“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

Pageant… We’ll make a wonderful pageant. You as chancellor Puddinghead… Me as Smart Cookie… Ruby as Clover the Clever… Alula as Commander Hurricane…

“There’s no pageant!”

“She’s screaming that from time to time,” Barrel Cortex muttered. “I guess she spends lots of time with Curtain Call…”

“No surprise,” Midline Shift replied. “Those two have lot in common…”

I have nothing in common with her!

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

I need to stay strong. One day I’ll get better. Then I’ll meet Silver Spoon and everything will be like before.

There’s no Silver Spoon! You killed her, remember?

“Delusional… Complete denial…”

“Y’know, the doctors said that she’s, like, in a complete denial,” Sunshine Rainbows said. “She killed her parents and she still talks how they’ll come to see her playing in that stupid pageant…”

There’s no pageant. And there’ll never be.

There’s no Silver Spoon.

Silver Spoon.

“Silver Spoon!” Diamond Tiara jumped out of her bed, wrapping her hooves around Nurse Charming’s neck.

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

“So, Diamond…” The doctor looked at her curiously. “Tell me what happened when Pipsqueak died…”

“I… It was like I lost control over my body… And when I regained it…”

“I just want to see the other foals… I want to see Silver Spoon.”

Moths. Thousands of moths. She tried to smash them, but the new ones were still appearing.

“At first it was that… Like with Ruby… Then there were voices… whispers… and then I saw her…”

Curtain Call turned her big, green eyes at her and started to play with her braid. “Of course it is,” she replied. “But who can tell what is a dream? Maybe you’re locked with me and this–” she pointed at the trees, “–is just a scenography? It’s raining, but we are dry. We’re sitting in the mud, but we’re clean.”

“Oh, come on…” Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes. “You’re gonna teach me about what is real? Don’t you remember the pageant?”

“There’s no pageant,” Curtain Call replied, smiling in her usual, a bit unconscious way. “But I prefer to think that there is. You know what’s the alternative…”

There’s no pageant. There’s no Silver Spoon.

There’s no Silver Spoon. But I prefer to think that she lives. You know what’s the alternative…

“Who knows, maybe there’s no Ponyville… No Silver Spoon… Just the loneliness and cold walls of the mental hospital…”

No! Silver Spoon lives! I’ve seen her!

“I will never leave you…”

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

“Midline, we can’t feed her with pills all the time! Just look at her! She doesn’t even know what’s going on around her!”

“Do you want to risk? We don’t know what triggers those attacks…”

“How do you want to learn what triggers them? She can’t even move a hoof!”

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

“Electroconvulsive therapy?” Filthy Rich’s face became white. “You still use it?”

“Yes, and it’s getting more and more popular…” Dr. Shift replied. “It’s not like in the books… Under anaesthesia it’s practically painless…”

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

“Well, some progress was made,” Midline Shift said. “She didn’t try to kill anypony recently. Maybe we’ll be able to cure her.”

And I’ll see Silver Spoon…

“She doesn’t look dangerous,” the reporter said. “Who’d say… How old is she now?”

“Fifteen,” Midline Shift replied.

“Do you know what caused that?”

“We can only guess. From what I know, her mother had a neurological problem…”

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

Sixteen.

“...a neurological problem. She passed out during a hike and fell down the mountain.”

“We’ll make a wonderful pageant…”

“Stop it! There’s no pageant!”

“Diamond Tiara!”

“I don’t know what happened. In one moment she was okay, and seconds later she wanted to smother poor Curtain Call.”

“How’s she now?”

“Still on meds. I don’t know what triggers those attacks.”

“So, you think she inherited it from her mother?”

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

Seventeen. I wonder if Silver Spoon has a coltfriend. Maybe Pipsqueak finally asked her out?

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

“Happy birthday, Diamond Tiara!”

Diamond Tiara slowly opened her eyes. She looked at nurse Charming Heart and smiled weakly. She saw that the nurse’s mane started to go grey and began to wonder why she hadn’t noticed that before.

“So, how am I?” she asked.

“Doctor Shift saw your results. It seems that you may leave us soon,” Charming Heart replied. “By now, you can get out of the secure unit.”

“Great!” Diamond Tiara jumped out of her bed. Over the last couple of years it became a bit too small for her. She stretched her hooves and went out of her room.

Walking down the corridor, she thought about the ponies she’d met there. Of them all, only Curtain Call was still in Trottingham; yet, she was to be relocated to the hospital for adults soon.

