When You Fall, I Can't Catch You

by SwiperTheFox

Rating: teen
Tags: Derpy Hooves, Sad, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Nurse Redheart, Other
Length: 6088

Nurse Redheart writes a sad letter about a difficult teenage patient.

Nurse Redheart feels herself overcome by emotion as she writes a letter about one of her adolescent patients, a Ponyville stallion with Hooftington roots named Sunbury Sparkle who just so happens to be Twilight’s cousin. She’s had to do this countless times before, but every patient has their own, compelling story. Some mean more to her than most.

It probably goes without saying that this is mostly autobiographical, with things such as the timing of events and such jumbled about. It’s also a loose sort of spiritual sequel to my very first fanfic, Rarity’s Raspberries. I’d like to thank all of my fimfiction friends for their care and support. I’m also indebted to the work Against Depression by Dr. Peter Kramer. Thanks very much for reading.

P.S. Why the hay does Nurse Redheart have no character selection icon?

Published 2012-12-15 22:20:01 UTC
Last updated 2012-12-15 22:20:01 UTC

When You Fall, I Can't Catch You

When You Fall, I Won’t Catch You

Nurse Redheart stepped into the side room— eyes moving about from the plain white bookshelves to the large glass skylight to the grey and blue striped calendar on the nearby wall. She took in a little breath as she moved herself onto the soft black chair in the middle of the room. Scooting closer to the adjacent desk, she stared straight ahead at the magical dictating machine in front of her. The grey gears already gripped the first page, prepared to stamp word after word as soon as the mare tapped the red button and opened her mouth.

“I shouldn’t have to write this,” Redheart murmured to herself, brushing her front right hoof through her mane. She kept on staring at the machine, feeling that sense of dread that had surged up inside of her every other time she had merely stepped into the room for a few seconds. “It’s been a long time coming, isn’t it?” She sniffled as she nudged herself deeper in the seat. A flurry of thoughts flashed through her mind— thoughts too fluid and wispy to mean anything concrete, anything worth writing down.

She rubbed her front hooves together. She tapped her bottom hooves upon the tile below her. With another, longer breath, the large red button atop the machine finally got pressed. I could do something like this a hundred times. A thousand times… and it wouldn’t matter in the slightest. It’s horrible. Every part of it just… drips of that feeling… and it’s something that I could never begin to really understand myself. Redheart closed her eyes, sensing the pale moonlight shining down upon her long, pretty pink mane and her delicate white shoulders, and she began.

Dear Miss Midnight Sparkle,

Her hoof hovered right over the button to close the recording session. That iconic click-click-beep-click noise— though softer and quieter than ever with this new A-16 generation of dictating machines— might as well have been pokes against her own fur. She steadied herself, bottom hooves locking against the floor.

I, Nurse Redheart, am writing this letter in my official capacity as the psychologist of your son, Sunbury Sparkle.

She had gone through such legalese countless times before, and it sounded more pointless each time. Get to it! Eyes still closed, she leaned over to the side to take a sip of water, and she continued.

And, far more importantly, I’m writing this as a friend of your son— as somepony that cares deeply for him and values his well-being, like I know you do.

And now, the ‘fun’ really begins. Redheart’s mouth opened up wide as she considered how to word that next, crucial part. Her front hooves rubbed against the smooth, slick corners of the dictating machine.

He has come to my office several times this past month. He has taken tests with us, he has gone into great detail about what has been on his mind, and he has made it clear that he hopes we can help him. And, I assure you, we can. I know we shall succeed.

Your son has kept all of his difficulties secret for you until now, upon his insistence. Before, during, or after he tells you about his efforts on his own to seek mental illness treatment with his office, I hope that you will read this letter thoroughly and understand that he does have these very real issues—

Her mouth ran dry pretty quickly, causing her to slide over once again and take a deeper swig of water. She opened her eyes and gazed, this time, upwards through the skylight. Somewhere, far out there, Princess Luna has painted this glorious night upon the world. She watches. She cares. And I’m watching. And I’m caring. I’m just doing it in my own little way. She felt a sort of nervous energy building up inside of her, keeping her prose stuck up in her mind as confusion built up throughout her subconscious.

