Usually, when you start a story, you want to start with how the weather was that day. For some reason, many people seem to think that starting any sort of story has to include whether or not it was raining cats or dogs or angels or what have you, because the key to starting the scene is to start setting up an environment.

Like I give a shit about the weather on any date in my life. I was coming back from work and only cared about getting home. I don’t remember if there was a single cloud out that one day. I don’t know if it was hot or cold, or what clothes I was wearing, or if I stepped on random dog shit or not. I don’t really care, and I’m betting you really wouldn’t care either, you just want to see where my life went to shit.

I do remember one thing. I felt like shit. I think that day was when my friend got laid off from our work. Eh, friend is the wrong term. We were more like co-workers that tolerated each other more than the other co-workers.

I felt like shit because I felt that I should have been laid off that day, not him. I only have to take care of my sister, he’s the one who has to take care of an entire family, including a wife that, in my opinion, is the bitchiest bitch that ever bitched on Earth. Their whole family was crazy, and work was really the only place he had peace and quiet, and I was the only one that listened to him rant.

You tend to get bored when all you do is look at financial spreadsheets.

But, economy isn’t what it used to be, and holding a job at our level is never a steady situation. He’s out of a job, and I’m out of someone that could relieve my boredom.

And then, as I’m walking home from work, not knowing what I was stepping on and not caring about what the weather was, my life changed forever at that moment.

*Click ska ska!*

“Huh?” I looked down at my feet. I hit something with my right foot as I dragged it in my post-work depression walk. At first I thought it was a rock, since, you know, kicking a rock while you’re feeling down is usually what happens when you’re feeling down.

But, no. Instead, it was her.

Didn’t really think much at first. It was some toy, like a horse shape, and had some colorful fake hair on it. I picked it up and looked closely at it. Seemed to be a girl’s toy, and the face looked real goofy, even for a horse. Recalling what the brand for colorful tiny horse toys was, I remembered my sister would watch a show called My Little Pony. Seems to me like someone dropped their little pony.

Looking around, I saw absolutely no one near where the toy was dropped. I mean, I have a sister, and she knows money’s tight, so it would be good to show her I care for her and give her the toy, and just tell her I bought it randomly at the shopping center.

Didn’t seem too dinged up. It was a white pony, with colorful hair that could probably need a brush and some horse toy hair conditioner. It had a horn and it had wings, and its unblinking eyes had violet irises.

I’ve seen bits and pieces of the show while my sister watched it in the TV room. I don’t remember this pony, so I wondered if maybe it was supposed to be a cheap knock-off. Oh God, please don’t let it be a cheap knock-off. If my sister knew the show inside and out, she would probably be a little miffed that her brother got her a toy that clearly screams “I care for you, but I don’t want to spend enough money on you”.

Sure, money’s a problem. But I at least still want my sister to have a nice childhood. Ask any parent with money issues and they’ll probably say the same thing about their children. If they don’t, they’re probably bad parents. Maybe if I told her that a co-worker wanted to sell some of their daughter’s toys…

*bump*

Ow. Okay, so, my head has realized that I have arrived at the apartments, and my body realized it when my head bumped into the door for the apartments. I would try to laugh it off… but actually this isn’t the first that’s happened.

Maybe the weather was depressing? The bump on my head made the day a little bit worse. Walking up to my apartment, which I did by instinct and didn’t really realize my surroundings, I tripped on the last step of the stairs and fell on the floor. To make matters worse, the neighbor in the other apartment on my floor just got out of their door.

“Long day, Mr. Kierkas?” asked Miss Strombi. That wasn’t her real name, and I wouldn’t ever dare call her that out loud, but it was a nickname that my sister called her because she smells like cooked food.

“Mrf,” I so eloquently told her about the full experiences of my day. While I was on the floor. With my head feeling pain.

“How’s Millie? I heard your phone around the time that Millie usually comes in from school. She hasn’t come today yet, so that call was probably her or about her.”

“Bleh. I’ll check it,” I replied. A call right when she’s supposed to be here? Either something went bad or… something is good. As her guardian though, I am obligated to assume something went bad.

“Oh, I made an extra batch of pretzel dogs by mistake. Would you and Millie like them for tonight?”

Miss Strombi also was the head cook at some restaurant or bakery, and she likes to try out new recipes at home. Usually she takes the goods back to the shop, but she sometimes makes an extra batch of whatever she made and likes to give them to Millie and me. Millie loves her and her cooking, and I don’t complain because, hey, free food. Miss Strombi is kinda like a second mother to both of us.

“If the call is her saying she needs to stay at school for a project or something, yeah I’ll take them,” I accepted. She went back into her apartment before coming out with a silver tray full of tiny-as-hell hot dogs that were wrapped in what looked like soft pretzel bread.

Thank the Lord we have you for a neighbor, Miss Strombi.

“What is that in your hand, Collin?” Strombi said, pointing with a free hand at the pony toy in my grasp. I was still on the floor as she came back, never bothering to stand.

Hey, I had that kinda day, okay?

“What, this? Found it on the ground. Someone I guess dropped it and never came back for it, so I was gonna give it to Millie. I think she’ll like it.”

“Well that’s sweet of you, Collin. Now c’mon, get up. I’ve got to go back to work, and I’m guessing you’ll need all the hot water for a bath. Have a good day, Mr. Kierkas.”

I stood up and dusted myself off a little before taking the pretzel dogs and seeing Strombi go downstairs. After absentmindedly staring at the stairs for a bit, I took out my key to the apartment and went in.

The apartment was… nothing much to look at, like all other aspects of my life. We had the kitchen to my immediate right, the main room that Millie and I called the TV room, since we had the TV and most of our entertainment media there, then we had the two bedrooms and the bathroom in a little hallway on the far side of the door.

I went into the kitchen where I set the pretzel dogs and the pony toy down on the main table, before going to the side to check the home phone. I saw that there was two missed calls and a voicemail from a number that I didn’t recognize. Caller I.D. said it was a residence, so it might have been another home phone. Is Millie at someone’s house?

I pressed the voicemail button to have it dial my number and press the pin code to my voice mail box.

“Hi Collin, it’s, um, Millie. I’m calling from Katie’s house, I think you know her mother. She wanted to do a sleepover this weekend, but we had to start right after school. I know I’m supposed to come to you first about this, but I didn’t remember your work phone. If it’s okay with you, can I go to the sleepover? Oh, and could you bring some of my stuff, like my pajamas and my toothbrush? Thanks!”

Katie’s mother, Katie’s mother… Nope, not ringing a bell. But wow, Millie’s already at that stage of her life where she knows to ask for forgiveness than permission. They grow up so fast…

“Millie sounds like a sweetheart, doesn’t she?”

At the sudden and mysteriously feminine voice, I turned around. There, on my table, was the thing that would forever haunt my life for years.

A white horse with twitchy wings and a sparking horn, and colorful hair that flowed in some sort of wind, was standing on the table right where I had the toy before, and was the same size too. She looked at me with violet eyes and a smile, before she looked up at her horn and frowned.

“Oh, darn, the spell is malfunctioning…”

Now, see, I like to think of myself as a calm and rational individual. You don’t get to my situation in life without having a harder brain and maybe a colder heart. So, seeing as how a creature from what I assumed was from a show that my little sister likes to watch was now currently on my table complaining about something, I did what any calm and rational individual would do in that event.

I fainted.

