‘Ah, our expert in male affairs is back from his talk with the great village leader.’ Samantha said when Michael walked into the Ghost Town bar for the second time.

‘Congratulations on your promotion,’ Eliza said with a typical wink.

She seemed in a weird mood, probably with all the emotions of saving a human life, even if it meant bringing a boy into a Ghost Town.

‘As far as I know you are the one who managed to convince a Ghost Town leader to take in a boy today, Eliza. They just wanted me to talk to him because he hadn’t even talked to a woman before, and he was scared. But how is he now?’

‘I think he’s asleep. He’s alone in his room anyway. Tomorrow they’ll show him the farm. I think he needs some rest first but I’m quite sure he’ll adapt well.’

‘A boy here? Hmm…’ Samantha said.

‘Leave him alone. He’s too young for you and he doesn’t need any complications like that now!’ Eliza said.

‘He’s not even interested in that, believe me. And he’ll need a lot of time to adjust, but he surely can use all the friendship he can get.’

‘Boring…’ Samantha said.

‘Hey Michael!’

A girl with rather short blue hair suddenly stood before him wearing an apron with the Ghost Town bar logo.

‘Want a drink?’ It took him a few seconds before he recognised her.

‘Eh, Sh… Leya. I almost didn’t recognise you with that blue hair. No, I think it’s almost time to go back to the city if the girls agree. It’s been a heavy day.’

‘And, do you like it?’ Leya asked and took on a dramatic pose as if she was a model from an ancient fashion magazine.

‘It’s something I haven’t seen before in real life. It matches your eyes now. I think it works. So that’s your revenge on the dude who wanted a blond wife?’ He didn’t really know how to answer a question on a girl’s appearance but she didn’t seem to notice.

‘I’ll never ever be blond again. Eliza called it aposematism, like a warning to predators that they shouldn’t mess with me. Nothing says more that I refuse to play the Wife game than unnatural hair colours, don’t you think? But it’s pretty in a very different way, just for me. I don’t live to be pretty for others.’

‘It’s certainly not ugly, but you’re right, it goes against everything Wifely and even against non-Wife traditions in the Nation too. I don’t know why even.’ ‘Yes, it’s peak twenty-second century or so, the outlaw woman who did my hair was quite surprised too, but she loved what it became.’

‘Ah, watch out, you’ll be a trend-setter too before you know it.’

‘It doesn’t seem to repel men very well though, judging by our test sample.’ Samantha said, pointing at him.

‘He doesn’t count. Aposematism is there to warn off predators, not friends. Plus your almost bald non-Wife hairstyle never scared him away either, and that’s also an anti-Wife statement to communicate you’re not available for men, remember?’

‘Yeah, he doesn’t count and he’s eternally in the friend folder, but what about actual potential partners? What’s the boy you used to escape going to make of this?’

‘Robert? That’s his problem. And he can only be friends with me, you know that. He’s a Gamma-3, rated men are off-limits for a non-Wife, especially if they’re so high-ranked. If we’re not talking about toxic affair stuff that is. Even as an E-girl a Gamma would have been an impossible match. There’s only one man ever who went under his ranking to find a fiancée, and he’s here now with us… But he said he doesn’t mind blue hair and he still wants to be friends even if I live in a Ghost Town now. Do you believe that? After all his conspiracy theories about how dangerous women are…’

‘Everything he had heard about women was secondhand information from people who weren’t really a fan. And you were different. You’re all very different from what men think to know about women. And much more real than a bunch of idealised ideas. People are always more than archetypes.’ Michael said.

‘This idealised archetype woman is going home. And that means I take both of you with me.’ Eliza suddenly said, and she hugged Leya without any warning.

‘Bye, take care of yourself, and of him. He isn’t wearing a stunner,’ Leya said.

‘I will do that. Come, Loverboy.’

Michael thought that she had something weird in her voice again, but followed her without thinking about it much. The three of them walked out of Seventh city Ghost Town, their arms linked. Rebecca didn’t even react to his presence anymore when they passed the gate, and Michael realised he wouldn’t even be the most notorious male in this community anymore after the arrival of Eric. He was old news already.