Right? Just because you’re his own mother, Miss Sparkle, doesn’t mean that other ponies can’t also care for your son. That they can’t also like him… that they can’t also want the best for him… I’m not taking anything away from you. And I’m just, wow, I’m just internalizing what poor Sunbury has said. Aren’t I? She tried to focus on the skylight, attempting to spot glimpses of her own reflection in the thick glass. He told me that he feared you would blow up. It’s a fear. It’s one of many things he’s dealing with. I’m not doing anything wrong. I’m not taking a surrogate mother’s place. And I can’t doubt myself like this!

Redheart tossed about her mane with both front hooves, brushing it over and over until the pretty locks eventually fell right above her eyes. That mane, along with the rest of her beautiful body and elegant manner, had brought up complications with a lot of male patients— crushes popping up every so often like daisies upon the nearby field. It’s not that feeling either way here. It’s something else, something even worse… I’m taking that place. Honestly, I’ve already seized it. I have that safe, paternal place— I’m welcoming your son in, Miss Sparkle, so that he can tell me his psychological problems while he’s afraid that you’ll suck those up and spit those back at him like flames out of the mouth of a dragon.

Redheart’s bottom hooves started to grind against the floor, creating bursts of faint squeaks. But I’m just helping. I’m watching over, same as Luna does with every single pony in Equestria. Why am I acting like that’s so… so bad…

“That’s it,” she declared, her voice gathering a sudden burst of confidence. She glanced down, seeing that she inadvertently had those two words typed into the letter. Head shaking, Redheart didn’t want to care in the slightest. She locked her head up towards the skylight, ignoring the machine in front of her altogether. Seizing the nearby cup, she also sucked down the rest of the water. “That’s it.” She snorted as she took in a deep breath. “I’m saying what I feel and that’s that.” Her head stayed pointed skyward as her eyes dipped down, still feeling that impulse to follow the black text being printed with her every statement.

Your son loves you. He really and truly does. He might not really be able, in his condition with as severe the mental illness that he has, to tell you, but I can. I’m doing it now. And you love him back, accepting him totally. You have to.

“Have to,” Redheart repeated, speaking so quiet that she couldn’t even hear her own voice. She kept one eye on her reflection and one eye on the machine, both eyes welling up with the tiniest beginnings of tears. Her training and years upon years of on the ground field work told her to stay professional and stay objective. She always did try— just as much as she tried to really care for every single patient. Doctors didn’t call it ‘patient-centered therapy’ for nothing. “Miss Sparkle.”

I’ve seen mothers reject their sons before. I’ve seen mothers go to sons who say “I’m a coltcuddler” and reply back “I’d rather you be a corpse”. I’ve seen fathers tell daughters who finally muster the courage to say “Dad, I’m schizophrenic” start to cry before remarking “At least, I have your sister; she’s normal— and she could catch a stallion for the family if you can’t.” I can’t even pretend to know what would cause a parent to renounce their own children like that. It’s something so terrible that I don’t even want to try.

Redheart fought back the tears starting to form. Sucking in another breath, she reached over and brushed her bottom hooves against the table legs. I’ve done this before. I can do this now. But I’m just, oh Celestia, I’m just… so sick of coating things in any kind of pseudo-academic language. This isn’t just as a psychologist. This is as a friend.

I’ve heard things from your son time and time again that just confirms that you could never be of those parents. He loves you. You love him. Neither of you, Miss Sparkle, should forget that.

And, look, I’m sure that you feel scared. I’m sure that you don’t know where to begin when you look at your son’s behavior, baffling you more than any puzzle in The Canterlot Times that you used to solve with him cuddled on your lap back when he was the size of a bread-box. He’s told me just about everything about his life, and I know that— from your perspective— it might seem that he’s chosen to arrogantly detach himself from other ponies, conveying some kind of superiority complex or some sense of an adolescent rebellion.

You’ve seen him walk into crowded clubs that ponies his age would normally thrive in and then seen him in a compressed bundle against the wall— partially hidden behind a coat-rack, with his eyes twitching and his bottom hooves curled up over his chest. You’ve seen him walk up into his room in a cheery mood before shutting and locking the door with him alone, two different voices suddenly seeping down into your bedroom the floor beneath. And you’ve seen him walk down into the kitchen away from his room, sheer hatred almost dripping from his face and his ragged, dark blue mane, as he’s refused to talk about what had just happened.

