Be a full, and accomplished feeling Floor Bored, just saying goodby to your GramGram. "Make sure ya eat that tonight, ya hear? It ain't half as good if you leave it in the fridge all night," the old mare warns, gesturing at the container of leftover quiche in Anon's hands.

"Looking forward to it," Anon says with a genuine smile. "Frankly, we'll be lucky if it isn't gone before we get home. That bus ride takes awhile."

"Good, ya need some more meat on the rest of your bones. Your flanks been hogging it all," GramGram says, getting your smile to drop.

"O-okay, GramGram, it's been great, thanks for teaching me how to make quiche, but we better get going," you say, pushing at a confused Anon's leg as he looks at his backside.

"Wait, flank is pony for butt, right? Did she just say my butt's big?"

"Yep," GramGram confirms with a nod. "Don't worry though, it looks firm. Has some nice muscle."

"By! See you next week!" you continue, actually getting Anon to skid across the ground with the force of your push.

His heels leave trenches in the grass before he finally starts walking. "Okay, okay, we're going. It was nice seeing you, Miss Worn. And, ah, thanks for the compliment, I guess."

"Just stating a fact," the old mare says with a smile. "And it's always nice talkin' to ya, Anon. See you next week."

You couldn't have gotten Anon out of there fast enough as your face burns. Why, oh why does your GramGram have to be so embarrassing.

"Your grandmother's kind of odd," Anon comments once you're out of the building and on the sidewalk, making your face burn even hotter.

"Yeah, I know, and I'm so sorry about that thing she said. She's from a different time, you know?"

Anon chuckles. "It's fine. She may be odd, but she's cool," he says, getting you to breath a slight sigh of relief.

Some colts can get pretty sensitive about stuff like that, you've heard, and you'd rather not have Anon mad at your GramGram. Things are awkward enough as it is whenever the two start talking.

"Is my butt really big though?"

You nearly choke on your own spit. "W-what?!"

"I mean, it's not that big, right?" he continues, looking down over his shoulder.

Your eyes follow his and you blush. The way he's twisting his back just so, one leg bent to lift a heel an inch off the ground. It really makes his flank stretch the fabric of his jeans. Unf, why must he wear so much clothing, the tease. "No- I mean, it's not huge, but, um nice, but not in a pervy way!" you attempt, feeling yourself spiral out of control.

Before you can crash and burn, Anon shrugs. "Guess not having an elevator in the building and living so high up helps. Really, elevators in general are pretty scarce around here. Wonder why?" He looks to you. "Anyway, you ready to go to the library?"

"Yes! The library! The boring, not juicy library!"

"Did you say juicy?"

"To the books!" You quickly move past the confused human and trot down the street. He catches up a moment later and the walk becomes far smoother as pedestrians naturally part around the big alien amoungst them.

"Guess we're skipping the carrot dogs this time," Anon states conversationally. "Shame, but I guess this quiche makes up for it. You really knocked it out of the park, Floor."

Even though it's not the first time he's complimented the meal, you still feel the butterflies in your stomach take off. "It was mostly GramGram who made it. I just cut the vegetables and put it together how she told me."

"Well, you did a good job cutting those vegetables, and you put it together perfectly."

You regret not putting your hood up as soon as you were out of the building, because now all Anon has to do is lean down to see the wide smile you can't force off of your face. You drop your head to hide it, but brush into a passing pony a moment later and remember you need to pay attention to where you're going. "So, you really liked it, huh? M-maybe we can make it together sometime. I could teach you the recipe."

"Sounds good to me," Anon agrees. "And it's pretty healthy, right? That's always good. I mean, it's just vegetables, mashed potatoes, and cheese."

"And the secret blend of spices," you say, quoting GramGram. "The spices are very important."

"If it's a secret, will your grandma be okay with you telling me?"

"GramGram likes you though, so I'm sure it's okay," you reason.

"Aww, makes me feel like I'm part of the family," kids Anon, causing you to nearly trip.

At his words, you can't help but imagine Anon really being part of your family, and you have to suppress the giddy feeling that bubbles up. Reminding yourself that Anon only thinks of you as a friend helps squash those feelings, and your mood sobers for the rest of the walk to the library. Upon seeing the old, but dignified library, your mood starts to sour from there.

"Phew, about time. These books were starting to get heavy," Anon comments. "I think I'll ask Page Turner to suggest some lighter ones this time. Love and Tolerance is pretty thick."

And now your mood is dipping into the red. Maybe if you're lucky, that mare will have called in sick today. Entering through the double doors, you quickly recognize the grey mare sitting behind the counter even at this distance, and a frown pulls at your lips.