Probably the worst thing to do when you had two hits to your head already that day is to faint on the floor. Head first.

I was faintly aware of something cool on my skin. It felt like I was being caressed on the face by a living being of water.

“I think he’s waking up!”

Took a couple moments for me to regain control of my eyelids, but once I did, and once I got used to the blinding light of my dim kitchen ceiling, I found Millie bending over me with a wet rag we use for cleaning dishes.

Oh God, couldn’t you have used a paper towel?! That rag probably has, like, several thousand germs or such.

“Millie?” was the first thing out of my mouth. I knew it was Millie already, but I didn’t exactly realize it either. Memories were not coming to my head, and I felt so disoriented that I almost slipped out of someone else’s grasp.

“Whoa there, Collin, relax. You fell down and hit your head on the floor. Here, let’s get you on the chair, nice and easy,” I heard a voice from behind me. I turned to see who it was, and I almost fainted again.

Right. I knew who Katie’s mom was. She was an ex.

A ten-years-older-than-me ex.

“Bridgette?” I coughed out. I’m not exactly in the right mind to have any surprises.

Why was I on the floor?

“What happened?” I asked to no one in particular.

“We found you on the floor unconscious, and the phone says you were out for 3 hours. Why were you calling yourself?” A girl Millie’s age suddenly popped up in my face, and I flinched back in fear.

Hey, you try waking up from fainting hard on the floor.

Why was I on the floor?

“I, um, tch… I was listening to, uh, Millie’s message. Said she wanted to, uh, go to a sleepover?”

“Yes. My daughter asked her, and she said sure, asking if we could leave that message for you. Did something happen at your work today?” Bridgette asked.

“Bleh, many things. Why are you here at the apartments?”

“Well, when you had not come to drop off Millie’s sleepover items, we decided to call again, wondering if you maybe forgot. After three times which the phone in use tone picked up, I knew something was wrong and we came here,” Bridgette leaned in, “Millie was horrified when she saw you. I saw you were still breathing, and I told her to grab a cloth and wet it before patting your face, hoping that could wake you up.”

“What…what time is it?”

“9:00 now. I don’t think Millie would like it if you told her she can’t stay over…”

“It’s night? Feh. She can go, but will you be able to take them to school tomorrow?”

“It’s a Saturday tomorrow, Collin. Are you sure you’re okay?”

I sighed. “I’ll be fine. Millie’s room is on the right in the hallway. Make sure she brushes her teeth now, she’s at that age where she’ll ‘forget’ to do things.”

“Don’t worry, Cole. You’re not the only one who’s taking care of a 10 year old,” Bridgette giggled.

Cole? Great, she’s using that name now. This is going to get awkward fast if I don’t do something.

“Uh, Millie?” I yelled a little. “Come here for a second.”

“Yeah, Collin?” Millie’s head popped out of the doorway for the kitchen. She walked into the room. “Are you hurt?”

“Nah, I’ll be fine. C’mere,” I gestured to Millie towards me. I gave her a hug, “You be a good girl now, okay? I don’t want to hear you were up to funny business from Miss Coulter here.”

“I promise I won’t try to burn anything again!” she whined.

“Wait, ‘again’?”

“That’s my sister,” I smiled. “Now have fun, and make sure you get sleep.”

“Thanks Collin!” Millie rushed out of the kitchen, eager to get ready for the night.

The room was silent for a few moments, save for the far-away rummaging of Millie’s room. Bridgette tried to end the silence. “Cole…”

“Just make sure you order pizza tonight,” I replied nonchalantly, finally standing up (whoa, a bit of whiplash there, gotta take it easy tonight) and heading out the kitchen. This day was just full of bad happenings, and I just wanted to go to sleep. Also, again, why was I on the floor of the kitchen?...

But then, my stomach rumbled. Shit, now I gotta go back to the kitchen, where she is…

“Big men like you are always going to be hungry, huh?” Bridgette walked up behind me from the kitchen. We were now in the TV room, and I sat myself down on the couch in front of the most expensive item in our apartment. A nice, 70 inch, plasma screen TV. With Netflix.

Always love saying that.

Bridgette sat down next to me on the couch. Some memories flashed into my mind, and I scooted myself away hoping to end those sudden memory flashes. I’m done with that part of my life, and she should be too.

“That’s… a really nice TV,” was all Bridgette could say. I can tell the tension was getting to her too, but she’s the one who started calling me Cole, I would have thought by now that-

“What was that?” Bridgette pointed to the spot between my shoes.

“What? Did you see something?” I asked.

“Looked like something white popped out before going back under the couch.”

Wait, what?

“Under the couch?” I asked as I stood up and then got down on my knees to look underneath the furniture.

Underneath the couch was what one could expect to find things hastily stashed away. Looks like Millie found one of those magazines that people buy to look at what’s happening in the celebrity world. Guess she didn’t want me to see that and WHAT THE HELL IS THAT.

“What in the…?” I mumbled out loud as I tried to lean closer to the ground. Something small and, in the dark shade, something affably white was hiding right near one of the couch legs. It looked like it was shivering, and I’m pretty sure no one was actively trying to make a small earthquake.

“Okay, something alive is hiding underneath the couch,” I explained. “It’s probably a mouse. Uh, why don’t you check up on Katie and Millie and I’ll see if I can get the little guy outta there.”

“Oh… ooookay then,” Bridgette replied, getting up from the couch and moving to the hallway. I heard the left door’s lock being rattled.

“Door on the right.”

“I just remembered that.” The right door’s knob twisted, and I looked down again.

It was gone.

“Shit…” I mumbled. Great, now I have a mouse or maybe even a rat in the apartment. Not the first time it’s happened, but one once bit Millie, and she has a hard time with small animals now. The last thing she needs to see or know is that there’s another mouse here.

“Then we can play!... Uh, some racing game that I just got from the store,” I heard Katie hesitate before I turned to face her. “Hey, what are you doing on the floor again?”

“I dropped the control and it went underneath the couch. What’s this racing game you’re talking about?”

“Uh… Mario Kart?” she replied with an uneasy tone. I showed my suspicious look to Bridgette, who rolled her eyes me before mouthing that it’ll be okay.

They’re both ten year olds, but it’s easy nowadays for ten year olds to get some really bad games for themselves. Far be it from me to say I never tried to get some rated M games for my systems, but far be those games from Millie too.

“Millie, remember to drift on the turns, and conserve your boosts,” I winked to her.

Millie giggled, while Katie chuckled uneasily and Bridgette rolled her eyes again. After a quick shooing, the three left the apartment and I locked the door behind them. I went back into the TV room, and put my hands on my hips in a determined fashion.

“Alright, where is the little bastard…” I spoke out loud. I didn't want to go to sleep with a mouse somewhere waiting to bite my nose. I started to walk back to the couch to check again when I heard a little scuffle behind me.

I turned around to face the "mouse".

My memory suddenly returned as to why I was on the ground. The little horse toy that I got for Millie was suddenly alive on the table, and it shocked me so much that I fainted.

Before, she looked at me with a smile. Now, she looked at me with abject terror. It was clear she was very afraid of me, which explains why she acted like a scared mouse when she was under the couch.

“…Hi?” I asked. Seeing a toy suddenly being alive wasn’t making me think critically at the moment to try and wonder how to express a greeting to a different and possibly sapient creature.

“Hel-hello. Greetings,” it, or rather, she spoke. “I must admit, when I first saw you, I thought you would be of a relative height to me, not a… giant as you are.”