*

The walk to the City was long but no-one seemed to notice anything of that because of their intense conversations about Ghost Towns, non-Wife rights and stuff like that, and suddenly they were almost at the woman house where Samantha and Angela lived.

‘Finally alone with you!’ Eliza said, grabbing Michael’s arm closer in the coldness of the night. ‘Eh, what?’ Michael and Samantha asked simultaneously. ‘I can have you all for myself now. Isn’t it finally my turn now to kiss you, have a long hard and painful conversation about feelings afterwards, and then not start a relationship with you? I feel rather left out that I have missed out on that until now. Don’t you find me attractive too?’

There was a twinkling in her green eyes, but it didn’t make him smile.

‘Not funny, Eliza. Not funny. I’m not like that.’

‘Come on, where has your sense of humour gone, Michael? Was it attached to your ranking badge or so?’

‘Do you really want me to feel like a slut?’ He said.

His unexpected intensity made her back off.

‘Hmm, don’t get depressed again. You seemed a lot better recently. I didn’t want to retrigger any trauma or so. But why on Earth would you even use the s-word word for yourself, dude? You’ve never used words like that.’

‘Isn’t it applicable? You know what they say about men. We are always the predators, have always the wrong desires, can never be trusted. Why wouldn’t I be like that too when provoked? I’m a man after all. Don’t summon that part of me!’

Samantha looked at him in disbelief, but didn’t find words to react, so she left him to Eliza. ‘You know what they say about women. They always want to submit, and are always ready to satisfy a man. Plus they fart unicorns and rainbows.’

‘I’ve never heard the last part, and I know enough women by now to tell you that the rest is nonsense too. Whatever Miss Hunter may say.’ He said, bewildered.

‘Yup, people are themselves, and being man or woman is just a small part of that. There are as many ways to be a man as there are men, and there are as many ways to be a woman as there are women. None of us here is an avatar of any of those gender stereotypes, not even remotely.’

Samantha yawned. ‘You two are getting boring, I’m going in, goodnight,’ she interrupted them.

‘So I was going to walk you home too, Eliza?’ He said.

‘Oh, baby, tonight you can walk me anywhere…’ She smiled teasingly, with that weird energy again.

‘Don’t be too flirty. Just in case it might work…’ he said.

‘I see someone is becoming less dense.’ She said, grinning.

Samantha suddenly walked in between them and made a protective gesture. ‘What are you planning, Lizzie man-hater? Are you finally learning to play with chemistry? It’s a weird moment for you to start with that.’

‘None of your business, Sam! He’s mine tonight. Fix your own guy if you want one. I’m not sharing him.’

‘You’re completely giving her the wrong ideas, Eliza. I’m just walking you home. And you two are the ones protecting me actually. Magic stunners and all…’ Michael said tiredly.

‘Her ideas are her own responsibility. If she has a dirty mind she’ll have to wash her own brains with soap, I’m not gonna do that for her.’ Eliza said.

‘How come you always shut me down for being too flirty, and when she goes much further than I do you only ignore her and then walk her home?’ Samanta sulked.

‘You are seriously trying something and I’m not interested in whatever that is, and Eliza doesn’t want anything at all, she’s just joking around, and we trust each other as friends. Nothing else.’

‘Not fair.’

‘Life isn’t always fair. And I don’t have to justify myself about how I react to flirty girls.’

‘You’re no fun.’

‘You said that before, so you should be used to that now. Come, Eliza, we’re off. It’s time for bed for me.’

Samantha disappeared inside the building.

‘Hah, I won the battle of the girls for the most wanted free man in The Nation for now.’

‘Good luck with your prize, which is just this hopeless case.’

‘Yeah, but it’s my personal hopeless case for now.’

‘Your optimism is extreme sometimes, Eliza, but I have no idea what you’re talking about. What are you planning?’

‘What? I don’t have any wild plans with you. I just know that being with you is fun, and that we trust each other as you said. Do we need more?’

They stopped, and she grabbed his hand.

‘Plus, you are the one who swayed Eliza the man-hater into liking at least one boy. You’re a keeper. Did you really mean that a-word earlier, when you were worried about me smothering the kid.’

