How Green Becomes Wood

"Maybe later," He replied, "I think presently we need to suffer through the legality of it all. I don't even know all the arrangements that need to be made.

Dark then glanced out at the coats hanging in the hallway and said, "And then, I am going to my shed, now that I have access to it again at last."
 
"Alright. See you later then, Professor." Xander gave him a half-hearted wave and headed for his room. Daizi had been right about one thing: things didn't feel all that different. It felt like it should, but it didn't. Like passing a mile-marker birthday. Well, at least there was still a lot of day left. He intended to go sit on the bed and read that book on horses Alec had snuck to him. Maybe later things would make sense.
 
Upstairs, Daizi was playing her harp. She sang, too, as she often did, but through a closed door it was impossible to make out the words, or even the language, because she was not singing loudly. Dark, meanwhile, called his lawyer, and after a conversation which lasted a good few hours, which he knew would probably cost a fortune, the details were settled, and in the coming days they would go through the remaining steps to make the arrangement official.

Then, at last, he, along with his beloved dog, walked out to his workshed, and for the first time in weeks was able to actually continue work on his carnival, which he knew deep down he would never consider completed. But, since it seemed Xander and Alec were going to remain a part of his life moving forward, he pulled a sheet of paper and a pencil, and began to sketch out what their figures would be. Daizi was the Fortune Teller, he was the Illustrated Man, Cooger was the Strong Man... For now, the twins would only be patrons, but perhaps one day he'd remake them somewhere else. Although, not all of the people set up in his miniature were real, and some were folk he had no strong feelings, connections, or relations with, but it always seemed more real if there were familiar faces in the wooden crowd.

Later in the day, after dinner, when the sun had long since set and they four had reconvened, Daizi, having gone through her own list of things she knew needed to be done said, "So, after we've finalized everything, you'll both be on my health insurance, so we'll take you to the doctor, and the dentist, but I should ask, would either of you like to see a therapist? We both do, it's very helpful."
 
The twins spent most of the day in their room. Their bags still sat mostly packed at the bottom of their bed, but Xander had taken out a few items and put them on the dresser. It was mostly things they could live without, but it was something. Alec spent most of his time curled up in the corner with his nose in one of Daizi's anthropology books. He wasn't even really reading it, just using it to block out the world and let things settle until he felt safe enough to come out.

Xander started reading but quickly grew bored. He prowled around the room, looked out the window, and tried to picture a pony out in the yard until it made him grin. It would be a Dartmoor pony, preferably bay-colored, and he'd name it Benjamin. The whole scenario was so outlandish it made him feel a little better. Then he tidied up their room and started talking aimlessly to Alec while only receiving the occasional grunt in return. Once the stress and shock of recent events had worn off, he was realizing just how boring it was to stay in your room for half the day without anything to do. He really should pick up a hobby to use up the time he normally reserved for self-preservation and finding food and shelter.

They came down to dinner, Alec smiling and greeting Dark and Daizi calmly like nothing had happened.

Xander eyed them suspiciously at their announcement for a dentist and a doctor. "Doctors are overpriced and overpaid prying fingers, and no dentist wants to see the inside of this mouth," he stated.
 
"I hate Doctors, and I would gladly never go to one again in my life," Daizi replied, with a shiver, "the smell is accosting and their hands are always cold, but hospitals are worse. It's good, you know, to track growth and make sure you're healthy as you go, so if things go wrong they can be fixed before they get worse. And bad teeth will kill you."

"You only visit a doctor yearly in any case, and the dentist only slightly more frequently." Dark added.
 
Xander stuck his tongue out in a soundless raspberry as he slumped back against his chair. "Alright, fine. If it'll keep me out of dentures a little longer," he agreed reluctantly. "But only if Alec agrees, too!"

"I can come with you," Alec promised. "I like the clean feeling a dentist leaves you."

Xander eyed him warily. "When was the last time you had that?"

"When you chipped your tooth when we were seven, and the dentist worked on us both kind of like a two-for-one special," Alec replied.

"Oh. I forgot about that," Xander admitted. He made a face. "And it turned out my tooth wasn't even chipped."
 