“Well, it’s not every day some little thing starts talking to you. Unless you’re Pinocchio or Sid from Toy Story.”

Preeeeetty sure I’m now feeling what that kid felt when Woody the toy cowboy started talking to him.

“What’s your name?” I asked. We can at least get introductions out of the way.

“My name?… My name is Princess Celestia of Equestria…”

On the things that I would say I have wasted a night doing, I never thought it would be “talk with a princess from another dimension”.

Princess Celestia explained herself as the ruler of Equestria. I didn’t know whether or not I should tell her that I kinda already knew what Equestria was when she started telling me about the country, because I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t like the fact there’s a TV show for girls that basically monitors what happens in Equestria.

Regardless, I let her talk, sitting on the couch as I leaned in towards the little princess on the table. Apparently, her former student Twilight Sparkle (which I had to stop myself for a moment, as that name and pony I knew) wanted to devise a spell of some sort that would travel dimensions, so that they wouldn’t use “magical artifacts” to go to different worlds and study them. Celestia didn’t really believe she would make much progress (well that’s a dick move for a teacher to say…), but eventually she found a way to cross dimensions by “using a golem of their similar stature or size” to “inhabit their consciousness for the time they are in that dimension”.

Yeah, the technical aspects I lost. It’s been a while since I was in school, I wasn’t a very good listener.

The spell required two beings. The caster, and the guinea pig. Eh, she didn’t use the word “guinea pig”, but when someone says they have something they need to test, and they want to test it on you, you’re kinda the test subject guinea pig there.

Twilight casted the spell and Celestia offered herself to be the test subject. According to her, she looked at what she thought was the night sky, and she had to touch one star in order to inhabit that “golem” and witness the new world. So many to choose, but then she noticed a patch of black that had only one star in the middle.

She was curious, touched it, and now she was here.

I would have just gone “enney miney moe”. If there’s a spot where the stars aren’t at, I would stay away, because there’s probably a chance that spot was a bit more dangerous than others.

She just thought the star looked lonely.

While she was talking to me, I could tell both her and I relaxed. Maybe we accepted the absurdity of the situation, maybe we were just getting used to each other. For such a tiny thing, her voice carried well, almost as if I was talking to another person right in front of me instead of something the size of a mouse.

She wasn’t terrified of me anymore, thank God. I guess after speaking to me and seeing I wasn’t going to hurt her she grew confident. It seemed like she was very proud of her student to develop a new spell that could lead to a whole new school of magic to study.

I silently hoped that I wouldn’t have to learn these “schools” while she was here, because she started getting into the technical aspect of the spell again, which apparently included equations and runes that were waaaaaay beyond my head.

Then my stomach rumbled again, and I was grateful for that rumble instead of the one before.

“Oh dear, have you eaten anything?” Celestia asked as I stood up.

“Nah, typically you don’t tend to eat when you faint,” I replied.

“Yes, I… I wish to apologize for my sudden appearance. I realize that maybe I could have introduced myself better back on the other table. I know that if a mouse started talking to me, I would probably not act in the right mind.

“Ah, don’t worry about it. Really, you were just one of the bunch of reasons of my stress.”

“A bunch? I remember you saying that your day wasn’t good. What happened?”

“Ah…” I hesitated. I’m just some guy that she randomly chose to meet with her spell. Maybe in the next jump she’ll choose someone different, and I’ll just remember this as maybe a fever dream. So I guess it wouldn’t hurt to actually talk to someone whom I probably won’t see again, so I decided to tell her my life.

While I was busy eating the rest of the pretzel dogs (Celestia didn’t like the smell of them because they reminded her of something, and she was a bit horrified that I was eating something that had that smell. Awkward to teach a different species that you eat meat, I’ll tell you that much.) I told her the story of Millie and me. I was 29 and she was 10. Our parents died when she was 7, and I decided to take care of her myself instead of having her sent to our grandparents the next state over.

When Celestia asked why not our grandparents, I just said that I didn’t trust them to do a good job. The princess didn’t need to know the whole story about our family, anyway.

She raised an unreadable expression at me when I told her I work at the bank. I guess since she’s the ruler of a nation, she too doesn’t like how bankers work and act. I quickly pointed out that I wasn’t a banker, I just worked at the building as an employee. She didn’t understand what I meant as a teller, but now she looked at me with the same interest as before, without that expression.

Never really finished my schooling. Dropped out of high school to go do what I wanted instead of being stuck in classrooms. It was also for another reason involving my parents, but again I didn’t want to tell her about that history.

Millie does well in school, thankfully. Some teachers have raised concerns over Millie’s home life, as we don’t exactly live in the nicer area of the city, but a quick meeting with me usually calms them down.

Usually.

Apparently the fact that Millie was a ten year old at school delighted Celestia. Took me a few seconds to remember that she too was also a teacher, and practically raised Twilight as her own, going on from what she was proud about her student’s successes.

Things ain’t pretty for us, but we get by from my salary and the check we receive from our parents’ Social Security, for Millie. When she’s 18, they’ll stop coming, but Millie is smart enough to excel and impress colleges for her to get scholarships and move out.

As for me, when it comes to that time… I don’t know. I’ll get there when we get there.

I took a glance at the clock. Jesus, it’s 10 already? I don’t feel like hitting the hay yet (goddammit, the horses are getting to me), so I decided to plop down on the couch and prop up some Netflix.

We have premium cable and somewhat good internet. Working at a bank doesn’t make bank, but it pays enough to get some nice things. And Millie, while I hadn’t talked to Celestia about this, is a bit of an introvert who just likes to watch TV or movies and never gets out much with her friends.

Maybe if Celestia comes back, she can help me with that problem, whenever I have the time to talk to Millie about it. Which… is usually never.

I hear little shufflings as a tiny princess decided to fly up to the side cushion next to me on the couch. “What, don’t you have a country to run at this hour?” I ask.

“Luna is certainly capable of lowering the sun as well as raising the moon. I am rather intrigued by your technology. I know of televisions from another world I have visited, but never have I seen one this big.”

Luna, huh? Well, it’s on her if she wants to procrastinate with Netflix while Equestria may potentially be on fire because of someone else’s mistakes. Could it even be on fire, or have they fireproofed everything with a spell or something?

“What are you planning to see?” Celestia asked from the side of the couch. While I think that it’s fine where she is, she could probably have a better view from my shoulder.

I picked up the little horse princess (Hah! She even squeaks like a mouse!) and placed her on my left shoulder. She let her forelegs dangle in front while her hind legs stretched out behind her on my back. After the brief panic of being picked up, she shifted a bit to make herself comfortable, and honestly I found it kind of cute the way she glued her eyes to the television up front.

…Which showed nothing but the Netflix screen still loading.

What to watch, what to watch… I have the leader of an entire nation from a new planet/dimension on my shoulder, who likes to squeak when she gets scared, and I need to show her something that can be relatable to both me and… her.

Fuck. Well, I guess it’s time to let the cat out of the bag.

“Celestia?” I slowly started, catching her attention, and slight worry from the tone of my voice. “I haven’t exactly told you everything about me. Technically, I know where you are from. There’s… something you have to watch.”

She cocked her head to the side (Goddammit, either she’s getting too cute or I’m getting too soft around her now…) in confusion. “You know of Equestria?”

“Eeyup,” I responded with a line I once heard from the bits of the show I’ve seen with Millie. I felt Celestia recoil back, and I looked to see her with a shocked expression. I guess she knew who also said that.

