As himself

Instead of getting to my feet and scanning the area around me for my friend, I settle myself into my current position. I get a message on my phone, which reads, “I'm at the fountain. Are you here?”

I quickly type out a short answer, “I'm here.”

Not even five seconds after I send it do I get a call from my friend. It's in that moment that I remember giving him my phone number, just in case Facebook craps out on us. I stare at the phone with my friend's name on the caller ID, but hesitate to quickly slide the cursor to the side where it would connect the call to him. I decide it would be unwise and rather rude to slide it to the other side where the phone would disconnect the call.

Before the call redirects to my voicemail, I slide the cursor to answer and bring the phone to my ear, a bit shocked that my female voice is what my friend will hear. “Hello?” I answer. For about a minute, I don't get a reply. Thirty seconds after I answer the call, I shoot off another “Hello,” but I do not get anything from the other line. I bring the phone down to look at the screen. The call still looks like it's connected and doesn't seem to have dropped for whatever reason. I start to wonder if my in-call volume was turned down low, but I discover it's at maximum volume when I try to adjust it. I put my phone back up to my ear to determine if my friend has said anything.

Then I hear my friend's deeper voice ask, “Charles?” but it's not through the phone. It doesn't have that tinny, electronic sound like you would get from a call, but it sounds like the voice is coming from right beside me. I slowly bring my phone down and look to my side. I see a shirt, pants and a body filling them in. I raise my gaze to the neck of this shirt and above it, with much uneasiness, is my friend's face, just like how I saw it at the X-Change store.

“Raymond?” I ask, getting to my feet. Even as I'm standing straight, the man before me has to look down a bit due to him being taller than me. “We didn't specify whether we come as ourselves or on X-Change. I just assumed...”

“It's okay, really. I just wanted to make sure it was really you,” he says, interrupting my attempt at explaining.

To expedite him knowing if it's really me or not, and to even the playing field a bit, I pull from my purse my wallet and then take out my ID card, first showing the NHPA side and then flipping it to show the face that he remembers.

“That will do it. And this is you, on X-Change,” he adds after confirming it's really his friend, just in a female body.

“Sorry if it comes a shock, like the time at the store,” I say, trying to apologize for his uneasiness.

“No, really, it's okay. I did panic as I was going in, but since there wasn't anyone around who knew me, I was able to calm down. And I did browse through the products, but didn't buy anything. I think, that's why I messaged you,” he explains. His uneasiness doesn't seem to go away, but it's only when I realized halfway that I've been looking straight at his face. I avert my gaze and immediately, I could hear his speech calming down. “I figured, since you bought a whole bottle of pink pills, you'd have more experience and therefore more knowledge about the products.”

“I know a good deal of stuff, but I've only ever tried the Basic pill,” I tell him, mindful to not stare into his eyes as if I'm trying to hypnotize him.

“So, I think we should have our chat somewhere more private, like somewhere it wouldn't be easy for people to overhear. You saw that I was registered by the ID you saw, but I haven't really told anyone about it. Not even my work knows,” he explains. I nod, understanding his case, knowing I was in his boat three year ago.

“Did you have anywhere in mind?” I ask.