Big thanks to Teacup_Kitty for brainstorming the idea for this one with me.

===

When your best friend, the inventor, calls you up and says “get over here” you don’t waste time.

One time he did this, he’d managed to make a time machine. No lie. A working time machine. It was a feat of pure genius. Luckily, it broke. I say that because when we realized it was configured to reset after a few minutes, we knew we were stuck in a time loop. The machine, as it turns out, wasn’t stuck in the loop with us. Something about space time entropy. After an unknown amount of time, it finally broke and set us free.

You would think that would slow me down a bit, cause me to pause when he called me up the next time? Not at all; I was all-in and ready for the next ride. The next invention? Water-powered skateboard. No wheels, just water. I know what you’re thinking, how could that possibly work? I don’t know either. It didn’t work for long, really, but it was awesome for the five minutes we could use it!

This time, when I got in the door, he was there ready.

“Ray, I’ve cracked it.”

“What’s ‘it’, George?” I asked, handing him my coat, but he’d already turned down the hall. I just threw it on the couch. I should always just throw it on the couch. He’s never going to grab it.

I had to jog to catch up. “George?”

“I’ve invented my first Scanner of Non-Stochastic Probability.”

I just shook my head. “A what?”

“A scanner of… you know, it’s easier to show you than explain.” And yet, he turned to me and tried to explain anyway. “You know how the future isn’t like a fixed thing, right?”

I just nodded but my brain was already going a mile a minute. I mean wasn’t that like some unanswered philosophical question? George didn’t really do philosophical questions.

He continued his explanation as we made our way downstairs. “Well, it’s not not fixed, either.”

I was even more confused than before. Unabated, this one-sided conversation pressed on.

“There are plenty of variables that are fixed in the future. Let’s say, they’re fixed enough that we can look at them, we can scan them. If we scan enough of them, we can draw a picture.”

“A what?” I at least know what a picture was, but that’s not what I was asking.

“A picture.”

Dammit, George. “I know what a picture is, my friend. What are you saying?”

George inhaled and drew himself up into his most proud posture. “We can draw a picture. Of the future.”

I’m pretty sure I just stared at him unblinkingly for maybe five minutes. Or maybe five seconds. I’m not sure. Sue me, I was in a time loop once.

“How does it work?”

George shook his head. “Respectfully, my friend, I don’t think you’d understand if I told you.”

“No no, not like that,” I replied, trying not to sound exasperated. “I mean, do you just look at it? That’s it?”

George nodded. “Pretty much that’s it. You walk up to it and look. Here, see?”

In the middle of George’s basement stood a machine straight out of science fiction. A tall mirror framed in a white ring. Behind it, a series of wires and tubes wove their way around strange metal boxes. Off to the side, George had set up what looked like a control terminal,

George walked up to the device and turned it on. As it booted up, a ring of light encircled the standing mirror. The hum that followed shook the floor, as if an old refrigerator had kicked into life for the last time. Finally, the mirror blinked to life.

He stood there, looking at himself in it, nearly preening.

“I mean, it works great. At least I think it does. I’ve got a few more gray hairs, a new pimple, and apparently I cut myself shaving.”

I just let myself collapse onto the ratty sofa in his basement and watched him. Finally, I spoke up. “How far ahead do you think it is?”

“It’s hard to say exactly. Could be three months? Could be six months? Could be more?”

I tilted my head, surprised at his lack of precision. “Why don’t you hold up one of those old flip calendars and see what it shows you.

He laughed. A full belly laugh. Moments like this set our friendship into stone. “Ray, you’re brilliant.”

He looked around his makeshift office for anything he could use as a calendar. He tried writing the date and showing it to the scanner. Nothing. The reflection never showed anything back. I rummaged through a desk and found an old satellite digital wall clock. I wasn’t sure if it would still get signal, but there were enough batteries in this place to power an army of toys, so I figured it was worth a shot.

I managed to swap out the battery. Excitedly, George took it from me and held it up to the scanner. Nothing.

He turned, frowning. “Why… doesn’t anything we try work?”

