September 6th, 2032

     Cairn and Lilly are too good for this world!  Maybe they are aliens too? hmmmmm….  But I talked to my friends, and as usual, I’m blowing all my problems out of proportion.  Yes, having feelings for Sylph is complicated, but also I should extend her enough trust to talk to her about them, as well as all my worries and anxiety.  Well maybe not all my worries and anxieties, best to process a bunch of those myself.  Also, why in the past year of having almost no responsibilities have I not gone to SanFran to visit Cairn and Lilly again?  I should do that!  

    We wound up landing on a new planet in the game last night, and in an amazingly noisy jungle, Cairn found a big carnivorous pitcher plant that had the bones of some creature floating in it.  There might be some interesting medicinal compounds in the jungle we’ve landed near.  My mom would be so proud if I became a plant medicine specialist in the game.  Anywho… I think after work this evening I'm gonna get takeout and walk it and Badger into the hills to see if Sylph is home.  I wonder if she even eats food?

    When I first moved back home to Longsprings, when mom got sick, she got me a job at the local library.  Her friends owned the place, friends as they were the only other out queer adults in town, but also true friends in the love and support they gave our family throughout my life.  David, Larry, and Jessie were like a whole other set of parents to me growing up.  That oh so comforting smell of aging paper always brings to mind cherished memories.  Larry telling the worst pun filled ghost stories with a flashlight under his chin, David’s oh so tickly hugs up against his bushy beard, and all the times spent sitting across a mug of hot chocolate telling Jessie about the newest “friend” from school she knew I was crushing on, but she wasn’t the type to push me into the realization.

    Badger and I set off to the library for work.  I had taken the time to get my hair looking nice into a spiral bun that took up most the side of my head.  Done some makeup actually, some light eyeliner and mascara and a maroon lipstick graced my freshly shaved face.  I wore a black blouse and a pencil skirt that matched my lipstick.  The skirt came down to a bit above the knee, but had a fun zipper up the side for an adjustable slit to expose a thigh covered in tasteful floral hosiery.  The zipper was all the way down currently, it was cold outside today and I was going to work.  I had on some nice warm heeled boots and a long wool coat.  I looked very cute I thought, and I was trying my best to not think consciously that the main reason I put the effort in was my plan to see Sylph later.

    The walk was quick as the library was just down the road towards Main st.  The library was beautiful.  It was one of many townhouse looking storefronts built in the 1950’s by some loaded investor, but it seemed obvious that it had been lovingly maintained slightly better than others.  Renovations twenty years ago when I was little had set up its current visage.  Green siding accented with faux rosewood framing that stood up better to the elements.  The entrance was a large dark oak door that was decorated with trim carved to look like stacked books, over which was a semicircle window with the painted golden lettering “Longsprings Library”

    As Badger and I stepped in, a bell rang over the door and David looked up from his laptop, a warm smile spreading on his bearded face.  “Good morning Marin.”  David was a big cuddly bear of a queer man.  He had slightly graying red hair all around his face that continued across the rest of his body.  Thankfully not on display now, his fuzzy form was covered by a wardrobe that said “lumberjack professor.”  A nice pair of brown slacks with suspenders over red plaid.  There was a patched elbow tweed jacket hanging on the coat rack that I didn’t have to look to know was there.  “You are obviously dolled up for some reason.  I’m not going to pry but you know Larry will be a wreck if you don’t tell him before the end of the day.”  He tilted his head towards his oblivious husband who popped up from behind the checkout/returns counter at mention of his name.

    “Tell me what now?”  He turned to take in my outfit and face.  Larry was a gracefully aging twink, who was working on reinventing himself as a twunk in his middle age.  He was beginning to fill out his formerly well fitted paisley print button down dress shirt and corduroy pants so it looked to be working.  “Oh honey, you look absolutely gorgeous today!  And yes, you are very much required to tell us about whomever it is that you are attempting to impress.”  He gestured at me as he spoke, looked thoughtful for a moment, and then screamed out for his wife, “Jessie!  Bring hot chocolate, Marin met someone!”  

    I giggled to myself, well at least I had practice last night and this can go easier.

