"I want a haircut."

We're having lunch at a nice little tea room. My universe doesn't have tea rooms anymore. They were exclusive female enclaves, dedicated to refinement and dainty food. I feel like a bit of a moose let loose among gazelles. I'm surrounded by genteel looking women, sleek and fluffy variety. It's mostly twos, usually one older, one younger. Are there really this many mothers taking their daughters to lunch?

Lois seems to be well known here. Well, why not? She's a fairly big shot journalist, especially in Metropolis. Lots of the other ladies are watching us, not being too concerned about hiding it. I'm getting a lot of stares, and I'm beginning to wonder if maybe I shouldn't have given in and at least worn a blouse instead of a man's style shirt.

When we're seated, the waitress brings two menus, handing the first to Lois. As I reach for mine, Lois puts a hand on my arm. "Here, take this one." She then takes the second menu.

The waitress blushes. "I'm sorry, Miss Lane. I thought..." she gestures at me.

"Yes, it's a little confusing, but interesting," Lois replys. Well, confusing, anyway. I have no idea what they're talking about, and am too hungry to wonder for long.

I study the menu eagerly. As I'd thought, grandma food, if your grandma had a very picky, delicate digestion. Cream soups, watercress sandwiches, fruit salads... I figure I might get enough, if I eat half the stuff listed. But there's something peculiar about this thing. "Lois, my menu doesn't have any prices on it," I whisper.

"I know. Pick what you want. There isn't anything on the menu I can't afford."

"Yeah? Well, maybe I don't want you to think that I'm a cheap date." She gives me a real funny look. "Joke, joke. Okay, let me see. It's pretty hard to screw up a club sandwich, I guess. Does it come with fries?"

The waitress smiles at me. "It can. Nice to see you have a healthy appetite." Lois shoots her a semi nasty stare, for no discernable reason. After the waitress leaves with our order, I broach the subject of a haircut again.

Lois shakes her head. "Oh, c'mon, just a cheapy. I don't need styling, I just want to chop this off." I grab my fluffy ponytail and wag it. "I look like a demented Clydesdale here."

"I think you should keep it, at least for awhile. You won't be able to just change your mind if you lop it off, you know."

"It's hair," I argue. "It'll grow back."

She's adamant. "No. I think you're just trying to reinvent yourself for your new environment. You need to take a little time to adjust before you go rocketing off with radical changes."

"Lois, this isn't all that radical," I complain. "It isn't far off how I dress at home. There, the guy clothes are more feminine, and the girl clothes are more masculine. This is the closest approximation I can find to my ususal style." I rethink. "All right, you can't really call it style. Style implies that there's some thought put into it. I generally just wear what's comfortable. That was the original purpose of clothing, anyway. Comfort and protection. There's nothing very protective about a dress. Leaves you open to the world from the ground up, at the mercy of a good breeze."

"I'm sure there's more to it than that."

"Oh, sure. If you want to get into the whole cultural thing. Clothing is also a way of attracting a mate, but I'm not really concerned with that." I laugh, tugging on my button down collar derisively. "Who'd want to mate with me?"

The little waitress is back with our food. She jumps for some reason, and knocks over my water glass. It's part empty, but a thin, cold dribble lands on my leg, and I jump up, yipping. "Oh, I'm so sorry!" she babbles.

"S'okay." I try to keep my teeth from chattering.

"No, I am so sorry! Here." She grabs my napkin and begins trying to dry the wet spot.

"Um, that's all right."

"This'll just take a second." She's gripping my waistband with one hand, the other stroking the napkin down my thigh.

"SHE SAID THAT'S ENOUGH." Lois doesn't yell, but when she says that... well, it's in all capitals, and her voice is colder than the water ever thought about being. The waitress mops up the spilled water and leaves, very pink. I watch her go, puzzled. Why on earth did I have a sudden mental flash of Superman just now?

"No haircut," Lois says firmly. "Not now."

I start munching my french fries, snapping at them sulkily. "Yes, mother."

"And don't pout."

"Huhn." I pour ketchup on my plate and draw patterns in it with a french fry before I nibble the end off it.

"Scribe..."

I lean back in my chair, crossing my arms, and make my voice singsongy, "Whaaa-at?"

"You're a brat, you know that?"

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but labels just make me more tacky."

"Look, we'll go out tonight, okay? Will that make you happy?"

I consider. "Yeah." I perk up and begin eating in earnest. I notice a young woman at the next table smiling at me in what looks like a conspiratorial way. Her older companion is shaking her head with a rueful grin at Lois. The look she's giving her is sort of Kids! What's the matter with kids today? I'm beginning to realize that no matter how closely it resembled my own world, there's a lot of subtleties I'm probably missing. It's a good thing I have Lois around to keep me from doing anything that might land me in a rubber room or jail cell.

The next stop is the Daily Planet. Big thing. Must be on the level of The New York Times, or the Washington Post, or one of those other big a... large urban newspapers. Lois takes me right up to the managing editor's office. The name on the frosted glass door is Perry White.

