“Heh, you know what?” Mike said. “I’ve got the rest of the day off. We should get the burgers to go, order enough for the family, and go to our place. I could introduce you to Mindy and the kids, and show you my gaming room! Aiden’s getting into Battletech, too. You should see some of her figurines! A real painter.”

The sudden proposed extension of their plans gave Sarah pause. It was a little jarring, and it felt like it would eat into their routines, Goreth updating social media, and her evening art time. She immediately wanted to say, ‘no.’

“Or, we don’t have to do that. It’s just a thought,” Mike said. “It’d be pretty cool to just sit and talk, really.”

Sarah weighed the options.

They were already driving past their neighborhood. Doom Burger was on the other side of the freeway from their home. If need be, they could walk home from Doom Burger, though. Which made that appealing.

She had a fleeting thought that since she was now presenting as a woman, and a trans woman at that, she should be more careful about who she was with and what she did. And there was something about this that felt a little like a bad scene in a movie. But she knew Mike. And he was already supporting them financially, and generously, too. Well, at least, in comparison to the other subscribers.

On the other hand, if they went to his house, and he definitely had a family, there’d be another woman there and maybe the kids. Though, was it a school day? Anyway, probably reasonably safe, and she knew Mike. They’d been buddies.

Also, she had Phage and Ashwin with her. Phage, who was ancient beyond comprehension and had helped her walk in the dark without being scared, and Ashwin who’d started healing her body and could do weird things with electricity, heat, and the air.

“Where do you live?” she asked.

“Oh, the Parkrose neighborhood, right next to the Elmer’s restaurant there,” Mike said. “OK view of the river, if you can see through the neighbor’s houses, and excellent proximity to the high school.”

Sarah hadn’t ever been in that neighborhood, but she remembered seeing that there was a transit center near there. They could probably walk to it in an emergency.

And, again, meeting and catching up with the whole family who were supporting them. It just felt really good to do. If they could strengthen those ties, that support would be more stable.

But, more importantly, maybe they’d all feel less lonely.

To have another house they could go to in a pinch would be cool. But, also, maybe they could start gaming again!

She started to nod, and eventually said, “Sure. That would be pretty awesome.”

“Sweet!” Mike said cheerfully. “So, what do you want to eat?”

“Plain bacon cheeseburger and garlic fries,” Sarah rattled off without thinking. “And a Dr. Pepper.”

“Damn, girl!” he grinned at her. He was maybe too straight and too white to be saying it quite like that, but Sarah didn’t feel ready to call him out on such a little thing. He’d always been a little unaware. He raised an eyebrow at her, “You really haven’t changed, have you?”

“Autistic,” she said, staring at the fake wood paneling, tracing the grain with her eyes.

“Oh, I get that,” Mike said. “Aiden’s the same way. Totally cool. But, you had me thinking you weren’t going to go for the meat somehow. Like maybe you’d gone vegan.”

“Well,” Sarah said, remembering that Mike had been following them on Patreon. She looked over cautiously.

He seemed oblivious to her thoughts, and just so happy to be giving her a ride somewhere and chatting. He didn’t prompt her or anything while she thought about how to answer, either. Just waited and paid attention to the road.

He was a really careful driver. Which she would never have guessed from their time in high school. But, he’d had kids, so that maybe made sense.

“So, you know about Ashwin, right?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

“Well, they have trouble with meat,” she explained. “They’re not used to it. But if they hide away deep enough, I can still eat it. And it’s still Goreth’s safe food. And I haven’t had a Doom Burger in way too long.”

“Ah, OK. That makes sense,” Mike nodded.

They had to park down the street from the little restaurant. The tiny parking lot there was still full from the lunch crowd, but there was parallel parking that was empty a block away. They had to circle to get to it, but it wasn’t that big of a deal.

And while they were finding the spot, they shared their stories of first encountering Doom Burger.

For Sarah, it was when Peter brought some home for dinner.

For Mike, it had been when he was driving through the neighborhood on a Saturday to go shopping when he saw the name of the business and thought, “Really? Really?! That’s too clichéd not to try it!”

The walk from the car to the joint wasn’t all that bad. And while they sat there, Sarah told Mike just how long it had been since she and Goreth had played Battletech.

“Oh, man,” Mike exclaimed.

Sarah held back a flinch, telling herself it was an exclamation, not a form of address.

And he continued like he didn’t even notice, “The game has changed, like, a little bit since then. But it’s still really the same old game. The figurines are so much better though! More surface area to paint, too. They look a bit less like the properties they stole from. Though those were always my favorite, really. But you can tell, they finally hired some real artists.” He nudged her, “Like you!”

“Ah, well,” she said.

“No, I’ve seen the pieces Goreth’s been sharing!” Mike said. “You’re good. Really good. I can’t wait to see your show.”