    I heard some rustling from the balcony above me and Jessie leaned over the railing, seeing the effort I had put into my hair was enough for her.  “Oh gosh, is our baby going on a date later?!”  She quickly turned and disappeared from the balcony, seconds later she reappeared rounding down the spiral staircase and headed directly towards me.  Jessie was an average height woman of athletic build.  She was still wearing her outfit from her morning run. Light blue compression leggings, a purple windbreaker, and rainbow running shoes.  She had short blond-grey hair held back from her face by a rainbow headband.  When she reached me she gently grabbed me by the shoulders to look me over for a second before pulling me into a hug.  I hugged back quickly, I really do love hugs and very much had needed one after not quite hugging in VR.  “Hot chocolate, coffee, or tea?” Said Jessie as she was pulling out of the hug.

    I gave Jessie a last parting squeeze.  “I’ll have coffee actually, I was up late playing a game with Lilly and Cairn.”  

    I let Badger loose from his leash.  The triad all loved having a library mascot and had made many accommodations for puppy needs.  I hung up my coat as David approached to also hug me good morning.  He smelled like pancakes every time I hugged him.  I swear he had that smell bottled and put a tiny bit in his beard every morning just for me.  “Give them our love the next time you talk to them.”

    “How about right now… selfie?”  I asked and of course he acquiesced.  I pressed my cheek into his beard, we both plastered on cheesy smiles, and I held up my phone to immortalize the moment.  I typed off a message along with the picture to the group chat as David led me to the reading nook.

• 08:10 - Marinara: The entire population of the Longsprings library loves you two💕💕💕💕

    I sat myself on a very large pink beanbag in the corner as Larry and David settled into more conventional chairs.  My phone erupted in chimes of my friends gushing over how cute we were in the picture and how they love us more.  Shortly after Jessie arrived with four mugs, three coffees and one hot chocolate for David.  “OK, tell us about them”

    I went through the not quite truthful tale again, but this time leaving out the made up headwound and the panic attack.  I felt bad about lying to my loved ones, but ultimately there’s no way I’m going to be at all involved with someone who I can’t introduce to these three.  So if that ever happens It'll come with the truth.  The same with Lilly and Cairn.  Wait, I’m now thinking about the possibility of introducing her to my family?  The stray thought distracted me from my story.  “Uh, where was I?”

    Larry prompted me, “You were about to tell us your plans for the date.”

    “You all know how I’m a huge mess of feelings?”  They all nodded, agreeing very quickly.  Too quickly.  “Well, last night I unloaded all my worries about having feelings for her upon poor Lilly and Cairn.  They helped me through it, but made it obvious I really just need to talk with Sylph.”

    “It’s almost like communication is the foundation for any good relationship.”  Jessie said with a wry grin on her face.

    “Yessss… I know that, but I was just getting to my idea of just bringing a meal for the two of us.  At first I contemplated cooking something, but there’s no way I can take on the anxiety of if she likes or can even physiologically stand my cooking… uh… like allergies I mean”  and there I go slipping up again.  I’m so bad at this.   

   “Veggie pizza and a salad.”  David stated as we all looked at him confused.  “No meat to pick off in case she’s vegetarian, and a filling salad with a non-dairy dressing in case she’s vegan, gluten, or lactose intolerant.”  He shrugged, “best case you both end up with pizza, worst case she can’t eat any of it, but it’s obvious you tried.”

    Larry nodded and kissed his husband on his fuzzy cheek.  “Yes, Professor David is very wise”

    I got up and hugged him in all his pancake smelling glory.  “Yes he is, I think i’ll do that”

* * *

    The rest of the day at work was pretty uneventful.  A few people checking out books, a bunch of restocking of shelves.  They really didn’t need four people to staff this place, but the throuple had a boat load of savings and this was effectively their dream retirement.  They didn’t see a problem with paying me to bless them with my continuing presence.

    I left work receiving a heaping helping of loving goodbyes and good lucks.  Badger and I went to grab the pizza I ordered from a place just down the street.  Pizza and salad in hand we started our walk to Sylph’s clearing.  My outfit and hair had thankfully withstood the day.  

• 16:34 - Marinara: I have pizza and to Sylph’s place I go… aaaaaaaaaaaaa
• 16:35 - CairnRocks🪨!: {cartoon otter giving two thumbs up}.gif  You can do it!!!
• 16:35 - LyllyVale: eeeeeeeeeeeeeee I’m so proud of you, being all brave and going to talk about your feelings!

