I am Commander Shepard of the SSV Normandy.

I'm going to sound like a little girl in this entry, but I met someone. The asari we rescued from Therum is both beautiful and innocent, despite being nearly four times my age. I've never met anyone like her and I'm not sure how I feel about her. Well, there's a definite attraction, and I feel it's somewhat reciprocated. She's a girl (obviously, as the asari are mono-gendered) and an alien (obviously, as the asari are aliens). No other girl has ever intrigued me like Liara. I don't know why, but I've never been with another girl, I've been attracted to other women and I've definitely seen beauty in women, but with Liara it's much more than being attracted to her and seeing her beauty. I guess I'd just never thought about it that much. While I'd say I was bisexual, I've never acted on it. Like I said, I'm sounding like a little girl, and I feel like I'm going through puberty again, not knowing which side of the fence I'm truly on.

The Lieutenant is a nice guy and the only real possibility other than Liara on the Normandy, but he's just not my type. That and the rules on fraternisation in the Alliance. But Liara isn't Alliance, and there's just something about her. It doesn't help that whenever I talk to her, she brings up 'the myth of asari promiscuity' and how the asari reproduce. She seems to want to point out that most asari aren't whores and that it's possible that we could 'meld.' It sounds kinda disgusting, but I can't say I'm not curious. It's almost as if she's trying to persuade me into a relationship in her own awkward way. At the same time, it's stupidly endearing. I find it hard not to tease her so she gets flustered and I get that weird, pleasant feeling in my stomach. (Or is it in my intestines? I'm going to ask Dr Chakwas about that weird feeling.)

I don't know how I feel about it all, either. I'm fairly sure I'm the first human she ever saw in real life, and therefore the first human who'd ever spoken to her. To her, I'm exotic. To me, she's kinda just another asari. The most beautiful asari I've ever seen, but the point still stands. I've interacted with asari before, so it's hard to compare how I see her to how she sees me. She's spent the last 50 years researching the Protheans, so it'd be safe to say she's been fairly isolated from humanity since even before we were invited to join the Citadel. I'd also rescued her from possibly the most vulnerable position she's ever been in, so there's also that. (I'm sure there's a term for a rescued individual falling for their saviour, but I'm fucked if I know what it is off the top of my head.) I just think that if she is attracted to me, she's not attracted to me personally, but rather to what I am to her: an exotic alien savior. Does she even think I'm good looking? This sucks.

Oh God, I sound like a little girl. I knew writing this was a bad idea.

I'm getting ahead of myself. Liara just seems awkward and maybe she isn't attracted to me at all. Like most people who try to get close to me, I am short with her, and I've already kinda yelled at her. She has these big blue eyes that break my heart whenever she's sad, so I'm going to have to not make her sad any more. God dammit. I have no problems being short with anyone else. Heck, Williams pisses me off every now and then and she just brushes it off with a resolute, 'Aye, aye, Commander.' Wrex seems to respect that I'm not scared of him. Tali, Garrus and Kaidan never seem to do anything to piss me off. Liara is just a civilian, so she isn't used to being yelled at like Williams. The military teaches you a lot of things, but they're useless at teaching you how to deal with love.

LOVE!? What the fuck? I'm not even deleting that, I'm leaving that there as a warning that I'm getting ahead of myself, here.

All I have to say about my apparent attraction to an asari is thank God quarians wear those helmets all the time, because I can't deal with being physically attracted to another female alien. Seriously, Tali's voice is beautiful. And those hips!

So much has happened since Eden Prime, but the thing that seems to be troubling me the most is that I might have become a xenophile. I need to refocus on the mission, and I need to stop looking at Liara's butt whenever she walks past me. Maybe that's it. Maybe it's just lust and I'm dealing with it weirdly because it's been so fucking long.

Maybe I just need to sort myself out (a 'self-induced relief event' as a friend once called it) and get past it all.