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“Are you ready?” Rae asked.
Max nodded, swallowed, and nodded again.
“And the music is good? I can turn the lights up higher if you –”
“Rae, it’s all fine.”
Max smiled at her friend, and took a deep breath.
“It’s alright if you don’t want to,” Rae said, before she’d had a chance to move.
Max took her hand, brushing her thumb over the smooth plates that covered most of Rae’s skin.
“I want to,” she said, sounding sure to her own ears for the first time this evening. “Just give me a second for the culture shock.”
Rae nodded, and withdrew her hand, stepping back a pace.
Max smiled at her, and began to undress.
They’d met on Max’s third day of work at the station, in the break room of the science department. Max had joined the staff as a social optimiser, trying to improve the living experience of one of the first long-term residential spaceports. Rae was a Sypodian bio-engineer, trying to improve the yields from the on-board aeroponics. But really, they were both there for the same reason as every young person who left home for a life out among the stars – the learn more about other worlds. Where better to start than the alien you shared a sofa with?
“Hello, Dr Chidal’k.” Max couldn’t pronounce all the phonemes necessary for the name on the stranger’s ID, but it would have been rude not to approximate as well as she could.
“Call me Rae,” she responded, offering a hand.
“Max.” She took Rae’s hand, expecting to shake it, and was surprised when the woman slid her fingers through Max’s grip, tracing a line up to her elbow. The touch was gentle, but unexpected. As her fingers went slack, Max felt the scaly texture of the Sypodian’s skin sliding under her fingertips – not rough, as she had expected, but flexible in spite of their hardness, like her fingernails after a hot shower.
Rae caught her expression of surprise and quickly released her. “Sorry, I should have asked first. On Sypode –”
But Max had already gotten over her moment of shock. She had already known that Sypodians were highly tactile, and most cultures from the planet valued physical touch – she just hadn’t really processed what that cultural different might mean on a day-to-day level. But then, wasn’t that what she had wanted in the first place?
“No, it’s fine,” Max assured her. “It’s just a way of getting to know someone, right?”
“More or less,” Rae said. “To be precise, it means something like – I want to get to know you better.”
Max smiled. “I could get on board with that.”
Standing there in nothing but her skivvies, Max felt self-conscious, glancing down at herself, second guessing – her support band felt too tight, straining over her breasts with each breath. But Rae is still smiling at her, and it’s nothing like any situation she’s been in before. Max might be close to naked, but there’s no hunger in Rae’s gaze, no roving eyes. She just gestures to the bed, inviting Max to lie down.
“Let me know if you get cold,” Rae said. “I’ve got the temperature up a bit from normal, but I didn’t want you to overheat.”
“I’m good,” Max said as she lay back. “Uh, go ahead, I guess?”
She felt more vulnerable than she had expected, flat on her back while her friend remained standing. She wanted to crane her neck to follow Rae’s movements, but she tried to relax instead.
Rae stood beside her, and gently ran her fingers through Max’s hair. The contact helped her to relax. Rae had touched her hair before – she was fascinated by it, just as Max was by Rae’s plates.
Rae buried her hands deep in Max’s hair, massaging her scalp, then gently pulling the hair back across the pillow so that Max’s neck lay against the smooth sheets. She repeated the motion several times, her fingertips seeking Max’s parting and her crown, the nape of her neck and the curve of her ear. Nothing the two of them hadn’t done before.
Then Rae’s fingertips rubbed across her forehead, and everything was new.
They began having dinner together regularly after work. Rae was passionate about her work with the station’s crops, and about her favourite serialised adventure series, and especially about learning everything she could about Max’s culture. Cooking for each other seemed like a logical progression.
Max had called up her mother to get the recipe for one of her favourites. She’d had to make a few changes – she didn’t have a food mixer in her apartment’s kitchen – and she was so nervous that she had to stop herself from glancing in the oven every three seconds to make sure it was cooking, but the end result looked alright. When she bit into it, it was like she was ten years old again, sat around the dinner table with her family.
Rae’s expression was thoughtful – not openly disgusted, but not happy either.
“What did you say this was called again?”
“Sage and onion stuffing,” Max answered. “It’s called stuffing because it was originally served inside something else, but my mum always did a dish on its own...”
“It’s very...” Rae hesitated. “Heavy.”
Max chewed another mouthful, trying to understand what she meant.
“I suppose,” she said. “Have you tried any of the crunchy bits around the edges? They’re always the best.”
Rae tried one, but she still looked dubious.