You’ve seen him reach his right hoof out as if to push somepony else or pat somepony else on the shoulder when nothing is there except thin air. You’ve seen that sad confusion on his face as he has realized that several seconds afterwards. You’ve seen him sitting on his bed, trying to sleep, as his mouth has moved up and down in endless silent arguments and his eyes have burned holes in the empty white ceiling above him. You’ve gone to sleep at about midnight with that going on and woken up at seven am to find, to your horror, that still going on.

Come on, Redheart, get to the punchline. Get to the point. Hammer it home. The beautiful mare suddenly shifted her attention to the bookshelf to her left— the shelves all filled with various wonderful dissertations, academic studies, textbook-style guidelines that any appropriate medical pony would own, and the like. A ragged red book dissolved into a bright blue novella-style memoir and then into a thick, pale green dictionary before her eyes.

All of those recommendations about what to prescribe to what pony, what to say, what not to say, and everything else— emotionless, dead black text upon featureless white paper— were made of distillations of thousands upon thousands of cases. She rubbed her hooves against her face, thinking deeply. Cases like this one… they’re distinct in some ways, with everypony as unique as a snowflake. But guidelines exist. Procedures exist.

Every illness felt like a tragedy to Nurse Redheart. Almost every patient felt like a friend. Some meant more than most, though her medical professionalism always made her feel touches of guilt about that. Foals, fillies, and those in the grey zone right before adulthood triggered her— usually those tender, helpless young ones.

I have to tell you something, Miss Sparkle. It’s something that can’t be over-emphasized enough. Though, I often don’t do that enough.

Pieces of a puzzle seemed to fit together in Nurse Redheart’s subconscious, spurring her one to say her words with true conviction. Her eyes went on scanning the bookshelf before blinking again and again. She brushed a hoof against her chin, feeling her white fur dancing upon her skin, before she went on.

I hate that I have to write this. I hate everything about it. I hate, more than anything, it.

It—yes, I almost don’t want to give that horrible disease the dignity of having a name—has occupied a huge portion of my life. It has stolen all that time and energy from me just as it has stolen that from ponies such as your brilliant, kind-hearted son. And I hate that.

Your son, oh Celestia, has always apologized for cutting me off. He’s apologized for supposedly taking up too much of my time, for making too much noise with his heavy jacket, for biting his nails in session, and for countless too many things. And I felt so surprised to hear about all of his positive citations from the Ponyville Technical Institution, with him finding taking compliments as difficult as pulling teeth sometimes. He’s in such a soul-eating shadow compared to his famous cousins— one an Element of Harmony and another royalty, for goodness sake— and he can’t even begin to let himself seem to have individual worth himself. It won’t let him.

It, in full terms, is known by the common term ‘schizophrenic depression’ or, alternatively, ‘schizo-affective disorder’ in medical terminology. Those words may seem mundane. They may seem scary. But, please, let me tell you what it means to me.

“Miss!” cried out a deeply familiar male voice from off in another room. Redheart immediately smacked the red button on the device as her world crashed down upon her.

“What!” Redheart screamed back with full force, shivering as she jumped off of the chair, “come on, what the hay is it!” Feeling like a pony in deep sleep with a bucket of ice-water dumped on her head, she rattled through a series of little breaths as she thrust open the door and glanced up and down the hallway. “Buck it, Robbie!”

“I was just… uh…” muttered an ashen-faced orderly standing far left corner of the hallway, his front hooves rubbing nervously against the adjacent wall, “I just wanted to say… your… cider is ready.” He sniffed that cute, little nose of his upon his freckle-covered face and body.

“Oh, Celestia,” Redheart commented, reaching up and trying to straighten her messed-up mane. She lowered her voice and stoodd up straight, making a motherly gaze over at the short stallion. “Thank you, Robbie.”

“I won’t disturb you further,” Robbie replied, trying his best to calm down as he turned around and opened back up the door leading to Ponyville Clinic’s emergency rooms. He hesitated for a moment, pressing his white cap down upon his dark green mane, and he searched for the right words. “Also, ah, he’s feeling fine… n-now.” He still seemed to verbally trip over himself, nudging a hoof against his acne-coated face. “ You know that, seeing him just a m-moment ago, but I wanted to make it clear that that’s st-still the case. Even Twilight herself is with him.”

“Right,” Redheart responded, opening back to the door to her side-office. Well, gosh, then what the hay am I writing this for? Or does Twilight even know? She doesn’t… oh, good heavens!

