Life goes on.

I spent the next week enduring the same schedule every day. Wake up early, hay, work, apples, go the sleep early and occasionally talk with AJ, Granny, Applebloom or Big Mac. Before I knew it I was trapped in the same cycle that I had been back home. Wasn't this meant to be a fresh start? One of the few posititives of becoming a pony and I was wasting it. I needed to get off the farm for a day. So I approached Applejack, and while we were walking back to the house I asked her.

"Is there anything fun to do in town? I'm starting to go a bit stir crazy from being on the farm for so long."

AJ thought for a moment, "We could go see the girls," she suggested. It was true that I hadn't seen Twilight for a while now. She must be busy studying.

"You have more friends than Twilight right, we met Rarity while we were walking through town."

"Of course ah' do! There's Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and Pinkie."

"You just reminded me, Twilight told me that Pinkie would ambush me but it never happened."

"Oh darn it, that must mean she's planning a big old party," AJ sighed.

"Why does she like parties so much?"

"There are some questions better left unanswered," AJ grumbled walking through the door into the barn. "Everypony has something they're passionate about, and Pinkie is passionate about parties, she can't get enough of 'em."

"And?"

"Nothing against Pinkie, she's one of my closest friends. But once you've lived here a couple years you'll have been to hundreds of 'em."

We both sat at the kitchen table. I kicked back and looked to the ceiling. "A party huh... I better make a good first impression." I'm a functional person, as long as I don't piss myself in front of everybody I should be fine.

Applejack nodded with a smile. "Don't you worry, this is the friendliest town you'll ever see. I'm sure you'll make some new friends as well."

I didn't really want friends considering that this was hopefully temporary but... I couldn't say that to AJ. So I just smiled and nodded. We had dinner and went back to work.

Eventually the weekend rolled around, so it was time to bite the bullet and head into town and see what Pinkie had put together. Applejack had predicted that she'd say something along the lines of "hosting a super-duper big part for a super-duper big pony!" Which was specific enough to make me believe it. Sure enough the streets of Ponyville were fairly empty considering that it was a Saturday. If there were at this not-so-surprise party the entire damn town would be there.

So we wandered through the streets for half-an-hour before AJ sighed and gave in. "Alrighty then, let's go down to Sugarcube Corner." We turned around and went back the way we came. In the middle of town lay my doom, Sugarcube Corner. Appropriately decorated to look like a gingerbread house. The curtains were drawn and the doors closed. A deep sense of foreboding lay in my chest as we approached.

AJ spoke with a whisper, "Try to look a bit surprised, Pinkie'll get sad if you don't."

Okay?

She motioned me to go ahead. I walked through the door.

Before I could prepare myself a gaggle of ponies hopped up from behind the counter and various pieces of furniture and bellowed "Surprise!" Party poppers were detonated and hooves were waved. Even when I knew it was coming it still made me jump. Above the counter was a banner, it read "Welcome to Ponyville!" and had several doodles scattered on it. In almost all of them that involved ponies, I towered above them. Was that the first impression that everybody got of me?

Before I could think on it any more a pink blur dashed up to me. Her hair was curly and wild and her blue eyes darted around with room with boundless energy. This must be the infamous Pinkie Pie, I thought to myself. "Were you surprised? Huh? Huh?" she asked with a level of insistance that spoke to a deep personal disturbance. I answered "yes," before she added me to the pile of bodies that must have been buried under the floorboards.

She smiled and spoke with words like a machine gun, a rapid onslaught of questions followed. "Well, I heard that there was a new pony in town but I didn't see you for aaaaaaages! So I decided to wait until I saw you for myself, and then I saw you walking with Twilight and I thought, wow! That's a huge pony! So obviously for such a huge pony we needed to throw a huge welcome party!"

I looked around and she wasn't lying, the entire town had shown up. Some of them had moved outside to clear up some space inside the store. The others who'd stayed watched with amusement. I supposed that Pinkie Pie did this for every new person in town, which once again begged the question of just how many ponies lived there. Becuase there was no way she did this if there were a lot of people moving in all the time.

