How Green Becomes Wood

"Yes, I named myself Dark and prefer white. It is witty and irreverent and steeped in many layers of irony." Dark replied, spinning the board back around, "Try again when I have not slept in three days following the nativity of my daughter."

He seemed rather blunt and annoyed, but his eyes gleamed with amusement, "Perhaps we should play a simpler game. Are you familiar with checkers? It might be more your speed."
 
"Why don't you just hire a nanny for some days? You could afford it," Xander said.

"Because he wants to suffer as much as Daizi has for the sake of their child, and this is his chance," Alec said, coming around to the front. He dropped into the seat, crowding Xander. "I know checkers! Can I take a turn?"

"You can take your elbow out of my stomach," Xander groused, pushing Alec playfully.

Alec tipped more than expected, automatically putting out a hand to steady himself. His elbow caught the edge of the chess board, and while it did not flip entirely, the pieces fell and scattered, most of them rolling off the table. The twins froze and looked at Dark with identical expressions of terror. Then they all but flung themselves off the chair and started scooping up the pieces, mumbling apologies. Deeply embedded instincts were hard to overcome in reactive moments.
 
"Because I have no desire to entrust my child to a stranger for the sake of a nap," Dark replied, "and because Daizi, who had a nanny, believes her relationship with her father might have been better, if he were involved, rather than passing her off. It also feels rather... affluent and cold."

He shook his head, it really wouldn't do. Perhaps it was unhealthy, but he held doggedly to his obsession of love, of proving to this unborn person they would always have safe and caring arms to run to. Always. He didn't flinch when the chess set was knocked over, but the sight of their terror did punch him down, and crouching beside them, he began picking up the pieces too. He knew that look.

"No worries, no worries," he assured them, and held up the King to them, "No harm done, see? They are not so fragile a fall would destroy them. And even if one piece did break, they can be remade, easily remade."
 
The twins relaxed when Dark spoke, getting down to help them. He wasn't angry, and why should he be? He'd never been angry with them before. Yet seeing him helping them fix their mistake calmed them.

"Oh, good, the bishop still has his hat," Alec said, holding up the black piece.

"It's a good thing these are wood," Xander said, studying a pawn. "You do good craftsmanship. Sturdy."
 
"We could not really afford toys when I was younger, you understand, not that if we had money I would have been bought anything, but when I was only about five I found a pocket knife. So I made things for myself. And by now it has been..." His heavy brows flicked together, briefly, "many years since then. This set is about a decade old. Maybe longer." He took it up and flipped it over in his hands.

"A little more than a decade," He remarked, "Younger than you both, though."
 
Alec put a couple of pieces on the table and sat cross-legged looking at the white queen. "I think havingmade it yourself makes this even more special. All things made by yourselfare special. "


"Yeah, I guess so," Xander mumbled, picking up the last of the fallen pieces. "And expensive stuff is always super breakable."
 
"They can be. I have met people who desperately want me to sell what I make. And I may well earn more money doing that than I do teaching, but," He sat back, resting his arm against his knee, "I always think that would make it less special, and then it would become elitest. I came from so little, I could never do it. Sometimes it is good to find what money cannot buy..." He rolled his shoulders back, "but sometimes I will make toys and things and bring them to women's shelters and children's homes. Not too often, because everything takes time, but I keep a box of what I will donate, when I have enough to give."
 
"That is kind of you," Alec smiled. He pushed himself up off the floor and brushed off his pants. "Weren't we going to play a game of.checkers?"



"No, we were going to play," Xander said, indicating himself and Dark.



"Right! You two play." He turned as if distracted. "I'm going to go.ewt an apple! I feel quite like an apple. Then I'll come watch. He trotted off in his search for fruit.



Xander looked at Dark. "We don't have to, if you donwant.'t
 
"We can, if you would like to, although it is a solved game," Dark replied. And then he paused, and thought for a few moments, "if we have checkers. I am not sure. Daizi and I default to chess... Cooger certainly has a board, because it is nice on lazy days, but even then, we have not played it in a few years, I think, and him having one is no use to us. I can go look," He suggested.

He had more or less offered it as a joke, but if Xander wanted to play with him, he would certainly do his best to oblige. In theory, he thought, the chess pieces could perhaps be repurposed, if they were clever enough, but he wasn't certain if the size of a chess board was the same as a checkers board.
 
"We can just use the chessboard," Xander pointed out as he set it up again. "It's the same situation. Just different moves, and really fancy checker pieces. It's the same board size and everything. You just have to remember to not use the chess pieces like chess pieces. But if you'd rather wait for Cooger to bring a board..." He let the sentence trail off.
 