He's a little more rugged than the comic books have led me to believe, sort of like Brian Dennehe. I shake hands enthusiastically. I really respect anyone who can hold down a job like this. He gives my outfit a puzzled look, glancing at Lois for an explanation. She shrugs. "Superman has told me about your problem. I'm willing to give you a job under two conditions. One: you actually work. You can start out as office help, running errands till we find out where you fit in."

"Hunky dorey." I'm glad to have a place to use my store of antique expressions. No one around here ever lifts an eyebrow. "What else?"

"You let us do a series of articles about you, and your life here. Miss Lane and Clark Kent can collaborate on it."

I frown. "Oh, c'mon. Who's gonna be interested in reading about me?"

Perry looks at Lois, and she says, "She really believes that."

"Miss Scribe, you're from another dimension."

"Well, there is that. But it's not like we have magic, or dragons, or space travel... Wait, we do have that. It's just that it's expensive, and it sucks. If you honestly think it won't bore you readers stiff, go for it. But it might be more exciting to have extra articles on, say, bake sales."

I'm introduced around the staff room next. Look, I guess I shouldn't use too many pop culture references, for literature's sake, since they'll date. But what the hell? I don't expect this to be high school required reading forty years from now. Jimmy Olsen looks like a red headed Ewan McGregor. A hell of a lot cuter than the comic books, and he doesn't have nearly that squeaky clean of an aura. In fact, he looks like a cheeky devil.

Then there's Clark Kent, AKA Youknowwho. I'm introduced by Lois, who gives no indication that she'd pinched his red and blue clad butt last night. He shakes hands politely, like he's never tried to stroke my tonsils with his tongue. I find it all a bit surreal. I feel like saying, "For God's sake, people, it's a suit, glasses and combed back hair! It ain't like he's wearing foam latex appliances." But I go along with it. Maybe in this universe glasses cause vision problems in everyone but the wearer. Outing his secret identity could have real consequences for him, so I do the "I'm so proud to meet you" bit.

I have a quick typing test to see what I'm capable of handling. Sitting down to the old upright is a blast of deja vu all its own. I learned on an old Royal, and I always kind of miss the machine gun rattle. The hushed patter of fingers on a keyboard just isn't the same. Of course there are drawbacks. No backspace erase, no delete. I'm going to have to once again struggle with carbon copies and correction tape. They don't even have White Out here. I think, *Damn, if I just knew the formula to that, I wouldn't have to work. I'd end up one of the richest bleeping women around.* But I'm one of those people who know that things work, but I'll be blamed if I can tell you how. My results are acceptable, and typing up copy is added to my list of future duties.

I'm excited about going out this evening. I never got out as much as I wanted at home. Mom doesn't complain, but she'll always be sitting up when I get home, no matter how late. Guilt is a wonderful restraint.

That afternoon I almost manage to do something about my hair on my own, but Lois walks in and catches me before I can start sawing through the clump I have clenched in my hand. I guess I should have locked the bathroom door. "Scribe! Give me those immediately." I sigh and hand over the scissors. "What is wrong with you? You would have butchered yourself."

"But I need to do something with this mess," I whine. Did I whine? I never whine. But I did this time. I guess I'm acting a little differently away from home.

She reachs for the hair spray. "If you'll just let me..." I put a towel over my head. "Oh, all right. Let's get it wetted and see what we can do." I drench my hair and allow her to work all the tangles out of it, till it lays over my shoulders in a heavy, damp sheath. "Let's see... braids are more controllable. We could do one on each side, then coil them up here." She cups a hand on either side of my face, looking at the effect in the mirror.

"Oh, no--not the Princess Leia look. I always thought it looked like she had two coffee rolls strapped to her head. Uh uh."

"Well, we could just let them hang in back."

"Heidi. I'm a little old for that."

"Damn, you're hard to please."

"But I'm worth it."

She clears her throat. "Okay. One braid. Starts here." She touches my temples on either side, then movs them back. "Goes back here to one tight braid."

I consider, then nod. "That'll work."

"Okay. Hold still." She works patiently, scraping and combing and sorting and twisting. At last she's done. I turn my head back and forth, studying the effect. Curly strands are already escaping, but its much more tamed than usual.

"It's okay, I guess. I'm never gonna win a beauty contest, but it's okay."

"Nonsense, Scribe. You're a pretty woman."

I look at her sharply. "Nice is nice, Lois, but don't lie to me. I'm not by any stretch of the imagination pretty. It doesn't bother me." I examine myself again. "Actually, I'm not sure what I am. I'm not ugly, either. My face is too hard to be soft, and too soft to be hard. Well," I consider a bit more. "I've talked about pretty men before. I've heard the term 'a handsome woman'. Maybe I'll settle for that. What do you think?"

She gets very busy, combing my long strands of hair out of the brush. Then she winds them into a little ball, fluffing it thoughtfully before depositing it almost gently in the wastepaper basket. "I think that might be an appropriate term. Now go wait in the livingroom while I get ready."