"So I'm the third flower," she teases.

"If you really insist on stretching the metaphor."

"It's fun!"

"Well, that's the important thing."

Giggle!

"Run along and feed the kitties, then. I'll clean up our research here."

"Kay!!!"

And off!

Anakin feeds all the cats - she's very prompt about this every day (they don't exactly let her forget) and then combs out the ones with long hair and then all of them to be fair, and plays with Lala (who's the youngest and keeps annoying the older cats with all her energy), and makes sure their liter boxes are clean while she's at it, and scritches Coti (who's older and cuddlier and doesn't move around too much).

And then, two cats following in her wake, she goes to find her mama for evening cuddles and stories.

Her mama is emerging from her study and into the family room when Anakin comes in. (One of the cats, Stripey, very promptly abandons Anakin to wind around mama's ankles.)

"Hey fuzzball," she says, ruffling Anakin's hair. (She's been doing that the last two years, ever since Anakin had to get her head shaved due to Unfortunate Childhood Decisions shortly after their arrival on the planet. Anakin's first pet decided to move in around the same time, an at the time extremely fuzzy and slightly mangy baby great cat who's since floofed out nicely, which probably encouraged it. Anakin and her cat - Dagger - looked pretty similar back then.)

(Dagger, of course, is currently taking up a solid two thirds of the couch, plopped right in the middle.)

Anakin laughs and bats at her mama's hand. "I'm not fuzzy anymore!" she fake-complains, then hugs mama and then immediately goes to climb on top of Dagger, shoving the giant cat aside enough she can squeeze in with room for mama if mama sits half under Anakin. 

(Grumble grumble yaaaawwwwn - showing off their massive fangs.)

Palpatine has a fairly healthy respect for those fangs, and of the fact that Anakin's the only one Dagger will allow to manhandle them, so she stays back until a space is cleared.

At which point she scoops up her daughter with the Force so she can sit down. 

Giggle shriek!

And she drops Anakin into her arms. 

She giggles some more, squirming until she's in a good cuddle position. 

Hair ruffle.

"How was your day?"

"Good, mama! Elesse told me we're going exploring and I did research!" Anakin waits only half a second for mama's inevitable interested noise before launching into an excited and long winded recount of everything they discovered. 

She's got the rhythm of encouraging Anakin to keep chattering down pretty well, staring at her daughter with a soft smile and an interested expression, asking questions if Anakin seems to be getting tongue tied.

She eventually runs out of new things to say about the research. Very eventually. 

Which leaves room for Anakin's own questions! Like what mama knows about the exploring, and like, "Are you and Elesse gonna get married mama?"

She bops Anakin's nose. "You know not to go behind Elesse's back to ask me for things she said no to, fuzzball."

Pout!

"This is kinda different," she grouches. But, well, mama has a point. Still, she hasn't asked: "Do you wanna marry Elesse?"

"Marriage is pretty complicated," she says, resting her chin on top of Anakin's head. "Palpatine can't get married, certainly, at least not without a lot of politics getting in the way, and that's not something our family is."

"But I think you mean to ask if I want a romantic relationship with Elesse, don't you?"

(Mama mostly does the putting her chin on Anakin's head thing when she wants to try having very few obvious emotions, so Anakin tries not to grumble about it too much.)

She does frown, though. "I guess, yeah? But I think you guys should get non-Naboo married. You don't have to be Palpatine for it."

"You're right that I don't."

"But that's not the type of relationship Elesse and I agreed to after I had you, and it's not the kind we've had since."

"You can renegotiate though, can't you?"