sensors detected a sudden flurry of excellent headcanons and impressive posts from a corner of the cabin pressure tag and it turned out that their creator is Brilliant
vanilla - what i like most about you
that's not actually a fair question um
you really get trans stuff and actively blog about it and all your posts about it are great, and you are great and lovely, also it makes me SO HAPPY your tags referring to me as aunt or andle
imagine - during edinburgh, martin knows that there are more important things they should be thinking about, but seeing douglas' nail varnish reminds them very strongly of times when they tried painting their nails for school and were teased mercilessly until they gave up trying and pushed the idea of trying to decorate themself to the back of their mind. but all the way through the flight, despite all the chaos of mr birling and douglas' attempts to steal the talisker, martin can't stop thinking about it. they hope douglas doesn't notice the glances they keep on sending towards his flight bag, and they think they're okay to go on as usual - because think how douglas would tease them if he knew. but then, after the flight,
"anyone care for a shot of nail varnish", and they all laugh, but then when arthur points out very earnestly that "that would taste nasty!", douglas gives a shrug and says "well, in that case, i have no further use for it" - and leaves it on a shelf in the portacabin "just in case"
and martin can't help themself; they never have money to spend on fripperies, and they tell themself 'just this once', and they make some excuse to be the last to leave and paint all their nails - it's clear, and the next flight isn't for several days, and nobody will know
what martin forgets, of course, is that they don't have any nail polish remover
what martin also forgets is that douglas is good at anything he sets his mind to
and the nail varnish is clear, and martin gets so comfortable with it, that by the next flight it's still on their fingers (barring a few chips from man-with-a-van work).
douglas gives them a meaningful stare, and they realise and start stuttering about 'protecting nails during heavy lifting'. douglas hears them out long enough to be completely sure that they're bullshitting and embarrassed about it, and then smoothly cuts across with the last thing martin expected - a compliment
and martin's kind of stunned but they manage to keep it together, and for the rest of the flight they even have a little confident smile on their face. and near the end of the flight douglas gives martin an assessing glance and demands to know if he needs to start doing anything different, and martin is utterly taken aback but manages to say that they/them pronouns would be good, and they both go on as before
and then on the next trip, douglas sets his flight bag down with a clink of bottles, and smoothly pulls out a range of colorful nail varnishes that he "just happened to have knocking around; they were a present for helena that she never used", and they spend the flight painting martin's nails in cool and snazzy colours, and douglas even helps with some patterns (turns out he's very good at nail art)
arthur thinks it's brilliant!!! and martin gets more and more confident, and lets arthur try as well and they even conspire to paint douglas' nails (martin patiently specifying that it doesn't mean anything about your gender really it's just something that makes them feel better about theirs)
carolyn approves in a long-suffering way, and only comments to make fun of them when martin and douglas come into work one morning with their nails painted in stripes like captains' and first officers' epaulets, until arthur grabs her arm and paints 'gerti' one letter on each nail
dorky nail art mjn family supporting their fave nonbinary pilot and having as much silly fun as they possibly can
for the rest of martin's life, happiness is the smell of nail varnish drying in the cockpit of an airplane in the sunshine
