How Green Becomes Wood

"I'm almost out of my thirties. In two and a half months, Dark will be forty." Daizi said, for the first time really feeling what that meant, "Back then, I was so delighted to be with Dark again, it made everything easier. We were trying to be secretive, I can't remember why now, but it felt so important. I think we just felt a little embarrassed I became a runaway bride for my high school boyfriend. We tried so hard to pretend like it was just physical, then he told me he loved me by accident. Ruined that game."
 
"We both tried to convince ourselves we believed it," Daizi chuckled, smiling at the memory, "It was fun. All the sneaking around. That's how you turn a bedroom into an oasis. Then there was this one day, oh it was awful, we were running late for some plan, and Cooger just threw open the door yelling at Dark to hurry up, I was lucky to be lying on my stomach. I just froze in place while Dark and Cooger both spluttered at each other until Cooger just threw Dark's pants at him and told him to hurry up before leaving." She laughed quietly, "All that, even though he definitely knew from the beginning."
 
Sally choked lightly on her water but tried to cover it as gracefully as she could. "That would awful!" she agreed emphatically. "I suppose Cooger was... really in a hurry."
 
"We weren't... engaged in anything at the time," Daizi clarified, "but we were still dressed like we had been the night before. It wasn't our proudest moment, but it meant I got to stop pretending like I was sleeping on the couch every night so it worked out. Because Cooger had offered me his bedroom, right? When I moved in, because he is courteous enough to recognize as the only woman in the house I deserved privacy, but I couldn't take him up on that offer when I never once slept on that couch."
 
Sally couldn't help a small giggle that she tried to stifle. "I suppose when you share close arrangements, it is only a matter of time before such secrets get out. If they were ever secret to begin with."
 
"I doubt it was," Daizi replied and after thinking about it for a moment longer said, "If he didn't know from the moment Dark booked the plane ticket to fly to Egypt, or after we told him I was coming back to the States, the moment I said I was fine on the couch probably revealed my hand."
 
"Undoubtedly. We are hardly ever as smooth as we think we are," Sally chuckled. "I snuck around with a few boyfriends only to find out later my mother knew perfectly well and was having me watched discreetly. As long as I didn't do anything too foolish, she was content to let me get out some of my rebellion that way."
 
"It is not such an uncommon thing for someone of my family's standing," Sally replied with a little shrug. "I have much more freedom here in the States now that I am an adult, but when I was young, there was always a servant or employee not too far from me at all times."
 
"That is wild," Daizi breathed, "I mean, my family has a lot of money, we had some staff, but my father sooner sent me across an ocean so he wouldn't need to watch me and I'm pretty sure he wasn't interested in what I was up to when I came home, which is for the best, I don't think I'd have been allowed to do half the things I did if he knew I was doing them."
 
"Appearance is everything to the inner circle, and the closer you are to the inner circle, the more access you have to the family money," Sally said dryly. "Some think it is worth it to do whatever it is Grandmother and my Mother desire. Others are content with the yearly stipend, which they would only lose if they did something truly abhorrent. Otherwise, they are free to do as they please. If they require more money - say, for a startup for a company - they can request it. If their request is granted, there are no strings attached, not even to pay it back. A lot of privileges and a lot of rules go hand in hand."
 
"I used to get a stipend from my father while I went to boarding school," Daizi replied, "I was meant to prove to him I had used all of it each month so Dark helped me fake receipts so he wouldn't decrease it."
 
"Mine might've continued, but it never began again after my father disowned me the first time. Now I don't want his money, although he did pay for the bulk of our house. We bought the land all on our own, though, and some of the construction costs."
 
"Hmm, I guess the house is your backpayment for owed stipends, or a wedding gift, and you could look at the fact that the stipend stopped and never picked up again as a sign that he sees that you can stand on your own two feet," Sally mused, trying to be positive. "That was good of him to help you with the house."
 
Daizi shrugged, rubbing her thumb against the rim of her glass as she thought about difficult parts of her argument with her father, "I don't mind it stopped regardless of the reason. I don't need his money."
 
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