She froze as her pretty pink tail scrapped against the doorframe. Sunbury probably doesn’t even want Twilight there to begin with. Right? She’s hardly any different in his mind than… his… his mother… especially given those, well, fantasies that he’s told me about. Redheart’s mind flashed back to page after page of incredibly disturbing material written out in black and white striped notebooks hidden well in Sunbury’s room— detailed descriptions of Sunbury’s cousin bound with spiked restraints cutting into her lavender thighs while he listened, satisfied, to her deep screams and dotted his own hooves in her blood. The mere words had been bad enough, but Sunbury’s expressions and tone of voice while bringing those books out in the session three weeks ago had been something else.

“Oh, Robbie!” Redheart called out, rushing over to the orderly’s side as he made it halfway through the door. She put a hoof on Robbie’s shoulder, which made him blush profusely. “Please, tell me, did Sunbury even hint about Twilight that…”

“He did kind of angrily stare at the door when she came in, while also waving his hoof with,” Robbie began to reply, but he put two and two together— with his mouth snapping right shut. He pointed over with his eyes at a shelf on the nearby wall holding a tall glass of nice, hot apple cider atop before nodding.

Nurse Redheart nodded back, gripping the cup tightly, and she made her way back to the side-office. She took a nice swig, reading through the dictated letter so far, and she closed her eyes once again. Tapping the button, she went on, snapping back into the zone quickly.

Depression has a face. So does schizophrenia. In your son’s case, the two are so intermingled that separating them is purely academic. But thatface is nothing other than real.

In my many years of practice, pony after pony has come into my Clinic seeking psychological help. And I’ve seen the patterns, those iconic signs, even when they step intor in the waiting room. A patient walks in with his head at that special ninety degree angle where he acknowledges other ponies’ existence but remains half focused on the floor. A patient speaks in a tone hardly above a whisper, staring at the receptionist’s nametag all the while, as his hooves rub against the cold, hard counter.

Their sheer sense of weakness almost seems to radiate from their hooves as they make their way onto their seats. They look eternally out of place, squirming around as they shift from position to position but never, ever find something like comfort. Hooves shiver again and again, almost like a continuous blast from an invisible flurry of icy wind, as they fumble to speak. Reflective ticks happen like clockwork, their subconscious barking out orders nonstop. Some keep scratching their hooves against their chest. Some keep brushing their mane. Some grind their teeth ever so softly.

Your son does all three of those things, but his disease’s favorite thing has always been the old ‘take off glasses, blow into them, wipe them off, and put them back on’ routine. I’ve counted him doing that twelve times in just one hour. Miss Sparkle, he has that face. He says those words, too. He’s used all kinds of metaphors and smiles over the past several weeks with me.

It’s “like that overbearing fog in a werewolf movie, seeping over the carriage where the damsel lays helpless”. It’s “like that constant pressure you’d get from ferrying a fifty pound box on your shoulders all day and all night”. It’s “like that blurry yet very real gloss put over the screen on a sitcom where the heroine gets dumped by her coltfriend.” It’s “like having something like the hole in a sink inside of your body, constantly draining out all of the positive things in your life and leaving nothing but pale, white emptiness.” It’s “like having to stay in a building with the fire alarm pulled down all day, that endless droning sound ramming upon your senses minute after bucking minute”.

His mind, heart, and body usually feels “vapid”, “bland”, “weak”, “pained”, “aching”, and so on. That would seem terrible enough by itself, but Sunbury’s illness has another dimension. Hearing things that aren’t there, talking to himself while answering back to himself in another voice, and the like all make up as much of a part of his life as breathing— coming just as naturally.

Patients like him often repeat a mantra to get them through the day. Sunbury uses “live through this”. It’s quite a horrible sight to see him pressed against the wall, looking almost like some kind of gargoyle with his body contorted between the plastic chair and the drywall, with his eyes firmly shut, his body coated in sweat, his hooves shaking right beside his temples, and his mouth muttering “Live through this, live through this, live through this, live through this, live through this, live through this, live through this—” like a blasted metronome.

Redheart drank down the last of her cider, knowing that she had to wrap this up somehow while also getting directly to the point. She looked up one last time to see that the moon had finally broken through the clouds completely, the skylight revealing the shining orb in all its glory. Getting off of the chair and simply leaning up against the wall, the nurse went on.

