"It seems to have worked out really well on several levels."

"I'm glad."

"Thank you again for being so accommodating."

"It's no trouble," she says sincerely.

Annie smiles, and then goes to flop on Edie again. Because Edie.

But it is late and eventually they will need to go to bed.

Separate beds. For now.

That's okay. They are not so far apart that Annie cannot "watch" Edie breathe until she falls asleep.

True, true.

...Unfortunately the next day is a school day.

"I'm pretty sure I'll be okay," Annie says when this is explained to her. "I don't think I need to be around you constantly."

"Okay, good. If you have problems when I'm gone let me know and we'll figure something out?"

"Yeah. I think I'll be all right though. Have a good day." Kiss.

Kiss! Boring public schooling!

Annie experiments gingerly with cooking things with her weird sense; nothing catches fire. She finishes The Hobbit. She notebooks. She avoids fretting too much about Edie.

And eventually school lets out. "How was your day?"

Hug! "It was fine, I missed you but I didn't melt or anything. I made stew for lunch and there's some left. Has meat and no dairy in it."

"Cool. I have homework, ugh, but it's all stuff I have to do longhand instead of on the computer so I can totally cuddle you while doing it."

"Oh good." Annie picks a new book off the shelf - turns out there's more Shakespeare, who knew - and cuddles up.

There's way more Shakespeare! "Done the Hobbit? How'd you like it?"

"It was good but I liked Much Ado better."

"On its own merits or because I suggested it?"

"...the first but I'm not sure the second didn't contribute."

"Fair enough. Shakespeare is bloody brilliant, regardless."

"The words just all sort of snap together."

"Is that a comment on the aesthetics or on how it interacts with your language magic?"

"The aesthetics. The language magic seems to handle his dialect just as natively as it does yours, but he's doing cool stuff with the underlying sound of them."