The Hay Bar isn't the first place I would choose to go out to eat. When you have very unique tastes, not just any restaurant is a treat.
When you have unique friends, not just any restaurant is a choice.
It's a labor, but it's a labor of love. If sipping over-saturated milkshakes and chewing on fries drenched in oil is the cost of having a real heart-to-heart chat, I'll take it. The ability to stomach food pales in necessity to the comfort of my friends.
And if you knew the first thing about me, you'd realize what that says about my reliability. I'd never leave a friend hanging.
Except for sometimes maybe Angel. But other than that, I personally consider myself to be an excellent friend. They don't always see it that way, but that's fine. We don't have to see eye to eye on everything, even if they could stand to be a little more understanding of what I go through for them.
We meet every week for lunch. Sometimes I choose the place. Sometimes Winona does. This week was Winona's pick, and it's going to be the ultimate test of my stomach. But it's worth it for the conversation, where we talk about our common interests. Which, in this case, happen to be named Angel, Tank, and Owlowiscious.
It's possible that good friends don't make weekly meetings with their best friend to gossip about all their other friends behind their backs. Maybe I'm just an okay friend.
But I try. I suffer, and I get no thanks. I suppose that's the cost of having good friends. We all have to give a little bit.
For example, I'm about to give a little bit more as Winona begins her speech about Tank. Again. For the third time this week.
I won't be the first to deny that the stallion has a bit of an alluring charm. He has that air of mystery around him, a void that you can fill with all your fantasies. It's the same reason ponies wear lingerie. What you can't see, what you don't understand, is always the most alluring part. Tank is a walking work of art.
And, of course, that art is lost on Winona, who likes him for entirely different reasons.
I thought I had arrived early, but Winona was already at a table waiting for me. I don't think it had anything to do with cordiality, and much more to do with her getting impatient, or just really really excited at the thought of spending time with me. She tends to get excited about everything. She's dressed simply, like always, with just a red bandanna around her neck obscuring her spotted brown and white coat. It's a sort of rustic charm, I suppose. Not the belle of the ball by any means, but not hard on the eyes either.
"I mean, just look at him, Opal!" she cries. "He's a walking powerhouse. I bet you he could break a beam of wood straight in two with just his abs. But he doesn't, of course, because he would never do anything rash. He's so calm, coordinated. Slow to anger. Slow to almost everything else, too, but when you've got somepony dependable like that, speed is the last thing you want. If you know what I mean." She reforms the dopey grin plastered on her face to add a hint of mischievousness.
I do know what she means, although I wish I didn't. Leave it to Winona to leave her tastefulness and tact at the door. As if to prove my point, she takes another hay fry and begins chewing on it loudly.
Why do I hang out with her again?
She isn't wrong about Tank's attributes, either. It's actually a pretty fair assessment. She's just focusing on his secondary attributes. His body type. His personality. Sure, they're both important, but not nearly so as who he is, as a pony. I don't think Winona understands that. I don't think I know how to explain it to her.
"I love talking to him, of course, even though he doesn't talk back much. He just sits there and listens. But I don't think I'm bothering him, because he still has that smile. He likes the attention, I think. He likes the fact that out of all the ponies in the world, I chose him to talk to. Do you understand that feeling, Opal?"
Oh, sweet Philomena, does this pony ever shut up? I don't comment on it, though, just nod and continue listening like a good friend. She's so playful, so wide eyed and innocent.
"But sometimes I'm just looking for reasons to talk. I don't always want to talk, you know." I find that hard to believe. "Sometimes I just wish he would lose his patience and take me then and there. Just bend me over and..."
I hurriedly tune out what she's saying. Based on the accompanying hoof gestures, it's not something I want to hear anyways. Then she bends over herself in an attempt to demonstrate, and I avert my gaze, wishing with all my might that I could be anywhere but here, in a public restaurant, with a mare who is performing an impeccable impression of the princess of the night by raising her moon.
Good Goddesses, she is actually doing this in a public restaurant. I take back everything I may have said earlier about her being innocent. Wide-eyed and perverse, that's more like it.
