How Green Becomes Wood

Dark explained to Xander seperating the text into different labeled sections would make the information easier to process and if he maybe added an image it'd make it more interesting. He suggested Xander try looking at it from across the room and see how much he was able to make out and understand. Alec's poster he only had mild suggestions to improve on, because the text was already carefully separated.
 
Xander took a couple of tries on his poster until it was more readable, but he called it good and quits possibly sooner than Dark might have. It was better. It was readable. It was enough for now. He rolled up his poster and put it aside before going to entertain Ivy for a while.

Alec went to join him, and they looked after Ivy together for a couple of hours before once again wandering off to do their own thing. The rest of Saturday went by quietly, and soon, Sunday dawned.
 
Breakfast was normal, but since Dark and Daizi needed to leave by noon, not long after, they both had to go upstairs to get ready. It was easy enough for Dark, he just needed to throw on a light grey shirt, dress pants, and a blazer. Considering the party's dress code, he skipped a tie, although he did still include cufflinks. As part of his commitment to not startle the family of his wife's friends by the two of them appearing supremely goth, he even chose ones which were simply a jewel the same colour as his wedding ring set against gold, rather than skulls, daggers, gargoyles, Medusa, or anything more dramatic. He even avoided decorating himself in a mass of rings, although he did not cover his hand tattoos. There was a lot he would do, but he would never hide his tattoos again unless it was absolutely necessary.

Daizi, however, found more trouble. The simple pencil skirt she had expected to be able to wear would have fit at her waist, but she couldn't get it over her hips, and her button-down blouse stretched at certain buttons, so she had to last minute try to find anything in her closet which both fit and didn't look overly gothic, witchy, or otherwise inappropriate for the event, but she didn't typically1 bother buying clothes that weren't gothic, witchy, or otherwise inappropriate for the event! Dark did her best to help her, and they eventually settled on pulling a sweater on over a red dress which, in truth, had great cutouts to either side of her waist with straps bisecting them, but with the sweater over it, it seemed a perfectly appropriate knee-length skirt. They added a bit of delicate jewelry, added some safety pins to make sure if she raised her hands the sweater didn't ride up, matched her lipstick to the skirt, pushed her hair back with a sleek headband, and then, miraculously, both she and Dark looked almost normal. At the very least, it was obvious they tried, and they looked nice together.
 
"You look almost normal. Actually, comparatively, you look completely normal, but upscale normal," Xander remarked as he eyed them both.

"You're both absolutely beautiful," Alec told them, balancing Ivy on his hip. "I love the color of your skirt, Mama. It's pretty, and your sweater goes with it very well. You two match quite well."

Xander checked the clock. "What time are you going to be home by?"
 
"Well, that is a good thing, considering we were explicitly asked to appear normal so Mittz' grandmother did not fall down dead at the mere sight of us." Dark replied, checking his appearance one more time. To his eyes, he looked rather plain and boring.

Daizi shifted slightly at Alec's praise, "Matching each other is easy enough, it was hard finding something normal that fit properly. I haven't tried to for something like this since... my first trimester, I think."

"Nobody can tell," Dark promised, touching her lightly at the waist so he could see the two of them together again. It was such a simple pleasure, seeing himself stand with his wife on his side, and being able to feel the little metal heart hidden beneath the sweater's fabric felt like their secret.

"I think we will be home before 6:30," Daizi answered, leaning against her husband for a moment before pulling away and putting a toned-down pair of sunglasses on. Then, she picked up Ivy and kissed her forehead, leaving behind a dark red splotch, "Mama and Baba have to go to see our friend, but we'll be home so soon, habibti. Mama promises."
 
"You two look fabulous, and I hope you both have fun!" Alec told her, making a note to clean Ivy's forehead as soon as possible but not interrupting their goodbye.

"But not too much fun," Xander warned. "For each minute past midnight, I'll be considering which privileges to take away."

"Where did you get that idea?" Alec demanded, distracted.

"TV," Xander shrugged.
 
"I assure you, we will be home far before midnight," Dark assured them, taking Ivy from Daizi so he could say goodbye too, taking out his handkerchief to try to wipe her forehead clean, although it could only do so much, so he took a quick glance at Alec to communicate what he already knew. While Daizi talked the twins through the baby care instructions one last time, Dark looked into his daughter's distressed face, and holding her up so they were eye level with each other said, "My darling girl, you must be very brave. You are in charge, you understand."

"Enkidu is in charge," Daizi corrected, petting her dog while Dark finished his goodbye. Then, handing Ivy to Alec, both adults murmured the quick final goodbye, be safe, make smart choices all parents needed to say before walking out. The very moment the door shut, Ivy burst into tears.
 
"Welp, that's that," Xander said over Ivy's cries. "Come on. Let's go get some food and put on something to watch."

"Alright," Alec agreed. He glanced at Ivy, trying to decide if acting like everything was fine would be a better approach to her tears than trying to comfort her. After all, she was going to soon have to get used to her mother leaving every day (nearly), and maybe comforting her and fussing would lead to bad habits. Then again, not comforting might make her think that her needs were being ignored and not met. Maybe a few soothing things and then moving on? Or distraction?

"Hey!" Xander called from the kitchen, "when you're not being stuck with indecision, maybe you should wipe her face."

"Right," Alec agreed, hurrying after Xander. He sat Ivy on the counter next to the sink and spoke soothingly to her while he washed off her forehead.
 
Unable to recognize why Alec was trying to wash her face, Ivy tried to squirm away from him while continuing to cry for her parents. It was hard enough when just one parent left, but both? Mama and Baba both gone, and she didn't know when they'd come back or what she would do! Could do! Getting away from Alec wasn't going well, so she tried to push his hand away.
 
