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This should have been easy. No, this was supposed to be easy.
Twilight licked her lips, her fingers clumsily running along the fretboard of the guitar in her lap. Every string she plucked, every chord she strummed, sounded less like music and more like a jumbled mess of ringing noise. She groaned, leaning forward and resting her head against the instrument’s wooden body.
She had a single week to learn six songs for the Rainbooms’ upcoming concert. Under normal circumstances, the only instrument that she needed to worry about mastering was the sound of her own voice. But with Rainbow Dash competing in an out-of-state soccer tournament that same weekend, the band was out of a lead guitarist. Fortunately, Sunset had stepped up to the plate to take on that role, but that left the background rhythms wide open.
Honestly, Twilight wasn’t sure what was going through her head when she offered to learn how to play the guitar in a week, but now she was stuck with her decision. She had assumed learning an instrument would have been no problem considering how quickly she learned just about everything else in her life. However, picking up the guitar was proving to be far more difficult than she had originally imagined.
And, to think, she was kind of hoping that she’d be able to impress Sunset and the others with this newfound skill.
“Hey, Twilight. How’s practice going?”
As if the powers that be had read her mind, Sunset Shimmer herself had stepped into the doorway of the band room. She approached, tossing her backpack onto a stray chair nearby.
Twilight gritted her teeth, sitting up and inhaling sharply. “O-oh! Sunset! Hey!” She coughed, running a hair through her bangs. “Practice? Practice is going stupendously! I’m really nailing it.”
“Okay, then.” Sunset smiled, crossing her arms. “Let’s hear it.”
Twilight froze. “Uh… hear it?”
“Yeah. Show me what you’ve got.”
“Oh. Well. Uh.” Twilight fidgeted nervously, her fingers drumming along the guitar’s body. “Meaning, like, you want to know what I’ve learned?”
“...Yeah.” Sunset raised a brow. “That’s... what I meant.”
“Of course you did! Well, yeah, I can do that.” Twilight let out an awkward laugh, her mind in a frenzy, knowing she had nothing to show for her hours of practice. She needed to find an alternate solution. If she wasn’t any good at actually learning to play the guitar, she needed to show something she was good at learning—useless facts.
“Like…” Twilight started, holding up a finger with a crooked smile, “did you know that the earliest guitar is believed to have existed over 3,000 years ago in the civilizations of Mesopitamia and Babylon? Back then, though, it was less of a guitar and more of a lute.” She put a finger to her chin, glancing to the ceiling. “Regardless, it was definitely a member of the chordophone family. The modern version of the guitar that we know of today didn’t begin developing until the year 1200 in Spain when—”
“Twi.” Sunset deadpanned with a wave of her hand. “Less telling. More showing.”
Twilight cringed with a wince. “Okay…” She glanced down at the guitar. “I’ll show you my best…” She strummed her fingers across the guitar’s strings, “G-chord!”
The sound rattled throughout the room. What was meant to be a gentle chord came out as a loud, wavy mess. Twilight recoiled at the sound and Sunset grimaced.
“Wow, Twi… That was really…”
“I know,” Twilight sighed. “It’s awful.”
“I wouldn’t say awful,” Sunset offered with a lame smile. “Maybe more like… a work in progress?” Twilight narrowed her gaze at the obvious lie. Sunset added, “A serious work in progress.”
“I don’t get it!” Twilight groaned, throwing her head back against the chair. “This should be easy! It’s just a couple of strings and finger motions. What am I not getting?”
Sunset snickered, leaning forward with a mischievous grin. “Oh? You mean to say that the super genius Twilight Sparkle is actually struggling to learn something for once?”
At that, Twilight immediately collected herself, shooting her friend a hard glare. “Sunset. I learned all the basic principles of quantum mechanics in a day. I. Don’t. Struggle.”
Sunset rolled her eyes, pulling up a chair and taking a seat beside Twilight. “Music isn’t something you just learn out of a textbook, Twi—especially when you need to have the music for six songs perfected in a week.”
