“Dear,” Bonita, a redheaded older woman sighed, stirring sugar into her tea and setting it back on the coffee table. “Did you break another constable’s heart recently?”

“What?” Ruby startled, then made a face. “No, of course not.”

Bonita cast her a skeptical look, but didn’t push it. Ruby sat across from her, waving a hand over her tea.

“It looks more elegant if you stir, dear.”

Ruby raised her brows, but followed Bonita’s implicit instruction. She tolerated Ruby … and that was more than she could say for all but three of the other girls and, well, Cheri.

“How’s your granddaughter?” Ruby said idly.

“Still engaged,” Bonita said, neutrally. “I’ll believe it when the wedding’s over.”

Ruby glanced over to the doorway when she heard the knob turn. God. She half hoped it was a john. Bonita treated her like a child, but she was nineteen!

One of the few good things about living in a land whose language you don’t understand much is the silence. Most of the sounds become background noise and you can just sulk into your thoughts, without getting involved with anyone.

They had managed to come back to the Pony ignoring most of the girls but as they entered, there was Ruby. They had to smile at Ruby.

“Bonità,” they greeted the older woman, as they took a chair and surrounded the younger woman’s shoulders in a comforting fashion, with their bright smile on their face. They put so much warmth in it they filled the room with it. Which naturally meant there was not as much space for anybody else.

“What is food?” the question was what was there for breakfast.

[[CW: Very, very normalized bigotry.]]

Bonita looked suspiciously between the two, not for the first time. Men and women being ‘just friends’ was like the johns who said ‘just the tip’. Especially with a boy like that. He took up the whole damned room. She sipped her tea.

Ruby beamed back, unaware of the boatloads of judgment rowing their way. She wiggled her shoulders and settled into their embrace, still stirring their tea. She blew on it. Bonita cleared her throat mid-blow and Ruby looked sheepish for it.

“Tea,” Ruby answered, while Bonita cast a look just as scalding as it. “I made some tea, and am waiting for someone else to give in to hunger,” she admitted with a shrug. “Comment allez-vous, Chéri?”

French:

“How are you, Chéri?”

People were suspicious of Chéri. It was just a fact of life. And because they were bratty and defiant by nature and enjoyed doing their absolute worst with it, they even pouted their lips and started humming an absolutely normal song in French, but making it sound much sleazier simply by the way they snag that.

Chéri held Ruby closer because she was a friend and they could use some genuine warmth. Chéri extended an arm to reach the tea on their own.

“Ruby no cook?” Chéri asked. They turned to Bonita, wondering silently if she was going to feed them somehow.

“Triste,” was Chéri brief answer “Chéri need musique,” they tried to explain. They wanted to make something that felt good out of this day, something that felt easy and closer to them. Not work. They were under the impression their life, here, had turned into only work, the way it had been in their native village.