‘A-word? A-attractive you mean? Why wouldn’t I? And you are still slightly tipsy it seems, Eliza.’

She winked. ‘Ah, well… Drunk on life itself then. Actually I’m as good as sober, I’m just happy to be alive. Just being myself, you know.’

She grabbed his other hand too and looked in his eyes. ‘Who wouldn’t get lost is this feeling? You, me, safety and trust, and…’

Her eyes were deep and green, and he almost stopped breathing when she came closer than he was comfortable with. But this time he didn’t protest at all.

‘You know, Samantha wasn’t wrong about you being flirty tonight. And I warned you it could work. You’ve never been so irresistible as today, Eliza. And everything about this moment is perfect.’

‘I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks that.’ She said with a weird smile.

They looked in each other’s eyes, still holding hands, and became silent. Time seemed to stop, and it was as if there was nothing in the universe except for the two of them.

‘You’re making it difficult to not do this,’ he said, and then he kissed her.

For a while they kept on into each other’s eyes while holding each other’s hand, not knowing how to react.

In the end she looked away, still lost for words.

‘Sorry, not sorry!’

He finally said with a weird high voice, finally breaking the magic. She stared at him, clearly impressed.

‘Michael kissing Eliza? That was unexpected. And exactly when I had decided to not try anything like this at all, ever... But unless I’m very mistaken we just did the kiss but not start a relationship thing now, as I predicted? And this is the talk about feelings now?’ She said awkwardly as she let go of his hands.

He shrugged, a bit uneasily now,

‘Is there any other option? Wouldn’t anything more be impossible anyway? I’m the husband of a robot, you’re a Free Woman that lives half in a Ghost Town. And you’re completely out of my league. But at least this kiss was my own initiative, and that’s a first. It’ll probably make me even more confused and lonely, but it was worth it, and now I can have some closure.’

She looked at him, looking confused and even a bit disappointed now. ‘Closure? What do you mean?’

‘You just said it. None of us both expects more than one kiss, and that is the end of this whole romance arc that never went anywhere. Of the last one even, my slutty days are over now. That was all the experimenting I needed. Now it’s time to go back to our complicated friendship. I thank you for your trust.’

He looked away now.

Eliza was completely stumped for a moment.

‘That is not what I meant. You are being crazy and impossible, do you know that?’

‘You can tell Samantha that if she still wants to experiment with chemistry I know a guy who can get her a chemistry set. That’s fun too. If the water becomes red it’s acidic, if it’s blueish it’s alkaline.’ His voice sounded strange again.

‘We surely can trust you to know how to charm a girl… You know she’s not even going to get that joke, let alone find it funny.’

‘Well, if she turns blue from frustration about my bad jokes she’s alkaline, and if she turns red she’s acidic.’ He grinned, and she looked at him in disbelief.

‘Do you know that you are actually better than anything in the secret book of advanced courtship sabotage? It’s incredible. It might make me like you more though in an ironic way…’

‘Please don’t like me too much, that’d be a very bad idea now,’ he said.

‘Shut up! I’m just going to strangle you I think. Who’s liking who too much? I’d never thought I’d ever be able to bewitch a boy like that into kissing me like that.’

‘It’s your fault. You’re incredible. All girls are a bit incredible, except maybe for Samantha sometimes, but you are the incredibelest for sure.’

‘That’s not even a word, and let poor Sam off the hook for now, she’ll have to live with missing the biggest price in man-hunting among the Free People of Seventh City already.’

‘But so do you tonight. You’ve had your fun, but I’m going home alone. You’re not safe in my home and I’m not even allowed in yours and I’m illegal as a lover anyway. It couldn’t work with me, you know that.’

She frowned, and ignored the second part. ‘Not just fun, an unforgettable memory. And that for the girl of whom everyone speculated she doesn’t even like boys.’

‘Glad to have been of service. Goodnight. I love you… In some kind of way. As a friend at least.’

Her hands made fists and then relaxed while she tried to find an answer.

