“Spike? You in there?”

“Not now, Twilight,” came the muffled, downtrodden reply from within the drake’s room.

Twilight pursed her lips and huffed. He had been at this for the last couple of days… it was unfortunate that tragedy befell him in his love life, but regardless, it was never like him to miss their outings with the rest of the girls.

“Spike, you can’t sit inside your room and keep moping at what happened a few days ago. You and I both know that’s not gonna change anything.”

“It’s pretty comfortable, though.”

Twilight rolled her eyes. She really did feel for Spike, especially after his marefriend of several months spontaneously decided to call it quits with him. The Princess of Friendship then calmed her annoyances, because Spike had been dealing with this in the most mature way he could have.

And boy, had she seen some immature stallions and mares when it came to breakups.

But still, it didn’t hurt her any less to see the greatest dragon ever—whom was essentially as close to her as a little brother—completely shut down. Her heart ached for him, but everypony was starting to get concerned, and starting to ask questions…

...which was exactly what Spike didn’t want. If he wanted to avoid that, he was going to have to at least talk to her.

“Spike, open the door.”

“No.”

Twilight lit her horn, encasing it in a lavender, ethereal sheen.

“That wasn’t as suggestion. Either you can do it, or I can. Up to you,” Twilight asserted with an air of authority that would make Princess Luna proud.

Placing her ear up against the door, she heard a defeated sigh, along with the gradually increasing thuds of his footsteps. She dispersed her magic and pulled herself away from the door as she heard the lock unlatch… and then the door swung inward.

Twilight’s heart dropped at the sight of Spike once again.

He looked like he hadn’t slept much the past couple of days, and while he had not been crying anymore (at least, that Twilight could tell), she could very easily read into those windows of his soul. Spike’s posture, combined with the extra glare of hopelessness in his eyes spoke of somepony who was defeated… by all accounts.

Without any initial words, Twilight entered into his room and brushed past Spike, though before he could say anything or protest, the Princess fired up her magic and wrangled this entire body from the floor.

“Whh—hey!” Spike then protested, but said protests fell on deaf ears.

Twilight deposited him on the lone chair in his room, directly in front of her, and she decided to take a seat on her haunches.

“Alright, talk to me,” Twilight ordered. “What’s going on inside that head of yours, and how can we all help you deal with this?”

Spike leaned back into his chair and let himself fall limp. He shook his head and sniffled.

“I can deal with it myself, Twi. I’ve told you all this, already. I need to handle this on my own.”

“No you don’t!” Twilight protested with a shake of her head. “You think you do, but you really don’t. I know this is tough… I know believe me!” she stressed.

Spike continued to gaze at the floor absentmindedly, even when his next comment came out with far less tact than he had hoped:

“Easy for you to say…”

Twilight rolled her eyes deeply.

“Okay you know for a fact that’s not true. Like I wasn’t the nerd shut-in before I got these damn wings??” she pointedly reminded, drawing attention to the aforementioned appendages.

At least Spike’s snark was still intact:

“You still kinda are, but that’s neither here nor there I guess…”

Twilight deadpanned, but that at least told her that there was some manner of hope in getting what Spike was holding in, out into the open.

“Wow, love you too, Spike… but seriously,” she drew the conversation back into focus.

“I’m not going anywhere until I can at least do something to help you… even just listen to you rant. Come on, you know I’m good for it. I just hate seeing you like this,” the lavender alicorn urged on, placing a hoof on Spike’s knee.

The drake was about to protest further, but seeing the determined, sincere look on Twilight’s face further eroded his resistance.

He took a deep breath and sighed. He still didn’t look her in the eyes.

“Just…” he began, wondering how he could possibly articulate the myriad of thoughts that occupied his mind since the breakup.

“Why?” he began. “I still don’t know what I did that made her just… leave,” he voiced.

Twilight was getting somewhere now, and she prodded further.

“Well, what did she say?”

Spike pursed his lips as he re-heard those fateful words escape his ex-marefriend’s lips.

“She said that… after all these months, she just wasn’t into me as much as she should’ve been by this point.”

Twilight nodded thoughtfully.

“I see…” she offered, but Spike followed up promptly with:

“Please tell me you know what that means…?”

Twilight knew exactly what it meant, and she glanced away as she figured out how she wanted to best express it to her bestest friend in the whole world… even if he wouldn’t exactly get much out of it. In the end, honesty was the best answer, and she responded:

“Honestly?” she began. “It just means as she said… I hate to say it but, sometimes she really just isn’t into you.”

Spike didn’t look convinced.

“I’m gonna need more than that… seriously?”

Twilight shrugged.

“Sometimes ponies just aren’t meant to be together, and they don’t find that out until they’re in deep. Sometimes they recognize this and, instead of stringing you along over a false sense of compatibility, it’s best to end it,” she explained.

Spike pursed his lips, and Twilight could see an anger fueled by misunderstanding working its way through him.

“So,” he began, sniffling. “You mean to tell me that one day, Mist woke up and decided ‘Oh, I don’t like Spike anymore! I’m gonna break up with him!’? Is that really what you’re telling me right now?” he queried incredulously.

Twilight sighed. She expected this from the answer she gave.

“Sometimes that’s just how it works, Spike. Relationships aren’t always pretty… or the spontaneous ends to them, at leasts.”

Spike shook his head pleadingly:

“I’m really gonna need more than that to go off of, Twi…”

“That’s really all there is!” Twilight countered. She reached a tentative hoof out. “I know it’s hard to think of, but as mares… no, as ponies, we come to realizations when others just aren’t good for us. We can’t really help it but would you rather they lie to you? And pretend there’s something when there’s nothing?”

