I don't remember how long I had been crying for. All I knew was that I was alone. There was a snap and I jumped up, startled. "Sorry, Fluttershy." Rainbow said. I sighed and relaxed when I realized who it was. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"It's fine." I said. I looked at her costume and saw that it was soaked through. Her entire costume was torn and ripped from the rain. I guess it wasn't as durable as a normal Wonderbolts uniform.

"The rain is really hammering down on our costumes." she said. She was right. The fabric that was meant as the leaves for my costume we destroyed, and the hood was soaked to the point that I couldn't wear it. My hair covered half of my face the way it naturally did. I was cold and shivering and didn't what to say. "Have you been out here since I left?" she asked. I nodded my head.

I looked at her through my hair. "Umm...Rainbow, about the note, is everything-" I started to ask but she cut me off.

"Ah that was nothing. Just a little prank my parents pulled on us. They gave us some extra money for Felix and I. Nothing too much, just a little." she said.

"Oh, okay, good. I was worried something awful had happened." I said. I didn't really believe her story. She looked like she was hiding a lot of emotions that she didn't want me to know. The story about her parents wasn't an exact truth from what I could tell by the way she said it, but at the same time, I didn't want to bring it up. I've been lying about my parents for a long time, so I figured there was a reason for what she was hiding.

"It's all good. So I figured staying the night at your house might be a good idea. Felix is taking them out to dinner with some extra bits he won in a blackjack game. And when was the last time you had somepony as awesome as me stay the night with you?" she asked.

I smiled. "Not in awhile." I said. I couldn't believe what she said. I'm actually having a sleepover. I thought happily. My parents weren't too keen on me having a friend over, but I knew that they would let Rainbow Dash in. They always did and I wasn't sure why. I didn't question it though. I didn't want them to have a reason to keep her from coming over. "Maybe we could play some 'Hungry Hungry Pony.'" I said.

"That'd be great! I haven't played that in awhile. How about some 'Oranges to Oranges' after that?" she said. I smiled and nodded my head. There was another crash from inside and I winced. I knew they were thinking they were hitting me, that the glass was my skull.

I started to tear up again when Rainbow Dash came up to me and held me. "Hey, it'll be alright. I've got you." she said reassuringly. "When have I let you down?"

Never. I thought to myself. Out of all the ponies I know, she was the only one who stood up for me and protected me from those bullies. I stood up and led her inside. My mom threw another picture and my dad hit only the edge of it.

"I got un'!" he shouted with the bat in his mouth.

"Umm...mom, dad? Rainbow Dash is going to stay the night. You know, if that's okay." I said quietly. They waved me off and we walked behind my mom to get to my room. As we did, she threw another one and my dad smashed it to pieces, sending shattered glass in all directions.

"Great hit honey!" my mom said, finishing off her bottle of alcohol. I felt Rainbow push me into my room and lock the door behind us.

"How can you stand them?" she asked.

"Oh, they aren't so bad." I said. "They just get like this sometimes." I knew I couldn't keep it hidden forever, but I don't have a place to go if my parents get taken. I know some ponies have already been asking questions. My teacher noticed a bruise on my back one day and asked how I got it. I just told her I was walking through the house when a loose plank fell from the ceiling. It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't the truth either. My dad liked to set up traps that would hurt me and one of them involved trip wire and a wooden plank. She didnt say anything after that, but she did give me a journal. I kept it hidden so nobody else could see what was in there.

"Well I would've gone insane by now." Rainbow said.

Does always imagining new ways to be hurt count as insanity? I thought. Rainbow Dash was taking her costume off and turned to me. "Umm... Could you..." I said looking away from her. She turned around and I took the costume off. I wasn't shy about taking the costume off in front of her, I mean we rarely wear clothes as it is, but I hadn't thought of a way to hide the bruises yet. I positioned my wings to cover some of them, and moved some fur on my coat to cover a few others.

"Okay, I'm done." I said, taking 'Hungry Hungry Pony' out from my bed. I'm really good at this game. It's one of the few that I have so I usually end up playing by myself. It got lonely, but it was a good way to practice and figure out when to close the mouth of the pony and collect the white balls.

"How do you always win?" Rainbow Dash said after we played for an hour.

"It's not too hard. You just need to hit the lever just right." I said.