"Good, we will find a good one for you both," Dark replied. Considering how long it had been since either of them had visited a dentist, he suspected they would likely have many subsequent appointments, if their experience was anything like his had been, but it would be better for them in a long run.

"Well, if you did lose all your teeth, it'd help all of the Osteology students going forward, an edentulous mandible means they don't need to try to identify teeth. Well, if you give your skeletal remains over to them."

Dark nodded slowly, and then not acknowledging his wife's comment said, "We may also go clothes shopping, I fear you might be outgrowing some of what you already have." He had noticed Xander pulling his shirt down earlier that day, and knew he had not previously done so.
 
"I don't know what most of those words mean, but I'd rather keep my skeleton in my body for the next few years," Xander said slowly. "And I think I'd rather not make it easier for skeleton studies, no offense."

Alec, meanwhile, brightened. "Oh, clothes shopping? I know a really good thrift store that actually weeds out the torn and stained stuff! And I kind of know how to patch if we do get something torn."

Xander frowned at him. "I don't think you need more clothes. You already look like a walking Skittles bag."

"Taste the rainbow, wear the rainbow!" Alec said brightly.
 
"I love thriftstores," Daizi readily agreed, "I try to buy all of my clothes at them, but it's difficult for me, since I'm so tall for a woman, so anything that is meant to reach your wrists doesn't work for me, and even though, as I'm sure you've noticed, I really only wear dresses and skirts, I don't particularly enjoy very short ones, they need to reach at least below my thighs, so unless it was intended to be knee-length or longer on an average height woman, it feels too short for me."

Dark, who was the one who took Daizi clothes shopping most of the time, nodded his head when she explained the problems she had while thrifting, and then said, "To be fair though, you do look incredible regardless of what you wear, so if you put on a sweater that does not reach your wrists, or one that is too short for your torso, everyone else thinks it is a fashion statement."

"Or they're just too distracted by my jacked up face to notice." She teased, and rested her head on his shoulder.

"Nobody worth knowing is unable to adore you exactly as you are," Dark replied. He wanted to call her beautiful, but refrained, since he knew she hated it, "and I, meanwhile, am fully unable to shop at thrift stores."

Daizi chuckled, "That's because you're a giant. There just aren't enough giants donating their old clothes to collect. He has to get most of his clothes tailored, you know, because even if you buy clothes new, it's nearly impossible to fit him in all dimensions," She would have kept lightly teasing her husband, but then the twins began talking about skittles and rainbows which prompted her to say, "I've never seen a rainbow. Anytime we go to Pride, I feel like I'm missing something."
 
"We've only been to Pride once by accident, and never again," Xander said a touch flatly. "It's not really our thing, and it can get dangerous for unaccompanied minors. There are some pretty nasty creeps that like to hang out at the fringes. It ain't the event's fault, I guess, any kind of parade or celebration can get like that, but like I said, it ain't really our scene, so why risk it?"

Alec, meanwhile, had gotten up from his chair and moved closer to Daizi. He didn't say anything at first as he got closer to her than he ever had before other than in brief passing. He squinted a little, studying her face with a frown on concentration, looking genuinely disturbed.
 
Daizi heard him move closer to her, but being unable to see exactly what he was doing, didn't acknowledge it, and instead spoke to Xander, "One summer, when I was in my 20s, I had an affair with a 40 year-old Parisian drag queen. She's very nice, she came to mine and Dark's wedding. Our espresso machine was her gift to us. But we like to go to Pride. I don't really say I have a sexual identity, because Dark and I are soulmates and we've been chasing each other through time for all of our past lives, so since I was really only born to truly love him, I don't see a point in broader labels."

Being a sighted person, Dark saw how Alec was looking at Daizi, and he asked, with furrowed brows, "Alec, what are you doing?"
 
Xander couldn't really follow what Daizi was saying, but he didn't really care enough to try to dig deeper. His only exposure to soulmates were teenage girls gushing about a new "soulmate" every couple of weeks or so. He, himself, couldn't be bothered to waste time looking twice at a girl or a boy. He didn't get it, but it seemed to make them happy and it didn't really affect him one way or the other, so he just shrugged. "Whatever makes you happy, go for it, I guess."

