After My Picture Fades...
Her words cling to me. It's not so much something like how a snide remark gets bounced about in my head like a bee caught in a jar, a feeling I know all too well from a childhood full of it. It’s more than that.
It's not so much something like how an out of place comment hangs in the air and lingers, not blatant or obtrusive in any sense-- no-- but sticking there on the side, like a greasy stain on an old washrag. Actually, it feels more like those words out of Nurse Redheart's mouth are clinging to me. Her words give me a close sensation as real as the flannel of a jacket held tightly against my bare body.
"Make a routine out of it."
I know that you're supposed to make a routine out of it, like I've just replied. It's supposed to help when you grieve a lost loved one. Of course, it should help. I'm nodding my head as I sit there now in my usual spot-- trying to relax on the comfy therapist couch across from Redheart with all of these calming, soothing earth tones around me from the nice wooden dressers to the greyish and brownish artwork hung up just inches above my mane.
My suicide attempt, a pretty half-hearted one at that-- where I merely mixed together a few bottles that I had hoped would have given me fatal counter-acting affects while I knew that they probably wouldn't, was exactly one month to the day ago. Given that, Redheart looks a bit antsy. She's shuffling her pretty white hooves on the delicate rug beneath her. She's not quite looking right at my eyes, what my mother occasionally let slip as those "big, changeling-like orbs" (not a compliment by any means). Of course, that could be me just psychologically projecting (as usual). I often look antsy. I often sound mean. I look like a goon, after all.
I just said most of that out loud. Redheart's just smirking in that perfectly feminine way of hers and saying that I can't help feeling so dark and alone, not any more than a diabetic can help needing insulin. My mood just swings rapidly from chemical misfirings in my brain. I agree, and Redheart believes me, but I suspect deep down that she doesn't. Or maybe she just has doubts. I often can see doubts in her eyes, those immensely pretty things that I wish I could just gaze in for months and months.
I hope she'll get me out of this. She's just remarked to me that maybe there should be some kind of ticket that you can get that says "under the influence of depression" just like "under the influence of booze". She gets it, deep down. I just wish I could really make heads or tails out of that one line that she opened today's therapy session with.
"Sunbury Sparkle, just make a routine out of it. Plan out your grief sessions. Put a flower on his grave. Do it every other day, and allow yourself to get a psychological cleaning, a moment of peace. Then, go about your day with a clean conscience."
"Making a routine out of it" makes sense. I've read the books. I've looked up the seminars. I've checked out all of the pamphlets that they give you in the church services, glossy papers held in such sterile, cold plastic shelves. They all lay out grief and patterns of grief in perfectly logical, mechanical order.
First, you say this. Second, you purchase that. Flowers relate to their own step. Being angry has its own step. Denial has its own step. And it all goes on with the tedium of record player repair instructions. You're supposed to go through the motions like that.
You're supposed to... yeah. Past a certain point, you're essentially supposed to not care. That's life.
Ponies die.
Other ponies are supposed to get over it.
That's life.
It's what mom has told me time and time again. And I just said all that out loud, which brings a frown and a fluttering of Redheart's brow. The wonderful white pony wants me to go on about my mother. And I guess I will talk about her again, like so many therapy sessions in the past several months now.
My dear mother has told it to me flatly, openly saying to me that she had "no idea that my husband would get to you so much-- being gone". She knows how much that wording drives me out of my mind. "My husband"... she doesn't care if she gives the implication that Big Mac's death meant little more to her than having a room get flooded or a purse get lost. Mom sometimes, in her darker moments, remarks about how Mac wasn't even my "real dad", whatever that term is supposed to mean, like blood means anything when love means everything.
Deep down, I know that mom has torn herself up inside about it. I've seen her cry and cry, when nobody's supposed to be listening. I've pressed my head against the kitchen door as she'd let out a torrent of sniffles, her pretty white gown scraping against the tile flooring as I know that she's shifting back onto her hind hooves. My mother keeps on this mask, almost like one of those ugly, contorted wooden things that I've seen my cousin Twilight display in her library (supposedly from lost Zebra culture).
Mom thinks that forcing herself not to care anymore helps. It might. I don't know. Everyone past a certain age, that's dealt with loss before, has basically acted like that-- even if they haven't talked like that. Forgetting about the lost pony in your life lets you go on, move on.
