"The goat is out back; you can go back there, but don't go in the pen, she likes to butt."

He tries not to look too eager as he goes to look.

Yup, there's a goat back there. She trots over to see if he has anything to give her.

Well. He'd snuck a handful of the sunflower seeds earlier, he fishes them out and offers them to the goat.

She takes them politely, and then nudges him for more and/or scritches.

He offers her a few more (he still has some), and provides scritches with his other hand, smiling slightly.

Happy goat!

Happy-as-he-knows-how-to-be Nova!

Aww. Daisy leaves him be until the barn chores are all done and the goat needs to be brought in.

Nova blinks, flinches, realising he's been distracted, that he had meant to help. "M'sorry," he offers. "Should've...helped?"

"No, you should do what you want." She sounds pleased. "You were enjoying yourself, that's good."

He blinks again, opens his mouth to say something, and then just nods, a little confused.

He'll help get the goat back inside if there's anything he can do.

She's trained to voice commands, apparently; Daisy asks her nicely and she goes right in. 

He watches, a tiny smile on his lips, and ducks back into the barn himself.

The goat is already nosing at the scraps - looks like she got the leftover egg salad sandwiches, too - and Daisy gives her a pat. "You like animals, huh?"

He nods. "I- they're...easy?" he says. "Don't want much from you."

She nods. "That makes sense. I'll have to ask Pradnakt what she thinks of you spending time out here - it might be okay, if you stay in the shade. If you want to. Jasmine here definitely won't mind the company, though."

He gives a almost hopeful little smile. "'d like that," he admits quietly. "If-if it's okay?"

"I don't want you to get hurt; it's hot out here during the day, and I don't know if the shade will be enough for you. But if it's safe, yeah, of course."

He ducks his head, and kind of nods. "O-okay." (He's not used to people worrying about him like that.)

"I'll ask tonight. Do you want to do anything else before we go back in?"

He shakes his head.

"All right." She leads the way back, and gestures for him to go to the table while she goes to put away the dishes that have appeared in the drying rack.

He freezes when he spots the dishes. The only other person he's seen is Pradnakt, which means Pradnakt did those dishes. And-

And she shouldn't have. He should've-

His breath catches.

"Hey. It's all right." She takes his hand and leads him over to the table, dishes ignored for now. "Remember I said you could leave things undone, and she'd do them and not be upset about it? I meant that, it's how things work around here. We were busy, and she wasn't, and it's fine. Nothing bad happened and nothing bad is going to happen."