    I chuckled to myself at my friends.  “So Badger,” they looked up at me ready to give their dogly advice, “We are gonna go there, and after we find out if she even eats food, I’m going to talk to her about my feels.  How do I even start?”

    “Murflelb” they said wisely with a half bark, half growl.

    “I don’t think I can look at her as I talk.  I have a lot to get out… that I want to tell her, but I want… I want what I say to be for me.”  A pause, Badger was quiet, head pointed at a nearby tree.  Their ears upright, probably because they saw a bird.  “If I am looking at her… it will turn into doing it for her and, oh dear, how I really want to do things for her…  Things to make her smile and laugh and look at me the way she was… but that’s part of the problem!  Those are the feelings I need to talk about… and my needs are important!”  As I stated this out loud to Badger, but mostly as a mantra to myself.  I knew it was true and I needed to hold on to that.

    We made it up to the place on Badger’s potty path where I think we zagged last time.  They seemed to know it was the spot as well as they looked down that way and back at me expectantly.  “Yeah, let’s go see her.”  It was only about twenty meters off our trail and we found the clearing.  It looked like the mix of moss, clover, and mushrooms in the clearing had shifted.  There was now something of a green path from where we emerged from the trees leading up to the outcropping.  There were what looked like morels lining the path, any hint they were morels vanished as they would send out a few glowing spores every few seconds resulting in a very subtle light show outlining the edges of the greenway leading to her cave.  As I stepped into the clearing there was a slightly larger puff of spores from the mushrooms nearest me which badger huffed at, but we continued on.  “That probably means she knows we are here now.”

    A few more steps up the trail and Sylph’s voice called out softly, “Yes, indeed it does.”

    I must have been too distracted by the beauty that is her clearing, that I missed the beauty of her form stepping into view.  “Hi…” was all I could get out before half my brain was filled with anxiety, and the other half with thoughts of, “Pretty alien lady is Pretty.”  Today she was wearing a very flattering orange sundress with a bunch of species of mushrooms printed on it.  I need to ask her where she getting these clothes.  It was cold enough I could see my breath, so she must have some weird alien metabolism going on keeping her from freezing.  

    She smirked at me, oh no, the smirk!  “Hi yourself… I’m happy to see you again.”

    I held up the pizza and salad in front of me and I felt like I was making an offering to a goddess.  I was right, this is heckin’ awkward!  “I brought some food… but I don’t really know if you eat food.  It’s food I like so if you don’t… uh… eat… I’ll have something as I am a bit hungry… That is if you don’t mind me eating.”

    She smiled at me, “How about you bring it inside and I’ll see what I can do about eating it?”

    I smiled back nervously and followed as she led me inside.  I circled around her bed and seeing the desk type area was clear and large enough I set the food down there.  I sat down on the soft little green patch by the desk.  “I brought some plates as it didn’t look like you had anything for this… Oh!  They’re compostable.”  She’s a dryad looking alien ecologist, must impress.  “The surface is coated with I think some nitrogenated cellulose resin that will be water resistant for about a week, but after a week of wetness a texture forms that slime molds can latch on to and then they go wild for.  It breaks down very quickly from there.”  I placed a slice on a plate as I was rambling and turned to where she sat on the bed to hand it to her.

    She was being very quiet today.  She could probably tell that there was some new different nervousness to me and didn’t know what to do with it.  No Marin, stop trying to put thoughts and feelings on other people and talk to them instead.  Gosh I know I don’t have to keep hassling myself like this… but if I knew I’d be doing it already…  I realized I got lost thinking to myself and looked at her.  

    She was examining the slice of pizza and had puffed a bunch of glowing spores at it from her hand.  They deposited themselves on the pizza and she closed her eyes.  I waited for about a minute but Sylph didn’t budge.  She looked deep in thought so I didn’t interrupt her and instead collected myself some food and began eating while occasionally glancing at her.  Gosh she’s so pretty!  I consciously tried very hard not to stare at her like I was some sort of creeper while she was meditating about food… but there she sat, still except for the slow steady rise and fall of her chest, plate of pizza held up in one hand, looking very much like a lovingly painted statue of a goddess.

