Uhhh. Okay. Evelyn is kind of unsure whether to expect Deskyl to freak out or be embarrassed or anxious if she realizes she's being recorded (Evelyn hates being recorded), but she will try to mime talking, pointing at the pencilled-in English-alphabet letters and saying "I'm talking in English now," and then pointing at Deskyl's alphabet and at Deskyl herself and making a talking gesture with her hand beside her mouth. She feels utterly ridiculous in front of Christine but so be it, she can pull up her big girl pants and do it. 

She considers for a moment, and then recites a short poem, perhaps a nursery rhyme, in Basic.

And then she goes and gets the little globe that Evelyn showed her yesterday, and points to the Aurebesh and then to it. "This not this."

Christine clearly doesn't know what she means, but does look curious. "Oh! Maybe she means it's a conlang, like Klingon or something?" 

Is Evelyn supposed to know what the hell she's talking about? She will smile blandly and try to pretend she isn't some kind of ignorant plebe. 

Hmmm. Ah, okay.

She points to one of the lamps on end tables at either end of the couch, "this," and then to the sun, visible out the back door, "this. This this." She points back and forth. Then she places the globe on the table, and carefully recites: "one fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish. Evelyn here, Christine here." Looks at the adults to see if they're getting it at all.

Then she goes to the other end table with its lamp, points between the lamp and the back door, "this not this," and recites a different nursery rhyme in Basic. And then she taps her chest, "I this," pointing to the second lamp, "I go," she walks back to the first one, "I here."

Evelyn watches her intently, because Deskyl is clearly trying very hard to communicate something, that seems important to her. She isn't exactly sure why the Dr Seuss rhyme is meant to mean, what are the fish here– oh, maybe it's not intended to be meaningful so much as just 'the longest stretch of English Deskyl has memorized' - come to think of it, the thing she said in her own language had the cadence of a nursery rhyme too... 

She does follow that Deskyl is using the lamp as a prop to mean the sun. It's very clever! ...And then Deskyl goes to the other table and points at the other lamp and says 'this not this' and Evelyn can't help but make the leap.

Deskyl isn't just claiming the language isn't from here. She's claiming that...she, herself, is from another planet...? 

Evelyn has several dozen clarifying questions and also the last thing she wants to do is have that conversation in front of fucking Christine. 

Who continues to look politely puzzled. After a few moments, she glances over at Evelyn. "You've spent more time with her, do you...?" 

Deskyl will probably (rightly) be upset and hurt if Evelyn pretends not to have any idea what she's trying to say. She looks over at Deskyl, gives her a reassuring smile and tries, almost certainly unsuccessfully, to communicate via eyebrows alone that they should talk about this properly LATER. 

"I think what she's trying to say is that she came here from another planet," Evelyn says, as neutrally as she can. She is mostly not even assessing the question of whether she believes Deskyl, but she wants Deskyl to know that she's really trying to listen and understand, and she also isn't at all expecting Christine to believe that it's literally true. 

Christine smiles at Deskyl. "How imaginative!" 

Evelyn...had not really expected a different reaction, but also, ugh. "Christine, why don't we come back to this later? We have a lot to cover." How is Deskyl reacting? 

She's watching both adults carefully, with her attention more on Evelyn.

Evelyn gives her a reassuring smile. "We'll come back to it, Deskyl, I won't forget."

She turns back to Christine. "Thank you for figuring out the specialist appointment. I'm going to need permission from social services to book her for a regular doctor's appointment with my pediatrician, and dental check-up. And where are we at on the language tutoring? She's making a lot of progress - actually, maybe what I could use is advice on working with her at home, I've never done this before. I'm wondering if we could arrange something sooner," and at a cheaper pricetag for Social Services, presumably, "if I can just have a call with someone knowledgeable who could send me some resources to use at home?" 

Christine looks thoughtful. "You'd be up for doing that? It would certainly simplify things, and - you're right, I can already see she's made progress, one-on-one tutoring might be redundant by the time we can find someone. I think the best advice for young people is immersion, anyway, we should consider getting her in regular school as soon as she has basic comprehension down and can communicate her needs in the classroom." 

Evelyn isn't sure how much of that Deskyl would have followed, so she turns to smile at her. Or whether she knows what school is given how she might be from another planet. "Deskyl, Christine thinks you would learn faster if we brought you to a place with lots of children your age and a teacher." 

"Uh?"

Evelyn shakes her head apologetically. "Sorry. Christine, I'll try to explain it to her later with visual aids, that usually works well. It'll be a few weeks anyway, I want to make sure to prepare her for it."

Christine nods. (Christine is capable of picking up on conversational subtext.) "Of course. It seems like I should leave you two to get to it - let's just get everything signed?" She passes Evelyn the folder of paperwork. 

(Okay, well, that's some kind of progress, she's pretty sure. She sits back down.)

Whatever Evelyn might think of Christine's other qualities as a person, she always has her paperwork organized. She's even neatly marked all the little spots Evelyn needs to sign with a little X. It takes them about five minutes to sort out all the paperwork - Christine printed extra copies for Evelyn's records, which is something that the less organized half of social workers often forget - and to go through the parting pleasantries, before Evelyn sees Christine out the door. 

Aaaaaaand then Evelyn and Deskyl are in private. 

Evelyn takes a deep breath, and turns to smile at her. "You were trying to tell us something very important before, weren't you? I'm so glad you were able to do that. I'm, er, not sure I understood it right."

Because Deskyl coming from another planet seems impossible. Right? Even if there are aliens - Evelyn honestly hasn't thought very hard about whether there are aliens - they wouldn't look human, right? She remembers Jeremy complaining that Star Trek was unrealistic that way, back when he used to be into it. 

"I not..." she mimes talking, and then taps her ear.

Evelyn ducks her head. "Yeah. I'm sorry." She tries to remember the exact words Deskyl used. "You said - not from here? This not that?" Maybe they should actually just do more worksheets, Deskyl is picking up English quite fast even with Evelyn's inexpert tutoring and this conversation will be vastly easier to have once it's, well, actually a conversation. 

She picks up the little globe. "Not this, yes. ...Evelyn," she points, "Deskyl, this?"

Wow, Evelyn is really wishing right now that she had two globes. ...Hmm, there might be something in the toybox she can use as a prop. Leaving Deskyl still holding the regular globe, she hurries over and digs in it, pulling out one of those squeezy foam stress balls, this one with blue and green Earth-globe pattern on it. 

She takes it to the living room and sets it down by the first lamp. "This is here. This is the sun." She points at the lamp and then out the window at the actual sun, like Deskyl did before. "This planet is Earth. Here." She taps the stress ball and then points down at the floor. "Earth, we speak English, 'Red fish blue fish'. Evelyn is from here."

She points at Deskyl, still holding the actual globe. Wow, she's glad she isn't doing this in front of Christine, it feels right but it would be so humiliating. "Deskyl is from - where?" 

"From Echitov. English, yarva."