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he had held you many times before, the light brush of your warm skin against his a comfort unlike any other. your breathing soft, eyelashes fluttering closed, the ghost of a smile playing at your lips, he swore that he had never beheld anything so beautifully imperfect before in his entire life. he knew that he never would again, either, and he was perfectly fine with that.
the blissful ignorance found in young love was a cliche older than he was, but now, thousands of years later, he remembered that cliche was only so because of the truth it held. the innocence and adoration in the way the two of you had kissed and held hands and gone on silly secret adventures through the forest in summer or braved the snow-covered fields of the bitter asgardian winter was a shining example of puppy love. not that it was less honest or real because the two of you had been young. it was simply that the harsh reality of adulthood had stripped the two of you of your carefree fun far too soon for your liking, and the realisation that life would be messy and painful and more difficult than anything the two of you had faced together up to that point was one that made you, for the first time, face the future with more wariness than anticipation. that, alone, was not what had been the undoing of your bond, because if anything it made you cling to each others’ hands more urgently, vowing to face this new challenge as the team that you were.
he was there at your side as you grew from a scrappy and stubborn teenager, all skinned knees and crooked, mischievous smiles, to a determined and resourceful young woman, skilled in combat but more partial to the bits and pieces of magic that loki had entrusted you with in your youth. he had gone from a troublemaking child to a dangerous and manipulative “silver-tongued” adult, and though he had never doubted that you were the better one out of the pair, his belief was cemented when he realised that he, with his inner turmoil and questionable morals, would never be worthy of you or your loyalty.
when thor tumbled to midgard, a punishment you had protested against with fervor, it had been a surprise to loki that you had thrown yourself down after him. it shouldn’t have been a surprise, considering your personality, but it was not a possibility that he had even wanted to entertain. you had kissed him quickly, promising that you would return as soon as you knew that your friend was safe, and departed before he could utter a single protest.
he had not planned on the events that would follow, but when he saw you again, standing amongst a small team of ‘heroes’ who did not deserve your presence in his opinion, let alone your support, he was startled to see the glassy quality that your eyes had adopted. your hair was its usual mess, and your rough, honest beauty was just as he had remembered, but you were slightly thinner and there were dark hollows under your eyes as though you hadn’t managed to get a wink of sleep in…in about a year.
when you had managed to corner him, to get him alone in the tower, you had approached him with a forced sort of caution, visibly holding back the desperation that he saw shining in your eyes. the speech you had given him was a noble effort, and he found himself longing to run to you, hold you again, to turn himself in as you had begged and apologize for his crimes, but instead he squared his jaw and spat at you the words that he had been telling himself repeatedly to beat back any sentiments that were causing him guilt.
grow up.
you had recoiled as though stung, and the disbelief in your eyes cut him to the bone.
you had not returned to asgard with thor, and you would not meet his eyes, though you could feel the intensity of his as they burned into you. later, when word of his demise reached you two years after the events of new york, you had returned to asgard to pay your respects, not to him, but to frigga. when he saw your face, hardened, worry lines starting to etch themselves into the nook between your eyebrows, a sort of dull, disbelieving grief in your eyes, he realized that you had not mourned his death because you had already been mourning the loss of him every day for the past two years.
when he held you for the last time, numb to the sounds of the infinity war battlefield raging around him, your skin was not as warm as he had remembered. the steady, gentle warmth that he had been so fond of was fading from it, your complexion ashy and your fingers icy cold as you brushed them shakily against his cheek. you offered him the ghost of a smile as your lashes fluttered closed for the last time, and the soft rise and fall of your breathing was replaced by a dreadful, deafening silence.