How Green Becomes Wood

Daizi went upstairs, bringing Dark along with her. She did feel a bit sleepy, but wasn't really in the mood to nap, so she just brought him along to cuddle and talk privately, and that was restorative enough. One of the most difficult adjustments for them as a couple after taking in the twins, was not always being able to speak openly around each other anymore. They technically could at any point use Arabic, since the twins couldn't speak it, but it felt rude to have entire conversations in front of them, and even if it wasn't rude, sometimes what they wanted to say to each other would be uncomfortable to express in front of them--tone was, after all, an important part of conversation.

In that hour, they discussed what felt like a million different things: work, the baby, the holiday, the twins... Dark rarely took naps unless he was ill, and he wasn't, but he was just so comfortable with her he couldn't help but doze off. She lay with him for awhile, but eventually disentangled herself, because there was something on her mind, so she climbed out of bed, pulled the blanket over her husband, and as quietly as she could, left their room.

Then, she went and knocked softly on the door to the twins' bedroom, "Hey, can I come in for a minute?"
 
Alec lay on his bed, earbuds in as he listened to music, browsing images on his phone. He didn't notice Daizi's entrance at first, caught up in what he was doing and not paying attention to the world for a little while. It was nice not to let his mind wander for once, instead keeping it on a single track. One that had nothing to do with anything about the day.

Xander sat on the floor with a tiny piece of leather he'd just finished working on outside. He glanced up and picked up his things from the floor, tossing them onto the desk. "Yeah, sure, I guess." He reached over and poked Alec's shoulder. "Alec. Alec, music off."

"Hmm? Why?" Alec took out the earbuds and looked up. "Oh. Okay."

"Daizi wants to talk to us," Xander said, sitting on the edge of the bed as Alec turned off his phone and the music. Xander bit his tongue, resisting the urge to sigh, knowing Daizi would hear it. What was it now? What had they done or not done?
 
She turned slightly around in the room, "I don't know where to sit," she said, amused, "I used to sit on the desk, but now that it feels like your desk and not mine it seems rude, and I don't know if you have anything on it," Since she didn't want to sit anywhere that would make things awkward, she chose to instead lean against the wall, "I just wanted to ask how you both are doing, today. But," She put her hand on her chest and then waved it, "I also want you both not to lie to--spare my feelings, or whatever. It's not your job to worry about how I feel, it's nice that you do, but that's never something you need to stress about, and I don't want either of you to feel pressure to lie or pretend something isn't how it is, because of me, okay? Anyway, I wouldn't be upset to begin with, because I don't have a mom, so I know how this day can feel. And I know it's probably harder, because it's your first one without her."

Her voice was calm and silvery, and she used long pauses to give them both plenty of time to interject. She knew it was a difficult conversation, with complex and complicated emotions involved, so she was trying to give them space and not make them feel like she expected too much too quickly, "And... you don't have to say exactly how you're doing, or anything at all, but... I still wanted to ask."
 
Alec and Xander glanced at each other, waiting until Daizi had finished before voicing their thoughts. It gave them time to think. They hadn't expected this, though they both knew they really should have.

"We're doing fine, I guess," Xander said with a shrug, cautious but not hostile. "I don't know how you expected us to be. I mean, it's not like we're talking about the world's best mother here, so it's not really a big deal."

"It's super sweet of you to come and ask and make sure," Alec interjected.

Xander nodded. "Yeah. Nice."

"But we really are okay," Alec assured her. "It's not any different today than it was yesterday or the day before."

"Other than the fact that today is now your day, so you should spend it how you like, not worrying about a pair of troublemakers like us. You can go back to doing that tomorrow," Xander said lightly.
 
"I didn't expect anything. Grief is never so predictable. Even Dark, who has every reason in the world to feel nothing sometimes..." She shrugged, rubbing her arm, remaining soft spoken, "and it's not... now my day, it doesn't only belong to me. So I wanted to check in, because of course I'm going to worry," She smiled slightly, "I only get to celebrate today because you both are in my life. I wouldn't be, otherwise. But I just wanted to come in here and remind you both that it's okay to be okay, and it's okay to not be okay. If you feel angry, or glad, or upset, or nothing at all, or even if you don't know how you feel, that's normal. I'm glad it's not any harder today than it has been, and I hope you're being honest when you say that. I don't completely understand what this is like for you. Dark comes closer, but he can't either, and nobody ever will perfectly 'get it.' It's too personal... I suspect your personal feelings towards it differ from each other's, to some degree, because you don't share the same mind, and you aren't the same person, not that you need me to tell you that."

