He drops his head a little more heavily into her lap, eliciting a faint squeak from the Octoplushie as he rolls his head into her fingers. At the other end of the bed his tail beats rhythmically.

"I am tired," he points out again. "I played outside and inside and I chased rabbits and I splashed in the lake and I chewed on my toy."

And maybe if Dug were a person with any sense of human tact that would be it, but he's not and it isn't.

"And you are sad. Why are you sad?"