Very happy mush.

And when he's finished, his breath still not quite caught, he says in half a gasp: "Get lost, Bella, we're taking that break now."

Bella writes down the time. And she goes up the stairs, and closes the door.

They are not especially quiet down there.

Bella and Andi will be up in their room on the top floor working on the clothes thing. Also they will - probably not coincidentally - have on loud music to see how this interacts with understanding thoughtspeech.

When next they venture downstairs, Ethan will be sitting on the couch drinking tea.

And Trouble will be curled up with his head in Ethan's lap, sleeping peacefully.

Bella comes down the stairs, with her hands behind her back. "Despite her protests, Andi has been practicing morphing-in-order and has learned an adorable trick. Does Trouble want to wake up and see, do you suppose?"

"Oh, probably," says Ethan.

<Trouble! Wake up and see what I can do!>

Bella brings her hands around in front of her.

"Holy shit," says Trouble, "that's so adorable, I want to hug you but I'm afraid you'd squish. Can I hug you when you demorph?"

Even Ethan grins.

<Sure!> says Andi. <I'm not a perfect fairy. I can't fly like this and I'm pretty sure about half of me has an exoskeleton I couldn't postpone till after the wings and I can only do it one try in three. But I'm so cute!>

"You are unbelievably cute. I don't believe how cute you are."

<Bella says photographic evidence of the cute is too dangerous. It's sad.>

Ethan rather absently pets him.

<I wanna demorph now. And call it a day, I'm tired.>