    The pizza was good and I was so thankful for something to do with myself.  Badger ate at the library, so they should be good, but they were now seated next to the bed, intently creeping on Sylph’s slice of pizza.  I poked them in the butt with my foot and pointed at the ground.  They got the message and layed down, but returned to staring up at her unwatched and untouched plate.

    I was most of the way finished with my first slice when her eyes opened.  “There, I should be all set to digest this now.”  She took a test bite and closed her eyes, a smile drawing across her lips as she began to chew.  “Mmmm I think I like pizza”

    I cleared a bit of pizza grease from my throat, “I’m glad I brought it then.”  After a pause I asked, “Um, what did you do?”

    Sylph held up a finger as she finished chewing her second bite.  “I had my spores sample the pizza and adapted my digestive tract to best accommodate.”  She went back for another bite.

    “You can do that?”  Eyes wide in amazement.

    “Yeah.  If I am right, you could too… If you wanted me to bring the colony in you back out of dormancy that is.”  She looked away from me, some residual shame probably still there over that.  “The other option is I could signal it to degrade.  It would break itself down into components that would be processed away by your body.”

    “Oh, wow… um I see.”  Time to start a little more communication though.  I had a vested interest in the destiny of my brain fungus, but feels first.  “I noticed that you’ve been a bit more careful and quiet around me since the other night.  Could I ask why?  I mean I kinda know why but I’d like to hear your thoughts”  I internally sighed, a tad too passive voice, but a good start.

    Sylph stopped chewing for a moment and looked at me, she set down her plate and finished with her last mouthful.  “You seemed very… overwhelmed before… and now, you seem nervous.  I want you to feel safe and comfortable if you visit me.”  She took a few moments.  “I prepared for a lot of reactions with first contact and played out a lot of different scenarios in my head.  Ones where I looked more like I did eighteen years ago, before I began altering myself to better experience humanity.  Ones where I altered myself further and looking phenotypically human… a ‘humansona’ if you will”  She smirked at me and giggled 

    I gagged on my last bite.  I remembered my water bottle in my bag and washed down whatever was stuck.  “Oh that was so bad.” I said as soon as I was able.  I will have to ask her about the shape shifting, later though.

    She giggled again and slowed to just a smile. “I wanted to see you laugh… to lighten the mood, but not to choke.”  She pointed at the sticker plastered purple metal container in my hand.  “May I have some water?”  

    “Yeah of course,” I did the ‘I don’t know how this person feels about cooties’ wipe of the lid with the hem of my coat, which I only just realized I hadn’t taken off.  I handed her the water and removed my coat to set it down next to me.

    Sylph took a drink and continued, “I prepared for a bunch of situations that were a whole lot worse than how things went with you… either for the unfortunate human I chose to make contact with, or for me.”  She took another sip of water and passed it back to me.  “When you had your panic attack, which appeared like something slightly more than just that… It made me worry that I was hurting you… that things were slipping into one of the scenarios that went badly… where the unfortunate human was harmed.”  She looked at me with those very expressive eyes and brows full of concern and guilt.  She needed me to listen and I nodded for her to continue.  “You’ve come back… and it doesn’t look like I’ve done harm, but I know that sometimes, harm lingers and doesn’t show right away… So I’ve been gentle and patient with you.”

    We sat together in the quiet room for a moment.  I let the silence settle and listened to the trickling of water, watched the rise and fall of Badger’s breathing, felt the slight rock of my head in time with my heartbeat.  I was still, it was steady calm.  Without looking up from Badger, “Sylph.  I think I understand what you’re saying.  And I came here with the intention of talking to you… about a bunch of things that have been going through my head…  This will probably make things a lot more clear for you as well”  I took a couple of deep breaths to work up some courage to get really into things.  “I’m not going to be able to look at you while I’m talking… but I’d like to talk for a bit, and for you to listen and wait a bit before you respond.”  I glanced up at her.

    Sylph looked thoughtful for a moment and then responded, “I can do that.”

