Books Are Heartwarming Things

I honestly didn’t really expect the little filly to come back, so the floor of the library was covered with books and scrolls. But the next morning, around 10, Rosy Cheeks entered the door, appearing excited and raring to go. I felt bad since I hadn’t even bothered an attempt to tidy up the place before I opened.

But I had to do something with her that didn’t include cleaning. Smiling, I walked over to her and said, “Good morning, Rosy. Did your mother enjoy that book?”

Rosy nodded. “She’s been reading it ever since breakfast! She tried showing the book to me, though, so I told her about what you said yesterday, and she asked who you were, and I told her, and she asked why you wanted me to come over, and I said why, and she let me come, and I said-”

She was interrupted by me placing a hoof up to her face. “I see,” I said, chuckling at her sudden happiness. A drastic change from the monotonous, casual and semi-depressed personality I saw only yesterday. Perhaps I would see her as she truly was? Then again, she’d have to be comfortable around me, first.“Do you want to begin?”

“Yeah!” she cried, her hooves clopping the ground excitedly.

I grinned at her readiness and took out a small paperback book from the shelf, placing it on my side table. “Sit down,” I welcomed, beckoning her to the red chair.

Already her energy had simmered down some and she was slow and cautious when she walked. I sat next to her and put the book in front of us. “Can you try to read that?” I asked. I wanted to see where we needed to start. I was hoping we were close to the same page.

Turns out, to my surprise, she knew what the letters of the alphabet were, but didn’t know how to pronounce them. When I had shown her the book Goodnight, Luna, she had identified the letters but didn’t say anything about the actual words.

“Well,” I said, glad we were on the same page, “I guess we’ll have to go through the whole alphabet in order to teach you this.” Rosy looked a bit worried at this conclusion, but I quickly added, “It won’t take long.”

“It won’t? There are a lot of letters in the alphabet...”

I shook my head confidently. “It’ll be quick and easy, you’ll see.”

Boy, was I wrong. The alphabet, you see, is a very complicated system that takes quite a few days to learn. There are multiple intricate sounds with each letter, rules and boundaries, and the list of longer words gets bigger and bigger as you go. And I had no clue about the pain that teachers had to go through to teach it to a classroom of over 25 students.

I didn’t know this, though, so I had stupidly decided to start teaching the alphabet that day. Do you know how long it takes for a filly to learn the letter A? A long time, mind you.

And she wasn’t a fast learner. I can’t begin to imagine how long it took her to learn just what the letters looked like, bless her heart. Magic was going to be a toughie if we were going this slow.

I can remember one part of our lessons that brought us closer together, I believe. I was showing her a book about some foals doing varying things together, and we were nearing the end when she asked me a somewhat random question.

“Hey, Twilight, what all do mothers do with their kids?”

I gazed at her. It wasn’t a bad question, but why would she ask something like that? Surely she had done something with her mother before. I felt a tiny voice in my head to skip over her question just in case I touched a fragile subject, but her face was just so... cute.

“Well,” I said, crossing my hooves in thought. “They do puzzles together, read books, dance, sing, knit or sew, play games...” Memories of my mother and I flooded through my mind and I had to stop myself before I explained my entire childhood to her. Then I said, “Why do you ask?”

Rosy fidgeted her hooves a bit, contemplating her answer. “I... wanted to know what kind of stuff normal mothers did with their daughters.”

“Normal mothers...?” I hope she didn’t mean what I thought she meant.

Rose exhaled deeply before saying, “My mom has cancer, so she can’t do a lot of stuff with me.”

I felt my heart catch in my throat. I was sort of expecting that, but in a way that I wished I hadn't. “Is that way you had to come here last week instead of your mother?”

She nodded. “She can’t go places much anymore because her head might get hurt.” Her sad frown then dispersed and became a smile. “But that doesn’t mean she can’t love me any less than a pony without cancer.” At least she was trying to stay happy while her mother was going through this.

I chuckled. “That’s good.” An idea popped into my head. “Maybe we could do things together when you come over to study,” I offered, then remembered her mother. “Of course, if your mom says it’s okay. I mean, she hasn’t had much time with you so I guess it’s all up to her with the issue of your education."

Rosy’s purple eyes twinkled more than I’d seen them before. And, combined with her mile-wide grin and forming blush, I could see why her name was Rosy Cheeks. “That sounds awesome! Thank you, Twilight!” she squealed.

Her head suddenly nuzzled under my chin, and I almost jerked back in surprise. Normally fillies didn’t just decide to rub against me and expect me not to turn awkward.

But her golden locks felt smooth against my fur, and I sensed the love that came out of that one magical gesture. Strange how I didn’t know her very well, and yet she felt a faint connection to me.

Strange, indeed.