Okay. And back on it goes: intrigue intrigue intrigue the one in the blue is about to stab that one villain.

That makes it a little less startling. She shuffles a little closer to Pradnakt keeping her eyes focused on the play.

Carefully broadcasted (with telepathy if necessary) arm around shoulders?

There's a tiny, very definitely reflexive flinch, before Rhoda leans very slightly against Pradnakt. (She's not entirely sure she likes physical contact, but she still feels strangely...comforted by this.)

Yeah. Good.

Stabbing! He sings! He dies! His plots unravel and the heroes win the day.

Apparently people take long enough to die to sing. But that's fine. It's pretty. She's obviously enthralled by it, if occasionally perplexed by it. Completely unconsciously, she settles more firmly against Pradnakt's side, smiling slightly to herself.

Awwwwww.

Want to watch it again, or one of the others?

She thinks about that. The...cats? she requests cautiously, not sure she's remembering the word right.

Sure.

This doesn't involve unsnuggling; she has telekinesis.

Rhoda certainly doesn't complain. Just watches the holo-viewer avidly, clearly fascinated (and a little bit of desire to take it to pieces to try and figure out how it works, carefully quashed).

This one's animated; the cats are primarily strays, though there are a couple of pet cat characters. It has slapstick - the cats try to hunt mice, but the mice have their territory humorously booby trapped and are never in any real danger - and comedy - the puns really don't translate, but Pradnakt notes when the laugh track is responding to one - an a reasonable amount of plot - a lost pet from the other side of town needs help finding his way home, one of the cats decides to move in with a human family and then needs help escaping when she changes her mind, a scary human's daughter starts putting food out for them and they have to figure out how to get it without him noticing them, one of the cats plays a prank on another without realizing how cruel it is and has to be convinced to apologize.

Rhoda can't seem to figure out whether or not the cats are creepy or cute. Regardless of ability to understand, she seems to get drawn in, not quite laughing, but reacting to the plot the way most kids probably would. But the idea of one of the cats not understanding how cruel something was seems to upset her. (Although she doesn't seem to understand why someone would need convinced to apologise for something.)

Sometimes people have trouble understanding what other people like, like that, she explains when the episode ends. Solan's a joker, and doesn't mind when the other cats play jokes on him - the other ones that I don't have show that a little better - so it wouldn't bother him if someone did that to him, and a lot of the time people have trouble understanding that other people are bothered by different things than they are. And then he didn't want to apologize because he didn't think he did anything wrong; he thought Tanner was wrong to be upset and should have just stopped.

She mulls that over. Then nods, because that does make things clearer, and more understandable. She still doesn't...like it. But she doesn't find it as upsetting as she had.

Yeah. It's not nice, and it's not okay, but it is true. And it does help sometimes to realize that someone might not have meant to hurt you, in a situation like that.

She nods thoughtfully. Which is about the point that she realises how much weight she's leaning against Pradnakt and goes very still, watching the woman out of the corner of her eyes.

It's all right. Cuddling's nice.

She does the thing where she doesn't quite relax while a lot of the tension leaves her. I- No-one ever- Before this... (She'd never had any desire to before this either, hadn't realised that physical contact didn't always hurt.)

Yeah.

Touch is - complicated, a lot of the time; if someone touches you when you don't want them to that can be bad even if it doesn't hurt. But I'm not going to, and I don't mind being touched, usually. And it helps with some things, on top of just being nice a lot of the time. Like relaxing.

She smiles a little, and actively snuggles in a little bit. {I...this, it's...nice,} she admits, quietly, like she's imparting a closely held secret. (Which for her, she kind of is.)

Yeah. She gives her a little squeeze, and after a moment puts the poetry collection on.

Which certainly enthrals Rhoda. She might not understand the words, but she continues to enjoy the cadence and rhythm. (Apparently though, her brain is of the opinion that Pradnakt's voice is better, even if this is good.)

She has some of them - maybe a third - memorized well enough that she can recite along.

Oh, that's nice. Rhoda closes her eyes - able to better focus on the tones and rhythms, breathing out a content sigh - but doesn't even doze, definitely very focused on the reciting.

It's over all too soon.

Getting kind of late - do you want a snack, or just do dinner a bit early?