The following day was largely swallowed up by your ‘homework.’ Like any homework you weren’t too enthusiastic about it, but it was exciting in the sense that it made you feel like you were an inventor. It was also going to be responsible for your substantial bump in income, so you weren’t about to complain. But the more you worked on it the more hesitant you felt about the whole deal. Part of you wanted to improve breakfast making efficiency for every equine household, but another part of you was afraid of breaking some unspoken prime directive. What if you interfere with their timeline and the universe just disappears you because you're not supposed to be here or something, wasn’t there a Twilight Zone episode about that?

Your reasoning nullifies that fear before it gets too out of hand. Even with the butterfly effect or whatever it’s not like a toaster is going to change the course of history. Speaking of which, the little ‘bread oven’ as Dash put it was proving much more difficult to design than you anticipated, especially since you couldn’t take simple things like nickel wire for granted. Or pencils.

It was a pain in the ass having to dip a quill in ink every ten seconds. But as predicted your diligence pays off and by dinnertime you have a full size set of schematics for a 4-piece toaster. They were by no means pretty, but they contained all the proper dimensions. In the end it cost you three broken quills, two vials of ink and the better part of your temper. You neatly align the papers on their end and place them in a stack at the corner of your coffee table. Joints pop as you arch your back for the first time in hours. You’d taken a break earlier that morning to make brunch, but you were too lazy to make anything other than buttered bread and apple slices.

Numb feet shuttle you around to the necessary food and utensil dispensaries until you’ve created an equally pitiful dinner. You plop down on the kitchen stool with a creak and bite into your food. The calendar on your fridge draws your eyes as you chew your welfare sandwich. You can’t help but chuckle inside at the crude blue drawings Dash did of herself performing radical tricks on the date blocks. She said it was to help you remember where she was during her trip.

Today is Saturday. Two more days…counting today. Two more days and then Dash gets back. Then you get a whole day with her before you start your job.

You start with the blue pegasus speeding through Friday, pulling a banner that said ‘Canterlot’. The next block has her cartwheeling over a skyline that was apparently Manehatten, Sunday’s block shows her standing triumphantly over the crumbling word ‘Baltimare’—apparently she was going to crush it. You snort at the ridiculousness; you still can’t get over how similar Equestrian names are to US cities. It was like one giant cosmic joke delicately interwoven into this world just so you could find some temporary humor in it. Or maybe you weren’t the first human? If you weren’t, no one’s ever mentioned anything of it. You’re momentarily overcome with the desire to find a library and search the history books for references to humans. Nah…you’re not in a book-scouring mood right now. You take another bite.

And of course there was also the possibility that it could all just be a dream induced by a coma, and one day you’ll wake up in a hospital…or if they pull the plug you’ll probably just pass out…or maybe you’d stay in your dream?

But it’s probably not a dream because they don’t usually have the long boring parts where you sit by yourself in a dimly lit apartment and chew your bread to the sound of a ticking clock.

Before you take another bite you go to pinch yourself, then pause. You’d done it a hundred times before; you knew what the outcome would be. But deep down there was still that nagging fear…what if you wake up this time? A few months ago it wouldn’t have bothered you that much, but now…you look back at the crudely scribbled azure pegasus on the calendar. There was far too much for you here to go back to what was. You’d found something, someone else to live for. And that came with responsibilities…like not pinching yourself.

It was probably just your lethargy and paranoia talking, but either way you go back to eating your dinner. You finish up rather quickly and rather than bum around inside, you decide to take a walk in the cool evening air. A few ponies are still out and about, mostly the younger types heading out to socialize on a Saturday night. Despite the fact that the pegasi weather teams actually changed the seasons practically overnight, there was a bit of a general climate shift throughout the year. The change was much more noticeable to your bare skin, and over the past few weeks, the evenings had been getting a bit nippier.

Winter is coming.

Of course, there wouldn’t be any morning frost or snowfall until it got ‘scheduled,’ but shorts and a t-shirt was still a bad choice of attire. You break into a light jog to warm up.

A few minutes later you find yourself on the path to a familiar grassy knoll in the park—one you frequented when you first arrived. When you get to the base of the hill you notice someone, or rather some pony silhouetted against the skyline at the top. Whoever it was is demurely sitting on their haunches watching the golden aftershocks of the recently set sun. Couldn’t hurt to make new friends right? Worst case scenario they’d freak out and run away; that happened once before.

You walk up the side of the hill making sure to step heavy enough that they would hear you coming. But the stranger doesn’t turn around. As you get closer you could distinguish the frame of a skinnier stallion and he was…crying? You were never very good at calming people down, but it was too late to turn back now. Besides, you felt kinda bad for him…crying to himself all alone in the park. What could be so bad as to…oh shit.