As Anon smiles, shifting the books and food to one arm so he can wave with the other, you resist the urge to pull off our sweater and puff out your chest tuft. You have no right to act like Anon is yours, you try to convince yourself, and the human himself said the grey earth pony is just a friend, so there's no reason to get upset.

Despite knowing these things, the wide smile Anon directs the other mare's way sends a stabbing pain through your heart. You do your best to ignore it.

Be Anonymous, currently walking with a pep in your step as you move to the library desk. Though you've only had one meeting with her, and it's only been a week since, you're still looking forward to talking to Page Turner. Besides Floor, the librarian is really the only friend you've made in Equestria.

You aren't arrogant enough to count the princesses as friends, even if they've shown you great kindness and you've had plenty of pleasant conversations with them back when you first arrived. And the few other amiable interactions you've had were all with coworkers while you were still being shuffled around for a job. Yeah, you got along with some of those ponies, but there was never any effort made to stay in contact after you were inevitably replaced by a pony with a special talent.

Page Turner, however, isn't a princess being cordial, nor a coworker making pleasantries, but instead a pony who is generally interested in being friends with you, and it feels nice.

"Yo, Page Turner, how's it been?" you ask. "Anything big happen since last week?"

The mare giggles and shakes her head. "Nope, same old same old. Books are checked out and more need to be re-shelved."

"Sounds exciting," you joke, placing the three books down on the desk. "Got another action-packed job for you."

She smiles brightly. "You read them all, then?"

"For the most part," you explain. "The journal I only actually read through about half, but I did skim the rest."

"Oh," she begins, tilting her head. "Was it not interesting?"

You shrug. "Nah, the stories were interesting, but I kind of already knew most of the morals."

"Really? Why, if I didn't know any better, I'd think you were claiming to be a master of friendship," Page jokes. "Maybe we should write a letter to the Princess of Friendship and tell her we've found her perfect champion."

"Hey, I only said I knew the lessons," you explain. "I'm sure there's a big difference between actually being a good friend and just knowing all the rules like facts from a book. I'm not claiming to be some friendship savant."

"So following through," the grey mare clarifies thoughtfully. "Yes, I suppose it's easier to say thing like be generous towards your friends and actually making the sacrifices to do so."

"Exactly," you agree. "Being a good friend can take a lot of effort, and not everyone is always willing to put that in all the time. What do you think, Floor?"

The mare besides you jolts at being addressed and stutters, "W-what do I think?"

"Yeah. We read most of the book together. You have any thoughts?"

"Oh, um, it was... good. I guess, yeah, it can be hard to do what the journal says, like how you should always be honest with your friends..." She looks up at you for a few seconds, trailing off before looking away and continuing, "It's easier said than done. Um, still, I think it at least helps having the... the guidelines. It may not always be easy to follow them, but it's good to know what to do. Like having a map; you still have to read it and do all the walking, so that's the work, but it's better than trying to find your way blind or just sitting where you are forever."

You blink down at her for a while, the mare starting to squirm, before you smile brightly. "Good point, and you're totally right. It's better to at least know what you have to do and then work hard to do it rather than just taking a guess, putting in all the effort, and then finding out it was the wrong thing to do." You chuckle. "Reminds me of this time way back when I was in forth grade. We were assigned a project where we were each given a different country and told to give a presentation on the food they eat there. I was given a place called India, but I accidentally made my project about a group of people called Indians from a completely different place."

Page Turner snorts, covering her mouth. "No... you didn't."

You nod. "Yep, I did my entire project on the wrong kind of Indian food. I put hours of research into that, made a big poster, gave a presentation... and got an F."

"That's terrible," Page says, though she can't hold the chuckle of amusement. "That teacher must have been quite the mean one to fail a student for such an honest mistake."

"Oh yeah," you confirm. "Miss Brook was a total bitch. Probably why she was single."

"Language, Anon," chides the grey mare, though with very little heat. "You know foals could be here to check out books."

"Sorry," you say, looking around. "Are there any here? Place seems pretty quiet, even for a library."

Page sinks a little into her seat. "No," she says with a dejected sigh. "My grandma was actually the librarian before me, and she always tells stories about this place being packed with little fillies and colts on the weekends."

"Wonder what changed," you ponder aloud.

"The internet," Page immediately answers. "Why walk all the way to library and checkout a book when you can just stay home and browse the internet all day."

Floor seemingly chokes on air for a second, getting you to look down in concern. "You okay, Floor?"

"Y-yes," she answers, catching her breath. "Um, but do you think we can go start reading now?"

"Sure," you say. "We have done a lot of walking today. It'll be nice to sit down for a while" Turning to Page, you give a smile. "We'll talk more in a bit, but I'm gonna go take a load off and read some comics."

