she going to kiss me? Instead, she plucked my goggles from my face, making sure they snapped against my head. "Ow!" I said, rubbing my head. "Did you hear what I said?" she asked. "Uh-huh." "What did I say?" I hated these kind of questions. But I figured I was getting good at answering trick questions. "I'm getting distracted?" "Yes! You can't keep getting distracted! What are you even thinking about anyways?" "Pie," Rapid Fire answered for me, and everypony got a good laugh out of it. And as always, I played dumb. Actually, I was dumb. And pretty funny, I liked to think. That was probably why they kept me around. For my personality. And my flying skills. I shrugged. Spit let out this adorable groan. "Ugggh! Soarin', you're not gonna be on the Wonderbolts much longer if you keep this up!" "Sorry," I apologized. "Don't say sorry. I want to see an improvement." Let's be honest. Nopony in real life ever says sorry the way they do in those cheesy movies and stuff. Nopony ever wants to take the time to sit down and have this long, meaningful discussion about how sorry they are and put on this phony act that'll make anypony roll their eyes. And when ponies do say they're sorry, it's really quick and they probably didn't mean it anyway. "Sorry." "What did I just say? Stop saying sorry." "Sorry!" I watched them all fly off without me. I slumped, and let out a sigh that I'd been ready to let out two weeks ago. Good job Soarin'. Messed up again. You're so good at it. I rubbed under my eyes. Why was I so tired? I wasn't sure when it started. During, or after the Grand Galloping Gala? I was starting to get fed up with it all. We were always doing shows and panels and signing autographs. There was no time to talk anymore, no time to enjoy the bits we made or spend time with each other. Things used to be different, or maybe that was just me making things up in my head. Things used to be fun. It felt like less of a job, and doing something we all loved together as friends. At best, we were just teammates now. I missed that camaraderie. Even during practice we did our own little tricks and got lazy. After practice we'd all get drinks, get dinner, go to nightclubs, hang out. Now it was just practice, practice, practice. It wasn't any fun anymore. Any of it. All of it. Spit and I hadn't had a real conversation in a long time. And every time I invited her for a coffee, or maybe a slice of pie (which I liked to think were dates since it was only us), she'd turn me down. I needed a pie to cheer me up. Thinking back, I'd been eating a lot of pies. Mostly to make me feel better. But maybe one more wouldn't hurt.
Smoke and MirrorsI took my sweet time flying back to the lockers. What I was doing could hardly be called flying. More like crawling on the ground in the air. It was getting dark. I couldn't face them. I think it's weird how the sun and the moon always come up, but you never notice since you're too busy to be paying attention to stuff like that. You blink and all of a sudden the moon is up in the sky and the stars are out. You blink again and it's morning. You got barely any sleep and feel like hay. I took a spot in the cloud stadium for a view of the starry night sky, and I just watched the moon inch its way up while far away in the distance, the sun dipped below the horizon as it set. It's like watching grass grow, or looking back on the years gone by. You never notice until it's too late. And then you start feeling a little depressed and prop an elbow up at your windowpane, staring out and sighing forlornly with music playing in the background pretending you're in a movie. I do that sometimes. I think we look for things to make us sad because nothing makes us sad anymore. What was there to be sad about? And then I remember that I'm Soarin' (still single, by the way! And totally hot). Reality comes crashing down, because then I remember how well off I am, and how many other ponies would do anything to be me. I pulled off the hood of my flight suit, fixing my goggles so that they pulled back my mane. Like that Rainbow Dash. It was hard to forget her. I mean, how could I? She'd saved my pie after all. I stood back up, twisting my back a little. A few flaps of my wings were enough to get me through the underpass beneath all the cloud bleachers. The locker rooms, empty. The lights flickered when I came in, and the only sound of my hooves making soft plods on the cloud floor punctuated the eerie silence. The showers came on. Lukewarm water washed over my body, quickly turning hot. I dunked my head under and closed my eyes. "Race you!" I