Joel Jones sat alone on the restaurant's patio, protected from the sudden cloudburst by his table's overhanging umbrella. The other patrons had gone inside, but he liked the coolness of the air, not to mention the solitude. Although, now that he thought about it, his solitary existence was currently his main problem in life.

Seeing a hand reach out to take one of his french fries, he grabbed the wrist and heard a shriek. As the wrist pulled back, he let go, and he was looking at a woman, a little younger than his 22 years, with long platinum blonde hair that looked gray from the rain.

"Hello," he said, hoping he sounded friendly. She looked shocked at what he had done.

"You noticed me," she said, shakily.

"You weren't exactly being stealthy, standing right in front of me while trying to steal a fry." The young woman just continued to stand there. He noticed that she wore a gray tracksuit that clung to her slim form due to its rain soaked condition. Her small nipples, obviously bra-less, poked out the front of her top in the cool air. Embarrassed, he quickly looked back up at her face. Sort of cute with a small nose and mouth, not wearing any makeup, but he favored the natural look anyway.

She still looked upset, so he gestured to the seat across from him. "I'm sorry for grabbing your arm. Please, get out of the rain. You must be cold." He deliberately made sure not to look at her nipples again, preferring to instead be a gentleman. She sat down and leaned her head forward so that it was more under the umbrella, though the position made her seem like she was interested in him, which was silly. Women were never interested in him.

"Let me order you something." He waved to the server, who hesitated only a moment before rushing out with a menu over his head to protect it from the rain.

"Yes sir?"

"You want a burger and fries too?" Joel asked her. She nodded. "Another of these for my friend, please."

The server glanced around the table and then back to Joel with a strange look on his face.

"Is there a problem?" Perhaps the server thought that the girl was homeless, Joel thought. Well, maybe she was, but... "We are paying customers."

The server paused and then responded carefully, "Another burger plate...yes sir." Then he went back inside.

Joel shook his head and then turned to the woman. "I'm Joel."

"Grey," she responded. "You can still see me?"

"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be able to see you?"

She sat there, watching him and thinking. "Is there something special about you? Are you a Talent?"

He laughed. "I wish! No, I'm incredibly unremarkable, honestly."

"Oh. I don't think you're unremarkable." She stared at him and absentmindedly cracked her knuckles.

Soon the second plate arrived. Joel had to point to the spot in front of Grey when the server looked confused as to where to put it, and then the employee left, shaking his head.

The two of them ate in silence, Grey ravenously consuming her burger first, and then slowing down to enjoy her fries smothered in ketchup. "Thank you," she said as she leaned back to pat her slim belly. The rain had stopped, but the rest of the patio was soaked so they were still the only ones out there. "Joel, I'm sorry, but soon you're going to forget me. I'm surprised you still know I'm here."

He gave her a doubtful look, half smiling.

"This is the longest conversation I've had in 10 years, I think," she continued. "I don't want it to end. Can I tell you about my life?"

He nodded.

"I was born...I think 19 years ago? An only child. I don't remember much of growing up, except for when my parents started to forget me. They'd set themselves plates for meals, but would ignore me when I came to the table. When I asked about my food, they seemed surprised that they had forgotten me. I thought that they were playing a prank, and then it started happening more and more often. Finally, it happened every meal. Outside of meal times, they just left me alone to do whatever I wanted. I didn't realize at the time that they just didn't notice me anymore. I eventually just ate the occasional bit of food from their plates.

I still went to school. I was in my early teens then, so I realized that if others weren't going to help me then I had to help myself. By the time I would have graduated, if the teachers had remembered to put my name on a diploma, my parents had completely forgotten me. I had to put a sleeping bag down in what used to be my bedroom after my father remodeled it into a home office. One day I finally managed to get their attention again, but they screamed at me like I was an intruder and I had to leave or they'd have called the police!"

There were tears rolling down her face now. Joel didn't know what to do...whether her story was true or not, she was obviously upset. He reached forward and took her hand.

She gasped at the contact and squeezed his hand tight. "You can still see me?" He nodded. "Joel...can I...can I have a hug?"

He nodded, and they got to their feet. She melted into his arms, squeezing him hard and holding on as if he'd disappear if she let up even a little.

The top of her head came to just under his chin and he rested it upon her gray-silver hair, enjoying the first hug he'd received from a woman that wasn't family.

Then he caught a whiff of her. "Um...you've been living rough for a while, huh?"