I wish you had been there, Miss Sparkle, to see your son describe that voice in session after session. That, more than anything, made me expedite his process to finally getting the much-needed medication. I’ve seen the intense fear in your son’s huge, blue eyes and his big, broad purple shoulders shifting forwards as he’s described it. He knows, intellectually, that everything only happens in his own mind. Yet it sounds, in terms of his uncontrollable feelings, like another pony right there, standing directly beside him.

That other pony— that completely imaginary yet also completely real specter that just seems to haunt him no matter where he goes or who he talks to or what he does— just despises him, everything about him. And I hate it back. So does Sunbury. It never ceases to tell him that he’ll always be a failure. That nopony really loves him, that nopony would miss him if he didn’t exist, that nopony can stand him for being so ugly and so stupid, that he would feel so happy if only he would kill himself, and all other varieties of indescribable things that I can’t write—

Redheart froze, having crumpled upon the floor of the office with her face in her hooves. She could hear Sunbury’s voice crying out from her memories, seeing his agonized expression once again. Session after session had happened as the weeks had gone by, and Redheart had had a harder and harder time forcing herself to sit still in her blasted chair right opposite Sunbury’s. She felt amazed that she hadn’t just succumbed to her motherly instincts and reached out for him with both hooves to embrace him. Please! Oh, Celestia, please! Speak to me!

She pushed her mane out of her eyes, and she tried her best to stand up straight. I have to go on. I have to finish this. I hardly care how the hay I say it anymore, but I just have to say it somehow. She has to understand.

That voice sounds deep, low. It seems to itch and scratch over him. It triggers something like a visceral reaction— almost like set of bites of scratches against his smooth fur. Gosh, if only you had seen him tweaking as he’s talked in our psychological sessions. He relives those moments so vividly— with his bottom hooves knocking against each other as he reflexively smacks his front right hoof against his temple. Those physical sensations seem to “jog him” out of the auditory hallucinations.

I have to tell you, Miss Sparkle, that—as a general practioner that has seen all varieties of illnesses suffered by Ponyville ponies— I find that the faces of the patients often match up with a very real, very sharp picture of what actually happens inside of them. When I talk to Mr. Cake about his heart troubles, I see a huge video screen filled with clogged arteries right above his head. After Scootaloo accidentally crashed into that shed, working her new wings with her new cutie mark as she should, I pictured an x-ray with broken bones.

I’ve read the studies. And they are horrifying. I’ve listened to neurologists talk about how the brains of depressive stallions at age twenty look like the brains of average stallions at age forty. I’ve seen the slides of neurons of patients with schizophrenia—some being too large, some being too small, some being all horribly misshapen as if some microscopic bully had beaten them into a pulp. I’ve been in the room with the CAT machines along with the rest of the Canterlot Medical Association panel as I’ve witnessed how the auditory delusions light up the exact same parts of the brain in the exact same way as a flesh-and-blood doctor talking to the scanned patient.

When your son sits down and looks up with me with those huge, puppy-dog eyes, softly biting his lip, I visualize his neurons failing and dying before my very eyes. I can’t even help it, anymore. That vision just happens.

So, I have to tell you, Miss Sparkle, that your son has an illness. He’s not weak. He’s not lazy. He’s not bad. He’s not evil. He doesn’t have a character flaw. He’s not being deliberately moody and disobedient. The gods are not punishing him for anything. Dear Celestia, Rarity’s has no more fault for her diabetes or Roseluck for her slipped spinal disk than your son does for his schizophrenic depression.

“Time to stop beating about the bush, finally,” Redheart whispered, leaning over the machine and gazing into the variety of magically-powered gears beneath the top screen. This letter is long enough as is. She made a long sigh.

That’s why, Miss Sparkle, I started your son on a high dosage of anti-psychotic medication this time two weeks ago. He’s insisted that I keep it all from you. He kept saying to me that you’d blow up— that you’d throw him out of the house and leave him homeless for a variety of reasons, not least his very complex feelings about Shining Armor, about Twilight Sparkle, about you, and about your late husband.

He paid out of pocket, using his own bits from his own job. He’s said time and time again that eventually he’d sit you down and come out to you. Today would have otherwise been that day, or so she’s claimed to me just like oh, so many days so many Thursday s past.

