>"Anon please I need you to stop eating through the month's supply of Celestia O's in three days"
>"I know you're depressed that you never got to see your "girls" before they passed"
>"Heck I bet I could've talked Princess Twilight's ears off with the number of questions that I wanted to ask her"
>"But that doesn't mean I should stuff my face full of sugary sweets all day and jack off to lewd depictions of national heroes past until pass out at night"
>"My smoothie stand job can't sustain this lifestyle. We're barely staying afloat as is!"
>"Come to bed, Anon. Please"
>"I'll even put on the Twilight wig that you like."
>"We'll talk about you getting a job tomorrow, okay?"
>"Please?"
>"Thank you. I love you, Anon"
 
>Anon finally concedes to Sunny's pleas and joins her in bed
>He wraps his arms around the mare's barrel and pulls her closer to his torso while burying his face in her artificial mane
>It still has that faint artificial smell when it had been bought from Canterlogic many years ago
>But after years of use, at birthdays and costume parties, Sunny's scent had fused with the wig
Hey, Twiggy
>"Wha-"
>"Yes, Anon?"
I love you, too.
>Anon's sudden reciprocation had compelled Sunny to turn around, causing her wig to shift and cover part of her face
>He reaches out a hand to part the locks of her covering the mare's eyes, revealing a set of pensive emerald green eyes staring back at him
And of course you too, Sunny
>His attempts to quell his marefriend's had only ended in her scrunching up her snout in response
> And at that moment, under the faint glow of moonlight beaming through their bedroom, he could almost see the visage of his beloved Twilight on the face of the mare beside him
>It had been almost a year since he first arrived in Equestria
>At first he felt elated to have finally found himself in his personal paradise, in the show that he loved so much as a youth
>But when it dawned on him that the Equestria he hand found himself in was not the one he had seen in the show, it sent him spiraling into a depression
>He only managed to hit it off with Sunny since she had such great admiration for the girls he had loved so much, almost enough to rival his own
>But soon it would prove to be a detriment to the both of them
>Anon can't stop comparing the mare before him with the one he loved in his time on Earth
>And Sunny cannot help but feel compelled to chase after the phantoms of Anon's past, in a doomed attempt to appease him
 
>Anon had woken up first the next morning
>Looking to his side, he saw Sunny, wig completely off at this point, on the far end of the bed having rolled away from him at some point during their sleep
>Mornings in Maretime Bay were quiet; the silence allowed for Anon's subconscious musings on the events of the previous night to well up to the surface
>Looking to distract himself from himself, he walked over toward the window of their bedroom and pulled back the blinds to reveal the town's skyline before him; the sunrise on the horizon giving the silhouettes of the town's architecture a gilded lining
>He had always wondered whatever happened to the two sisters ever since he first saw the night sky in Equestria
>Stars, looking like a billion microscopic shards of a crushed diamond strewn across the night sky in perfect sprezzatura fashion had him convinced that a sentient being with an artistic streak was behind it
>This caused Anon to further hold out hope that a certain alicorn had also survived the millennia that had passed since Equestria was still recognizable to him
 
>Though it's no Ponyville by any measure, Anon could appreciate the fact that the ponies' generally warm, cordial nature had remained intact after all these years
>Peering down from their bedroom window on the top of the lighthouse, he could spot a few pegasi clumsily fluttering about in the woods beside their home
>One of them, in particular, had reminded him of a certain pegasus from eons past
>With flaxen mane and eyes, and a pale bluish coat, he began to ponder if the mailmare he had been thinking of had been this pony's great ancestor
>Thoughts of all his favorite characters having grown old, raised families, and eventually dying without him bearing witness to their passing had begun to drag Anon back into his regular depressive state
>Maybe looking outside the window to distract himself wasn't a good idea
 
>Sunny had woken up to an empty bed
>She found the Twilight wig she wore last night on the floor next to their bed
>Trying to shake off the morning grogginess, she grabbed the wig with her mouth and threw it in the hamper as she walked towards the bathroom to splash her face with water
>After tying her hair in her usual fashion, she proceeded to walk downstairs towards the kitchen in search of her missing coltfriend
>Instead she found Zipp in front of the stove tending to some boiling oatmeal
>"Hey. Have you seen Anon? I didn't feel catch him leaving the bed this morning."
>"Yeah. Found him sitting on a foldable chair, eating beans from the can, out in the back when I was looking for the can opener."
>"Beans? Again? Please tell me he was using a spoon at least."
>Zipp furrowed her brow
>"Don't think I saw him holding one I'm afraid."
 