    I turned away again, it really did help to not see her as I was working through this.  To not worry about how her reactions would play into or change my thoughts.  This was something I needed to do for me.  “I talked with my friends about you… not about you being an alien so don’t worry about that.  But I needed some help with some feelings.  I’m sure you noticed I was having a lot of feelings the last time I was here.  It looked like you were having feelings too, but I worry I don’t know how to interpret your feelings from what I see, as your culture is well… alien to me…”  I giggled at the turn of phrase I stumbled into, but continued.  “Hearing you open up to me helped me understand some of what you were going through, but not all of it.  But what you’ve said… It has made me feel safe… not that I felt particularly unsafe, but it’s making the rest of this feel way easier.”  I turned to make eye contact for this as it was important.  “Thank you.”

    A load of tension eased out of her face.  That helped me continue.  I looked back at Badger.  “I’ve been living alone for the past year… well except for Badger, they live with me.  Probably my best roommate ever.”  I giggled again,  “Before that It was just my mom and I, but she was sick, dying actually… she’s not around anymore and that was hard.”  A sigh and another deep breath.  “I’d been so focused on taking care of her, and then so tied up in her death for all of the past year…  I’ve really not made any space in my life for having feelings for another person…  and now I’m having feelings… for you… and you aren’t human, but you feel like a person?  I don’t know how those type of feelings even work for you, but the way you look at me, and talk to me… well it all feeds into a cycle of me just having more feelings… for you.  We only just met and the emotions swirling about in me for you are a lot.  Even if you were human I’d be freaking out over how fast my emotions are moving.”  

    There I did it!  One more time to sum it up.  “I guess… I just… I like you Sylph, and I am so very confused about liking you, and I don’t want you to be scared away or hurt by me liking you… and I don’t think I have much room for, or resilience against being hurt myself as a result of me liking you… and… Um, you can talk now… if you’d like… please?”

    I gritted my teeth through the silence that filled the cave.  Badger took advantage of the lull to steal the pizza crust off my plate I’d haphazardly set too close to his reach.  I wordlessly cast my love for this puppy into the cosmos for how much more secure their fuzzy dog face made me feel in this moment.

    Sylph started slowly, “These feelings, you are speaking of attraction?”

    “Yes.  Mostly emotional, but also you are very physically attractive”

    “Well, this wasn’t one of the scenarios I had planned for.”  I saw out of the corner of my eye her pick up and take another bite of pizza.

    She doesn’t look offended at least. 

    She thoughtfully chewed for a moment, “You mentioned not knowing how feelings work for me.  This might be a bit rambling for me now, but please bare with me...  In order to better experience and interact with humanity, I went through some alterations to my mind and body.  Before… I was physically of a form that was better adapted to move through our ship, our biosphere, with the lack of gravity and very different… architecture.  And I was mentally, and emotionally of a form that was better adapted to commune with my people.”

    My gaze had been drawn back to her as she spoke.  I couldn’t help but be intently interested in this.  Plus she wasn’t upset at all about what I’d unloaded on her, which was promising.  

    “We all have colonies of the engineered organism that now also inhabits you.  I said when we first talked that the spores communicate through entangled particles that are shared with cell division.  Each pair only can share a small quanta of information, and the act of manipulating one, and reading its partner breaks the entanglement.  Each division generates a reserve of these pairs.  Each generation of division can share only with the partner cell, but that line is long.  Billions upon billions of divisions back I could trace a still lingering connection to whatever parent organism that spawned the first.  As more is shared across the network of generations, access to older paths is throttled so that last chances at connection are rare but still possible.”

    I looked upon her in awe.  Sylph’s gaze shifted from my adoration, to the empty space on the floor between us.  She moved off the bed to sit in front of me, knees almost touching.  “I am still connected to my people.  We are a consensus driven collective of beings.  Communication and consensus between us comes through this entangled sharing.  Concepts shared directly amongst the collective bypassing the need for spoken language.  Before, my mind was structured to best hold and process concepts as they are shared between us, and best able to contribute to consensus.”  