It's Zephyr.

Unfortunately the lighting didn’t make his coat and mane distinct until you looked at it from a different angle—that angle being right next to him.

His watery eyes meet yours before widening. He shoots to his hooves and takes a step back, “Whoa! Calm down, I’m just here for the scenery.” You put your hands up in a universal disarming fashion. You weren’t sure how you were going to handle this, but you didn’t want to bring up any bad blood between you again.

He watches you warily, a hint of suppressed anger behind his watery eyes, ”I was just about to leave anyways.” He mutters venomously before sniffling. He turns around to go.

“Wait.” Oh shit man, what are you doing.

He stops and looks back at you with an annoyed expression. Dammit why’re you trying to be nice?

“I uhh…I’m sorry.”

His expression doesn’t change, but nevertheless he doesn’t immediately blow up on you. It’s extremely awkward, but you were too deep down the rabbit hole to stop, “I’m sorry about your nose.”

You leave it at that and wait for a response. He glances at his own snout before looking back to you, ”You think I care about my stupid snout?” You half expected him to get mad again, who wouldn’t. But what he was saying didn’t add up. Your confused look prompts him further.

“If I cared about my snout I would’ve told the guard you assaulted me! The reason I didn’t is because I didn’t want to involve her in this!”

His words stop you in your tracks and you feel your chest go cold, not out of fear, but out of guilt. This whole time you acted like you were the only one who could care about her, but you’ve just been proven wrong.

His voice pierces your thoughts louder than he was yelling before, “But now that my life is ruined I’m thinking I just might! I don’t know where you came from but here you can go to jail for that sort of thing!”

“Yeah and what are the laws on voyeurism and stalking! You think they won’t charge you with something too?”

The sharp rebuttal silences him for a moment and he looks away, there was no escaping the facts of what both of you had done. You take a deep breath, as much as you wanted to argue the morality of what you’d done this isn’t going to help anything.

“Look, I said I’m sorry can we just move on?”

”You think everything’s just gonna go away because you said sorry!”

He takes a step towards you and his eyes burn with anger, ”You ruined my life you big…bald…m-monkey!” He struggled with that last part. You resist the urge to escalate the situation, it was your sympathy that got you into this after all.

“You done?” You ask monotonously.

He just sits there breathing heavily through flared nostrils, “You of all ponies stole her from me!”

Now he’s done. You take a moment and consolidate your thoughts over the sound of his heavy breathing, “Look, I don’t want to be your enemy.”

”But you are!”

“No, I’m not.”

”I loved her and you stole that away!”

All this yelling was beginning to get on your nerves, “I didn’t steal anything because she wasn’t yours to begin with. She wasn’t anyb-anypony’s. She’s an individual with individual feelings, and she gets to decide what she wants to do with them. And from what I’ve seen, you were pretty far from winning her over even without me around.”

He winces at that last line and his eyes start to water up again. Shit, you’re not here to make him feel any worse dumbass.

“That was…I’m sorry that was uncalled for.” You pause for a moment and let it sink in for what it was worth.

Whether it was your comeback or the fact that you were still trying to make peace with him, he seems to calm a bit. His voice comes out much quieter this time, ”She just made me so happy, I loved talking to her and…and…” He starts to choke up a bit.

Damn, you actually feel his pain. The thought of losing Dash to someone else made you nauseous. That mutually shared sobering idea is what allowed you to feel empathy for your self-proclaimed enemy.

You suddenly feel a bit awkward looking down at him, so you sit facing the horizon, “I uh…I know these words mean nothing coming from my position…and I understand your anger, but you can’t look at this thing in terms of absolutes.”

More sniffling. ”W-what?”

“I mean, you can’t just say ‘I’m right, he’s wrong,’ I don’t think it’s as simple as that.”

”So you’re saying I shouldn’t think what you did was wrong?” You can hear a hint of rage working its way back into his side of the conversation.

”I was wrong.” He gives you an intrigued stare.

“I was wrong to try and shun you off when we first met, I was wrong to punch you…and kick you…and pull on your tail—”

”—So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying we both have to look at our actions first before we blame each other. Did you ever think that Dash deserves some privacy and respect? You were so focused on how she made you feel, you didn’t stop to think how you made her feel.”

Damn, where did all that come from. You ought to be a relationship counselor or something. Your words hit him like a freight train and you can see all of his anger and frustration melt away as realization dawns on him, “I’m in no position to judge whether one love is more valid than another, I don’t think anyone is, but it’s not hard to see what the results of our actions are.”