I tabbed into the search function and started pulling up My Little Pony. I clicked on the first item that came up, which featured a picture of 6 various ponies posing underneath the title of My Little Pony Friendship is Magic.

I heard the gasp from my left. Yup, we know about you and your world. Hell, this is probably some Truman Show shit for her.

I clicked the tab that started the first episode, and cranked down the volume a little bit so as not to get angry neighbors. The first few scenes in the episode showed that apparently there were two sisters who ruled the sun and the moon, respectively. I recognized one as Celestia, and judging by the name, that darker sister has to be Luna.

…Wait, eternal night? Wouldn’t that have caused all the plants that depend on sunlight to wither and die? Jesus, I thought this was a little kid’s show, not the Accidental Genocide special.

…Oh. Oh wow. So she banished her sister to the moon? Damn, that’s gotta make you feel bad and lonely. I wonder how she…

And she’s crying on my shoulder, and I can see it in her eyes that she just relived that memory.

…This is gonna be a long night.

One of the worst ways you can ever wake up is with your head leaned back as you’re sitting up on a couch. What can make it even worse is when you have that weird sensation when you’re about to fall and hit something, so you wake up suddenly with a jolt.

And then your neck feels like it’s about close to snapping, with all that pain going through your head.

Guess what I did this morning?

I don’t know what I was dreaming about. Usually I never do, unless it was some traumatic or important memory. All I could ever take from dreams is that it at least meant I slept that night, and didn’t lie awake the whole night wondering and worrying about Millie, the apartment, money, my work, and myself.

Again.

First thing I saw was Netflix still on, closed out of the My Little Pony tab, and giving me new recommendations based on what I watched. Great, this is going to fuck up my watch playlists…

Wait. My Little Pony? Why the hell was I…

Oh right. Celestia came alive and said hello to her first contact with a being from another dimension, that being me. I was also high or delusional or something, as the toy I was taking for Millie was suddenly possessed in my hallucinations.

Where was Millie anyway?

Ow, ow, ow. Okay, head hurts. Why is my head hurting?

Oh right, I was up a good portion of the night watching a children’s show because of delusional hallucinated little horses.

What time is it anyway? I pointed the remote at the TV and went back to the home menu, and was horrified to see the time as ten o’clock.

Shit, I’m late for work!

I quickly rushed back to my room and started looking for my work clothes. Fuckfuckfuck where are they!? I know my room’s a bit of a mess with all the clothes lying around, but I at least make sure my work uniform is placed in a recognizable spot in the room when I come back from work!

Wait.

When I came back from work yesterday, I met Miss Strombi, set a toy I found on the table, listened to a voicemail, and passed out.

Why did I pass out?

Without meaning to, my brain finally connected the dots. Millie was at a sleepover’s with Katie, the daughter of Bridgette. Today was Saturday. It was also this Saturday, the one I had requested off so I could take Millie to the local fair that’s in town this weekend.

I looked down to see the trademark polo and khaki shorts I use for my work’s uniform.

…

What the hell is wrong with me.

No, seriously, what the hell is going on with me as of late? I’m constantly forgetting things, I’m getting delusional, and I’m waking up in positions that land me in pain.

And why was I on the floor last night?

Suddenly, I remembered Bridgette getting a little scared. There was something that she saw in the TV room. I walk up away from my room and into the TV room, re-living the memory.

She pointed at something at the floor. I got down on my knees and looked underneath the couch, and I said the words out loud, “It’s probably a mouse.”

It hit me. That Celestia toy. It was alive, and if that was her that scurried underneath the couch, then that means Bridgette saw Celestia too.

That means I wasn’t hallucinating. There was a fucking toy that got possessed by some demon that tried to impersonate a TV show character.

…Holy shit am I screwed.

I suddenly became very aware of my surroundings due to my fear of the toy. It was late morning, so the sun was already showing through the dim and slightly dusty windows.

Slightly dusty? That one near the entrance is dusty as hell. There’s a huge spot where it’s clear that neither Millie or me cleaned that spot during trash days.

…That’s not a spot, that’s a note. What in the world?

I sat up and walked to the door, and got a better look. There, on the window sill next to the door, one of the notes I keep in the kitchen for grocery shopping was sitting up. I picked up the note, and I almost dropped it when I immediately saw the name “Celestia”. Getting over my initial shock, I saw that it was supposed to be for me.

“Dear Collin Kierkas,”

“There is… a lot of information that I must comprehend after this evening. I originally wished I could speak to you after the television wasn’t showing anything more about my country and my ponies’ lives, slightly changed and censored as it was, but I saw that you were already deep in sleep. I do wish to apologize whole-heartedly for the harm I must have caused to your mental and emotional health, as neither you nor I were prepared to meet each other in sudden circumstances as we did. However, I do value your generosity to host a guest such as myself, small as I was. The spell was a bit of a first test, and when I had first met you there seemed to be some complications with projecting my consciousness at first. I had to leave my body a state of an instinct driven animal as a ‘placeholder’ until my mind could come to affirm my sentience fully. Even after I met you again, and we started to talk, the spell wasn’t fully fixed. Right now, I sense the spell fading, and it may revert my consciousness back to my body in Equestria.”

“Thank you for everything, Mr. Kierkas. I am letting the spell fade while I am at the kitchen table. If I am in the previous state of the golem, or if the golem is in a new present state, please let me know the next time I visit.”

“Yours truly, Princess Celestia of Equestria, and apparent TV show actress.”

…

Well at least she accepted the fact she was being watched.

I wondered at that last part though. Golem in a new present state? Does that mean it’s going to be a semi-dead looking tiny horse in my kitchen.

I let the thought sink in for 3 seconds before rushing to the kitchen, bursting through the closed door rather loudly. I did not want a dead creature on the place where Millie and I eat, for God’s sake!

Instead of a dead creature, however, I discovered a tiny sleeping princess horse on the table. At least, I thought it was sleeping. I poked with my finger to wake her up, which was rude and possibly dangerous but I am also not a smart man, and the princess still slept. It was rising and falling as if it was breathing, but when I put my ear to it I couldn’t hear anything. So, when her consciousness is gone, the body goes into a silent sleeping state?

To test that theory, I decided to pick up Celestia’s body and violently shake it around.

Again, I am not a smart man.

Her limbs flailed about wildly, but when I stopped shaking her, her head flopped down on my thumb, with a small smile that some people wore when they were sleeping soundly.

And she was still out cold.

Dang. So I have an almost living Celestia doll now, instead of a plastic toy, and sometimes it’s fully living when the Princess decides to visit.

…

Not to be mean to her, but… screw Millie, I’m keeping this one!

“Oh, Collin! Look over there!” Millie yelled as she pointed towards a red…tent thing among all the other red tent things.

“Look over where?” I asked Millie. Like I would know where she was pointing at when all the tents at this fair looked the same.

“Oh, you mean that over there?” Katie asked as well, pointing in the same direction that Millie was pointing at.

“Do you mean that game over there, Katie?” Bridgette pointed out, and again in the same direction as everyone else. Does no one know how to be specific about where they’re pointing?

Luckily for my sake, the girls walked (or rather, skipped, as they were very jumpy while walking) to the game tent they were pointing at. It was one of those pellet gun games, where you put a pellet on the tip of the gun and shoot, and the pellet would hit some kind of target.

