Rarity opened her bedroom door.
The hallway stretched in front of her, something closer to a chasm, crammed into the listless, domestic space. The notion of stepping out into it felt blasphemous, profane.
No, no she was simplifying to herself, she didn’t quite know why.
The simple truth was that she didn’t want to go out there.
Was that laziness? Was it that she was a worthless sack of shit who just felt it easier to remain in bed? Was she just poorly? Was she not built for this?
Did it really matter? The result was the same.
“I wonder if I’ll ever be unafraid?”
“Ever? Do you think that’s appropriate?”
“In what way is that not appropriate?” Rarity replied.
“I don’t know… it just makes it sound so severe. Like you think there’s a genuine chance you’ll never not feel like this… is that really what you think?”
Rarity turned around. Fluttershy was sat on the bed, looking as angelic and innocent and pure as ever. No hint of malice, or subterfuge in what she was asking.
She just wanted to know the answer.
Rarity wanted to reply, and be honest. Tell Fluttershy that yes, that’s exactly what she felt. She felt like she’d always feel like this, and that every moment of life henceforth would be dressage in service of maintaining an illusion that was more about the comfort of those around her.
But Rarity didn’t want to ruin the moment.
So she didn’t say that.
XXX
Rarity opened her bedroom door.
She chewed her lip, watching the dust motes cascade through the stark morning sunbeams. She watched as the carpet fibres moved ever so slightly in a breeze coming from some unknown entryway. Maybe Sweetie Belle had left a window open, maybe Sweetie Belle had left the front door open, maybe she wasn’t coming back.
“Don’t do that.” Fluttershy said, a note of sternness present in her voice that may have surprised someone who didn’t know her as well.
“Don’t do what?”
“That. Thinking like that, you know you’re not supposed to.”
“How do you know what I’m thinking?” Rarity asked, turning around.
And, despite everything, she wasn’t able to stop herself from giggling as soon as she met Fluttershy’s eyes.
What a silly question.
“I think something that concerns me is the idea that I’ll be pretending forever. That I’m going to leave our room here, and go out into the world, and then everything in the world will keep going, and it’ll still feel so hard for me, but the problem will be that I’m out there, then. And then I’ll have to be out there everyday for the rest of my life.”
“Would that be such a bad thing?” Fluttershy asked.
Rarity sighed, she wanted Fluttershy to get out of bed, and walk over to Rarity, maybe hold her for a short while.
But Fluttershy remained in place, offering only a sad smile, and a softly voiced question.
“What’s stopping you?”
“I… I don’t think I should say.”
XXX
Rarity opened her bedroom door.
There were some flowers placed on the floor, which she stared at for a moment. It took noticeable effort, more than it felt like it ever should, but Rarity was able to light her horn and retrieve them.
They were addressed from Twilight, and Rarity held them close to her.
She did appreciate it, intellectually she did. She knew she should appreciate it all, it was just hard to make herself feel it.
“So much more head than heart, so little feeling, like an empty tin, all the warm parts scooped out and left to rot somewhere I’ve forgotten. No different to a dress hung on your ponnequin, a thin, beautiful artifice draped over something that isn’t living.”
“Is that what you think of me?” Rarity asked, turning to Fluttershy, who looked horrified.
“No, you know I’ve never thought that about you, you know you’re not supposed to think that about yourself.”
“Then why did you say it?” Rarity asked, bluntly.
“Because that’s what you’re thinking right now, isn’t it?” Fluttershy replied, and then started crying, and Rarity was forced to once again watch as someone was able to do so effortlessly what she felt was no longer possible.
“And what if I am? Why do I owe everyone this rosy perception of myself, when I don’t have it? What you just said is authentically what I think about myself, and everyone just keeps telling me ‘oh no, don’t worry that’s not true’, well I think it is true, and I know myself better than anyone.”
“Better than anyone?” Fluttershy asked, sniffling.
Rarity looked down at the floor, scowling. She tried to force herself to feel guilty for being angry at Twilight, at all her friends, at the world, at Fluttershy.
But it just wouldn’t come. She felt angry, spiteful, bitter, dangerous. She suddenly found the energy to seize her bedroom door with a flare of her horn, and slam it as hard as she could.
“‘It couldn’t have happened to a better mare’,” Rarity whispered under her breath.
“Aren’t you going to leave here today?” Fluttershy asked, apparently not hearing, even as she quietly made space for Rarity to join her on the bed.
“What’s the point?” Rarity asked, the words leaving her like the air from a deflated balloon, “I’m happier in here with you.”
“Is that what you are in here, Rarity? Happy?”
Rarity didn’t answer, she was too tired to keep doing this.
XXX
Rarity didn’t open her bedroom door, no matter how many knocks there were.
“You shouldn’t keep them locked out like this,” Fluttershy in a breathy whisper, engaging in Rarity’s juvenile affectation of being asleep, even as she argued against it.
“Why?” asked Rarity, “I don’t want to talk to them, why can’t they just respect that?”
“They’re worried about you?”
“And what about you, Fluttershy? Are you worried about me?”
“I don’t think that’s what I’m here for… you always told me you wanted me to worry less.”
“I know…” but I always loved it when you did.
Rarity bit her lip, fighting back tears, and feeling disgusted with herself at the twinge of arrogant pride she felt at being able to cry.
“It’s okay to feel proud of yourself for getting back to normal, it’s alright to do that.”