I had an idea. I doubted if it would work, of course. I had never been clever enough to be clever twice in 30 minutes. Still, it was worth a shot. “How about putting it on the wall? If the battery stays good maybe it’ll still be on the wall in the future?”

He just looked at me, then. He had a kind of “what clever alien replaced my best friend” look on his face, but thankfully he had just enough good sense not to say it. Instead, he said

“Brilliant.”

A minute later, we’d affixed the aged wall clock on its wall of name, and I turned to watch George.

“You did it, bud. 497 days into the future. Almost exactly.”

“You’d think you could tune it and make it a nice round number,” I joked, but then bit my lip when he spun on me, his eyes already glazed.

“Do you know what that means?”

“I do not, admittedly.”

“Here, come and look,” he said, scooting over a little to make room for me beside him.

I stood back up, careful not to knock over the box of wall-hanging nails perched beside me on the couch. I walked over to him and finally got a good look at the scanner.

It wasn’t an exact reflection, and it seemed to work best for the person standing directly in front. Everything on the sides got a bit fuzzy.

“You didn’t tell me you had a cute girlfriend in the future.” I smiled, spying George and a cute blonde about my height in the reflection.

George had gone silent. Completely silent. I wasn’t sure if he was still breathing, so I looked over to him.

“You okay? I think you’ve got a few bugs to work out.” I chuckled. “But hey, at least she’s cute. What I can see of her.”

George took a few steps to his right and pulled me directly in front of the scanner.

“What do you see?” he asked. Admittedly, his question sounded more of a demand, but I honestly couldn’t care less in the moment. I was looking at her.

There was no one else.

There was just her.

“George, why is it still showing me your girlfriend? You’re not even in the scanner anymore.” My voice betrayed me. Every word after the first got quieter and quieter until it was only a whisper. “But you’re not…” was all I managed to say before I lost the ability to speak.

“You’re gorgeous, dude,” George said in an attempt to be helpful. “I guess I should drop the ‘dude’, eh?”

I barely heard him. I just wanted to know her. Who was she? What did she sound like?

Where did she get that beautiful dress?

Shit.

I looked down instinctively, hoping to see it on me, but of course it wasn’t there. I wasn’t the person in the scanner. At least, not yet.

“George,” I tried to force myself to speak but instead tears came. A heaving weep caught in my lungs until it poured from my vocal cords and echoed in the basement. George caught me in his arms and just held me.

Once it looked like I was calm enough to stand in my own power, George led me back over to the couch and set the wall nails on the coffee table like a sensible person. Setting me down, he gently sat beside me.

“I dated a trans woman, once,” he said. I hoped to all the heavens this conversation wasn’t going to turn bad. Thankfully, it didn’t.

“She was very sweet. It ended up we decided to go our separate ways. But I was glad for what I picked up being around her. If you want, I can ask her if she has any tips for a newly-discovered woman.”

I shook my head. “Look, I appreciate the help. Getting you to look up an ex is maybe not the best idea.” Still my voice betrayed me. I could feel that I did want his help. Badly. I wanted all the help I could get.

“It’s really not a problem. She helps newly-minted trans women all the time.”

I pictured a cartoon factory where men were conveyor-ed in on one side and out popped women in flowery dresses on the other.

“Only if you think it won’t be too much trouble.”

He shined his brightest smile at me. “None whatsoever. Do you want to crash here for the night? I can bring some blankets down.”

I stood, waving him off. “I’m good. I think I’m just going to go home and think. A lot. Do some reading. A lot of reading. I think I’m just going to go home and do a lot.”

He chuckled. “Just don’t wear yourself out. I’ll send you whatever I find. Take it easy. You’ll get this figured out.”

He followed me up the stairs, mostly because I think he didn’t want me to pass out and fall down them.

“You okay to drive?” he asked in that voice reserved for being the responsible guy at the bar.

I picked up my jacket. “I’m good. No, really. I’m good.” I felt a funny sensation in my feet. “You should get that scanner checked before it shakes your house apart.”

We chuckled, and I left. I don’t remember the car ride home. Or taking a shower. Or getting in bed. Waking up the next day there was only one thing I could think about.