It seemed unbelievable, but the first to leave was Pepper. After he had finally started to take his pills, his mental health quickly improved and he left the hospital when he was fifteen. From what Diamond Tiara heard, he was now living in Baltimare. Soon after, Sunshine Rainbows left the hospital and never came back. Later, Diamond Tiara overheard the doctors saying that she’d ran away from home, went to Manehattan and started to work in the local funeral parlour.

Now, it was Diamond Tiara’s turn. She didn’t pack her things yet; she couldn’t stand a thought that she’d have to unpack them again.

She couldn’t exactly remember the next couple of days. She was still living in her room, but she could walk around the whole hospital. However, she didn’t do that much; she was nineteen and all the foals were much younger than her, so she had nothing to talk about with them. Some of them even thought that she was a new nurse.

Finally, the day came. When she woke up in the morning, she saw Filthy Rich standing in the door to her room. It struck her how old he looked; of course, he’d been visiting her from time to time, but she didn’t remember that; everything was a continuous blur of screams, weird whispers and fragments of conversations.

“Hello, Diamond,” Filthy Rich said. She hugged him, noticing that she was now a bit taller than him. Tears were flowing from her eyes, but she didn’t care; finally she was free.

When Diamond Tiara was younger, she was often bored by the long train ride from Trottingham to Ponyville. But this time it was different.

“How’s Ponyville?” she asked. “Do you think they won’t have anything against me?”

“Oh, lots of things happened since then…” Filthy Rich replied. “Berry Punch… Well, nevermind. I talked to Apple Bloom a couple of days ago; she forgives you.”

“Really?” Diamond Tiara’s eyes widened. Of all the ponies, it was Apple Bloom’s and Scootaloo’s reaction she was worried about the most. From what Filthy Rich told her, Scootaloo didn’t take well the fact that Diamond Tiara wanted to kill her.

“You’ll never believe,” Filthy Rich said. “Scootaloo trains to be a royal guard.”

“No way!” Diamond Tiara exclaimed.

“She really does,” her father replied. “And Silverspeed…” His expression faltered. “You’d better avoid her. She never came to terms with…”

“Neither did I,” Diamond Tiara said and sighed heavily. “Silver… She only wanted to help me and it…” She pointed at her head. “It killed her…”

Filthy Rich only nodded his head.

With the screeching of the brakes, the train skid to a halt. Diamond Tiara stood on the platform and an idea appeared in her mind.

“I need to go to the cemetery,” she said to Filthy Rich.

“Are you sure you want to do that?” he asked.

Diamond Tiara nodded. “I need to apologise,” she replied. “That… That’d be right, I think…”

Walking down the street, she quickly noticed the curious glances ponies were giving her. She trotted past Lyra and Bon Bon’s house and saw them both hanging out in the garden. Lyra waved her hoof at her, but Bon Bon turned her head back, trying not to look at her.

“Good morning,” Diamond Tiara said. “And… I’m sorry, Ms. Bon Bon… I… I wasn’t myself…”

Bon Bon muttered something under her breath. For a moment, Diamond Tiara stood before her in silence. Finally, Bon Bon spoke, “I know you weren’t yourself. I don’t blame you, just… I don’t think I’ll be able to forgive you…”

Diamond Tiara nodded.

“She’d be nineteen…” Bon Bon continued.

Diamond Tiara shuddered. Before Bon Bon could say anything, she was running down the street, trying to hold back tears.

She stopped by the cemetery gate. She looked at it unsurely before taking a step forward. The ponies she wanted to meet were dead; unlike the living, they couldn’t hurt her.

She felt dull pain in her legs when she was climbing up the hill; ten years spent in a small room weren’t good for her stamina and now she could feel it well. She started to sweat; even though it was September, it was still sunny and the dusty path was burning her hooves.

Finally, she saw them. Seven white tombstones standing in a row. She read the name and dates on each of them and sat in front of the last one.

Silver Spoon. Diamond Tiara looked at the ground beneath her hooves. Reading her name would be like admitting that she was dead.

“Don’t worry, Diamond. I told you that I would never leave you…”

Startled by the voice, she raised her head. She was there. Unlike Diamond Tiara, she didn’t age a day since they’d last met.

“Welcome home, Diamond Tiara,” Silver Spoon said, jumping from the tombstone and smirking at her playfully.

Author's Notes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJXN5VPkyH8

Of course, it's not the end. In fact, I plan three more stories taking place in the same universe as Sleepless. Two of them, Manehattan Blues (teaser cover art here) and Thirsty will be posted soon. The third will be like One Ring: One to bring them all and in the darkness bind them...