Sunlight shone through the small clearing in the forest where Wallflower Blush had started her previously secret garden, illuminating her collection of different flowers and plants, helping them gain their needed sustenance.

The gardener herself was observing the usual phenomenon from one of the stone benches the new members of the gardening club had helped her build along with a small shed and a workbench. It took a couple of days of hard work, but it made their activities far easier, and accommodated the new members.

Wallflower was so happy to have someone else to share her passion with, but as it was usual by now, it faded rather quickly. Exam-season had started, and the new members of the club couldn’t find the time to keep coming to work on the garden, leaving her alone once more.
They promised to return once exam-season ended, but she knew they would probably find some new activity that would be more appealing than gardening. She absolutely loved working on the earth with the flora that the world provided, and most people loved seeing the colorful end result, but gardening was dirty, sweaty, fertilize-stenched hard work. It was a difficult sell, and one of the reasons Wallflower sympathized with Fluttershy’s similar dilemma with her animal shelter.

Taking a deep breath through her nose, gathering the scent of her favorite place in the world, Wallflower felt her pains and laments melt away as she relaxed. Even if alone, she could find a bit of peace and respite from the world here.

But it quickly faded when she heard a familiar voice approaching.

“Hello? Wallflower?”

The gardener opened her eyes, wishing that her brain was wrong about who had arrived, but her vision confirmed it.

Standing at the entrance of her garden, was Sunset Shimmer.

“Hi Sunset,” Wallflower said as she stood up from the stone bench, her voice not having even a hint of bitterness. Her days of hating Shimmer were behind her, and the flame-haired girl had offered her hand in friendship, but her presence was far from calming to her, and the friendship currency was overinflated by now. “How can I help you?”

Sunset fidgeted a little before responding. “Well, I do need a favor, but first, how have you been doing?”

Wallflower cocked her head slightly, noticing the unusual stance the fiery girl had. “I’m… okay. I was just relaxing a bit. You?”

“Oh, the same as always. Dealing with exams, going to band practice, having interdimensional-chats with pony princesses,” Sunset answered a bit more relaxed.

“Honestly, even after all that happened, that still sounds a bit weird,” Wallflower confessed with a small smile.

“I could say the same about these.” Sunset showed her hands and flexed her fingers. “I’m still getting surprised by how many uses they have.”

Wallflower let out a small chuckle, also relaxing into the conversation. “Yeah, they’re very practical. I bet magic beats them tough.”

Sunset made a ‘meh’ gesture with her hand. “It’s more practical in some ways, but you also can’t feel what you’re doing. Doing precise things is harder with magic without the muscle memory, and you need to be specific with what you order your magic to do or you could end up ruining your work or getting some unnecessary strain.”

Wallflower nodded, feigning knowing what she was talking about. “What favor did you need?”

Sunset started fidgeting again. “Well, if it isn’t too much to ask, I wanted you to… grow some flowers for me?”

Wallflower’s eyebrow started to rise. “I… could do that. But I could also point you to some flower shops I can recommend.”

“No, I would prefer if you grew them yourself.” Sunset tapped her fingers against her thighs. “Is that a weird thing to ask?”

Wallflower crossed her arms. “It takes like seven weeks for a flower to bloom from seed. If you really want them from me, I can give you some from my garden. Did you have a specific kind in mind?”

“Well, if it’s possible.” Sunset tapped the tips of her fingers. “Borage, Candytuft, Abatina, Marjoram, Hydrangea, and please tell me you have Honeysuckle.”

Wallflower stared at Sunset for a few seconds. “I… don’t, but I do have Borage and Candytuft.” She shook her head. “Sorry, but, again, why not get them at a flower shop?”

Sunset looked away, scratching the back of her neck, and spoke almost too quickly. “I just want to know how to grow them.”

Wallflower blinked twice. “Wait, you want me to teach you?”

Sunset did the same. “Yeah... You teach all the members of the club, right?”

Wallflower raised her hands. “Okay, so, you want to join the gardening club?” Sunset nodded with the articulation of a rusty hinge. “Why didn’t you start with that?” The gardener placed the tip of her fingers against her temples. Sunset Shimmer did not act like this, at least as far as she knew.
Her brain started to make microwave noises as she tried to figure out what was really happening, until there was a ding.

She looked at Sunset straight in the eyes, which were darting around nervously. “Sunset, are you asking me to grow flowers for you, so you can eat them?”

Sunset said nothing, and just stood frozen in place for a few long seconds, until she finally answered.