She disengaged and stepped back. "Oh, I must stink. I've been slipping into people's houses to use their facilities but it's been a few days since I bathed." Her cute face reddened with embarrassment.

"Well, I only live a couple of blocks away if you want to take a shower. I can wash your clothes too. Uh, if that's not too forward!"

Her face lit up. "That would be great!"

He paid their bill and as they walked to his apartment he told her his story. "I wasn't kidding when I said I was unremarkable. I'm also an only child too, of a bank teller and an accountant. With those backgrounds you'd think I'd be good with numbers, but I got middle-of-the-road grades and barely graduated. When my parents passed away a couple years ago I inherited their condo. I get by doing editing and other boring online things." He turned to her, but she wasn't there. "Uh, where'd you go?"

"Right here," she said from right beside him, and he jumped.

They entered his apartment and he gestured to his bathroom. She pulled her top off and revealed small but attractive breasts with tiny pink nipples.

"Um, Grey...!"

She quickly covered her chest with her arms, her pale skin turning red from embarrassment. "Oh, I'm sorry! I've just gotten used to undressing while people are around, since they don't notice me!" She rushed into the bathroom, and then a moment later she threw her track pants and panties into the hallway, where Joel collected them and took them to his clothes washer.

As she showered, she heard Joel call out from just beyond the bathroom door, "I can't turn on the washer while you're showering, but I've put some spare clothes here." Then she heard his retreating footfalls.

Grey felt a thrill that Joel still remembered her, even though she was out of his sight. How was this happening? she wondered again.

When he heard the shower stop, Joel put the clothes washer on. A few minutes later, Grey came out of the bathroom wearing the long t-shirt he had left her, but without the accompanying bottoms. "Sweatpants no good?" he asked.

"Too big," she replied. "Plus, I only really wear clothes to keep warm, and it's nice in here."

He gestured to the couch, and she sat, tucking her smooth, slim legs under her.

"Dad always kept the temperature low. 'You can't just throw money away. Put on a sweater if you're cold,'" he said, mimicking an older man's fatherly voice. "Now that this is my place, I keep it as warm as I want."

"It's nice." She noticed his eyes had moved to her legs again. "I hope you don't mind, but I used one of your razors."

His eyes snapped back to her face. "Oh, yeah, no problem, Grey. Mi casa, su casa." She smiled again and he thought she looked pretty when she did that.

He needed to get the conversation off of her legs. "So, can I ask, what other things have you been doing since you went off on your own?"

She cracked her knuckles again, which seemed to be a nervous habit. "I've...had to steal things to survive. I started doing it when I was still at home and growing out of my clothes. I would work, but you can't make a living if people don't know that you actually did labor for them, but they also don't notice the occasional bit of food or clothing missing."

He nodded, understanding.

"Sometimes I help people. I saved a cat that was trapped in a tree one time. It never even noticed me, so I was able to grab it and climb down. I've pushed a lady out of the way of an oncoming car." She frowned. "The driver didn't see me, though." She held up her arm to show a healed scar. "I learned how to sew stitches that day."

Joel kept silent. He didn't know what to say.

She continued, "Oh, just the other day, I saw a sniper in an alley taking aim at The Sentinel as he accepted an award from the mayor. I managed to shove the gunman so the shot went wide, and then once The Sentinel knew where the sniper was, he made short work of him." She smiled, self-satisfied.

"Holy shit! You're like a superhero!"

She liked the way Joel was looking at her. "I...never thought about it like that. I can't fly, and I'm certainly not invulnerable..." She rubbed her scar. "My talent is more geared toward bad things. Can you imagine what a man might do if he had the power to not be noticed?"

Joel thought for a moment. Yes, the temptation to take advantage of people, of women especially, with that power...

Then he had another thought. "You know, if a man -- or anyone else -- did have that power, how would anyone know?"

Grey gasped. "They wouldn't! Oh my God...there might be more like me out there, slipping through the cracks in society, forgotten by everyone. I thought it was just me, but..." She reached forward and took Joel's hand. "Thank you, Joel. Just the idea that I might not be alone...it helps."

She was smiling again. She smells nice, Joel thought, even though she was wearing his body wash. Then he realized how close together they were sitting and got self-conscious. He got up and went to transfer her clothes to the dryer. On the way back to the couch he was surprised to find someone sitting there. He gave his head a shake. Oh right, he thought, remembering her, she's hard to notice.