taunted, running forward for a head start. "Soar-in'!" Spitfire called in a whiny way. "Not everything has to be a race!" "Oh." I slowed down until I was back next to her. "Okay." She stuck her tongue at me. "Race you!" In a fiery streak, she flew off, flapping her wings. "H-hey!" Saturdays were truly something to be treasured. No teachers or parents to stop us from flying too fast. Watch out Cloudsdale, Soarin' and Spitfire were on the loose! The water shut off with a squeak. With a toss of my head I flung off most of the water on my mane and shook myself dry like a dog. The other guys got so mad when I did that, heh. Normally, our manes were all messy and spiky because we spent most of the time flying, so the wind kept it like that. I usually kept mine slicked back, using my Wonderbolts goggles to keep them in place. I decided to keep them dangling around my neck. When I left the stadium, Cloudsdale had gone dark. Well, sort of. Even after the sun went down, the lights came on. Cloudsdale never slept. It was always awake and ponies would still roam the streets to experience the night life. I passed by the weather factory. I could have been one of those poor saps, working in the factory 365 days a year making different kinds of clouds. I shook my head, trying to change the subject in my mind. Clouds were weird. How did they work? Even I had a hard time wrapping my head around it. Pegasi used clouds for almost everything! Our entire city had been built by hoof using clouds. We even used clouds as a nice bed occasionally. We obviously could walk on them, probably something having to do with magic (or how light our bones were), and could even mold them into different things. It's kind of like playing with snow, except it doesn't melt. You could pack it together, or stretch it apart and it'd come apart like cotton candy. I kept my wings spread, riding the current as I banked, taking a different direction. I'd changed my mind. The night was still young. I flew down onto another street and landed, trotting the rest of the way to a sizable cloud house. I rang the doorbell politely. Five seconds later, I rang it again. And again and again and again... "Alright, hold your horses!" The grumpy resident tore the cloud door open and glared. "Oh. It's you." They slammed the door shut. I rolled my eyes, pounding my hoof. Pegasi only knocked to be polite. I could have just have popped my entire body through whenever I felt like it. "Thunderlane," I hollered. "Open up. It's Soarin'." A pitter-patter of hooves. The door came flying open again and I was tackled by a grey blur, landing painfully on my back. Ow. "Uncle Soarin'!" The charcoal Pegasus with the electric-blue mohawk sighed at the doorway. "Rumble, he's not your uncle." "Thunderlane, don't be dumb!" I grinned. "Yeah, Thunderlane, don't be dumb." I glanced down at the small colt, grinning and mussing his mane. "How's it goin', Rumble?" The precocious colt beamed and hugged me tight. I tried to get back up, but Rumble had me pinned. "Rumble, you can let go now." "Uh-uh," he mumbled into my chest, shaking his head. I grabbed him and held up at arm's length. He shot back, clinging to my leg. I sighed, trying to pry him off. He was like cling wrap. I eventually gave up and let him ride on my back. Thunderlane let the both of us in. As usual, their house was a mess. "New interior? Nice." Since pegasi could mold clouds, it was inevitable that they would want to build their own houses and be their own architect. The only problem was that it wasn't regulated, and there was a huge problem with random houses floating all over the place. Nowadays, all you had to do was purchase some property space and build it yourself or hire somepony else to do it. "Nice?" I said, "Yeah. It's, uh, spacious." The entire place was an absolute mess and in disarray. "You didn't come over here to admire my hoofwork," Thunderlane said. "What's up?" We bumped hooves, like colts usually do. "Just came to say hi to Rumble." "Hi, Uncle Soarin'!" Rumble wrapped his hooves around my neck. I smiled. "And I thought I'd just visit you." Thunderlane rolled his eyes. "What gotten you all sentimental?" "Best buds can't hang?" He stared. "You okay?" "Yeah, I'm fine." "What's gotten into you?" "You keep saying that," I said irritably. "Soarin', we can always hang. We're best buds, but..." he trailed off, pointing at a clock, "it's almost nine. What about the Wonderbolts?" I didn't want to talk about the Wonderbolts. "Yeah, yeah, everything's swell. Wonderbolts, practice," I said breezily. "Oh, that reminds me. it's almost nine. Rumble, time