“Yes.”

Wallflower drummed her fingers against her thighs, looking away from Sunset, and then backpedaled back to her bench. “Please sit, this’ll take me a minute.”

Sunset did as she was told, keeping some distance from the gardener, and patiently waited for an answer.

“Okay, horse-girl wants to eat flowers. That's understandable, but, why me?” Wallflower turned her head towards Sunset. “What’s the real reason you can’t order them in a flower shop?”

Sunset played with her thumbs. “I tried at first, but… how to explain it?... It’s like the difference between the food served at a restaurant and the one that’s delivered to your house from the same place.”

“I haven’t been to a restaurant in years,” Wallflower confessed.

“Oh...” Sunset stopped playing with her thumbs. “Well, there’s a difference in taste. It’s better if they come directly from the ground.”

Wallflower thought for a second. “What about potted plants?”

“Those are good too, but they’re a bit expensive over time, and I get a lot of questions from the shop owners.” Sunset remembered the happy faces of the florists morphing into concern as she slowly depleted their stock of flowers. At first they assumed she was really bad at keeping flowers alive, and tried to give her advice before her next purchase. Sunset felt awful for wasting all their efforts. Later they became suspicious about her intentions, and some refused to sell her any more.

“And Equestria?” Wallflower proposed in a vain hope that she could squeeze out of the offer.

Sunset chuckled. “Flowers are valued in gold over there. And I don’t have the face to ask Twilight for them.”

“So you asked me,” the gardener thought internally. She was running out of options to deny Shimmers’s request. Seeing each other at school and even some small talk here and there was fine, but Sunset was far down the list of people she wanted to join her club.
Of course, she could just invent some excuse to deny her request, or even just say no, but Wallflower felt in debt to Sunset. She had tried, and temporarily succeeded, to ruin her life.

Sunset had forgiven her, but the action lost meaning when she considered how often it happened.

“Okay, since you would join the club, I’ll do it. ” Wallflower turned to face Sunset. “How much do you eat?”

The redhead's cheeks reddened with embarrassment as she raised her hands. “It’s just like a snack. I’m not expecting a full course meal!”

Wallflower couldn't hold back a chuckle. This secret side of Sunset was more comfortable for her. “Maybe this won’t be so bad.” The gardener stood up from the bench. “What do you know about gardening?”

“Uh… nothing really,” Sunset admitted as she stood up.

“Well, I’ll teach you the basics. Payment comes after it.”

With that said, Wallflower gave Sunset a quick tour of the garden, mentioning what had been planted and what care the plants needed during this season. She noticed the leather-wearing girl eyeing the Borages a bit more intently than the rest, but other than that, Sunset paid attention and absorbed everything she said.
Wallflower found a bit of relief in how diligent Sunset was being, even her new members had a bit of a learning curve to go through, but the redhead learned rather quickly.

“I guess it makes sense since she had to adapt to our world in a few days.” the gardeneer thought as she finished her tour. “The main jobs you’ll need to do will be trimming, taking out weeds, and helping me plan and prepare future expansions to the garden. Those will include your snacks.”

Sunset nodded with a smile. “Got it.”

Wallflower looked at the sky, checking the position of the sun. “It’s a bit late for today, but we can continue tomorrow after classes.”

“Okay. I’ll bring some clothes that can get dirty.”

“Exam-season won’t get in the way?”

Sunset placed a hand on Wallflowers shoulder, taking her by surprise. “I’ll be here,” she assured her, her voice carrying the same tone she had used when she forgave her.

The gardener watched her leave, feeling a familiar sensation return to her. An old question she asked herself constantly, even before getting the Memory Stone.

“Will they keep their promise?”

“You’re back,” Wallflower exclaimed when she saw Sunset arrive, wearing an old leather jacket ─because of course she was─ that had a few stains of paint, and old jeans which showed some wear and tear.

Sunset chuckled a bit nervously as she entered the garden. “You don’t need to sound so surprised.”

Wallflower shook her head. “Sorry, force of habit.” She took a deep breath and looked around the garden. “I bought the seeds for the plants you wanted. Though not all of them.”

“You couldn't get Honeysuckle.” Sunset stated more than asked.

Wallflower raised an eyebrow. “No... Was it hard for you to find before?”

“Yeah, I don’t know why but no one has it!” the redhead complained before sighing. “Thank you for doing this. I know it's pretty weird.”

Wallflower chuckled. “If weird really bothered me, I would’ve changed schools long ago.”