“I suppose,” she acknowledged. “But overall it’s – well, it just doesn’t really feel like food to me. It’s really your favourite?”
“Yes,” Max said. “Well, if you don’t want it, I guess there’s more for me!”
Rae smiled as Max served herself seconds.
“If this is what you expect, then I’m not sure what you’re going to make of my dessert.”
Rae had brought along one of her own favourites, something that looked a little like a white mousse. Max watched as Rae demonstrated how to eat it, curling a little at a time around one finger.
When Max tried it for herself, she gasped. She had expected a liquid texture, but the substance seemed to be made of fine strands, and separating some was like pulling apart candyfloss.
Then she put it in her mouth, and all frames of reference became useless.
The texture seemed to change constantly. Sometimes she’d struggle to prise her jaws apart like she’d glued her mouth up with toffee, but a moment later the substance would be fluid and yielding again, or solid and crunching under her jaws. At one point, the entire mass congealed on the roof of her mouth and she almost choked, before the whole thing softened into a light foam that she could easily swallow.
It took three mouthfuls before she even registered the taste – there wasn’t much of one. It was more sweet than anything, but only faintly at that, and with a spicy kick that Max didn’t expect to encounter in a dessert.
“So?” Rae asked.
“I know what you mean,” Max said. “This isn’t at all like food.”
They both laughed.
“I never realised how different things could be on other worlds,” Rae said.
“Next time,” Max promised. “I’m going to introduce you to popping candy.”
Rae’s fingers brushed softly across Max’s forehead, rubbing in small circles with light pressure. Rae’s touch moved slowly, hesitating on any variation – a couple of pimples in her hairline, the rough, short hairs where she’d plucked her eyebrows. She tensed at the unfamiliarity, and Rae’s fingers followed the curve of muscle along to the crease between her eyebrows.
“All good?” Rae asked.
“Mm-hmm.”
It wasn’t a lie. Max had been worried about how she might react, but now that it speculation had become reality, all that tension was draining away. Rae’s careful curiosity was as endearing as ever, and being the centre of that attention was not as awkward as she’d feared. In fact, it was rather gratifying.
Rae’s academic knowledge of human biology showed – as her touch moved slowly down Max’s face, she took great care to be gentle of the eyelids and lips, her touch so light that Max could hardly feel it. But her lack of practical familiarity was obvious too – she seemed fascinated by the rough skin where Max had chewed her lip one time too many, and by the raised mole on her cheek with its sole black hair. Max followed her touch with silent interest, relearning the fine variation of her own skin through her friend’s focus.
She didn’t speak until Rae reached her neck.
“Can you feel my pulse?” she asked.
Rae paused.
“I can always feel your blood flowing.” Max had forgotten how sensitive the Sypodian sense of touch was. “But your voice – say something else?”
“Umm...”
Rae’s fingers traced back and forth over her vocal cords, mapping out the vibration.
“This is so strange,” Max said.
Rae’s hand stilled. “I can stop.”
“No, it’s just –” Max smiled. “I never thought about it before. How talking feels.”
Rae smiled. “Me neither.”
All this had started from a conversation a few weeks earlier. They’d been sat on the couch after dinner, Rae finishing her bowl of watermelon and custard while Max traced out the patterns of the scales on her arm.
“You have the weirdest taste in food,” she commented idly.
“This from the person who thinks flyghit makes a good pudding,” Rae teased back. “Your species is definitely the weird one. Just look at Jeffers.”
Jeffers was one of Rae’s human co-workers, and a source of constant irritation.
“What’ve they done now?” Max asked.
“Apparently, they saw us holding hands in the break room the other day,” Rae said, “and they wanted to explain to the poor confused alien how you were obviously attracted to me.”
Max rolled her eyes.
“I know!” Rae said. “As though we weren’t both well aware that we’re not genetically compatible to produce offspring!”
Max muffled a laugh, and Rae’s expression turned questioning.
“Sorry, but, uh –” She grinned. “Your definition of attraction is a little outdated.”
“What?” Rae looked horrified. “Details.”
“Okay, so – there’s more than one kind of attraction,” Max explained. “Jeffers probably meant sexual attraction – that is, the desire to engage in sexually stimulating activities with someone. Such activities can produce offspring, given the right genetic compatibility, but they are generally considered... desirable, even where offspring aren’t concerned.”
Rae looked intrigued. “Ah. So Jeffers thought that you desired stimulation from me.”