Redheart stopped, sensing that surge of raw emotion bubbling up inside of her once again. She couldn’t fight the tears anymore. Laying her head on the hard, cold table besides the dictation machine, she continued on as they dripped down along her cheeks.

These medications save lives. Nonetheless, getting such a large dose of so many pills always presents a danger, and the most effective medications generally have the worst side-effects when taken in an overdose. As well, patients that start a high-dose regimen usually feel a sense of mania, this profound urgency, that physically compels them to ‘do something’ weeks and weeks before their mood actually improves. It’s a dangerous combination in the short-term that, generally, involves close contact between psychologists and parents. In the long-term, the success rate is remarkable.

Say it. Blast it, you, just come out and say it. Do it! Redheart scrubbed her mane against the table as she sniffed, body feeling limp.

So, Miss Sparkle, I’m writing to let you know that your son is currently in a good, stable condition after his suicide attempt this morning—

A loud knock made Redheart jump right out of her seat, her mane swooshing all over her shoulder. She sucked in a long breath. She turned over to the door, creaked upon with a tuft of Robbie’s own grease-soaked hair poking out.

“She’ll be-hee here in about forty-five minutes,” he remarked, his voice seeming to break just a bit, “ah, his mother, I mean. She was at some kind of a royal-related Hoofington luncheon that she really didn’t want to leave, but got talked into skipping out of. Just about all she knows is that he’s here. Period.” The orderly waited, still as a statue, for her response.

“And he doesn’t,” Redheart started to say, knowing that she didn’t need to finish as she approached the door.

“No, he absolutely doesn’t want to see her at all. He actually, ahhh, threatened to jump out the window,” Robbie replied, snorting loudly as he pushed against the door and kept his eyes right on her.

“This is a one story building,” Redheart remarked, closing her eyes and trying not to sigh, “he’d fall about three feet into a bunch of soft shrubberies.”

“To be honest, I’m not sure if that was a threat or some kind of twisted attempt at humor.” The orderly slid a bit to the side, rubbing his wiry, skinny body against the doorframe.

“What about the rest of the Sparkles?” She kept her eyes closed as she rubbed her temples.

“The Princess made it completely clear in her scroll that she’d move heaven and earth if it were necessary to save her cousin-in-law, but she also stated that she understands completely that such sensitive situations might involve, ahhh, discretion since her presence could hopelessly complicate the thing.”

“She’s a smart cookie, especially among the royalty,” she replied, moving back to the nearby table and gripping the cup before tossing it into the trash, “and compared to, say, Blueblood. That’s good, at least.”

“Shining Armor is completely unreachable given his current security duties, as I guess you might have pieced together from the news,” Robbie went on, “I think I’m pretty safe in assuming that the other Princesses are behind what Cadence said.”

“And Twilight?” Redheart asked, facing directly away from the orderly with her eyes on the calendar. Has it really only been something like two months with him? It feels like a lifetime.

“She’s, well,” Robbie replied, hunting for the right way to phrase things. He seemed to give up, taking a small breath as he went for brute honesty. “Twilight is in the middle of a pile of tears right now in the waiting room.”

“Alright,” Redheart began, and she turned back around towards the door. She walked down the hallway with him over to the end door and up to Room 101, where two other nurses tended to Sunbury. She halted, however, as her hoof held up less than an inch from the door handle to the patient’s room.

“Nurse…”

“Robbie, tell me, honestly,” she started, looking straight at him, “why me— in your opinion?” Her face looked as blank as some model on a postcard at that moment.

“Why… wait, what?” Robbie asked back, whipping his greasy tail back and forth as he tried to think.

“What do you think? Why— when he doesn’t trust his mother, his cousins, his cousin-in-law that’s a blasted Princess, or even himself— does he just unconditionally trust me?”

“I… well… honestly,” Robbie started to say, looking as dazed as ever. However, he suddenly seemed to snap inside, standing up a lot straighter and lowering his eyelids as he built this sort of inner strength. Redheart said nothing, hanging on his every word then more than ever. “Do you recall when I first started this job, my very first day?” A nod meant that he kept going. “You had this one proverb-like thing that, although I don’t think you’ve ever said it again later, went something like: ‘When you fall, I can’t catch you’.”

