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Carol woke up that morning from another dream about her father. It was annoying that she still thought about him at all, let alone that her subconscious let him mess with her sleep. If she told someone else about this, they might say that it was normal for someone not to totally forget their father a month after leaving home, but Carol was over it. She was moving on to better things now, and she was ready to leave him behind. Besides, she didn’t have anyone to talk about dreams with anyway.
The one window in her little dorm was still dark, and a glance at the alarm clock on the bedside table told her it was just after three in the morning. She didn’t have to report for training until five, but her nerves were all wound up from the dream, and she would never get back to sleep now. She heaved herself up from the bed and sighed.
You’re just gonna get yourself hurt.
Those were the words that seized her brain whenever she dreamt about her father. It was the first thing he said when she told him she’d been accepted into the Air Force Academy, and it was the last thing he said to her before she left home. In fact, it was the same thing he said any time she wanted to do something slightly exciting. She had learned to stop listening a long time ago. So why was it sticking this time?
Carol got dressed in the dark and headed to the fitness building, which she hoped would be unlocked. Maybe if she punched something for a few hours, she could clear her head.
The air outside was crisp and cold against her skin. Carol stared at the brilliant full moon as she made her way across campus. She wished more than anything that she could hop in one of the jets that sat idle in the hangar and fly up there to meet it. Not yet, she told herself. But someday.
Eventually she reached the fitness building and jiggled the door handle.
“Damn,” she whispered. It was locked.
Carol didn’t know what to do with herself now. She could go for a run, but it wouldn’t be nearly as satisfying as slamming her fists into a punching bag as hard as she could over and over again. No, she decided, a run wouldn’t be good enough. She needed to get aggressive.
Looking around to make sure no one was watching, she reached into the duffel bag she carried on her shoulder and rummaged around until she found a bobby pin.
“This is probably fine,” she muttered, smirking to herself, as she slipped the bobby pin into the lock. She fiddled with it until she heard the click of the tumblers sliding into place. She shoved the door open and reveled in her own ingenuity—but only for about two seconds. Before she could even step foot into the building, an alarm loud enough to wake the entire campus blared above her.
Without thinking, without even bothering to shut the door, Carol turned and broke into an all-out sprint. She couldn’t be caught here. Maybe, if she explained herself, the infraction really wouldn’t be that big of a deal, but she couldn’t risk it. If she got kicked out of the Academy, she would lose her best shot at becoming a pilot. So, she ran.
Immediately, she realized she would never make it back to her own dorm building before someone came looking for the culprit. Even though she had put some distance between herself and the fitness building, the alarm still rang so loudly it hurt her ears. Panicking, she darted inside the first residence hall she passed.
Carol wandered through the dark, empty halls of the first floor. She could still hear the alarm, but inside, the sound was distant and muffled. She needed to find a window so she could see outside. See just how much of a commotion she had caused.
But before she could find a window, the commotion came to her. Carol heard the building’s front door crash open. Luckily, she had just turned down the back hallway and was out of sight. For now.
“Game’s over,” a man’s voice called. “I saw you run in here.” With the door open, the unadulterated screeching of the alarm came pouring into the sleeping building.
Carol heard the man’s footsteps, and her heart raced in her chest. Any second now, either he would turn the corner and find her or the people in the dorms around her would wake up and come into the hallway looking for the cause of all the noise. Either way, she was busted.
Slowly, making her footsteps as light as possible, she backed down the hallway. There were no good hiding spots here, and she was really only delaying the inevitable, but she couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t just stand there, helpless. She had to do something.
As soon as she reached the far wall, two things happened at once. The beam of a flashlight appeared at the other end of the hallway, and the door to the dorm room right beside her creaked open. An instinct told Carol what to do, and she didn’t question it. She shoved past the person in the doorway and into the dorm, making sure the door closed behind her.
“What the hell are you doing?” said the person whose space she had just invaded.
Carol couldn’t answer just yet. She was panting, bent over, hands braced on her knees, as the jolt of adrenaline drained from her system.
“Sorry,” she managed to say between heaving breaths. “Had to—get away from the—” She waved her arm in the general direction of whoever had come looking for her.
“Get away from the what?” The other person moved to open the door again, but Carol grabbed their arm before it could reach the knob.
“Don’t do that,” Carol said. She looked up from the arm and into the face of a black woman with short-cropped hair. Even in the dark room, Carol could make out the curve of her jaw and the spark in her eyes. “Um. Please,” she added.
The woman snatched her arm out of Carol’s grasp.
