Twilight Sparkle was just leaving the classroom when she heard a familiar tune, and pulled her phone out of her pocket. She had a new message from Cadance.

You remember the deal, Twily. All you need to do is talk to a few of the other students during lunch, and I’ll buy you ice cream after school.

Twilight rolled her eyes. Naturally she wouldn’t have forgotten, and Cadance probably knew that. She probably just sent the text so Twilight couldn’t use the ‘I forgot’ excuse later.

It was Monday, the first day back at school after winter break and already Cadance was back to pushing her to make friends.

Not that she would try to back out of this. Talking to others was difficult — except for her family and of course, Cadance — but she did sometimes want to have someone she could spent her time with. Even if just to go to the movies once in a while.

She made her way to the cafeteria, wondering who to try talking to in between apologizing to the students bumping into her.

Indigo and her friends might be a good choice. She didn’t actually like Indigo, but she had at least interacted with her, giving her an excuse to sit with her at lunch. After the amount of homework she had ‘helped’ Indigo with, they probably would kick her away.

Once she had gotten her food, Twilight spotted the ‘Shadowbolts’ as they liked to call themselves. They were all laughing at something, and didn’t notice Twilight approaching.

She ended up standing next to them for a few very awkward seconds, before clearing her throat.

“Hey, Uhm. You girls mind if I sit here?” Twilight asked, nervously. She was usually nervous when talking to others her own age, though she had more luck with adults, like Cadance.

The Shadowbolts all glanced at Twilight, expressions ranging from confusion, to mild disgust, to obviously faked cheer. The latter being quite clear on Indigo’s face.

“Sparky!” She exclaimed, not convincing anyone that she was actually happy she was here. “Of course you can sit with us, right girls?” she added.

The response wasn’t a ‘yes’ exactly, but it wasn’t a ‘no’ either, just general disinterest, so Twilight just sat down. Not that Twilight was disappointed or hurt by their reaction. It was actually a slightly better greeting than she had expected.

“But uhm,” Indigo continued, “I would have thought you’d be more at home sitting with the geeks, though?”

Twilight squirmed in her seat. Of course they didn’t want her there, this was going nowhere. Maybe she should just apologize and leave. although that would be really awkward too.

Lemon Zest snorted, pointing at a trio of boys sitting a few tables away. “Isn’t it obvious. Twilight doesn’t like boys.” She wiggled her eyebrows at the tables newest occupant. “Thats why she came to sit with us girls, right, Twilight?”

Twilight blushed furiously. “W-what, no. I mean… I just-” She cut herself off and took a deep breath while the rest of the girls laughed, some more openly than others.

Stay calm, Twilight. Just keep talking and maybe it’ll get better, Twilight thought.

“I tried sitting with them before, but they always shunned me. I never found out why though.” She said, poking at her unappealing food. Even a prestigious school like this didn’t escape the curse of bad cafeteria food.

“They don’t like you because you beat them in every test,” Sugarcoat supplied helpfully. “And it doesn’t make things better that they’re getting beat by a girl.”

Twilight pushed her glasses up her nose. “Oh. I see.” It stung a bit that they disliked her for being talented, but at the same time, if they really were sexist like that, then Twilight wouldn’t really want anything to do with them anyway.

The girls spent a few minutes talking about sports and rock music. Twilight, having no interest in sports and being mostly into classical, remained silent for all of that discussion

“Well, anyway, did any of you see the news that the’re going to be making a Daring Do movie?” Sunny Flare asked.

Twilight perked up. Daring Do was one of her favorite book series. This was a topic she should be able to involve herself in.

“Oh, I did!” Twilight said happily, as Sugarcoat and Sour Sweet nodded at Sunny’s question. “I really hope they do Daring Do and the Griffon’s Goblet, that one’s my favorite.” There had been some contention on certain forums about which book in the series they would adapt. “But if I’m being honest, they’ll probably pick Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone, since that one’s a classic.”

Twilight’s smile faded under the combined stare of five unamused girls.

“So anyway,” Sunny continued, the rest of the Shadowbolts turning their attention back to her. “I heard they were going to have Chestnut Magnifico playing Daring Do. Oh, she is absolutely stunning in every film she’s in, isn’t she?”

They continued to talk about actresses, and how Chestnut Magnifico was the perfect role for an adventurous archaeologist type, for a while longer. A topic which, once again, Twilight wasn’t very versed in. She had actually thought that Chestnut didn’t really fit Daring’s personality based on her other roles, but was optimistic about her pulling off the famous character. She didn’t say any of this out loud of course, for fear of getting more unwanted stares.

Eventually the bell rang.

All in all, spending lunch with the Shadowbolts went about as well as she had expected. Hopefully once she recounted this all to Cadance, her old babysitter would understand her plight a little better. Plus the promise of having ice cream with Cadance did offset the unpleasantness of the experience.

After lunch came P.E. which was as unpleasant as ever. She spent nearly an hour sweating and panting, then had to get naked in front of the rest of the girls in the locker room showers. It was one of the few times Twilight was grateful that she couldn’t see anything without her glasses, you couldn’t be caught staring if you were half-blind. She was just happy that these girls tended to leave her alone.

After P.E. Twilight had two much more enjoyable classes. Mostly because they involved listening to lectures and writing down notes, rather than running and getting hit by dodgeballs.

After school, Twilight spent a bit of time in her lab until Cadance came to fetch her.

“Hey, sweety.” Cadance greeted, “how did it go?”

Twilight shrugged and picked up her backpack. “About as well as I expected.”

Cadance’s smile faltered. “So, it was pretty bad then?”

“They clearly didn’t want me there to begin with, but I stuck it out like you said I should, and at no point did they talk about anything that I found interesting. I spent the entire time either sitting silently, or making a fool out of myself when they started talking about the Daring Do movie, and then it turned out they were only interested in the actress that was rumored to be in the lead role!” Twilight took a deep breath, then huffed.

Cadance sighed. “Well, I’m proud of you for trying. And don’t worry, I’m sure well find someone who gets you in a way the other students don’t.” Twilight just sulked. Bumping her in the shoulder, Cadance added, “or, worst case scenario, I’ll just have to get you into collage a few years early so you can be around people your own speed,” she teased.

Twilight smiled at the indirect praise.

“In any case,” Cadance continued. “You earned yourself some ice cream. Now let’s get going.”

Twilight nodded. She was very grateful to at least have Cadance and Shining, but she really did want a friend she could talk with about science and Daring Do, someone she could just hang out with after school. Shining was her brother, and Cadance was her friend, but she would like to be able to get along with someone her own age too.

Welcome to my second story. Though, technically I started this one first even though I'm publishing it second...

Anyway, this story is basically finished. I only need to do some final revisions to some of the chapters. Because of this, I intend to release a new chapter every day.
I hope you enjoy the story!

If you see any grammatical errors, please PM me so I can fix them