Cinnamon's First Date Ch. 01

Author's Note: This story involves some unrealistic sexual acts involving some obscenely well-endowed centaurs and humans (and eventually, possibly some other fantastical creatures). If that's not your bag, thank you for your consideration! Furthermore, all characters contained herein are at least 18 years old, which is actually quite a bit older in horse years.

Abbigale

*****

Cinnamon's First Date

Chapter 01

The final bell rang, echoing through the halls and across the fields of Derby Senior Secondary High School, signalling the passing of another school week.

Up on the second floor, doors opened and student stormed out, eager to end their interminable time in the halls of higher learning. History 12, where the worst of the last sixty years was examined in excruciating detail. Math 12, where the intricacies and hidden agendas of the universe itself were expounded upon, and with any luck three or four students per class would use those lessons again. AP Bio 12, genetics and evolution with a steady undercurrent of pre-med organic chemistry.

Those exiting this last room tended to have a wide-eyed, shell-shocked expression, and it wasn't entirely because of the subject matter.

Once the second to last of the students had filed out, swinging their bags over their shoulders and racing for the stairs, there was a long pause. Some of the others in this hall knew their Friday schedules well, and they posted up at their lockers, huddled in twos and threes at the smattering of water fountains. Four large boys in matching lettered jackets crowded around the vending machines, taking great care when deciding which brand of Mountain Dew would slake their lust for thrills and excitement.

Heavy, yet hesitant, footfalls drifted out of the AP Bio room, and a great shadow fell out onto the well-worn linoleum.

No-one actually said 'here shi comes', but they were all thinking it. The atmosphere of anxious expectation was practically condensing into droplets in the air. It wasn't as though this was a particularly NEW sight, not so late in the year, but that never stopped this weekly ritual.

Cinnamon Philips stepped into the hallway, ducking to get hir head through the door. Shi had hir pack slung over hir shoulder, as had all of hir fellow students. Shi wore a light and breezy sundress, as did most of hir fellow female and femme-presenting students. Shi was wide-eyed and smiling, hir explosion of freckles contrasting with hir sky blue eyes.

Where shi tended to differ from hir classmates was the fact that emerging from the hem of hir sundress were not two long, slender, coltish human legs, but the thick barrel and four sturdy equine legs of a chestnut-furred bay stallion. Cinnamon was a centaur, and the first ever to attend Derby High.

Positive that shi was not about to accidentally crash into anyone, Cinnamon moved hir long body carefully through the door, pausing just as hir hind legs passed the jamb. Shi wore a cheery pink quarter blanket that mostly covered hir hindportions, hanging down to roughly hir hocks, which kept hir within the school's somewhat poorly-worded dress code.

All eyes were on that blanket, though, which seemed to be covering a lot more than it ought. Derby High was quite rural, more than fifteen miles from the city center, and less than eight miles from Cinnamon's home, the Magic 8-Ball Ranch. A considerable number of the students had grown up around horses and other livestock, and were reasonably aware of just how similar Cinnamon's lower body was to a standard Cleveland bay.

And were just as aware of how shi differed.

Cinnamon waggled hir fingers at the other students grouped up and down the corridor, well aware of why they were still there after the final bell. No-one made eye contact, but they didn't need to. Shi knew. They knew shi knew. Shi knew they knew shi knew. Sometimes, though, the charade was what kept things running smoothly.

All four legs moving with graceful, practiced ease, Cinnamon trotted over to the janitor's freight elevator and awaited hir ride down to the main floor.

---

The late spring sun was heaven on Cinnamon's sides when shi eventually made it outside. Hir passage through Derby High was a little tricky, given hir height and weight restrictions. Shi could make it up the main stairs in the office wing just fine, but getting back down again was always treacherous. The only elevator was clear on the other side of school, but shi didn't mind the travel. As shi liked to remind folks, shi was built for travel.

Sadly, there was no way around two of hir classes being located on the second floor. AP Bio and AP Chem both had specialized labs. The school had been more than helpful accommodating hir other needs (and finding some compromises when it came to the dress code), but on this issue there was little they could do.

Hir rubberized horseshoes made little squeaks on the polished cement steps, but there were only three here leading up to the school's double doors, and they were large and wide. Even a 'regular' horse wouldn't have had much difficulty. Still, shi breathed a tiny sigh, half relieved, half victorious, when shi felt grass beneath hir once more.

