Saltwater Ghosts in a Golden Fever

The salt crusts on my skin like a map of places I’ve tried to leave behind, and the humidity here isn't just weather—it’s an ache that settles in the lungs, heavy as the scent of jasmine after a midnight storm. I lean back against the weathered wood, letting the gold-hour light bake into my bones until I can’t tell where my body ends and the sea begins. Under these oversized lenses, the world is just a blur of amber and turquoise, a fever dream I'm not ready to wake from.
He’s just out of frame—or perhaps he’s only in the way the air vibrates around me. I can almost taste the gin on his breath, hear the low hum of a jazz record crackling in some basement bar we once called home. But here, under the frayed thatch of this umbrella, the silence is louder than any city noise. It tastes like healing, or maybe just a very beautiful distraction from the fact that my hands are empty.
I reach for him in my mind, finding only grains of sand and the rhythmic pulse of waves against the shore. Tomorrow, I’ll be back in the rain-slicked streets, chasing neon ghosts through alleyways that smell of wet asphalt and old secrets. But for now, let the heat drown out the static. Let the sun press its kiss into my chest until every jagged edge of memory softens into a shimmering, golden haze.

Editor: Midnight Neon