"...Anyway, what did your papa and mama feed you to make you so big? It's cool! I wish I was big so I could stomp around town like a giant monster!"

"Give her a sec' Pinkie!" AJ intervened. "You're gonna' burn the poor gal out before the party starts."

Pinkie nods, "You're right Applejack, silly me. Nice to meet you, I'm Pinkie Pie!"

"Uh. I'm Toffee."

The crowd disperses a bit and break off into their own groups. Applejack and Pinkie pulled me over to a table at the side of the room. Twilight was there alongside some other ponies that I hadn't seen before. There was a white one with heavy makeup and stylish hair, a yellow one, and a cyan one with a rainbow mane. My eyes watered slightly looking at her.

"Howdy girls," Applejack greeted them, sliding in next to the neon monstrosity. There was no way that her hair was natural. Applejack patted the seat next to her, I accept it with the grace of a child. It creaked slightly and I made the kind of face you make when you're about to break somebody else's furniture with your fat ass. Thankfully it evened out, although it made it hard to relax.

"Pinkie wasn't kidding, you're a big mare!" the Rainbow disaster commented. "I'm Rainbow Dash, nice to meet you!"

"Rarity," the well-kept mare continued.

"Fluttershy," the yellow one whispered. How on the nose.

"I have to say dear, it must be a nightmare finding clothes in your size," Rarity started. Even though nobody wore clothing for the most part, I just nodded along to keep up the facade.

"She's a famer Pinkie," Applejack responds to an unspoken question. "That's why she's so big."

"You aren't that big Applejack," Rainbow scoffed.

"Some ponies are just... bigger," I offered in return, "Not much else to say about it other then that."

"Bigger? You'd probably be eye to eye with Celestia!" Rainbow snorted.

"I've uh, never seen her myself, or been close to her, I mean." I replied with trepidation. How often do ponies even see their leaders in public? It didn't seem to matter as Rainbow accepted my answer anyway, perhaps because ponies from outside of the Canterlot area don't see them all that often.

"She's the tallest pony I've ever seen. Right Twilight?"

"She is on the... tall side, yes." It seemed like Twilight was trying to avoid being insulting. From what I knew of her, she was Celestia's student in Canterlot before moving to Ponyville so they have a close relationship to each other.

"They're alicorns, or course they're tall," Rarity added. "You must let me make you something nice to wear some time, I'd love to see what I could do for you."

Applejack shook her head. "I don't see many formals in her future Rarity."

"You should never judge a book by her cover! All kind of ponies enjoy engagements and parties like that."

"She's right Rarity, I'm not into high society personally," I state in an attempt to end the debate. "But if you really want to, I'd be happy to give you some of my time."

To be honest, I didn't really want a dress slapped on me. But AJ was right, what were the odds that I was ever going to wear a dress? Even most of the ponies at Pinkie's party weren't wearing anything. Trying to make friends around town couldn't go amiss though, so if it made Rarity happy I'd go along with it to an extent.

"I better start thinking of some ideas!" Rarity chirped. I groaned inwardly.

"So how are you liking the town?" Twilight asked.

"It's okay, I haven't gotten to see much of it yet."

"Sorry," AJ apologized, "I've been working you to the bone ain't I?"

"Don't worry about it, I'm living on the farm so I have to pitch in."

"It's pretty different from one of the big cities," Twilight continued, "everypony knows each other, so it's very easy to find something to get involved in. Rarity and Mac are in a band, for example."

"Mac? I can't imagine him singing."

"He's our bass dear," Rarity nodded.

"Huh, you learn something new every day."

Eventually the table had split up and went their own seperate ways to mingle. I, however, was struggling with it. I was afraid of tripping over myself and letting somebody in on that I wasn't a pony. I didn't trust myself enough to play off a blunder with a laugh and a correction. Not to mention that everybody seemed just a little bit afraid of approaching me.

