Work Text:
Luna Pentecost is lucky, everyone would say this, but she doesn’t believe in luck. It’s just life, if you are stubborn enough and don’t sit back doing nothing you’ll get what you want. Since she was a child Luna decided to become a pilot whatever it takes. She knew what people would say – “Your family isn’t so rich to educate you, and the scholarship is not given to everyone”. They would say that exams there are too hard to pass, that guys who go the flight school have education thousand times better than Luna’s, that security control is even stricter than the exams. “Who will accept the girl whose old man was stabbed in a night club fight and whose brother was then sent away from home because he burned this club to hell revenging his father’s death? Look in the mirror and forget it, you, nigger. It’s all bullshit that everyone is equal because there’s always someone who’s more equal”. Many people advised Luna the same thing: forget it, just stay where you are, finish school and go dancing in clubs like your mother, or maybe to a bar as a waitress, get your money and don’t even think about flights, silly girl.
Someone would listen to it but not Luna. If she decided something she will achieve it. And she did! Security? No problem. Luna couldn’t say how she managed to pass the security control. Maybe they didn’t care about Luna’s relatives, maybe one of her mum’s acquaintances who had helped her brother, arranged it, but she passed. Money? Everyone who meets age requirements is given scholarship, and Luna was not even seventeen. Exams? She studied day and night like crazy. Teachers at school asked “Aren’t you going to Oxford, Pentecost?” Maybe she wasn’t good enough for Oxford but enough for flight school. You can get what you want if you don’t sit on your ass scared of everything. It’s like in the fairy-tale about the dragon that Luna’s old neighbor told her. While people were afraid of the dragon he ate girls all over the kingdom, but there was a guy who didn’t listen to anyone and chopped off all beast’s heads.
Luna knows that she will kill the dragon if she wants to.
The flight school, of course, is not paradise on earth, but no one expected this. They are trained for pilots of Royal Air Force, not for angels, and if you are trained just study without whining. Luna doesn’t whine at all. Maybe all this square-basing annoys someone but Luna always knew that in the army no one can escape it, it’s not a disco party. Of course in the evening you are like a squeezed lemon, but who isn’t. Luna can’t understand those who complain about bad food or beds that are not so soft as at home. She thinks that food is good enough and rooms are clean. And every room is only for two persons. Well, everything is well except the room-mate.
They didn’t quarrel. Luna tries to avoid any conflicts. Discipline is discipline, and further studying at the flight school is not worth pushing for her rights. But it’s… annoying. All others are just folks and she is ginger. Or even red. You can light a cigarette from her hair because it’s like fire. Luna doesn’t care about others’ hair color, but her behavior...
Normal people, when they settle in the room, begin to unpack their bags, but she asked if she could occupy the bed near the wall and hung there a black-and-white photo of an old-fangled Spitfire on the aerodrome and a guy near it. Her grandfather, fancy that! A pilot of the World War Two, if you please. Of course the room-mate used the chance to boast that her father is a pilot too. A dynasty, so what! Mules can boast of their ancestors too – they are horses.
But even without her ancestors she does absolutely everything in the way that turns Luna’s stomach! Everyone studies hard. Everyone gives answers according to the disciplinary regulations, but she answers as if someone had programmed those regulations in her head and pushed the button. Only officers from films speak like that. Officers, not cadets. Everyone tidies uniform and cleans boots, but Sevier… Oh, Luna wants to present her a microscope so that she could better see where is every particle of dust. Luna would never see these little particles, though her eyesight is far from bad, but Sevier always wants to show off and look like the best of the best.
And she always has a handkerchief in her pocket. Checked and always clean. Normal people use paper ones and don’t fret but she doesn’t care how everyone does, because it’s not proper. She is a proper girl, damn it. Luna can’t stand proper girls because they show perfect rules but the things they do are in fact quite another. Each of them is the same and this Sevier girl is not an exception.