“You’ve got about ten seconds to explain what’s going on before I start throwing punches,” the woman said. “I might give you fifteen, since you said please.”
Carol cracked a smile. She could already tell she liked this woman. And it wasn’t just because she was the only female face Carol had seen or spoken to in weeks.
“Let’s start over,” Carol said. She held out her hand for a proper shake. “I’m Carol. Carol Danvers.”
“Maria Rambeau,” the other woman said. When she grabbed Carol’s hand and gave it a firm squeeze, another jolt of adrenaline surged through Carol’s veins, but this one was much different. She felt electrified, like all her nerves were standing on end. Her eyes met Maria’s for a moment. Carol felt like she should say something, but her mind had gone completely blank.
Then the thud of footsteps coming closer and the flashlight’s glow seeping in under the door snapped her back into herself. She held her finger to her lips, signaling to Maria to keep quiet, and they both listened.
The footsteps stopped. The man’s voice grumbled something unintelligible, and then his footsteps retreated back down the hallway the way they had come.
Carol released a deep breath, and her tense shoulders slumped.
“That was too close,” she said. “Couldn’t have done it without you. Thanks.”
“I still don’t understand what we did,” Maria said. She seemed more relaxed, too, Carol noticed. “But, hey, you’re welcome.”
“If you really wanna know how much trouble you helped me get out of, you could grab breakfast with me, and I’ll tell you all about it. Mess hall should be open by now.” It was a lame offer; Carol recognized that as soon as the words were out of her mouth. It was a lame line, too, the thing about trouble. The bad boy shtick she was attempting didn’t really work when the panic sweat wasn’t even dry yet. She should’ve just kept her mouth shut. Gone for a cool, mysterious vibe.
Maria raised her eyebrows, poised for some snarky remark. Then she stopped herself. Looked Carol up and down.
“I can tell exactly how much trouble you are,” Maria said. Her eyes lingered on Carol’s for just a second too long, and she smirked. “Give me a minute to get dressed.”
“Sure thing,” Carol said, and anything cool or mysterious about her evaporated as an uncontrollable grin spread across her face.
“Ok…sure…so you tried to break into a locked building on military property in the middle of the night. That’s always a great idea,” Maria said as soon as Carol finished telling the story of her morning.
Carol suppressed the urge to throw a forkful of eggs at her. They weren’t that close yet.
“Look, don’t judge me,” Carol said. “It was three in the morning. I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
“And yet I get the feeling you would’ve done the same thing any time of day.”
Carol considered. “Huh. Should I be concerned that I’m so easy to read?”
“No. The issue isn’t that you’re easy to read, it’s that I’m really smart,” Maria said.
Carol looked around at the other sleepy-eyed cadets scattered around the mess hall.
“Well in that case, in this crowd, I guess I really don’t have to worry.”
Maria laughed.
They focused on their food in silence for a few minutes. Carol was careful to keep her gaze on her fork as it went from her tray to her mouth and back again.
“There’s one thing I don’t get, though,” Maria said suddenly. “Why were you up and about at three a.m. anyway?”
“Oh, I—” Carol’s throat closed around the words. Maria was practically a stranger, friendly or not. She didn’t want to hear about Carol’s issues with her dad. No one here knew about that side of her, and Carol wanted to keep it that way. Needed to keep it that way. Who would trust a little girl with nightmares and daddy issues to fly?
“I don’t know. Just couldn’t sleep, I guess,” she finished.
Maria nodded knowingly. “I’ve been there—and hey.” She reached across the table and placed her hand on top of Carol’s. “It’s ok.”
There was kindness in her eyes, and pain, too. For the first time since she could remember, Carol felt understood. Like maybe—maybe she wasn’t the only one who had to struggle against the whole world to do anything she wanted to do.
“Thanks,” Carol said, and she meant it. She closed her hand around Maria’s and gave it a squeeze. Electricity shot through her system once again.
That was the first time Carol realized Maria Rambeau was going to change her life.
Over the next few days, any time she wasn’t training or in class, Carol was with Maria. They ate all their meals together, they worked out together, and they stayed up far later than they should have every night, sitting cross-legged on each other’s beds while they talked about anything and everything.
“I don’t think my parents want me to go into the service,” Maria said one night, and Carol instantly perked up. “I mean, they said I should do whatever I wanted to do, but honestly, I think their only plan for me once I finished school was to get married and have babies.” Maria chuckled a little, then cleared her throat and dropped her head.
“You know what, my dad doesn’t want me to be here either,” Carol said. Suddenly she was burning up, and her throat felt tight. She had to brace herself before she kept speaking. “Right before I left to come here, he said—um—he said I was making a mistake. That I was just gonna get myself hurt.”