He looked out the window and saw how late it was getting. "Grey, why don't you stay the night? You can take my bed and I'll crash on the couch."

"Are you sure? I can take the couch." She cracked her knuckles again and lay back, extending her legs and unintentionally giving him an eyeful of her pale upper thighs.

He quickly turned away. "Yep! I'm sure. Let me just change the sheets and grab some extras for the couch."

Later, as she paused in the doorway of his bedroom, she called out to him, "Thank you, Joel. I'll be in here if you want to talk some more." Then she cracked her knuckles again and closed the door halfway behind her.

Joel lay on the couch, confused. Did she mean really talk, or something else? He didn't know how women's minds worked well enough to answer that.

---

Joel woke up. He had been sleeping on the couch. Why was he doing that, when he had a perfectly good bed? he wondered. Shaking his head, he took his pillow and pulled off his underwear before climbing into bed.

Grey woke up as the bed jostled. Joel was joining her! She wondered what he would do about her clumsy invitation earlier. She turned, took his face in her hands, and kissed him.

Joel felt warmth on his lips, as if he was being kissed, but no one was there. Tired as he was, he figured he was dreaming. He kissed back.

Grey felt her body tingling in anticipation. She had decided to sleep in the nude, and had removed the t-shirt Joel had given her before climbing into the comfortable bed. She pressed her naked body against his.

What a great dream, Joel thought as the unseen woman reached down and took his hardening cock into her hand.

She was awkward, not having dealt with a hard penis before, but soon she managed to figure out how to stroke it to full size. She took a breath and then climbed astride Joel, rubbing her throbbing pussy along his hard shaft.

When the dream woman got on top of him, he reached up to massage her breasts, feeling small but firm ones, with tiny hard nipples. He had a feeling of deja vu...why was he thinking of a girl in a gray tracksuit?

"Oh, Joel, that feels so good," she gasped as his hands found her breasts. Nobody had ever touched them before! The pleasure was almost overwhelming. She continued to move her pussy along his cock shaft.

Finally, Joel had enough foreplay with his dream girl. He wrapped Grey in his arms and pulled her forward to kiss her. She was happy to kiss more, as love-starved as she had been for half of her life. Then she felt the tip of his cock nestle between her very wet pussy lips.

"Um, Joel, I've never..."

He pushed her downward, spearing her pussy with a couple inches of his cock.

"Oh! Joel...wait..." She tensed her legs, thwarting his attempts to impale her further. She paused, realizing that her first time hadn't actually hurt. Her vagina felt invaded, but also strangely...right. She relaxed her legs a little, and felt another inch of him enter her. She grunted softly. Some discomfort now, but still no pain. She repeated this cycle until he was buried all the way inside her.

She felt so full inside! She had watched others make love or fuck, and had pleasured herself at the sight, but she had always wondered how it would feel.

Joel, impatient with his dream girl, started to thrust his hips.

It felt good for her, so she let it happen, a little of his penis slipping out of her before it was replaced a moment later by his full hardness. After a minute of this she assisted, lifting her hips up as he withdrew, and then when their bodies moved together again, the impact reverberated through her clitoris. "Oh, God, Joel..." she moaned. Soon they were both moving with passion, and she kissed him hard as she orgasmed.

When Joel felt his dream girl's pussy grip his cock, his own orgasm swept over him and he held her tight as he filled her with his hot sperm.

"Oh-hhh! Joelll!" Her own orgasm crested again and she shook in pleasure as she felt her recently virginal reproductive system inundated with her new beau's seed.

Then she collapsed upon him and both of them breathed heavily. Absentmindedly, she cracked her knuckle.

He heard it, and it shocked him out of his fugue state. "Grey?"

"Yes! Oh, Joel, did you forget me?" She kissed him again.

"I...I'm sorry, Grey, I did. Please forgive me." He began to cry.

She kissed his tears. "I do! I do! Oh, Joel, I love you."

He looked up at her, her pretty face haloed by her platinum gray locks. "I love you!" he realized.

They held each other. "We'll make this work," she told him.

---

Joel went about his life as he had before, doing meaningless online tasks for money, except something had somehow changed. He no longer felt alone...no longer felt that he was missing companionship, especially of the female variety.

When he went to make dinner, he found two sets of plates ready to go with hot food. That had freaked him out at first, but then he remembered Grey and she was there, smiling at him.

When he watched TV, he felt her lean her head into his chest and he absentmindedly stroked her silver-gray hair, content.

