"How open are you to an extremely bizarre story?"

"Completely open, I think that knowing my patients well is absolutely critical for being able to provide the best care possible. I think it's something you should really tell me."

"Well. I think it will be noticeable in a lot of aspects of my behavior, many of which may imply odd questions if I don't tell you this story. So I think we'll have a much less confusing and frustrating relationship if I tell you this."

She takes a deep breath.

"I'm from another world. I know this is a typical delusion, but I have a wallet full of ID and currency referencing countries that don't exist, and will gladly show it all to you when I get to the office. And the region where I lived in this other world was much more transphobic than this lovely world I found myself in this afternoon."

"Transphobic? I don't think I'm 100% sure about what that means, sorry. I'm struggling to guess the meaning of those words put together."

"Wait what. You don't... Okay then! Estimates of how nice this world is are going up further still. So, transphobia is what my old world called the shaming and rejecting attitude many people had toward trans folk. The word was derived from an earlier word, homophobia, which was shaming and rejecting behavior toward people who are attracted to the same gender. The construction of the word using the -phobia root was likely from a combination of the frequent fear-mongering some people did about the non-cishet community, as well as the fact that this kind of shaming behavior is often rooted in fear deep down."

"Oh, so trans in that way? I thought it must have something-else trans-phobic, if that makes sense?"

"Yeah, my old world was not very accepting of differences. Realize you're a different gender than you were assigned at birth? Realize you're attracted to someone other than who you're supposed to be? Half of one of the most powerful countries in the world thinks you're weird and gross and possibly a predator now. Have fun."

That couldn't possibly be old bitterness seeping into her voice, could it?

"Well! That must have been miserable. But at least things are getting better, here. I think you should try not thinking about bad things that aren't happening anymore." The subway train seems to have one fewer seat in width, to make each seat extra spacious and comfortable for Sable and everyone else. And the subway is almost uncannily quiet, as it races past the stops.

She nods to herself and lets out a slow breath. "You're right. Dwelling on the dumpster fire of a world I came from is a good way to stress myself out. Better to dwell on the new opportunities here. Anyway, in short, yes, living in one of the most transphobic regions in the previously mentioned powerful country is why I hadn't transitioned yet. But now I'm here, surrounded by people who seem to do things much more sensibly and comfortably and pleasantly."

"Well, we try our best! Let's think about what's next, not what's some day soon or some day then. Think positive!"

"Yeah! So, next steps, I get to the office, learn about different courses of hormones y'all offer here, receive one, get appointments to deal with hair, and then go to a tailor and buy a few days of clothes to tide me over while I find someplace to live."

"I mean, there's more than enough vacant apartments for you? You won't need to be tided over for a few days, unless I'm misunderstanding you?"

The subway stops are all open and bright, with minimalistic murals of blocks of colors painted onto the walls. There are many vending machines around, carrying small food items for travelers, and lots of seating. The train seats use a kind of office-chair like mesh, that's incredibly soft and nice and breathable in the warm weather.

"Oh wow. This world actually builds enough housing? Awesome. I'm used to there being multiple days of steps to move into an apartment, and days to acquire furniture, and hauling the clothing back and forth between places being an ordeal, and just the whole process being overcomplicated." 

"I'm trying to understand the idea of a world that doesn't build enough housing? I'm just confused, are there, like, sprawling, bombed-out wastes everwyhere? The furniture and clothing things are still an annoyance, though. But nothing here's overcomplicated, we take not having overcomplicated things very seriously!"

"No, people are just very badly confused, confuse themselves worse with how the politics work, and then they regulate the wrong things and put economic incentives on different wrong things."

"Well, I guess it'd be some complicated medieval systems with tons of parts and constituencies and a complicated mess of laws bumping into each other? I can see how those would be hard to deal with and cause big problems."

"Yep, pretty much. Oh, and we use first-past-the-post voting. Which has been mathematically demonstrated to be garbage, but we use it anyway."

She sighs softly and looks out the windows. "Saner country in a saner world. Gotta remember that."

There are a few more detailed murals, now. With various presumably-famous scientists in front of equations and scenes from their lives and illustrations of their inventions. There's one illustration of a man in scientific-looking glasses staring at a small, glowing orb, probably an LED. There's also an image of someone with a clipboard of some kind looking at a huge pane of glass, examining it thoroughly. And all sorts of other scientific achievements.

"Oh wow, this world puts scientists on the murals in subways? Goodness. That's... so much better." The smile in her voice is audible at this point.

"Who else could deserve it? Outside of people responsible for revolutions to introduce democracy, of course. But honestly, I think about those people kind of like scientists, and they said themselves that it'd probably be a bad idea to have murals built of them."

"You'd think that would be obvious, but my old world mostly had politicians or civil rights leaders. Usually they were on there for doing something good, but sometimes it was for doing something confused."

"Well, they're really defined by their times and their methods were really intended for their context, right? So what they did won't work next time, usually. But scientists sort of followed a process that'll work today as well, so admiring them results in less obsessing over how to stop those dastardly coal barons and their ingenuous abuse of the Common Infrastructure Investment Act of 1811."

"Exactly. 'Take a guess, test your guess, take notes about how your guess held up, repeat' is a fundamental process that holds up in lots of places on lots of topics and in lots of time periods. It's a pretty great thing to grow up admiring. I think my old world would suck less if kids grew up admiring that."

"Yeah, and that's something you'll need to keep doing during your transition, together with keeping up with your blood work to let you use the hormones safely while achieving the right dosages."

She nods and smiles, getting off the train as she reaches the subway station closest to the doctor's office. Out into the sunlight she goes, looking for landmarks and signs.