"That's great," I interrupt her, speaking for what I think might actually be the first time in the entire conversation. "Really, I'm thrilled to hear all about what you and Tank... and... but how about we talk about one of our other friends now. Perhaps one with a little bit less, you know..."
"Raw sex appeal."
"Exactly."
She huffs. "What're you afraid of?" she protests, briefly, but she relents and moves on. In my head, I answer her question anyways. Embarrassment. Acting so undignified. The off chance that her words might be humiliatingly arousing. (It's actually not a chance. Winona may not have a way with words most of the time, but I've discovered that she's frighteningly skilled when it comes to describing certain recreational activities. Had she continued, the situation would have inevitably become unpleasant, both in atmosphere and in my seat.)
"What about Angel?" I ask, trying to move the situation along. "I hear he's been taking care of a nest of baby birds?"
I don't really care about the birds that much. Or Angel. A short tempered infuriating little twit like him gets everything that's coming to him, in my opinion. And even when he's right, he lacks subtlety.
Winona seems to like him, though. There aren't many ponies she doesn't like. Her problem is that she lacks discretion.
My problem might be my urge to assess everyone else's problems, but that's neither here nor there.
"Their mother died," explains Winona, her hyperactive demeanor faltering for a second. "It's kind of sad, I think."
"Very sad," I affirm, timing it with a sip from my milkshake to try and mask the fact that I honestly don't give a hoot.
"He's taking it pretty hard," continues Winona. "He's kind of withdrawn from the rest of the world just to focus on the birds. You know how he does that sometimes."
I do know, and it's infuriating and nonsensical. "It's like he thinks those animals are more important than ponies. He'll dote on them every hour of his life but he won't give anypony else the time of day." How can he be expected to get by in this world if he refuses to make connections with other important ponies, I wonder. It's almost like he doesn't even care about social status.
Angel's mind is a strange and alien place. I've given up trying to understand it.
"Are you sure he's wrong?" asks Winona, forcing me to pause in the middle of a sip of my godawful shake.
"I don't see how he could be. Birds are birds. Ponies are important."
"A bird wasn't the one that threw the rock that killed the mother. I swear, if Tank wasn't there to hold him back he would of gone ballistic on that little colt. Angel may not see things the way you do, but I don't think that's a reason to pretend he's stupid. Maybe it's an opportunity to learn something."
And now I'm finding myself wanting to change topics again. How does she do this? How can Winona turn every conversation into an opportunity to force onto me something I don't want to hear? I swear her special talent is finding ways to annoy ponies by being unpleasantly honest.
Honesty. I hadn't understood why she had been granted that element, at first. She says everything that comes to mind, which is only honesty on a technicality. But I think I understand now. The element was never about being honest with others. Anyone can do that. It was about being honest to herself. Honest about herself. I don't think Winona has a single secret. I've never found any dirt on her, and believe me, I've tried. Is that her strength? The fact that she can be describing in rather graphic detail what she wants Tank to do to her, and yet somehow retain a sort of purity while doing it? The fact that she can force me to think about everything I know without having to be sneaky or have an ulterior motive?
If it had been called the Element of Sincerity, I think I might have figured it out sooner.
"Maybe," I confess. "Look. If I admit that maybe I'm wrong about Angel, can we change the subject?"
"Again?" She laughs, but I don't think she's mad. "Alright then. I've talked about my love life. Who do you have your eye on?"
I pause, trying to gather my wits, and she must assume that I didn't understand the question, because she rephrases it. "Is there anypony you fancy? Anypony you wouldn't mind getting dirty for?"
"Winona!" I cry in shock and disgust.
"Winona?" she repeats slyly. "Is that your answer? I'm flattered, Opal."
Wait, what? No, no, nononono.
"Don't be disgusting," I reprimand her. She backs away from me, her ears flattening against her head. Did I hurt her feelings? "That wasn't funny, okay?" I tell her.
"I thought it was."
The gears in my mind are spinning furiously. I figure that an actual answer to the question might help ease the tension, but I'm stuck. I can't stop thinking about Winona. It's impossible. Any real answer is being drowned out by the images that I'm now creating against my own will. Since Winona is so liberal with her descriptions of her own exploitations, it isn't difficult at all to imagine her "getting dirty", as she puts it. I'm incredibly unsettled and confused. "No, I... argh." My speech devolves into incoherent rage.
