I love the thrill of flight.

And that’s a lot coming from someone like me who thinks love is just a bunch of mushy nonsense.

To feel the rush of air as I surpass speeds everyone said was impossible; that’s awesome. Seeing the ground go by in a blur of color and knowing that from anypony on the ground I’m just as quick is the best. I’d even say it’s what I live for! Heh, just look at my cutie mark. I got it when I broke the sound barrier, something nopony else has ever done I might add.

But that’s all just another day in the life of Rainbow Dash.

So now you can imagine the unbearable pain I was going through at the hooves of my so-called friend. I was trapped, practically strapped down by fabric, in a hellish world called a boutique and being held hostage by a torturess by the name of Rarity. She claimed to be taking “quick and easy” measurements for her clothing for pegasi but every answer to “Are we done yet?” just lead to another five minutes of agony until I managed to choke out the question again from under the clothing she insisted wasn’t too tight. Just form-fitting, she said. If that wasn’t bad enough, she decided to conveniently place me right by the upstairs window, knowing full well I’d be thinking about jetting out of there and returning to the free skies where I belonged. So you can’t really blame me when I actually did that on a break I declared myself.

She looked a little annoyed when I got back half an hour later, but hey, she’s always working and could use a rest. At least I was kind enough to wait until she got the (ugh) dress off of me. Why did I even offer to help again? Oh, right. It’s because I’m a nice friend.

Anyways, we were on another break some time too long after the last one, this time one she declared. She left off to some other room for some reason. I think it was about powdering her nose but that doesn’t make much sense. Why would you put a bunch of itchy, sneezy stuff on your nose? I don’t know.

I was left to myself for the time being but I didn’t have anything to do. Something told me flying off wouldn’t be as appreciated this time so I decided to stay put. To the house, at least. I left the room I was in just for the sake of some new scenery. I glided down the stairs, quite literally, and made my way to the living area. Maybe I could grab a snack, I was thinking when, I saw the piano.

Has she always had a piano? was my first thought. She would definitely be the type to have one just for decoration. All the big, fancy mansions seemed to have one. This definitely wasn’t a mansion by anyone’s standards but Rarity was the type to make the most out of what you have. That’s why she’s a designer.

The piano sat there in its own grandness and was colored a stark, shiny black, as they always seem to be. Seeing it was a bit odd to be honest. Sure, I’d seen some recently at events like the Gala a while back, but this one was just being here without any sort of purpose. There wasn’t any pianist playing a melody. It was like it just came in one day and plopped itself down, having had enough of the snobbish crowds in Canterlot.

I just stared at it for a moment. It brought back some memories I hadn’t thought of in a long time. Years, in fact. Maybe it was the sheer randomness or some weird sense of nostalgia but I decided “Eh, Why not?” and took a seat at the stool. Just real quick, I assured myself.

Placing my front hooves on the keys and my others in position for the pedals at the base of the instrument, I found a familiar, old position that started a tune. I hadn’t played this in a long time but that only had so much on hours and hours of muscle memory. Starting on a chord of notes B accompanied by the two same keys an octave lower, I hit each note of the chord individually going upwards before jumping up to notes higher than the original starting point. The melody repeated a pattern similar to this a few times, changing the arrangement of notes as it went on, before shifting into a new progression brought together by the pedal that held the note longer when I let go of the actual key. I’m sure it sounded nice but it wasn’t the style of music I like, not counting the lack of electric guitars. It was too slow, which tended to be something I never liked. It picked up later, but that took about a minute or two to get to. The fact that I actually did get to it probably should have told me how long it had actually been, but I didn’t notice. What can I say? I was concentrating.

“Why Rainbow, that is simply marvelous!” she said from behind me, causing me to end the song abruptly with an awful clash of sounds.

I’ll admit I jumped a bit from the random voice out of nowhere but I definitely wasn’t scared. I was only caught off guard. You think I’d be used to that with how much I hang out with Pinkie.

I whipped around. “Rarity!”

She either didn’t hear or didn’t care for my tone. “I had no idea you were so gifted in such a skillful talent.”

“I’m not-” wait, what? “What do you mean skillful talent? Are you saying flying isn’t skillful?”

She backpedaled, “Oh no, never! I was just referring to…” She raised a hoof to her chin as she thought of an unskillful word.

“High class? Or cultured?” I deadpanned.

“Yes,” she stated with a completely straight face, avoiding answering either question.

“Yeah, well… I am. You know those stories of parents forcing their foals to learn an instrument while telling them ‘it’s a good thing to learn’ or ‘you’ll appreciate it when you’re older’? Yeah.”

“It sounds like you’ve put some thought into this.”

“I guess so.”

“By that tone of voice, I can assume you have yet to appreciate it as you’ve gotten older?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

I raised my own eyebrow. I didn’t like the way she said that. “Yeeeeah,” I drew out suspiciously.

“May I ask why?” she asked lightly.

“Because it’s boring! And slow and time consuming and I’d rather be flying,” I spilled out. Odd, I could’ve sworn that felt like I’d said that before. Déjà vu.

“But Rainbow, dear, surely you must understand the instrument if you’ve played as much as you implied.”

Oh boy.

“The musical process may be slow but the reward is much greater.”

I groaned internally.

“I, myself, have actually played piano a bit in my youth but never to a serious extent. I could only dream of having your level of skill.” Her eyes widened.

I knew exactly where this was heading.

She gasped. “Idea!” her sing-song voice rang out, “I know! Why don’t we play together? You could even teach me a thing or two. We can’t let that musical talent go to waste.”

I blinked.

Okay, not what I was expecting. I was expecting her to ask me to play more, like in front of our friends or something. No, this was much worse. Me playing is one thing. Teaching it would be awful. And teaching it to Rarity of all ponies would be horrible!

Er, no offense to her. She’s just a little… uptight at times.

I looked into her eyes which were happily smiling at me with blatant giddiness. Great, just guilt me into it, why don’t ya? “Um, I’d… love to? But I can’t really do that right now because of,” I waved my hoof, trying to think an excuse, “I’m busy.” Really?

“Oh, I know that already, Rainbow,” she said.

“Huh?”

“We have to get back to dress making!”

“Huh.”