Max tried not to blush, and failed. “Yes, almost certainly.”
“And do you –”
“No,” Max said, a little too forcefully. “No, I’m ace – asexual. I don’t experience sexual attraction to anyone.”
“So you can’t be stimulated?” Rae asked.
“No, not quite...” How was this harder with an alien than with other humans? “I still find the stimulation pleasurable, under the right circumstances, but I prefer to – uh – well – I don’t have any desire for a partner.”
“And I take it that this subject is taboo in human culture?” Rae grinned at her obvious discomfort.
Max pulled a face. “Less so than it once was, but apparently cultural hang-ups die hard.”
“Don’t they always?” Rae shrugged. “So, what are the other forms of attraction?”
“Well, there’s romantic attraction – that’s a desire for... I’d describe it as intimacy? Certain behaviours culturally associated with mating relationships, although again those behaviours are enjoyable even for non-mates.”
Rae nodded, although her eyes were blank. Max didn’t blame her, since she’d barely understood that explanation herself, but it would do for the time being.
“Aesthetic attraction is the desire to look at someone, an appreciation of beauty,” she continued. “And sensual attraction is the desire for physical intimacy, sustained touch.”
“Ah!” Rae made a soft sound of recognition. “So you are attracted to me, but not in the way Jeffers meant.”
“Yeah,” Max admitted. “I suppose I am. I definitely like touching you.”
“Then I am sensually attracted to you too,” Rae declared, running a hand through her hair, and Max couldn’t help but smile.
“Actually...” Rae continued. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you about. Something that would help me learn about humans – but you don’t have to say yes unless you’re sure...”
Rae’s exploratory touches moved slowly down one of Max’s arms, and then the other. With the lights low and the room warm, it was easy to relax and enjoy the feeling of gentle contact. By the time Rae was done with her left arm, Max was so relaxed that she let Rae turn her hand over to examine the palm without any attempt to move herself.
When Rae moved her hands to Max’s stomach, Max blinked open her eyes to watch her sleepily. She had intended to warn her friend that she was ticklish – even her ex hadn’t been able to touch her ribs without her squirming. But Rae’s touch didn’t make her pull away, and Max watched as her friend’s fingertips trailed across her belly-button.
“Does this mean anything to you?” Max asked, the words escaping before she’d thought them through.
Hearing her tone, Rae withdrew her hands immediately. She sat on the floor beside the bed, and took one of Max’s hands in her own.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
Max turned on her side to face her, curling her legs up to her chest.
“Just answer the question.” She hated how petty she sounded.
“I can’t, it doesn’t make sense to me,” Rae said. “Please explain.”
Her expression was neutral, and for a moment Max thought her friend was calm. But then she looked again, saw the flared plates around her friend’s head, and realised Rae was panicked. Panicked enough to forget the facial expressions she put on to make her meaning clearer to humans.
Max sighed.
“If I tried to explain this to anyone – anyone human – they’d think I... To a human, this looks sexual.”
“But you don’t want it to be sexual,” Rae said, hesitantly.
“No, and I don’t think you do either.” Rae nodded in agreement. “But I don’t know what it is.”
“If you want to stop, we stop,” Rae said. “We don’t ever have to do this again.”
“No, that’s not the problem.” The fact that it wasn’t a problem was the problem. “Rae – if I had said no to this, would you have asked someone else? Another human?”
Rae was quiet for a moment. Then she shook her head.
“No. Not unless I – there isn’t anyone else I would want to ask.”
Max exhaled a breath she hadn’t known she was holding, and stretched out her legs.
“This isn’t something I would be able to explain to a Sypodian either,” Rae explained. “This kind of – I’m not even sure I have words for it.”
“Tell me about it,” Max murmured.
“But I like touching you,” Rae said. “I like touching you.”
The second time, she said the word ‘touching’ in her own language. In Sypodian, touching had no subject or object. To touch was to be touched.
“You asked if this meant anything to me,” she continued. “And it does. It means this.”
She squeezed Max’s hand, and Max squeezed back.
Max moved backwards on the bed.
“Lie next to me?” she invited.
When Rae did so, she wrapped her arms around her friend – more than friend? – and pressed her face into the plates on the back of Rae’s neck.
“We’ll figure it out,” she murmured.
“We will,” Rae replied.
Max would have to leave soon, go back to her own quarters to sleep. She wasn’t ready to spend the night with Rae yet. But someday – someday soon – she might be ready to fall asleep next to someone.
Max smiled, and held Rae close.