The urge to break into a run was strong, but shi resisted. Shi'd been shouted at enough times for one year already. Apparently, twelve hundred pounds accelerating up to highway speeds was just wrecking the grass, and the landscapers were complaining.

"Cinna!"

Cinnamon's human torso swivelled. Tucked into a shady hollow against the side of the school were two other seniors, Millie and JoAnn. Millie was the taller of the two, a willowy young woman with pale skin and dark hair, wearing the finest in discount almost-goth couture that the Derby Mall could supply. JoAnn was quite a bit stockier, the dirty blonde seeming not just poured but crammed into her jeans and plaid riding shirt.

As a general rule, they were the only two humans at Derby High who could be counted on to hang out with Cinnamon and not immediately spark torrential flooding of rumors and innuendo.

Cinnamon waved and trotted over to hir friends. "Yo-o-o," shi said tiredly, shaking out hir long and perpetually-frizzy light brown mane. "My head is going to explode before final exams, I fucking swear."

"Ooohh, wah wah, the AP nerd is whining," JoAnn grinned. "Always the overachiever."

Millie thwapped JoAnn's shoulder, but it was a playful gesture. "We can't all hang out with you in Remedial Art."

"We get to use cray-yuns next week!"

They laughed, and Cinnamon counted hirself grateful once more for hir childhood friends. JoAnn Bawsey and her family ran the Lazy Barrel, a couple rural roads over from the Magic 8-Ball, and the pair had known each other for more than ten years. Millie Jorunn, despite the spooky-chic aesthetic, was also a farmgirl, though she tried mightily to separate out her family life from her social life. She could just as easily be seen throwing hay bales into a truck as she could be seen posing for selfies in the Old Town cemetery on the outskirts of the neighborhood, wearing monochromatic lingerie.

Of course, as far as her parents knew, she was either at JoAnn's house or Cinnamon's house, or hanging out at the mall.

"Weekend plans?" Millie asked, pulling her phone out of her purse.

"Myeh," JoAnn shrugged. "Wanted to go to see Dead Rising now that the crowds have thinned out, if y'all are up for it." The horror movie was the third in the Dead Walking series of films, and was reported to be delightfully gory.

Cinnamon's ears perked. "I could be down for that. And no, you don't need to sit at the back with me, you can sit in the good seats."

"We're not going to abandon you!" Millie protested.

"It's not abandoning me, I can see you from the back!" the centaur laughed. Due to hir height, and hir general inability to sit easily, Cinnamon typically stood at the very back of the theatre, taking up five or six seats but not bothering anyone around hir.

"It's still rude. If we're all going, we're all going together, and that's that." JoAnn set her mouth firmly and nodded her head, once. Cinnamon and Millie exchanged a glance; when JoAnn made that familiar gesture, her mind was set, and nothing short of high explosives was going to change it.

However, there were extenuating circumstances, and one such circumstance was sidling nervously towards the trio.

"OK, Dead Rising it is. Early show? Late show?"

"You can't go to the EARLY SHOW of a horror movie!" Millie squawked. "Were you raised in a barn?"

"You know, funny you mention that..."

It was a familiar patter, and Cinnamon never tired of it. Shi'd only attended public school for this year, hir senior year. The rest of hir life, shi'd taken courses via distance education, watching pre-recorded lessons on hir computer and writing multiple-choice final exams that were almost hilariously easy. The state didn't offer AP courses via distance, though, and if shi was going to medical school, shi was going to need the benefit of an in-person, rigorously-proctored high school diploma.

For the first month at Derby High, shi'd been the new local freak, stalking the halls. JoAnn and Millie had hung out with hir, bless their hearts, and that made a huge difference, but it was still a long time before even some of the teachers would address hir directly.

All throughout October, shi'd been treated more as a curiosity. Strangers would walk up to hir constantly, and ask questions like "Is that real?" and "What's it like?" and "Did your mom fuck a horse?" Cinnamon tried to respond to all of these as honestly and politely as shi could, but even shi had limits.

By Christmas, though, shi'd apparently passed whatever unofficial acceptance process the school had, and was now a new and welcome addition to the team. After the New Year, shi was treated more like the school's treasured mascot. The graffiti of hir went from sketchy and ill-proportioned to positively flattering. Shi was invited to the occasional house party (though shi mostly just hung out in the back yard), attended a couple dances (though shi mostly just hung out by the wall), and even helped other students study for AP Bio and AP Chem tests.