‘You dummy, I love you too, in some kind of way. And you’re a good friend. No matter who you choose in the end. Even though I’m probably incapable of liking other men in this world than you. And maybe it’s betterto without anyway, like they say.’

‘Pfff… Maybe I’ve had enough experience with women now for a whole life. I should probably become a monk.’

‘Too late, you’re in love with the idea of being with girls already. You’ll fall in love with one of us too one day. And there’s one I can recommend.’

She smiled sweetly as if she were the SCWF logo girl.

‘We already had that conversation today, goodnight. My replacement robowife is enough drama for now.’

He leaned closer to kiss her on the forehead, and disappeared into the night.

She looked at him disappearing, and then stood in the shadows in complete silence against the wall for a while, her forehead still glowing from the last kiss.

‘If you’re a slut, then I am the whore of Babylon, and we’re both still complete virgins, you dummy!’ she whispered to herself. How could everything be so complicated? Suggesting kissing just once, and then not starting a relationship but only a lot of drama had been a stupid idea. It had worked though, completely against everything she’d expected, so next time she’d better suggest something else… If there would be a next time that was. He seemed to be hopeless for now anyway, with a hopelessness that was transmittable just by coming too close to him… And why did she even bother? When had she ever even thought about romance as an option for herself anyway? She shouldn’t even be thinking about this. And she needed to go to bed too indeed, so she disappeared in the darkness.

*

‘So what do you think, Jenny?’

Lady Martha poured her assistant some tea the next morning.

‘About what, Lady Martha, there’s so much going on.’

‘That maybe. In the same year that we’re opening up to the male side there’s a lost sister of Héva crashing in. And Eliza is almost ready with her radio, they’ll try to contact the outside world tomorrow. And meanwhile Mildred is fuming again because of that new boy. Again Eliza, but I agree we couldn’t let him die. Which makes me wonder how many lost boys like him have died already, it’s a dog-eat-dog world on the male side.’

‘But we can’t carry the whole world on our shoulders. We can take in some refugees here and there, but we’re a Ghost Town first and foremost. A community for women.’

‘They were thinking of starting an offshoot male colony in Tenth City instead of taking them in. There seems to be a man who’s interested in that there. They found him wounded in the forest, he was almost killed by hunters who were killing the ferals.’

‘Hunters shooting humans? Despicable.’

‘Ah, yes, it’s a new hype among the Alphas. Shooting big animals is forbidden but there’s no protection for the ferals. They are too afraid of the Ghost Towns to be a danger for now, but the male outlaws are not so lucky in their small unorganised gangs.’

‘Men… Every time I think they can’t get worse they still get worse…’

‘But their victims are men too. And they’re human beings after all.’

‘I know, I’ve only met three of them or so but they were all decent persons, even if they came with horrible stories about other men too…’

‘So what is going to happen if we make a new alliance with Héva?’

‘Don’t they have outsider contacts themselves? I think it would mean the end of our isolation as a country, not? The question is only how the male Nation will react to that.’

‘I wasn’t thinking about that. I was thinking about the baby problem as Jibrilla calls it. Something tells me Héva isn’t going to give us the secret of parthenopills. We’re coming together again next month, and who knows how much will have changed by then…’

Jenny looked at her watch.

‘So any special orders for today, Lady Martha?’

‘You have to take that boy to the farm in the afternoon, if he’s well enough already. If he isn’t ready for that we give him some rest days before he starts. He’s been through horrible things. And speaking of orders, I think we should order more stunners, we might need them. Could you do that? Apart from that it’s just the usual. Maybe check in with Eliza how far the radio experiments are working. I want to stay updated on our international connections.’

‘I will, Lady Martha, I certainly will…’

*

‘Does anyone already know what happened to Shirley?’

Greystone looked at Miss Hunter, who was her class teacher.

‘Not what happened to her, but does it matter? The boy said she wasn’t pleasing to him. She left his house without permission. She’s as good as unmarriable now anyway.’

‘The girl is Gone, Miss Hunter. Isn’t that a problem?’

‘Our school provides suitable brides to young men, Mister Greystone. Shirley doesn’t fall in that category anymore after being rejected when he has taken her to his room already. Plus, her father wasn’t interested when we called him. Just forget her.’