She shifted, wishing she could sit down. It wasn't that she was uncomfortable, physically or otherwise, she just worried she seemed distant, standing away from them, "But even though that's true, we still do understand to an extent. We can relate, you know," She held her hands together and tapped her left thumb against her right thumbnail, evidently putting a lot of thought into what she wanted to say, "even though our experiences aren't identical. They don't have to be. Dark and I are always willing to listen, if there's ever a day that feels harder, and I know I bring this up a lot, but if you ever want to speak with a professional, we'll find someone. You only have to ask, and if it's too hard to say to our faces, you can text us, if it's easier. We're always available for you both. I really do care." She wanted to warn them that some days might be harder than others, even unexpectedly, but didn't want to talk to much or overwhelm them. And she was anxious enough about saying the wrong thing, they weren't always easy to talk to.
 
Xander's hand found Alec's, and they threaded their fingers together, holding hands like small children as they kept their hands hidden down between them. Not that Daizi could see or would likely care, but it was a habit they'd developed. Hiding things from "grown-ups" had become such a fact of life for them that it was hard to do otherwise, even when they knew, logically, that they didn't have to, or even when they didn't want to. It was a primal reaction. They sat quietly listening, not shifting or squirming. Xander looked away after a while, studying a spot on the floor instead, and Alec watched Daizi's fidgeting movements. She seemed uncomfortable to him. Maybe it was harder to say than it was to hear.

"Thank you, but we'll be alright. Really," Alec said softly. "I'm sorry we bring you worry and stress, but I'm also..." He hesitated, not sure of the right word.

"Flattered," Xander finished for him.

Alec nodded. "Flattered that we are worth worrying about."
 
"No, don't apologize." It was the first thing she ever said firmly, because it was the only thing that wasn't a discussion, "You both are still, despite everything you have been through, teenagers, and it's become my job to care for you, and I take it seriously. I want you both to live exactly as is comfortable to you--as long as it's safe, make good choices--and I'll worry, even in the far flung future where you are both adults, and are living happy, fulfilling lives, I'll worry, and you never need to apologize for that. Because when you apologize, it makes it sound like you did something wrong, and you haven't done anything wrong. Okay? You haven't done anything wrong. So you have nothing to be sorry for." She smoothed the front of her dress, and then smiled at them, "Of course you are worth worrying about. And you are worth much more than that, too. I hope you see that, one day, because I can."

Drumming her fingers against her middle, Daizi moved towards the door, "Well... I guess that's all I really wanted to say. I told you it'd be quick. I'm glad you're doing alright today." She lingered a bit in the doorway, just in case the twins wanted to speak to her longer.
 
"Of course you are worth worrying about. And you are worth much more than that, too. I hope you see that, one day, because I can."

Alec ducked his head, flushing a little at her words. He didn't feel worth worrying about. He didn't like worry. Worry was only a negative thing to him, and he hated the thought of Daizi worrying, but she made it sound like... almost like it was a privilege. That didn't make sense. He wanted it to make sense, but his mind refused to compute the idea. He turned toward Xander instinctively, his heart fluttering. He almost wanted to tell Daizi more about what he was feeling, almost, but the thought of opening up like that was frightening. He opened his mouth... and closed it again. Maybe later. Maybe another day he could talk to her. Maybe.

"We're okay," Xander said again, struggling to keep the shortness from his tone. How many times did he need to say it? They were fine! Or as fine as could be expected. He didn't want to snap at her. She really did seem to just want to help, and he knew he should appreciate that, but she was poking around at a sore spot he'd been trying to ignore and forget. No one liked having sore spots poked. There was no need to talk about this. Not now, not ever. It would pass in time. All things did.
 
"Okay. I'll see at dinner. Well--agh, you understand what I mean." She intentionally joked with them to lighten the mood, and then with a gentle wave, left them alone and returned to her bedroom where Dark was still napping. She shuffled over to him to lightly touch his face, and then she went into her bathroom, deciding to take a nice, long bath. Just to decompress a bit. She wasn't sure how successful her conversation had been. It didn't end badly, and she was able to say everything she had wanted to, but she still felt uncertain. Not that she was surprised, grief was difficult for all people, regardless of age, she didn't expect teenagers to be open to it. Not yet.

