[Do you want to borrow a book?]

[...Um. Sorry? I, uh, may occasionally forget that it is biologically possible to pass the age of six without learning to read.]

[It's okay.]

[...Do you want to learn?]

What a very quiet panic attack that is.

[Or not!!! Not is fine!!!]

Yeah, that doesn't particularly help.

She curls up in a ball again.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

Yes, that.

She's trying to stop - rather desperately, in fact - but not managing it yet.

--Edie is going to go sit down on her bed and pick up a book and read it and not pay any attention whatsoever to whether Denice is having a panic attack. 

That helps, some. It still takes her a while to get her emotions back under control.

She looks up, when she finally does: carefully, so as not to attract attention, checking to see what Edie is doing.

Still has her nose buried in the book. 

Well, she's certainly not going to interrupt her. She adjusts to a slightly more comfortable position and waits.

Eventually she looks up.

[I'm sorry for scaring you.]

[It's okay.]

[I don't know what kind of thing would make that scary but it's--that's bad. That's really really bad.]

She gives a wry grin. [It was really, really bad, there.]

[I am very angry with them.]

That's only a little scary, but scary is the thing that it is; she sends an impression of it not being safe.

[Scary for whom? They can't hurt me.]

[Yeah. But it still feels unsafe.]

[Yeah.]

[I want it to stop.]

[Where is it?]