Sometimes, just for a giggle, not to be so annoyed, Luna tries to imagine Sevier wearing a T-shirt with silly kittens. Or with freaky hairstyle and a fringe covering one eye. Or with both eyebrows pierced. A girl at Luna’s school taught her to do so. If you can’t stand someone just imagine this guy in funny rags and you’ll feel better. Now it doesn’t work because Luna realizes that her annoying room-mate would look quite good with all this stuff. Luna’s mum was a dancer in a club, and she knows about style.
It’s better not to look for a quarrel. If something is annoying Luna can endure it. It isn’t for the whole life, only until graduation. Quarrels will only bring more trouble than they’re worth. Of course commanders will support Sevier. That’s why Luna doesn’t even talk to her, but she isn’t talkative. Thinks that Luna isn’t cute enough to talk to. They can have a quick word when they need but mainly leave messages for each other. “Alex brought your notes, I put them on the bedside-table” or “Don’t leave your boots at the entry, I’m tired of sweeping the floor” or “Tell there I went to the medical unit” or “If someone asks for me I’m in the library”. That’s enough for good neighborhood. And there are other people at the flight school, not only this Sevier …
Three weeks before Christmas cadets are chatting at the common kitchen about their plans for holidays. Of course, almost everyone will get a leave warrant and cadets are looking forward to rushing home or to their friends’ places to celebrate. It’s even curious to listen about others’ plans. But Luna herself doesn’t plan anything special.
“And you, Pentecost? Where are you going for Christmas?” asks Roger Enfield from Luna and Sevier’s group. Tell the truth, Luna can’t understand what he wants from her. Enfield is a showoff too and a big one, but if he just asks she has no problem to answer.
“I’m going to see my mum”.
“And where she lives?” Enfield grins, “On a palm with monkeys?”
Luna realizes at once what he means. She restrains herself not to give a good and proper answer, takes a deep breath to count up to thirty and say nothing. But Enfield is not going to stop. If she doesn’t answer he is ready to carry on mocking.
“Are you here because your mumsy went to bed with someone to pay for it? Or maybe you’d done your best yourself? Oh, no, our commanders aren’t black muzzles, they wouldn’t shag an ugly nigger. So, you’re just lucky because modern laws let them take macacas to Royal Air Force. I think those guys who treated you like dirt were right…”
After that Luna flies off the handle. She doesn’t care about behavior and the commanders who will shift the blame on her. She is standing tall and swearing Enfield dirtily, so that only prepositions could remain uncensored.
When she stops for a moment to catch her breath she hears a loud slap and offended Enfield’s voice.
“Damn! Tam, what the fuck are you doing?”
Luna looks around and sees Enfield blinking in perplexity and touching his cheek where a red spot has left. All his arrogance has fallen into pieces. And near Her Hihgness, the Princess-in-exile and Luna’s adorable room-mate Tamsin Sevier is speaking nailing him down to the floor with every single word. “I promise you won’t die. Now shut up and go wash your dirty mouth with soap, you, hope of the white race.”
Where have you come from, you, ginger ass? And who asked you to meddle?!
Sevier looks at Enfield like at a crushed worm, and hisses with despise so that Luna can hear every word:
“Just look at him. This is the future officer of the Royal Air Force. What a nuisance!”
And she is wiping her hands on that very checked handkerchief.
In the evening all three of them are called to the office of the deputy director of the flight school.
Luna pretends to be calm. Of course she isn’t, and she can see that there will be trouble. Yes, Enfield started this, but there was no need to swear like drunks in a bar. That’s why she’d better stop crying over spilt milk and listen how the dormitory supervisor captain Dobson, a stout man who doesn’t even resemble a military officer, casting cross looks at the group adviser and the deputy director of the flight school, is rattling that he, captain Dobson, had to put aside a plenty of important work, and it is a mess. No, captain Dobson doesn’t know what they had a roar about there, in the kitchen, but it’s a disgrace when cadets come to complain of such terrible things and who has ever seen anything like a future officer, especially a girl, letting loose her fists on her fellow-cadets…
“What do you think you are doing, Sevier?” Colonel Jenkins is not shouting but Luna knows that he’d better did. “I can understand many things, but… Do you at least remember whose daughter and grand-daughter you are?”