‘And Eliza?’

‘What about her?’ Miss Hunter looked up.

‘She asked us to take care of Shirley when she was here.’

‘Forget her, Greystone. She can’t do anything to us.’ ‘

I’m not so sure of that. She got me thinking since she recently visited us, and it’s clear that’s not as silly as we thought, and she has her contacts. She must have done more behind the scenes. Remember what happened to old Rogers?’

‘Him? He got promoted a few years ago or something like that, not?’

‘Yes, to an empty tower, away from everyone. The girls had been complaining about abuse, and the school did nothing. And suddenly he was gone, promoted away they said. But his pay was much lower and he had the worst menial job ever, that would even bore a robot to death. And for some reason he couldn’t get back. Administrative problems or something. He’s still there they say. And I’m sure now it was her doing.’

The look on Miss Hunter’s face had changed.

‘Come on, Greystone, this is bordering on superstition.’

‘On your head be it if this goes wrong,’ Greystone said, and left the office.

For a while Miss Hunter kept staring at the place where he had been, unable to process his words, and then she went back to a pile of tests that she still needed to correct.

*

‘So, I’ve heard you’re going to a Ghost Town Love Ceremony soon?’ Angela asked Michael.

It was a few weeks later and it had been another day of bar work. She seemed to have taken up studying in the bar for serious now.

‘Apparently. They’ve invited me as a male representative or something. I don’t think a no would be a good signal.’

Angela looked him up and down, ‘Hmmm, be sure to be dressed well,’ she said teasingly.

He suddenly felt nervous. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Just a tip about Love Ceremonies. Women always dress up for the occasion, and Ghost Town outlaws are not like us city non-Wives, they know how to make themselves pretty. And a Love Ceremony is the ultimate occasion for that. And everyone will be looking out for you if you’re there.’

‘Oh joy…’ ‘But there’s no real rules, and you’re new, they will take anything from you, I’m sure. They are understanding too for non-Wives. And you’re not even that…’

‘Yeah right… No-one will notice me. I’m only the first man ever to visit such a ceremony.’

He looked absentmindedly at her book with the basics of 23th century philosophies on gender for a while, remembering that the same book had belonged to Eliza last time he had seen it, and then suddenly asked another question.

‘Hey, don’t you wanna come with me maybe?’

Angela looked at him.

‘Are you asking me to come as your plus-one? Sorry, but no,’ she said decisively.

‘Hey, I’m not asking you out on a date, I’m just asking you to come with me. To have someone with me.’

‘Every other time I’d have said yes, but with the first male guest ever at a Love Ceremony, no… That would attract too much attention that I don’t want, and people will talk about it for ages. And I’m not even invited. Sorry.’

‘Ah…’ He said, not knowing whether to feel rejected or not. ‘At least tell me more about what can I expect then!’

‘Well, a celebration of love and beauty as they would call it. A ceremony in which the partners promise each other eternal love, stuff like that. With music and rituals with a priestess, and then a party afterwards.’

‘And it works? I mean, they choose freely and then they stay together. That’s a weird idea.’

‘I suppose. Separations and break-ups still exist here and there, but a lot of them stay together as loving partners as far as I know. Outlaws only make those vows when they’re really sure…’

‘Lucky them… They’re not stuck with Marriages that are hell for both partners,’ he said, fiddling with his fingers, ‘but it’s probably because they’re women that it’s possible. I should have been a woman too. Men are just just doomed to be horrible with relationships. All we can do is hurt women and get hurt ourselves.’

‘And what do you even know about that, Mr kiss and never start a relationship? You haven’t even tried since your engagement is over.’

‘That time is over. No more messing with girls for me. And I think it’s time for me to go home now. Need a walk home?’

‘Not today, I’m waiting for Sam, she has a stunner. She’s even safer than you now.’

‘Ah…’ For a while he didn’t say anything, seemingly staring at something before him, and just when she picked up her book again because she thought he wasn’t going to reply anymore he spoke again.

‘Well, I’m off then. See you later, Angela!’.

‘See you later.’