When Cheesy Sense calls, Cheese Sandwich has no choice but to obey it, throwing parties and spreading laughter wherever he’s needed. This time is different, though. Pinkie is having a very hard pregnancy, and he doesn’t want to leave her. Between keeping an eye on Pinkie and trying to convince her friends that he’s not just being a nervous husband, he has a lot on his hooves. And on top of that, he’s got the suspicion that there’s something Pinkie isn’t telling him.
This fic is a partner piece to Triple Threat. You can consider it a sort of prequel to that and to another fic, Triple Slam. It’s out of continuity from my other CheesePie work, meaning that it isn’t a certain look at their future at all.
Art by DragonFoxGirl; used by permission.
Hooray for Cheesy Pie!
This is beautiful.
I've never been a father -- though I'd like to be -- but I can totally sympathize with Cheese. His beloved is pregnant -- which is, literally and obviously, his fault, even though they're not sorry about it because they want children -- and he can't be with her because something important calls him away. The pregnancy looks dangerous (we know that it's because they've conceived triplets, but he doesn't know that). If anything happens to her he will never forgive himself. And there's pretty much nothing he can do about it.
That's stark drama.
This part particularly almost reduced me to tears:
Because -- though she has different speech patterns -- that is so much like my wife when I don't look out for my health, or do something dangerously stupid (like run across the street in the middle). Because that's what marriage is like when you really love each other -- you are best friends. Just like Pinkie says it.
Pinkie, you little... ugh, can't think of the proper word. Still, surprising your husband with triplets...
Ehehe, I didn't expect you to write a pregnancy fic. It's interesting to see Cheese as being so nervous over leaving her, especially since I assume that Pinkie's getting close to foaling. Really close.
Quite the touching story. I really enjoyed it and a shipfic this heartwarming deserves more attention. Much better than I could ever do with a romance tale. Keep up the good work!
I LOVE IT. PERFECT. SIMPLE. TOUCHING. EXCELLENT
That was so sweet. Great job. I think you did a wonderfully.
This was so sweet!
Amazing job as always!
Thanks, guys!
4776769 Hooray, indeed! I'm still not tired of writing about them.
4776867 Pretty much, yes, although of course she's got a little something to do with being pregnant (and everything to do with its being triplets, unfortunately.)
Yep, and nope. And of course, she herself doesn't want him to stay because he has to exercise the gift she gave him years ago. And she also doesn't really appreciate that she's in danger . I'm surprised no one's said anything about "but, Maud!" because of course Maud would be at her little sister's side if she had any idea. She doesn't. Pinkie simply hasn't mentioned it. Cheese has been wondering what's up with that, because he sees Pinkie write to Maud and the rest of her family at least once a week, if not more. But hey, what does he know about what functional families do? You notice I *still* have barely mentioned his family in these stories or the EG story?
Childbirth has got to have been nightmarish, or potentially so, before people understood anything about antisepsis. Even now, sometimes stuff goes well, and sometimes it doesn't. I had a colleague who was pregnant with twins who was in the hospital for about a month. If I remember right, her water had broken and they were trying to keep the babies safely inside her, because they were going to be really premature. Anyhoo, I've mixed some human and some equine issues here. Mares work differently from lady humans. The hypertension and diabetes are mostly people stuff. The bloating is everything. Probably even lady cuttlefish get bloating.
4777032 Surprise!
Pinkie's on the edge of giving birth too soon, in fact. It's possibly the main reason they're trying to keep her in bed. I thought it would be nice to write a fic with pregnancy in it that didn't really use most of the major story tropes. I guess Cheese is an anxious new father, but I think he would be pretty ok with it if he didn't know this wasn't looking good. Also, look, Ma! No pickles! Ice cream, sure, but it's because she wants to eat the foods she likes and isn't allowed to.
And there was another reason I wanted to write this, but my lips are sealed on that one.
4777079 Thank you! I wasn't born with the ability to write romance fic. Everyone starts somewhere. And I don't even think of myself as a romance writer, but a comedy writer! Just keep plugging away at it. You'll do fine. Anyway, I'm glad you liked it!
4777513 It means a great deal to me when the artist likes the fic. Thank you.
4777646 Thank you!
4778304 I'm glad you liked it!
The cover photo itself melted my heart.
EDIT: Then I've read the story. So much feels!
4778591
We know it from the sequel that she didn't tell it to her family.
Pinkie having triplets? I'm not surprised to hear that. Nice story!
