Rose Tinted: Feeling Blue

Rose Tinted:  Feeling Blue                                This is a sequel.

By: Chistery                                                This is not the end.

Dash awoke in comfort.

The bed was a cozy sweet down, the kind a body could get used to.  She could smell clean lemon cleaner and some faint sweet champagne from a far corner. The morning light had just started peaking onto the fashionably-printed sheets, warming her skin just so.  She luxuriated in a world of just a few more minutes -

But a lightning-bolt earring had begun to dig into her ear.  She still had lipstick on, making her lips feel cracked.  By degrees Dash realized she had cottonmouth, matted hair, and the faintest feeling of a hangover.  She never had hangovers.

She rolled over in the double bed restlessly, trying to find a new position.  A probing wing found the sheets on that side pulled back.  A hoof found the pillow mussed.  Had she really rolled around that much last night?

Rolling off of her earring, she settled into the comfortably cool pillow.  It smelled faintly of bubblegum.

Settling into her new pose, Dash caught a glimpse of dress, lace propped up in metal rails and Rarity’s fabric rivets.  Funny thing, though, in the light her dress sparkled quite a cheery pink.  Tittering to herself, imagining wearing a pink dress to the Gala, she pulled up the blankets.

Half-closed, her rose eyes passed around the room for a glass to drink from later.

A rainbow dress - her rainbow dress - was hanging over a chair by the well-appointed desk set.

There were two dresses.  She was one pony. Math was not her strongsuit, but -

“Pinkie.”

After the party Pinkie must have crashed there and slipped out; she was always an early riser - but Dash hadn’t felt her get out of bed, she’d felt so cozy after-

After.  Remembering happened in an instant.  Warm knowing tickled down her spine.

She remembered a great deal, now closer to waking.  There’d been giggles and stolen kisses (which meant drunk and terribly affectionate) in the hotel lobby, the long wait on the elevator, struggling with the keys to the door, struggling with Pinkie’s snaps, struggling together loudly on the bed…

And the kiss.  Earlier.  The kiss and the drinking and-

Dash smiled to herself, deciding on just a few more minutes.  The Gala had turned out well after all.

She felt like strawberries.

---

Showering and combing her hair just right felt longer than usual.  The lipstick and blush that hadn’t been left on the pillowcases refused to soap out.  Her earrings were wedged in; it took some doing and a complimentary corkscrew to get them out.  Nothing felt intuitive; turning taps felt odd; why didn’t the hotel just have a proper rain cloud like the Cloudsdale Inn?  

Leaving the room felt odd, too - there were so many floors; no open space to fly.  She knew her destination, breakfast the next day.  Everyone had planned it on the coach ride to Canterlot.

Pressing buttons, turning doorknobs, walking the whole way there - everything felt so wrong.  The elevator’s hum was eerily quiet without guffaws and giggles.  The lobby had the most gorgeous vaulted cieling, but NO FLYING signs were everywhere.

Following the scent of frying potatoes, Dash found the dining room.  On a far corner, Twilight raised a hoof, beckoning the rainbow pony over.

The rest of Ponyville’s troupe were seated around a large round table, all apparently waiting for Dash.  Rarity was in a bathrobe, tittering minor gossips fresh from the hotel spa.  Twilight was still in part of her dress from the previous night; her coat was peaky and eyes weary.  She looked a weary kind of cheerful.

The rest were in various states of “clean and dressed for the day.” Pinkie still had flecks of makeup and haphazard hair.  She looked like hastily-sprinkled cupcake.  Fluttershy was extremely prim, with a dainty butterfly clip in a tress.

Applejack was nursing an orange juice.  Groaning softly, it was apparent she was also nursing a hangover.

“Hi guys,” Dash rasped.  Two glasses of water hadn’t done much for her dry throat.

“Hello, Dash.  You’re looking well,” Fluttershy cheered.

Dash sat nervously next to Pinkie, who smiled brightly.  There was a certain sparkle in those sapphire eyes.  Sitting down, Dash felt a pink hoof touch at her haunch playfully.

“Yeah, you’re looking really pinkie keen, Dash,” Pinkie giggled with a squeeze.

“You just get up?” Twilight asked with an edge.

“Yeah, it was pretty much awesome,” Dash blustered.

Pinkie laughed.  It sounded wonderful.

The walls echoed clinking glasses and mumbled plans for the day.  A maitre’d came by to sell the a la carte menu, with especial emphasis on egg scramble and coffee.  There was mention of fruit sorbet served on lettuce - it was simple but extremely inviting, “only the best for our guests, misses.”

Orders were taken quickly enough, though Applejack’s request “to feel something other than mah head getting kicked” was not something the kitchen could serve.

Conversation bounced between plans for the day and old friends they’d seen at the party.  Twilight had a full day of laboratory purchases to make before heading home.  Fluttershy had a researcher friend to discuss avian healing with, Applejack muttered something about getting her wares loaded on a train back to Ponyville.