A gun game in this part of town? I bet it was very popular for a short while. A quick glance at the prizes told me though that not a lot of prizes were won.

That meant either I was wrong about people as this game was as popular as sorting pennies by year, or this game was meant to be so hard, no one could possibly beat it without buying off the clerk for one of the prizes.

Seeing as how the clerk was counting a huge wad of cash, I would guess the latter.

“Collin, can we play? Pleeeease?” Millie asked in her “I gotta” voice. She always asks me to do anything in the fair, which might seem normal and polite for some people, but it just reminds me that she knows about how stingy we have to be with our money.

A kid shouldn’t have to ever worry about money.

“Millie, I…”

“I can pay for her, Collin,” Bridgette piped up.

“Are you sure? I mean I can pay just fine with my own-”

“Don’t worry Collin. Save the money for dessert, okay?” Bridgette had a good point. Although I still felt uneasy about letting someone else pay. Especially when she was paying.

“Thanks miss Carrolyn!” Millie thanked Bridgette and took the money from her to the clerk.

Yeah, something is telling me Bridgette is trying to get on Millie’s good side. I better ask Millie later what she heard about me and Bridgette. Probably wasn’t even the whole story either.

Millie and Katie got up on the little stools and started to hold up the guns, which were evidently very heavy for 10 year olds to aim. The clerk gave them a pellet and told them how to play the game. They had one shot, and they could either go for the near target, the middle target, or the far target, with the far target awarding the biggest and best prizes.

I saw Millie holding the gun way away from her body, and I decided to do a little lesson about aiming, the way my grandfather taught me. Well, tried to teach me, anyway.

I’ll make sure that in this lesson I won’t smack Millie with the gun if she gets posture wrong.

“Millie, wait,” I started, “Don’t hold the gun like that. Here,” I showed her how she should put the barrel of the gun right into the shoulder, making sure she didn’t outright jam it onto her collar bone either.

Guess who did that when he was younger?

“Fingers off the trigger. Don’t ever put your finger on the trigger until you are absolutely ready to shoot,” I closely whispered to her as I leaned down next to her. She did as I said and put her finger on the stock of the rifle above the trigger guard.

Hey, the more people that understand trigger discipline, the better. ‘Always start young’, my grandfather said. And then he took me hunting.

“Control your breathing and line up the two sights on the gun with that little prong you see at the end of the rifle. Don’t be scared of the gun. As long as you are in control, there’s nothing to fear from it. Also, it’s not like the real guns, it won’t kick back. Just take it nice, and e-“

POP

The sudden sound made us both jump a little bit, and we turned to see Katie already taking her shot, and hitting the near target just barely. The clerk nodded in some weird satisfaction smirk, and showed Katie the small prizes she could choose. We turned back to our target, and I stood back up. “Let ‘er rip!”

After, maybe, three seconds, Millie shot her pellet and it barely missed the middle target. From my position, I knew she was aiming for the far target.

Huh. This gun’s rigged.

“Let me try, Millie,” I held out one hand towards the rifle while pulling out money for another pellet with my other hand. Once I was given the pellet, I put it on, put the rifle stock into my shoulder, aimed down the sights…

“Don’t put your finger on the trigger all the time, like you said Collin!”

…Thank you, Millie.

Alright, so the pellet went down, way below where the aim is going. This is going to be a bit of guess work, as I aimed the gun up but kept the end prong still trained on the far target. Once I was about 90% sure I would hit it, I put my finger on the trigger, exhaled, and shot the pellet.

Bulls-eye.

“Well, now, sir, you hit the far target!” the clerk told me in an obnoxiously nasally tone. “You win a prize from our selection of large prizes!”

I took a closer look through the top shelf where the large prizes were. It was the usual fair prizes, with a large stuffed panda, stuffed giraffe, stuffed shark (it looked like it was high on something, the way its eyes were so glazed over).

What made me slightly freeze, however, was the giant stuffed Princess Fucking Celestia all the way at the end of the prize row.

“Oh, oh, I want the pony!” Millie jumped up in excitement. I gave a look to the clerk, and he nodded before pulling down the stuffed Princess and handing it over to Millie.

“Have a great day, and hope you had fun at the fair!” the clerk, in his annoying tone, waved goodbye to us as we walked away. Katie put her prize, a tiny little panda, on top of Millie’s Celestia, and the two ran around a bit having fun with throwing their prizes up and down.

“You know, it’s just a pellet gun, not a hunting rifle, Collin…” Bridgette chuckled.

“Yeah, well, if our grandparents ever come back around, at least she won’t go through my grandfather’s lessons in hunting.”

Soon we found ourselves at the food court. We had a big breakfast, but that was a long time ago. Now, it’s getting a bit late, and I saw some tents on our way closing down. Luckily, the food tents were still open, so we found a table and ordered our food.

Oh God, this funnel cake is going straight to my thighs, aren’t they?

“Cole?” Bridgette called me by that name again. I made sure of my displeasure by giving her a dirty look while giving her my attention. “Th-thank you for coming with me and Katie to the fair. I think Katie had a lot of fun with Millie.”

“Ah, no problem,” I calmed my look. “I was already going to ask Millie if she wanted to go. I asked for this day off so I can spend the whole day with her. When Katie mentioned she was also going to the fair, of course I would say yes when Millie asked me if we could go too.”

We took a couple more minutes of eating, before I had an idea. I gave Millie some money and told her to pick out some ice cream pints for us to take back home.

I shot a look towards Bridgette, and she got the hint, also giving Katie some money. With the two kids out, I needed to ask.

“Cole…”

“How’s the whole thing doing with Katie’s father?” I asked.

Bridgette looked slightly startled by the sudden question out of nowhere, before sighing with exhaustion. “Not as well as we hoped. IRS are still tracking him, and now because of not filing his taxes as well as not paying child support. It might be that John left the country now, the way things are going. It’s been three years, he’s probably never coming back, Collin.”

No matter how much I may dislike Bridgette for what she tried to pull with me, along with how she treated Katie before, I feel sympathetic for her. I only met John once, right at the funeral for my parents.

We… had a loud disagreement over what happened to my parents and how it related to Bridgette and me. In reality, it never involved her, but he left without any sort of warning or note a couple days after. Never found him since.

Sure, cheating on your husband is bad, but having that husband suddenly leave you and their daughter alone is going to be the top tier for my shit list.

“Collin?” Millie called. “I’m tired. Can we go home?”

“Heh, I think that’s the food coma talking. But yeah, it’s time to go. Say bye to Miss Carrolyn and Katie.”

“Bye Miss Carrolyn! Bye Katie! What’s a food coma?” Millie asked as we left the food court and started our walk home.

“Basically, when you eat so much food, you can feel tired and lazy instead of hyper and full of energy. Usually that’s because you ate so much bad food. No nightly desserts for the next week, Millie.”

“Aww…” she whined.

“Hey, I’ll make it fair, and I won’t eat anything sweet either next week. Deal?”

Millie looked up at me with pleading eyes, before looking at the ice cream pints in between her hands as she cuddled Celestia up close to her chest.

“Of course we’re going to finish those first before we start the no dessert rule,” I assured her with a laugh. She smiled back and nodded, and we walked silently back to the apartment.

When we got to the apartments, it took me a little while to fish the keys out of my pocket. We heard fire sirens roaring down our street as I opened the door, and I silently wondered and wished it was my work that suddenly had a fire because someone forgot to unplug something correctly with all the papers lying around.

