Author : Pyai (aka Megan Hoffman)

Three years and two continents later, they reunited in an airport in Nairobi. As far as airports go, it was one of the worst they could have picked. The dust blew in and aluminum clusters of waste rolled into the traps the homeless set up to catch the scrap metal.

She ran into the arms of her lover, his soft scent so familiar and yet so different. She looked up into the unfamiliar blue eyes and saw the woman she had once loved. A tear coalesced in the corner of her eye, and then another and another, until they filed their way down her face through her wrinkles like slaves building the pyramids.

The young man who held her to his chest wiped away the tears. “Don’t cry, my love,” he said softly in deeper tones than she expected. “It’s still me, just in a better working body. This is what we wanted, remember?”

The woman nodded. Lips found lips as they had to relearn how to kiss each other. “I just don’t know, Amber,” the woman said, “I just don’t know how things can be the same.”

“I will always love you, Diane, be I man or woman, be you woman or man. Some day you will go through your own body transfer and then we will get yet another opportunity to explore each other anew.”

The woman nodded, drying her tears off on the man’s shirt. “But your breasts, Amber… they’re gone.” There was the beginning spark of amusement in her eye.

He chuckled. “You always said you’d love me if I had smaller breasts, or even if I had breast cancer and had them removed. This is your chance to prove it.”

She laughed. “I guess it’s just ironic when you used to be so femme.”

The man shrugged. “I’m finding I don’t mind being all that masculine. You know what the shrinks say. They recommend balancing your chi or soul or something by alternating genders with every body. Besides, I get to pick a new name. What do you think of Sunil?”

The woman nodded, her tears gone. There was a look of determination on her face. “I will always love who you are, Amber, but it will take getting used to this new body.”

“That’s all the fun, my darling. You know what they say about men like me, though, right?”

The woman nodded, finally smiling up at the man who was once a woman named Amber. “A lesbian in a man’s body.”

As they walked out, he whispered into her ear, “Maybe we should get you a male body in a few years yourself. I have it on good authority the prostate isn’t something you want to miss out on.”

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