    Sylph looked to the wall of root and soil.  “We came to this planet, despite its seeming destiny of ecological collapse, because there was a distant generation, a very old path of entanglement active here.  Here in this grove, something of us took root amongst a foreign star and sought connection long ago.  The 18 solar cycles our biosphere has been in orbit behind and beyond your moon, is miniscule when measured against the time since this connection was made, but we came as it called.  Connection is very important to us.”  Sylph sighed, “Okay I am rambling a bit more than I thought, but you don’t seem to mind.  I promise I’m working my way back to how you fit into all this, with me”  

    She wore a guilty grin on her face, she looked genuinely happy and I wasn’t about to let her stop being that.  “I could listen to you speak for hours.”  I blushed the second I said this, but everything about her was just far too interesting right now for me to care.  She really was a goddess in any way that was important to me right now.

    Whatever guilt on her face was wiped away, replaced by excitement to continue.  “As we grew closer to Sol, to Earth, we needed someone to make contact with the part of us that had taken root here, to renew the old lines of entanglement that had long since dwindled.  I had done some initial work on evaluating your world and something about it intrigued me so I volunteered.  Consensus accepted and I began a process of study and self alteration to best accomplish that.  I studied the communications that emanate from Earth, a long timeline of your world’s media history stretched across light years.  I saw the diversity that existed, not just biodiversity, but the diversity within humanity.  I shifted the model for my mind towards one that could better appreciate the nuance and complexity that came with your diverse cultures and languages.  The more I did so, the more clearly I could distinguish all the different facets of human expression, the more interested I became”

    “I’ll start from where I began…  You mentioned not knowing how feelings worked for me?”  She leaned forward and took my hand in hers.  “They work for me in very human ways.  You were right to be concerned.  Before they wouldn’t have worked at all in any way familiar to you, but they changed as I changed myself… To better know your world, to better know humanity.  They are sometimes very confusing for me… and I’m still learning how to interact with and move through them, but I have many connections to my people to share and process and seek consensus on what is generative to move with, and what would be harmful, a closing off of possibility to move against.”

    There was a moment she took, looking down at my hand in hers.  “The me that I am now, that sits here… with you… feels very strongly that kissing you would be very generative and fulfilling for me.  And hopefully for you as well.”

    I was in shock, this was a dream.  Someone please pinch me!  This amazing, interesting, beautiful creature sitting in front of me very much wants to kiss me.  My mouth hung open.  My whole body was surely blushing with how warm I felt.  My skin felt electric, like any touch of hers would shock me into a quivering mess.  My heart was racing.  But unlike last time I was here, feeling this, the parts of my mind that generate anxiety were just empty.  Nothing was there.  Everyone I cared about on this planet actively helped me be here, right now, in this moment.  Marin, stop thinking and kiss her! 

    Doubts cast aside, I gently set down her hand and got up to my knees.  I placed one hand on her shoulder - oh it was so warm and soft - and leaned in.  I placed another hand behind her head, her feather-like hair fluttered against my fingers as they threaded through.  She leaned her head back into my cradling hand to look up into my eyes, caring and longing filling hers.  I leaned closer and closed my eyes as our lips met.  Butterflies erupted inside me.  We were gentle at first, but I felt the strength of my steadying arm on her shoulder give and in my legs waver as all I wanted to do was lean further into this kiss, into her.

    Her hands moved to my hips.  She supported me and pulled me closer as my lips parted and we began to explore.  I almost lost my balance and fell over top of her but she leaned with me and rested her back on the elevated bed of moss and clover.  I straddled and set myself in her lap, zipper on my skirt rising up my thigh on its own to relieve the pressure of my widened stance.  We both giggled at the sound, smiling into each other's lips, as her hand moved to what was just exposed.  I moaned into her mouth as my whole right side clenched and quivered with the movement of her hand.

    I pulled back slightly to catch my breath and just take in the moment.  Her eyes fluttered open and the look on her face perfectly communicated that she very much felt this was the right choice.  Looking into that face, I felt tears filling my eyes.  Relief flooded over me.  I’d trusted my vulnerability to her, and to have her cradling my trust just as securely as she was currently cradling my hips and thighs.  I wrapped my arms around her shoulders, tucked my head against her neck and cried.  With one hand moving up my back and the other around my waist she pulled me closer and cried as well.  

Badger, who’d been sleeping up until this moment, walked over and rested their big head on my still covered thigh and whined.  Too funny to not laugh, but too emotional to be done crying, I alternated between the two into Sylph’s shoulder for the next several minutes as she held me.