The Broken House

He needed to open her door.

He'd run out of usable dust masks and his allergies had come back in force. The medicine hadn't helped, and the doctor had told him to come back by now if it wasn't working - but at the same time he hadn't been entirely truthful about how much mold he was exposing himself to. So, he hadn't gone back to the hospital. Instead, he'd spent the day stewing with his running nose and burning eyes, once again not making any progress on the hundreds of things he needed to get done before the architects came by on Monday.

The furniture in the rooms surrounding the water damaged areas of the house had to be analyzed and thrown out if necessary. He had half a mind to completely trash all the furniture not nailed down, but figured it would be a poor financial decision to not at least try and save a few pieces. He had to go and put the furniture out by the road and then call a garbage disposal truck to come and pick it up, and move the pieces he wasn't throwing away to some other part of the house so that they would be out of the way of the workers. Then, he probably had to see how long he'd need to spend in the travel inn in Ponyville as his house was made uninhabitable by the works.

The water damage from the roof leak lead straight up from the ground floor, into the second floor, and then up to the attic. One side of the damaged wall faced her old game room. The other side... faced inwards. To her room. They would need to go inside. They would see her room. He couldn't... let that happen, both for the sake of needing to move the furniture out, and for... her sake.

He squeezed his eyes shut, his eyelids forcing hot, bitter tears out and down his cheeks. As he opened them again, he no longer saw the chipped, flawed wallpaper. The knob was not coated in a thick layer of dust. The world seemed brighter, more whole. The home was intact. The door opened on its own.

"Why are you here, Lancer?" she asked, standing in the doorframe. She looked at him with that slightly amused smile. There was no judgement in her eyes as she looked into his.

"I don't know," Lancer responded, folding his forelegs as he leaned back on the opposite wall, "To fix your house, I guess."

"You really don't seem to want to fix it," Starlit Beacon observed, leaning out from the door and turning her head down the stairs. Outside of the range of the yellow sunlight pouring from the door, the house was dank, grey, and dirty, "You're happy the way you are, aren't you?"

"No?" Lancer huffed indignantly, "What makes you think that, stinkmare?"

Starlit did not react to the name-calling, and instead frowned, "Lancer. I'm dead. And you weren't even there, when I needed you the most."

The sun dwindled, becoming bright and harsh. The buzzing of fluorescent lights came from somewhere. Behind Starlit, Lancer could see a hospital bed. Her cheeks sunk, her eyes grew hollow. Still, she looked at him, concerned.

"I..." Lancer could hardly find the words, and brought a hoof up to an eye as tears ran anew, "I wanted to be. I wanted to be there for you so bad... I didn't know..."

"Maybe you did," Starlit said, voice somber, "It's too late now, you realize that, right?"

Lancer broke down into a fit of sobs. The fluorescent lights shone down on him from behind the mare. She was a mere shadow now, the lights far too bright to make her out through the halo. The buzz grew louder and louder in his ears.

The shadow spoke, "Why are you here, Lancer? Why didn't you bulldoze this place? Why are you letting me rot, Lancer?"

"I'm not!" Lancer cried, raising his other hoof to block his other eye as the lights grew brighter and brighter, until they even seemed to shine straight through his flesh, "I'm not!" he cried in retort, "I'm going to fix it! I won't let you down again! I won't forget about you again!" he screamed.

Glass cracked. The lights flicked off. He slowly lowered his hooves. The shadow was gone. The lights were gone. The bed was gone. The mid-afternoon sun shone through a window on the other side of the opened door. The wind blew through the decaying house, carrying with it the apparition's final words.

"Then you will rot with me."

There was a bed, stripped of its sheets. There was a windowsill, with a wooden carved doll sitting on it. The glass of the window itself was still only half-cleaned, he simply couldn't bring himself to finish it the day prior. There was a writing desk, with a dried inkpot and a paper still on it. There was a bookshelf, filled with all of her favorites and textbooks, sitting right next to a bubbling, ugly, damaged section of wall. There was a wastebasket, still filled with a two year old Hay Burger's wrapper, as well as several clippings. He remembered her eating less and less of her usual, whole meals near the end. What was the point? She may as well live a little, in the face of... everything. He'd never left the phase of eating the same way.