But she did what she could do, so after a brief shower to make sure she wasn't lying in a tub of dirty water, and then drew the most relaxing bath she could assemble, candles and all.
 
Alec and Xander didn't say anything for a long time. They sat quietly holding hands, lost in their own thoughts. They didn't know how to fully process what Daizi had said. A part of them, even in Xander, wanted to reach out and accept the metaphorical hand she'd held out to them, but neither was sure how. It was a strangely terrifying prospect, to accept the love, acceptance, and kindness of another person. It was easier to hide where things were familiar. They might be dark, angry, fearful, and painful, but they were familiar. Painful familiarity was easier than kind unfamiliarity. Yet, despite their initial resistance and refusal, now they knew that the hand was there, waiting for them to grasp it.

Eventually, they separated and went back to what they were doing, focusing solely on their projects and fighting to ignore any other thought. No thoughts. No ideas. No plans. No regrets. No wishes. No memories. Nothing. Just what was right in front of them in their hands at the moment. That was all that mattered.

Dinner time rolled around as it always did, and they dawdled a little before leaving their projects and heading to the kitchen. Maybe neither Dark or Daizi would bring up the topic again. Alec put on a brave face, Xander an impassive one, and they went to see what they could do to help.
 
In the kitchen, Dark was once again cooking. His hair was slightly damp, not from sweat, and Daizi was in her usual seat. Normally it was her day to cook, because she tried to cook dinner on the weekends, since because of her schedule Dark had to be the one to during the week, but he had thoroughly refused to allow her to do any work on mother's day.

She was laughing about something he had said when the twins came in the room, and while Dark greeted them immediately, it took her a few minutes to recover. At last she said hello, and didn't say a word about their earlier conversation. If Dark knew about it, he made no sign.

"Dinner is nearly ready," he said, "it would be completed already, but w--I lost track of time."
 
Xander and Alec instantly relaxed in the light atmosphere.

"Awesome. What's for dinner?" Xander asked, coming over close enough to spy on the cooking food.

Alec sat in his usual seat and spun back and forth on the seat as far as the back of the chair would allow. "The talent show is the day after tomorrow! I can hardly wait!" He put his feet down to stop himself and frowned. "It's also terrifying."
 
"Masgouf," Dark replied, "all of the sides are available ready, but I need to go outside to the grill to finish it." He was currently adding another tomato sauce mixture over vertically split fish. They did try, especially more recently, to make more American foods, and they had always been a fan of Italian, but meals from their respective cultures were still extremely common, especially on special days. One day, the both believed, the twins would come to desire it. Still, Dark and Daizi had both, when cooking, begun to make two variants of the sauces: one for them, and one with the spice heavily decreased for the twins... although they had, by miniscule amounts, been increasing the spice they added to the twins' food. They would learn, with time.

"I know it is!" Daizi exclaimed, sharing in Alec's excitement, "I can't wait to go. I know you'll be incredible. And I think it's normal for good things to be scary too, but that just makes you feel more accomplished when you survive them, right?" Secretly, she was nervous too. It was her second time going to that school, and the first time didn't exactly go over well for her. And this time she would be expected to meet her husband's colleagues, and his students, and she was worried it would necessitate sharing certain information. She wasn't so nervous that she was dreading it, and ultimately her excitement to get to expecting what her boys had put together overwhelmed all other emotions... But it was still something she needed to prepare herself for.
 
Xander eyed the food speculatively, his expression full of misgivings. "It looks like fish swimming in spicy blood," he stated. In truth, he'd actually come to really enjoy Dark's cooking and even the rather adventurous mealtime, but it went against his nature to make things easy for Dark. Xander had to give him a hard time or he just didn't feel like Xander.

Alec grinned at her. "Are you really and truly coming? That is going to be so awesome! Not only because you'll be there to see, but also because everyone will get to see you. You are quite the source of rumors, you know. You are a hallway legend! You should wear your dark goddess outfit. It looks smashing and will stop everyone in their tracks in awe."
 
"Then close your eyes," Dark replied, knowing Xander was ultimately teasing, "Unless you prefer to think of it as blood. If you like to eat blood, I can do that for you. You only need to ask," After assembling it all, he lifted the plate, "Would you like to come help me grill?"