===

George, to his credit, was not the kind of guy to waste time. Whether it was building the next great idea, or jumping head-first into the next topic of interest, he never hesitated. When I saw a new email waiting for me the next morning, I was not the least bit surprised. I did like the title though.

Subject: Instructions for the New You

A bit of a sci-fi flair and why not? We were living in the future now.

Clara, George’s ex, had a ready-made list of suggestions, including local resources, doctors, groups, etc. You could tell at a glance it was heavily researched and well-manicured. I instantly liked her, or at the very least appreciated the hell out of her.

I don’t think I ate breakfast that morning. I might have snuck in a large glass of orange juice. Just enough sugar to let my brain turn into full-on siphon mode.

George called me to make sure I was still alive on day three. By then, I had started ‘The List’. Meds, which friends I could reach out to for fashion tips before I was ready to come out, foods that help with hair growth, places to remove facial hair, you name it. The dance so many trans people were familiar with, I realized in short order. I was very, very much one of them. One of us.

“That’s great, dude!” he replied as I recounted what I’d found. “I mean, ma’am. I mean… they need a better word for this. There’s no way in hell I’m switching to dudette.”

“Please never say that word again,” I warned, though I stifled a laugh.

We hung up, and my calendar flew by. Work, eat, learn, sleep. Days. Weeks. The HRT turned out to be a dream come true. Years of weird mental issues gone. Not all of them. But enough to thank the fates or the stochastic whatevers.

A few months passed, and I caught back up with George at his place again. I felt pretty ratty. My hair still had a long way to go. But my skin already looked better. And I felt so much better.

He just stood at the door beaming at me in the door frame, before I reminded him that I came over to actually enter the building. We laughed and made our way back downstairs.

The truth was I was a bit afraid of his scanner. Deathly curious? Yes. But also afraid. Something in me almost didn’t want to know. But I wanted to know. I never claimed to be consistent.

Obligingly, he restarted the scanner. He admitted he hadn’t been using it lately. He was working on a new project instead, one he wasn’t ready to talk about, yet. That was fine with me. The only project I cared about was the one about to rumble like a small jet engine.

“Oh my god, I’m gorgeous.” I didn’t even feign being shy about it. I wanted it. Badly. My hair had gotten to the length I could get it styled, and it worked so well. I wanted to date her. I wanted to be her.

To George’s credit, he never made me feel weird about coming over and staring at myself in his magic mirror every few months, and I tried my best to limit myself to that.

Just as we were about to cross my first year since the “big reveal” - as we called it - something strange happened with the scanner. The machine started up just fine, but when I stood in front of it, I just saw darkness. Nothing. George still saw himself. Apparently, he was going to start losing some hair soon. Me? Still a big nothing.

“George, please tell me this doesn’t mean I’m going to die.” My face was ashen as I took in what to me seemed the only possible answer.

He shook his head. “I mean it could mean that. Or it could not. We don’t know what this thing is willing to show and what it won’t, yet. Or what the limits are. We have a sample set of two, and if I’m honest, I’m scared to show this thing to anyone else.”

“Please shut it off,” I told him, somehow in my shock forcing myself to slip back up into trans voice. I just needed a moment to think.

I looked up and somehow I was on the couch and George had an arm around me.

“Clara is coming over later, but you’re more than welcome to crash here,” he was explaining. I couldn’t remember how we got to this point. Had I asked to stay? Had I said anything?

I just looked at him, managing to ask, “oh I hadn’t realized you and Clara were together again.”

“We had a slow burn romance.” He chuckled. I mentally crossed my fingers, hoping he wouldn’t tell me about the “burn” part of their romance.

“She’d like to meet you,” he continued, “if you’re up for it. No pressure, though.”

I wanted to gesture wildly, pointing at the machine that seemed to have sealed my fate, or at least ruminate on all the other things it could be telling me. Then, I thought, finally meeting Clara might be a good change of pace before I let myself fall too deeply in the hole I was rapidly digging.

“Sure, that sounds lovely,” I replied, hoping to confirm at least some amount of confidence in my voice.

“Good, you can help me cook,” he chuckled as he helped me off the couch.

Wait, what had I just agreed to?