Rarity turned to look at Fluttershy. In the dark of her room, sun long set and curtains resolutely drawn shut, she was barely even visible. Only the suggestion of her remained, a connect-the-dots outline unfilled, the mind did what the form could no longer, tried to populate the details, tried to concoct something to connect to the voice.
Rarity’s mind went to the most natural place, when she’d last seen Fluttershy, and tried to use that.
She curled up in bed and gripped her stomach, screwing her eyes shut and heaving with shuddering, wet breaths.
“What’s wrong, what’s happening with you? Tell me how you feel in this exact moment, breathe slow and try to describe it as best you can. Be as detailed as you feel you need to be,” Fluttershy said, impeccable bedside manner as usual, such a cool head in a crisis.
“It feels like I’ve been kicked in the stomach, it hurts… oh fuck me it really hurts,” Rarity said, trying to steady her breathing.
“You’re okay, you’re going to be okay, you’re not going to be alone, I know you’ve been worried about that but you’re not going to alone,”
“I don’t know how to make it stop,” Rarity wheezed.
“Don’t lose track of your breathing, come on now, you’re nearly there,” Fluttershy replied, her voice so uncharacteristically clear, nothing of the demure, breathy tone ponies so often knew her for. She had such strength, such surprising strength.
She was the only pony that Rarity knew that had killed before.
Dogs and cats that were too sick to carry on, Fluttershy was trained in taking that pain away, when it was the best thing for the animal. When everything else was just too much at that point, when someone needed to make the choice for a pet to put it out of it’s miser-
“Don’t do that,” Fluttershy said, voice hard as rock.
“How do I make it stop?” Rarity asked, in barely more than a tortured squeak.
“Just… just open the door… please Rarity. If you want it to stop, then open the door,”
“It couldn’t have happened to a better mare…” Rarity whispered.
“What?” Fluttershy asked, but Rarity had already rolled over, facing away towards the wall.
XXX
Rarity opened her bedroom door.
Well, she tried to, at least.
She got to the part where her hoof extended, gripping the doorhandle, and then her strength and impetus seemed to leave her, air from a deflating balloon.
“Why don’t you want to leave her, Rarity?” Fluttershy asked, her tone coming off as more frustrated than anything.
“There’s a long day ahead, and I’m just lazy… it’s not more complicated than that, honestly,” Rarity offered, still looking at the door, “At least, it doesn’t feel more complicated than that, not to me,”
“Aren’t you supposed to-”
“Self-compassion yes, yes I’m not supposed to be down on myself, I’m not supposed to be so self-critical, there’s a lot I’m not supposed to do, according to my therapist. Doesn’t it just feel like life is a long slog of things you’re not supposed to do, until you die. And everything that makes you feel remotely better, or happy, is a thing you’re not supposed to do. This big zero sum game, where every moment of happiness is bargained off a toll of misery, either someone else’s now, or your own later… I’m not supposed to do anything, other than what makes other ponies happy,”
“And is that so bad, making your friends happier?” Fluttershy asked, and Rarity could have almost hated her for her earnest tone. Almost.
“‘It couldn’t have happened to a better mare’, isn’t that what Applejack said?” Rarity spat.
“And what’s wrong with that?”
Rarity faltered, she didn’t know why hearing Applejack saying that had made her so angry. Why Twilight dropping off flowers had either. Why everything anyone did right now made her want to jump on them and gouge their eyes out.
“It felt like the most contrived thing to say, like she had nothing better to add. And they all fucking nodded solemnly like it was the most insightful thing in the world, the whole thing is a big con.”
“What’s a con?” Fluttershy asked, confounded patience and understanding still laced through her voice.
“You know why I don’t want to leave this place, Fluttershy? It’s because no one likes leaving their loved ones for the day… for the… and if I go out there… I’ll just want to see you again… I just want to see you again…”
“Don’t do that.” Fluttershy said, voice hard as stone, the only pony Rarity had known who’d ever killed, she had capacity for cruelty, when needed, for anger disguised as tough love, for bitterness.
“It’s a con because you weren’t the best mare in the world, it could have happened to someone better… but you were mine… and I loved you more for being someone real, someone who wasn’t perfect, someone who was just as… just like me, not the same, but as-” Rarity gestured frantically to herself, “-as me.”
“You’re not supposed to do that,” Fluttershy said, tears in her voice, “You were always too hard on yourself,”
“I don’t want to leave this room because if I do, all it will be is things like Applejack said, however well she meant, however hard it is to say the right things at funerals… you’ll be perfect and not… not yourself… and all I’ll have is the last time I saw you, skin and bones, wasting away in that bed… at least here, I still have you…”
“Oh sweetheart… sweet thing…” Fluttershy said, “You’ll always have your memories of me… but staying in this room forever?”
“At least I’ll still have you…” Rarity repeated, refusing to turn around, refusing to look at that massive, cavernous, freezing cold bed.
“I love you beyond words, Rarity, and I always did… but you know the truth-”
“Don't do that.” Rarity snapped.
“Sweetheart… you don’t have me now…”
Rarity remained stood at the door, biting back tears that stopped her from talking, threatened these precious moments that meant so much more to her than anything in life.
“Can I talk to you a bit more, just for today?”
The room offered no reply.
XXX
Rarity opened her bedroom door.
The hallway looked like the least appealing place to be in the world right now, all she wanted was to go back to bed.
So she turned to look behind her, at everything her room still contained.
Her gaze came to focus on the bed, where it remained for a few moments.
Rarity didn’t smile, it didn’t feel as simple as that. But she didn’t scowl, she didn’t cry, either.
And then, after a steadying breath, she took a step out.