You nailed it. The recent pregnancy things I've seen popping up here weren't for naught. Well, I could tell that anyway, but still!
Everything you played here is a common thing; the nervous husband, the friends willing to help, the pregnant one with the cravings or mood swings (that yelling part got me). I may not be the most knowledgable person when it comes to pregnancies, but this is what I imagine.
Pinkie keeping it a secret/surprise for Cheese about Cheesecake Surprise, Sachertorte and Silly String? Yeowch, that's going to be some surprise right there. But knowing Cheese, he'd come around. He always does.
And man oh man is Pinkie a temptress. Those eyes and the batting the eyelashes. Yeah, she does that a lot. No cookies for you miss!
I used to ship CheesyPie, but then I found out who voiced Cheese and now I can't help but feel like I'm shipping Pinkie Pie with Weird Al.
4778591
Yes, but that's not how a father would think at this point. Especially one as obviously-protective as Cheese.
Pinkie's actually being really nice to him for a mother experiencing a difficult pregnancy. One can get hormonal mood swings, and of course there's both pain and all sorts of strange sensations; there is a tendency for the mother to think "It's all your fault" to the father, and express it. Especially during actual labor, but of course during actual labor there's a lot of pain and hence all sorts of things may get said. Or screamed.
Then again, Pinkie is really nice. In general.
Well, fraternal/sororal twinning occurs when more than one egg is released, identical when a fertilized egg divides into two zygotes. Of course, the mother can't really control any of this. I don't know that even Pinkie could control that sort of thing.
My version of Pinkie is a sororal twin; I'm guessing yours isn't. The tendency for multiple births can be partly heritable.
Indeed. The danger she's in is medical, and the best most of her friends could do would be to help take care of her and get her to the hospital / bring a doctor / midwife in time; I think that of all her friends in Ponyville, Fluttershy's the only one who probably has the skills to help directly, and that's not her specialty.
My version of Pinkie has a midwife grandmother. Though depending exactly when this is set (obviously at least a year or more after the end of Season Four, since we have to allow in time for Cheese and Pinkie to get married, consummate their love and conceive their children in some order, and she's at a fairly late stage now), Goldie might be getting too old to provide much active help. Her only canon justification, of course, is her mention in the "Giggle at the Ghosties" song, and I named her.
I'm assuming Pinkie doesn't want her family to worry. And you're right -- Pinkie's probably not enough worried herself.
Multiple births are, in a species (such as Humans or Ponies) that normally does single births inherently dangerous. Especially if the mother is small, and (given Cheese's knowledge of her, he may mean "small" in more than just the sense of "small-bodied" -- he'd know how wide was her pelvic girdle etc, though I doubt he's an expert on childbirth).
Equestria is technologically advanced in terms of medicine (the equipment shown in other eps looks like what was common in our world around 1950, while their overall tech looks more like around 1875-1900) but multiple births were quite dangerous in 1950 in our world. Indeed, it was only in the 20th century (due to antiseptics and antibiotics) that it became normal for all three or more babies in triplets or quadruplets and the mother to survive. Before then, this was rare in multiple births larger than twins.
I'm not sure what Maud could do to help a pregnant or birthing Pinkie Pie save to help take care of her or get her medical attention. Maud is smart, though, and cares about Pinkie, and hence would try to help, and would probably find some way of helping. If she knew.
Given Pinkie's normal appetite, metabolism and diet, and thinking about how her needs would shift during pregnancy (she'd especially need calcium and various other elements to actually form the babies), I could see diabetes as a problem. If she ate her normal diet, all the sugar that she normally would expend working would be accumulating in her bloodstream.
4778835
Well, the real Weird Al Yankovic is human. And married. So he probably wouldn't get involved with Pinkie Pie.
But then Cheese Sandwich isn't Weird Al Yankovic, any more than Andrea Libman is Pinkie Pie. They're just their voice actors.
Cheese Sandwich's personality is somewhat based on Weird Al's, but not precisely. Remember also that the persona of "Weird Al" is itself a stage act: Alfred Matthew Yankovic is the real person.
For that matter, the totally-frentic versions of Cheese Sandwich and Pinkie Pie that they manifest when throwing parties -- while not an "act" the way that "Weird Al" is an act -- is only part of their personalities. They have depths of tenderness, fear, and other emotions which would not fit into being party ponies, which they display in non-party circumstances. Such as this one.