"Sounds good. I should probably get back to work, anyway. These books won't shelf themselves," she responds with a smile. "Just come find me if you have trouble finding anything."

With a final wave, you and Floor go to the same shelves as last time and pick out some reading material. You choose some more Power Ponies, hoping to get through the library's entire collection by the end of the day, and Floor grabs some manga.

Once seated, it doesn't take long for you to realize Floor Bored seems distracted. "Hey, Floor, is something on your mind?" you question, getting the beige mare's eyes to leave the page they'd been stuck on for the last three minutes.

"No," she answers a little to quickly. "Just... reading."

"Well, you haven't turned the page, so..."

"Oh, I was just... admiring the art. Look, it's a two page spread." Sure enough, across the centerfold is an image of a stallion dressed in a tux and top hat crossing weapons, a cane for him, with a sword wielding demon.

Huh... cool, and familiar," you note. "Still, you know if anything is on your mind, you can tell me, right?"

"It's nothing, really."

You raise a brow. "So their is something, then," you press.

"I didn't say that. I literally said it's nothing."

"But there has to be something for it to be nothing," you counter, getting the mare to puff up her cheeks in frustration.

"That's... Okay, fine, there's something but it doesn't matter. It's stupid."

"If it's bothering you, it's not stupid," you affirm, shutting your comic around your thumb to not lose your place. "Seriously, you can tell me; I won't laugh."

She groans and throws her head back. "Ugh, why do you always have to be in, like, great friend mode?"

"Because your worth it," you answer glibly. "Now what's up?"

Floor blushes and stammers before regaining enough composure to speak. "It's just... Page Turner-"

"Wait, you don't still think I like her more than you, do you?"

"No! I mean... you said you didn't at least, and I'm sure you wouldn't lie to me, even if the two of you seemed to really like talking to each other."

"That's just because I haven't seen her in a while," you explain. "It doesn't mean I like her or talking to her more than you."

"It's like I said, it was stupid," she mumbles, looking away.

You suppress a sigh and say, "It's fine. I'm glad we could clear this up. Feel better?"

She nods and you smile before reopening your comic. She does the same, but you again notice that she's not reading. You don't hold in the sigh this time, putting the book down. "What is it?"

"What?"

"Something's still bugging you. What is it?"

She opens her mouth to argue, but you interrupt, "Floor, I can tell you're still upset, don't say that you aren't, so what's up?"

She remains quiet for a few seconds before mumbling, "It's that thing Page Turner said, about sitting inside on the computer all day, like it's a bad thing."

"Oooh," you breath. "I guess I can see that bugging you, but you know she wasn't trying to be mean, right? She doesn't even really know you."

"I know she doesn't, but it felt like she was saying it to me... Is it really bad? Being on the computer all the time?"

You scratch the back of your head.

"Well, it's not good..." you start, seeing the mare slump. "But it doesn't make you a bad pony, or anything. It's just not a good habit, is all."

"Well, what's the difference between that and reading books all day," she asks, frowning.

It's quickly wiped away by your answer. "It's not."

"Wha- Bu- I thought reading was good!"

"It is, in moderation," you begin. "Remember the beginning of the Friendship Journal, that bit about Princess Twilight's life before meeting her friends? She wrote that all she did was study before that and how, looking back she realizes how miserable her life was. Doing just one thing all the time isn't good for you, whether that's reading, browsing the internet, heck, even exercising."

"I... guess that makes sense," she admits.

"Sure it does," you continue. "Changing things up, doing new things once in a while, it can really make life happier than just doing the same thing day in and day out."

"Yeah," she agrees, starting to smile slightly. "Since you moved in, I haven't been just on my computer like before, and I guess I am feeling better."

"I'm glad to hear it," you say, smiling. "And I hope you're really feeling better this time now that we talked about what was bugging you."

"Mhmm," she hums cheerily. "Thanks for not laughing, even if it was stupid."

"No problem," you answer with a chuckle. "Now, if there isn't anything else, I want to get back to this comic. The Power Ponies just fell into Doctor Ruin's trap and I want to see how they get out."

"Ooh, is that issue sixteen? It has this really cool part where Matterhorn-"

"Shh! No spoilers!"

"Oop! Sorry, just keep reading."

The two of you are silent for a few minutes before Floor Bored speaks up again. "Hey, Anon."

"Hmm?"

"You want to try something new after this?"

"Like what?"

"I don't know, something new. You know, to change things up."

"... Yeah, that sounds good," you answer, trying not to sound too proud of your friend. At this rate, she probably won't even need you watching over her anymore before the year is done and you'll be able to move out.

... For some reason, that thought makes you sad.

Author's Notes:

Nothing too major this chapter, but I hope it's still welcome.

Art by Happy Harvey. Floor sitting in front of the computer all day.