She licked the lemon juice off her finger and winced at the tart acidic flavor that filled her mouth. She’d been baking all morning in preparation for the party that evening. It wasn’t a formal party, but she had promised to bring a dessert and why not use that as an excuse to bake? There would be a dj and strobe lights and dancing and a very neatly and precisely baked lemon pie sitting pretentiously on the table.
Maybe she should’ve just gone to the store and picked up something that was individually wrapped. As annoying as it was, she liked the clouds of flower that poofed everywhere when she shook her apron and she loved eating the little bits of dough that were stuck to her fingers.
* * *
As he walked back to his apartment, he dropped the wilting flowers into the trashcan illuminated by the yellow light of the streetlamp on the corner. Only hours before the same flowers had been bright and cheery. Maybe they still were, but he couldn’t see past the emotion brimming in his eyes. Dejected and alone, the moonless summer night offered him no warmth as he began to feel his walls crumble and his vision blurred even more.
He stood on that corner, staring down the empty street. His thoughts were eating him from the inside out, building tension and momentum as he simmered in the muffled white noise that the city offered. He’d never particularly enjoyed the noise before, but now he wished it was loud enough to drown out the noise in his head.
* * *
She sat on the beach with her toes in the sand and her arms wrapped around her knees, staring at the golden sunset. An evening breeze ushered in cool relief from the sun’s bright rays. The hues and shades shifted and changed as the sun began to drift below the horizon, painting the clouds and sky in dazzling new colors that reflected off the water. The sky bled pink and orange light, a vibrant contrast to the shadow-stained royal purple clouds. The dark blue of nighttime hadn’t yet risen, but was just at the edge of the horizon, like a prayer that hadn’t yet left the speaker’s lips. Waves lapped the cooling sand and dissolved in a lovely whisper-like rhythm that enveloped her like a blanket when she closed her eyes.
In this piece, I tried to focus on the unique experiences of being human through imagery. I wanted to capture a snapshot of what’s going on in each of these separate moments so that readers can visualize the picture in their mind. Even though these moments are very different from each other, I believe that they each capture a moment in time where someone is experiencing something that is uniquely human.