"You asked him—oh, no!"
"Oh, yes," he said. "Are you sorry? I hoped he'd do better for me, but—well, did you marry me for my looks?"
"You know better, Fred!"
"I didn't marry you for yours either. I told you that before, but you wouldn't believe me. Maybe now you will."
Her voice choked. "Perhaps—perhaps looks aren't so important after all. Perhaps I've been all wrong about everything I used to think was essential."
"You have," agreed Fred. "But you've always had a sense of inferiority about your appearance. From now on, you'll have no reason for that. And maybe now we'll both be able to grow up a little."
She nodded. It gave her a strange feeling to have him put around her a pair of arms she had never before known, to have him kiss her with lips she had never before touched. But that doesn't matter, she thought. The important thing is that whatever shape we take, we're us. The important thing is that now we don't have to worry about ourselves—and for that we have to thank him.
"Fred," she said suddenly, her face against his chest. "Do you think a girl can be in love with two—two people—at the same time? And one of them—one of them not a man? Not even human?"
He nodded, but didn't say anything. And after a moment, she thought she knew why. A man can love that way too, she thought—and one of them not a woman, either.
I wonder if he ... she ... it knew. I wonder if it knew.