===

Manicotti, apparently. Mixing and filling shells was a bit of a meditation on… something. I wasn’t quite sure, but at least it was soothing. In short order, the stuffed pasta was in the oven, and Clara was on her way.

“Wine?” George asked, pulling down a bottle.

“Not on an empty stomach. I wouldn't last five minutes.” I chuckled, waving him off.

I wasn’t going to last five minutes, anyway. I just hadn’t realized it, yet.

Four minutes later, a 5’10 brunette was going to walk through the door, and I was going to feel like a very bad friend.

I desperately told my brain over and over to play it cool. Sure, she’s attractive. That’s why George - my best friend for many a year, I might add - was dating her. Just let it go. As if it were that easy.

“And this is Arya,” George said, motioning to me. I smiled at her and reached for her hand when she offered.

“Clara. It’s so good to meet you. George has told me so much about you.” She smiled, and her lips looked like they could cause trembles with a whisper.

I shook my head, trying to knock the thoughts loose. “Same for you.” I smiled. “And thank you so much for the help early on.”

She smiled, again. “No problem at all. Happy to have played a small part in helping George’s beautiful friend find herself.”

I blushed. No, really blushed. I was trying to will the capillaries to calm down, but they just laughed at me and pumped even harder. She noticed too, but thankfully she had the grace to change the topic and put the focus back on George.

I couldn’t place Clara’s accent, but I was quickly falling madly in love with wherever it was. I made a mental note to ask her, so I could book a plane ticket and find my own Clara there. I chuckled to myself. Surely this was quite possibly a record for fastest crush. Surely.

We made small talk until the oven timer dinged, telling us dinner was ready. The manicotti smelled divine, and Clara was quick to compliment it before she’d even tried it.

I felt butterflies mounting in my stomach, and I knew right away I should say no to the wine, eat dinner, and make a polite exit. Which is exactly why I answered “yes” when Clara offered me a glass. Like I said, I never said I was consistent.

With the wine, the first comment slipped out without being fully vetted by my stout team of brain filters. It was harmless really. I loved her dress, and I said as much. Women do that all the time. It wasn’t flirting. At least, that’s what I told myself.

The more we chatted, the more I wanted her. Or at least a carbon copy of her. I wondered if that’s what George had been cooking on down in the basement that he kept under the tarp. George’s inventions. That damned scanner. My mood went from entranced to uneasy in the span of a time it took my fork full of manicotti to travel to my mouth.

“Are you okay, love?” Clara asked. Innocuous and sweet, but that final word woke me right out of reverie into desperate longing.

“Fine, just have some things on my mind. I should probably head off after we eat, so I can work on them and get them finished.” I tried to be vague and shoot George a knowing look, but he looked just as concerned as Clara.

“Anything we can help with?”

Focus on the “we”, I told myself. They are a “we”.

I managed to pass the remainder of the meal in peaceable, light conversation. As we were cleaning up, Clara leaned in, careful to touch me just so on the shoulder so she wouldn’t spook me.

“If you need to chat for a minute, we could head outside. I can let George know.”

I looked into her eyes hoping to read something there. Concern, yes. But something else, too. I nodded, and she gave my arm a light squeeze.

“George, the girls are going to have a quick chat. We won’t be long.”

===

“It’s strong, isn’t it?” Her opening volley of a question nearly knocked my knees out from under me. “You’re a good friend, but it’s strong.”

My mouth opened and shut without really any relationship to my tongue. I kicked myself for taking so long to respond, and then only managing a “what’s strong?” as a reply.

She just looked at me. Those eyes I was trying so hard not to swim in over dinner were now here to drown in, under the early evening sky.

“Do you feel it in your stomach? Does it feel like electricity running up your skin? Do you feel the desire to run and yet pull closer at the same time?”

As she listed off each thing, it was as if she was summoning them one-by-one to my attention. I looked at her like the witch she clearly was.

“It’s your first crush on hormones?” she tried. Immediately, I was gutted. Found out to be the noob I was.

“I’m sorry,” I turned and hid my face with my hands. “I feel like an idiot. I’m so sorry, please forgive…”

Then something happened that stopped my rambling. Clara was gently pulling my arms away from my face.