The painful reminder of their quickly approaching concert date only served to rekindle Twilight’s previous anxieties. She slumped in her chair, allowing the guitar to slack in her lap.
“Ugh! It’s hopeless! I don’t know what I was thinking!” Twilight wined, dragging her hands down her face. “I’m going to make a total fool out of myself!” She gasped hopefully, sitting up as a new idea sprung into her mind. “Maybe Fluttershy and I can switch?”
The image of Fluttershy standing up on stage, electric guitar in hand flashed in Twilight’s mind. Just as quickly as the thought came, it went. Both Twilight and Sunset cringed in unison.
“Somehow, I don’t think that’s gonna work out.” Sunset laughed lightly. “Why don’t you just let me help you?”
“No, no. I don’t want to be a burden,” Twilight declined, waving a hand. “I know you have a million other better things you could be doing than teaching some newbie guitar.”
“Fortunately, my schedule is wide open right now,” Sunset grinned, elbowing Twilight in the side, “and you’re kind of my favorite guitar newbie. So, it’s no sweat.”
“W-well…” Twilight’s face dusted pink as she scratched at her cheek. “I guess… if you insist.”
“Okay, well, for starters, your posture is all wrong,” Sunset began, adjusting herself in her chair to scoot closer to Twilight. “Make sure you’re sitting up straight, like this.”
As Sunset said that, she put a hand to Twilight’s lower back, coaxing her to sit up straighter. Twilight let out a quiet, surprised squeak at the contact, her face flushing. Her reaction was immediate as she quickly adjusted her sitting position.
Fortunately, Sunset hadn’t seemed to notice Twilight’s beginning stages of a bumbling meltdown as she continued on with, “Second, you’re gonna wanna make sure the fingers on your fretting hand aren’t totally covering the strings—just your fingertips.”
Sunset took Twilight’s hand in her own, adjusting their placement on the fretboard. She then took Twilight’s other hand and rested it against the guitar strings. Internally, Twilight was beginning to panic, wondering how sweaty her hands must have been.
“And, third, your wrist on your strumming hand is all tense, relax a bit.”
“R-right,” Twilight stammered, her voice cracking. “Relax. Sure. I’m relaxed.”
“Great!” Sunset beamed. “Now how about we work on your chords? Once you have the basics, we can focus on the intro to All Good.”
“Y-yeah! Sure!” Twilight agreed with an eager nod. “That.. that sounds… all good to me!”
She almost facepalmed herself for the pun. What was she thinking? Why was she acting like this? It wasn’t like she had never been alone with Sunset before. And it wasn’t like Sunset hadn’t touched her before.
But she supposed there was something different about it being just the two of them.
Alone.
Touching hands.
And such.
She inwardly cursed her awkwardness for getting the better of her now. Sunset didn’t seem bothered at all, and if she noticed how painfully awkward Twilight was being in that moment, she certainly didn’t show any signs of it.
The clock seemed to move especially slow as Sunset walked Twilight through all the basics of the guitar. Not that Twilight minded. In fact, the way her heart raced at every touch of Sunset’s hand seemed to ease just the slightest as time went on. What, at first, felt tense and weird was becoming comfortable and fun.
Sunset had the patience of a saint as Twilight struggled to put the chords together while learning the intro to All Good. But once she had finally strung a few good ones together, the look on Sunset’s face was enough to make Twilight’s chest swell with a mix of pride and… something else she couldn’t quite explain.
But it was nice.
Really nice.
“See? You’re getting it!” Sunset encouraged, giving Twilight a gentle punch to the shoulder. “A little more work and you’ll be ready to roll.”
“Well, I have a pretty good teacher showing me the ropes,” Twilight laughed lightly, rubbing her arm.
Sunset winked. “Nah, you’re just a pro student.”
Something about that made all the heat in Twilight’s body rise up into her face. She was sure her cheeks must have been flushed with at least 60 shades of red in that moment. Her throat felt dry, and she couldn’t find the words to respond.
Fortunately, she didn’t have to.
