Author's Notes: The revised, revised edition. Oh well, nobody's perfect. Standard disclaimers apply. Enjoy.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I was crossing the East Old City Common to see my mother at the Psychiatric Center, when I collided with a life altering force. Like the ripples in a pond, a little thing with enormous consequences. I was walking along, preoccupied, when I saw a pale blur out of the corner of my eye and… there we were, me and destiny in a heap on the aging permacrete of East Common. I was on my back and she was sprawled across my lap with the skirt of her little black unisex dress hiked up to her waist. It was the kind of dress that most office workers wear, but she wasn't wearing the normal black satin garter-belt combination that most office lackeys favor. She had on some really high-class midnight-blue lace and kid leather panties and impossibly sheer silver hold-up stockings. After a very long moment I realized I was staring rather rudely, tore myself away from the show, and looked her in the face. She had long white-blonde hair, unlikely lavender eyes, and fashionably translucent skin. To me she was stunning, but I doubt most Transylvanians would even deign to call her pretty. Not on this planet, anyway. Around here things run more to the overtly confident and ostentatious than to the physically beautiful. The way she dropped her eyes and turned her head, modestly trying to hide her underwear would normally be considered a big turnoff to most of the resident population. True to my fetishist roots however, I found it horribly distracting. Not the best frame of mind in which to visit your (legally insane) mother. As she began to gather her papers, I noticed her hands were small and well groomed, with long, elegant fingers, the nails smooth and manicured; I let my mind wander momentarily, then bent down to help.

"I am so sorry," she murmured, not meeting my eye. "I should have been watching where I was going."

"No, it was my fault. I wasn't paying attention..." She had stopped gathering papers and was looking intently at the ground. She had a little crease between her eyebrows, and with a brief twinge of panic I knew she was about to cry. Here I had a brief moral dilemma. Mother, pretty stranger, mother, pretty stranger... but then again, I thought, why not both? "Hey, are you busy? Um...I'm going to visit my -- uh a friend of mine at the Psychiatric Center …would you like to come along? If you're not busy or anything, um... it won't take very long, we could go get tea or something after if you like --Oh please! No, don't cry!" Too late. She was sobbing embarrassedly into a memo paper. The strange spectacle was beginning to draw curious stares from passers-by. I helped her up and half led, half carried her up the nearby ramp to the Orchard Park and set her down on a bench under some fruit trees. Then I made a quick dash back down and clumsily gathered her papers and folders into her slim metal briefcase, found her expensive looking Mobile Computer Unit miraculously still there, and went back up. By the time I got back she had calmed somewhat and was wiping her nose with the remains of the memo. I put her things to her left on the bench and sat myself on her other side. She pushed a lock of silvery hair out of her face and looked over at me. Her eyes caught mine, lovely and helpless, and felt a strange popping sensation in my chest. I had another brief twinge of panic as I realized I was in imminent danger of becoming seriously infatuated. Some of my feelings must have shown on my face (I thought I could feel my cheeks burning) because she blushed and looked down. She reached over and began to fiddle with the sleek little keyboard of her computer unit. I noticed the time on her screen, "Oh, shit."

"Um….I'm sorry?" She offered timidly, glancing at me uncertainly.

"No, no, nothing you did. The time, err…visiting hours will be over soon, and I have to hurry if I want to see my mo- er, my…my friend." I stood up abruptly, feeling stupid.

"I'm very sorry," she whispered, gathering her things and standing as well. "I've caused you quite enough trouble. Please excuse me-"

"No, don't!" I said rather loudly and harshly. She looked taken aback, and I made a clumsy attempt to cover my ass. "Um….I -- uh, look -- no harm done. Why don't you come with me? You'll have to wait in the lounge, but it'll only be for a little while and then we can go do something. My treat, uh… to -- to make up for running into you like that." I said with more bravado than I actually felt, and as soon as the words were out of my mouth I realized how strange they must have sounded. Most people in this part of the city were just coming back from lunch hour; she was in an office worker's dress. Oh well, I never claimed to be especially observant. Except as far as lingerie is concerned, anyway.

"Okay."

"You mean you will?" I blurted out, taken completely off guard.

"Yes, I mean it's the least I could do, for being so troublesome, I mean." She said looking cute, shy and (perhaps understandably) a little confused.

Now I'm quite sure that among more rational readers her answer sounds just as strangely random as my invitation, but I wasn't in a particularly rational state of mind to begin with. Anyway, no place in the galaxy is better for picking up a date than the "moon drenched shores of Transsexual." Or whatever the Intergalactic Board of Travel and Tourism has come up with these days. I stood by, feeling awkward while she put her things tidily into her steel brief case. When she finished she stood very straight and looked at me expectantly.

"Um, this way." My vocabulary seemed to have degenerated into monosyllables. I motioned in the general direction of the Psychiatric Center. We walked together down the ramp and proceeded across the Common in silence for a few minutes. I was doing my best to watch her without her realizing that I was watching her, when I realized that she probably realized that I was watching her without her realizing that I was watching her. Then I realized that I had no clue who she was. I stopped walking "My name's Red, by the way." I said, somewhat belatedly.

"Morphia," she said slowly, watching my face intently.

"That's a lovely name," I said eventually. Her scrutiny made me uncomfortable.

A radiant smile blossomed across her face, and my heart skipped a beat. "Thank you."

We walked the rest of the way in a surprisingly comfortable silence.