He walked into the room, almost in a trance. There was complete silence as his hooves clonked across the creaky floorboards. The room was a time capsule. An unopened relic from the past. He took a long, hitching breath as he stood in the center of the room, slowly turning in a tight circle to take it all in.

The writing desk caught his gaze. First, it was the framed photograph sitting underneath one of its upper shelves, shielded from a lot of the falling dust. It was the two of them on the Idol of Boreas Adventure Ride at a park in Las Pegasus. He could still hear their half-terrified, half-joyous screams as they came down the final plunge after the winding ride through a tunnel shaped like an ancient temple. She had said raved about how cool it was, he vomited as soon as he was off the ride.

His eyes drifted to the page left on the table. Her beautiful calligraphy was plastered all over it, although obscured by years of dust. He could make out that it was addressed to him. Delicately, he brushed the paper off, reading it on the desk.

Dear Midnight Lancer, my shooting star

I am writing this just in case. Today I leave Ponyville to go in for preparative operations for the surgery. I am... honestly not sure if I'll ever be back, and that terrifies me. I know you don't want to talk about what happens if I don't make it. To be fair, I don't want to either, which is why I'm writing about it instead I guess. If you are reading this letter, it's because I didn't come home to trash it. It's because you're probably cleaning up this place to sell it, and you've found it wherever I ended up putting it.

Midnight Lancer, you are... or rather, were, the love of my life. Ever since the first day we met, I have felt a happiness I could get from nothing else, and I feel that you have experienced a similar thing. Ever since, all I've ever wanted for you was for you to be happy. I thought I could provide that, that we could grow old together and have as much happiness as possible. Yet, I think that the largest regret I will have on my deathbed is the grief I will leave behind.

I have one dying request, Lancer. I'll try and remember to tell you this once we meet at the hospital, but I'll restate it here in case it was lost in the commotion: I want you to be happy again. I'll have all the time in the universe to grieve my own death in the afterlife. The last thing I want is to look down and see you grieving about me with me. I understand you will mourn. Maybe for a month, maybe for years. That's okay, it's natural to do that. But, whatever you do, don't let that mourning be forever, for my sake. Learn to let me go, and I'll be happy.

Your shining beacon, forever and ever, Starlit Beacon.

Lancer stared at the paper. Over and over again, he scanned the writing. Her final message... missed twice. Once at the hospital. Twice at the house. All because he wasn't enough of a stallion to open a damn door.

His anger at himself faded into choked sobs as he lowered the page, quickly flinging a hoof to his eyes as a new flood of tears apparated forth. He now sat on the side of her bed, the only thing behind him that he could collapse onto that was softer than the floor. Wasteful. That was all he ever was.

He had thrown away the days he had with her. He had put off the time to buy a ring. He had waited on the end of his expedition to rush to Manehatten on the operation day. He had let her home go to waste. He had let everything good she had ever given him go to waste. He couldn't even mow his own lawn until two weeks had passed. Starlit had even wasted her final few moments of freedom, outside of the walls of the hospital, just trying to give him her last message. It was too late for it to matter now. The house had rotted away, collapsed. He could never be as happy as he was with her again. What was even the point anymore?

Rain began to patter on the window. His red, bloodshot eyes travelled to it. Rainclouds had rolled in over the fields over the last two hours he had spent in the bedroom. The smeared dirt on the outside had been half-cleaned by Cheerilee. The raindrops ran furrows of clean, clear glass down the other side of the window. He was dry and warm, even as the winds howled outside and the rainstorm kicked up.

Another few months of wind and rain, and these beams might give out on you and the whole roof'll cave in.

Despite everything, the house still stood. The pipe out back was fixed. The gate worked. The door latched. The windows were clean. The lights turned on. The architects could... fix the place.

Lancer looked down at the paper, reading the second to last sentence one more time. He knew what he had to do.