for bed." The colt on my back stuck out a tongue. "Make me." "Rumble," Thunderlane said, his tone dangerous. Rumble immediately dashed off upstairs. Thunderlane waited for a few seconds before turning back to me. "You look tired." "I do?" Thunderlane pointed. "Bags under your eyes. You been sleeping?" "I dunno," I said, looking away. "C'mon. I think we still got a pie in the fridge." We trotted into their cramped kitchen. I sat down. Something squeaked underneath my haunches. I pulled the toy out from under me. It was a stuffed toy, more specifically, me in my Wonderbolt suit and goggles. "Hah, Rumble loves that thing. Sleeps with it every night." I smiled. "Gave it to him for his birthday." I slicked my mane back, arching my eyebrows. "I'm pretty handsome." "Oh please." Thunderlane set a plate down in front of me, a slice of apple pie with some whipped cream on top. I blinked a few times, not feeling too hungry. I pushed it away. I swear, his jaw dropped to the floor. "No thanks." "Dude." All of a sudden, Thunderlane was up in my space, touching a hoof to my head. "Are you sick?" "Get offa me!" "Are you dying?" "Thunderlane! I'm fine!" "You don't want pie?" "Nah." "Soarin', be straight wit' me for a sec. What happened?" I sighed and pretended to think it over, looking around. "Spit got mad at me today." "What'd you do?" "I messed up during one of our routines. I got...distracted." "That's it?" He looked relieved. "You still like pie, right?" "Thunderlane!" I snapped, snorting angrily. "I was thinking a lot today, and I thought about you and Cloudchaser. You guys going steady?" "Four months," Thunderlane said proudly, puffing his chest. "She's awesome. Best filly I ever met." Personally, I thought she put on too much makeup. "Congrats," I said glumly. "You have a special somepony." "You don't?" he asked, surprised. Now that was just offensive. "What's that supposed to mean?" "Nothin'. Just surprised is all," Thunderlane stammered. "Why?" "Well, I mean, you're Soarin'." "So?" "You're a Wonderbolt, dude! You should be rollin' in girls!" "I want something more out of a relationship than that," I said. "Well, who do you like?" "I don't like girl." He gave me a questioning look. "Whoa." "Spitfire's the only one I really care about," I said. "Then ask her out." "You make it sound so easy." "It's not that hard. You walk up to her and ask, 'Hey, you wanna go for a cup of coffee', and take it from there." "But what if she doesn't feel the same way?" "Whoa, whoa. Slow down. I said ask her out to a cup of coffee, not asking her to be your girlfriend. Those are two completely different things." "Ahhhh," I said, waving a hoof, "she always says she's busy." He gave me a look. "How long have you been crushing her?" "I don't know," I said hastily. "Depends at how you look at things." I tried not to look at things. "Since last week, or maybe since flight camp," I admitted. "That's...not healthy." "Shut up." Thunderlane socked me. "You should be out there, looking for somepony who really likes you." "That narrows it down a bit." "That's the point of this game, Soarin'." "What game?" "You know. The game. Trying to find that special somepony." "Did I lose the game?" "You only lose when you want to," Thunderlane said wistfully. Pause. Our eyes locked. We stared. "Whoooooooooa," we both intoned together. "Deep," I added. "Well, night." . "You should move on, Soarin'." "Some help you are," I said, jumping off the chair. So in the end, I got my best friend from flight camp lecturing me on how relationships worked. I didn't know why I came there in the first place. Ponies go to their best friends to hear what they want to hear, and I didn't like what I heard. I landed on the balcony of my penthouse, sighing. I propped an elbow up on the edge, studying Canterlot from my view. A penthouse was already too much. In my high school days all I ever wanted was that dream that every other pony thought they wanted. The fast life, the party scene. I got my penthouse, and the parties were fun at first. Now I just had a pool and concierge service I rarely used. Most of the other Wonderbolts had multiple penthouses, sometimes in other cities. Sometimes they'd even pay rent even though they hadn't been back in years. Some had vacation home in Canterlot, or even in Manehattan or whatever. Maybe a ranch in Ponyville, just because it looked nice. Huge mansions the size of castles. I didn't see the point. They had to spend even more money to fill the place up with junk just so that it wouldn't look so empty, spend money on giant parties with thousands of ponies