The first thing I noticed about the apartment was that the TV was on. I could have sworn I turned it off when I left to pick up Millie this mor-

No.

No no no no.

On the couch in front of the TV stood a little white horse-shaped mouse which I knew as Princess Celestia. She was currently watching TV of another show involving some fairy tale characters in a forest, with one character going, “Elsa, no, don’t listen to her!” in the background.

…Why is the Princess here?!

“Oh, hello again, Collin Kierkas. When I came back I noticed you were gone, so I decided to explore your dwelling for a while, especially your TV. Oh, and is that Millie Kierkas, the sister you were telling me about?”

I quickly turned with worry to Millie, who stared with fear at the little creature on the couch. She dropped the ice cream pints first before the Celestia plushie fell out of her arms.

She then fainted as well.

Millie woke up a couple hours later. She blinked her eyes for a couple moments, trying to adjust to the dim light in my room. She saw me over my desk, talking to something, but I didn’t have my computer on and my cell phone wasn’t anywhere near me.

“Collin?” she called.

“Millie!” I realized she woke up and rushed over to her. “Are you okay? Are you hurt? Do you have a headache?!”

“What, Collin no!” Millie slapped my hand away and rubbed her neck. Fainting like that would probably cause a couple cricks up there.

I would know. The carnival was fun, but I had to keep rolling my head all around.

But… she’s the one who fainted now. Not me. Fuck me, this is going to be weird to explain.

“Hey now,” I put my hand on her back now, “I’m just worried, okay? And before you ask, you’re in my bed. I carried you after you fell, but I didn’t want to wake you up because I was afraid that, um, that you would be scared again…”

“Scared? Scared of what, Collin?” Millie asked. Oh boy, here we go…

“Millie… look, you need to promise me you won’t tell absolutely anybody about this. Not to Katie, not to anyone at school, not even to your teachers or to our neighbors. Do you promise?” I looked at her with the most serious expression I could muster, because right now I could either have a girl who’s excited for a new friend, or a girl who gets so scared she accidentally kills a royal leader horse thing from another dimension.

“I… I… Collin, what happened?” Millie asked.

I stood up from the bed and took a long, deep breath. I went back to my desk and then grabbed the thing that was going to either bring some light finally into our lives… or probably make us all the more confused.

“What are you holding in your hands, Collin-”

And then that’s when she saw her.

Celestia sat in my hand like a dog (instead of a horse, although I don’t know how a horse sits so…) and she stared up at Millie. I felt her take a deep breath in my palm, I guess she was as scared as I was.

“Millie Kierkas, I must apologize for causing a shock like that to you. You must believe me that I would never intend to cause harm to those in this household, even though it seems first appearances never go well when I arrive. Furthermore-”

I poked her in the side with my thumb, which must have felt like a big bump to her body, so she could shut up. I realized that Celestia likes to be a bit wordy when it comes to saying “I’m sorry about making you fall on the floor unconscious in shock”.

Just then, because I can’t have one moment to relax in tough situations, I hear a couple knocks on the door.

I looked at the time. Who the fuck wants to talk to me at ten at night!? I’m busy trying to prove to my sister that tiny magical unicorns exist, goddammit!

I laid Celestia down on the bed and left the room without a word. I don’t know if Millie or Celestia called out my name or not, but frankly I didn’t care. What I did care about was who was at my door.

A quick glance in the side mirror before the door and I saw my face matched my anger. Good, maybe the person can fuck off when he sees I’m not in the mood.

“What do you want?” I harshly asked as I unlocked and open the door.

Aw fuck it’s her.

Right outside the front of my door was our dear old friend Bridgette, her makeup smeared because she was crying.

Please don’t tell me she’s about to…

“Collin, we need to talk-”

“NOPE.”

I closed the door with a slam, and walked away from the rapid knockings that came after. She sees me back around in her life, so now she’s trying to get together again, using Millie and showing off that she’s doing better with taking care of Katie again I guess and now she’s going so low as to put on makeup and then try to make herself cry so it seems her heart is just so torn and wants to be together with me again and I’ll feel bad for the poor crying woman even after all the fucking lies and all the fucking shit she did and all the fucking stupid bullshit I had to go through after my parents death and…

And…

And…

FUCK I JUST WANNA FUCKING PUNCH THIS FUCKING WALL AND OW OW OW BAD IDEA.

“Fuck!” I cursed loudly in the middle of the TV room, holding my right throbbing fist down into my chest to stop the pain, closing my eyes. I took a couple deep breaths, a technique another great ‘pal’ of mine used to teach me.

Dear God, I hope he doesn’t come back around. I’m going to fucking wring his neck next time I see him. I promised him that.

Okay, rage is out of the system. I took a look at the wall where I punched and yup, there’s a big dent there. That’s probably going to hurt the sale value of the apartment whenever I decide to sell this damn place. Also Millie will probably ask some questions. Don’t need her to learn about my problems.

I took a brief look at the door. I heard her crying against the door, a feeble sound of a knock or two barely going past the kitchen door. Yeah, no. She needs to learn that I am not interested in her anymore. She needs to move on.

Maybe I’m a bad guy for giving a woman a hard time, especially for romance, but she knows where my priorities are, and she knows that I'm not interested, no matter how much she tries.

Speaking of Millie, I had to go make sure I don’t have another fainted sister on my bed again. I walked back through the hallway and into my room, now much calmer than before. My hand still throbbed a bit though. Also going to need to cover that dent in the wall.

I'll worry about it later.

Inside was probably the sweetest thing I’ve seen of Millie yet. She was sleeping in my bed with the little horse thing curled up in its own sleeping position right next to her. Dang, if I had a camera this would be the best photo ever.

Millie didn’t wake up, but Celestia did. She opened her eyes sleepily before looking at me and then at Millie with a smile. As quietly as she could, she raised up and hopped into my hand, and I took us both the couch in front of the TV.

I didn’t want to wake up Millie. If I have to sleep on the couch again, then I guess I will.

“She seemed sad,” Celestia mumbled in my hand. I put her on the table in front of the couch before laying back into the harder cushions of the couch, so I could lessen the back pains in the morning. “She was quite willing to accept me, even faster than we both thought, but when she saw you leaving the room and heard the stomping, she just laid back into the bed with a far-off look in her eyes. Collin, was there something between Millie and you before?”

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. She is noticing my anger issues. FUCK.

I couldn’t look Celestia in the eyes when I replied, “Not against her, but our parents. We didn’t exactly see eye to eye on basically everything. She probably remembers only the last two years our parents were here, when they actually started caring for her, unlike what they did to me for the last 26. Of course, I was still seen as the pariah so I wasn’t allowed near Millie until…”

I hesitated. If Celestia and Millie become friends, she could end up spilling what I did all those years ago. Better to keep that to me.

“… Until a couple weeks before their deaths. She’s since accepted me, and I thought she finally accepted our parents’ deaths the way kids sometimes do, but I know sometimes she’s… scared of me. No doubt she still remembers what our parents told her about me…”

“And what did they tell her?” Celestia asked in a gentle tone, a sullen expression at hearing my life story. Maybe I can trust her with some things…

“They told her I was violent. That I would hurt her because I wanted to hurt our parents. Of course things always revolved around them, and my little sister bought into their lies that the whole world did or should have revolved around them. She was scared of me after the funeral at first, and I was just pushing her away because I didn’t want anything else to do with her, but eventually I realized something. If there was one thing my parents actually didn’t lie about, it was that I lived like I had no purpose in life. Going out to parties, wasting away money, and my mother was traditional so of course she didn’t like my boyfriend at the time, and my father didn’t like him because he couldn’t see that he was the one that actually treated me like a human being rather than them.”