The pouring rain beat down on him as he walked down the patio stairs and to the side yard. The rain was coming sideways, and tapered off significantly as the house provided cover. Reaching down, he opened the cellar doors, holding the paper and an envelope, taken from a stack of empty ones in the writing desk. Down below, all the drawers were still open. Two years of correspondence, packed right to the cold, hard end of the basement.

Slowly, he opened the first drawer. The carbon copy of her final letter. In front of it, there was one more space. Falling to his haunches, he grabbed the envelope and paper from under his wing. He read her message one last time, before folding it over delicately. Placing it into the envelope, he slotted it gently into the last remaining space.

Calmly, he walked past the cabinets. One by one, he pushed them closed. Her diagnosis. Her final year of college. His entrance into guard academy. Her random facts about the weather. His recountings of his O&O sessions. Their third date.

Finally, he stopped at the final cabinet, tipped over onto its front. Heaving against it, he straightened it up. One of the drawers clanked and clanged as it was opened by gravity during the move. His eyes were drawn to her first ever letter.

"Just cause I'm far away doesn't mean there's anything less between us. No matter the distance, we'll always be together. Doesn't matter if I'm in Vanhoover, Olenia, or Griffonia. I'm just a letter away."

He bit his lip, tears running from his eyes. Her first and final message. He closed both with the slam of one last drawer.

Cheerilee sighed as she evened out her stack of papers. Feeding the loop of her binder through the notepaper, she snapped it shut with a clack and shoved the whole stack into her bag. As she stood, she slung her bag over her shoulder and walked for the front door of Ponyville Schoolhouse. From a cabinet by the door, she retrieved her set of keys before she closed the lid and reset the combination.

The lock slid shut on the front door as a cool breeze washed over the schoolyard. The bell on the top of the building clanked softly as it was blown around, mixing with the sounds of the few foals who hadn't immediately run off to go home or play. She managed a smile as a pair of foals playing on the seesaw waved at her, wishing her a, "Good afternoon, Miss Cheerilee!"

Adjusting her mail bag, Cheerilee sighed as she began her walk back home. Her mind was filled with thoughts of work as her hooves ran on autopilot. Methodically, she filed away all the information from the long day of classes. There was the quiz coming up on Friday that she needed to prepare for, a new janitor she needed to hire before the schoolhouse got dirty enough to get infested with something...

Cheerilee was so wrapped up in her own head, walking through extremely familiar surroundings, that she didn't see the pony landing in front of her until she nearly ran face-first into him.

Her and the stallion shared a frightened yelp as they leapt back from each other. Holding a hoof to her thundering heart, Cheerilee recognized her neighbor easily, "Mr. Lancer! You gave me a fright!"

Midnight Lancer, nose red with irritation but otherwise looking unusually clean, gave her an awkward smile, "S-Sorry! I did call out to you."

"Oh," Cheerilee adjusted the strap of her bag, "Sorry, had my mind on work."

"Yeah? Uh, was it... good?" Lancer's smile failed to relax.

"It was... busy?" Cheerilee raised an eyebrow. She wasn't sure what else work could be.

"Well, uh, better than... not-busy work, right?" he nodded.

"I suppose so," she blinked.

Stomping a hoof, Lancer turned around and grabbed a box from his back. The pink, frosting-pattern cardboard immediately betrayed its origin from Sugarcube Corner as he held it out towards her. Through the see-through plastic window at the top, Cheerilee could see two-dozen baked treats. One of them, a normal glazed donut, had a bite taken out of it, "I uh, I wanted to return some of the kindness you've been showing me since I moved in. So, I, uh, bought you some donuts!" his smile somehow grew even more tense, "I didn't know what kind of donut you liked, so I bought, um, all of them..." he licked some frosting from his lips.

Cheerilee burst out laughing.

Lancer's ears drooped as his smile fell, "Uhm..."

Noticing his distress, Cheerilee tried her best to reign in her outburst, drawing back into giggles as she reached out and took the box, "That's - hehe - very nice of you, Mr. Lancer."