“Thank you,” Sarah said, trying out just being grateful. It felt good.

“Aiden’s more into big robots than dragons, like you, but I bet she’ll love you,” he said. “Mind you, when you meet her, she’s gonna want to go on and on about the robots.”

“I really don’t hate the robots,” Sarah said. “In fact, a lot of my peers would say that interest makes Aiden an honorary trans girl!”

Mike leaned away and looked down at her, “How do you know she isn’t actually trans?”

“Point,” she admitted, gesturing like the ‘you got me there’ meme. “And I’m not going to ask. That’s for her to tell me.”

Mike chuckled and shook his head, and said, “It’s for her to tell us, too. So far, she hasn’t.”

Sarah grunted and then smirked, “Well, you did give her a name that’s popular among the trans boys these days.”

Mike broke out laughing and said, “Oh, dear! Maybe. Maybe I won’t tell Mindy that.”

“Why not?” Sarah asked, suddenly interested in the answer to that question.

“I’d lose an old argument about whether or not it’s a gender neutral name, that’s all.”

“Names don’t actually have gender,” Sarah said.

“Yeah, I know,” Mike said. “It’s cool.” He looked up at an approaching clerk. “Oh, our food’s here! I got it. Holy hell, there’s a lot of it.”

“I’m fine, Mike. I can carry some of it,” Sarah told him.

“Do you think you could take the drinks?”

“Sure!”

They didn’t talk much on the way back to the car. Mike seemed happy he had food in his hands, and Sarah was thinking furiously about what they could talk about next. She had to spend some amount of time remembering how typical people conversed, it had been so long since she’d had to mask for work or school.

She felt like the right thing to do was talk to Mike about high school, gaming, and his kids. He seemed ready to talk all about those things. Maybe even work. She could ask him about his work.

But the things that had been on her mind all month were her art projects and the visiting Ktletaccete. Plural shit.

It ached not to talk about that with Mike, like she did with Erik and the Murmuration.

But, then, when delving into it with Mike the little bit she had felt transgressive. Like she was divulging someone else’s personal matters. And, in a way, she had come close to doing so.

Her headmates were not her, after all. They were their own people, even if she was used to sharing just about everything with Goreth.

Back in the car, Mike took a moment to look at his phone, after making sure the food was secure in the back seat, and said, “Huh. The Goog’s saying the freeway is faster.”

Sarah shrugged and said, “Sure.”

“So,” he said. “Remember Mr. Sotterman?”

“Oh, god,” she said, images of that disaster of an English teacher coming right back to her like a bad flashback.

Mr. Sotterman had taken over for Mrs. Gilder’s creative writing class when she’d gotten too sick to continue teaching it for the year. About halfway through their last semester of senior year.

And where she’d been having the class do freewriting every day, and assigning writing prompts for homework, Mr. Sotterman came in and started teaching the class like it was English 101, with spelling tests and grammar exercises, and no actual writing assignments to speak of.

It had been the most bewildering thing. He’d basically destroyed the class, and Sarah’s grade had gone from an A++ to a D. She’d refused to do any of the homework, because it had all been stuff she’d done as a freshman.

“What about that asshole?” she asked.

“Oh, nothing, just fucking hated him,” Mike said.

“No news?” Sarah asked.

“Yeah, no. Sorry. But wasn’t it fucked up what he did to Mrs. Gilder’s class?”

So, she found herself reminiscing with Mike about high school after all, and it came pretty easily.

It didn’t feel all that good talking about other people, but she found her old opinions of them were all still there.

But, while he talked about how he felt about their classmates and teachers, she tried to focus on the funny things they did that she always recalled.

“Remember that one soprano in choir who could perfectly imitate a car alarm being armed?” she asked.

“Oh, my god, yes!” Mike shouted, guffawing. “I was the first one she armed! She pointed that fob at me, and it was like I made the noise myself. Like, her voice just filled the whole room so you couldn’t hear where it was coming from! Holy shit, yes!”

“I always wished I could do that,” Sarah said. “I had the highest and loudest voice in elementary school, but by high school concert choir…”

“We baritones had it easy,” Mike said.

“Yeah,” she agreed quietly.

“Just sit back and rumble.”

“As much as I really wanted to be a soprano, rumbling did feel good,” Sarah admitted.

“And the girls loved it,” Mike said.

“Yes, yes they did,” Sarah said. Then put on a mischievous smirk, “And still do.”

“Ah! OK!” Mike chuckled. “OK. Point taken. Point taken… Oh, shit.”

“What?” Sarah asked.

“Missed our exit,” he said.

Sarah sat up straight and looked around.

But, they hadn’t just missed their exit, they’d missed the last exit in Oregon. Two exits.

They were headed across the Glenn L. Jackson Memorial Bridge, crossing the Columbia River, with Government Island in front of them and Washington State beyond that.