“Oh,” Maria said. “That’s really shitty. I’m sorry.”
“Nah, it’s fine.” Carol waved her hand, tried to play it casual, but her throat was still constricting, and she felt red heat at the back of her eyes. “He said that kind of stuff all the time. No big deal.”
“To hell with that!”
Carol laughed around the tightness in her chest.
“No, seriously.” Maria’s voice was low and intense. “To hell with that. And you know what? To hell with your dad! I won’t even apologize for saying that.”
“Yeah,” Carol said. She didn’t know what else to say. This was something she had never talked about before. She didn’t know what kind of response she had expected, but it definitely wasn’t this.
“He’s wrong,” Maria continued. “You know that, right? Doesn’t matter how many times he said shit like that to you, doesn’t matter what he was talking about. He’s wrong.”
“Right.” Carol took a deep breath. “You’re right.”
That night, after Maria went back to her own room and Carol was left alone in the dark, she dreamt of her father again. She saw his face, his cold fiery eyes, clear as anything.
You’re just gonna get yourself hurt, he said. Again and again. Each time he said it, his voice got louder, until eventually he was yelling it so loud the room around him shook.
Carol woke in a cold sweat to the grating beep of her alarm. She slapped a hand on the snooze button and lay there, staring up at the dark ceiling.
Her father was wrong. He was wrong.
So why were his words eating away at her, bit by bit?
“Well, it’s official,” Maria said as she dropped the 90-pound bar into place. “I bench more than you.”
The smile died on her lips when she looked up at Carol, who was spotting her. She still held her hands out, as if she hadn’t noticed Maria had stopped lifting, and her eyes were far away.
“Hello? Earth to Carol?”
Carol blinked and looked down at her own hands in confusion. Then her eyes moved to Maria, who was now sitting up on the edge of the bench.
“Oh,” Carol said. She let her hands fall. “Sorry.”
“What is going on with you today? You’ve barely said two words to me.”
“Nothing’s going on. I’m just…I don’t know. I don’t feel like talking, ok?”
Carol didn’t mean for it to come out as sharply as it did. Maria recoiled, and Carol instantly felt guilty. It wasn’t Maria’s fault she was in such a bad mood. In fact, it was her own fault, and that’s why it was so hard to deal with.
They’ll never let you fly, her fellow cadet had said. Carol could still see his face hovering over hers, blocking out the sun, as she lay on her aching back. She had fallen from the ropes course—fallen hard. And in front of everyone.
Now that cadet’s voice would join her father’s in her nightmares.
“Hey, I know what’ll cheer you up,” Maria said, sensing the need for a subject change. “A bunch of people are going out to Pancho’s for karaoke tonight. We should go.”
Any other day, butterflies would have filled Carol’s stomach at the mere idea of going out with Maria Rambeau. Sure, Maria probably didn’t mean going out the way Carol wanted her to, but still, this was something.
Or it would be. If Carol hadn’t proven herself a failure only a few hours before. Tonight, going out with a bunch of people was the last thing she wanted to do.
“Doesn’t really sound like my scene,” Carol said, even though she always killed at karaoke. “You should go, though.” Carol thought it was probably for the best that Maria had plans. It would give Carol a night to sulk without taking any more of her frustration out on Maria. Maybe she would stay in the gym once Maria left and go a few rounds with the punching bag.
“C’mon, Carol,” Maria said. She nudged Carol’s arm. “I want you to come. It won’t be as much fun without you.”
Carol met her eyes, and for just a second, she forgot all about the fall and the douchebag cadet and how angry she was. She forgot about everything besides the buttery soft, glowing feeling in her chest.
“I guess…I guess I could use a drink,” Carol said. The corners of her mouth tugged up into a smile.
“Great! Now there’ll be at least one person there who sounds worse than me.”
Carol rolled her eyes. “We’ll see about that.”
And just like that, Carol felt all right again.
The bar was already crowded when Carol and Maria walked through the door. It was so dark and filled with smoke that Carol couldn’t make out anyone’s faces. Most of the people here were from the Academy, she guessed, but she couldn’t tell if she knew any of them. Truth be told, Maria was her only friend, anyway.
Someone, a man from the sound of it, was up on stage, screeching the lyrics to Pour Some Sugar on Me. He jumped around like an absolute madman, playing to the crowd of drunk people who sang along with him.
“Oh, god,” Carol said.
“You mean ‘hell, yeah’?” Maria said. “That’ll be us up there in a minute!”