Rarity took the opportunity to discuss her fashionable friends at some length.  The rest of the table took the time to chew at their food and nod when appropriate.  Dash’s eggplant omelet was delicious and warm.  Sneaking a sly hoof down to tickle Pinkie’s flank was better.

"Have a good night of tribadism, girls?"  Rarity tittered coyly.  Her exacting eye eye slid over smudges of blue makeup on Pinkie’s face and crescent bite marks on Dash’s nape ...

Dash and Pinkie stared blankly, without understanding.  Twilight choked on her toast with all too much understanding.

"I think they had a good night," mumbled Spike around a danish.

“What’s tribad-” Pinkie began to pipe loudly.  Her words were corked by Applejack’s hoof.

“Jus- just don’t start.  Please,” Applejack moaned blearily, “Ah’m … ah’m gonna need my ears to work right b’fore ah can handle hearin’ you.  Or anything.”  The painful wear in her voice was gravel.

“Oh, but do let them talk, Applejack!” Rarity cheered roundly, clapping her hooves together. ignoring Twilight’s ministrations to choke down bread.  “It’s good to hear at least some of us had an evening, looking gorgeous and in love, right?”

Fluttershy’s eye caught the deepening confusion on a certain pink and a certain blue face.  She spouted a little quickly, “W-well I had a fun time last night.  It was lovely.”

Spike furrowed his brow, muttering darkly, “I really don’t think you had as much fun as they did.”

Understanding struck upon Dash a few heartbeats before Pinkie. In love?  Dash began to stare very intently into her plate.  She heard Spike chortle into his half-eaten danish.

The tender pink hoof fell away from Dash’s lap.

“Mah eyes taste like whiskey,” Applejack blubbered into her orange juice, oblivious to the goings-on, “eyeballs shouldn't taste!”

Fluttershy steeled herself noticeably and huffed - huffed! - “I did too have a fun time last night.  Wind Healer has an understanding wife.”

Twilight very nearly choked on air, sputtering “WHAT?”

“We did extensive research in the royal gardens.  Her wife had to push back dinner, but it was … nice,” Fluttershy beamed.  

Twilight’s hoof struck her head, only to yelp at her own strength.  Rarity roared with laughter.

Dash’s eyes darted to Pinkie, who was only laughing lightly.

In love?  It’d been fun and Dash liked Pinkie; it wasn’t just the wine talking when they’d whispered between the sheets - she’d had Thoughts - capital-T Thoughts - for months back home.  But did Pinkie want something more?  Was that why she wasn’t looking at Dash, or only in half-glances?

It was a fun fling.  She’d done this before with others - at the academy, at work back in Trottingham, on vacation.  They’d stayed friends and it didn’t get weird, even if Dash really liked them.  Pinkie didn’t expect more, right?

There wasn’t the twinkle in Pinkie’s eye, what little Dash could catch of it. Dash wanted desperately to feel it’s all okay, to find see that in Pinkie-

It was already starting to feel weird.

The blue pony resumed staring into her broccoli salad.

---

The coach ride back to Ponyville was long and dull.  The trip to Canterlot had been filled with excitement for the Gala, grand plans in Canterlot, gossip about who was who in the royal court.  There were hints of that camaraderie on the return trip. There were still murmurs from Rarity about new clients.  Fluttershy was very excited about her new experience with avians.  Twilight was terribly terribly anxious to get home to set up her new chemical flask system.  Applejack was blissfully, achingly asleep, snoring loudly into a window.  

A wonderful sunset poured out a silhouette with a proud hat on the floor of the cabin.

But Dash barely spoke.  Pinkie’s gaze refused to meet Dash’s, always finding a particularly interesting place on the wall or the cushions of the carriage.  She dithered enthusiastically at some length about her new buttercream recipe, then fell to looking out a window.

Upon arrival, a gaggle of townsfolk plied questions on the group, asking this and that about Canterlot - did they really have so many magic users?  Were the streets always clean?  Was the gala everything you wanted it to be?

Dash only had trouble answering the last question.

---

In the coming days It was suddenly very difficult for Dash to see Pinkie in any real way.  Flying past Sugar Cube Corner “just stopping by,” Pinkie looked too busy to talk “right now.” “Right now” turned into “later” and then “I don’t know,” like melting cupcake frosting.

During Twilight’s “please would you help me clean” party that Wednesday, Pinkie talked at great length with Fluttershy about how “supercoolawesomefascinating” the new bird wing-cast design was coming along.  Dash tried to act nonchalant by cleaning the ceiling, only to collide with the bookcases.  Repeatedly.

Pinkie was just “too tired” making special cupcakes for the town dinner to play pranks on Thursday.  There was no talk of when she could, just a rather clipped “I’ll be glad to when I’m done with these, Dash, the festival’s coming up and I want it super-duper.” not looking up from her frosting work.  Not cheerful.  Not jubilant.  “Happy.”

Things were starting to feel weird.