But there had always been a slight moat of emptiness around hir. The other students were kind, but shi didn't fit in well with them. The Derby locals had gotten used to hir, but treated hir diffidently rather than warmly. Except for JoAnn and Millie, shi could go days without sharing a casual word with anyone. It was a polite, but quiet and somewhat lonely, existence.

Millie's eyes flicked over beyond Cinnamon's heavy barrel, widening slightly, but she said nothing.

"Also, I'm down for some shopping. It's gonna be summer soon, and I don't have a lot that really fits me right anymore." JoAnn grimaced and tugged at her shirt, which was pulled very tightly across the middle of her extremely ample chest.

"If you'd just stop growing, you know-" Cinnamon started, hir eyes twinkling with mirth.

"You're one to talk! Just because you focused all your hormones below the waist..."

Cinnamon smoothed hir hands down the front of hir dress, highlighting hir slender, almost waifish human aspect. Even for a regular Derby senior, shi was considered below-average in that department. "Trust me, this wasn't my first choice," shi grumbled. "I'd have liked some more, you know... balance..."

JoAnn leaned back and leered openly at Cinnamon's quarter blanket. "If you wanted to 'balance' all that out, you wouldn't even be able to see in front of you, honey."

"Bitch," Cinnamon grinned. "But shopping sounds good to me. I want to try and actually get some stuff that's flattering for grad, not just baggy and functional. What about you, Mill?"

After several moments of silence, Cinnamon and JoAnn turned to face their friend. "Millie? Hello-o-o," JoAnn called, waving her hand in front of the taller girl. "Earth to Millicent?"

"Don't call me that," the goth said automatically. She blinked and shook her head. "Sorry, something... distracted me. Right, clothes shopping! I'm down for that. But before we cement our plans, I believe someone has something they'd like to say?"

Cinnamon's brows furrowed. Shi glanced back and forth between Millie and JoAnn. "Like... what?"

Millie gestured meaningfully with her eyes over Cinnamon's haunches.

Cinnamon misinterpreted. "Yes, I KNOW, I've got a fuckload too much weight back there, could we please get off the subject?"

Millie sighed in exasperation. "No, dumbass, I was referring to him!" She pointed a black-polished fingertip this time, figuring subtlety wasn't going to cut it.

JoAnn turned in surprise, and Cinnamon danced in a short, complicated little circle. Millie took a step back, having taken her fair share of accidental hip-checks over the years. Standing a short distance away, bag slung over one shoulder, tanned skin still blushing furiously, was a tall, lean boy that none of them immediately recognized.

"Uuuhhh... hi," he eventually managed. He wore dusty jeans and a faded grey t-shirt, like any of a hundred other students.

"Hi," said JoAnn.

"Hi," said Millie.

"Hello!" Cinnamon chirped brightly.

The young man cleared his throat, glanced down at his boots, looked over at the sun as if gauging how much time before sunset, and then back at Cinnamon. Not at the three girls together, but quite specifically at the centaur. His eyes were light blue, just as faded as his shirt.

He cleared his throat again. "I'm, uh, Hunter."

Cinnamon nodded. "I'm Cinnamon."

"Yeah, I, uh... I know." His blush was spreading down his neck now.

Cinnamon was used to this sort of interaction. Talking to hir directly was difficult for most people. Given the size of hir equine aspect, shi was essentially a seven-foot-four teenaged girl, who weighed well in excess of twelve hundred pounds. "Can we help you?"

Hunter dry-scrubbed his hands together, but was trying his best to maintain eye contact. "Yeah, uh. Well, I was gonna ask you something, but I heard you saying you was gonna be going to Dead Rising, so, uh... I, uh..."

Millie gasped softly, and JoAnn thumped the taller girl with an elbow. Cinnamon didn't notice; shi was focused intently on Hunter's eyes, and the growing sense of unease in hir belly.

"You can still ask...?" shi said politely.

"Uh, yeah, I, uh... guess. I, uhm... well, if you weren't doing anything tomorrow night, I was going to ask if you wanted to do anything. Er, do something. Er! Do something, with... me. Go out with me. And do... something. Awww, jeez..."

JoAnn gasped, and Millie thumped her with an elbow. Given their height difference, she ended up poking the shorter girl square in the breast, which only elicited another gasp.

A light breeze picked up. Cinnamon's ears twitched. From their position by the rear doors of the school, shi could see the football fields and the track, the student parking lot, and a decent portion of the wide green lawn that encircled the school. There were students milling everywhere, as was typical for a Friday afternoon.

