How Green Becomes Wood

"What is 'candid?' Is that baby pictures?" Austin asked.

"Nah, it's the not-posed kind of pictures," Xander said, returning the picture with care. "People not realizing they are getting their pictures taken." He spotted Becky in the background of one of the pictures clearly making a funny face at the camera and pointed it out to Milo. "Usually."

Austin nodded in recognition. "Oh, I get it now. Do you do it a lot?"
 
Austin considered that for a moment before nodding. "I guess that makes sense. Candied shots are better for preserving day-to-day and how people lived, and posed are better for records keeping, like who lived where when, like those shots of the whole family standing in front of the house somebody's dad built. Right?"

Xander gave Austin a skeptical looked when he said "candied," but it seemed a legitimate slip.
 
"I guess posed ones are good for record keeping," Milo replied, having not really thought of it like that before, "I just find them kind of boring, I guess. I mean, there's a challenge, you know, in the---you know, posing of people. Trying to get them all to look at the camera at the same time, trying to get them all to smile, right? But it's just not a challenge I have fun tackling."
 
"That makes sense," Austin agreed.

"I gotta get going and figure out what happened to my brother," Xander said, looking around. "Thanks for the photos. I'll show them to my folks tonight. They're great."

"Do you stuff like the ghost thing a lot?" Austin asked curiosly.
 
"Cool." Austin walked next to Milo, leaning down slightly to get closer to his height as he asked a few questions about photography and listed with great attention to Milo's every word. He didn't understand everything, but he was listening.
 
Milo continued to feel awkward and uncomfortable, still not used to people taking an interest in him, but even though he could seldomly look at Austin's face as he explained how photography worked and what he liked about it, doing his best to explain it in an easily understandable way.
 
The twins soon joined Austin and Milo but didn't interrupt their conversation. Xander was proud of Milo for carrying on a conversation with someone other than him. He didn't see that often.

After school, the twins headed home with Alec carefully cradling the photos as he looked through them one more time. When they got home, Xander went in first, calling out, "We're home!"
 
In the kitchen, Daizi was baking and singing along to music she had playing over her headphones and because of it, she didn't hear the twins come home. Like always, at least when she was in a good mood, she danced along to the music she was listening to while she worked. This time, she truly had no intention to torture her poor, poor man, she didn't even know where he was. She had just finished lying Ivy down for a nap before deciding she wanted to bake.

Dark had been in the dining room on his laptop, setting up their meal plan for November only to look over and catch sight of her, and was now sat, in perfect silence, with a bar across his computer screen reading, "Your battery is running low. You may want to plug in your PC."
 
Not hearing an answer, Xander went further into the house with Alec trailing behind. They both spotted Dark sitting at the table, riveted, and glanced at each other in amusement. Xander silently slipped up close to Dark, ready to spring back in case of poor reaction, and loudly whispered, "You might want to plug it in."
 
"I do not understand what you are implying." Dark replied, swallowing and stealing one last glance at his wife as she rolled her hips and then turned to plug in his laptop, "I was only working on next month's dinners."
 
"Uh-huh," the twins said simultaneously.

"I need to put away my school stuff and get changed for work," Alec said.

"I need to put away my stuff, too, and then I have something important to show you," Xander said, turning away.

"We'll give you a minute to finish your menu and maybe catch her attention," Alec teased, following Xander.

The twins disappeared for a few minutes, soon coming back down with Milo's photos.
 
Dark refused to acknowledge their teasing and, clearing his throat, saved his document, and then got up to alert his wife the twins were home. She had absolutely no idea he had been watching her but picked up on the energy he had when he spoke to her.

"Our renewal is next Saturday," She said, in the brief moments they had before the twins came back downstairs.

"Yes, it is." He replied, looking at her face for a few moments before they both sharply turned away. Walking up to the twins, Dark asked, "What are these?"
 
"These are from Ivy's birthday," Xander said, setting them on the counter after making sure it was clean, "and these are from the ghost photo shoot."

"There are some absolutely brilliant ones," Alec told Dark. "You should describe them to Mama!"
 
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