Dark stopped where he stood, and went to sit back down by Xander, "Thank you for asking to spend time with me today." One corner of his mouth pulled backwards slightly, "We do not need to play. It seems silly to call Cooger to come all this way for a board. If you want to still spend the day with me, we can do other things. Or we can try to make it work with the chess pieces."
 
Xander sat back slowly, pleased yet feeling strangely shy at Dark's comment. He rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully. "Well, how about something you'd like to do now?" he suggested. "We could do... carving... or cleaning something... unless you needed to finish the thing you were doing earlier. What were you doing? If it's okay to ask."
 
"No, I do not need to go back from it. It is better if I do not, it makes my brain feel like it is melting. I have been making a list of what we have for the baby, what we have selected but have not bought, and what we still need, and," He scratched his beard, "I had not realized how much babies require. I had been thinking we really only needed a crib, a rocking chair, a changing table, diapers, and onesies. And some toys. At least as first. I was incorrect."

Dark took a few glances around the room, and sighed, "Our house is going to become very, very ugly," he turned to Xander and shrugged, "Carvings, though! Now there is something I have been meaning to show you--having nothing to do with the baby."
 
Xander looked around in confusion. The house was going to be ugly? Why? What more did babies need? A place to sleep, a place to poop, a place to play, and stuff for hygiene. How was that going to make the house ugly? Looking at Dark's stressed face, though, he didn't dare ask. Why were kids such a wonderful and magical experience, again? Nope, there was no way he was going to ask.

"Yeah? What is it?" Xander asked, standing up to follow Dark.
 
"Come on, come on, it is still in the shed," Dark said, getting up. He put the chess set away and led Xander out back.

The inside of the shed was a bit messier than usual--the crib and cradle were coming along nicely, and they filled up much of the space. The swan sat ontop of his work bench, roughly assembled in rough shapes, in the process of being shaped down into something more delicate. Leaning up against the wall were many identical, or nearly identical slats for the crib, and the base sat awkwardly wedged against the corner like a strange, low, table. The problem with it being round, he had learned, although he remained deeply attached to the idea, was it couldn't be set up on its side without rolling.

All of this he ignored, and instead went into his drawer, and then handed Xander the tiny wooden fire-breathing version of himself, now completed, or mostly, "I still need to add a sealant," he said simply.
 
Xander took the piece delicately and turned it over in his hand. "Wow." He stared at the piece. Was that him? Was that really him? "Wow," he whispered again. "Is this really what I think it is?"
 
Dark nodded, "I thought fire-breather made sense. It took me an embarrassingly long amount of time to find something that worked right, but it is really obvious in retrospect I think--no offense." He rubbed the back of his neck, "The fire is resin. I thought about putting a light inside, but if it burnt out it would be impossible to replace."
 
Xander looked almost shy as he nearly smiled at the fire breather, his eyes sparking. "I think... it's perfect," he said quietly. He set the firebreather down in the carnival and leaned over to get a better look. "Huh. Would you look at that." He smiled briefly at Dark. "He fits right in. Perfectly."
 
"He really does." Dark replied, looking down at so many years of his creations, "I wish I could figure out where to put Alec. It eludes me." He took a long look along his shelves, where little people he had since removed from his midway looked down upon what was, ultimately, his life's work. The age of them was evident, because some were visibly less finely carved than others. Dark's history of tattooing himself showed in defunct models of himself. Daizi had remained more or less the same in his carvings, although she was still up on the shelf, replaced, temporarily, with a model which more accurately represented her current state. Old rides, too, sat upon the shelves, replaced as he found newer ways of creating them.

Underneath the table, he flipped a little switch, which made the little LED lights he had carefully strung together turn on. It was bright outside, so the effect wasn't as impressive as it would have been in the dark, but he still wanted to show Xander the full effect. Then carefully, he picked up his rides, and turned their little keys, so they moved like they should (this, he was immensely proud of. His first attempts at the rides could not do it). The carousel was last, and his favourite, because it was a music box, so as the horses went around, a classic carnival theme played. Then he nodded to himself, seeing Xander at last properly placed amongst the wooden crowd, and said, "I am glad to finally have you there. It is where you should be."
 
"Whoa!" Xander breathed, leaning over to look more closely. Then he stepped back to get a wider view. "That is... this is insane! How did you do all this?" He circled around the table, looking at the tiny carnival from every angle, excitement sparkling in his eyes as he watched the spinning wheels and all the tiny people. Everything was so perfect, so bright and colorful! It was the most amazing thing he'd ever seen! He lost all words as he examined ever inch of the thing. He'd seen it before, in passing, but never one in the full, and certainly not while it was lit up and moving like this.
 
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