He stays seated next to you and a moment of silence passes as the sky gets darker and darker. You cross your arms to keep them warm.

”You’re right.” His hoarse voice breaks through the breeze.

You look over at his crestfallen features—surprised at his confession, ”All I could think about was how mad I was at you for what you did, it didn’t occur to me whether she was happy or not.”

For some reason your guilty feeling returns full force and you both share a quiet moment of reflection. The sun slowly slips below the horizon waving a golden-red goodbye to the day. Both of you watch in silence until one of you clears their eyes and nose of lingering tears.

“For the record I’d be just as pissed if I were you.”

He manages to crack a small smile underneath his drying eyes, ”Heh, yeah…”

“And if you think your nose was bad, my gut still aches every time I sit down.”

He chuckles lightly at your joke before going back to staring at the horizon, ”Hey…thanks for apologizing. I still feel like crap, but uh…it’s nice to not want to murder you anymore.”

Geez. You weren’t sure how to take that, “Yeah…”

Another awkward silence, ”Soo…I’ll uh, be on my way.” You turn back and nod to him as he slowly walks away, leaving you to contemplate what just happened.

That was…interesting, but it did feel good in the end. You were always bad at holding grudges. You can’t be friends with everyone, but at the very least you can keep this thing from getting any worse. It’s also nice to know he doesn’t want to murder you anymore. You wait until he’s long gone before heading back towards the town lights. You almost forgot how much ponies liked to party on Saturdays until you walked through town. It's like a holiday or something. Luckily your apartment was fairly secluded, its closed door provided a high level of sound mitigation.

Your apartment seems just as empty as when you left it, but now you have a plethora of thoughts to entertain you. You’d all but forgotten about Zephyr over the past few days. Needless to say it was pretty sobering realizing he was still messed up over your encounter…in more ways than one. It was even more sobering realizing you’d been the equivalent of your high school bullies. Well it’s not a perfect analogy, but you definitely misjudged him.

You juggle some thoughts as to how to breach the topic to Dash when she gets back. You need to let her know what’s going on, but if you tell her the truth it’ll make you look like the jerk that you are. You already know the answer to the unspoken question, you were going to lay it all out and be truthful with her, she needs to know what kind of person she’s involved with.

You’re suddenly overcome with feelings of inadequacy, it was the same nagging feeling you got back in the shop at the Wonderbolt’s show, but this time it was stronger and identifiable. It was more than a feeling; it was a flurry of odd emotions shrouded by an overarching dread that pulled the strength from your diaphragm. It was like the feeling you get after you do something wrong but before the impending retribution. You felt many things, but they all pointed towards the same conclusion.

You don’t deserve her.

That one thought rings out like a bell and sends a chill down your spine. You hated the very idea of it but you can’t argue its validity. She’s incredibly beautiful, she’s a national hero, she’s famous, she’s definitely not strapped for money and she’s dating…you.

The more you entertained it the more the poisonous thought spread. It wasn't a sudden revelation either; it'd been surviving in the recesses of your mind ever since you first considered a relationship with Rainbow. The encounter with Zephyr had emboldened your self-esteem, but what does that mean? Just because he was unqualified to be with her that made you a better choice? By what metric?

What are you even…a bald monkey for one…your existence here is probably a mistake. If there is a God, he probably just messed up…that or he put you here because he thought it’d be entertaining.

That mistake was now involving your best friend…someone you genuinely cared about. You’ve seen how half the ponies act around you, what they think of you…what will that do to her career once everyone finds out about you? Sure her team knows but they’re her friends too. She’ll get eaten alive by the newspapers, they’ll make her the laughingstock of the team and destroy her reputation…because of you.

And even if that didn’t matter there was still the fact that you’d never be able to give her children or pony-lets or whatever they’re called. You punctuate your thoughts with a deep breath to calm yourself down. Foals, that’s what they’re called. You can’t give her foals…even with the help of magical voodoo. That was one thing you knew for a fact, Twilight had entertained your question on the specific topic of interspecies children during one of your 'orientation classes.' Something about two different magic’s not being compatible or something.

You hated yourself for it, but you can’t deny the fact that Rainbow Dash was pretty far out of your league by any standard. That was something you weren’t sure how to talk about. You want nothing more than to stay with her, but she needs to know what she’s getting into.

You crash on your fresh bed sheets but you don’t feel any more comfortable. You weren’t even sure what you want anymore. You wanted what was best for her, that you were sure of. But the last few days had undoubtedly been the best of your life and you don’t want that to stop. Can you have both?

Despite your catharsis on the hilltop, you find nothing but inner turmoil as you struggle to clear your mind and get some sleep.