Strawberry Lemonade Meets the Love of his Life
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Chapter ONE!~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Embarrassing Introductions
to the love of his life
"Have a nice day!" said Strawberry Lemonade, as one of his most common customers, a dragon-colt hybrid named "Short Circuit" walked off with a nice cool glass of the towns most popular drink. Sitting down with a loud sigh, Lemonade started to count his earnings for the day. "Two, four, six, eight..." When all of a sudden, a gust of wind almost blew all the money away, forcing him to have to do a recount. He looked up in annoyance, and spotted the culprit, a light-pink pegasus whom he'd never seen before. She had a sun with an overlaying lightning-bolt as a cutie mark, he wasn't sure what it meant, but that was the last thing on his mind at the moment, because he found her surprisingly cute. When she had landed and walked up, Lemonade decided to initiate conversation.
"Afternoon miss, and welcome to my humble lemonade booth!" Said Lemonade
"Hello, I'd like one lemonade please, I heard your lemonade is the best in all of Ponyville. By the way, my name's Sunstorm, whats yours?" She responded.
"Coming right up!" said lemonade, who was happy to have yet another customer. "I'm Strawberry Lemonade... Y'know, I haven't seen you around town before, are you new to Ponyville?"
"That's right! I just recently moved here. Came from Fillydelphia, but... I didn't like the big city, so I came here!"
"Oh wow... Fillydelphia? That's quite the distance..." He said, a little shocked from how far away Sunstorm had moved from home. "Did you move here by yourself?"
"Yeah! All on my own. Moved away from my parents. Wanted a bit more freedom in the skies."
"Oh my! That's mighty impressive!" Lemonade responded, more than just 'a little' shocked.
Sunstorm giggled. The sound was comparable to the sweetness of his lemonade, and he relished in it, albeit the embarrassment when he realized that he was the reason she giggled.
"Whats so funny?" He asked, cheeks slowly heating up and turning bright red.
She giggled harder. Lemonade lowered his head in a bout of comedic shame
"Seriously" he said, with a bowed head. "Whats so funny..."
She stopped giggling once he lowered his head and said "Oh don't worry, I just thought it was funny when you were so surprised that I moved on my own. And even more so when you started blushing because I was giggling at you. It was kinda cute, actually!"
His now normal yellow cheeks instantly flared up again once he heard her call him cute. He diddn't know whether she was trying to embarrass him, hit on him, or that's just how she was. All the same, he thought that he wouldn't mind so much if she became a normal customer...
"So... Lemonade?" she asked.
That's right! The lemonade! He had forgotten completely! "Sorry" he muttered and started preparing it for her in an instant "Coming right up!" In a flash, he had gotten out a glass and poured her some of the Strawberry Lemonade that everypony in Ponyville loved. She swiped it up and drank it all down faster than you could say 'delicious'
"That was delicious!" Sunstorm said with a loud sigh.
For some reason, when she said that Lemonade got really, REALLY happy. He was happy because she liked it. This cheery, funny, and just a little bit stunning Pegasus liked his lemonade. Not just ANY-PONIES lemonade, his.
He had no idea why that made him so happy, but it, sure as the cutie-mark on his flank, did.
After a little bit of smalltalk, Lemonade found out that Sunstorm is actually a Clydesdale, which explains how she could move everything on her own, and explains why she made such a large gust when landing. She has no mother, just a father, who wanted her to be an actress, when in actuality, she's a gear head. She loves tinkering, and is currently working on robotic wings for the wingless who want wings, but its not going anywhere yet. Eventually, she flew off, saying she'd come back for more of his delicious lemonade. He felt rather dark inside, like she lit him up like the sun. He liked the feeling she gave him. He couldn't wait to see her again.
Lets make Strawberry Lemonade!
Strawberry lemonade woke up feeling great. He's getting a new batch of strawberries today, so that means its the best time to make more lemonade. He sat up, got out of bed and went to the bathroom. He had planned on brushing his teeth, but, before he could start, he heard a knocking.
"Who is it?" called Lemonade
"Package for a Mr. Lemonade..?" Said a half-muffled female voice
"My delivery!" thought Lemonade as he rushed to the door, but who was on the other end was not to be expected. He opened the door, and, having just woken up, he put on the biggest smile he could muster, but, it stopped abruptly when he saw who it was. Sunstorm was standing at his door with the package. Instantaneously, he woke right up and felt as if he'd been up for at least an hour. Then he got self conscious, and regretted not brushing his teeth.
He asked, with a light, but surprised tone "Sunstorm? Why are you my delivery girl? It's normally Derpy who delivers to this part of town, isn't it?"
"Normally, yeah, but Derpy went to the eye doctor and now she can't see at all, much less accurately deliver packages to someones door. Especially ones of this size."
On Sunstorms back was a rather large package, probably full of berries. It was surprising, the size of the package, normally its much smaller because he gets them from the leftovers his family doesn't sell.
"Must not have had a good year..." Lemonade muttered under his breath
"What was that?" Asked Sunstorm.
"Oh, I was just wondering why the package was so big, normally it's a lot smaller because it's the leftovers from my families berry booth. They must not have had a good year." He answered "But, back to the original question, how come you're delivering packages?"
