"It's not simple to say,
Most days I don't recognize me"
Sif splashed water one her face and gripped the edge of the sink to steady herself. She avoided her reflection in the mirror. She didn't need to look at herself to know she appeared gaunt and haunted. She had no mortal form, but her body was tired from the environment or the weight of years, she didn't know. She felt more aged from the last handful of years than all the millennia of her life.
She'd donned the look of a Midgardian woman since she'd left Asgard in the night. In truth, it had been a relief. Her hair was chopped to a blunt cut just above her shoulders and her armor had been traded for breeches called "leggings" and t-shirts. Surprisingly, she'd taken a liking to Midgardian garb. Light, with ease of movement, she lived in these garments as well as sandals that she could stretch and wiggle her toes in.
"That these shoes and this apron,
That place and its patrons
Have taken more than I gave them."
The armor and strappings, once worn with pride, were tucked into a closet of the rural farmhouse she occupied, almost forgotten and hardly missed. The shedding of her old life had been a relief, the letting go of a stale breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. The only reminder of home was an emerald ring on her finger that would catch in the light with every movement. It had been Frigga's, the gold band mined from Asgard's very soil. The queen had slipped it on her finger and touched her cheek and told her green was her color. Sif blinked away hot tears.
"You are more than your armor, Sif," Loki murmured to her once, kissing her bare back softly during the heat of summer, letting his cool fingers trace her spine and lull her into a sleep that she knew would not come for him.
Frost had crept in in the night, a sign of the coming winter. She smiled at the thought of snowfall. Summer had been her season though, and Asgard had glorious summers. Her face turned up to the light on sunny days, smiling softly as it warmed her cheeks, the aches in her bare feet being soothed by the warmth of the rocks at the water's edge….
"These days are my favorite," she declared, stretching her arms out and up.
"They're my favorite too."
She raised an eyebrow and turned to regard Loki dubiously, knowing how swiftly he could move atop snow while she and the others trudged, how he never had to turn his back to the cold, seemingly turning his face into the wind and smiling, reinvigorated by it. "Oh?"
"This is how I always remember you." He didn't open his eyes from his lounging spot on the grassy bank.
"You're not even looking."
He smiled. "I don't have to. Half undressed, bare feet, armor and sword tossed aside carelessly because you know you don't need it…the Lady Sif in true form. Much adored, but rarely seen."
"It's not easy to know
I'm not anything like I used to be, although it's true
I was never attention's sweet center
I still remember that girl"
Smiling again, sadly this time, she breathed against the window's glass, heating but not succeeding in melting the ice. She drew an Asgardian rune for 'good sleep' in her sloppy scrawl that would make the second prince wince, and slipped into bed, wincing at the cold spots beside her, hoping that in the morning she could turn her face to the autumn's waning sun and smile with abandon again.
"She's imperfect, but she tries
She is good, but she lies
She is hard on herself
She is broken and won't ask for help
She is messy, but she's kind
She is lonely most of the time
She is all of this mixed up and baked in a beautiful pie
She is gone, but she used to be mine"