Sunset laughed. “We would’ve missed you.” Wallflower’s gaze turned towards the ground, and an uncomfortable silence grew between them. “Sorry… I-”

“It’s okay. Let's prepare the soil for your flowers.”

Sunset just nodded and walked behind her, following her instructions in silence, checking that the dirt didn’t have any weeds growing and making sure the plants would get proper spacing before digging the holes.

Wallflower welcomed both the extra hands and the peaceful silence. The less she talked with Sunset the better for both of them. There was no reason to scratch healing wounds.

But Sunset rarely listened to reason. Probably a side effect of being friends with Pinkie and Rainbow.

“Hey...”

“Please don’t say sorry again,” Wallflower begged in her head.

“Where’re the other members of the club?”

“Okay, a bit better.” The gardener kept working as she answered. “They’re studying for the next exams.”

“Oh. I guess they need the extra time.”

Wallflower turned to Sunset. “And you?”

“Exams are easy,” she answered with a casual shrug and a little smirk. “What about you? Need some help?”

Wallflower resumed her work, looking away from Sunset. “No, I already studied most of the subjects of my exams.”

Sunset was surprised by the answer. “Really? Are you a secret genius?”

Wallflower sighed. “No, I just have a lot of free time.”

Sunset’s brain came up with a response, but she didn’t say anything. She felt like she had screwed up enough.

But then she thought “Third time’s the charm”.

“If you have free time, maybe I can invite you to one of those restaurants you never went to. As a thank you for all this.”

Wallflower froze for a moment. “Isn’t that a date?”

Sunset chuckled. “Not necessarily. It would be just us hanging out. What do you say?”

“No.” The gardener answered almost instantly. “I’ll be busy with your flowers and I’ve other stuff to do. Sorry.”

Sunset wanted to press on, but she knew it would be pointless. “Don’t worry, we can leave it for later.” The sigh of relief Wallflower let out after that only confirmed it.

They continued to work on the garden until it was starting to get late, so the gardener called it a day and went over to the Borages and Candytufts. “Wanna eat here or take away?”

Sunset tried to hide a bit of a blush with a small cough. It wasn’t very effective. “Just pluck them out and I’ll eat them on my way home.”

Wallflower was genuinely surprised by the response. “Oh. I guess it would be a bit embarrassing with someone looking at you.”

“Something like that.” Sunset laughed awkwardly as her friend gave her a small cluster of her desired flowers.

“Bon Appetit, I guess.”

Sunset’s blush deepened. “See you tomorrow.”

With that, the redhead fled the garden, and Wallflower waited till she was gone to let out a groan and throw herself down on the ground. “Maybe I should start meditating again.”

That night, Sunset was laying on her bed with her magical diary in hand.

“Hey Twilight, can I bother you for some advice?”

She waited a few minutes until a response came back.

“Sure, what do you need?”

“Well, I’m having difficulty reaching out to a friend.”

“Is it one of the girls?”

“No, it’s Wallflower.”

It took a bit of time for Twilight to respond.

“Who was that?”

Sunset frowned.

“The girl with the Memory Stone.”

“Oh, yeah. What’s the issue specifically?”

Sunset bit her pen as she gathered the words.

“I’m trying to be friends with her, but she seems guarded of me. Also, I’m messing up. Frequently. I think I’m just pushing her away even more each time I try to be friendly.”

“Well, I guess it’s to be expected.”

Sunset raised an eyebrow at that.

“Care to elaborate?”

“I’m guessing you expected it to be like when you befriended my human version, but this would be different. You and human-me already had a bit of a relationship, if what you told me is accurate, and her being like myself probably helped too.”
“You won’t be able to do the same with Whiteflower. You two had a bad start even before you truly knew her, so it’s to be expected that you don’t know how to act around her without triggering something in her that automatically makes her push you away.”

Sunset’s teeth had dented the back of the pen by the time she finished reading.

“How should I approach her then?”

“I don’t think I should just give you the answer. You should discover it yourself.”

Sunset’s frown was accompanied by a small, irritated grumble.

“That’s some real sage advice, Twiggy.”

“I learned it from Celestia.”

Sunset rolled her eyes.

“One of the very few things she teaches.”

There was a small pause before the next response.

“Are you okay, Sunset?”

“Just tired. I’ll tell you how it goes tomorrow.”

“Okay. Good luck Sunset!”

Sunset closed the diary, ignoringTwilight’s response, and went to sleep.