Spike understood fully, but still he protested one aspect vehemently:

“How the heck do I defend against that?!” he pleaded. “How do I prevent, in the future, from some mare sleeping wrong and telling me the next day that she wants to dump me?! What did I do wrong?!” he demanded.

“You can’t!” Twilight defended. “That’s just how life works sometime, Spike! Not everthing needs an overt reason for happening. Maybe it’s a combination of things! You didn’t do anything wrong!”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard!” Spike rejected that outright, his eyes misting over, then dropped from the chair and began to pace towards his window.

“So I could do everything right…” he reasoned. “And by her standards, as Mist told me, even if I’m the ‘model coltfriend’...” he air quoted with his fingers. “...I can still get dumped the next day. Why are you mares so complicated?!”

Twilight stood up immediately at that statement:

“Spike!” she scolded. “Don’t you dare pin this on ‘mares’ as a whole! I taught you so much better than that!”

Spike calmed down in understanding.

“I know… I know, I didn’t mean it like that I’m just… UGH,” the drake gripped his forehead before continuing:

“I just don’t understand how I can ‘do everything right’ by her words, and get told to get lost the next day!” he cried out. “Was she lying to me, Twilight?! Or is there really just no link between how I behave with her happiness with me?

“I THOUGHT I DID EVERYTHING RIGHT!”

Twilight knew Spike was getting way too worked up with this, so she promptly trot over to him to settle him down lest he break down again.

“Okay okay, relax… listen…” she said as she took him into her embrace, which Spike leaned into but didn’t return with his own.

“Look… you are a wonderful drake, charming and thoughtful to the bone—”

Spike broke away immediately and glared daggers at her, tears in his eyes.

“Stop. Stop that right now,” he ordered.

Twilight cocked her head.

“Spike? What did—”

The drake bared his teeth and balled his fits in a pained rage that made Twilight’s stomach ache at the thought she offended him.

“I don’t need your damn platitudes!” he roared. “You and the girls think that just telling me over and over again that I’m ‘smart’ and ‘funny’ and ‘handsome’ and whatever else you think that day is just the end all cure all to how I feel about this!? Or even just in everyday life!” he ranted.

Twilight raised a hoof to speak but Spike was not having it.

“You wanna know what those words mean to me from you girls?” he asked rhetorically, fresh tears streaming down his face that emphasized his deep frustration.

“Nothing,” he answered. “Absolutely nothing.”

Twilight flinched, as if struck.

“Spike…” she softly spoke, but the drake was not done.

“It’s not like any mares of your caliber would ever stoop to give me a look romantically!” Spike continued to rant in anguish. “So your opinions on my looks and personality in relation to other mares literally mean nothing! Sorry, but that’s truth!”

“But noooo!” Spike continued to pace. “I put up with them because otherwise I look like a jerk!

“In reality I get to be treated like a child around you six gorgeous mares! The little sidekick dragon that will never get the time of day from any mare in Ponyville or even beyond because I look like an eleven year-old! And in reality… I’m not that much younger than you!” he pointed directly at Twilight’s chest.

“And that’s not their fault! I can’t help the way I look! They don’t have to like me!” Spike continued.

“But one mare that finally decided to look past the fact that she needs to literally look down at my eyes to talk to me! We really like each other, and she just up and leaves… apparently… because ‘Oh, I’m not as into you after all these months as I should be by this time! I’m sorry, there’s nothing you can do. Bye!’” Spike paraphrased in a mock-feminine tone.

“Sorry if I find that just a little hard to believe. She probably got made fun of by her friends because I look like a kid,” he concluded with no shortage of mirth for Twilight’s explanation.

As for the alicorn who sat and diligently listened to Spike’s rant, she knew how he was feeling. His emotions rolled off of his scales and strangled her heart. She hated seeing him like this.

“Spike…” she voiced meekly. “I know it doesn’t make sense. I know it seems like some problem that came out of the ether, or a problem about you that she lied about. But it happened to be that there was really… nothing.

“And you can choose to deal with it productively, or not,” she said. “You’ve been incredibly mature about this, and I appreciate you opening up to me and ranting to me. I really do… but as much as you hate it…

“You are a wonderful drake. I know you hate hearing this apparently from me or the girls, but any mare would be so incredibly lucky to have you as their special somepony. Mist doesn’t know what she just cast aside.”

Spike cringed internally, but he knew that Twilight went well. He turned to gaze outside of his window and into the sunlight as Twilight continued on:

“But you’ll eat your words one day… because one day somepony amazing is gonna trot into your life. And this situation,” she gestured around. “...will have made way for it.”

Spike released a pent up breath. He hated those words… words that he had heard so many times in his life when he was more idealistic about his romantic endeavors, especially with Rarity. But every time, they still provided some measure of comfort to him.

It may have been Twilight and the girls’ job to tell him that he was an upstanding individual.

But he also knew that they would never lie. No small measure of guilt washed over him for his previous words.

But even so, Twilight smiled before closing the remaining distance and pulling Spike into her chest once again.

This time, he accepted and returned her embrace wholeheartedly. He unabashedly dried his tears in her coat.

“Your time will come,” she softly stated, then nuzzled his head.

“Will it?” he inquired genuinely.

Twilight nodded with a bright smile.

“It will. And it’ll be more wonderful than you know. I promise you. And this will be little more than a funny story to tell later.”

Spike smiled back up at her, having regained some semblance of sanity and laughed at the ridiculousness of it all.

“Thanks Twilight… I’m sorry if I was harsh but… I love you. I really do, and the girls. Thanks for being here for me…”

“I love you too… We love you too.

“And for the record?” Twilight added. “You really are a fine drake who is good looking…”

“ENOUGH!”

Author's Notes:

Drunk Flammenwerfer writing.