>The back of the lighthouse had a deck for house parties and grilling but it had another set of stairs that led down to a small pier on the rocky shoreline
>There she found her coltfriend, sitting on a folding chair facing the sea with a can of beans in hand, as Zipp had described
>As Sunny approached, Anon took a swig from the can, crushed it with his hand as if it were a 12oz can of Steel Reserve, and threw it over his shoulder along with other empty cans behind him
>"Anon, please stop pretending you're drinking cider from a can again. Apples aren't even in season yet."
>The human turned around to face her, his mouth red from being covered with tomato sauce
>His face takes on a serene appearance when he sees his marefriend giving him a concerned look
Hey there, Sunnybuns. Come over here and warm me up. I forgot how cold it got down here at this time of the year.
>"Only if you promise to start eating beans from a bowl. And with a spoon, of course! Also please stop littering near the water. It's a pain to fish out the trash you throw in the ocean." She moans as she walks up to snuggle her human lover
But it's funny to watch your flank move as you work that long rod with that capable mouth of yours
>"It's embarrassing. I don't want other ponies in town to think that we're...litterbugs!"
>He nuzzles his face into the crook of her neck, glazing her coat with canned bean drippings
>"You look yucky like this, you know that?"
But you love it
>Her human chides
>"That won't work on me forever"
Nah I'm pretty sure it will
>She rolls her eyes at her human's smug retorts
>"Yeah you're right"
>Sunny then brings Anon's face to hers with her forehooves and proceeds to lick the excess tomato sauce from his mouth and lips
>This gets a laugh out of Anon before he eventually succumbs to his marefriend's tongue and he eventually returns the favor with a full blow Prench kiss of his own
>Sunny liked seeing Anon like this
>She only got to see this side of him a few times a week now, if she catches him in a good mood, so she relishes the opportunity
>Back when they had first met a year ago, he was giddy to have found out that she had been responsible for restoring magic to Equestria
>He gushed on about how that's what Princess Twilight and her friends used to do back in the day and she returned the energy by sharing anecdotes of her own about the ancient princess
>The human then began to draw comparisons between her and her predecessor which had flattered her to no end, being compared to her heroines
>After several weeks of meeting up and discussing Equestrian history, one night, during their several hour-long discussions, Sunny found herself planting a kiss on Anon's lips as the latter was in the middle of describing how ponies back then welcomed springtime in an event called "Winter Wrap Up"
 
>She found him so adorkably cute, with how worked up and passionate he got with the most mundane aspects of ancient life in Equestria
>On the other hand, taken aback by the sudden contact at first, a smile slowly began to creep its way onto Anon's lips and he matched her peck with a kiss of his own
>Having licked his face clean, Sunny found herself smiling at both her work and the memory of their first kiss
>She paused to look at him in the eyes
>"So what made you come all the way down here and eat your breakfast by yourself instead of eating with us upstairs; with me?"
I got to thinking this morning.
>"What about?" she replied
You do know how the sun and the moon work here in Equestria, right? They taught you that in school, no?
>"Yeah. The two princesses used to raise and lower them every night and day. In fact, that's the reason why Nightmare Moon rebelled against her sister, correct?"
Exactly. So I was thinking, seeing as how we still experience day and night cycles, the two sisters must still be alive somewhere out there. And if those alicorns managed to live after all this time then--
>Sunny cut him off
>"Anon is this about Princess Twilight again?"
I was getting to that point but yes.
>Sunny, exasperated from her coltfriend's musings, dismounted herself from his lap and went to pick up his litter with her mouth, stuffing the crushed cans in her cyan sling bag
Sunnybuns, wait!
>"Anon, please. I'm not starting my day with this Princess Twilight crap again."
>The human had jogged up to her and placed a hand on her withers while she walked down the small pier
>This caused Sunny to suddenly turn to face him, tears welling up in her eyes
>"I can't be her, okay? I'm not a prodigal magic user and nor am I as smart or as charming or as even pretty as she ever was, even when she was just a unicorn!"
>Her sudden shift in volume had Anon retract his hand from her withers
>"You think this...this cosplaying s-stuff doesn't get to me?"
>"My dad had worked hard to raise me into the pony that I am today and I love him for that-- and I love you, too! The both of you. So much. Which is why I can't wrap my head around why you want me to be somepony else so bad?"
>"Go sort this s-shit out yourself, Anon. I can't let the memory of somepony cast a shadow over my life. I just can't. I love you but I can't. Not like this."
>Sunny had turned around again to walk back to the lighthouse
>Anon knew that if he let his mare go this time, feeling like that, he'd never forgive himself for as long as he lived
 
