Kesra Dey: A Seam of Her Own

A place in the yard

Kesra Dey is twenty and midway through an apprenticeship repairing small cargo vessels in the independent moon kingdom of Nereth. She shares a rented flat near the shipyard with two other apprentices. Their rooms have doors; the kitchen has a rota nobody quite remembers writing. Kesra labels her lunch containers because one flatmate regards all cooked vegetables as an invitation. Her parents live elsewhere in the kingdom and send messages containing advice she has usually requested from someone else first.

The yard receives worn vessels in a pressurised service enclosure. Kesra spends much of her shift measuring, cleaning and preparing surfaces. She trains on pressure seals and joins under supervision. Being allowed to touch a ship does not mean being allowed to declare it safe. She understands this distinction perfectly when somebody else's work is being discussed.

Her apprentice pay covers her share of rent and household costs, with a small amount saved towards qualifications. She plays a battered string instrument, badly enough to be sociable about it, and spends one evening a week making music with friends. She wants the full craft certificate, a room of her own and a name that a supervisor will put beside a difficult job without hesitation. She wants these things sooner than they are likely to arrive.

The mark beneath the seal

Kesra felt the slip before she saw it. The cleaning tool caught the lip of the channel, leaving a bright score where the replacement seal would sit. She lifted the tool and stared. It was a very small mark. The ship surrounding it was discouragingly large.

Her supervisor, Brannic, was speaking to a customer at the enclosure doors. Kesra could turn the light away and make the scratch disappear. The seal itself would cover it. She imagined finishing, washing her hands and going home with an ordinary day's work behind her. Then she imagined being asked exactly when she had noticed it.

'Brannic.' Her voice came out too quietly. She set the tool down so that she could not resume. 'I've scored the channel.'

He brought the gauge, examined the surface and asked her to show him how she had held the tool. She did. The customer waited. Kesra could feel every minute becoming visible to everyone else.

'We can dress that back within tolerance,' Brannic said. 'You'll do it with me. Next time, support your wrist here.' He touched the edge of the bench. He was irritated, which was better than the careful gentleness she had feared. The repair took most of her remaining shift.

That evening, Kesra arrived late to the music room. Her friend handed her the instrument without asking why. She played the first piece much too fast. During the second, she began listening to the others. By the end of the evening, the scratch had become something that had happened at work, rather than the only thing that had ever happened to her.

The next inspection

Eight days later, Brannic gave Kesra another channel to prepare. He inspected her tool, pointed out where the old compound had hardened and left her to begin. She waited until his footsteps receded before setting her wrist against the support.

This seal belonged to a small supply vessel with scuffed cupboards and a child's drawing pinned inside its service locker. The drawing showed six people, a green animal and a star much too close to their heads. Kesra looked at it while her cleaning solution worked. Somebody would be glad when this ship came home.

At inspection, Brannic ran the gauge along the channel. Kesra watched his hands rather than his face. He checked twice, wrote the result and handed her the record to sign beneath his. Her name identified the preparation work. His still carried the approval.

'Good,' he said. She had imagined a longer speech on several occasions. The actual word fitted in her pocket much more easily.

She bought fresh fruit for the flat on her way home, taking the cost from that week's spare money. One flatmate offered to cook; the other washed the containers gathering beside the sink. Over supper, Kesra told them about the seal. She included the mistake from the week before. Neither of them seemed to find the successful inspection less impressive because of it.

Where we leave her

Kesra has completed a supervised job that passed inspection and added its record to her training file. She still needs further instruction and assessment before certification. At the flat, the empty fruit bowl has acquired a note suggesting a shared supper each week. Kesra has signed it.

The extra place at supper

Two evenings after the fruit supper, Kesra came home to find Anet sitting beside the cooker with one hand wrapped and resting on a folded towel. The pan was still empty.

'It's not a burn,' Anet said before Kesra asked. 'A clamp slipped. They cleaned it.'

Kesra put her bag down. Anet was another apprentice; he had prepared meals with the elaborate confidence of somebody who believed a recipe's final instruction was a personal challenge. Now he watched the wrapped hand as though it belonged to an unreliable lodger.

'What did the clinician say about work?'

'Light duties. The yard says they'll look for some.' He shifted the towel. 'Until they find them, I get the injury rate.'

Kesra knew what that rate would do to his share of the next bill. She had been counting the money saved for her assessment. For a moment she disliked him for sitting beside it in need of something.

Anet tried to lift the pan one-handed. She took it from him too quickly. His mouth tightened.

'I can still cook.'

'You can tell me what to ruin.' Kesra set the pan on the cooker. 'Then complain about it afterwards. We should preserve your duties where possible.'

He gave a short laugh, which helped until he began explaining the onions. She had never heard so much instruction attached to an object that was about to become smaller.

Their other flatmate returned and cleared the table. They counted the food in the cupboards before deciding what to buy. Kesra offered a fixed share towards the household bill until Anet's next pay statement, enough to matter and less than she had first felt obliged to promise. Her assessment savings would recover more slowly.

Anet stared at the little calculation. 'Write down what I owe.'

'I have.' She turned it so he could see. 'The groceries are all of ours.'

They ate onions cut to three incompatible standards. Afterwards Anet dried what he could with his sound hand while Kesra washed. Before bed she set her assessment money aside and returned to clear the table. Anet had left her the least burnt piece of bread. She ate it standing up.