Carol grinned. “Can’t wait.”
“Ok, you go see if you can find us somewhere to sit, and I’ll go pick our song.”
Before Carol could protest, Maria disappeared into the sea of dancing bodies surrounding the stage.
“Maybe I wanted to pick the song,” Carol mumbled as she scooted her way along the edge of the crowd, scanning the booths by the wall. She was joking, though. She loved that Maria was so enthusiastic. And maybe, Carol thought, maybe her song choice would clear up a few things about their relationship.
Miraculously, Carol spotted an empty table in the corner and slid into the booth. Soon, Maria was weaving her way back through the crowd to join her. Instead of sitting across the table, like Carol had assumed she would, Maria scooched in next to her and huddled close against the noise of the crowd. Carol’s heart beat faster.
“So, what did you pick?” Carol asked.
Maria waggled her eyebrows like a character from a cheesy B-movie romance.
“It’s a surprise.”
Carol opened her mouth to ask if she should be afraid or excited, but just then, someone leaned over their table to talk to them.
“You embarrassed yourself good today, huh, Danvers?” The man’s words slurred together. He had obviously had a few drinks too many.
Carol froze. She recognized him. He was one of the cadets in her training unit, one of the ones who had watched her fall. She didn’t want to think about this now, and she definitely didn’t want Maria to know about it. The man was right, Carol was embarrassed.
“What are you talking about, Ford?” Maria said before Carol could answer him.
“Aw, she didn’t tell you!” the man (Ford, apparently) exclaimed. “She couldn’t finish the ropes course! Totally wiped out. You should’ve seen how hard she hit the ground. Hilarious.”
Maria looked at Carol. “Is that true?”
Carol felt too hot. “I—”
“Hey, Miller was right, you know,” Ford interrupted. “They’ll never let you fly.”
“Fuck off,” Maria said instantly.
“Hey, uh,” Ford said, barely suppressing a laugh. He leaned a little closer to them. “You know why they call it a cockpit, don’t you?”
“You’re about to find out why they call it a black eye if you don’t get away from me.”
Ford busted out laughing, but he walked away.
“Asshole,” Maria muttered.
Carol still felt frozen in place. She should praise Maria for telling him off, she thought, or make a joke about how awful he was. But she couldn’t. Words kept chasing each other around her brain. You’re just gonna get yourself hurt. They’ll never let you fly.
“I need some air,” she said abruptly, and shoved past Maria and out of the booth. She felt like she was moving in slow motion as she waded through the heat and the smoke to the front door. As soon as she was outside and the cool air hit her skin, she took a deep breath. Not here, she pleaded with the tears that were starting to well in her eyes no matter how hard she fought them. She slumped against the bar’s brick wall and let herself slide until she was sitting in the dirt.
“Carol?” Maria came tearing out the door. “Carol! Where—oh. Hey, what’s wrong?”
Maria sat down facing Carol, cross-legged, just like they had sat so many nights in their dorms.
“Nothing. I’m fine,” Carol said, but the choked voice raking up through her tightening throat gave her away.
“Nope. That’s not gonna cut it. Talk to me.” Maria’s gaze on her was steady and unflinching.
“I know I shouldn’t let that dickhead get to me, but I just—” Carol hesitated, afraid to bring this up again. She was new to talking about her father, but even from her limited experience, she knew how sorely it hurt. “What he said reminds me of my father. How he never thought I could do anything.”
“Carol. We talked about this.” Maria was firm, but gentle. “Your father was wrong about you. This loser is wrong about you, too.”
A thought occurred to Carol then. It was something that lived deep down inside her, carefully buried and locked away.
“Is he, though?” she said, her voice strained. “I mean, what if he was right?”
There it was, out in the open. She had never let herself think it, let alone say it out loud. But yes. This was the reason she had nightmares about her father. This was the reason she wanted so desperately to forget him. Because the weakest, most insecure part of her worried that he had been right about her all along.
“Carol—” Maria stopped, just staring at her. Without warning, she wrapped her arms around Carol and held her close. Carol didn’t fight it. She didn’t even think about it, really. It felt so natural. She leaned into Maria’s shoulder.
After a few moments, Maria pulled back and held Carol at arm’s length.
“I will say this as many times as it takes to get it through your head. Your father is wrong about you.”
“But I did get myself hurt!” Carol burst out. “I couldn’t even finish a damn ropes course.”
“Let me ask you something. After you fell, did you get back up?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
Maria smiled. “See, there you go! You got hurt, but you kept going. That’s how I know he’s wrong about you.”
