perficere

Perfect. 

For as long as she remembered, Rarity was perfect. 

The perfect face, the perfect body, the perfect smile, the perfect grades, the perfect personality, the perfect boyfriend, the perfect friends, the perfect life. 

Then Blueblood broke up with her just as her parents were divorcing and she didn’t take that very much in stride, her life unravelling in a storm of bitterness and anger as her perfect world revealed itself to be anything but. 

I would elaborate, dear reader, but that would displease poor Rarity. In lieu of that, at least allow me a cheat as I ask you to trust me when I say: it was bad. She was in pain, and suffering, and did unspeakable things that don’t matter in the grand scheme of life but certainly matter to a young woman who demands perfection from herself. 

Perfect people, after all, did not do things that were ‘super not cool’ as Rainbow Dash had said when, hours ago, having found out her designs did not qualify for the school’s fashion contest, Rarity had a complete mental breakdown. And I do, dear reader, mean complete. The stuff of legends, with the screaming, and the crying, and the saying she might as well quit everything and go join a convent because she was worthless and pathetic and untalented and unlovable and the world hated her and she hated it in return. 

A statement you and I know is not true, as did her friends, who pointed it out. A noble act, that Rainbow’s harsh tone made worse, aggravating Rarity into… well… yelling at them that they should kick rocks because she was clearly a dramatic bitch who deserved to die alone because Blueblood had left her because she wasn’t perfect for him, and also love wasn’t real, and she wasn’t even a good designer, AND ALSO—

You get the idea. 

“Perfect,” said a voice. “You have to be perfect, or else what’s the point of you.” 

Rarity raised her face from her hands, blinking through tears at the closed door of the stall she’d sequestered herself in the bathroom no one at school used. 

“Perrrrrr-fect,” the voice repeated, savouring every syllable and enunciating the final ‘tuh’ with great purpose. “I keep thinking back to what you said, and now perfect doesn’t even feel like a word. Where did it even come from?” 

Rarity buried her face back in her hands, electing to turn shame into anger. “Oh, will you leave me alone?” 

“Hang on, I’m looking this up. Here, listen.” 

Rarity heard noise outside the stall, the loud sound of boots stamping against the tile, the stall next door opening, and then glimpsed a hand grip the top of the stall’s side, followed in short order by Sunset Shimmer’s face looming over her, looking at her phone. 

“Perfect,” she read, “comes from the Latin word perficere which breaks down into ‘per’ a.k.a. complete, and ‘farcere’ a.k.a. ‘do’.” Sunset raised an eyebrow. “Its original meaning doesn’t even have anything to do with doing something well! It just meant completing something.”

“Do you think you’re funny?” Rarity asked, aggravated. She wanted to be left alone! She was awful, and wanted to be awful, because only being awful justified everything she was going through. “Will you just leave?!” 

Sunset softened. “…Rarity, list—” 

“Just leave!” Rarity yelled, slamming her fist against Sunset’s stall, only for guilt to consume her. There she went again, being dramatic and mean. Tears burned at her eyes again, and she buried herself further into her hands. “Leave me be.”  

After a long pause, she heard Sunset jump down onto the toilet, and then onto the floor. 

“Okay.” 

Rarity sniffled into her hands, listening to the sound of a stall being kicked open and heavy footsteps marching off and away until they finally stopped. 

“God,” Rarity asked herself, aloud, “why are you such a bitch? She was just trying to help.” 

She was just trying to help, and she was distracting her, and now Sunset had left. Or maybe she hadn’t. God, please, she hoped she hadn’t.

“…Sunset?” Rarity called out, voice breaking. 

Silence answered her, oppressive and shaming, and Rarity hated herself right up until her eyes flew open under her hands at the sound of footsteps, a stall opening, and seconds later, there was Sunset Shimmer, peering down at her, her expression so gentle and warm Rarity wanted to cry. 