“Please don’t spiral, dear. Are you a hugger?”

I nodded and felt her arms wrap around me warmly, pulling me tightly to her. Suddenly, I was wondering how exactly this was supposed to be helping me.

She let me go but stayed close to me so she could look me in the face. “We all go through it, and there is absolutely no shame in it. I’m flattered you picked me for your first.”

I blushed hard. Blood ran up from areas it had been hiding in my body to flood anywhere and everywhere that could turn a deep shade of pink.

“I… could have worded that a bit better,” Clara ducked her head then looked back up at me. “But that’s not the only thing bothering you, is it?”

How could I not pour my heart out to this woman? I was ready to give her a copy of my house key. I took a breath and steadied myself, though her unflinching look of kindness was continuing to unknit me.

“You know how George invents things,” I said in an understatement for the ages. She nodded. “A year ago, he invented a kind of mirror. A scanner. That if you look through it, you see yourself in the future. Well, not exactly yourself, but a kind of superposition of your possible selves. I don’t understand it, even though George has tried to explain it to me multiple times.”

“You saw yourself as a woman,” she said, following my explanation with another remarkably accurate guess.

I just nodded, then lost myself again in her eyes. She had to be a witch. It was the only explanation.

She smiled at me like she could read my mind, and in that moment I was convinced she could.

“That wasn’t all you saw.”

At this point, I’d had it. Psychics had nothing on this woman. I raised my hand, forgetting how close we were still standing to each other. I ended up resting my hand on her shoulder as I looked up in her eyes.

“You can’t keep doing that? I can’t take it.” I watched for any reaction and got none. “You know you’ve read me like a book, ever since we walked outside? How am I supposed to handle this? How am I supposed to keep my cool when everything you’re saying makes me feel so seen that it tugs my heart into your arms. I just met you. There is no way you know me this well so quickly.”

At this, a single tear dropped from Clara’s eye, but she kept herself steady. “What did you see in the scanner? Arya, you can tell me.”

Like the sound of a thousand warm, familiar voices woven into one perfect song. I could only obey it, holding my heart continually in my hands.

“Tonight, I saw nothing. Clara, the scanner went black. Not for George. For me.” Somehow, as I recounted this, I felt clear and calm. I wanted Clara to feel my worry, because I knew, standing in front of her like this, she would catch me if I started to spiral again.

“Would you like to see if we can figure out why?” Her eyes continued to feel like a large, calm ocean. I happily idled there in them for as long as I could.

Finally, I agreed. “Yes, let’s do that.”

“Good. After that, I have something to tell you.” She placed her hand on my back, spinning me to face the front door. My mind ran round and round trying to process the conversation that had just happened. What did it mean? What did I feel? What did she feel? How did she do that?

Instead of answering any of those questions, I found myself in front of the scanner with Clara by my side, and George about to turn it back on.

===

“We’re ready.”

Clara turned to George and watched him flip the proverbial switch on the machine. She put a reassuring arm around me as she turned to match my gaze into the scanner.

“While we’re waiting for this thing to power on, explain it to me,” Clara’s voice was calm, yet firm, almost as if she realized she had just signed herself up to be part of the experiment, too.

“Fate isn’t really a real thing. At least mathematically,” George began, fiddling with a few settings. “Instead, what we have is the superposition of a nearly limitless number of states. We can’t really see those states with our normal eyes. If we could, though, we could get a sense for what the most likely outcome is. To do so, we overlap as many of the states as we can reach at a point in the future. If we overlap enough of them, and they happen to agree enough, we can create an image from what we see.

“Admittedly, it’s an imperfect science at best.” George sighed. “Though it does seem to get some things right.”

George had been so engaged in his explanation he missed me glancing over to Clara, her face turning bright red as she recognized the image before her. She had seen it, too.

Clara cleared her throat loudly. “How far ahead can it see?”

George also cleared his throat, though in an entirely different way. Pride and a bit of preening were clearly audible. “You can read the calendar behind you.”

“Halloween. This year.”

George stood. “Now that’s interesting. I wonder why it isn’t as far into the future for you as it was for us.”