“Yes, sir”. Damn! Is she human or a walking bullet-proof armor? Her voice isn’t even trembling. “I remember. In nineteen-forty, my grandfather shot down his… soulmates over the English Channel”. She nods at Enfield. “Did I really have to remain uninvolved?”
Luna doesn’t like all that literature with fine words but now she realizes that the phrase “there was deadly silence” from a story in the reading-book she read at school meant exactly the thing that was written. She also realizes that she has no desire to punch Sevier in the nose for mentioning her grandfather. This is not, however, the thing she wants to confess.
The deputy director of the flight school says: “Now everyone tells in turn and in detail”.
Luna thought that they would avoid shouting, but after listening to everyone Colonel Jenkins shouted at Enfield so that she didn’t find it funny. Enfield had it coming, so he must be glad to spend some time in a disciplinary cell and clean the territory with a broom and a spade before and after holidays. Who had said that some are more equal? This was just. But now Luna and Sevier are left without leave warrants for two weeks, but it’s not the end of the world and they got off cheap. Ooops… Since when it became “they”? Anyway Luna should thank her for what she’d done.
Tam only shrugs her shoulders for Luna’s sincere “Thank you” and says calmly: “Not at all. It was just… right”. Bugger! She really has the same rules for everyone!
Luna can’t say that they became friends with Tamsin since then. This can be only in stupid films when two people don’t even talk to each other and become best friends in a moment. But Luna became calm and could even talk with Tamsin about the things that happened during the day. Their talks were not long, but it’s still better than looking at her angrily from the corner, especially when they are punished for the same thing. Just good neighborhood, not an invitation for a birthday-party.
Luna’s birthday this year is a failure. First that clash with Enfield, then punishment, and to make everything worse she caught cold. The cold was so bad that Luna lost her voice and was excused from attending classes for several days. The doctor in the medical unit said that it’s nothing serious and gave her some pills with instruction how to take them. But the birthday is coming and Luna can’t even talk normally and doesn’t know how to explain what had happened if mum calls. She will for sure, she never forgets.
Of course mum calls. On Tuesday evening, as usual. The mobile is ringing on the bedside table but Luna can’t answer. Bugger! Mum will worry if she hears strange sounds instead of her daughter’s voice. But if Luna doesn’t take the phone it will be only worse because mum will worry even more. Luna sits on the bed, looks at the phone and hears: “Parents? Never mind, I’ll explain”.
Luna nods. Anyway things cannot be worse. She listens to Tam explaining her mother what had happened. How she knows? She did everything right: first told that the cold is not serious, then promised that Luna will soon recover. She even mentioned the words of the doctor from the medical unit, but she can’t know that mum calms down when you mention someone clever. After that Tam turns to Luna and gives her the mobile. “Just listen. Your mum wants to congratulate you. Oh, by the way, why didn’t you tell me? Oh, sorry, your voice”.
Luna listens to mum's congratulations and thinks that she would surely tell if she hadn’t sore throat. When Luna recovers they should at least drink tea.
They will have a lot of occasions to drink tea. And a lot of things to talk about, even about battle of Britain, because Tam turned to be quite a nice girl. If you, of course, are not arrogant like Enfield. They can even argue for football. But Luna will always shout for her favorite “Tottenham” because they are the best, never mind that Tam’s dad supports “Liverpool”. Luna won’t explain this in summer when they get acquainted. He told Tam himself: “You can invite your friend to our place. We have enough rooms here”. Luna didn’t even mind for “friend”. So they are going together. Friendship is sharing not only troubles but joys too. Now Luna realizes that you’d better do together everything you can do.
Even if once they have a dragon to slay.