I didn't move on. Ugh, I'm such an idiot. I really am. I'm hardly any good to anypony.
Just like at Twilight's coronation... oh, it looks like Nurse Redheart wants me to tell her that story too. She's staring straight at me now, smiling that irresistible smile. I knew she would ask.
I served as the 'skunk of the party' that day. Everypony gathered together, all of my cousins, aunts, uncles, and everypony else in the Sparkles all had had on big smiles. Twilight had ascended her race, for goodness' sake. It wasn't just enough for her and her brother to endlessly seperate themselves from the lesser, inferior Sparkles such as myself by never speaking to me, never even returning cards, and so on. No, Twilight made herself into something divine in pony form.
Anyways, I tried my best to deal with it. I really did. Everypony wanted to eat something and relax. Just as the royal cake started to get cut at an important moment in the ceremony, I said it. I just had to say it. I blurted it out from my sickly, depression and schizophrenia-infected and deeply inferior mind. I couldn't help myself.
"Oh, I'm sure Big Mac would have loved to have been here today."
And looks turned to ice all across that Canterlot table. I had ruined it. Princess Twilight's special moment got ruined. Why couldn't I have dealt with it? Why couldn't I have just kept my trap shut? It's been more than two solid years since my dad died. I've got to be such an ugly, cowardly, and stupid little bug of a pony and not be able to get over it. Ponies die. The end. I just have to be some pathetic being that just clings to the memory of my dad when I should just deal with.
Oh, goodness, she's holding my hand now. Redheart always knows how to get to me. More than my mother, more than anyone else except for my late father, she speaks to me. She's saying that I can't keep beating myself up. She's telling me that higher dosages of the medication should help. She's pointing out that, at least, the thoughts seem to be coming from my own head instead of schizophrenically floating in from outer space.
I'm just sad now. I'm not so sad that I think about suicide all the time. That's an improvement. Right?
It's cold comfort, but I'll take it. I can't say no to Redheart's adorable face, her cheeks blushing as her elegant mane shines in the sunlight from the nearby window. Anyways, she's stressing the improtance of turning disorganized bad thoughts into a routine-- a regular catharsis.
I look out from her beauty to just stare out the window, looking at Princess Celestia's brilliant morning sky. I see a group of almost pink clouds puffing up past the horizon around Sugarcube Corner, almost looking like tasy cotton candy in the sky. It reminds me of Princess Cadance and that foal confectionary tasting ceremony at Canterlot Castle a little while ago-- how couldn't it?
I'm told that Princess Cadence herself inquired about my condition hourly. I rely that to Redheart, and she remarks back in the affirmative. I then ask her where Cadence was two years ago. I ask why the royal power of love stayed in a tower somewhere while my mother and I had our heart's ripped away from us-- just like other common ponies without royal favor. I hear back silence.
Of course, two years ago, Twilight merely served as a student. I merely served as a son with a loving, caring father. And then it all ended for me. For Twilight, her life rocketed out into the stratosphere. And I just sort of... lingered around.
It's not that I deserved any better. He died, and I didn't grow as a pony. I didn't blossom into a butterfly as I transitioned from foal to stallion. I've always felt more like a shadow, like something that begs for the nearby light to be kept off lest he get snuffed out. In my darkest moments, less now with the medications but still too painfully frequent, I have to confess to myself that I didn't deserve him. So kind, so loving...
Redheart's meeting me at the window now, standing next to me. She's cradling me with her left hoof now, touching me like my mother used to before this whole mess years upon years ago. I can't help but close my eyes and breathe much easier, the warmth of her amazing body just flowing into me.
"You beat yourself up worse than any bully in the world, Sunbury."
Even her words feel like a caress upon my neck. I seem so at peace in my sessions now. I don't know if it's progress, but at least it's a refuge. The same blackness, like a dark cloud always following me in the air, seems to wait for me at Redhearts door, right when I leave. But, in here, I can be something good for once.
"Our time is almost up."
I glare at the clock on the mantle, wishing that I had Twilight-level power to just magically melt it into a pile of goo. My breaths get a bit tense. Redheart knows, and she gently eases my body away from the window back over to the couch.
"Make a routine out of it. Keep a log or journal. Check out every visit, every flower left. You could start right now."
