Secret Garden

“Wheeler! Sundew! Venus! It’s time to do your chores,” shouted my mother, who was in the kitchen. This was the start to an average summer’s day. Dad was at work and that meant that we had to do chores like cleaning the house. Venus and I were the first ones in the kitchen to get orders from mother but Wheeler was dragging his feet. Typical. “Wheeler, I need you to spruce up the house and take out the trash. Sundew, go with your sister and do the laundry. By the time you’re both don with that, I’ll have lunch made.”

“But I cleaned the house last time!” cried my older brother. I wasn’t sure what he hoped to achieve through this. If he didn’t clean the house, he’d have to wash dishes or laundry and he detested washing of any kind. Mother just rolled her eyes at him and excused Venus and me to go wash laundry. Wheeler probably received some sort of lecture along the lines of ‘don’t be disrespectful’ and ‘I give you easy jobs.’

Venus and I quickly gathered everypony’s laundry and took it outside to wash. Venus separated the clothes out while I filled the washing bucket with soap and water from the lake next to our home. Walking back to Venus, I could see her struggling with the clothes. She was such a small filly that some of father’s coats were far too heavy for her to lift. I set the bucket down and helped her out.

“Th-thank you, S-sundew,” she whispered to me. She always felt bad when she couldn’t help out like she wanted.

“It’s okay Vee. You’re still a little filly,” I said to comfort her, messing up her mane with my hoof. After the clothes were separated, we started washing all of father’s work jackets. Father was a business stallion and always wore expensive, heavy coats that had to be washed separately. “I heard there are some towns out there that don’t require everypony to wear clothes in town.”

“Really? S-so do they just trot around n-n-n-naked?” she asked, her eyes following me as I moved a coat from the bucket to the clothesline. She giggled as she awaited my response, finding the idea ludicrous.

“That’s what I heard from my teacher last year when she was complaining about our school uniforms. To them it must not be such a big deal, I guess,” I told her.

“Wooooow,” she said with intrigue. “Am I gonna have to w-wear a uniform too?”

“Everypony does. Don’t worry, I like mine,” I said confidentally as I pulled my school shirt from the pile and held it up. It was a blinding white, button-down shirt with two black stripes down the front of it.

“Why is y-your shirt d-different f-from Wheeler’s?” She may have been young, but she was always noticing everything around her. She’s going to be such a smart little filly. Wheeler’s shirt, in question, looked identical to mine, but it lacked the black stripes on it.

“Well, if you do your homework and study, you get to wear a different shirt like mine. It’s just one of the ways they can tell the difference between one another.” I submerged the shirt into the soapy water and hung it to dry while it explaining it to her. She looked at the shirt like it was a trophy; something to take pride in. The feeling vanished when she realized she didn’t have her uniform yet and school started in a week.

“I think mother said your outfit will be in tomorrow,” I assured her. “You’ll be fine.” I washed Wheeler’s shirt and hung it up, too. I started to wash one of mother’s dresses when I saw Wheeler sneak out of the house.

“Are you done already?” I asked him with amazement. I was hoping this was the case, as opposed to him slacking off. Again.

“Tch. No. I just took out the trash so I could get out of the house,” he said as he walked up to Venus and me. There was something about the way he always walked that made it looks like he had a chip on his shoulder.

“You sh-should get it d-done so father w-won’t be m-m-mad,” Venus said to him, looking away in case he yelled at her. I didn’t blame her though, it was hard to look Wheeler in the eye to tell him something; he was much older than us and was quick to anger.

“Easy for you to say. You always have Sundew to work with you, I have to do everything myself.”

“But you get such easy chores. And don’t pick on her, she’s still too young to do things by herself yet,” I told him.

“Whatever, I was doing chores by myself when I was her age.”

“Not everypony is the same.” In truth, Venus was small for her age. She just needed to be given more time to grow and she’d be where she should be in terms of growth. For now, though, she wasn’t fit for doing things alone. She didn’t let that stop her though; she always tries her best to do things independently. “Just go back inside.”

“I’ll get there when I get there,” he said yawning. “Until then, I’m going to just bother you two.”

“Then why don’t you make yourself useful and help us then? If you help us finish faster, we’ll help you pick up the house,” I offered to him, all the while washing clothes.

“Yeah right, I’m not falling for your little trick, egg head. I’m not stupid,” he arrogantly replied. Everything was about getting ahead in life to him. His personality wouldn’t allow him to recognize when a pony is trying to be nice to him.

“I’m serious, Wheeler. If you help us get done, we’ll help you. You complain about how you have to work alone all the time, so here’s your chance,” I restated.

“No way. I didn’t come out here to go right back to work.”

I sighed and Vee felt my frustration too. “Fine, then you can just sit there while we do our work,” I told him, my voice getting impatient.

Wheeler made sure to communicate to us how bored he was and how ‘stupid it was’ that we had to do chores. We were nearly done with our work, only one more of Wheeler’s school shirts to wash. Just then, mother’s voice poured out of one of the windows. “Sundew! Venus! Lunch will be done as soon as this water boils. Have you seen your brother?”

Right then, she leaned out of the window and you could see Wheeler freeze where he was. “Waterwheel! Get inside right now! No Excuses!” He glared at mother, but she shot him a cold gaze right back.

Mumbling to himself, he walked himself back to the house. Vee and I quickly washed his last shirt and trotted back up to the house. “Now, if you see Wheeler, don’t say anything Vee, you don’t want to do anything to set him off,” I warned her on the way back up.

“I’m already ‘set off,’” Wheeler said. He hadn’t gone inside yet; he must’ve been waiting for us to come back. “You think it’s funny I got in trouble?”

“Not at all-“ I said, but he cut me off by grabbing ahold of my shirt collar.

“Give me one reason I shouldn’t just pummel you right now,” he threatened me

“Because then you’d get in more trouble then you already have?” I questioned him.

“J-j-just let him g-go Wheeler!” Vee yelled at him.

He delivered a stinging look at Vee and looked back to me. “Go ahead, cry to mommy, but she can’t take away a black eye.”

He started to raise his hoof to hit me, but my wings started to flap and soon I was ten feet off the ground. He let go of my shirt and hit the ground hard. I picked up Vee and went back inside to hear the tea kettle whistling.