How Green Becomes Wood

"What do you mean plans of my own?" Cooger asked, taking out the ingredients he had brought over, "For cooking, I'm gonna make a beef stew. Knew this was gonna happen. Recipe only cooks for an hour and a half, if I had time to prepare I'd have got it in a crock pot and left it cooking all day. Plans other than that? No idea, kid."
 
"I meant cooking. What else could I mean while your head is in the fridge and we're talking about making dinner?" Xander asked blandly. He helped Cooger fetch the ingredients he'd need and started chopping and seasoning, acting as a sous chef for Cooger.
 
"I don't know, y'all two are always scheming something," Cooger replied. His cooking style was much less elegant than either Dark's or Daizi's. When he had to season anything, he didn't bother to measure, he just dumped it in, stared at it, and then decided if it was either good enough or if it needed any more. Didn't seem a point in being too precious about it: a stew was a stew. He was careful about measuring the wine, and a few other things, but in general, he wasn't gonna be fussy about it. Although he needed the twins to be distracted later so he could bake 'em a pie without them realizing what he was up to. "Should watch a good Halloween movie later. Really close out the day."
 
Near the end of when the stew was ready, Dark came quickly into the room, pumpkin tucked underneath his arms and eyes bright the way they always were when he completed something he was proud of, "I finished it."
 
"Do you want to see it carved first or first see it alight?" Dark asked, holding it carefully to obscure the design before he had their answer. He was fine displaying either way, but he wanted to know how they wanted to experience it.
 
"Carved!" Alec blurted instantly.

"Lighted," Xander said. "Wait to see it lit. That'd be better."

Alec pouted. "We've already waited, like, three hours. Can't we see it now?"

"You can," Xander pointed out, "but I bet it's going to look way cooler lit."
 
Cooger chuckled softly and set about helping to darken the room while Dark set up his pumpkin against the blankest wall they had available. Then he lit a candle and moved the pumpkin over it before stepping back.

On the pumpkin side facing them he had carved a man with a shield and a sword, his face turned towards the camera. Of course, Dark had made use of simple lines and details so the light could shine through, but he knew to do the tricks to peel pack layers of the pumpkin for depth.

On the other side, though, the one facing the wall, he carved Medusa, cleverly placing it so it would cast a shadow of her face on the wall.
 
"Wow!" Alec breathed. "That is beautiful! Really well done! I am impressed."

Xander came closer to look at the detail and try to figure out how Dark did some of the stuff he did. "This is really cool," he admitted.
 
"How long do carved pumpkins last?" Alec asked wistfully. "We can't keep it forever, can't we?"

"Nope. I'm afraid it'd turn into mush," Xander confirmed. "Not sure how long that takes, but it happens."
 
"If you put vaseline along the cuts they last longer," Dark said, crossing his arms and turning his head to the side as he considered his work from more angles, "But this sort of art is impermanent, and that is why it is special."
 
"Because everything is impermanent." Dark replied, looking over at Alec, "The Sahara was once green, the Grand Canyon was once under water, temples crumble to dust, and pumpkins rot. It is just like the seasons. And life must be that way, because how else would we appreciate anything if everything went on and on forever? Jack-O-Lanterns decay so next year we can carve new ones. That is also why snowmen melt and sandcastles are washed away. But I think the true joy in creation is the process not the product. It is nice to look at a pretty thing, and I enjoy showing off. But showing off is not the call."
 
"I don't know. It just seems kind of endless and purposeless when you look at it like that," Alec said, not taking Dark very seriously. Of course, he was going to go extreme. That was just how his father was. There was no way pumpkins could be compared to canyons. He lost interest in the topic, turning instead to the shadows on the wall. "This would make the coolest, most elaborate shadow puppet play ever!"
 
"No, that is what gives it purpose," Dark murmured slightly, wanting so desperately to say more but seeing the clear disinterest on Alec's face. Even his wooden carnival would decay. Every flower in the garden would wilt. Everything and everyone eventually died and decomposed. That was what made life precious, that was what gave it meaning. The fact it would end.

That, also, was why he felt most comfortable in the autumn, when all the world was dying peacefully around him only to be reborn.

"It would be difficult to get them to move," He said, watching the shadow flicker on the wall, "In some painted caves, the animals were painted over themselves with too many legs. It is believed it was so the flickering lights would make it look like they moved.'
 
"True, but it would be epic! I like the idea of painting multiple legs on," Alec said, holding his hand up in the show and letting the light dance over it. "I wonder if I could give shadow puppets a try?"

"Not in our room. There's not enough space," Xander said firmly.

"Hmm. You're right. Oh well!" Alec.turned to watch the lights. "Maybe we can try carving other gourds for practice until next year! Yours is so cool, Ba."
 
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