>Snapping out of his mental fugue, Anon runs after his disgruntled marefriend
>Sunny let out an audible yelp when she suddenly felt the human sweep her off her hooves and scooped her up in an embrace
You don’t have to wait for me to figure it out, Sunny. I’ve already made up my mind.
>He looked at her while the he held the pony in his arms
>Unconvinced by his words and too tired from all the shit she had put up with to this point, Sunny had maintained a distant look on her face
>Noticing her unresponsiveness to his words, Anon continued
I mean—I know it’s true that I still have to sort some stuff out over here
>He gestured toward his brain
But I’ve decided that if I’m going to get serious about becoming better, I’d want to get better with you
>Lifting the mare until face level with his own, he nuzzled her snout and placed her face in the crook of his neck
>Almost instinctively, Sunny wrapped her forelegs around his shoulders and her forelegs around his torso in a full-body embrace
>Relieved to see his words placate the girl’s distressed heart, he let out a sigh
>Then suddenly, he felt moisture building upon his right shoulder
>He returned her embrace two-fold, holding her tightly but careful not to actually hurt her
W-what’s wrong? We can talk about it if you want.
>”I hate you.”
Hey! Where’d that come from?
>”I hate how much control you have over me”
>Sunny managed to stifle her tears long enough to say
>“I hate how I almost immediately fold whenever you show me the slightest bit of attention. Like I can’t handle not giving into you at any moment”
>Anon was silent
>For him, this came out of the left-field; he didn’t know that Sunny felt that way about how he behaved
>He kept silent, waiting for her to finish
>” And you know the worst part is? I believe you. Every single time. I want to believe that you’ll finally stop moping about the past; that you’ll finally see us: Hitch, Izzy—the rest of the gang”
>” That you’ll finally stop seeing Prince—Twilight Sparkle… and her friends”
>”That you’ll finally see me.”
>Her eyes were downcast
>Dejected and glazed
>In the back of her mind she had already resigned herself to being only second to Twilight Sparkle in Anon’s heart
 
>Back in Earth, Anon had struggled to relate to other people, including those closest to him both in proximity and in blood
>Though he had the capacity for love (unbeknownst to him), he could not find an appropriate outlet for it; not even in himself
>It wasn’t until that one day, almost a lifetime ago, when he gave the silly pony show on tv a shot, did he find his own beating heart
>He felt the thrumming of his pulse, almost bursting at the seams from all the years of pent-up passion and philia welling up to the surface
>For he had found on his computer screen something he never knew he wanted: a place where one such as him could have grown and prospered as a youth; a place that would have nurtured him into a functioning individual in society instead of the pariah that he ended up becoming
>And to top it all off, a bookish purple unicorn that would help him see it all through
>In his personal life, even after the show ended, he would catch himself looking at people, trying to find the pony in them
>He had previously struggled with maintaining proper eye contact and adhering to the social mores of proper conversation
>The show had succeeded in teaching him to at least give other people a shot
>His general misanthropy notwithstanding, he eventually learned to carry a conversation that didn’t involve his beloved mares
>This of course led him to meet romantic prospects, surprising himself
>But he found that when applying the same technique to these women, he would always find himself using the closeness of their resemblance to Twilight, both in physique and character, as a barometer for their compatibility
>Naturally none of them passed his unfair standard
>This led to him spending long stretches of his life alone with the occasional tryst with much more desperate women which he only obliged out of some sense of “kindness”
 