“What’s u—Hey, it’s okay,” she said as Rarity broke down into sobs, relieved to find out she was still somehow cared for. “Do you want me to come in there?” 

“How?” Rarity asked between choked sobs. Somehow, somewhere, she found the will to joke around. “Are you going to jump over?” 

Sunset snorted. “What? No. Who am I? Rainbow Dash?” 

She vanished behind the stall’s wall, and moments later Rarity saw black boots plant themselves on the other side of her bathroom door. The door started to rattle, the handle jiggling, and seconds later, like heaven’s golden gates, the door swung open and there was Sunset, card in hand, grinning. 

“Hey.” 

“How did you do that?” Rarity hiccuped, so stunned she forgot she was upset. 

Sunset shrugged, placing the card back in her wallet. “I used to be a bully, remember? Opening a bathroom stall is easy.” She shoved the wallet in her pocket and her warm expression returned as she said with so much affection, Rarity felt she’d been shot, “Maybe we can be bitches together?” 

The tears came back at once, and before she knew it Sunset had forced herself onto the tiny toilet seat, the two girls crammed in the stall as she pulled Rarity in for a tight hug. 

“Hey,” she said gently, “it’s okay.” 

“God, I’m sorry.” Rarity buried herself in Sunset’s chest, feeling peace for a moment even as she felt like dying. “I’m just—I—I’m sorry, I—” 

“Apology accepted,” Sunset replied, rubbing her hand over her friend’s back. “We’re all good, I promise.”

“What about the others?” Rarity asked, her voice small. She remembered the hurt in their eyes as she told them they all hated her. 

“…Well, they’re upset for sure,” Sunset replied after a moment.  

Rarity laughed bitterly. “So they hate me, then?”

Mission accomplished. 

Sunset frowned, tightening the hug. “Stop that. They’re just upset, and honestly, they’re probably more upset over you than they are over themselves.” She glanced towards the bathroom’s exit. “All five of them sat outside when I came in here to see you. They’re probably still sitting there, unless…”

Rarity froze. “Unless?” 

“Unless Rainbow Dash is missing because she went to beat up Blueblood like she said she would,” Sunset replied, her grin returning as Rarity giggled against her. 

Finally, Rarity pulled away from the hug, wiping her hands with the hand that wasn’t being held by Sunset. 

“Thank you. I feel better.” Her eyes then landed on Sunset’s shirt, now completely stained with tears, and she winced. “Oh! Your shirt…” 

Sunset shrugged. “It’s no problem. This just forces me to do laundry today instead of putting it off another day. Hey.” She squeezed Rarity’s hand. “If I was still okay after everything I did, you’ll be too. And we’ll still be here for you, too.”

“Even if I’m a bitch?” 

“Even if you were The bitch,” Sunset added. “Which you aren’t, but—You get it.” 

“What if I want to be The Bitch?” Rarity asked, a smile curving her lips. “You know, it’s not necessarily a bad thing. Maybe I will be The Bitch.” 

Sunset frowned exaggeratedly. “Hey, wait, that’s my title.” 

Rarity giggled. “Perhaps we can share? Reign supreme over Canterlot High, uncontested.” She waved her hand horizontally, from one side to the other, adopting a tone of great reverence. “The Bitches.” 

“You know what?” Sunset offered Rarity her other free hand. “Deal.” 

“Deal.”

She shook Sunset’s hand, and when her friend used this opportunity to pull her in for another hug, she allowed it, sinking into the feeling of being loved, flaws and all. 

“Sunset?” she asked, her eyes closing.

“Yeah?”  

“When you looked over the bathroom stall like some kind of absolutely unmannered hooligan, did you even consider what you’d have done had I actually been using the restroom?” 

“…No,” Sunset replied. “But, hey, you’d at least have been upset over that instead of over your issues! Win, win, right?” 

Rarity laughed. “Right,” she said, feeling for the first time in months that maybe everything would be alright.  

Maybe, just maybe, she was allowed to not be perfect, after all.

—