"Huh. I guess that makes sense as a way to do it."

"And some other places it's gendered, one or the other keeps their own last name and their spouse takes it and the kids all get that one, and there same-sex couples are in a bit of a bind, usually just pick one."

"That would seem to be a flaw in that system, yes."

"Most people like the opposite sex. And some religions try to enforce that. So the systems can stick around pretty long like that."

Snort. "'The system has glaring flaws' doesn't mean 'it is in any way unrealistic or even, frankly, unexpected'."

"Are there similar problems in your world to make you so cynical?"

"Spoken like someone who has never tried to navigate the Lellepin City bureaucracy."

"Indeed I have not."

"In my experience, people don't throw out systems that have been around a long time just because they don't work as well as they did when they started out."

"Yeah. What's wrong with Lellepin City specifically?"

"It's where I live."

"Oh, it's not, like, famously hard to get a building permit or file a noise complaint?"

"Not so far as I know!"

"My town is mostly famous for flavored rice milk and the annual handicrafts festival. The nearest city, where my mom works, is a slightly bigger deal."

"Lellepin City has some semi-famous gardens."

"I wonder if your plants are different."

"I have no idea."

"Well, I knew how to say 'rice milk'."

"Oh, yeah, we definitely have those things. But there are enough different kinds of, say, flowers, that if we had different ones it would be hard to tell because I don't know them all."

"Roses camellias tulips pansies lilacs carnations daisies."

"I recognize all of those things. Uh, hibiscus magnolia lotus lily?"

"Yup."

"So we probably have the same plants."

"Sounds like. Or at least similar plants. Maybe your lilies have eighteen sexes."

"...I don't think plants have sexes the way animals do."