Cohost Sapphic September 2024 writing prompt: 16 — Girls who bring comfort
Brandwyn is drunk.
Brandwyn is sloppy-and-listing-against-a-pillar drunk, haunting the spacedock bar. This would normally be the juncture at which she has a good time, however brief; some amount of drunk, whatever hospitable bed she can manage to land in, and then back to the top of the loop: mech pilot for hire, freelance, solo, whatever job’s going.
Only no. Not this time. The universe has thrown an exception, and she’s fallen out of the loop and crash-landed at an ugly and terminal error message. No hospitable bed; no hustle tomorrow morning; no mech. No freelance. No job.
And so, perforce, while she still has any cash: drunk.
“You know what you need?” says the bartender, some flat-skulled, chihuahua-eyed stub of a guy called Chet or Randy or something. “You need some cheering up. And I know just what cheers you up!”
“Gin,” Brandwyn says flatly.
“Girls!” Chet or Randy or Rodney says.
“I will literally pay you to shut up,” Brandwyn says.
“And this is from the girl over there!” Chet or Randy or Rodney or Collin leers nauseatingly, and slides a glass over to her. Brandwyn sniffs it suspiciously, and at the botanical notes of nice gin, casts a suspicious glance across the bar.
“That’s not a girl,” she hisses, grabbing at Chet or Rodney or Randy or Collin or Raymond’s sleeve. “That’s a mercenary!”
“I don’t think she’s after your cash, buddy,” Chet or Randy or Rodney or Collin or Raymond or Jackson negs her with well-worn faux sympathy.
“No! A mercenary, dipstick!” Brandwyn gesticulates with the glass. “From a merc company—”
“Brandy,” the merc says, in a soft and golden voice.
“Naw, you ordered her a gin,” Chet or Randy or Rodney or Collin or Raymond or Jackson or Percy says.
“Don’t you have other customers,” Brandwyn snarls, letting go of his sleeve and shoving ineffectually at his arm, which, by Newton’s third law, nearly dumps her on her ass. The mech-merc steadies her with a kind hand on the small of her back; Brandwyn attempts to shove the glass at her. “You! Have this back!”
“Brandy,” the merc says, impossibly gentle. “I heard you were having a rough — well, nobody said it was like this. What’s wrong?”
Brandwyn laughs hollowly, too loud and too long, slugs back half of the nice gin and tonic, and resumes trying to obstinately shove it back at the merc. “Freighter hired me as in-flight protection from pirates,” she says bitterly. “I was in shallow-cryo, ready for flashwake, pirates tried an ambush and mistimed it; the skipper reckoned he just needed to burn hard and they’d lose their window. So instead of waking me, he jettisoned some mass he didn’t care about and hit the drive.”
“No,” the merc says.
“The fucking mech,” Brandwyn says, voice thready. “My fucking—” and closes her eyes and presses the back of her hand to her mouth.
“Sue him,” the merc says, after a beat.
“Yeah, that’s what he said, too,” Brandwyn says bitterly. “And then he went Ha! Ha! Ha!”
She downs the other half of the drink, and tries to shove the empty glass off on the merc. “Don’t buy me drinks,” she says, loud and shaky. “I can’t owe you any more, Shantae.”
“You don’t owe me,” Shantae ways, gentle and wounded. “You never owed me.”
“Oh yeah because your pals haven’t spent the last decade taking every fucking chance to turn their noses up and purse their lips and tell me I broke you—”
“Were you still piloting that old Wolfclaw?” Shantae interrupts, a little harder, and Brandwyn squints into her face and pulls a terrible expression and says, “Yeah,” like she’s expecting whatever comes next to be a low blow.
“I hated it,” Shantae says. “You know I hated it. That thing was junk, and it was going to get you killed. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry things are shitty for you, but that mech? You tell me it’s gone, and the first thing I do is think now I can breathe.” She puts her hands on Brandwyn’s shoulders, digs her fingers in a little. “Let me do something,” she says, fierce.
“Fine, yeah, great, sure,” Brandwyn says, “I’ll accept this drink, then,” and blinks into it in startlement when she tries to swig from it and finds it empty.
“I am not trying to fix everything,” Shantae says. “I learned. It was a rough lesson, and yes, a lot of people who care about me hold it against you. But I am not trying to fix everything, not this time. I am asking you to just let me do something for you. Just what you want, yeah? Another drink — though maybe you should slow those down. A hug? We had good hugs! A bunk for the night, if you need one, you got somewhere to stay? I’ve — just got your back.”
Brandwyn plonks the glass down on the bar. She sways a little. Shuffles forward until she can put her head on Shantae’s shoulder.
She says something heartfelt, and entirely inaudible in the other pilot’s shirt.
Shantae folds her, slowly, into tight arms, eyes crinkled with affection and old regrets. “I’ve got your back,” she says, and Brandwyn relaxes into it; and finally, finally the tears come.
