"Why did you ask about that and not about whether I like boys?"

"With enough advance notice I can more or less decide what gender to be on a given day, so I did not expect that to be a problem, and if the fact that I'm sometimes a boy at all was I'd expect you to object. Is it?"

"No, but if I were seeing somebody and not polyamorous you could also expect me to object."

"Fair enough, I guess I was assuming you were less likely to object due to the gender—due to my genderfluidity—than due to the other things."

"Anyway, uh, okay, what were you thinking of doing?"

"Well I'm unfamiliar with the customs, what do people usually do in these situations, here?"

"Restaurants? Theater? Sort of requires compatible tastes."

"I don't know what you have in the way of food and plays here and I like doing new things by default."

"Well, I can pick something - am I paying, usually whoever asks pays but you probably don't have any local money -"

"Hmm, I don't think the school would cover it but I could sell stuff from my world and get enough money?"

"...for theater tickets?"

"I have no idea how much theatre tickets would be, here," he confesses.

"They're not that expensive, it just seems weird to sell your possessions for it."

"Oh, well, to have pocket money in general—we were just discussing that they'd be pretty useless here in Elcenia."

"Useless, sure, but also irreplaceable otherworldly doodads, so you might want to shop around for somebody who wants them a lot."

"Oh, yeah, naturally. Anyway, point is, I don't mind paying."

"Shopping around would take a while, when were you imagining we'd go -?"

"I don't know! I'm not even all that acquainted with how your timekeeping works, yet. Whenever you want."

"If you're planning on paying and have no money and would take a while to get some then that affects the timing!"

"It does! I'm saying I'm okay with you paying and us going out tomorrow, or us waiting a while and going out later, or any other thing, your pick."

"...okay, I'll find something."

"Alright!" He grins. "Now I should probably let you sleep."

"Yeah. Tomorrow there's classes, I won't be here or in the library most of the day."

"It's alright, I—" Pause. "Guess you can call me on my communication crystal? How exactly does that work?"

"They're paired, I can call you if I have the other half of a pair."