How Green Becomes Wood

"I told you it would grow on you eventually." Dark replied, taking his glass back. After taking another sip he said, "Think about it. You deserve a space that feels like your own. Even if we do want to help Alec... declutter."

"You aren't mean," Daizi replied, resting her cheek against his hair and holding him close, "and everyone can be selfish sometimes. Everybody is still learning.'
 
"I'll think about it," Xander promised. He stared up at the ceiling for a bit. "What do you think about all of this?" he finally asked. "All of it."

"You're never mean. You're never selfish," Alec told her softly. "Same with Ba."
 
"That is a loaded question." Dark replied, taking a slow sip of his wine.

"I'm not mean to you, Dark and I aren't selfish with you." Daizi told him, "Sometimes we can be selfish with each other, even if we don't mean to be."
 
Dark looked at him from the corner of his eye and then down into his glass. The ripples in the wine looked like the sea. It took a long time for him to answer, "I think that Alec is depressed and," he waved his hand, "all of this comes from refusing to admit it to himself. If he always stays busy, he does not have time to just be with himself, meaning he does not need to acknowledge it about himself. I think because I am the person I am, despite the therapy and the medication and the psychiatric holds, I scare him, because he does not want to be like me. He does not want to be like that part of me." And as much as he wished otherwise, he believed it was the truest part of him. When all the layers were peeled away, he was merely a sad, broken man, doing his his best with a bottle of glue. It was his disappointing truth.

"I'll tell you if it ever does for me," Daizi told him, but then held him a bit tighter and said, "But I will tell you, the things I do not know what I am doing change. Now, I'm always pretending like I know what I'm doing with you and your siblings. Even after all the books I've read and podcasts I've listened to, I don't know. Neither does your father. We're doing it for the first time, and we're terrified of mucking it up. A decade ago I was established my career, and had no idea what I was doing. Now for most of it, I've learned what I'm doing, even if I still have moments of uncertainty. When I was your age? I had no idea how to be a good friend or a romantic partner, or how to navigate what adulthood meant. I think I learned a good deal about the first two. I'm still working on the last one."
 
Xander mulled this over, not responding right away. "I think you're right," he finally admitted, "but also a tiny bit wrong. You're broken, yeah, and that'll never change, but you're not all bad. You know, you remind me of this thing I learned about a while back when looking up some leather stuff. It's a Japanese art thingy. It's called... Kin... Kin-sugy? Something like that. Anyway, they take broken stuff, pots and bowls and things, and they put them back together, but instead of hiding the broken bits, they highlight them by using stuff like gold to glue them together. It's still broken. That bowl ain't good for eating out of, might not even hold water, but it can be pretty just as it is. I think you're right that Alec is scared that if he is depressed, and maybe he is and I never let myself see it, then maybe he'll never be like a good bowl again. He'll be like you. But he's focused on the bad bits. Like I used to be. He can't see how maybe just because you can't eat cereal out of the bowl doesn't mean it can't be a good bowl in other ways. Ironic when you think of how his current obsession is to re-make stuff into other stuff." He paused, thinking for a moment of how this all sounded like something Alec would say if he didn't have his head... up in a certain place.

"I'm sorry it's taking me so long to learn, Mama," Alec whispered. He took a deep, shuddering breath. He was tired. So very tired.


(Xander means Kintsugi)
 
"Kintsugi," Dark corrected, still looking into his wine cup. Although he understood what Xander was trying to say, or thought he did, there was some part of it that didn't bring him much comfort. He was just so tired. He felt like what was left of a ship's sail after barely surviving a hurricane. "I am glad I am not all bad." Then he grit his teeth and looked up towards the ceiling, silent for a few moments, "A person needs to be complicit in their own rescue. All of the rope in the world will not save a person if they are too afraid to grab onto it. That was something I needed to learn, it is something everybody needs to learn."

"It takes everybody a long time," Daizi promised him, lying back so he would too, "and there's nothing you can do about it tonight, so you just rest, habibi. Rest right here where you're safe."
 
Xander grunted. "He's lucky I don't chuck the coils of rope at his face and tell him to get on with it," he grumbled moodily. He didn't really mean it, but he was still hurt and angry despite how well he seemed to be taking it.

Alec stayed still and quiet, nestled in close to his mother. It took him a while, but eventually, he did fall asleep, releasing his hold on Daizi as he did so.
 
"He is lucky." Dark replied, eyes still trained on the ceiling, "And so were you. As terrible as this mess is, at least we know now so we can rebuild. We always do."

Daizi stayed right beside him in bed until about ten minutes after she was certain he had fallen asleep. Then she carefully got up, made sure he was tucked in snuggly, kissed his forehead, and quietly crept out of his bedroom, once again stumbling on one of the pillows as she went, but not loudly. As she shut the door, she did, admittedly, forget to make sure the light switch was off, but she didn't realize it as she headed downstairs.
 
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"Hi habibi," Daizi said, stretching as she joined them in the living room. Now that she was away from it, she was able to recognize how stiff sitting like that had made her. No part of her regretted it, but Alec was much heavier than an her thirteen month old and she was much older than she used to be. "What are you still doing up?"

"We were just talking," Dark told her.
 
"I'm stiff, I was sitting on the floor with your brother for who knows how long. But I'll be alright. I always am." She replied, coming to join them, pretending like this whole experience wasn't triggering for her, given all the sorts of anxieties she had been carrying. It wasn't like this was another moment where she was proved right to be afraid of what catastrophe was hiding behind the next corner or anything.

"Come sit by me," Dark told her and Daizi certainly didn't need to be told twice as she folded herself beneath his arm, where it felt like she has been born to fit.
 
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Xander eyed Daizi skeptically. Was anyone in this family ever honest with how they felt? It could be worse, he supposed. She could be wailing on his shoulder. Yes, that would be much, much, much worse. "So," he finally said. "What are you going to do with him?" The question was directed at both parents.
 
"We haven't had time to discuss it." Daizi replied, forcing herself to sit upright since the day's work clearly wasn't done, "The problem is if he won't talk about his problems, there isn't a lot we can do. We can't secretly dose him with antidepressants, we can only support him if he allows himself to be supported---" Oh. This is what Dark meant when he was panicking about how he didn't know what to do. "We're still going to go to family therapy, regardless of if it's what he wants. We're still going to find him a new therapist. We're still going to try to talk to him and try to help find solutions to his hoarding problem but he has to do the work too."
 
Xander glanced between them and nodded. "Okay." He settled back on the couch and stared at the ceiling. Part of him wanted to give Alec a thump on the head and tell him to get over it, but he had a feeling that wouldn't actually help. Or maybe it would, but he doubted his parents would approve of the plan. Didn't take away the desire, though.
 
"I think we should all head to bed," Daizi said, stretching deeply, "Or at least try to. It is very late. I have work tomorrow. You two have school." She sort of expected at least one of them to take a mental health day, but until it was asked for, she was presuming they would still attend.
 
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