“Eventually I figured out that Millie was my responsibility, and a lot of people in my life really didn’t want me to take responsibility for her. Practically told me why should I care about others, put in in the system, let her grow out or get adopted by some fool that thought they could take care of her themselves. No. No, I wasn’t going to do that. That would be fucking heartless of anyone to do, and yet they couldn’t see that. Lost a lot of friends, but for what it was worth, fuck them. I didn’t need those people in my life, and I especially don’t want those kinds of people near Millie as well. It’s why I don’t trust Bridgette-”

At that moment, I heard more knocks at the door. Dear God, did that woman never leave? Is she still trying?

“Mr. Kierkas?” I heard a young voice say my name beyond the door, and I started walking up to it. The hell? Was that Katie?

I stopped for a moment and turned around to look at Celestia. She nodded in understanding and started flying away from the table towards my room.

Oh right. I forgot she could fly.

“Mr. Kierkas, you have to help us…” I heard that same young voice say. Help? What happened?

“Hello?” I answered. Instead of Bridgette, it was Katie, like I thought. She was crying too, but I also saw some of her clothing tattered and…burned?

“Mr. Kierkas, you have to help me and mom. Our house… it’s gone!”

Often enough, I don’t dream. Or at least, I barely ever remember my dreams as soon as I wake up. Sometimes I can remember pieces of it, but they’re usually things that need a lot of context to them. One time I had a dream that apparently involved string cheese and me going “No! Don’t execute her!”.

I thought it was weird because I don’t even like string cheese.

Last night, though, I thought I had dreamt the worst nightmare of my life. My old ex came to my apartment with her daughter because their house had apparently burned down. The cause was arson, someone else had done it, but Bridgette was in such a state that she couldn’t form a lot of words, just saying she needed to see me.

Then I slammed a door in her face.

Once again, and without dignity, I rose from my spot on the couch with a crick in my neck again. God, I hate sleeping on that thing, but yet it seems I find myself laying there a lot these days.

Today is Sunday, which already gives me the day off from work since only the tellers come in to take the Sunday customers. Us normal employees get the day off so that we can “rest on the last day”, or whatever our crazy boss tells us. Eh, it’s a day off, so who will complain except the tellers.

Fuck those guys anyway. Bunch of complaining egotistical little fucks in their pretty little suits and their pretty fucking “accents” and their pretty–

“Excuse me? Miss Carrolyn?” I heard Millie’s voice in the hall behind the couch.

“Yes? Millie is that you?” Bridgette answered, muffled by a door. If it was that close, and Millie has to knock, then she must have been in the bathroom.

“I, uh, I want to brush my teeth before church, Miss Carrolyn.”

“Church?” I heard Bridgette ask. Oh god, I just remembered how she feels about religion. I better defuse this situation before Bridgette accidentally goes off on my sister. If she cries once because of her, I don’t care what the police begged me to do, I’m kicking her out of this apartment.

“Millie?” I call out from the couch. Ergh, my voice is raspy. Definitely too much yelling last night.

I hear footsteps in the hallway, and Millie pops her head around the corner to see me lazily getting up on the couch, with my hand massaging that annoying crick. “Go and see if Miss Strombi is up, and ask if you can use her bathroom to brush your teeth. Maybe even a shower, if you can. Tell her I’ll wash and bring back the towel later.”

“Okay, Collin,” Millie replied, walking sleepily to the door with her toothbrush and toothpaste in hand. Our parents taught her to keep the bathroom neat and have her toiletries in her room, and she kept that little lesson to today.

So many little lessons she keeps from them. It honestly annoys me sometimes.

“Wait, Millie, before you go,” I lazily got up from the couch, rolling my neck around to get that annoying crick out finally. I walk up close to her and slightly nudge her towards the entrance of the apartment, leaving my hand on the knob first to ask an important question. “I was speaking to Celestia last night when I answered the firemen. I didn’t see her anywhere while they were here, or even after they were gone. Did she go back to my room with you?”

“Uh, yeah, she did. We heard all the screaming and I tried to hide in the bed. She kept saying everything is going to be okay, and asked if there was anything I wanted to do while I waited. I, uh… I kinda grabbed your phone and showed her some youtube videos.”

Okay… Millie knows my phone’s password and usually watches youtube anyways, as I’ve told her that’s the only thing she’s allowed to do on it other than make calls. A check of my phone’s history now and then, she usually sees funny videos that aren’t too raunchy or sometimes an educational video or two. One time she actually tried to look up a how-to video for making a special sort of DIY card for my birthday. It failed, but the idea was awesome, and I was still proud that she showed initiative like that. At her age, I was just playing on the playground and getting bullied by other people, including our parents.

So why did I get a bad feeling about her using the phone now?

“I… guess Celestia liked the cat video? I went to see Katie when she knocked on my door, and I showed her my room and gave her some blankets from the closet. When I came back, she, uh, she was still looking though youtube, but I think when I went to sleep, she played the other apps.”

I stared at the space above her, giving the side wall a deadpan glare. “So my phone’s probably dead this morning then?”

“Probably…”

I sighed. Dammit Celestia, I know you’re excited about seeing things, but give me a break here…

“Just… just go get ready. I’ll see you after church, we need to talk about this whole… situation,” I gestured with my hand back at the apartment, “and figure out where we’re going to do. Uh, do you know where my phone is in my room?”

“She hid underneath the bed while I slept, so it should be there. If I’m not back after 5 minutes because I’m taking a shower, can you get my clothes from my room? So I can just change in there and go, cuz it’s kinda late…”

I sighed again, but not for getting Millie’s stuff. How late was it? “Yeah, sure, I’ll go get it after I put my phone on the charger. And find where Celestia went,” I added.

“Thanks Collin!” she replied with a muted happiness. At least she was the only one cheery this morning. I opened the door for her, and I saw her knock on Miss Strombi’s door before I closed mine. Turning back around, I saw Katie standing in front of Millie’s room in the hallway.

Eyes red and puffy? Yeah, she didn’t have any good sleep. I can’t blame her, it was a rough night on us all.

“Hey, Katie…” I walked up to her in the hallway and crouched down to her eye level, laying a hand on her shoulder. She flinched back when I touched her, I guess she was kinda scared of how I acted from last night. “It’s Sunday. What do you usually do on Sundays?”

“I… I would watch TV in my room, before mom and I go out to eat like all the other Sundays we do…” she hesitantly replied. She looked down at the ground, “I would also play some games if mom needed to do work. Then I would work on homework before dinner…”

Those games are probably all burned down, probably. Including that ‘new game’ I remembered her talking about with Millie, calling it Mario Kart when I turned to listen. She probably has a couple good memories with whatever consoles and games she had, and now that’s all gone.

Shit, the homework’s gone too.

“Was your homework in the fire?” I asked. She twitched when I said fire, that was probably not a good way to approach the subject of last night. She nodded slowly, looking at the floor and closing her eyes, already breathing haggardly as she began to cry for probably the thousandth time. “Well, uh, I guess this time you won’t have to do your homework, right? You have a pretty good excuse for not doing your homework now.”