At this particular moment, though, nearly all activity had ceased. Hundreds of eyes were surreptitiously aimed at the centaur, and the small bubble of humans within hir sphere of influence.

"Are you asking me out?" shi murmured.

Eight months at this school, Cinnamon thought to hirself. Three house parties, three dances, a dozen field trips, dozens of trips to the mall, constant social effort put forth by Millie and JoAnn to normalize my presence around here... and now this.

"Well, I... was... but you said-"

"Do you wanna go see the late showing of Dead Rising with me?"

Hunter looked like he'd nearly swallowed his tongue. "I... er... sure! I mean, if your friends don't mi-"

"We don't!" Millie and JoAnn chorused.

Cinnamon chuckled, and Hunter looked relieved. He started to speak, closed his mouth, pondered, tried again, failed, and cleared his throat. On the third attempt, he managed, "D'you wanna grab dinner first? With me?"

It was Cinnamon's turn to blush. Going to a movie was one thing; it was easy enough to hide that you were there with the Derby Freak, as shi was still occasionally referred to as. Going to dinner, in a restaurant, in public, was something else entirely. "I'd... love to," shi managed, when shi got over the surprise. "Uhm... there's not a lot of places that I fit-"

"Fenucci's Pizza?" Hunter smiled shyly. "I've, uh, seen you there a couple times, so I figured-"

"Yeah, Fenucci's sounds great!"

"Great! Great. Seven pm?"

"Seven it is! Great!"

"Great!"

Hunter and Cinnamon smiled at one another, not sure where else to look, what else to say. After several long, awkward seconds, someone on the distant football field whooped and shouted, "I THINK SHI SAID YES!"

That broke the spell. Hunter and Cinnamon laughed, sharing their embarrassment. JoAnn appeared at Hunter's elbow and started to guide the young man away. Millie, meanwhile, tugged at Cinnamon's elbow, drawing hir in the opposite direction. "OK, you two, save something for tomorrow. Preserve the mystery. Bye, Hunter!"

"Bye," Cinnamon called, turning hir head, but Hunter was already walking away. JoAnn looked to be whispering something angrily into his ear. "What's... JoAnn doing?"

"Hmm? Nothing. So, change in plans tomorrow."

"Yeah, he asked me out-"

"We're gonna meet at the mall at 5pm," Millie said firmly. "And YOU, little Miss Four Legs, are getting some new clothes."

"What? Why me?"

"Because YOU have a date at seven," Millie leered. "And YOU are going to show him something he's never seen before."

---

Cinnamon's walk home passed in a dazed blur.

Shi'd made this trot a couple hundred times by this point: heading east on 13th Street for a mile or so, turn left at the highway and follow that for four miles, then turn right on Rural Road 8 and keep going straight until shi saw the familiar wrought-iron archway proudly announcing the Magic 8-Ball Ranch. At hir preferred speed shi could be home in under an hour, and about halfway down RR8 the school bus for hir area would trundle past, with a dozen students hanging out the windows to shout greetings to hir.

Besides, it wasn't like the school busses were equipped to give hir a lift. There had been some discussions at the start of the year about purchasing a horse trailer just for Cinnamon, but shi refused. Even when the snow was up to hir tail, shi would much rather walk than make a big fuss about getting a ride.

Most days, shi'd pop in hir earbuds, crank the tunes, and watch the countryside flow past. To the farm-trained eye, the landscape was always changing, if you knew how to look at it.

Today, shi was nearly home when shi realized shi'd turned on hir music, but had completely forgotten about the earbuds. Music chimed faintly from the pockets on hir dress.

He asked me out, shi thought. Someone asked me out! SOMEONE ACTUALLY ASKED ME OUT!

It wasn't as though shi'd been completely devoid of that sort of attention. According to most of the bathroom graffiti that had been relayed to hir by friends on both sides of the gender spectrum, there was clearly a great deal of curiosity and speculation about what a roll in the hay with Cinnamon would be like. Most of it was a little too graphic for hir tastes, but shi supposed it was flattering, in a way.

Shi'd asked out a few folks during hir one and only year at high school, determined to not be the proverbial shrinking violet. Shi'd asked Sandy Summers to the Snowflake Festival, who had politely declined and then refused to make eye contact for a month. Shi'd asked Mitch McDonnel to the Spring Fling, and his befuddled terror had put an end to that right quick. So far, shi was batting a no-hitter, but shi was still in the game.