I shut my eyes again, though my body has already turned for the door. I let out a deep breath and suck another one in.
"Nurse, I can't... I... and I..."
"Right now," she says, her face just inches behind mine. I open my eyes again, looking out into the clinic hallway. To my lower right, I spot a nice vase with three roses in them, all of their thorns gone. She doesn't have to say anything to me. I don't say anything back either.
Letting myself walk a bit easier, I head outside with the roses in my teeth. I forget I've even got them soon. I just let my mind drift as I take in the sunny day. Things really do look beautiful, Lyra skipping amongst dew-soaked grass besides Fluttershy conversing with a set of cute squirrels, and I can't help but notice every little detail.
It all feels like a great release until the path turns, bringing me to a darker set of corners all alone. The trees seem to pack and layer upon each other like sardines in a can. And then, finally, I see that very old metal array that simply reads 'Cemetery'.
Twenty steps forwards and forty steps to the right. I've got it memorized more than any name or date in my entire life. My body moves almost possessed, without any conscious thought behind a single hoofprint. At any rate, I end up right before an ornate shape of marble with delicate carvings across the front.
I try to concentrate, but the words seem to jump out at me. I wonder if I've got a headache going, dropping the flowers and straining my eyes. I seem to be trying to make myself cry already, but my body won't obey. I finally manage to let out a low, embarrassingly feminine (were anypony around) whine.
"Make a routine out of it."
I regurgitate those words back. I've visited this place so many times already now. More than Twilight, Armor, and their ilk by far as well as even more than my dear old mother, I've stared silently at this special rock without the slightest idea of what to say. Minutes upon minutes have passed, even going into hours.
I don't even know where to begin right now. It's been two months. Should I pray?
I lick my lips before letting out just a gasping-like sound. No, I'm not a praying pony. I don't have anything profound to say. I probably should.
Ugh, I just ruin everything. I'm sure he'd hate to see me now. I can't even think to speak. Dad would be so disappointed in me, especially compared to Twilight and everypony around her.
I'm crying now, for real. Feelings like waterfalls going down my cheeks won't stop. But I don't want them to stop.
I'm leaning up against the gravestone now. I'm sliding my hooves against the deeply cold marble, digging into the indentations. I can hardly breathe. I certainly can't think.
After time seems to lose meaning, I finally manage to spot the roses out of the corner of my eye. I nudge myself off of the gravestone, make my way through a bit of mud, and then bite them back inside of my teeth. I turn to the marble, taking in the name that means so much to me, and I gently lay the flowers across the top.
A torrent of words, feeling almost like grimy, itchy, and scratchy sensations up my back, swell up inside of my mind. I open my mouth. Nothing comes out. The thoughts just pile up inside of my head.
"When will you get over it?"
"Past a certain point, and it's long past, this is just pathetic!"
"Can't you just stallion up?"
"Someday, Sunbury, you need to grow up!"
"You're just a kid! You don't know anything about what it really means to lose someone!"
"When will you finally get over this?"
A jolt of action goes through my senses like a lightning bolt, and I just place my head against the edge of his gravestone. I rub my mane into the rock, panting hard. The frustrating thoughts seem to fade just as quickly as they had came into being, seeming like rain sliding off of a bedroom window.
I take a deep breath. Tears still sliding off of my face, I try and look up. My voice clears.
"I love you Dad."
There's a pause that feels like it lasts a lifetime.
"And I always will."
Not even a second goes by before I turn around and gaze out at the sky through the trees above me. I march out of the graveyard, slowly but surely, and I rest my hooves against a moss-coated hunk of rocks right beside the entrance. The cotton candy-like clouds seem to have multiplied, coating the afternoon air past the oak and maple leaves of the forest. I take a long, deep breath, and I make my way on the path back over to Ponyville proper with Lyra, Fluttershy, and the other ponies.
The End
{By Swiper The Fox}
Author's Note
At this time, this story is a bit of a parting gift to the Brony community, which I've felt more and more alienated from and am sort of taking a break from right now. It's a highly personal story, like what When You Fall is, going right to the heart of things. Though I've never lost a parent, dealing with their very serious medical issues this past year and having that profound sense of helplessness. Anyways, thanks very much to all of my readers for being such wonderful sweethearts.