4778835 To each his or her own, but to me, that's like getting creeped out because Andrea Libman voices both Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy. Cheese is voiced by Weird Al, but the character isn't synonymous with Weird Al. And honestly, did you see anything Weird Al-like in the story you just read? My initial thought before I saw the episode was "that would be unpleasant, to ship a cartoon character with a real person," and if I saw them that way, I wouldn't. But I don't. I think Cheese is a lot more than that or Rule 63 Pinkie. If that's all he was, I wouldn't write them. Thank you for reading, and I hope you liked it anyway!
4778644 Thank you very much! Of course, I can't take any credit for that fabulous picture. DragonFoxGirl does some gorgeous CheesePie art. I didn't want to assume that everyone's read Triple Threat, but of course, you're right.
4778666 Pinkie can perform wonders. Also, she thinks it's funny.
4778693 Thank you! Yeah, since you saw that thread, I partly wanted to deconstruct some of those tropes. Pinkie craves some particular food? Yes, but in this case, she doesn't want some comical concoction with pickles. She wants to be able to eat sweets, something she normally chugs down. Cheese may be nervous, but he's nervous about specific things for very good reasons. There's a difference between that generic "it's not good for the baby" fluttering around and refusing to let the wife pick up a dish when there's nothing wrong with her, and being really worried over serious pregnancy complications. Cheese is concerned that based on what the doctor's said and Carrot has confirmed, there's a very real possibility that Pinkie could lose the foals, die, or both. As I mentioned to Jordan, I've seen some people I know have high-risk pregnancies, including one who spent weeks in the hospital. That's not a mood swing, by the way. It's Pinkie interjecting herself into the conversation and underlining that yes, he does too have to go. If it didn't come out that way, my bad, I guess. So I wanted to take on some pregnancy fic standards, twist them, and even make them an issue, because Pinkie's friends are initially assuming they're true.
She sure can be, can't she? Some of those looks ought to be illegal!
4779334
Eh, I dunno. I don't usually like Human / Pony romances because they are normally done so very badly by writers who are just basically doing self-insert sexual fantasies, but I see no reason why they can't be done well. In theory.
A good story with Human / Pony friendship (and enmity) is Ardashir's My Little Balladeer, in which Silver John (the human) connects emotionally with several Ponies (some in the Mane Six, and some others). Notably both John and the Ponies stay in character: John has his beloved wife back home and does not want to live in Equestria and abandon his life on Earth (he wants to get back home to her); the Ponies are not inexplicably sexually-attracted to John (though they come to like him well enough).
If a Human were stuck long-term in Equestria I think he or she would probably wind up falling for a Pony -- the Ponies are psychologically-similar enough to humans that this makes sense. I don't think it would happen rapidly, though. The two species simply have different sexual cues and signals, and it would take time for said human to learn them. One should also consider that most Human cultures do not acknowledge even the possibility of other species being sapient and regard all such relationships as "bestiality," while the Ponies are familiar with non-Pony sapient life.
The cross-species thing doesn't bother me that much. I've written five cross-species romances (or romantic friendships) into my fic -- Spike and Rarity, Discord and Celestia, Discord and Fluttershy, Fischfootur and Meatlugger, and Wind Whistler and Green-Glint. The last-named is interesting in that Green-Glint is a very alien alien -- an Elder Thing -- and the Elder Things have no concept of romance in the Pony sense (hee perceives the relationship as being the sort of close-hobby-oriented-friendship that is the basic social unit of Elder Thing society).
I come to it from a science-fictional perspective, though, and I'm very aware that I'm writing aliens when I do it. And that we can't take human norms for granted when writing aliens.
For instance (and this is one thing many writers miss), Human males are very much excited by breasts. Pony mares don't have those sorts of breasts. They have (relatively small) udders with teats, and while they're probably tender enough to be a secondary erogenous zone, it would be much more secondary for them than for Humans -- and they are carried much farther to the back of their barrels than a Human woman's breasts are on her torso. Also (and I know why male Human writers don't like to think about this), a stallion's genitalia are in proportion to his bodily size larger than a human man's in proportion to his bodily size. (I think you know what story forced me to think about this). Just to name a couple of anatomically-relevant considerations.
One can't even take all the emotions for granted, even though the Ponies are psychologically very similar to Humans in many ways. For instance, I read Equestria as being (mildly) matriarchal, and the reason as being that stallions have historically been more excitable (due to the presence of mares in estrus around them 24/7 in settlements) than mares. Well, think about all those HiE stories in which Mr. Hero yells and rants and the Ponies are impressed by his manly deciveness.