He relaxed a bit as he watched Cheerilee's fit die down and as she took the box, "Well, uh, I guess I'll... go then?"

"We're both heading in the same direction," Cheerilee smiled warmly, "If you don't mind slowing yourself down for a ground-pony."

"Oh, but, uh, I'm staying at the- uh," Lancer blinked, realizing what she was offering, "...Nevermind. No, no problem."

Turning and walking down the path, Cheerilee continued on her way. Lancer, hesitating only a moment longer, jogged to catch back up to her. The four-o-clock sun was unusually cold in the sky that day, and the wind was getting a hint of a bitter edge. Summer was ending just as scheduled. Then, it would be autumn, and Equestria would be preparing to give the world a break as winter set in.

"You seem nervous," Cheerilee looked towards him, deciding not to beat around the bush.

"Oh, yeah, uh..." Lancer looked away, avoiding eye contact, "I dunno. Just, kinda tense I guess?"

"What about?" she pressed.

"The, uh, house," he simply said.

Nodding, she moved the topic ever so slightly, "How is the house, anyway? You said contractors were coming today to start clearing out the mold and stuff?"

"Yeah, uh. I had to move some furniture yesterday," by recounting things that were procedural, Lancer seemed to relax, much to the relief of Cheerilee, "Got rid of a bunch of broken furniture and had it moved to the landfill."

"Mhm..." She nodded, "So do you need to move out until they're done?"

"Yeah, I'm gonna be staying in the boarding house in town, probably for the entirety of next month until they're done," Lancer sighed, "It's expensive, but hopefully it'll be worth it."

"If you're living in the boarding house, why are we walking to your home, then?" Cheerilee chuckled softly.

"Erm... you asked to walk..." Lancer mumbled.

"I suppose I did," she sighed. After a moment, she changed the subject, "Would I be prying if I asked how much the contractors are charging for the repair?"

"Nah," he shook his head, "Six thousand bits. Really cheap considering the amount of damage."

"Six thousand?" Cheerilee frowned, "That's less than a quarter what you'd probably sell the house for, if it was fully repaired. Sounds too good to be true."

"The contractor's a local pony. He said me moving in and becoming 'part of the community' was enough motivation to not kill me with the bill," he shrugged, "I'm not loaded, so I didn't pry into it too much."

Cheerilee clicked her tongue, "Tsch. That's Ponyvillian generosity for you. I swear, I could never find ponies like the ones I find around here when I moved to Filly for university."

"Can't find 'em in Canterlot either," Lancer admitted, looking up at the sky as clouds scrolled overhead.

They continued in silence for a while, eventually taking a branching path off between a dairy ranch and a cornfield down towards the outskirts where she lived. The road turned from packed gravel to dirt beneath them and they deviated to the far left of the path to avoid the deep, uneven wheel-ruts in the center. The scent of fertilizer grew thick in the air as wind washed down from the farms and across the road.

"What's it like being a guard?" Cheerilee raised the conversation again.

"A lot more boring than the movies make out, I'll tell you that," Lancer frowned, "Especially in Canterlot. Not a lot happens up there. Maybe sometimes you're lucky enough to eavesdrop on some gossip about the aristocracy, but it's mostly just standing in empty hallways staring blankly at walls."

"You'd say you're more the action-seeking type?"

"Eh, I was when I joined up. Eventually started to just see it as a job, gonna be honest," he admitted, head drooping slightly.

Cheerilee adjusted the strap of her bag idly as she looked over at him, "Generous amount of leave time, though, if they're allowing you to vacation long enough to see this house rebuilt."

"Yeah..." Lancer trailed off, avoiding her gaze and biting his lip.

Tilting her head, Cheerilee asked softly, "Is something wrong?"

Lancer took a deep breath, before meeting her gaze at last. His blue eyes hesitated as he grimaced slightly. Without realizing it, he stopped, Cheerilee only taking a few extra steps before stopping as well and turning around.

"Lancer?" she frowned, staring at him, "If you don't wanna talk, that's fine with me."

