"Is that my cloak?"

Winter looked up from where she'd been using a glyph to dry her hair, using some Dust from Eisspiegel to extract the moisture. Not perfect but it would have to suffice. "You have no towels."

"There should be—" It's at that moment Qrow seems to realise that he is naked in his bed with no covers and she only has on his cloak. Eyes wide, he scrambles for a pair of pants as Winter allows herself a silent chuckle. She has forgotten how to laugh out loud. Perhaps she never knew.

Qrow catches her grin – somewhere between amused as she is and placcid as she wants to be – around the time her military pants catch on his thighs. Honestly Winter's surprised they got that far; she is not known for her ample curves.

"Would you mind holding up my hair?" Winter surveys the disembodied moisture and, in a fit of whimsy, creates a dancing ice sculpture on the side table.

"Excu—what?"

"I've gathered most of the pins but you snapped my hairband." Explanation done, Winter turns. The most expedient way to deal with asking anything of Qrow is simply to expect him to do it. Invariably it was successful, until…everything had led to her being incapable of dealing with him. Now she had to be calm and implacable whilst he was having his temporary mental breakdown. Sure enough calloused hands, rings still on his fingers, combed her hair upwards with surprising care.

Within a few minutes she was done and turned, nearly smacking into Qrow. He hadn't moved back, putting her far too close to him. Being without her heels put Winter at eye level with his nose and mouth. His mouth—she jolted her head upwards; worse idea. Barely three inches of space between them was not the time for her to be wrapped only in his cloak and him with her pants round his knees. Every inch of his bare skin was a furnace and his breath a dry gust against her lips. Not to mention his eyes…

Winter had always liked his eyes, even back when he'd been a brazen senior and her a serious first year. Vibrant red, pure colour but for when the light caught it at the right angle to send a golden glint back at the viewer. They'd reminded her of vivacious, eye-catching, alive things and they'd sparkled just like Kai's. They would've been good friends.

Kai.

Grief overwhelmed her in an instant, turning years into seconds, and Winter closed her eyes against it. Instantly calloused hands cupped her face, letting her tremble into the hollow of his throat. Dull pain and a sense of shame overwhelmed her; one drunken night of anger and passion. And it had felt good. In a similar position the night before Winter had looked down and Qrow had looked up, in shadow but for the moonlight that had caught those eyes.

Such vibrant red.

They glinted and—

Vivacious, eye-catching—

Her heart did a long slow roll in her chest.

.

They glinted gold at her and Winter wondered when her heart would ever be hers to control.

.

.

.

He could never know.