Dash spent most of her time ruminating over what she could remember - the party, the dancing, the wine, the breakfast.  Everything had gone so smoothly, but … A dozen times she imagined having piped up at the table surrounded by her closest friends and proclaiming “Hells yes, I’m with her!  It was great!” to great fanfare.  There were a few times with streamers falling down from a chandelier.  There’d be cake in Ponyville’s best bakery, and maybe dancing - real dancing, not just wine and chatting.  Going to a play.  Taking Pinkie flying.

Dash thought of it at work, breaking clouds that needed to stay in the sky.  She began to think of it at home, leaving the pot on too long for hot chocolate.  She tried not to think of it hanging out with Rarity pinning up banners or puttering around with Twilight, but there had been more than a few stares into the middle distance.  She’d started to receive worried looks from her friends.

Dash thought of it especially at night in her double bed.  Turning on her side (she had a side now?) Dash didn’t see more clean comfortable space to laze in.  She saw empty space.  If she started to think of that space filled with a plenum of pink curves and those short happy laughs and those bubblegum lips, she couldn’t get to sleep.

She couldn’t not think about them.

Two days after her return to Ponyville, Dash had a very bad go of things.  Her thundercloud work had come out half-done, the hot chocolate scalded again, and staying up all night in bed was … bad.  The cold second pillow and remembering tore at her more than usual.  There had to be some solution to the hot angry feeling inside.

Mulling over the course of the fateful breakfast, decided she had a bone to pick.

That bone was roughly two feet tall and came in one color - purple scale.  

The next morning, near tenth bell, Dash circled the town square, spying a certain tree house.  The Library lobby was blissfully absent a certain purple unicorn.  A proper confrontation was not a spectator sport.  More to the point, Dash had half a mind to dent hoof into purple hide.

The doorbell rang, and Spike turned to greet a prospective lender. In a blink, Dash’s rose eyes were hovering at Spike’s nose.  Beating her wings furiously in place, Dash was the picture of a irate hummingbird intent on draining a tiny purple flower.

“WHAT was that stunt you pulled at breakfast, huh?  You get your kicks twisting the knife?”

“What?”  Spike startled, confused, but keeping his books perfectly level.  One didn’t live with Twilight’s antics without growing steel nerves.

“The breakfast!  After the Gala!  You were chortling!   I looked it up!  Defined “A joyful, somewhat muffled laugh, rather like a snorting chuckle,” from Laughter’s “related words!” blue face coming into Spike’s all too close, eyes sharp and furious.

Spike’s eyes swiveled to the reference section.  Come to think of it, Dash had leafed through a dictionary the other day.  She had been searching for “tribadism” but spent quite a bit of time pouring over the C’s … “... Yeah?  You’re still on about that?”

“Yes I’m still on about it!  You have any idea how your snark hurt?”

“You kept me up all night.” Spike spat, turning again to his work.  “I like my sleep thankyouverymuch.”  A sniff.

“How?! What does that have to do with-” Dash rounded, stopped short.

“That hotel has very thin walls.”  Spike said archly, hefting a book nearly his size over a shoulder.

Dash felt the anger boil away and the blood drain from her hooves.  She drifted rather closer to the floor.

“You- you heard?” came out meekly.

“I heard enough,” Spike leveled, grasping at the ladder, sliding a small volume into its shelf.  He finished nearly  under his breath  “... all night. Next door.”

“You heard us making love?”  Dash eked very quietly, landing rather clumsily on the floor.

Spike stopped sliding the book into its proper place.  There was some pause.  He let go a nervous sigh, one his tiny frame couldn’t hide.  Voice low, “Yeah.  Yeah, I did.”

“You ...” came out in barely a whisper.

Spike turned around, eyes no longer accusing.  They looked ashamed.  “Dash, it’s- it’s no big deal.  You don’t have anything to apologize for.”

“But Pinkie and I- we did things and you heard?”  Dash gasped.

The little dragon’s head-scales pinned back.  He squeezed his tail in one paw, eyes cast down.  “Yeah.  I did.  And then … and then I made fun of you two for it.”  

“I know!” Dash yelled with a stamp of her hoof.  The jarring in her leg kept the tears from rolling.  “You made fun of me and- and us and Rarity kept talking about us and Twilight weirded out and Pinkie won’t talk to me and-”  She bit her lip, not daring to go further.

“This isn’t about me poking fun, is it?”  Spike plied carefully.  Catching the look in Dash’s eyes he winced, “I’m sorry. I am!  What’s wrong, really?”

“I … I really really liked it- being with her.  Pinkie won’t even look at me now,” Dash warbled.  Her face felt unbearably hot and her chest too tight.  She’d felt it before; she thought it was anger-

“Did you do something wrong?” Spike puzzled.  He regretted it instantly.

Dash didn’t bawl.  She didn’t give great raking sobs.  There was no angry explosion or fountain of tears; She wasn’t Rarity in a tizzy or Fluttershy tending to a baby bird too far gone.  Instead Dash folded gently at the knees,  pulling wings taut.  Even her feathertips felt heavy.  She choked, “I don’t know.”

Spike did the best he could.  He hugged Dash gently and held her.  He felt hot tears and shaking and a terrible feeling deep down.

“I don’t know.”