Winona smiles sympathetically and places a hoof on mine. Too late I realize that she's attempting to calm me, after I've already recoiled and drawn my own hoof away.
I don't know what comes over me next. It's stupid, it's weird, and it's downright bizarre, but I do it anyway.
I hiss at Winona.
She pulls her hoof back and stares at me. I'm just as shocked as she is.
"Did you just..." she begins, and I nod to cut her off. She doesn't have to say it; I was there.
"Like a cat?" Another nod.
"You don't need to get all hung up about this," she tells me, as if I didn't already know.
"I know," I confess. "And I'm sorry."
"How about this time I vote we change the topic of conversation," she proposes. "How about Owlowiscious? You know, I used to fancy him a little bit when he first came to Ponyville. Tried to hit on him."
Surprisingly, I haven't heard this story before. "Oh?" I ask, egging her on a little bit. This could turn out to be prime material for using against Owlowiscious at a later date, depending on what he thought of it. I made a mental note to ask him later.
"I think he thought I was suggesting we be study partners or something. I don't think it really clicked in his head. He's got his head stuck in his books so much that he doesn't even notice what's going on around him. I could've pounced on him and he would have thought I wanted to play a game of hoofball."
I laugh at her cluelessness. It riles her a little bit, but I hardly think she has the right to complain now. It may not be much payback, but I'll take what I can get. "Winona, our unicorn friend is not the stolid and sexless portrait you seem to be painting. Trust me on this one."
She crinkles her brow. "And how would know about that?" she asks. I wait, giving her a second to figure things out on her own. Then comes the moment of clarity, and her eyes widen. "You didn't... you and him, I mean?"
"No." I don't think she believes me at first, and it's my fault for intentionally leading her to the wrong conclusion, so I elaborate. "Nothing of that sort. But come on. He's as curious as they come. A stallion who wants to know everything. And something like his body, something so close and familiar, so strange, don't you think, even if he didn't feel the same urges as everypony else, and especially if, he'd try his darnedest to understand it? He does, though. Have urges, I mean. Or so I've heard. What made you bring this anecdote up?"
"Oh," Winona pauses scratching her mane. "I guess it might have been a warning or something. But if he's really just shy or something, it's just that, well, I know he's not as cultured as you, or sophisticated, but he has some of that same sort of attitude as you, to make everything perfect, you know? He doesn't settle for half. And I know you like art, and he likes books, but there's an in-between, right? Like an opera or something? Maybe you could do that together?"
"Is this an attempt to hook me up with Owlowiscious?" I ask with a teasing sort of mirthfulness.
"Well, it started as a warning for you not to, but now I guess it kind of turned into one?"
I laugh again, and she doesn't like this one either. She's suffering a moment of weakness and confusion right now, and it's probably not right for me to be taking advantage of it, but I will. Because watching her trying to play matchmaker is adorable.
"I don't think obliviousness was the reason he didn't respond to your advances, Winona." I answer.
This surprises her. "Really? Why, then, if you know so much about everypony?"
"Let's just say that if what Peewee's told me about Owlowiscious's journal is true, you and he have something in common."
"Which is?"
"You both have similar ideas about what Tank should do to you."
Except that Owlowiscious was somehow even more thorough in his descriptions, as they had included not only the vocabulary of a bookworm, but labeled diagrams and a feverish commitment to anatomical correctness.
"You sure about that?" asked Winona. "That's not something you just joke about."
"His attention to the concrete physical details reminded me of someone who knew all the theory but no experience. A student eager to put what he's been learning to the test. Really eager, I mean."
"You saying Owlowiscious needs to take a roll in the proverbial hay?"
"Maybe I'm just warning you that you might have a rival for your dear Tank's affections."
Winona lets this stew for a couple seconds. I'm pretty sure she doesn't have much of a response to this. She's not prepared to consider these sorts of possibilities. The perfect comeback will come to her eventually, it always does, but it will probably happen six hours from now as she's nodding off to sleep. So for now she files the information and moves on.