“I… have no idea…” Clara said, studying the image a little closer. Her face a mask of curiosity, trying to cover over her initial reaction.

We looked hot together, but I didn’t trust myself to speak. The two of us. Halloween of this year. That wasn’t so far into the future. God, whoever helped her pick out that pirate shirt – I’m going to kiss them. The way it hugged her hips. The way it accentuated her…

“Do you see the same thing, Arya?” George asked.

I blinked a bit to try to pull myself into the present moment. “I think so. I’m also seeing us at Halloween.”

“Fascinating. I have an idea.” George motioned for Clara to step out of the frame. After she obliged, he added, “what do you see now?”

“Nothing. It goes totally black. Does that mean I live until at least Halloween and that’s it? Sometime after that I go poof?”

The three of us looked at each other, trying to make sense of the facts we had.

George stood up, and with a professorial voice began his hypothesis. “Theory 1: If two people are standing directly in front of the scanner”

“...touching,” I added, trying not to show any interest in said touching.

“Right,” nodded George. “If two people are standing directly in front of the scanner touching, then we get the superposition of their interlocked potential states in which both people are again at the same place at the same time?”

“That’s a pretty reasonable theory,” Clara agreed.

“Give me a second, I’m going to get my notes.” Without any warning, George bound up the stairs leaving Clara alone with me.

“My god, you looked hot.” I couldn’t hold it in. I didn’t even try.

“You were hotter,” she whispered. And for a very brief moment, her teeth grazed her bottom lip. Subtle, but it sent fire along my spine. “Breathe, love,” she added, having noticed that I’d stopped doing just that.

“We better sit down before he catches us,” I managed, my knees already buckling under that word again.

A moment later, George’s rapid pitter patter of socked feet on stairs drew our attention. “I found them,” a triumphant George declared. “And I might have a theory about why Arya is drawing a blank, as it were.”

I just shook my head but let it pass. “Tell us.”

“If there’s not enough data, let’s say we try to find a sufficient number of future states, and we can’t,” he emphasized ‘can’t’ as if it helped us solve the puzzle. “Then, the system is set up to weed out the outliers. Enough weeding, and we just don’t have enough data. It’s supposed to help give at least some image, even if it’s a low probability.”

“George, you never said this thing would show images that were low probability before,” I gasped.

He bowed his head. “Admittedly, I probably put that in an earlier one when I was testing late at night just so I’d have something to look at.”

“How do we know if what we were looking at was low probability?” Clara asked.

“We just have to double check the settings.” George walked over, notebook in hand, and pressed a few buttons on the device driving the scanner. “Ah okay, nevermind. It’s still in the highest probability setting.”

Clara looked over at me for a split second before looking at George. “That means what we’re seeing is likely to happen?”

“Very likely, yes,” George agreed. After a beat, he added, “I bet you all looked cute in pirate outfits.”

It was that moment I was deeply thankful I hadn’t been drinking anything because I would have spewed it all over his basement. How did everyone get so good at guessing tonight?

“Arya does pull off a witch quite well,” Clara added, looking back over at me.

Was she trying to flirt or just trying to keep things light? I wasn’t sure, but I was more than happy to imagine dressing up in that costume just for her.

I waved my arms, in the hopes of clearing the all-too-delicious image away. “How’s this for a theory: what if not enough of my points in the future overlap? It has to be high probability right?”

“We could try it at a lower setting and see what you can see,” George ventured. “If we’re lucky, you’ll at least see something.”

I stood up from the couch and walked back over to the scanner, not entirely sure I wanted to keep running this experiment. What if I saw nothing yet again, even at a lower setting?

“Remember, whatever you see it’s a ‘maybe’. It’s a possibility among possibilities. This doesn’t make it your future,” George reminded me.

I nodded. “Got it.”

Clara backed away and let me watch the scanner come on by myself.

A moment later, I screamed.

===

Someone was yelling “SHUT IT OFF! SHUT IT OFF!”

I could hear them. They were nearby.

They were me.

I cupped my face over my eyes to block out the screen. Block out the light. Block out the world. I vaguely felt one pair of arms around me, then another pair wrapped around the first.

Minutes later, I noticed I was on the couch. Clara was beside me, holding me. George had squatted down in front of me.

