The neighborhood of this house has big, treeful plots and twisty roads and steep slopes. There's a swingset and a sandbox in a backyard next door but nobody's playing in them at the moment.

Denice hangs out for a few minutes, but only a few. She puts her moth wings back before going in, and goes to cuddle up to Winona.

Winona is happy to put a wing over Denice while she types things and reads things.

It's really nice.

Winona occasionally talks to herself under her breath while she's working. "No, of course not, I only told you four times..." "Ohhhh, the ACLU, why was I - okay -" "Springfield Illinois it's Illinois..."

She doesn't interrupt but she does listen.

"Did we learn nothing from Mylene Lavoisier..." "Oh no you don't you stuffed suit." "Right, illegible chart, you're a job for Billie..."

(She does snuggle a little closer when Winona seems frustrated, though.)

Wing snuggle. "You're a cuddly kiddo, aren't you."

Yeah.

She'll stop if it's bothering her, though, it's fine.

"It doesn't bother me one bit. I've got enough limbs to type and snuggle at the same time." Winona kisses the top of Denice's head.

(What a good adult. How lucky she is.)

"Turn your spellchecker on, Denise," mutters Winona, scrolling through an email.

She freezes for just a moment, hearing her name in that tone.

"- Janet?"

She's okay.

She used to know somebody with that name.

"Oh. Not a good memory, I take it?"

Not a bad one. It's complicated.

"All right. Would you rather I start calling my co-worker something else? I could call her Ms. Kapoor."

It'll be okay, as long as Winona doesn't mind her maybe being a little twitchy.

"I don't want to spook you."

It won't spook her.

She cuddles back up.

"Okay." She finishes reading Denise Kapoor's email and replies without muttering to herself at all and then switches tabs and reads an article on magical girls and school uniforms in a school in Springfield, Illinois.

The article page catches her eye; she reads along.

Apparently a magical girl called Kalisha Weber is currently suspended from her middle school because she refuses to change her body mods (she has hooves that they're "concerned will damage the floors" and a tail that they think will "provoke inappropriate gazes") and to wear the school uniform (she prefers to have all her spells all the time and to do this wants to wear her pink and gold dress). The case is extra interesting because the same girl previously came under attack for having poofy natural hair that "blocked others' view", eventually had it relaxed to comply with faculty orders, and has now restored it to its former poofy glory by magic; additionally, most high profile cases like this are of Thaumatologist kids who can fall back on religious discrimination law, but Kalisha is a Baptist.