Yule fast approaches. Loki wants to dress more to her feminine side for work, but she is not sure how Ralph will react if she appears in a skirt with curves and a wish to be addressed as 'she'. So instead, she wears the long tunic, the swishing trousers, and longjohns under them so she will not freeze. She plaits her hair in the simplest style she can think of and sets off to the bookshop.
When she enters, she hangs up her coat in the office and Ralph hands her a mug of tea, "'Morning."
"Good morning."
"Well, you're pretty swishy this morning. Feeling queer as a three dollar bill?"
"I do not know what that term means."
"Eh, it's an old one. Queer- odd, unusual, an old derogatory term for a gay person. We use it more kindly amongst ourselves. And there's no three dollar bill."
"So it means someone is very very gay."
"Yep."
"I believe I would say I am very very gender indeterminate instead."
"Now you're going to have to explain that one."
"I am rather fluid. I am some days Lady, some days Lord. And often, between, during which I am a man simply for the sake of making things easier on those wishing to address me. But it does not quite fit in those times."
"So you're saying you're transgender."
"Is there a problem with this?"
"Nope. Just not something I expected."
"Did I ever tell you that I wasn't born in this realm at all?"
"Are you pulling my leg, son?"
"No. Thor is my brother. But I have been banished here and stripped of long life and strength."
"You should have told me to sit down first."
"My apologies. I thought that if I was divulging my identity, I ought to do it all at once."
"I suppose that's one way to approach it."
"So do I still have work? Or is this too odd?"
"Odd's not quite the word I'd use, but yeah, you're still my apprentice. And you still get to take on the bookshop at the end. I guess you're not any different than ten minutes ago, just have a little more complicated backstory."
"Thank you, Ralph. Magda would say I have been blessed with good fortune to have found so many people here who let me be who I am."
"How is she? Wanda? That brother of hers? Everybody adjusting well?"
"Pietro's journey will be long. He has started to recall some of what HYDRA did to him to give him his unusual speed. Wanda says he often wakes screaming. She has been spending weekends with him."
"And how goes the wedding planning?"
"Beautifully. We will be picking up dresses after work. Magda wanted a few adjustments on hers."
"And yours?"
"Perhaps. If I feel like Lady Loki on that day."
"When you say 'lady', you mean that in the royal way, don't you?"
"Yes."
"Am I supposed to bow or something when you speak?" He is joking, but at the same time, he wonders if he should.
Loki chuckles, "No, not at all. I do not want my titles here. I am just Loki, sometimes she, sometimes he, but always Loki."
"Good to know. Anything else you might want to tell me before I find out from somebody else?"
Loki freezes, wondering if she should share what she did in New York, "Ah...you might want to sit down. And you might want to have another cup of tea. Or wine."
"You sure you want to tell me this?"
"No. But Thor knows, Alexi knows, Magda knows, and Wanda knows. The people most important to me know. And I count you among them. So I ought to tell you the whole story. And you will most definitely want to be sitting."