Ajs An'hlj fell in love with everyone she met. It was the curse of her species, or at least so she was told. Traditionally, the Hajarans would have large mating rituals in which partners were chosen for each other at random. The two mates would meat each other for the first time on stage, their hearts (which were attached at the shoulder) pounding with love for each other, the lottery announcer, and every member of the audience. Their hearts would pulsate, changing from their typical purple to red whenever they saw their mates, a barista, the post officer-- anyone, really. It was only when they were alone that the pulsating abated, because the curse of the Hajarans had yet another effect: They had to love everyone except for themselves.

Ajs, despite being far away from her homeland, could not escape the curse. From the moment she left her apartment, her heart would begin pulsing and flaring. She lived in a large city-planet, Sahreyn, inhabited by many different species. But despite this diversity, her pulsing, glowing heart still got a lot of stares in the street. And when Ajs stared back, her heart would pound with so-called love for those strangers, who would simply scoff at her and move along with their lives.

One day, as Ajs was walking to work, she caught a stranger staring at her with exceptionally purple eyes. When she looked at him, her heart stopped its throbbing. It rested on her shoulder, perfectly still.

At first she was frightened. If she didn't love this man, and she loved everyone else, then he must be an awful person. But he didn't seem to be too bad. Ajs watched as he picked up someone's hat that had fallen to the floor and handed it back to them. No, he wasn't bad.

Then she realized that she might be the problem. She whipped around, looking for another person. Could her heart be broken? She caught another passerbys gaze and her heart began to throb once more. Satisfied, she looked back at the purple eyed stranger, this time with curiosity instead of fear. Again, her heart's pulsating stopped.

Ajs needed to know who this person was, and why he affected her heart in the way that he did. She made her way through the street to the corner where he stood, clicking away on his callpad. She never took her eyes off him, and her heart didn't even throb once. A sense of excitement and joy filled her body as he put down his callpad and met her eyes with his own. "Hello." He said.

"Hi." Ajs responded, an irrational joy building up inside her. "I'm Ajs. Ajs An'hlj." She held her hand up and he did the same.

"I'm Corren." He looked just as at ease as she felt.

"Hey, I'm sorry if this is rude..." He started. Ajs prepared herself for the worst. Ajs prepared herself for the worst. "May I touch your shoulder-thing?"

Ajs sucked in a breath. Back at Hajara, this was a common gesture. Nobody ever asked permission. But in Sahreyn, no one knew about Hajaran customs. No one even knew to ask. Hajara was a small, far away planet. No one had ever asked Ajs any sort of question like Corren had. She felt flattered, and at the same time something new, something she didn't yet understand.

"I'm sorry if that was insensitive." Corren said apollogetically. "It was very inconsiderate of me."

"No no no! I was just surprised, that's all." She smiled at Corren. He sighed in relief and she felt a roll of emotion deep within her stomach.

"Here." She pushed her shoulder (and her heart) towards him. He reached his hand out tentatively. At first when he touched her heart, it was so gentle that she barely noticed. But when they shared another glance, and she gave him a nod of approval, he began to stroke it. Ajs sighed. If felt so good to have someone who seemed to think her heart wasn't a deformity. She hadn't met anyone in the city who even spoke to her without staring in disgust at her heart. But Corren so was innocently and genuinely curious that it made her forget. With him, she felt as calm and happy as when she was alone. And her heart wasn't throbbing like it usually did around people. It was such a nice feeling.

Corren cleared his throat. "Hey, um, again, really, don't answer if I'm being awful and insensitive, but what... is it?" He asked sheepishly. Ajs smiled. He was adorable.

"It's my heart." She said.

"Your heart?" His eyes were wide. Maybe she shouldn't have told him, but he had every right to know.

"Yeah." She said, stepping away from him and looking down.

"No! No. I think it's really neat." Corren held his hand up. "Really." He said, his purple eyes shining as they met her shy ones.

Ajs smiled. "Well, if you say so."

"Really, I do. I think you're absolutely intriguing, Ajs." She blushed. No one had ever called her intriguing before. Weird? Yes. Primitive? Yes. Unsightly? Her old boss kept her in a storage closet instead of a cubicle because he was worried she would frighten the other employees. Intriguing? In a way as kind and sweet as Corren had said it? Never. But it felt good. It sat in her stomach, warm and hopeful.

"Thank you, Corren." She said. "I think you're wonderfully intriguing too."

"So? Do you want to go for a coffee? Let's turn some of this intrigue into knowledge." He smiled, and Ajs returned it. She was smiling so much more than usual around Corren.

"Alright." She sighed. "There's a good place about a block away. Shall we?"

They walked off, chatting. Ajs never took her eyes of Corren, not even to order her coffee. She never realized how good it felt for the throbbing to be gone.

You see, the Hajarans don't really fall in love with everyone they met. The throbbing of their heart was simply a signal that another person was looking at them. The lack of throbbing meant something far more important. It was long thought that Hajarans couldn't love themselves, but in fact the opposite was true. They loved themselves more than any other species ever could. And it was only when someone could love a Hajaran as much as they loved themself that their heart could ever stop throbbing.

Ajs An'hlj thought she knew what love was. But the pulsing of an external organ meant absolutely nothing. It was only when it stopped its throbbing that she realized what love was, or rather what love could be. It came from the inside, not from the still purple heart that was attatched at the shoulder of Ajs An'hlj.