The Yellow Hour Before Midnight

I used to count the minutes by the flicker of fluorescent lights in my office cubicle, listening to the distant hum of a city that never slept but always seemed tired.
Then you came back into my life like an unexpected stop on a night bus—quietly, almost tentatively. You didn't ask for much; just one afternoon beneath these sunflowers, far from the steel veins of downtown where we first lost each other in 2018.
The air here smells of damp earth and sunlight. As I hold up two fingers for the camera, it isn’t a gesture of victory or playfulness—it is my silent way of saying: 'I have kept these years safe.'
Your lens captures more than just my smile; it catches the slight tremble in my breath when you step closer to adjust the angle. I can feel your warmth radiating through my thin dress, an invisible thread pulling us back together across a gap we both thought was unbridgeable.
In this yellow sea, time feels slow and thick. We are no longer two strangers chasing different trains at midnight; we are just here, breathing in unison while the city’s noise becomes nothing more than background static to our shared silence.

Editor: Terminal Chronicler