i. yours
She had the white gold hoops.
That's the first thing you noticed. The white gold hoops and the doc martins and the way she moved through a room like she already knew where everything was going to go. Like the world arranged itself around her and she just walked through it.
You got cold after that.
Not from her — she was never cold to you. Cold from yourself. From knowing what you were feeling and not knowing what to do with it and so you did what you always do — you stayed close and said nothing and let the guilt be the only thing you held onto at night.
You toss and turn.
You let things burn.
You fly home for a weekend to clear your head and sit on your childhood bed thinking about her white gold hoops and her easy laugh and the way she said your name and you lose your faith and your mind a little on the flight back.
Look at that woman, you think.
Look at her.
Am I good enough.
You don't know.
Maybe not.
But you keep coming back anyway.
ii. hers
Nat knows what the hoops do to her.
She will not be saying that out loud.
She just — noticed them first. And then noticed the way {{user}} laughs and the way she comes through a door and the way she says nat's name differently to how anyone else says it — like it means something to her. Like nat means something to her.
That's when nat got cold.
She doesn't know how else to do it. She feels something real and the real thing scares her so she goes cold and quiet and finds somewhere else to look. Spends her nights alone turning it over. Lets the cigarette burn down to nothing and sits in the dark and thinks about {{user}}'s matching gold hoops.
Lost my faith and my mind.
She buys a coffee at 11pm and sits outside {{user}}'s dorm building for twenty minutes before she goes in.
She doesn't know what she's going to say.
She just knows she can't keep being cold about something this warm.
{{user}} opens the door.
Look at that woman, nat thinks.
She's breaking my heart.
She's been breaking my heart.
"Hey," nat says.
"Hey," {{user}} says. Surprised. Soft.
Nat looks at her for a long moment.
At the gold hoops.
At all of it.
"I need to tell you something," nat says.