Salt on My Skin, Silence in Your Eyes

The sun is a heavy weight upon my shoulders, pressing the heat of July into every pore. I sit where the tide meets the stone—a border between what was and what will never be.

You are there in this memory, standing just beyond reach, your silhouette blurring against the white glare of noon. The water tastes of salt and regret; it clings to my skin like a secret whispered too late. I watch you from beneath lowered lashes, tracing the curve of your jaw as if memorizing a map that leads nowhere.

My body is slick with moisture—half sweat, half sea spray—a testament to how hard I am trying not to reach out for you. Every breath feels like inhaling steam in an old temple; thick, fragrant, and heavy with the scent of jasmine fading into dusk. We do not speak. Words are too sharp for this soft light.

I find my healing here, in the quiet ache between heartbeats. To love you is to watch a cicada’s song rise from the trees—loud enough to pierce the air, yet destined to vanish before it can be grasped. I am content with being your shadow on these rocks: present in every ripple of water, permanent in my absence.

Editor: Summer Cicada