Redheart shivered, scrunching her pretty face as her tail drooped low. “Although that was a very, very bad and ‘inartful’— to use politican speak— way of putting it,” she replied, “I wanted to get across something important: that I won’t always be there for you on the job— as a last resort to come to for troubleshooting, as a teacher to give advice, as a medical encyclopedia to give background on things, and so on. Thus, you have to get a handle on things at the Clinic just yourself, eventually.” She placed a hoof upon Robbie’s backside. “I can and will do everything I can to set you on the right path, but only you can walk it. And you’ll fall without me being there.”

“Nice speech,” he commented, reaching himself for the door handle as he kept his confident expression.

“And this has to do with Sunbury Sparkle… how?”

“I don’t exactly know,” he replied, his confidence waning as he hunted for words, “it’s that metaphor thing, you know? Motivational poster horseapples and such… I’m just saying that— I don’t know— it might just be something you said to him from the very first day you met him. Or how you treated him… whatever… that set off something.” He finally shrugged.

“Dear gods, if I said something like ‘when you fall, I can’t catch you’ to him and that fact came out, then I would be disbarred,” she said, quickly adding, “and I’d deserve it.” Did he really need that extra push that I didn’t give to keep himself stable? Did I treat him too much like a basically healthy stallion when he really needed more? Gosh, I didn’t… I didn’t even hug him. Or did I just get on his good side somehow for doing too little— for treating him like an adult, and that’s the only reason why he trusted me? She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Or maybe I just couldn’t have done anything.” That sense of powerlessness cut like a knife to the chest.

“Didn’t you want to give Miss Midnight Sparkle some kind of letter or something about—”

Before Robbie even finished the sentence, Redheart dashed back over to the side room, eyeing the button on the dictation machine that shined brightly in the ‘on’ position. She cleared her throat. She braced herself against the table.

So, Miss Sparkle, I’m writing to let you know that your son is currently in a good, stable condition after his suicide attempt this morning— something that we must discuss face to face immediately. I shall see you very, very soon.

Sincerely,
Nurse Redheart

She smacked the button, grabbing the finished note in her teeth. “Fine, fine— it’s been far too bucking long and she has to read this right now,” Redheart mouthed as she sped back over into the hallway but took a different turn. She burst into another room, this one with part of the wall missing to leave it open to the beautiful night outside.

Redheart looked about the mail-room, drag, grey desks filled with piles of neatly sorted papers all around matching the drab, grey walls perfectly. She looked over at the take-off slash landing platform above her, something welded into the steel supports of the roof with metal tile after tile going out outside. She locked eyes immediately with a cheerful-looking grey pegasus that had just touched down.

“I brought you a package!” Derpy Hooves called out, wagging her mane and tail as she reached for her mailbag on her right side. She seemed to beam at Redheart, looking as content as ever.

“Oh, gosh, I don’t know where Juneberry went, but you’re perfect!” Redheart remarked right after spitting out the important note, reaching straight upwards. “Exactly the right time!”

Derpy held up a package in her mouth that Redheart immediately traded for the note. Derpy nodded as the nurse pony made a small sigh of relief, though emotions still racked her senses with her colorless face making that more than clear. The pegasus filed Redheart’s note in a second.

“This belongs to Miss Midnight Sparkle, who’s currently on the high-speed, magically-powered side-rail train from Hooftington to Ponyville. She’ll be at our station in around fourty minutes I’d say. I’m sure if you deliver it mid-train-running that would be even better.”

“No problem!” Derpy yelled back, her nice mane tossing about her shoulders. She then cocked her head while making a flat sort of facial expression, confusing Redheart for a moment. Without a word, the pretty pegasus reached out and gave the nurse a huge hug, feathers brushing up upon Redheart’s body.

“Ah…” the white mare muttered, feeling one part confused and three parts grateful.

“You’re welcome!” Derpy called out, making sure her packages and letters were in order, “of course, you needed one. I can always tell those things.” She closed her eyes and made a confident smile as she pointed a hoof at her right temple. “That innate ‘feel sense’, you know, since if I see your feelings fall, I just have to try to boost them back up.” She gazed at her postage and then up at the shimmering moon. “Well, I’ll see you—”

“Later…”

“Later!” Derpy remarked, making a sudden salute before beating her wings. Redheart saluted back, not really sure why, as she watched for a second as the pegasus vanished into the night sky.

“And thank you,” she whispered, turning around to head over to the emergency room, “in a lot more ways than one.” Thoughts far clearer, she pressed against the door handle.

The End