“Look, Joan, you want to get up there as much as I do. So do Donna and Vanessa. And you know damn well they aren’t going to put two of us on a mission together at first. They are going to assign one woman at a time, because we’re novelties to them still. We’re not the same as a male astronaut until one of us or two of us or even three of us have gone up there and proven that we are. So if I want to get assigned, it means I have to wait out all of the women in Group 8, most likely. And then I have to make sure Antonio chooses me over you or Donna or Vanessa. So go ahead and blow off steam and take your eye off the ball—I don’t care. Because the first crew assignment for our class, you can bet your ass I’m going to be on it. If it means I need to curry favor with Hank so he wants me to be on his crew, I will. Especially because I know he’s more likely to push for Donna, since they’re sleeping together.”

There was nothing Lydia was saying that Joan didn’t already know. “Lydia, you have to do what you have to do,” Joan said. “Just leave me alone tonight, please.”

“I really don’t get you, Joan,” Lydia said.

“What’s not to get?”

“I see you working harder than almost anybody else out there except me,” Lydia said. “You’re up in the T-38s all the time, you’re puking in microgravity and going right back up the moment they give you a chance, you’re studying like hell for these classes, asking more questions than anybody. When the astronauts are running the simulations, you’re always there in Mission Control, always watching, keeping notes, just like I am. You look like you’re just as desperate to get into that seat as I am. The only other thing you have to focus on is politics, and you’re not doing it.”

Lydia was right about the simulations. They weren’t letting any of the ASCANs on them yet, but whenever Joan heard that any of the astronaut crews were doing one, she made sure to be there. She watched as the simulation supervisors threw every possible problem at them. It was one of her favorite parts of the job, being on that floor, watching it all unfold.

One of the jets starts leaking and you don’t understand how to close the manifold while properly accounting for the other lost jets? The crew dies.

One, two, three buses go down and you can’t figure out if you’ve lost critical redundancies in time to act? The crew dies.