"Oh! It's my job now! I was out on the town before I came to your booth searching for jobs, it's not like I can live for free, y'know?"
"Really? Well, it fits you, considering you can easily lift heavy packages like this one, and do it while flying!"
Sunstorm giggled because of his compliment. He couldn't help but smile even more. Then, she adjusted the package and he realized he'd been talking to her while she has around 50 pounds on her back.
"Oh! I'm sorry! Here, let me take that" Using his magic, Strawberry Lemonade lifted the box and set it down inside the door. "Do you have anything for me to sign?"
Uh... Oh! Yes I do! Here ya go!" Sunstorm held out a small clipboard with a paper and pen attached and pointed to a line on it "Sign here please"
"Not a problem." Lemonade swiftly signed the paper and put the pen down. As Sunstorm turned to leave, he stopped her.
"Wait, I have something to ask you!" He hurriedly said
Sunstorm turned around, a bit curious on what he wanted to say. "Oh yeah? Whatcha need?"
"I was wondering if you wanted to stick around for a bit and help me make this lemonade, if, y'know, that's not a problem..." He cautiously said.
"Uh... Well, that WAS my last delivery for the day... But, I still have to turn the uniform in and-"
"Its fine if you can't." Lemonade interjected
"No, Let me think here... Okay, I'm going to go back, drop of the uniform, and come right over, alright?" She said.
"That's fine with me!" Said a now very excited Lemonade. "while your gone, I'll unpack the berries."
"Alright! See you then!"
Then she flew off. He didn't know why, but he really liked that pony. She's just so fun to be with. He couldn't get over her, and now, he's having her come over! Lemonade couldn't be more pleased. He began to unpack the berries and, halfway through unpacking, remembered that he hadn't brushed his teeth. Hurriedly, his teeth were brushed and he was back to unpacking. Once he had finished, he took the box outside to throw it away when he saw Sunstorm descending without her delivery-girl uniform on. Perfect timing.
"Ahh! Sunstorm! Perfect timing, I just finished unpacking" He said as he threw away the box the berries came in
"Oh! That's good! So, what'd you need my help with?" She pondered
"Nothing in particular, I just wanted some company to make all that lemonade. There's quite a few berries in there, here, follow me." As he said this, he opened the door and led Sunstorm into his house.
Lemonade's house is quaint. A one bedroom, one bath, living room and kitchen house with pink wallpaper everywhere.
He lead her into his kitchen, where he had the mass of berries on the counter in a big'ol bowl.
"Wow, that IS a lot of berries, isn't it..?" Said Sunstorm
"Mmhm..." Responded Lemonade "And, we're going to make it ALL into lemonade."
"What?! All of it? Do you really sell that fast?!" She asked, noticeably surprised.
"No, I freeze a lot of it. Easier to get out a jar each night for a year rather than make a new one per night, right?" He answered.
"Ahh, that makes sense. Well, lets get to work, shall we?"
"Yeah, lets!"
They began by moving all the berries again. This time into a large barrel-like basin, where Sunstorm jumped in and began crushing the berries. Lemonade didn't jump in with her, no matter how much he had wanted to, because he had to squeeze lemons. They set to work. When they were getting close to done, some juice from the lemons squirted off and hit Sunstorm right on the wing.
"Oh! Did you mean to hit my wing?" she asked, sounding feisty
"What? What do you mean?" He turned to look at her, genuinely confused.
In response, she took her berry-soaked hoof and planted it square on his face.
"That should make us even!" and she began giggling. Lemonade couldn't help but laugh and decided to squirt her with more lemon juice.
"Ahh! Stop it!" Surprised, she turned away "That's not fair!"
Suddenly, she grabbed Lemonade and pulled him headfirst into the berry-pit.
"Ack-" and he plunged in. When he sat up, he was entirely red, and decided to trip the now heartily laughing Sunstorm so she fell in with him, splashing himself even more red in the process. She sat up with one ear down, the other up, and one eye closed with a hoof rubbing the back of her head. It was the cutest pose he had ever seen in all of everything that could ever be a something in ever. At that moment, he almost broke and admitted his feelings, but, his modesty got the better of him and all he could do was realize he loved her, and stutter out a question...
"H-h-hey... D-d'you wanna... May-be... H-hang out s-some-sometime?"
"That would be great!" She responded, still rubbing the back of her head.
"Oh, did I make you hit your head? I'm sorry! Here, let me help."
"No, no, it's fine. It just surprised me a little, I'm not bleeding or anything" She reassured him.
Lemonade let out a sigh of relief "Don't want to be hurting your crush, right after you get a date, do you?" He thought to himself. "Well, we better finish and get cleaned up." Proclaimed Lemonade.
They got back to work, Sunstorm still occasionally giggling over what happened, and the fact that they were both entirely red. But they finished shortly after. Lemonade offered Sunstorm his shower, so she didn't fly home sticky, but, she blushed at the offer and kindly said she preferred the one at her place. He didn't notice the blush under all the red juice, saw her off, and went to shower himself.
