How Green Becomes Wood

"She hid it well," Dark said, picking up his own sandwich and, as he so often did, began to tear it into smaller pieces so he could dip it into the soup, "but I could tell she was struggling with it. But I also think I would struggle more with if I was shown the picture before she was born and was told this is what it would be like. Now I know that she is messy regardless of what I do, so..." He shrugged, "As long as she is outside when doing something like that, I can be certain she will be clean before returning indoors, and being as messy as her, I am at peace. Unfortunately, it is good for her development."
 
Xander snickered. "Unfortunately, it is good for her development," he parroted quietly, seeming genuinely amused by the statement.

Alec glanced at him, momentarily confused, and then turned back to Dark. "So, do you think you could manage to finger paint with her next time? Or is this an uncles and brothers only event?"
 
"That depends," Dark said, taking a brief glance at Xander, "If I were to be involved, would it stay finger-painting? Because from what it would seem, it became full body painting. I would prefer to not be covered head to toe in paint."
 
"Maybe she just need practice and direction from someone who actually wants all the paint to stay on the paper," Alec grinned. "Although, I think Enkidu was a genuine accident. Good thing Kiki wasn't out there!"
 
"Yeah, definitely not two in one day," Alec chuckled.

Xander finished off the last of his soup before answering. "Nah. I'm good with my fingers the way they are. No need to paint them."

"No, painting with your fingers," Alec explained.

Xander frowned. "How else would you paint? With your feet? Or your mouth?"
 
"Yep. All good," Xander confirmed. "Good soup. Thanks. And good cheese."

"It was very good soup and cheese," Alec confirmed. "Thank you, Ba. Oh! I should text Sloan and Becky about this. Xander, do you want to text Milo, or should I?"

Xander didn't reply, quietly staring up at something or nothing up in the corner of the room.
 
Alec had put his phone on silent when they went into the doctor's and had completely forgotten about it. He pulled up his phone and almost flinched at the number of texts he had between Sloan, Becky, Tom, and Peter. He texted them all back individually, telling them what had happened and that all was well, but the visit had taken a lot of time. He asked Becky if she could gather their homework assignments, and she promised she would. Becky then texted Milo and Austen to see if they would cover the classes she didn't share with them.

"Just the corner," Xander replied. "We really take corners for granted. I know it's easier to build, but imagine if we lived in a house with no corners. Where would the spiders live? And the eyeballs."
 
Sloan and Milo sent their sympathies, and Milo promised to get their coursework for them. He also tried his absolute best to stop spiraling, but that wasn't reflected in his texts.

"In round houses, Spiders lived in the roof," Dark replied, recognizing exactly what was happening and just going with it, "but they had thatched roofs. What do you mean about eyeballs in corners?"
 
"Duh, the eyeballs that are always watching everybody. They like corners best. There aren't any in here because you don't like to keep eyes on things all the time," Xander informed him calmly as if this was a perfectly rational thought.

Alec watched Xander for a moment and then texted Sloan and Peter, Xander's pain meds are a little strong. He's totally high right now and talking about eyeballs in corners. Do you think he means cameras? He almost sent that text to Milo, but then stopped himself. With Milo's history, or rather his mom's history, with medication and drugs, maybe that would not be the best thing to tell him about his best friend. Instead, he sent Milo, He's very grumpy about all of this, but otherwise doing fine! My mother will probably make him her extra special soup. It's a secret recipe passed down through her family. He hoped that would ease any worries Milo was having, because he was sure Milo was having at least a few. He was Milo, after all.
 
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