"How about a different game?" she asked. "You up for some 'Oranges to Oranges'?"

"Sure." I said and put 'Hungry Hungry Pony' back under my bed. As I opened up 'Oranges to Oranges' I found my journal in it. I quickly threw it underneath the bed hoping Rainbow hadn't seen it. I was lucky. She was too busy looking at her costume, which was worse off than mine. "So, are we playing for points or just playing to play?" I asked.

"Just to play. I want to see what crazy things you can come up with." she said as she scooted closer to the cards. Usually, she makes the craziest comparisons between the two of us, but she wasn't having any luck with her cards. I made her a little mad when the describing card was 'overrated' and I played the Wonderbolts. It was just a joke and she laughed at it, but she started to step up her game after that. Of course, I still had the better cards this time.

After awhile we played in silence. This game was fun, but with only two of us, it could get really boring really quickly. My parents were singing some songs in the living room and I just hoped that they wouldn't come barging in on us here. "Do your parents ever stop drinking?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"Well, yes. They have to if they want to take care of me." I lied. The truth is that they rarely stopped drinking. And the times they weren't drinking they were beating me.

"Fluttershy." she said slowly. "I don't think they really care for you that much. I mean, don't you see the way they treat you? They were playing baseball with pictures of you."

"They're drunk. I can't do anything when they're like this." I said, looking away from her.

"Even when they aren't drunk they treat you badly. I've seen the emotional impact they have on you." she said.

"Oh, not at all. Most of the time what they say is true. I am a very weak flier and am definitely more like an Earth Pony than a Pegasus. I mean, how else do you explain my Cutie Mark?" I said, looking at it. The three butterflies that represented my talent with animals. And meant my parents disapproval and a beating for it.

"I don't know. It just bothers me about how they treat you." she said.

How do you think I feel? I thought. We returned to our game. Nothing exciting or funny turned up in these next few rounds. "Want to do something else?" Rainbow asked.

"Like what?" I asked. There wasn't much to do at my house, so I wasn't sure what she had in mind.

"Well, what about your Cutie Mark? You know how I got mine, but I don't know how you got yours." she said.

I smiled as I remembered the story. "Well, after you and those bullies started to race, I fell off of the cloud. Since I'm such a weak flier and afraid of heights, I was too scared to flap my wings. I could have sworn I was going to hit the ground, but then a cloud had appeared under me. It wasn't like the white ones we see in the sky, but one full of butterflies." I told her all about the animals I saw and how happy I was too see them. They made me smile and actually feel like I was worth something.

"After your Sonic Rainboom scared them all away, I comforted them and told them to come out. They were extremely happy to be around me that I thought, 'This is nice. I wish I could do this constantly.' And then when I looked at my flank, there it was. Three butterflies." I said with a smile. I looked back at it and it filled me with happiness again. I didn't care what my parents thought. All that mattered was that I loved it and nopony was going to stop me from feeling that way.

"That's nice." she said smiling. "But not as cool as my Sonic Rainboom." I giggled. It was just like Rainbow Dash to be the one with the cooler story. "Did I ever tell you how Felix got his?"

"No." I said. "Isn't his some bits with arrows around it?"

"Yeah. He got it when I was three years old, but he's bragged about it so many times that I've memorized it." she said. I moved a bit so I could get comfortable. Knowing Rainbow Dash, it was going to be a long, interesting story.

"So for as long as I can remember, we have lived in our old rundown house. It wasn't much, but it was still home. Every month my parents would fuss over the bills and how we would pay for them. One month had been particularly rough on us since my dad had dropped a heavy box on his leg while unpacking a moving truck. The box smashed it and he had to go to the hospital. The bill was way higher than what we could afford. After a little bit my mom was able to volunteer at the hospital as a nurse so they could pay his medical bill.

When they had finally paid it off, the bill for our house arrived. We were broke. We had no money whatsoever to spend on the bill and keep us fed at the same time. Felix took a look at the bill while my parents went to go see how much they had in the bank. He found that if we would stop buying me my Wonderbolts chewing gum every time we passed the store, and started to eat less than what we already did, then we could pay it off. With a few calculations he was able to find a perfect median to pay the bills and keep us fed.

