Light as a feather

Early morning had crept up before the pink pony slowed down. She looked dead on her feet and it was no wonder considering she hadn't stopped dancing, or talking, since the party began. The rainbow pegasus and Applejack both lay passed out on the table, drool dripping from the pegasus pony’s mouth. Fluttershy hadn't passed out but rather excused herself some hours before to go sleep in the corner on a low pile of discarded hay.

Amber crunched absently on a carrot stick when the lavender unicorn, who had held up pretty well considering, sat near him.

"Does every new pony get a party or is it just the grumpy ones?" He wondered aloud watching the pink pony wobble unsteadily on her feet. She seemed to be fighting sleep and losing.

"This happens on a regular basis around here." Twilight explained.

"Well...thank you. I've never had a party before." He mumbled a bit ashamed he felt comfortable enough to share anything personal with the unfamiliar unicorn.

The pink pony snapped to attention. "YOU’VE NEVER HAD A PARTY!?"

Her cry woke the rest of the ponies, the rainbow one and Applejack wrestling to detangle from one another. The table they were on tipped over and both were splashed with the remainder of the punch, soaking both their manes in sticky liquid. He thought it was apple juice but couldn't be sure. The way those two had been acting the later half of the party it may have been hard cider.

Amber backed away as the pink pony, quicker than he could comprehend, was in his face assaulting him with a near incomprehensible torrent of words. "You've never had a party? Every pony has a party, a lot of parties in fact, several times a year, or a week even! Birthday parties, holiday parties, welcome parties, THE BIRTHDAY PARTIES ARE MY FAVORITE! When’s your birthday? Do you want a birthday party! I could throw you the biggest best birthday party ever in the history of parties!"

Amber felt his haunches touch the wall behind him before he fully realized he had been backing himself into a corner. He felt the shivers begin in his hooves traveling the length of his body as his mind began to play tricks on him. The pink pony was changing, becoming a stallion, the menacing dark brown stallion so often present in his nightmares. His father's blazing blue eyes and ever present scowl brought the normally moody colt to tears. Amber lay his ears flat and put his hooves over his head babbling like a foal beneath the barrage of angry threats and verbal abuse echoing up from the dark well of his memory.

"PINKIE PIE!" Fluttershy shouted waking to find the pink pony leaned on her front hooves over the quivering colt. The party pony turned her head before falling back on all four hooves realizing her mistake.

"I'm sorry." She apologized to no one in particular, her hair deflating. She hung her head and retreated to the back of the barn, looking dejected and ashamed. The yellow pegasus hurried after. "I'm sorry I yelled at you Pinkie Pie." Fluttershy said softly. "I just wanted you to notice that you were scaring him. See?"

The pink pony glanced over her shoulder at the colt quivering on the floor across the room. She nodded and smiled as Fluttershy wrapped her in a tight hug. "There there. Now, I want you to go over and apologize to him. Can you do that?"

The pink pony nodded before slowly crossing the room. "Um…Mr. Amber?"

She waited until the pony lifted his head. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to scare you; it's just a surprise to meet a pony who's never ever had a party!" Pinkie Pie often forgot she had been just like him when she was young. Since then she had filled her life with so many parties it was as if she’d never been without.

The colt got to his hooves a quivering smile on his face. He wiped his muzzle on his foreleg removing the runoff. "I'm sorry too." He said apologizing to every pony in the room. "It was a great party. Thank you."

The pink pony brightened immediately, her hair springing into its usual poof once again. He had to say he preferred it that way, over the straight locks she seemed to acquire when she was feeling upset. It suited her personality much better, like cotton candy. He noticed the other ponies had smiles on their faces as well.

"Forgive me for noticing." The lavender unicorn spoke up suddenly pointing to a spot on his muzzle, more precisely a wide noticeable scar threading its way from the corner of his lip to the edge of his nostril. He was usually good at hiding it but with his breakdown the makeup he normally used to conceal it had been rubbed away.

"It's nothing important." He said, his renewed smile faltering.