Alec continued to patiently talk to her, calm and quiet, explaining to her what he was doing. Finally, even though he knew it would make her mad, he caught both her hands in one of his and held them out of the way while he quickly scrubbed off the lipstick. It took only a moment and, to him, seemed worth whatever annoyance it might bring her over spending the next half an hour trying to convincer her to let him do what needed done. At least now they could move off the counter. He let go of her hands and tossed the washcloth aside with a bright and happy, "All done! All done! Yay!" He smiled and clapped excitedly.
 
Ivy did, in fact, hate how he held her hands so she couldn't use them and therefore screamed like she was being torn to shreds. Her parents had already left her and then she couldn't use her hands. When Alec let her go, she drew them in close, sticking one into her mouth, her big eyes still overflowing with tears. This was bad!

When Alec was smiling and clapping at him, she stared at him, not sure how she was meant to respond to it, because he looked happy but she felt so worried and sad.
 
Xander and Alec sat with Ivy watching a movie they'd rented. It was a kid's educational thing, but it wasn't too annoying. They snacked on popcorn and fed Ivy her own little treats to keep her happy. When the movie ended, Alec sat with Ivy and played blocks with her while Xander cleaned up. He couldn't find one of Ivy's toys, so he went to check in the closet to see if, by chance, it had gotten stuffed in there on accident.
 
The movie quickly calmed Ivy down, because her parents seldomly put anything on the TV, for her or for themselves. It was amazing. Still, the whole time she held tightly to Alec because she still needed the comfort of being held. She only stopped sucking on his shirt when she was presented with snacks, which she was able to eat on her own now so like a they were dry. Spoons were something she had yet to quite master. Afterwards, she was back to her happy self and excited to play.

The closet Xander opened was lined with shelves. On them were nothing but hard-cover books of some sort. The majority were a deep hue but roughly a fourth of them were red. The spines were blank except for the span of years written on them, and the red ones which included, "خصوصي". Private. The earliest ones dated as far back as 2010, but the most recent one didn't have an end date printed on it yet. Almost twenty years worth of them, neatly lined up. The earliest red one was slightly more recent: 2013.
 
Xander looked over the books curiously. What were these? Records books? Diaries? Household accounts? He couldn't remember seeing any of these before, and there were definitely no toys in here. He even checked the floor. Oh well. On to the next spot she might have lost it. As he turned, though, fully intending to leave the books alone, his elbow bumped one and caused a cascading effect that brought half of the newest shelf tumbling to the floor.

"What's that?" Alec called from the living room.

"Nothing, just knocked something over," Xander called back as he knelt to pick up the books.

Alec smiled at Ivy. "Let's go help Xander, okay? And then we'll come back and play more. You have a little more time until sleep time." He got up and carried her up to where Xander was trying to not crease the pages as he picked up the books.
 
As all of the red books were shelved together, all stayed firmly on their shelf, although one came near to falling down and would probably need to be pushed back into place. As for the rest, their sprawling pages were littered with illustrations. All of these fallen books spanned the past five years. Each contained sketches of loved ones: Daizi presenting at conferences but also napping with the sunlight on her face. Her hair was shorter, in the oldest of them. Cooger in the process of painting a wall while visibly annoyed that whoever was sketching him wasn't helping, but also proudly showing off a new kitten. He didn't always have his eyebrow scar. Daizi's relatives at various points in their day, from visits back to Egypt, Enkidu from the tail-end of his puppyhood into today. One, from the newest book, was unfinished, just from yesterday, when Xander picked up Ivy by the ones.

All of these were just from the pages the books had fallen open to when they crashed down on the floor. Most of the pages so clearly displayed how these subjects were seen, the sketches overflowed with compassion, affection, and light--even when capturing Saladin, seen in the sketch of Daizi's family, although it was obvious he was less adored, it retained this strong sense of humanity. The style seemed somewhere straddling between realism and impressionism, adoring simple, mundane moments in life.

But on one of the open pages, the sketches were different. Rather than depicting someone distinct, and rather than seeming peaceful, this sketch was dark. It wasn't clear if it was of a man or a woman, tattered clothes hung to their emaciated form like rags as they shambled across the page, tearing at their face and hair. Behind them, quick pencil marks might have been smoke, or fog, or shadows. On the same page, a building in ruins and a dog chewing on what might have been anything, until one looked close enough to see the fingers.
 
"What is this?" Alec whispered, looking over the pages.

"Sketches, obviously," Xander replied, picking them up and putting them back up on the shelf one at a time. "And none of our business."

Alec picked up the book with the dark picture and held it, a cold dread in his gut when he looked at the image. It was obvious who and what was in this image, but a part of him did not want to accept it. He didn't want to think about those days for him. He didn't want think about this!

Xander pulled the book from Alec's hand. "Hey, the mini might grab that!"

Alec shook himself, feeling pale and shaken. "Right. Right. Don't want her hurting these."
 
Ivy didn't recognize anything special or weird about these books, but she did point at one of the drawings of Daizi and bounced excitedly, babbling as she grabbed at him. That was Mama! She knew her!
 
Alec picked up one of the pictures of Daizi and held it for Ivy to see. "Yes! That's Mama! Mama is so pretty, isn't she?" He closed the book and slipped it onto the shelf. "I knew he drew a lot, but I didn't realize he was this prolific!"

"It's insane," Xander said, carefully making sure all the books were properly organized and perfectly in line with each other. "Should remember this if we outlive them. We could put it in a couple of art books or an art gallery in his memory."

"That seems a little weird, but copying them for prosperity might be great," Alec agreed.
 
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