"I think we should leave Owly's personal writings to himself. And you shouldn't make Peewee do your dirty work for you. I swear you have the little phoenix wrapped around your hooves."
I smile knowingly. "I don't have the first clue what you're talking about," I deny.
Peewee's a real gem. Eager to please, and with the best intentions at heart. It's flattering, and it almost makes me feel bad for using him. But I don't get too hung up on it. He offers to help me. If he gets mad or thinks I'm taking advantage of him or anything, well that's his fault not making his intentions clear.
"If this conversation won't go anyplace, then we still got one more friend to chat about," says Winona as she finally finishes off the hay fries.
I wrack my brain to figure out what she means. "Are you sure?" I ask. "I think this covers them all."
"What about Gummy? I was thinking you and Gummy could plan a party for Angel or something. You know, to make sure he knows he's got friends."
Right. Gummy.
I don't think that I would call Gummy my friend. Being a friend has certain requirements, like common interests, or mutual potential for gain, or being able to share a conversation. Gummy has none of those.
How he got the Cakes to give him a job making cakes is something I will never figure out, but the image of a dragon baking cakes isn't something that's easily forgotten. The most dissonant part is the apron he sometimes wears, a pink frilly one that's a tight fit around his green scales and protrusions.
He does make a darn good cake though, I will give him that. But I still find it strange to hire a mute dragon.
I don't know if he physically can't speak, or if he just doesn't. Needless to say, we can't get him to tell us which. He's the subject of much speculation around Ponyville, and more than a few cruel jokes. I personally think the ponies that tease him are foolish. When you're a dragon, you get to set whatever rules you want, I think. The fact that he hasn't killed anypony yet is pretty strong evidence that he is, if anything patient.
I have one other problem, not with him, but with Winona.
"You shouldn't call him that, Winona. It's not his name."
"And since we don't know what is, I figure it's as good as any. Besides, it isn't mean or hurtful like some of the others, and he don't seem to mind."
"But it's deceiving. You hear about somebody named Gummy, you think of an old pony who can't find his dentures. And then you meet him, and he's suddenly a giant dragon. And those teeth. All those rows of teeth like he could bite you in two."
This seems to anger Winona more than anything insulting I could have said about him. "Gummy wouldn't hurt a fly!"
"Like you know what goes on in his head. You can't trust any creature you can't talk to."
"Gummy ain't a schemer, Opal," reprimands Winona fiercely. She's always the loyal one, I remember. The only thing more surprising than the fact that Winona held the element of Honesty was the fact that she hadn't been Loyalty. That one took me a long time to figure out too. Even after I understood her Honesty, I was still bothered by the fact that Loyalty seemed to fit her better. Tank was loyal too, of course, but he wasn't the one that came to mind when I thought about it. He was a more sort of subtle loyalty, the kind that was there when you needed him, even if you didn't notice him when you didn't. Winona, on the other hand, was always there. It was kind of hard to miss her.
I actually had a lot of problems with the assignment of the Elements at first. I mean Angel? Kindness? But I suppose if they were obvious, if our element was our most apparent and outright stated virtue, than we ran the risk of being superficial. Anyone can be kind. Ask a veteran or a charity worker. They know how to be kind. Doesn't mean they understand it. Doesn't mean they know how to wield it effectively. Ask someone what kindness is, because it's more than just good deeds. I can't capture what it really means, or else I'd be the one with the rabbit-foot-shaped necklace. But Angel can.
And that's why Tank is the Element of Loyalty when Winona isn't. She may be loyal, but it's an impulsive sort of loyalty, the kind she doesn't think about and gets her into trouble. Loyalty can be tricky, and when you try to balance to many loyalties at once, you can lose track of them all and have your conflicting interests collide. Loyalty becomes a vice instead of a virtue. She'll defend her friends to her dying breath, even when she shouldn't. But Tank, with his perpetual calmness, has a perspective on events that Winona doesn't. He can see things from the outside and act in ways that he believes are in everyone's interest. Winona had it right, what she said before: slowness is not a bad thing at all.
For the first time I think that Winona and Tank would be good together. They compliment each other well.
