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The School Dance

The next morning on the way to school, Mom rambled on about how she was excited for me to go to the dance today. I was excited too, but also nervous.

What if no pony wants to dance with me? Or what if I had a meltdown would the other students be scared of me because I was shouting and screaming? What would Miss Horse Apple say? Those were just some of the thoughts that swelled around in my brain as we flew to school.

When we landed, I was greeted by my teacher who had a wide grin on her face as she led me inside and led me down the hall to our classroom. As we entered the classroom, the other students turned and looked at me. I saw one of my best friends, just staring at me as though she saw me for the first time.

Miss Horse Apple showed me to my desk, which was next to my best friend who was a green unicorn Colt with a wild red mane with blue eyes, and a baseball bat as a cutie mark.

“Ok, you guys, today, we are going to talk about the school dance!” She smiled softly as she spoke as she sat down at her desk.

My eyes flickered around the room as my teacher continued to talk about the dance, but at this point, I wasn’t paying attention to the teacher or anything else. I was looking out the window at the city.

“Sky, are you still paying attention here?” Miss Horse Apple asked, coming up to my desk.

I didn’t even look at her, not until she came over to my desk and stood before me.

Then she asked me again but to me, her words were just gibberish because she spoke too fast just like mom did and just like dad, and just like almost everyponyc I meet. Everypony speaks too fast, so I can’t understand them. Why won’t they speak slowly?

“Sky, your mom signed the paper for you to go to the dance, so that is what you’re going to do, understood?” my teacher told me with a stern look on her face like she was upset. Or maybe it was another feeling I didn’t understand, I wasn’t good with knowing how ponies felt about me.

“Go dance?” I hesitantly asked, slowly looking at my teacher. I did not want to go to that dance. I was too scared to go.

She needed thoughtfully before returning to her desk and clearing her throat to get our attention.

“Don’t forget to pack your best outfit for the dance tonight,” She finally said after a long silence.

Miss Horse Apple noticed my hesitant demeanor and walked over to me. “What’s wrong?” She asked, looking me directly in the eyes.

“Don’t want to go dance tonight, will be loud,” I finally answered.

Miss Horse Apple just smiled and shook her head. “Oh, is that all, we can get you noise canceling headphones, but as I recall, you have noise canceling headphones in your bag, why don’t you just take them?” She suggested.

I hesitated to ponder over the question and nodded after a while of processing the question that was asked of me.

That evening after dinner, Mom flew me back to school for the dance. Mom and I touched down on the school steps, I slang my bag over my shoulder and we walked inside, the inside of the school was decorated with streamers and a banner that said welcome to the school dance hung over the auditorium.

Mom led me inside the auditorium, where my teacher greeted me and Mom with a big smile.

“Well, hope you have fun, kiddo, I’ll pick you up after,” Mom said to me as she walked out of the auditorium.

I looked around the room at all the streamers that were hung on the wall and there was even a table with snacks and a large punch bowl in one corner of the room, taking my bag off my shoulder. I unzipped it and brought out noise, canceling headphones, putting them over my ears, as it had gotten significantly louder, from some students chatting very loudly.

Still standing by me, my teacher nudged me to some of my peers. I honestly didn’t want to go over and socialize with them, but since my teacher basically told me to do it, I went ahead and did it anyway.

The unicorn Colt from earlier in my class was standing with his friends, so I decided to go over and try and say hello, though I wasn’t entirely sure how to approach them.

Even though the Colt was my best friend in the whole world, aside from my cousin Melody, I still didn’t know how to communicate with him. Other ponies made it seem easy but for me it was extremely difficult because I couldn’t talk, and my echolalia wasn’t enough of a communication method anymore.

I started walking over to them, but then stopped because I was unsure of where to begin introducing myself to his friends. His friends seemed cool and I didn’t wanna say anything that would embarrass me and make me look funny in front of his friends. But luckily, I didn’t have to say anything, because he was already coming toward me with his friend group.

“Hey, Sky, you remember me, we had class just this morning?” He asked. Of course, I remembered him, but I don’t know his name because I’ve always been too shy to ask.

“By the way, my name is Quillstroke, my mom works for one of the richest ponies here in the city, we are super rich,” Quillstroke beamed, his green eyes sparkling when he mentioned being rich.

He seemed to be very proud that he was rich, I didn’t know what at the time but something would happen, though I didn’t know what.

Behind him, his friends snickered when I didn’t immediately respond.

“Well, it was nice seeing you, Sky, hope we meet again one day, I’m gonna go off to dance with my girlfriend,” Quillstroke said with a little grin on his face as he walked away with his friends behind him.

I could hear his friends laughing behind him as they walked with him to go find this supposed girl friend of his. This night wasn’t turning out the way I had hoped, I was honestly hoping to ask somebody to the dance the day before, but I couldn’t and nobody wanted to even dance with me because they thought I was weird because I couldn’t talk

I glanced across the dance floor to see my best friend dancing with his very good looking girlfriend, she was dancing very closely to him, I didn’t understand what they were doing, but something felt off. So instead of actually dancing with somepony, I decided to sit in the corner the rest of the evening until mom picked me up.

The next morning, I heard a knock on my door, I got up from my bed and went to open the door, Mom and Dad were standing outside my bedroom with pretty big grins on both their faces. I wasn’t certain what they were so happy about. Mom came into my room and sat on my bed and Dad was standing in the doorway.

“So how was the dance last night, buddy?” Mom asked me, still grinning.

“Was good,” I mumbled, looking around the room before my eyes fell upon my Wonder bolt poster.

“We got exciting news, you’re going to be a big brother!” Dad smiled, going over to Mom and laying a hoof on her belly. I didn’t know what it meant to be a big brother but what I did realize was that mom was gonna have another baby, a new pony that I could potentially play with when they were a bit older.

I remember when Aunt Pinkie had her child it was super exciting for everypony, but I was especially excited because Bubble is someone who I get along with very well. I love all of my cousins, they really are the best.

“Oh, and we have even more good news, we are going to Ponyville for the weekend to see your Aunt Twilight,” Mom said to me.

And Aunt Pinkie, I think she will be very excited to see you and you get to see your cousin Bubble as well,” Dad added, smiling down at me.

I was super happy that we were going to see my Aunt Twilight and Aunt Pinkie, I hadn’t seen Aunt Pinkie and Uncle Cheese, ever since my cousin Bubble’s fifth birthday party. After the excitement had died down a little bit mom and dad went downstairs for breakfast and waited for me at the kitchen table.

I was so excited I couldn’t even eat my oats that mom specially prepared for me because she knew that was one of my safe foods.

So after breakfast I immediately ran back upstairs and started drawing a picture for my cousin since I knew he was deaf. It was difficult to communicate with him for me because I couldn’t talk, and it was even more difficult for him because he also couldn’t speak so drawing pictures was the best way for us to communicate.

To be continued…✅✅.