Uh-uh. We know what the Pony archetypes of admirable masculinity look like, because we've seen a couple of them -- Shining Armor and Big Mac, both of them masculine enough to attract romantic interest from Alicorns. Both are strong but gentle (Shining's moderately extroverted, and Big Mac is introverted), and neither of them is easily excitable. Why is this?
Well, because a male who rants and raves is playing into the stereotype of "stallion in rut." Pony biological and cultural evolution tells them to take anything a stallion in rut says as more serious from the point of view of the need to calm him down than its informational content. In fact, what Mr. Ranty Hero would be communicating with his tirade is "I'm just a silly stallion who can't control his emotions -- calm me down but don't take me too seriously." He's showing the attitude one would expect of an adolescent stallion -- "hysterical teenage girl" would be the human analogue. Not what he probably meant to communicate.
Little things like this are important when considering cross-species friendship, let alone romantic love.
4779311 Of course, that's more or less the way I think about them. Plus, again mostly in my version, I take some cues from the episode that he's really quite introverted and shy--still--and that some of the super-duper party pony thing is a persona. Heck, I have a public persona and I'm only a professor! It's not that professor me isn't real, but it exaggerates some things and downplays others.
Yeah, Cheese DOES think of this has "his fault" in a lot of ways, and if something goes wrong later, he'll really feel crushed.
In this particular case, Pinkie has used some of her reality-warping powers to create triplets, and of course, they're fraternal, not identical, so even I don't know how she managed that, given that she probably didn't know she was getting pregnant at the time. Or did she? I do know that she wouldn't intentionally fool Cheese and get pregnant on purpose without letting him know, but I also have a specific scenario about how this happened, so--
And she's used to doing weird physical things that would kill another pony, and she's always been fine. Unlike Rainbow Dash, she's never been in the hospital. She probably underestimated this.
Triplets are even less common among horses than among people, and that's all I'm going to say for now. But super-multiples are more common now too from infertility treatments. Twins were much more unusual when I was a kid, if I'm remembering right. [whoops--you posted again while I was writing this.]
Adorable and entirely understandable. Cheese is so used to being incomprehensible to the common pony that when he finds himself faced with a fairly common, relatable problem, he assumes they'll laugh it off as "just a party pony being a party pony." In reality, it's an equinizing moment that assures the rest of the Mane Six that there's a good stallion underneath all the party supplies and munitions. (Of course, they all know that at this point, but still.)
Given that multiple births aren't exactly common for horses (not that I know of, at least,) it's no wonder that Pinkie's having so much trouble. And why Carrot is so nervous. He may recognize some of the signs, but if so, he definitely knows better than to tell Cheese.
I have to wonder about AJ. Why she think she'd be "flaunting" the potential Apple-Pie family connection? I suppose family is improtant enough to her that she feels there would be an inherent inequality between her honorary family members and a potential blood relation, no matter how distant...
In any case, a wonderful look at a most adorable offshoot of your usual work. Thank you for it.
4779397 Possibly, but of course the issue that it wouldn't be a generic fictional human, but a real person: Weird Al. And that would weird me out, so to speak. I have a friend who ships members of Korean boy bands and soccer teams. The boy bands I can almost understand, because 80-90% of their appeal is marketing, and some of this is catering to the slashy tastes of their fans. You can see much the same thing at work in Takarazuka stars, where their public image is very rigidly controlled. Their "golden couples"--star actresses paired together in the lead male and female roles--are covered almost as though they were real couples. The actresses aren't allowed to marry, as it would "ruin the illusion." And yet woe betide them if they actually DO have a real same-sex relationship. Yet even though these "relationships" are often cynically made up and promoted, I still feel very uncomfortable about Real Person Fanfic. Once performers have given me delight in their performance, the responsibility is done. They don't owe me info about their private lives, and they're certainly not my puppet.
So if I thought of Cheese Sandwich as merely Ponified Weird Al, I wouldn't write for this ship, but I don't.
4779933
Oh, I totally see what you mean about that -- it would strike me as very strange, also, to create a character wholly based on the ponification of the stage persona of a real person. This would sort of be like writing an Equestria Girls fanfiction about someone falling in love with the Humanoid analogue of the Great and Powerful Trixie's act. A stage persona is at best (when it's created by the performer, as in the case of Weird Al or The Great And Powerful Trixie) an abstraction and perhaps falsification of their true character. It certainly won't contain the accurate intimate details that one would interact with in love or friendship.
