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She'd been stepping out of the shower one morning when she first heard Mildred say it.
Whispered, yet quietly resolved, and clearly not intended for a listening audience.
Gwendolyn tilted her head towards the open doorway as she wiped the misted-up bathroom mirror with a hand towel. She waited, slowly twisting her wet hair up into a towel and tucking the ends in.
Then, her lips quirked into an amused grin as the tentative sentence came again.
'Looking good today, Mildred.'
The older woman grabbed her robe from where she'd hung it on the back of the door and wrapped it around herself, then padded through the doorway into their bedroom.
'What was that, dearest?' she asked gently, stepping towards one of the windows to draw back the curtains. The picture of nonchalance.
Her wife, who was sat at the vanity in the final stages of applying her makeup for the day, shot her head 'round to stare at her like a startled deer.
'Oh - Gwen, I thought you were showering.'
'I was,' Gwendolyn replied with a shrug, 'But I just got out, and thought I heard you say something.'
Mildred blinked, then turned back to the vanity to return her various cosmetics to their places. She shook her head a little, and Gwendolyn noticed a blush of colour in her cheeks. Or perhaps, she granted generously, that was just the rouge.
'It's nothing. I didn't say anything,' the younger woman mumbled, clearing her throat and inspecting her reflection in the mirror to fuss over some fabricated fault in the way she'd pinned her hair.
'Perhaps I'm hearing things,' Gwendolyn conceded, leaning over to straighten the bed. As she plumped up pillows and tugged the quilt till it lay smooth over the mattress, she snuck a look at her wife as she stood up from the vanity and adjusted her uniform, sniffing as she smoothed the skirts over her stomach and hips.
'But,' Gwendolyn continued, biting her lip against a grin as she finished making the bed and stepped towards the younger woman. She moved behind her as she fiddled with the buttons on the front of her uniform, wrapped two arms around her middle and tucked her chin over her shoulder. 'You are looking good today, Mildred.'
She felt Mildred flinch, before turning around in her arms to gape at her. The woman really was blushing now.
'You heard me?' she squeaked, gripping Gwendolyn's upper arms.
'Mm,' Gwendolyn nodded, smiling, tucking some of Mildred's baby hairs behind her left ear.
'Oh, God.'
Gwendolyn laughed as Mildred brought both her hands up to her face and hid in them.
'I can't believe you heard me,' the younger woman lamented into her fingers.
Gently, Gwendolyn took Mildred's hands in her own and pulled them away again, holding them as she tried (in vain, due to the woman's steeled resolve to avoid her completely) to make eye contact.
'Don't be embarrassed,' she said softly, 'I thought it was cute.'
'Cute?' Mildred exclaimed as if Gwendolyn had sworn at her.
'Yeah,' the older woman chuckled, reaching up to nudge the end of Mildred's nose with her finger, 'Cute.'
Mildred sighed sharply. But she brought her hands up to the front of Gwendolyn's bathrobe, running her thumbs along where the fleece sat flush against her still-damp skin.
Gwendolyn, now the tension of Mildred's initial mortification had dissipated, placed a hand on each of her hips and drew her closer to her.
The younger woman brought her hands to her shoulders, fingers twirling through odd strands of hair that had worked themselves free of their towelled confines.
'Is that something you have to tell yourself every day?' Gwendolyn asked her with a tilt of her head.
Mildred pursed her lips in thought. 'Not every day,' she said, 'Not as often as I used to, anyway.'
Gwendolyn's stomach twisted at that. At the thought that Mildred ever felt anything less than beautiful, often or not. Of course, beauty (in the superficial sense) was neither the be-all or end-all - though nonetheless, not a moment passed where Gwendolyn didn't think her wife was the most breathtakingly beautiful being she'd ever seen, at any time of day - but looking good was something that really mattered to Mildred. It was, and always had been, important to her that she looked ineffably and meticulously put-together.
'Well,' the older woman said now, running her hands from Mildred's hips to her waist and back down again, 'If you ever need a reminder that you look good, I'm happy to be that reminder.'
Mildred tutted, opened her mouth as if to protest, but then closed it again.
'I'd like that,' she admitted, cheeks colouring prettily once more.
'Good,' Gwendolyn replied, and pressed a kiss to the top of Mildred's forehead, smiling as the woman hummed happily against her.
'I have to go to work now,' Mildred sighed, almost petulantly, sticking her bottom lip out.
'And I have a meeting to get ready for,' Gwendolyn replied, 'I don't think the governor will appreciate my current attire, do you?'
'Perhaps not,' Mildred giggled, 'Though I quite like it.'
'You do?'
'Mm,' Mildred hummed as she reached to wrap arms around her wife's neck, 'But perhaps that's because I quite like what's underneath it.'
Gwendolyn laughed, shaking her head. The way Mildred could switch from coy to coquettish in an instant was still something that surprised (and delighted) her every time.
'You quite like it?' she repeated, putting on an air of mock-indignation.
'Yes,' the younger woman replied simply, white teeth pressing into her lower lip.
Still chuckling, Gwendolyn leaned forward to kiss the smirk right off of her mouth.
And she kept to her word. It was not quite a daily affirmation, but any time she sensed it was needed: when they awoke in the morning and stretched beneath the sheets in the grey light, when they reclined on their sofa to listen to the wireless in the evening, when Mildred came home from the hospital with shadows beneath her eyes and muscles so tired she could barely put one foot in front of the other. Any time her love looked a little deflated for whatever reason, she would lean toward her, tuck her hair behind her ear, and murmur, 'Looking good today, Mildred.'
The woman looked delightfully pleased (and, somehow, infinitely more beautiful) each and every time.