The smiles around the room had faded as well at the sudden revelation, as each of them could guess at the cause of his breakdown. He apologized again excusing himself from their company. The ponies in the room exchanged puzzled looks.

--

A scattering of frightened birds pointed Twilight in the right direction. Since early morning they had been scouring the town for their newest friend, who had fled after Twilight foolishly brought to mind of his most painful memories.

As she approached the area it wasn't the colt she noticed first but a tree ever so slightly tilted with a distinct hoof shaped impression torn into the bark. Even Applejack's hardest bucks weren't able to leave such an impression, though her older brother, Big Macintosh, had been known to fell an entire tree now and then.

The colt was lying at the edge of a pond on the outskirts of the orchard swirling mud along the bank with his hoof. She was torn between alerting her friends as they had agreed, and comforting the colt, who seemed to be torn between a myriad of dangerous emotions. She waited and watched quietly as he smeared the mud over his scar, hiding it temporarily.

Her mind made up she trotted nearer speaking up so as not to startle him. "I'm sorry if I did something...bad. I meant nothing by it. I get a little curious at times and well… I just thought…"

The colt gave no reply and she moved a bit closer. Biting her lip she jogged her memory for tips on beginning a conversation, or in this case steering a conversation in a new, less dangerous direction. "I don't know if I ever thanked you for the help you gave Fluttershy last night. You were really something with… that tray and… all."

Twilight wasn't usually so clumsy with her words and she cringed at how that last bit sounded coming from her mouth. It was a lame start but it had the desired effect as the pony started talking. "I'm...was, a waiter at a restaurant in Hoofington up till about a week ago. I was fired after a particularly nasty spill just about snapped me in two."

Amber thought it best to keep the explanation simple and the details missing. He didn't need to go dragging these ponies into his mess; especially considering how nice they had all been to him. "I bummed around a bit looking for work but when nothing came of it I figured I'd best look someplace else. I'd heard of an event happening up at the castle, and I was hoping maybe to get my hoof in, but I ran out of strength shortly after arriving here. I guess you know the rest."

"Oh?" The unicorn brightened at the mention of the event. "You must mean the expose for Princess Luna! It's supposed to be closed to the public but I've been given special permission by Princess Celestia to attend, with all my friends of course."

"Special permission?” Amber wondered aloud. “…from the Princess!"

"It's not a big deal. She's my teacher so I get invited to things all the time." The unicorn explained. She bit her lip suddenly sorry for having brought it up. She hadn't meant to upstage him in anyway. It was only that she had received a scroll earlier in the week detailing the event, and since he was looking for a job, and seemed to have a knack for waiting tables, it was the perfect fit.

"I have the flyer here see?" She said producing the parchment from her saddlebag in an aura of purple magic. The colt's eyes went wide as he read through it, the prizes listed at the bottom garnering the most attention.

There were numerous categories the prizes for each ranging from a couple thousand bits reward money to the top prize of one hundred thousand bits. That was more than enough money to pay off the debt he owed including damages, and purchase a new apartment, or a small house even!

"I turned this down..." He whispered out loud getting a puzzled look from the unicorn pony. How could he have been such a fool! You hadn't known you would get fired or evicted with a massive debt to carry! He reminded himself.

"How far is Canterlot from here?" He said glancing up from the parchment. Twilight pulled it back, rolling it and placing it into her saddlebag as the colt got to his feet. "It’s only two hours by train."

"On foot?" He asked a bit sheepishly. He had no money for train fare. Realizing her mistake Twilight corrected herself. "It's a day’s hike on foot."

"You're really going?" She asked after a moment, a little surprised, though she shouldn't have been. She was the one who'd suggested it after all and with prizes like that what down on their luck pony wouldn't go for it?

"What choice have I got?" He said his vigor renewed. "I appreciate all you've done for me Twilight Sparkle, you and your friends. Tell them thank you for me."

"Don't you want to tell them yourself?" The unicorn shouted as the colt began a swift trot away from the pond toward the towering capital city in the distance. She gave a glance at the sun leaning toward the far horizon.

“At least wait until morning!” The purple unicorn shouted ineffectually.