The funny thing is that he enjoyed it! He loved the math, the speculation, the counting, all of it. Not only were my parents impressed, they put him in charge of the bills. It was then that he found out that it was his super special talent. They took him to the Equestrian Stock Exchange a few days later. He helped manage that budget too, but he had a blast. Apparently, he was able to beat a top speculator at an Exchange Simulator. Whatever it was, it wasn't something that anypony could do easily without prior experience. Yet somehow he did. He was too young to do any real help for the family to bring in money, but he helped keep the budgets in check." she finished. "Pretty cool, huh?"

"Oh, yes." I said. It was actually. I had wondered about how he got his. I figured he just went on a field trip to a bank and earned it there. I looked back at my Cutie Mark. I couldn't help it. The more I thought about it, the happier I became. I felt something rise in my chest that I hadn't felt in a very long time. Joy. Not just happiness, but pure and utter joy. It was the best thing that happened to me. I knew what I was meant to do.

There was a knock on the door, followed by my dad walking in. "Fluttershy! Your mom is sleeping on the couch. If she's up before I'm back, you'd better pray you weren't the reason for it." he threatened. "Understand?" I nodded quickly, feeling the blood drain from my face. "Good." he said and stumbled out of the room.

"Where's he going?" Rainbow asked.

"Probably to get more." I said. Then he'll get even more drunk. And then I'll get hit in front of Rainbow Dash. And then I'll cry in front of her. And then I'll never be able to show my face to her again. I thought. "He always gets more when they run out." I felt myself close to tears. No matter who I was with or what I felt like, he would always be there to push me down and make me feel so small.

"Hey, let's go to bed. It's late and we've been up for too long." I said quietly. I felt so ashamed and depressed by what happened that I wanted to just sleep.

"I guess so." she said. She had been on the bed while we were playing and talking. She jumped off and laid on the floor.

"Oh, please Rainbow, take the bed." I said. "You're my guest and you shouldn't sleep on the dirty floor."

"Are you sure?" she asked. I nodded my head. "Well, thanks Fluttershy." she said, climbing back on the bed and laying down. I found a spot on the ground where I could reach my journal easily. I waited a few minutes until I heard Rainbow Dash snoring. I looked beneath the bed and found my journal laying next to 'Hungry Hungry Pony'. I grabbed it and a pencil that was just lying around.

I opened up to my previous entry. Entry 59, the entry from yesterday. My dad was still on a rampage today about it. I flipped to the next page and began writing my next entry.

Entry 60. Today wasn't any better than yesterday. My dad still hit me and kept getting madder and madder at me. I just don't know what to do anymore. No matter what I try, he still seems to think I'm worthless. It's Nightmare Night, however, and Rainbow Dash and I went out to get candy and see a concert. It was a lot of fun and a big improvement from my past days. But when she left me, I felt worthless again. She's spending the night though, and I felt extremely happy knowing she was going to be with me. For once, I felt like somepony loved me. And then my dad walked in. I thought that he might come and hit me just for being in the room. He didn't though. I don't think he wanted to do anything rash in front of Rainbow Dash. I also feel like he wishes she was his daughter instead of me. He boasts about her and compares us all the time. It hurts, I'm glad that she's my friend. Nopony else is there for me like she is.

I closed the journal and shoved it underneath the bed. I laid back down and looked up to the bed where Rainbow was still snoring. I don't care what they say. I thought. You're my friend and I will make sure that they know that.

Author's Notes:

Entry 59. This is the worst day I have ever had. Today, Rainbow Dash helped me again when I was being bullied by the school jocks. She challenged them to a race. I was the flag starter. When it started, I fell off of the cloud and landed on a cloud of butterflies. Suddenly there was a huge blast coming from above me. It scared all the animals off, but they came back out once I told them that it was safe. It was then I got my Cutie Mark. I was so happy and excited. I couldn't wait to tell my parents. But when I did, they just laughed at me. They said butterflies didn't do anything but fly, which they claimed I couldn't do. When I tried to explain it meant I was good with all animals, they laughed even more. They said I was a poor excuse for a filly. I couldn't even get a proper Cutie Mark that was meant for a Pegasus. They laughed and toasted to my pain. I don't know what's worse. Being mocked or laughed at by my own parents, or being hit by them.