Daizi nodded, smiling brightly at him, "I am, I wouldn't miss it for the world," still, she turned away slightly, "I hadn't realized I had become such a mysterious presence. I hope I live up to expectations, I think there are some things about me that might be a bit of a... surprise," She chuckled, not even knowing if she meant her appearance, her blindness, or her pregnancy, "I have no idea what I will end up wearing. He hasn't told the school about the baby yet, so I think it will sort of depend on if we want to divulge that information yet or not. But, thank you, it's nice to know you think I look nice in it." She reached over and squeezed his hand.
 
Xander made a face at Dark's blood comment but nodded. "Sure. Fire's always fun. Let's roast some things like angry dragons." He followed Dark out, hands in pockets.

Alec smiled and returned the squeeze. "If you wore something billowy, no one would notice. You aren't that big yet, and it's nobody's business, anyway, is it? Plus, billowy things are fun and make you look mysterious."
 
He led Xander outside where they had a little in-ground fire pit. He was able to grill on an actual grill, but it always felt more like home to do it by a fire, so he talked Xander through setting it up and then squatted near the fire, occasionally poking it and making adjustments, "Back in my country though," he said, "we just built the fire on the sand. Nowhere in my particular neighborhood did we have something built into the ground like this. And I would go to sit by the fires of other families, scrounging."

"You're right," Daizi nodded, "I'm sure it'll be easy enough to hide. I need to talk to him to see if he wants to, I don't really mind either way... Hmm..." As was increasingly common, her hands were resting on her middle, "I can't believe she's already the size of a peach. When I told you and your brother, she was only the size of a raspberry, you know," She held her fingers up, pinching to roughly the size of a raspberry, "Now she's nearly big enough that we'll be able to tell if she is actually a girl, and in a few weeks, I'll be able to start feeling her move. Do you know, she can already suck on her fingers? And she's learning how to grasp. It might not be as impressive as what you and Xander will do on Tuesday, but..."
 
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"I guess it is pretty hard to set sand on fire, unlike, you know, grass and stuff," Xander said, scuffing the ground with the toe of his shoe. He moved around to see from a different angle. "We got locked out of the house once. It was a rougher neighborhood, but this creepy homeless guy actually brought us to a fire pit in a barrel. I thought they only did that in movies. He had us stay there, and a couple of other bums gave us their bread to eat while the first one went to find a cop that would actually take him seriously. Took him a while. When we got back home and told our mum about it, she used her fun day money to buy a bunch of bread for them. We were like... seven, I think."

"I think it's pretty impressive," Alec told her. "We aren't doing something we learned one-hundred percent from scratch."
 
Dark listened to his story while looking down at the fire, "Communities with nothing are so often more giving than those with everything. I do not think I would move back into one, because there are difficulties with such neighborhoods too, not that I need to tell you that, but..." He allowed his sentence to end prematurely. Even with all of the work he had done, he still found out difficult to talk about his childhood. There was too much. But he liked the smells that rose up from the food he made, because those scents were nearly exclusively attached to memories of kindness and humanity, "There is a quote from Les Misérables I think about often... I may be misquoting it, but I believe it is, 'there is always more misery amongst the lower classes than there is humanity amongst the higher.' I am glad you were helped, then, and that your mother was kind in return." There was, faintly, a hint of anger in his eyes at the thought of children being locked out of their home so young, but a hint of something else as well. He still had said nearly nothing about his past, yet at the same time, it was the most he had ever expressed regarding it. The fire popped, and he poked at it.

"Six weeks ago, she was just developing fingers," She replied sweetly, utterly enchanted by the thought of what was going on inside her. She so dearly wished she could see the sonograms, "I don't even know what she will be doing in another six weeks. I've never made it that far. Things have never gone this well."
 
"It was one of her boyfriends. I can't remember exactly why. I think she was working late and he fell asleep or something?" Xander shrugged. "I do remember her saying that she didn't want to be with a guy that treated dogs better than kids and threw a toaster at his head when he tried to refuse to leave." There was a glint of satisfaction in his eyes at that memory. He didn't ask anything about Dark's history. As little as Dark and Daizi had said, Xander could fill in the broad strokes of what it had been like. He doubted either he or Dark really needed or wanted to hash that out. So he changed the subject from his own sketchy childhood and pointed to the grill. "How come you don't put it over the flames? Won't it be warmer?"

Alec gave a tiny shiver. "It's a very strange thought, I hope you don't mind me saying. Life is so weird!"
 
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