Moondancer groaned on his favorite library table, quiet so as not to disturb the others making use of the silent study environment. Midterms were around the corner and Moondancer hadn't so much as had a repeat conversation with anypony in any of his classes, let alone made a friend. He had no idea how to. The last moments where he killed conversations replayed in his mind.

"Actually, that isn't Einstifle's general relativity formula; it's…"

"Party? Ugh, why don't we have a study session instead? … O-Oh, your birthday..."

"But you have to admit Unicorns are the strongest tribe. We built Canterlot!"

He learned every way possible to not make a friend. This was stupid. He was one of the smartest ponies around—besides his professors, and even then he had doubts about the assistant professor of chemistry, Dr. Burns—so it should be easy for him. Trivial! But it wasn't working. He either felt like a lost colt in conversations or ponies got offended—for no reason! (well, besides the birthday party goof)—when he talked. This was why he didn't make friends. He didn't even want them. Ponies were irrational and took away precious hours of his day, cutting into his studying time. And reading time, when he rationed it in. It was a preventative measure to keep from having another day like that.

No, he was better off without ponies, like he thought. But he still needed a friend by the time finals came around to keep his grade up in Dr. Nebulebray's class. So how was he going to manage? He didn't have enough free bits to convince somepony to play the part for the rest of the semester, and most ponies were too stupid or emotional to be his friend. There wasn't anypony he knew from primary education that he could—well, there was D—no, no there was not. So that was it. He'd lose his perfect GPA in his last year, for no good reason other than some donkey playing Princess Celestia. Why did she make attendance such a large part of the grade?

Moondancer rocked his head against the table from side to side, watching ponies that didn't have a worry in the world besides their midterms.. Dr. Nebulebray wouldn't accept making her into a friend—he could already hear her going on about peer groups—and there wasn't another pony anywhere on campus that he'd been able to have more than two conversations with.

A familiar green pegasus came into view, studying at a table on the other side of the room.

Nope, not another pony anywhere.

As Moondancer watched Anonymous, he noticed he actually was studying. Shocking. He didn't think the stallion could sit down for longer than ten minutes if he wasn't feeling somepony up or bullying them. If he could be studious like that, then maybe—no. He couldn’t.

There was no pony Moondancer could have n+1 conversations with, where n was the number of times Anonymous pestered him.

Actually, those weren't even conversations, were they? It was harassment. By that logic, he'd never had a conversation with Anonymous, and that put him dead last on the list of ponies Moondancer had the potential of befriending to save his grade.

Oh, Luna, he saw. Moondancer turned his head to look in the opposite direction. Anonymous saw him staring like a creep. Please don't come over here. Moondancer flipped open his book to study. Ignoring the fact that Anonymous had the ability to keep on talking with Moondancer even after his feathers got ruffled, there was no possibility of friendship there, real or bargained for.

Moondancer took a quick glance and Anonymous was looking at him. Moondancer's eyes flicked back to his books and stayed there, glued. He wasn't even reading the pages. He was trying to get the idea of befriending Anonymous out of his head and it wasn't working and there was no reason for that and Anonymous took the seat opposite of him.

"Caught ya starin', Asshole." Anonymous wore a frown. He whispered, leaning across the table, "What gives? Thinking of how to give me shit over studying, or about glazing my hot flank?"

"Wh—no!" Moondancer scrunched his snout, ears flat and turning red. He spoke too loudly and attracted angry glares from a nearby table's study group. Oh, how he hated that wicked smirk. His whisper back was low, but harsh, "I wasn't thinking about you at all. Go away. I have to study."

"You've been sitting there for half an hour, books closed, moaning to yourself. And you were staring at me for the last five minutes of it. Think I wouldn't notice?"

Moondancer's head went back into his hooves. No solution to his grade problem, and now he wasn't going to get any studying done. Great.

"What's the deal? Why have you just been sitting here looking nerdy and sad?"

"As if I'd tell you, jerk. You'd just make fun of me."

"Tell me or I'm going to get us kicked out of the library."

"You can't do th—HIII!" Moondancer sucked in air as Anonymous' hoof traveled up the inside of his leg, prodding the soft interior of his thigh. An angry 'shush' let him know he was one more molestation from being forced to study at his dorm, sans much-desired reference books.

Anonymous kept his giggles down with a hoof. Moondancer glared, flushed. "Fine. You made your point. I've been sitting here thinking because I…"

"Because…?"

Moondancer dipped his head and chewed on the neckline of his sweater. He couldn't just out and say he needed to make a friend for class, or explain why he—aha! He could.

"Because of you, I have a make-up assignment to make a friend."

The deadpan stare wasn't the reaction Moondancer hoped for. He continued, "Because of your stupid book, I got a reading bug and read a good one instead of sleeping, and I missed my classes because I fell asleep. Dr. Nebulebray said I would get forgiveness for my absence if I made a friend before the final exam, and since this is all your fault, you owe me."

"I don't owe you shit. In fact, you owe me for being an asshole last time we hung out, Asshole."