“You can’t…” I was saying. I had finally come to enough to hear myself. “You can’t show people these things. You can’t. I. I can’t. I can’t.”

“You don’t have to say anything about what you saw,” her voice a caring whisper. Clara rubbed my back and watched me closely. It felt good. It felt right. It reminded me a bit too much of what I’d just seen.

I barely made it to the toilet in time to expel dinner.

They watched as I sheepishly walked back, looking first to Clara. She knew. She could read something on my face and gave me a nod. She turned to George.

“George, I know you wanted me to keep this secret. We need to tell her, though. She’s your best friend, and you need to be the one to wear it.” She waited for George to nod his consent, and then she reached up into her hair, unclipping a dainty hair clip. She handed it to George.

Without a word, he fitted it onto his head.

“What is that?” The curiosity drove me to ask, even though I was ready to have another round with the toilet.

“It’s a kind of empathy magnifier. George has been asking me to test it out.” She looked over to him then, and I could see something had changed. She had changed. That ambient motherly energy was gone, but something else had changed too. There was an ever-so-slight coldness as she looked on at George. Had they gotten in a fight when I was indisposed?

George waited for the hair clip to sync with his brain patterns. I watched it happen across his face. First, nothing. Then, as if he gained a new sense of the world around him he looked up at me. Then, he looked over at Clara.

“Oh. Give me a minute.” His face went a bit ashen.

He stood there looking at Clara. Clara, to her credit, didn’t budge from the couch and let him read away.

When George spoke again, he sounded calm, settled, and resigned. “I know you didn’t want to hurt me. We don’t know how things will develop, so we give them a try. Really, all of us just want to be happy. When it comes down to it, I just want you to be happy. For you both to be happy.”

He didn’t cry, then. I wasn’t entirely sure I understood the meaning, but I had a strong suspicion. Rather than explain himself, George walked over to me, giving me his best loving smile. He unclipped the clip and handed it to me.

“See for yourself, dudette.”

I laughed at that, breaking the tension in the room. Finally, I felt like I could take a breath. With that relief, I reached up and took the clip and put it on. I didn’t know what to expect.

Instead of feeling something very techie and strange, it felt like warm honey being poured all over my body. Like the feeling of love filling me from the top of my head to my feet.

When I looked up, I could feel this feeling was coming from them. Both of them. From George, the love born from years of being together as friends. Of looking out for each other. His love and protectiveness watching me go through transition and wanting the best for me. Always being there with his support mixed into his passion for making the next great thing.

Then, I looked at Clara.

My heart stopped.

I felt a different feeling. Desire, curiosity, fearfulness. And also love. I didn’t understand at first where this feeling had sprung from, and then her face gave it away. She could feel what I saw in the scanner. What it felt like to wear the dress and look at myself. What it felt like to experience the pride of being the bride. I even felt her selfishness. Yes, her selfishness. She wanted to feel what I had felt for herself.

With me?

Those two words landed in my head like dropped bowling balls. How did things happen so quickly? I couldn’t understand. Not at first. As I looked at her, though, I realized that sometimes things just happen. Sometimes the right wick is lit, and the heart bursts open.

She stood up, then. She didn’t move at first, then, tentatively, she walked up to me. I reached out to her, feeling how warm her hands felt in mine. Feeling how many questions she had for me. I wanted so much to tell her I had all the time in the world for her. I’d happily answer each and every question she had.

I willed myself to look over at George and check on him. He was surprisingly okay.

“George,” I said. “I don’t think I’m going to use the scanner to guess the future anymore. Thank you for showing me.”

Then, I smiled at Clara. “I think it’s time. Time to stop trying to guess what the future will hold.” Clara smiled and nodded at me.

I looked into those eyes. Those beautiful pools of peace. That’s where I wanted to be. I tried my best then to forget how hot she was in a pirate costume. How beautiful I looked in a wedding dress.

“It’s time to make our future, rather than predicting it?” It was George who helped me finish the thought. I thanked him with a smile, then looked back to Clara.

“Yes,” I said, looking once again into those eyes. “And that is exactly what I plan to do.”