“Hey Dinky, there you are!”
 
She was caught. Dinky inwardly cringed in the middle of the large hotel lobby. From over the top of her book, she saw Hoops strolling out of the diner, still dressed in his training uniform and holding a…basket ball? Seriously? Isn’t this supposed to be a really high class place? She had no choice but to relax as he strolled towards her, realizing it’d be too much trouble to try and duck down a hallway. None were close enough and it would look too blatant that she was trying to dodge him. She lifted a hand to wave weakly.
 
“Hi Hoops. Just coming down to the milk bar to grab a sandwich.”
 
“And then skulk back up to your room for the rest of the day?” Hoops tossed the ball lightly. “C’mon, Dinky, at least step out for an hour.” Dinky frowned. “Maybe…thirty minutes?”
 
“I hate Cloudsdale.” Dinky raised her arms wide. “I’m not a pegasus! Why have I been trapped up here?”
 
“You’re not trapped, Dinky,” Hoops pointed back at the two large oak doors. “Door is right there.”
 
“I’m not stepping on clouds!” Dinky groused, bending her small student hand book into a cone and back again. “I’m a unicorn. I’m not supposed to be up here.”
 
“You’re half pegasus, Didi.” Hoops reminded her.
 
“Not all unicorns with pegasus parents can walk on clouds.” Dinky groused. In fact that was kind of a rare thing.
 
“Plus your mom said she used to push you around on little clouds all the time!” It was as if Hoops didn’t even hear her, the cloud thing had only happened once. She was terrified of heights.
 
“I don’t…like this.” she complained.
 
“We even went through the trouble of getting you a cloud-walking spell, you’re the safest pony up here.”
 
Dinky twisted the small book again, it would probably tear in half soon. This was the first time she had ever been to the pegasus city. Year after year Hoops and her mom would gently prod at her with incentives like “It’s fun!” or “You’ll seriously get a kick out of the view.”, as if any of that mattered to Dinky. She managed to hold out until Rosy and Bright Eyes were old enough to take a trip to Cloudsdale. Being pegasi themselves they were ecstatic, yet heartbroken when they learned their older sister wouldn’t be going. Dinky wanted to be stubborn but knew deep down that she couldn’t do that to them.
 
“Hoops, I’m going to stay here and study for my entrance exam.” She couldn’t tell due to the hair perpetually in front of his eyes, but from his body posture they were definitely rolling under that goofy smile.
 
“If anything happens, I’ll be sure to catch you.” Hoops’ voice was sincere and for a moment Dinky didn’t feel inclined to run back to her room and dive into the bed, like it was some irrational island of safety in her unstable circumstances.
 
“Your mom and sisters are at the stadium to watch a practice game. There’s plenty of solid ground there and the sunshine will do you some good.”
 
Ground. Yeah right, in the loosest sense possible. Dinky sighed, the sigh nearly turned into a yawn but she managed to hold it back. Now that she thought about it, how many hours had she slept before they took the air balloon? Two, three maybe. Since the start of the week she had had “enough”. She looked at the small hand book all twisted and rolled up to the point that it would never lay flat again ever. Maybe she did need to take a break…but the test.
 
“I—I don’t know…”
 
Hoops laid a firm hand on her shoulder. “Come on, Didi, your mom and I are worried about you. We’ve drilled with you over these questions a ton, and I mean a ton. You’re good.Just relax for one day. You won’t take the test for another three.”
 
“Ok fine.” Although, if she was going to be coerced out of studying, sleep was the preferred trade off, but she didn’t want to disappoint the rest of her family. “I’ll go…If something happens you’d better catch me.”
 
“Hah! Atta girl!” Hoops slapped Ditzy across the back almost to the point of knocking her over. “I’ll make a sports pony of you yet!”
 
“You’ve been trying for, what, four years now?” Dinky smiled, shrugging out of his hold. “Let’s just go before I die on my feet.”  

 
This is the result of me finally deciding to include the “Ditzy Doo is a single mom” thing into my headcanon. At first I was super indifferent to Dinky but one sunny random day I wanted see what I could do with her. My Dinks is an 11 year old mad genius in the making, studying to enter Twilight’s School of Magic. Adored by her younger siblings but not many others. Her friendship pool is small (She’s also younger than the CMC). Hoops entered her life when she was six, but she could never make the full parental connection with him. So when Ditzy Doo isn’t around, she’ll refer to him as Hoops instead of dad. Hoops is okay with it, he won’t force her to think of him in a way she isn’t comfortable with. Though it does distress Ditzy to a degree.