The reason I think it's kind of creepy to ship fully-realized characters with these sorts of stage caricatures is that it sort of implies the writer (and his world) can't tell the difference between real characters and caricatures. It's sort of what young girls do with boy bands, and the reason is that they don't understand actual males, so maleness isn't really real to them in general.
It's kind of creepy because it's the prose equivalent of playing with dress-up dolls, not of exploring character in fiction.
Vacation is giving me no time to read amazing stories like this! Gah! Definitly hitting my Read Laters.
Cute! I like it.
4779334 I have nothing against cheesypie, and the comment was a joke more than anything. But being I MASSIVE weird al fan, idk it just feels kind of weird.
4779546 This is something party ponies run into a lot. In fact, it's something I run into a lot myself. I can't resist putting things in a funny way, and then people think I was kidding. Oh, well. In Cheese's case, he's got that, plus being really off the wall, plus all the stereotypical "you're just worrying about nothing." He might as well be Ricky Ricardo. I can see how it would get old.
Horses are even less well set up for multiple births than people are, as it turns out. Makes sense, when you consider how much more developed a baby horse is than a baby human. They're up on their feet the same day!
I was going off what AJ says in Pinkie Apple Pie: that she doesn't want to brag about it. Then they never mention it again, not even when Maud comes to town. Twilight probably knows, but it seemed reasonable that she mightn't mention it. My EG Applejack is quite clear that Pinkie's a cousin, and they're much more closely related.
4783440 It just seemed odd as your only comment. You said nothing about what you thought about the fic itself; just why you thought the ship was weird, which really has nothing to do with anything. Oh, well, it's not the only random comment I've ever received.
4782960 Thank you!
4781468 Well, I'm glad it's on the Read Laters! I think there's another fic that came out while you were away--probably Good Morning, Beautiful and Say Goodnight, Pinkie.
I enjoyed it immensely. I can see the effort you put into writing this one shot, and it definitely shines through as one of your best written shorts. The immersion was great with this one! Thanks for another awesome read.
Just like all of your other PinkieCheese fics, I loved this one. It was pretty fun to read and I enjoyed every moment.
I know they're not the same ponies you mention in the sequel for this story, but I got inspired by this fic and created my own characters... So I thought you'd like to see them: Here.
Once again, congratulations for such a lovely fic!
4785844 Aw, thank you! And they're so cute! I always enjoy it when Pinkie and Cheese have a pegasus foal. If you think of Surprise as an ancestor--and I do--it makes total sense.
4785875 Thank you!
And that was exactly the reason why she's a pegasus, heheh. It just seems fitting :)
4783661 That's on there too! Gah, when you're around, everything is dead, but you go away for two weeks and suddenly, everything awesome happens.
Too cute! And I love that Cheese has no idea about one being three!
I had forgotten how syrupy sweet your stories are.
*clicks upvote button endlessly*
The realization of what you were writing dawned on me like crashing into a wall of bricks. Oh...Dear...God...
10 out of 10
Oh look, my new favorite story
TRIPLETS!!!
MAKE MOAR!!!!!!!!
I am purely speechless.
You sure know how to make people feel things.
4778591
Love the story, but just as an aside about early childbirth:
It was actually less dangerous in the pre-Victorian era, and that's despite the hellacious conditions. What really caused trouble was when doctors took over childbirth; it was in an era before they understood germ theory, and CERTAINLY before they believed it. The first guy who actually proposed that doctors should, y'know, wash their hands between operations ended up getting institutionalized, because he was obviously mad.
But doctors would often end up crossing the hall from the morgue (where they'd been conducting autopsies) to the maternity ward (where they delivered babies). And couldn't for the life of them figure out why the midwives had better results with delivering living babies and mothers alike.
So they did the logical thing, and got rid of the midwives.
Frankly, with Granny on the way (and almost certainly realizing that triplets are on the way), Pinkie probably has the best odds she could possibly ask for, especially since there are presumably magical painkillers (or at least something Zecora could whip up) that have got to be a ton safer than chloroform and ether were.
5524861 It's also Biblically proven that midwives are the best at delivering. That's why pharaoh commanded that the midwives be the ones that killed the Israelites boys; see how much good that did them. I think he even tried having Egyptian midwives do the job
4887195
Ohhhhh.......OH!
D'aaaaawwwwww.....
I can't believe it! You are like, the BEST WRITER EVER! And when I say best, I mean it.
She’s not allowed to have sugar.”
´s aunt
we´re screwed.the apocalipse has finally come, pigs are learning how to fly, Satan is making his way to earth and I´m pretty sure I became a
Nice
So cute! :D
What fic comes next after this?