It was half past bedtime, but the feel of midnight had arrived early: that tremblesome feeling when the world lay silent, and monsters lurked beneath the hospital bed. Sweetie Belle couldn’t sleep. She was too ghostweary to sleep, and so kept glancing at the closet, where a pack of shadows had gathered to escape the moonlight. 

“But you know,” said the closet in a voice fit for knarred trees in a winter’s storm. “It’s not bad being a ghost, not once you get used to it. You can scare ponies you don’t like! You get to visit your own funeral!”

Sweetie shivered under the blanket, reminding herself that closets didn’t speak. Closets were wood, brass bolts, and steel screws, and whoever had heard of screws that talked? 

Even so, she gulped and said, “Wh-why would I go to my own funeral? Isn’t that weird?” 

“Weird?” replied the closet. “Weird?! Why would you [i]not[/i] go? Why would you [i]not[/i] want to see how loved you were? Going to my own funeral was the best decision I ever made.”  

Sweetie stared at the closet. The closet stared right back, unblinking.
 
“Closets don’t go to funerals,” Sweetie said at last, though her voice was only half sure and a quarter certain. “They don’t die, and they know when to quit lying.”

The closet shook its head. Or rather, with no head to shake, the doors opened and shut, opened and shut, ever so slightly, ever so slightly. “Hah!” it said. “I myself died right there, in that bed of yours. Such a gruesome, ghastsome death it was too – a dozen doctors by my side, and not a single pony one of them could save me...

“But I digress. I merely [i]haunt[/i] this closet, because the bed is for patients. It’s for the most terminal of foals. The no-hopers. The final-stops. The end-of-the-lines.” 

“You’re lying.”

“Why don’t you have a looksee behind my doors?” said the ghost. “You’ll be joining me come morning, I shouldn’t wonder, so have a peek. What are they operating on again? Your horn? It sounded serious.”

“N-no it’s not.”

“Spell pox leads to horn-rot, which leads to magical terror trembles and the dreaded hoof-and-horn disease. Of course it’s serious.”

[i]“No it’s not,"[/i] Sweetie wailed. "Leave me alone.”

“You should think of something put on your tombstone, Sickly Belle, while you have time. Here. You can take something [i]I’ve[/i] been working on. It’s a work in progress, but you get the idea.”

The ghost cackled, then began to chant. Its voice was that of tombs and graveyards, and maggot-stinking coffins buried in the earth.

[i]“Cursed be he that moves my bones,
Cursed be she that digs.”[/i] 

Sweetie clambered out of bed. Her horn ached with every step, a pain like a hammer to the forehead. Yet she fixed her eyes upon the closet, and walked.

The ghost continued.

[i]“Cursed be they who crack this stone,
Be boiled alive 
Like pigs, oh pigs!
Be boiled, be broiled
Like pigs!” [/i] 

“Ponies don’t eat pigs,” Sweetie snapped. “Stop lying to me!”

With that, she opened the closet to shout at the ghost.

The closet was empty.

Little shadows nipped at Sweetie’s hooves, and the room seemed bigger than before, larger, huger, vaster, greater, grander. She was alone. Her eyes watered, and with all her heart and soul, blood, bile and bones, she wished she was home again – yet the earliest wishing stars had yet to rise. 

“R-Rarity,” Sweetie whispered. “I… I know there’s no ghosts in here. Not really. But I need you...”

A moon gleaming pause. It was followed by the sound of hoofsteps, but Sweetie didn’t dare turn to look. If she didn’t look, then that meant Rarity was really in the room with her, and nothing could prove otherwise. 

“Whatever is the matter, darling?” said Rarity behind her.

Sweetie gulped. “I’m…”

“Come along, dear. Spit it out.”

Sweetie spoke in a mouse-voice. “I’m... I'm so scared. I’m scared that something’s going to go wrong tomorrow, and I’m not going to see you again.”

Rarity whispered in her ear. “That’s O.K. Everypony gets scared. But no matter what happens tomorrow, know this: you are brave, and you are not alone. Don’t forget that. Don’t you [i]ever[/i].” 

It was an hour past bedtime, but the feel of midnight had arrived early: that special feeling of sister hugs, and of facing the morning with bravery and courage.

Sweetie yawned, then finally turned and climbed back into bed.

She fell asleep.