Katie stared at the floor, but a small smile crept up into her face. “Yeah, but, I still feel bad about not doing it.”

Ugh, I really hate how much we pressure kids these days to be the absolute best in academics. Besides, how are they going to be the best students if our education system isn’t even ranked high? I’ve seen the numbers, I’m making sure to tell Millie how to balance potential and work with how to follow their dreams and enjoy life. C’s get degrees, people, the lowest scoring person to graduate from medical school is still called a doctor.

To be fair, however, I ain’t gonna be a patient for that doctor.

“Ah, don’t be so worried. What’s one homework missing out of plenty in the year? Just keep up with the tests and you’ll pass,” I remarked. “Maybe just study a little bit harder on this lesson to make sure you get it, you know?”

“Okay, Mister Kierkas,” Katie replied, now finally looking up at my eyes. Holy geez, her eyes are red. Make sure you clean them kid, or otherwise they’re gonna be sensitive to everything today.

“Collin,” I heard a voice behind me calling my name. I turned around to see Bridgette covered in a towel, having it wrapped around herself. Aw, c’mon, you had to use one of mine? Okay, first order of business, they’re buying their own things. Also, where did Bridgette sleep last night?

“Katie, I need to talk to your mom for a sec. Do you mind if you could go to the bathroom and wash your face, at least? Gargle some water in your mouth, we’ll get you a new toothbrush later, okay?”

“Okay, Mister Kierkas,” Katie replied. She stepped towards the door, but I held her in my hand for another minute.

“Just call me Collin while you’re here, Katie. Okay?”

“Okay Mist– uh, Collin,” she affirmed.

I let go of Katie to let her step into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. Turning back around, I was met with an irritable Bridgette. Well, ain’t this a throwback to the last days of our relationship.

“Today, we’re heading to the thrift store to get you guys some clothes and blankets, then we’ll head to the mall to let the two kids have some fun and eat, Millie helping to cheer up Katie, while we buy whatever we can’t get at the store. I know you’re not wanting for money like I am these days–”

“And yet you have a giant TV in the living room and a decent computer in your room?” Bridgette sassed at me. Hey, no sassing!

“Products of a different time in my life, when everything was almost about to make sense. Besides, I’m going to sell that computer any day now to some teen who wants to play all the video games he wants with it. I’d be much happier with a decent laptop anyway,” I replied, crossing my arms and glaring at the still wet Bridgette.

Normally, a woman who just got out of the shower and is covering herself with a towel that is somewhat small might excite most men. However, with Bridgette, I can’t see her in any way attractive anymore. She might have fixed herself now, and is finally taking care of her daughter instead of wasting her money off and partying with the same group of people I was in, but I just can’t see her the same anymore after we laid everything out for each other.

Plus, being burned out in two very deep yet complicated relationships kinda killed the mood for me for a long time.

“I can pay for clothes and I’ll get a sleeping bag for me while Katie sleeps in the couch, but,”

“Whoa, no,” I stopped her. “That couch is the most uncomfortable thing ever. Seriously, that’s the oldest thing in this whole building, probably, I’ve been needing to throw it out anyway. Tell you what, if you can pay the rest of what I was saving for a futon, than it’s yours for you and Katie to use in the living room whenever.”

Bridgette snorted. “Alright, fine, I’ll pay for the damn futon, now what else do you want to do?”

“Hey, don’t use that attitude here,” I seethed. Was Bridgette reversing back to what she was all those years ago? I don’t remember her being this aggressive since I saw her again two days ago.

Gah, two days ago? Felt like nearly half a year…

“Well what the hell do you want me to do, Cole?! My house just burned down, a lot of important information just… gone!” she exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air. “All the photos, gone! All of Katie’s old stuff, gone! All of our clothes, our items, our stuff! All just fucking gone!”

"SO HOW THE FUCK IS THAT MY PROBLEM?!” I screamed back. “Let’s not forget what the police said to me: you couldn’t say anything except my name, and that you wanted to come to me. I’ve told you this before, we are fucking through! I never even wanted to see your face again, and yet, here you are! Suddenly in my life, and when something went wrong, you came crawling back, like all those times all those years ago! You’re 39, when will you listen to me when I say GROW THE FUCK UP BRIDGETTE!”

“WHO ELSE WAS I SUPPOSED TO TURN TO?! My husband is gone, my family is mostly gone because of what they found out about you and me. I don’t have insurance,”

“And who’s fault is that?”

“…And I sure as hell do not hold a grudge against you after what happened.”

I scoffed. “Of course you wouldn’t hold a grudge, because you’re not the one who was taken advantage of when he was 20 years old.”

“Oh, sure, you’re the victim here, when all that happened was your shitty morals getting in the way of how I was raising Katie when you found out about her, because back then you sure were a good little religious boy…”

“And how, when I saw that you were practically neglecting her to the point where I was going to call CPS. I should have called CPS, just so Katie couldn’t have a spiteful, awful littlewhore of a bitch like you!”

“STOP!” a child’s voice yelled, Katie bursting out of the bathroom and suddenly hugging her mother’s leg. “JUST STOP IT! PLEASE!”

While Katie cried into her mother’s towel-wrapped leg, trying to cling to it as if it’ll leave, both Bridgette and I glared at each other, breathing heavily as we regained our air, having expelling it in yelling at each other. With each sob, Bridgette’s body trembled more, while I kept looking between her and Katie.

Finally, I couldn’t take the sight of Bridgette anymore. I stormed into Millie’s room, disregarding how messy the bed was since Millie hadn’t had the time to fix it this morning, like she always does, and grabbed her white frilled-bottom shirt and her jeans and shoes from the closet, before stepping back outside to see Bridgette now hugging the head of her daughter.

I walked beyond them to take the items to Millie, but backtracked to lean into Bridgette’s side, wanting to tell her one last thing.

“We’re going to get some clothes and some blankets. In two weeks, I want you out of here.”

Celestia took her ear away from the wall. She heard enough when Collin gave his ultimatum to Bridgette. She knew that there was some animosity, she figured as much ever since last night when Collin and Bridgette were arguing about where they should sleep, but she never expected Collin to be so angry at his old lover.

What exactly did happen between the two? From what she could gather, it was something about how Bridgette had treated Katie when Collin was 20 years old.

Celestia, once she had her guilty fun in exploring the new device unwittingly given to her by Millie, went back to her world last night to both muse on her findings and to let Twilight rest her magic. When morning came, she convinced Twilight to let her use her magic one last time to check on Millie, since she had a little fondness already growing for the young girl.

When she heard a child crying, she almost blew her cover to try and comfort the child, years of instinct of guiding her students as her own children overtaking her mind for a few moments. When she heard Collin try to comfort the poor child, of which wasn’t Millie, since the young girl’s voice was different than the alicorn remembered, she almost gained more respect for the man.

Almost.

She kept her ear glued to the crack under the door, as she heard every vile and spiteful thing both Collin and Bridgette threw at each other. Once she took her ear away, she glumly lifted her wings and found a spot in the corner of a desk where a large contraption like the TV was placed in the middle of the table, the spot being a good place to hide her golem until she could confront Collin for his horrid actions, slightly justified if they may be, considering what he said about Bridgette.

What sort of man is Collin? He is nice and patient with Celestia, and then can be so cruel and hateful with other people the next moment.

Celestia hoped that Twilight could figure out a way to make a permanent connection without the use of another pony real soon; she had a feeling she would be tied to this broken family for a long while.