Carol swallowed hard against the lump in her throat.
“I know it’s hard,” Maria said. “You think I don’t deal with this shit, too? My whole life, people have been looking down on me. And yeah, when I mess up, it feels like I’m letting myself down. But everybody has to fail sometimes, Carol. Neither of us are ever gonna be perfect, but that doesn’t mean we’re not worth something.”
Carol let out a deep breath. “I guess I just want my dad to see that I can do things so he can finally get out of my head.”
“Carol, do you know that you can do things?”
Carol thought about how hard she had worked to follow her dream. She thought about the long nights of studying, the physical training she’d been putting herself through since high school. She thought about all the things she had taught herself about the sky.
“Yes. I do.”
Maria shrugged. “Then that’s it. You’re done. You don’t have to prove anything to him.”
“Huh,” Carol said. “I guess you’re right.”
“Say it.”
“I don’t have to prove anything to him.”
“Hell, yeah!” Maria exclaimed. She stood up and brushed the dirt off her pants. “Now hurry up and wipe away your tears. We can’t miss our song.”
Carol laughed. Maria reached down and offered her a hand. Carol took it and pulled herself up off the ground.
“Oh, and for the record,” Maria said just as Carol was about to open the door of the bar, “we are gonna fly higher and further and faster than any of these boys could ever dream. And we’re gonna do it for ourselves.”
“Hell yeah we are, baby.”
Carol smiled, and they plunged back into the chaos of the bar.
“Next up, it looks like we have a duet! Everybody give it up for Maria and Carol!” the DJ called out hardly a minute after they came back inside.
“Yes!” Maria yelled. She dragged Carol by the hand through the crowd and onto the stage.
“You ready, ladies?” the DJ asked.
Carol burst out laughing into her mic. She still had no idea what she was about to sing.
“I guess so, man!” she yelled.
The music started, and Carol instantly got into the rhythm. It was Kiss Me Deadly, a song she knew so well. Maria had done an excellent job.
Wait, Carol thought, as she and Maria both started the words to the verse, and her heart stopped. Kiss me, the song said over and over again. And Maria had chosen it for them.
Carol's face exploded into a smile. This had to mean what she wanted it to mean.
But I know what I like
I know I like dancing with you
And I know what you like
I know you like dancing with me
She stared at Maria, and Maria stared at her, as they screamed the words into their mics. Maria’s brown eyes were glittering, and her smile was as cheesy and uncontrollable as Carol’s own.
They swayed and danced with the music, and by the end of the song, their hands were clasped together.
As their final screeched refrain of the words kiss me deadly rang through the room and the drunk crowd cheered, Carol seized the moment—or the moment seized her.
Her mic fell to the floor with a clang as she reached with both hands to grab Maria’s face. And then she did the thing she had been thinking about doing since the first time she saw Maria’s face in her dark bedroom. As Carol practically lunged at her, their lips crashed into each other. Heat spread through Carol’s head and heart and belly and everything else as they melted into each other.
One of Maria’s hands found the small of Carol’s back while the other wound into her already messy hair. She must have dropped her mic, too, but Carol didn’t notice. She had completely forgotten where they were and what they were doing. All that existed to her were the places where their skin touched.
When they finally pulled away from each other and stared into each other’s eyes, Maria said, “You got the message, I guess?”
Carol laughed and kissed her again for an answer.
Later that night, they lay together in Maria’s bed, in the same room where they had met for the first time. The sheets were tangled all around them. Maria’s head rested on Carol’s shoulder, and Carol traced her fingers up and down along the skin of Maria’s side. Carol just wanted to touch her, every second for the rest of forever. She could never get enough, she thought.
“This just feels right, you know what I mean?” Carol said into the stillness.
“Yeah,” Maria sighed. “It does.”
“I had a good feeling about you from the moment we met.”
“Well, since you sort of broke into my room the first time we met, I can’t say the same.”
“Hey, I didn’t break in—”
Maria lifted her head and kissed Carol softly. “Don’t worry. I’m not mad about it.”
Carol grinned.
After a few more minutes of quiet, Maria spoke again.
“So, how are you feeling after…everything?”
Carol searched her brain for the proper words to describe the way she felt in that moment. For all intents and purposes, Maria had saved her. Saved her from being totally alone, saved her from her father’s lingering presence, saved her from herself. She felt free. She couldn’t remember the last time she had been this unreservedly happy.
And then she thought of the perfect words to encapsulate the soaring feeling in her soul. She smiled.
“Higher, further, faster, baby.”