Lancer shook his head, "No, uh, it's fine. I should just be honest with you," another deep breath, and he continued, "Did you know the... previous homeowner?"

She shook her head, "No. She was around while I was still in Filly, getting my degree. I've heard of her, though."

"Her name was Starlit Beacon. She was... she was my special somepony," Lancer grimaced, rocking back and forth on his hooves.

Nodding slowly, Cheerilee looked behind her. Between the ditch and the fence surrounding the cornfield, there was a grassy slope, long enough to sit on comfortably. Stepping over to it, she sat down and gave a nod towards the patch next to her.

Sitting down, Lancer folded his forelegs and looked up at the sky, seemingly building the courage to continue, "She, uh, died. Four years ago now. Left me the house. I never... never had the courage to come and maintain it, cause all of her stuff was in there..."

She nodded slowly. She had a sneaking suspicion, and it explained why the house was never put up for sale.

"We were gonna live our lives together in that house, you see," Lancer looked down, reaching out and poking a random dandelion with a forehoof, still avoiding her gaze, "I really... really couldn't bring myself to come back to Ponyville. Couldn't bring myself to bulldoze the house and sell off the land. Now, it's all disgusting and broken down... It all just really reminded me of everything that I lost. Everything that could've been," he let out a long, quivering breath as he reached up and mussed through his mane. After a moment, he continued, "She left me a message. One that I never read, cause I never came home to see it. Gave me new perspectives on things..."

Finally, he looked over at Cheerilee, "If it weren't for you and Carrot Top, and I guess that Pinkie Pie pony as well, I'd have never seen it. I would've just stayed locked up in the house forever. Probably have just left once my vacation was up, or... something else. I was having pretty bad thoughts too, not going to lie," holding up a hoof and looking away again, he quickly added, "D-Don't worry. On Sunday I went to go talk to psychiatrist, dumped all of this on her. I'm feeling... better now. Still, if you hadn't come... even just giving me that house plant. That was... it's basically the only thing in my house that had color under all the dust. "

Cheerilee frowned, a few tears coming to her eye as she reached over and placed her hoof on his, "Thanks for telling me, Lancer."

"Mmh..." Lancer slouched slightly, looking down at the hoof, before back up at the sky, "Thanks for being there. I really didn't deserve the amount of kindness you showed."

Giving his hoof a small squeeze, she removed hers and followed his gaze up towards the sky. Leaning backwards and using her forelegs to support her, she asked, "So, what's your plan moving forward?"

Frowning, he answered, "I was given six months of mental health leave. Even though I wouldn't feel right living in the house without her, I want to fix it up. Repaint it, refurnish it, fix the fences and utilities... maybe then keep it on as a vacation home or something. I dunno. Not going to be doing anything more fulfilling with my money."

With a nod, Cheerilee got up from the grassy knoll, holding out a hoof to help him up, "Seems like a good enough plan."

"Thanks, I guess," Lancer shrugged as he took her hoof and got up. Together, they stepped over the ditch and began to walk down the road again.

They began to near Cheerilee's turnoff. Walking at a slower pace with Lancer by her side, with the pause in the middle, the walk had taken nearly twice as long as it usually did. The sun was beginning to drift towards the horizon and pink rays shone over Ponyville and the surrounding countryside. Turning around at the corner, Cheerilee gave Lancer a warm smile.

"Thanks for the company, Mr. Lancer," she intoned politely.

"Thanks for all the help," Lancer returned the smile, the expression's authenticity being almost... rare on the stallion's face.

Adjusting the strap of her bag once again, Cheerilee hesitated before leaning forward and asking, "I'd like to keep up with you while you're staying in town. You mind if we got coffee on the weekends, or... something?"

Lancer blinked slowly. Was she... coming onto him? No, surely not. She was just trying to be friendly, and he had to admit he needed a friend or two at this point. With a nod he answered, "I'd like that."

She gave him a wave, "I'll try and meet you in town on Saturday, then! Have a good week, Mr. Lancer!"

"Yeah, you too..." Lancer watched her leave. Only once she was out of sight, did he turn and take flight towards the town center.