just to make it feel alive. Big places made me feel...lonely. Lonlier than I already was. Isn't it funny, how you can be surrounded by your teammates and ponies who act like they like you, but they're never there? Thunderlane, now he was my best friend. Spitfire, she was too. I wanted it to be more. I slid the glass door open. It was still the same. Nice, clean, and if you looked carefully, you could even see the white cloud floor. A mess. It looked like a tornado had raged through the apartment. "Just the way I like it," I said sarcastically. I never got around to cleaning it. A pizza box on the coffee table, some of my Wonderbolts uniforms on the floor. The counter top of the kitchen was a cluttered mess, much like the rest of the place. It was an apartment, but bigger. Mine was styled really simple. They had all kinds of interior styles you could pick from, and you could have someone come over and remold your home. I kept mine really simple. "Real cozy." I popped open the fridge. Nothing. I wasn't hungry anyway. The last thing I remember doing was just flopping onto my cloud bed. I had a headache.
Hot MailThat sickeningly sweet, bubbly voice. There was only one pony I knew that practically radiated sugar in her voice besides that baker in Ponyville who I get all my pies from. "Derpy Hooves?" "Hiya, Soarin'!" The Pegasus poked her head in. "Wow. Nice place." I rubbed my eyes. "Uh, thanks." "So anyways, do you want your mail?" "Uh, yeah, sure. Sure." I blinked. "Wait, WAIT, NO NO—" A torrent of fan mail flooded the entire room. I howled, sticking a hoof up in the sea of paper, practically drowning. "Don't worry, Soarin'! I'll save you!" In the process of trying to dig my way out of the fan mail, a hoof dragged me out. I gasped for air, filling my lungs were desperation, coughing. I hacked up something terrible. "Soarin'?" I wheezed and coughed, struggling for air. "Oh no! You're choking!" And of course, I was trying to say, "I'm not choking!" Except I think I actually was choking on something. Maybe I'd swallowed a letter. "Don't worry! I know CPR!" "CPR?" I coughed, except it came out like, "BLAGARAGHAH", on account of me choking. I figured that Derpy was at the very least, going to try and help me breathe. If she was going to lock lips with me, I would try and at least enjoy it OW! "BREATHE!" Derpy screamed, pounding my chest. "BREATHE, I SAY!" For the love of all that is holy, she really knew how to punch. I was 120% sure that you weren't supposed to punch a pony in the gut if they were suffocating, but hey, might as well go with the flo—ARGH! MY LIVER! And then, I felt something soft on my lips. She was trying to help me breathe. It wasn't quite as glamorous as in the movies, on account of all the saliva. I took a huge gasp and hacked up a stamp. "Thanks, Derp—mmgh!" She was still trying to help me breathe. Or was she trying to kiss me? My mind was still groggy from having just woken up and the lack of oxygen to my brain, but I was pretty sure that you didn't use tongue in CPR. I didn't really mind. I think she just stole my first kiss. Kisses on the cheek definitely don't count. I couldn't really judge Derpy on her resuscitation (kissing?) abilities, but I would have given her a 10/10. She was really getting into it. Not that I was complaining. Derpy was smothering me with her lips. Now I was starting to complain. I gently pushed her off of me, panting, blushing redder than a tomato. She, on the other hoof, looked completely fine. Not fine, like as in, a fine flank. I mean, her flank was very nice, but I didn't look, I swear. You know what I mean! Sure, she looked a bit concerned. "Are you okay?" I nodded, a little dazed, trying to process what had just happened. I could taste...something. I ran my tongue along the inside of my cheek. I could still feel the warmth of her lips on mine. That was definitely a kiss. I think. It wasn't like, mind blowing, like a Sonic Rainboom or anything. It was just...nice. She didn't taste like muffins, surprisingly. I think she brushed her teeth. "Yeah, sure. Thanks Derpy," I said, trying to be cool. "You know, you're supposed to deliver the fan mail to the stadium." "Oh!" Her golden eyes moved slightly. "Whoops." "It's okay." I scratched my head with a hoof. "I thought you worked in Ponyville." "I do!" Derpy chirped, puffing out her chest a little. "But Cloudsdale is short one mailmare, and they said I was just the pony for the job." She paused. "Actually, I think I'm the only pony available, so they didn't have much of a choice." Now it was just plain awkward. We were standing in the