When they went to bed, Joel had the most amazing wet dreams, always of the same woman with the hair the color of a light rain cloud, reminding him of the day that he had met her.

One day, almost a year later, he heard a baby crying from the bedroom, and he rushed in to find a newborn, covered in blood. Where had it come from? He called emergency services and the child was taken to the hospital. He got a call from them later saying that they had received an anonymous tip that he, Joel, was the father, so they asked him to come in for a blood test. Sure enough, a few days later, a confused Joel brought his baby boy home after buying all the requisite things: a crib, diapers, clothes, and formula.

His dream woman had stopped making love to him, but he still felt her there next to him as he fell asleep.

He found that the boy wouldn't drink the formula, and so he took the baby to the doctor where he was told that the child was actually well-fed, and was definitely not underweight. Confused, he returned home to find a note:

My darling Joel,

I know you will forget this note, but I hope you will keep it so that you don't keep calling the doctor. I have been feeding our baby with my breast milk, so you don't need to worry about his food.

You haven't named the boy yet, I think because you don't really believe he's yours. After weeks of sex with you almost every night, it was pretty much inevitable, you know.

Sometimes I feel that you know that I am here, and other times I feel so lonely. But our son, he sees me! I'm so happy about that.

Love,
Grey

Joel blinked the tears away. "Grey."

Then she was before him, crying herself, wearing one of his long t-shirts. He dropped the note and embraced her. "I can't...it's getting harder and harder to remember you..."

"We'll make it work," she told him.

---

A few weeks later, Joel's dream woman began making love to him again, carefully at first, but no more babies arrived.

Baby Jay would often look into what seemed to be empty air and smile at his mother. When she took the child into her arms, Joel would sometimes forget the baby as well, startled to find him back in his crib later. As the boy grew and he learned to speak, Joel let him pretend that his unknown mother was there with them.

One day, a few years later, little Jay asked, "Daddy, Mommy wants to say something to you."

Joel got down to his knees. "Oh, what is it, Jay?"

The boy concentrated. "That's too much, Mommy. Okay, a bit at a time. 'Joel, after I gave birth I got an...in...infec...shun? Doctors can't see me, so I had to do my best. I think I can't have any more babies.' Oh, Mommy, that's so sad."

Joel sat down on the floor hard. How could a young child know to speak about such things? He felt that he was missing something, something important...

He heard knuckles crack, and turned to the sound. He saw her then, standing next to their son, older than he remembered, but he remembered her! She smiled at him, so pretty, and then she faded from his view and memory once more.

---

One day, Joel was watching a news story on the television. The Justice Warriors had received an anonymous tip from someone who had followed the supervillain group The Destructors back to their lair after a robbery. When the heroes had arrived, they had found the villains' defenses disabled, and managed to take them all into custody with only minor injuries. The heroes warned the public that taking such action was dangerous, but they wanted to thank whomever had done it. Joel felt proud, then, though he didn't know why. Over the years, similar things were reported, some big, like a school shooter tripping on nothing and getting knocked out somehow, and some small, such as groceries appearing as if by magic at the home of a family whose single parent had recently lost their job.

---

Joel was amazed at his son's intelligence and empathy. As Jay grew older, he got into medicine, perhaps inspired by a certain conversation with his parents where he understood that doctors could not help his mother. His specialization was in metabiology. On his father's 50th birthday he presented the older man with a syringe containing a light blue liquid. "Do you trust me, Dad?" he asked. "You know that something's not quite right in your life, but not what it is, right?"

Joel nodded and bared his arm. He felt the pinprick and a slight pressure.

"It might take a few minutes," Jay advised.

While they waited, Jay explained, "I found what's in my blood that allows me to notice Mom, and adapted it into a retrovirus. Right now it's replicating in your blood."

Joel sneezed.

Jay looked sheepish. "You may experience some cold-like symptoms."

Then Joel noticed something out of the corner of his eye, a gray blob. He turned toward it, concentrating. As he watched, it gradually clarified into a human shape, then noticeably female. Finally...

"Grey!" Joel rushed forward to embrace the mother of his child.

"You can see me!" she cried, tears streaming down her beautiful face.

"Yes!" He turned to Jay. "Thank you, son."

Jay headed to the door. "I'll leave you two alone."

Joel fiercely hugged his dream woman, squeezing her hard and holding on as if she'd disappear if he let up even a little.

"We made it work," she told him. He nodded.

---

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