>Of course this condition which he had pathologized would continue to haunt him in the next life, he thought
>Removing himself from his thoughts, Anon once again turned his attention to his marefriend
>Though she had made it clear she doubted his convictions, her body did not betray her words either
>Despite all the turmoil Anon had brought upon Sunny, she still continued to cling to his form, further staining his already tomato-sauce-covered shirt with tears
>She was, after all, the first being, pony or person, to care for him in ways that were previously unknown to him both in this life and the last
>She always made sure that he never felt left out of a conversation or that his voice was drowned out by others’
>He adored how she would always make a point to pedal back and ask him about what he had interjected about the conversation despite having already switched topics
>She attentively and actively paid attention to everything he did
>She *saw* him for who he was and who he could be and she never gave up trying to draw that person out of him
>And all he could give back to her was making her put on her best Twilight Sparkle impression whenever they got intimate with each other
 
>Having realized all this, he felt a strong urge to kick his own face in for being such a bastard
>Realizing too that it had been a while since he just stood there pondering on the platform, he could only muster to pull Sunny into a tighter embrace
>Using one arm to deftly support the embrace while the other moved a hand towards her face to wipe away the tears from her eyes, he gingerly placed a kiss on her tear-stained cheek and whispered
How about you, me, and the gang go out to watch a matinee show at the cinema?
>This prompted Sunny to rear her head and give him a puzzled look, eyes still red from all the crying
>” But you hate going to the movies with the gang! No—you just hate going to the cinema in general! You said you hated how everypony talked too loud and how they’d react to everything too intensely like stomping their hooves and hollering whenever things got too exciting!”
Ah. Smart enough to remember that I dislike going to the cinema but not smart enough to figure out why I want to go today. I’ll admit, though, the hootin’ & hollering and incessant clapping isn’t new to me at all so I’m sort of used to it by now
>” But that doesn’t answer why you want to go with Pipp and everyone else to a matinee show of all times. The theatre’s gonna be packed with foals and their parents!”
Sunny. I know you. I know how much you love to watch movies with your—our friends
>Anon’s correction causes the edges of Sunny’s lips to crack into a faint smile
Despite trying to appeal to me by becoming a civilized moviegoer, I know deep down you want to participate in all the shouting and screaming that goes on whenever something drastic happens in a movie
 
>The mention of her attempts to woo Anon back in the day prompted a playful jab of her hoof to his cheek
And you know what? I’m starting to come around to it, too. I really do think you ponies are on to something here.
But most of all, I just want to see you happy, my love.
>Anon surprises Sunny by suddenly kissing her on the lips
>She kisses him back, prompting him to up the ante and use a bit of tongue
>As they pull away from each other, a string of their saliva forms, connecting their panting mouths
Also I really just want an excuse to finger you in public, in the relative dark
>Anon’s sudden shift of tone causes Sunny to scrunch up her nose and push herself out of his embrace
>”Anon! That’s nasty! Other ponies are going to use those seats after us! And besides, to do it with everypony around…h-how lewd!”
I know you’re only putting up an act Sunny Bunny. You love it
>She swings her rump and bumps her flank on your thighs as she walks up the flight of stairs, prompting him to follow her and place a hand on her withers
>Anon had just realized that he didn’t see or think about Twilight when Sunny had just scrunched up her nose just then
>Maybe that Twilight Derangement Syndrome he’d come down with was finally starting to wear off
>About goddamn time, too as he was about to spend a lovely afternoon with her marefriend and their best friends
>Having just thought of all of that and remembering how adorable Sunny was, Anon reached out for Sunny’s rear and grabbed a chunk of her butt and squeezed it, prompting a yelp from the mare
>Yep. He’s definitely going to have a good time, today.