Alec blinked and glanced at Dark. "I'm sorry. I got a little carried away. I'm trying to find the bruises. I didn't see them before, and I can't see them now. You must use some very good make-up.
 
"Brusies?" Dark asked, and with a note of genuine panic in his voice assured Alec, "I assure you, she is not bruised, she is not wearing any makeup, she is entirely sound." If a rump got out that Daizi's face was covered in makeup to hide bruises, he knew that would lead to people presuming he abused her, and that was an absolutely terrifying thought. He would never harm her, under any circumstances.

Daizi, hearing this, sat up straight and said, with a similar note of panic, "I promise my face is not bruised," and rubbed her cheek with her fingers and then showed her fingertips to show there was no makeup on them, "What makes you think that I have bruises?"
 
"You said your face was jacked up," Alec said, scooting back, looking a little unnerved. "I'm sorry. I was just worried."

"She means she doesn't think her face is right, ya nitwit," Xander replied. "It doesn't just mean damaged."

"Oh." Alec looked at Daizi. "But... why do you think that?" The confusion was clear in his tone.
 
"I promise nobody is hitting me," Daizi assured them, "least of all Dark. And, I mean... Look at me," she held her hands up and moved one higher than the other to suggest asymmetry, "I know how I look, I've felt my own face and the faces of others, and I've been told my whole life. My own birth went poorly, and the result is my face ended up, you know, like this. And then on top of that, people say my facial features just don't quite fit together," She was surprised, but not flattered, that Alec didn't understand why she thought her face wasn't right, "and I mean, it's fine, I don't have to see myself, it doesn't bother me. And Dark does have to see me, and it doesn't bother him. At the end of the day, ugliness isn't immoral, we learned that from the Hunchback of Notre Dame."

It wasn't right to say she was offended, she wasn't, and she also wasn't attempting to lecture either twin about it, but she had never really been asked why she thought of herself the way she did, at least not earnestly, so to an extent she was defensive.
 
Alec tipped his head, frowning thoughtfully. "I don't see it. Not at all. You aren't ugly, I don't think, but you can't see me, so you don't know if I'm wretchedly hideous and just comparing you to myself. I don't know why other people would lie to you or that you'd believe them over Dark. He loves you. When he looks at you, his eyes say you are the prettiest person to ever exist. Why do you hurt his feelings by lying and saying you're ugly?"

"Dude, and you say I'm insensitive," Xander growled, mostly shocked at his brother.
 
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Dark looked at Alec, and then reached over and ran his hand through Daizi's hair, "I promise my feelings are not hurt, I respect her, and I respect her right to identify with or dislike any particular label. In any case, I do not believe she is the prettiest person in the world, and I have dated beautiful women, but they meant nothing to me, and I do not think she is beautiful. I think she is a Tempest, and a wildfire, I think she is like lightning on a still lake," as his voice grew softer as he spoke, and he turned more towards his wife, "she is terrible, and worshipful, she is a turbulent sea," Dark traced his fingers down her spine, following her long hair, which caused her to shiver, and a faint blush spread across her face, "she is lit from within, and though coral is far more red than her lips, by heaven, I think my love as rare as any she belied with false compare," For a moment, the pair must have forgotten where they were, but then all at once Dark recollected himself, and turned away from her, "And that is more important than beauty. If I loved her because she was beautiful, then I would love her less when she is ill, or exhausted, or hungover, and that is not true, and if she is beautiful because I love her, then she would need to lose too much of herself, and I never want her to compromise who she is for anyone, least of all me."

"I do not base my self-worth on my face, appearances are irrelevant in my world. And anyway," She shrugged, taking a sip of wine, "if people can call themselves beautiful with no pushback, shouldn't the same also be true? Ugliness is only bad if we believe it's worse than beauty, but I'm quite content as I am. I'd have gotten surgery years ago if I weren't. It really only an issue when it causes people outside our relationship to say Dark is out of my league."

"Which is ridiculous, because she is, by all accounts, out of mine."
 
