If she closed her eyes and listened to the rise and fall of Scootaloo’s breathing, she could almost imagine she was at a Crusaders’ sleepover. Yes, that was right. She was curled up in a sleeping bag with her best friend, because of course Scootaloo had forgotten to bring her own, and the three of them were so exhausted from staying up discussing new plans to get their cutie marks that Apple Bloom had fallen asleep the moment her head hit the pillow, and Scootaloo had followed soon after. If Sweetie couldn’t sleep yet, it was because she was still thinking of new ideas, or reflecting on the ones they’d discussed.

It wasn’t because she regretted it.

Besides, there was nothing to regret. She was at a sleepover with her friends, that was all, just like all the times they had gotten together over the years, and any minute now Apple Bloom would start snoring. That was why she couldn’t sleep—without that sound, that comforting, familiar, godawful sound, Sweetie Belle didn’t quite feel like she could believe the sleepover was happening again.

She felt Scootaloo squirm a little by her side, snuggling closer to her and almost sighing in her sleep. She looked peaceful, with that cute little smile of hers and the way her nose scrunched up just a little. Sweetie Belle smiled at the sight of it, but it was an empty smile, and did nothing to calm her thoughts.

With some effort, she closed her eyes again, willing her thoughts to ignore the warmth of the pegasus snuggled into her side, the soft, thick duvet above them trapping the heat and magnifying it until it was all she felt besides the cool air on her face. She would forget about that, because she was at a sleepover, and she needed to think of ways they could get their cutie marks for the morning.

It was a lot harder to think of activities that might be your special talent when you already knew what that talent was. But then, didn’t their cutie marks seem so obvious in hindsight? Hell, she’d spoken with Princess Twilight not too long after she’d found hers, and it seemed that she and her friends (even her own sister!) had not only figured it out years beforehand, but placed bets on how long it would take, who would find out first… silly little things like that.

But they could always try base jumping! That would be fun, right? And they’d be sure to get their cutie marks in that.

She wanted to roll over, onto her side, to turn away from Scootaloo’s heat and hide her face from the pegasus in case she woke up. But she couldn’t—the grip of Scootaloo’s embrace, though not crushing, was tight enough that she doubted she could do it without waking her sleeping friend.

Friend. That was right, her friend. Her oldest friend, whom she had known since before she could remember, who could bring a smile to her face just by being there when she was down. That was all: her sleeping, silly, beautiful friend.

Her stomach was churning. She could feel it, beneath the heavy embrace of Scootaloo’s foreleg, wriggling and writhing. There was a sharp, acidic burn in the back of her throat, and she clamped her teeth tight together, her lips taut, as if clenching her jaw would somehow keep the nausea at bay. It was too hot—she lightly kicked at the duvet above her once, twice, three times… until at last it flopped back down not onto her but on Scootaloo, doubling the weight on her friend but leaving her exposed to the cold night air. She regretted it at once, the clammy, moist sweat that stuck to her coat chilling at once, and if it weren’t for the warm body pressed up against her, Sweetie Belle was sure that she would be shivering.

It was all because it had been so hot under the duv– inside the sleeping bag. Yes, so she had climbed out of it as carefully as she could, careful not to disturb the sleeping filly next to her, who had already leaned back against her in her sleep.

And if she closed her eyes, and focused hard enough on the rise and fall of Scootaloo’s breathing, she could almost hear Apple Bloom snore.

---

“Sweetie? You awake?”

Scootaloo’s voice was little more than a whisper, a mumble in the dark that could really have been anything, but Sweetie Belle recognised it all the same. Not trusting herself to open her mouth, she nodded stiffly, hoping Scootaloo was at least able to feel the movement if she couldn’t see in the darkness. She felt the pegasus beside her stir, the tight grip sliding off and cool air flowing in between them; she shivered, but only a little, and rolled onto her side to face her friend.

Scootaloo looked tired, but she didn’t look like she was going to throw up. Maybe it was just her? Maybe Scootaloo didn’t feel the heat, or was more used to it?

“Did I wake you up?” she asked. Scootaloo smiled sleepily and shook her head, blinking.

“No,” she whispered, not that she needed to. “I just sorta woke up by myself, I think. You get any sleep yet?”

Sweetie Belle considered lying for a moment, and was opening her mouth to say that she’d managed to get a few hours’ shut-eye when she felt her head begin to shake side-to-side. She let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding, her eyes closing of their own accord to hide the water that was starting to well up… but it was no use. She could feel the warm, damp tears dripping from her face to the pillow below.

In the dark before her, she could hear a sharp intake of breath and the scramble of a body across a soft, springy mattress, its motion damped by doubly-thick duvet. Soon enough, the heat of Scootaloo was wrapped around her again, and her stomach churned at the comfort she found in that. She buried her face in the soft bristles of Scootaloo’s mane and wept, the gentle circles rubbed into her back a welcome relief and a damning reminder.

She tried to calm herself down, to keep her thoughts together. Had Rarity not always said that to be nervous about this was natural, that even she had been nervous? Sweetie Belle clung to that thought, desperate to remind herself that this was a perfectly ordinary reaction, that she wasn’t a horrible pony for feeling sick at a time like this. After all, she often got butterflies when she was feeling nervous—hell, even now she still got them before going up on stage at a concert.