“Oh. Pardon ladies, we interruptin’ somethin’?”
Twilight blinked, pulled from her thoughts as her attention was drawn to the band room door. Applejack and Rainbow Dash stood in the doorway, both carrying a couple of cardboard boxes filled with sheet music.
Rainbow snickered. “Yeah. Were you guys making o—Ow!” she yelped as Applejack dug the heel of her boot into her toes. Her face flushed with anger. “Hey!”
“No, you guys are good,” Sunset dismissed quickly, rising from her seat. “I was just finishing up giving Twilight here a guitar lesson.”
Twilight raised her brows. She could have sworn she noticed a red tint to Sunset’s cheeks.
“A guitar lesson?” Rainbow perked up, throwing her boxes down onto the floor. Applejack snarled at her. “Why didn’t you tell me you needed help, Twilight?” She grinned, thumbing to herself. “I would’ve been an awesome coach.”
Applejack scoffed, crouching down to pick up the sheet music Rainbow had so carelessly dropped. “Somehow, I reckon Twilight’s better off with Sunset.” She rose to her feet, offering Twilight a smile. “I’m mighty glad you’re gettin’ the hang of things though, Twi. Think you’ll be ready in time for the big concert?”
Twilight perked up. “I hope so! I think if I keep practicing with the pointers Sunset Shimmer gave me, I should be okay.”
“Well, if you want we could have another… private lesson?” Sunset twisted a lock of hair around her finger, glancing back at Twilight. “At my place? Maybe tomorrow?”
“T-tomorrow? Private lesson?” Twilight repeated, pointing to herself as that same blush from before returned to her cheeks. “You and me? Your place? Oh. Yeah. Yeah, sure.” She nodded, maybe a little too quickly as her glasses fell askew on her face. “I’m totally down for privacy. I mean privateness… Private lessons. With you… so to speak.” She coughed, averting her gaze. “Yes, that would be… lovely.”
“Great!” Sunset smiled, gripping at the strap on her bag. “Tomorrow, then.”
“Yeah, tomorrow!” Twilight agreed, fixing her glasses. “I’ll call me. I mean, you. I’ll call you. Or… you’ll call me….” She pursed her lips, her face feeling hotter and hotter by the second. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Sunset offered her final goodbyes to her friends before taking off, closing the band room door behind her. Twilight groaned, sinking into her seat as she rubbed her face. Seriously, what was going on with her? There was nothing within any reason or logic that could have possibly explained this sudden feeling she was experiencing.
In fact, the closest way she could think of describing it would be—
“Smooth, Twi,” Rainbow scoffed with a roll of her eyes. “I swear, if your crush on Sunset Shimmer was anymore obvious it’d be…” She scrunched her face, trying to find the right words. “Well, that’d be impossible because, yeah, it’s already pretty obvious.”
“Rainbow Dash!” Applejack chastised, giving Rainbow a shove.
“What? It’s true!”
Twilight’s heart leapt into her throat. Her jaw slacked. A sharp intake of breath that sounded more like a gasp escaped her mouth. Her face erupted like a volcano.
“Oh my god, I have a crush on Sunset?!”
Rainbow Dash and Applejack gawked at Twilight like she had sprouted a second head. Within a beat, Applejack shot Rainbow a dirty look that had, ‘now look at what you’ve done’ written all over it. Rainbow merely shrugged with a sheepish grin in response.
Twilight’s head was spinning and her heart was racing a mile a minute. As if it wasn’t bad enough that she needed to learn the guitar in a week—now she needed to learn the guitar in a week from the girl she potentially had a crush on.
This was bad. This was so bad. What if Sunset found out? What if she also had a crush on her? No way. That was impossible. Maybe she could find a way to erase all of her memories of this afternoon and just forget about it. But if she did that then she’d be forgetting everything she learned about the guitar and would look like an idiot.
This was a mess and no equation Twilight thought up could find the solution. The only thing she knew for sure was that these private lessons were about to get way more stressful.
End.