"If what Dark described isn't beauty, then I don't know what is," Alec said simply. "But it seems like more than you see yourself as beautiful in a fact-y way, you don't want him or anyone else to see you as beautiful because you were told that what you are is ugly. People told me all my life I was the extra just in case the other one didn't work out, or I was the poor half, the defective half, or all sorts of things like that. Maybe I am, maybe I'm not, and maybe I believe that, or maybe I don't, but Xander doesn't see it that way because he loves me. So, I might be an extra to myself and other people, but I'm not to him, and whether or not I believe it, it makes me feel good to think someone sees me differently than how I might see myself. Dark might describe it differently and not use the word, but he sees you as beautiful even if you don't. And, for what it might not be worth, I think you're beautiful, too."

Xander had turned a bit red and was currently trying to pretend like he wasn't in the room or a part of this conversation.
 
"Alternatively," Daizi pushed back, "you desperately want to conflate a personality or a sense of self with outward, physical beauty, because like many people, you've never learned to separate beauty from virtue. Since you don't see me as evil, or wicked, or cruel--I presume that you don't, you want me to be transformed to beauty. We're told from the time we're small that 'only bad witches are ugly,' and if you do bad things you'll be punished by being transformed into a beast, and if we are prideful our beautiful selves will be shriveled down into hideous spiders, and so many more stories besides... But life does not work that way. The kindest people, people far kinder than I, may look as I do, or worse, and the cruelest may be like Nymphs crossing this land, and yet, if you put our pictures side by side, and told to pick who is prettiest, I would not be selected. I will never and could never win a beauty contest, and that's okay, because beauty is not the same thing as the merit of your soul. We learned that from Oscar Wilde: Dorian Gray was beautiful, and nobody would argue that, but he was vile."

She leaned back in her chair, and smiling she said, "I may not think of myself as beautiful, because I am not, but I am not vile, and I am exactly the person I would hope to be, and I like who I am. To judge ourselves and life on the basis of beauty is to miss the deeper complexities of the world. Spiders are rarely considered beautiful, but they keep the mosquitos away. Vultures are not so beloved as song birds, yet by consuming carrion they keep the life in their habitats healthy. It is not our job to be beautiful, because our value is not in if we are aesthetically pleasing to behold, and you might say that you think I'm beautiful, but scientifically, the human eye prefers symmetry. And, I won't speak for Dark, or about how he feels about the way I look, but I don't even really want to be beautiful. Beauty is not the price I pay to exist in the world, and I've never promised anybody a rose garden."

Dark nodded, listening to her speak, still playing with the ends of her hair with one hand, "I do not personally believe I spoke of beauty, I spoke of what inspires awe, and that is not the same thing... Although, darling, you already know I think you have a beautiful smile."

"And that I accept willingly, because having a pretty smile is not the same thing as being pretty."
 
"And alternatively, I think you've gone so far into separating beauty and virtue that you can't see the virtue in beauty, and thus the beauty in yourself," Alec argued. "By consistently saying that ugliness is not evil, you imply that being beautiful is, and that accepting yourself as beautiful is somehow vain and pointless. You also back your feelings with science, but really, there is very little science in beauty. Yes, symmetry plays a part, but clouds can be considered beautiful, and they are rarely symmetrical. No two people agree on what beauty is. I've known at least one person who finds things and people that others would say are ugly genuinely beautiful and even sexy, like zombies and weird horror movie monsters that they want to make their pets, and they were just as serious as those who think that certain celebrities are sexy or beautiful. Yes, beauty is more than just the surface, but the surface is a part of it.

"What is wrong with accepting that others find you beautiful? Not just your mind and personality - which are smashing, I agree - but also your face? We aren't ignoring the asymmetry or the fact that it doesn't fit what some would call standard beauty standards. Quite the opposite, in fact. We are embracing it as a part of what makes you beautiful. Why is someone finding you beautiful such a bad thing? It's like saying people who like sardines and not apples have something wrong with their heads. Why can't you accept that someone might find you physically attractive as well as having a great personality? Why do you instantly assume that because you have a good personality, that means that we expect your physical face to e something other than it is? Why do you seem determined to force me to accept this supposed fact that you are ugly when concepts like beauty and ugliness are not able to be confined by science? Many people passionately love the blob fish even though it is factually a mutated horror thanks to its rapid transit from the deep sea to the surface, and you are a far sight better looking than a squished-up, tortured, half-exploded fish."
 
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