It took me ten minutes to hunt down my boots. They were under Yasmin’s clothes, for some reason. Now I was dressed. If only the goddamn pills would kick in, I could face the world. Don’t talk to me about eating. I’d done that the day before yesterday.

I left Yasmin a note telling her to lock the door on her way out. Yasmin was one of the few people I trusted alone in my apartment. We always had a good time together, and I think we really cared about each other in some unspoken, fragile way. We were both afraid to push it, to test it, but we both knew it was there. I think it’s because Yasmin hadn’t been born a girl. Maybe spending half of your life one sex and half of your life the other does something to your perceptions. Of course, I knew lots of other sex-changes I couldn’t get along with at all. Well, you just can’t get away with generalizations. Not even to be kind.

Yasmin was fully modified, inside and out, body and mind. She had one of those perfect bodies, one of the ones you order out of a catalog. You sit down with the guy in the clinic and he shows you the book. You say, “How about these tits?” and he tells you how much, and you say, “This waist?” and he gives you an estimate for breaking your pelvic bones and resetting them, and you have your Adam’s apple shaved down and you pick out your facial features and your ass and your legs. Sometimes you could even go for new eye color. They can help you with your hair, and the beard is a matter of drugs and one magical clinical procedure. You end up with a customized self, just like restoring an old gasoline automobile.

I looked across the room at Yasmin. Her long, straight, black hair — that’s what I thought was her best asset, and she was born with it.