Was I too big? Too large for the lay-pony to come up to and strike up a conversation? It was my high-school prom all over again for God's sake. Except back then I wasn't transgender horse. My mind wandered a bit as I thought about the implications of transgenderism in a world with magic.

I felt a hoof tap my shoulder. I turned around to meet the eyes of Mac, who was holding a cup of some kind of juice in his other hoof. What fantastic dexterity. Mac wasn't good conversation usually, so I wasn't expecting him to bail me out of the awkward air that had descended on the party like a miasma.

“It’s fine, they just need time to get used to me.” I shuddered under my fur, remembering all of the team building exercises I endured during my lengthy post-graduation job hunt. “Once I get to know a few pe-ponies. It’ll smooth out.”

I looked to Mac, who was nodding along with my explanation. “Why? Are you a secret party animal Mac? I bet they can’t shut you up huh?”

“Nope. I like my peace and quiet.”

“Huh, Rarity told me that you have a nice set of pipes though.”

Mac bashfully turned to face the ceiling, “Aw, don’t bring that up.” For the first time in weeks I laughed - it took me by surprise. It felt good to find humour in something again. “I just help ‘em out sometimes.”

“Don’t be so shy about it, you’ve got a talent for it then.”

“My talent is apples, and only apples.”

“And singing.”

“And singing… wait.”

“Got you.” I pointed a hoof at Mac with a grin. The crisis that happened earlier was the farthest thing from my mind. “Hey, you know anypony here? Well enough to introduce me, I mean.” Mac looked around the party in search of somebody to talk to. I could see the sweat beginning to build on his brow as he tried.

“You aren’t very social, are you Mac?”

He hung his head low to the ground in defeat, “Nope.”

“Let’s both make some friends then.” I picked the first pony that I saw, an earth mare with a dark grey coat and black hair. I pulled Mac with me as I approached, “Hello, nice to meet you!” I began – the classic strategy of not giving your opponent time to escape.

The mare was caught off guard, “Oh, hello! The mare of honour. And Big Mac too!” She spoke with a natural rhythm in her voice. The hard part was following up.

“I’m Toffee,” I reached out my hoof and silently slapped myself for trying to do something weird again. The huge hole that I’d just blown in my chest cavity was soon patched over as she reached out and bumped slash rubbed her own hoof against mine.

“Octavia.”

Standing next to Octavia only made the size difference more evident than it was before. I was like a skyscraper, and Octavia clearly wasn’t the type of pony to do a lot of heavy lifting. Her frame was much smaller and slimmer.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Owe it to Mac not having friends.”

“I do.” He objects.

“Friends that aren’t here right now,” you correct course. “So I took it upon myself to get to know some ponies from around town before I drag the whole party to a standstill.”

Octavia nodded, “Forgive me if I’m being rude, but how did you become so… large?”

“I slept a lot.”

“Oh, truly?”

“No, my parents were just big too.” Big by pony standards, a little white lie to keep things rolling. I mean, technically it wasn’t false right? “And a lot of farm work. What do you do for a living?”

“I’m a cellist and composer. So I spend quite a lot of time travelling.”

“Really? Have you been anywhere interesting lately…”?

Soon enough I was deep into a discussion with Octavia about her life and work and the lies that I was worried about earlier faded into the background. Mac even joined in with a few anecdotes of his own about leaving home when he was younger.

The irregularity that had defined the past few months of my life wasn’t completely gone, but I took solace in the fact that I was surrounded by intelligent people with lives of their own and things to say.

Could be worse, I thought, I could have been turned into a jellyfish.

Author's Notes:

"Pinkie wasn't kidding, you're a big mare!" the Rainbow disaster commented.

"For you."

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Limping over the finish line with another chapter of Adjustment. To be honest I don't have much of an idea where to take this but I'm gonna finish it eventually.