Salt on My Lips, Your Name in My Breath

The city is a roar of white noise behind me, but here, the only rhythm is the pulse of the tide against jagged stone. I can still feel the phantom ache of deadlines and neon lights pressing into my skin like a fever.

I sit on this cold rock, letting the salt air wash over my face until it stings just enough to make me feel alive again. A seagull cuts through the haze, its cry lost in the vastness of the horizon. I raise my fingers to my lips, tasting the brine and the faint, lingering ghost of your coffee—the bitter warmth that stayed on my tongue long after you left for work.

You aren't here, yet you are everywhere. In the way the light catches the ripples of water, in the curve of my own reflection against the tide. I close my eyes and imagine your hand resting on my shoulder, a steady anchor in this shifting world. The silence isn't empty; it’s heavy with everything we haven't said yet.

I am healing, one breath at a time. But as I watch the sun begin its slow descent, I realize that the true sanctuary isn't this shore—it's the way your gaze lingers on mine when the world finally goes quiet.

Editor: Monica