"How can you call that 'hanging out'? All you did was interrupt my studying and make fun of me and sexually harass me, like you just did not two minutes ago?"

"I don't see you stopping me. So, which is it? You into this, or just stubborn?" He motions down his taut barrel with a hoof.

Moondancer stared. He caught himself, growled, and started packing up his books, "You're right. I need to stop being stubborn. Maybe Luminous Dust will give me another chance at being her friend, birthday invitation screw-up notwithstanding."

Anonymous scowled, "'Her,' huh."

Moondancer put his saddlebags on. Anonymous took a book out of his and pushed it into Moondancer's face. It was Posie Prose's Sleeping Beneath the Stars, "If you read this book and tell me what you think, I'll be your friend."

"Fat chance." Moondancer pushed the book out of the way and walked out of the library. He'd have to make do studying at his dorm.

Moondancer was sure he could make friends with Luminous Dust. He'd seen her test scores before, and she was smart, so they should have a lot to talk about besides boring social junk, like birthdays and such. And if he didn't make friends with her, he'd just take the grade he was given. His scholarship didn't demand a perfect GPA; that was something he demanded of himself. No, he was not going to read a red book to make a friend. He wasn't desperate.

Moondancer was desperate.

He didn't understand how it all went so wrong. She was a brilliant mind, so why did she concern herself with trivialities like pop culture and gossip? Where was the substance in that? She didn't want to talk at length about anything he was interested in from class or from his readings. He tried to play along, but it didn't work. She excused herself from the conversation. That was that.

Moondancer couldn't eat last night. He couldn't stomach the thought of getting a grade worse than perfect. That idea ate away at him. It was even worse than the idea of reading smut to get Anonymous to pretend to be his friend until the semester was over. And so here he was, chewing the neckline of his sweater, head buried in his forelegs on his favorite library table. Waiting for the jerk to show up.

"Well, well, well. Look at that. The egghead's about to crack."

Fuck.

Anonymous slung a foreleg over the back of the chair as he sat down, hind hooves braced against the table, leaning back. He wore a shit-eating smirk, "What's the matter, nerdball? Too intelligent to make friends?"

"Just give me the stupid book."

Anonymous let himself slam back into the floor, cackling. The silent study floor was empty after midterms, but the library patrons below were not going to be happy, "You know, Moondancer, I've been thinking."

"That's a—" No, Moondancer, no. Grit your teeth and bare it. You need this.

"First?" Anonymous smirks, "Not bad, but I've heard better. No, Moondancer, I think you might have had a valid complaint before. Well, really, it was flattery. You know, about me running through your mind all night? Making you lose sleep?" He snickered.

Moondancer tried to fuse with the table. Did he really need a friend? He didn't, right?

"So I figure I'll read one of your books in exchange for you reading Sleeping Beneath the Stars. Fair?"

No. "Fine."

"Great!" The book bumped against Moondancer's nose, "I'll meet you back here in, oh, a few days? I know you're a very busy stallion with many dates to keep—" Moondancer hated that snicker, "—and I'm not sure I'll be able to make it through this paperweight without falling asleep once or twice."

Moondancer looked up. Anonymous was waving a damaged, familiar copy of Harmony Lost, "Dr. Nebulebray let you borrow hers?"

"Yeah, we talk books a lot. More hits than misses with her, which is better than I can say for most of the mouthbreathers in my classes."

Moondancer sat up in his chair, puzzled, "Why do you even know Dr. Nebulebray, anyway?"

"Oh, she's teaching a course on space as ponies knew it through the history of fiction. Fascinating stuff. Did you know there was a prevalent theory among some reclusive Earth tribes that we revolved around the sun? They'd never even seen a unicorn before!"

Moondancer exhaled loudly. Not quite a laugh, more of a sigh with levity, "How long ago was that?"

"Oh, ancient history. It was just a tidbit from the second class, but I've been giving Dirt Apple shit for it ever since," Anonymous grinned, "He got his licks in a few classes later when we analyzed the literature surrounding Icarus, the first pegasus to die flying to the sun. And not the last…"

"Ancient history in the second class? Dr. Nebulebray always rushes through formalities in my classes to get to the material."

"Well, she didn't this time, and I'm thankful. I dropped a class to add that one my first week here. Something about it spoke to me."

Moondancer quirked an eyebrow, then shook his head. Anonymous wouldn’t have; he was being capricious, nothing new there, "I'm going to go back to my dorm to read this in peace and quiet."

"I've got some lotion if you need it."

Moondancer took several seconds to connect the dots between Anonymous' words and his waggling eyebrows. Moondancer recoiled, "Ugh, you're disgusting."

"It's natural, baby. And you're definitely gonna need it by the end. Posie Prose knows how to fuck a page."

Moondancer gagged, leaving a laughing Anonymous behind. He was all too happy to go back to his dorm. Anonymous would have definitely been breathing down Moondancer's neck as he read. The thought made him blush, and he shook it away. Anonymous' lewdness was contaminating his mind, although he didn't trust that stallion to be behind him and not try something, either. With a shiver, Moondancer cantered off.