But this revelation doesn't change the fact that I still don't trust Gummy. Sure, he seems peaceable enough. A dragon that works in a bakery isn't your normal dragon, that much is obvious. But it's hard to get past those rows of teeth and the hollow maw. Even if he's never hurt a pony, the idea that he could is frightening. And the idea that he doesn't talk isn't very comforting either. It's ponies wearing lingerie all over again, only this time your imagination fills in the gaps whether you want it to or not, and there's no guarantee you'll like what you find.
I'm not sure how long I've been following this train of thought, but it's been long enough for Winona to notice. She's studying me, and seeing me stir and look back at her, she reaches her conclusion.
"You know," says Winona slowly, as if she's still trying to figure out how the sentence is going to finish, "I think I know why you like to hang out with me."
Now this is a theory I have to hear. "Yes?" I ask, trying to sound disinterested. Theories tend to reveal much more about the pony making them than they do about the subject of their thoughts. This could be an unforeseen peek into Winona's mind.
Winona grins as if she's just won some sort of game. "You're jealous of me."
"What?" If I weren't dumb from surprise, I'd be struggling to keep in a laugh. But as it stands, I'm not capable of making any noise at all. She ignores my silence and presses onward.
"You think I'm brave. I'm not afraid to say what I feel all the time. I'm not afraid to open myself up entirely to the ponies I talk to. I'm not afraid to get my hooves dirty or talk about sex or anything like that. You're disgusted because you wish you could be brave enough to do all that."
She's wrong. Of course she's wrong. I know the real reason I hang out with her: she's fun to watch. Fun to analyze, to predict, to play with. And she talks enough that figuring her out is simple. That's it. She's the most entertaining of the lot. It's a friendship built on my coyness and animosity, and her complete sincerity and lack of discretion. I can learn anything I want from her without having to open myself up. Give and inch and take a mile.
"I'm not really brave," she continues. "Not any braver than you. Honesty just comes easy to me. But that just makes you more jealous. I'm a little bit of the things you want to be and do but can't. And even though you tell yourself your way of living is better than mine, and you believe it, you like to watch me because then you can pretend to be me. It's a way for you to get close to being like me, as close as you can without having to pay any of the costs." When she starts speaking about closeness, she begins to lean across the table toward me. I'm now more confused than anything. And her words bounce around in my head, looking for a memory or errant thought to grab hold of.
No. That's crazy. She's crazy. Or honest.
She leans in further so that her face is close to mine, and I feel squeezed into a tight space. I can't breathe. "I'm sacred to you," she says. "You worship me."
I'm now panicking, trying to read into her voice for clues. It's harder than it should be. Reading ponies is supposed to be my talent, but right now it's failing me. I think I detect a little bit of giddiness, joviality. Is she joking? It's not like her to joke, but she has to be.
"Winona," I warn, "it isn't proper for you to be talking like that."
She grins like I just cracked a joke. "I know," she whispers. "It bothers you, doesn't it? Gets under your skin. Maybe turns you on a little bit? And in public, too." She places one of her hooves on my shoulder, and I cringe nervously.
This isn't happening, I tell myself. This cannot be happening. My breath comes to me only in quick gasps, and I think I might be shivering. Winona needs to learn to respect personal space. I should tell her to back off. She would listen to me.
I should, but I don't.
I notice everything now. I notice the couple eating at the next table over. I notice the candles in the ceiling, which now glows with a blistering intensity. I notice the constricting feeling in my chest, and a nervous tingling numbness spreading over me. I notice that she's slowly lowering her hoof down my chest. I freeze, panicking inside, tensing as she inches toward...
"And that's why we aren't allowed to set foot in the Hay Bar ever again," said Opalescence as she finally finished her story.
Four thoroughly horrified faces stared back at her. The silence lasted just long enough to be uncomfortable, although Winona was fairly certain they all had been uncomfortable enough to begin with.
Angel was the first to speak. "Well," he began, and then nearly half a minute later, "Huh." Finally, he turned to Owlowiscious, giving the tall scarf-wrapped unicorn a quizzical stare. "Tank?" he asked. "Really?"