middle of a room flooded with letters and we'd just swapped spit. "So," I clucked my tongue, "How are things?" "Good!" she chirped. "It's been a while, huh?" It took me a second, but it clicked in my head that she was talking about flight camp. "Oh! Oh yeah, huh." "How are the Wonderbolts?" "Great," I said without thinking. Things weren't really great, but something weird about ponies is that sometimes they don't really mean what they say. Like, if somepony asks you how you're doing or how things are going, they don't actually want you to tell them. Going through the motions, or something. Imagine if every time you asked a pony, "How's it going?", they actually told you. Derpy was just somepony I knew. We weren't close at all. Not even friends. I rarely ever saw her and the only time I ever heard about her was when she kinda messed things up. Catastrophically. I felt a little bad for her in flight camp, 'cause she got made fun of for her eyes. "I'm gonna go wash up, okay?" I told her. "Just uh, clean up." "Will do!" She saluted. I wasn't sure if I wanted to wash the taste of her out of my mouth. It occurred to me that I couldn't exactly just smooch any hot piece of flank anywhere I went. I mean, I didn't really go about doing that kind of thing anyway. I was trying to save my first one for Spit, but Derpy kinda stole it. If any of the tabloids got this, there could have been some serious consequences. It's not like I was gonna lose my job, but ponies would think we were together. When I came out of the shower all wet and steamy with my mane down, Derpy had finished gathering all the letters. "You sure get a lot of fan mail," she said, not looking at me. When she did see me, her wings popped out and her eyes were wide. I wanted to laugh. Just to tease her, I said, "Hey there, "my eyes half-lidded in the most sexy way I knew. She folded her wings with some difficulty, her face flushed. Did I really look that good when my mane was down? "I-I think I'll go now," Derpy said woozily, dragging the bag of letters behind her. "Um, bye, Soarin'!" "Bye," I said, giving her my best winning hotshot grin. "See you around. We'll talk sometime, huh?" "Um. Um." She bolted in a streak of gold. She probably flew through the floor. I smirked a little, swallowing. Still no trace of muffins on my tongue. I shook my head. "Just a little CPR," I muttered, trying to convince myself. "She was giving me CPR. That was it." Thunderlane's words last night really bugged me. He was basically telling me to forget about Spit and find some other pony. But I couldn't just forget about her! I remembered why I was so distracted yesterday. I was thinking about stuff, but it was also the weekend the next day, so no practice. Could you really blame me for being excited about Saturday? Amidst the chaos known as my flat, I paused in between bites of some pumpkin pie, scanning the room. What kind of stallion did Spit want? After all these years of being close friends, I hardly knew. Did she go for the bad colts? Nice guys? I was a nice guy, I think. Why do people always say that nice guys finish last? Well, in any case, I figured she wanted a guy with a clean house. With that, I resolved to begin cleaning up, starting with all the junk on the floor. I mean, it wasn't that bad. Some books on the floor here and there, scattered everywhere. Those went back on my dusty bookshelf in the back of my room. Some takeout and pizza boxes went into the trash, and my Wonderbolts suits went up on a coat hanger. I surveyed my hard work, biting my lip. It looked more or less the same. I sat down, picking up a newspaper, remembering a fond memory. It wasn't what was on the newspaper that got me. "Tally ho, Soarin', away!" I wheezed, carrying the heavy, squirming yellow filly on my back. "Spit, you're too heavy!" "Be silent, my noble steed! We must go on to fight the dragon!" she cried, jabbing a hoof out with a ridiculously large newspaper hat on her head. The dragon roared. "Rawr." "That's not a good roar," she said. "Why do I always have to be the dragon?" Thunderlane grumbled. I cracked under pressure, dropping completely, panting, sinking into the cloud floor. Spit poked me a few times with her "sword". "Wanna be pirates instead?" Thunderlane suggested. "Yeah!" Those were the days. Now what had Thunderlane said? Ask Spit out to coffee and take it from there? I reached for the phone, pausing. She probably wouldn't like it if I asked her on a date through phone. Best to see her face to face, right? "Look out, world! Here comes Soarin'!" I struck a pose and ran out the door with a skip.