Only that wasn’t quite the same. Sure, being nervous could make her stomach feel all flittery and light as a breezie’s wings, but it didn’t churn. She didn’t have to bite back the sting of acid in the back of her throat. Forget butterflies in her stomach: Sweetie Belle felt as if she were going to throw up.

She clung tighter to Scootaloo, shaking not with the cold but with fear and tension and regret and exhaustion and fear and regret and fear and fear

A light touch of lips on her cheek; the soft, gentle warmth of breath that wasn’t hers. Sweetie’s own breath had caught in her throat, just beneath the burn, and her runaway thoughts ground to a sudden stop. Everything was quiet. Everything was warm.

She tilted her own head down, catching Scootaloo’s wayward lips with her own. She felt her body be pulled into Scootaloo’s (or had she pulled Scootaloo’s to herself?) and the soft fur of her belly rubbing against her. Their legs wrapped around each other, and Sweetie Belle closed her eyes.

Everything was Scootaloo. Her breath was filled with the mare’s scent, her hooves traced invisible lines through the mare’s fur, her tongue was tangled in Scootaloo’s own and every movement brought her taste to the front of her mind. And all around her, too, Scootaloo’s warmth pressed in on her, whether it was her wings that, extended, wrapped around her, or her lips pressed so fiercely against her own, or her hooves that circled hungrily down her sides…

Sweetie pushed away, gasping for shaking breath, her lip caught not in Scootaloo’s teeth but in her own. She rolled onto her other side, turning away, hiding her eyes because she could already feel the tears welling up once more.

“Sweetie?” She wasn’t at a sleepover. She couldn’t just dream this away—it wasn’t as if she could simply play make-believe and undo what had been done. She was a mare, now. She was responsible.

She could feel the tentative reach of Scootaloo’s hooves, the lightest brush of fur against her coat as her best friend—her marefriend—weighed up the choice of keeping her distance or offering reassurance. She wanted to snuggle back into her, to feel Scootaloo’s warmth again, to be held… but she couldn’t. Some irrational thought in her mind, the same irrational thought that made her stomach churn and roil, held her still, shaking with the cold and the fear.

“Sweetie Belle, please, what’s wrong?” The softest whisper behind her, a plea. Was Scootaloo as frightened as she was, now? “Please, tell me. Did I do something wrong?”

She wanted to shake her head, to say no, to do anything to reassure the mare who lay behind her, pleading. But she couldn’t, no matter how much she wanted to. Her mind kept replaying the same moments over and over again in her head, and the moments that should have left her heart fluttering and a wide, dopey smile on her face instead wrenched at her heart and left her with a bitter taste in her mouth. Before, she had expected things to be so wonderfully happy, so perfectly romantic, so great…

“Please, you’re starting to scare me. Please just say something, say anything, please.”

She regretted it. After all the years of waiting for the right mare, and all the months and months of taking things slowly; after all the times Rarity had told her how important it was to be ready for this, how certain she should be of herself and of Scootaloo; after all the times she’d said no when things had started to get heated between them… somehow Sweetie Belle still hadn’t been ready, even if she thought she was.

“Please, Sweetie Belle. I’m scared. Just say something. Tell me what’s wrong and I swear we can fix it, alright? Just please say something.”

Every tiny ounce of her being was screaming inwardly, yelling and shouting and trying to pull herself apart, trying to take back what had been done and make her young again. But she wasn’t a filly, and this wasn’t a sleepover with her friends, and now she had to live with her choices.

That was what growing up was all about, wasn’t it? It was never about finding her cutie marks, or getting her first kiss, or, hell, even her first time. It wasn’t a lack of a cutie mark that made you a child, because Celestia knew they had still been childish long after they found those, but a lack of responsibility.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered into the silent dark. There was a rustle behind her, the sound of a pony rummaging beneath a duvet, throwing it about as she wriggled, and then Scootaloo’s forelegs were wrapped around her. This wasn’t like the last embrace, with its hungry, urgent pulls and grabs; this was a gentle hold, little more than a hoof draped on her shoulders, and it settled her stomach more than any tablets or pills ever could.

“You don’t have to be sorry,” Scootaloo whispered, her breath warm on the back of her neck, tickling her. Sweetie Belle almost giggled. “You have nothing to be sorry for; you’re the one who’s crying.”

Sweetie Belle leaned backwards into Scootaloo and smiled softly to herself. “Not any more.”

Maybe, she thought, they’d need to talk in the morning about lines they’d crossed and things they’d done. Maybe that conversation would be difficult, challenging them both and forcing them to see the world at the other’s pace. And maybe, just maybe, she would have to ask Scootaloo to wait some more. But for now, Sweetie Belle relaxed in her lover’s embrace and pushed all thoughts of regret and shame from her mind, closing her eyes and letting the weight of sleep fall comfortably across her, like the duvet that Scootaloo threw back across them, and she smiled.

There would be time for regret later—for now, sleep beckoned.