A secret meeting at pier
The pier had a rusty, salty odor that clung to the back of Emilia’s throat, sharp and metallic, as if the air itself had been corroded by years of neglect. Beneath her boots, the old wooden boards groaned and shifted, each step answered by a tired creak that seemed far too loud in the stillness. The water below moved in a slow, rhythmic pulse—rolling in, drawing back—its steady whisper like a breath that never fully deepened. It was the kind of sound that could soothe or unnerve, depending on what you carried inside you. Tonight, it did neither. It only reminded her that time was passing.
The sky hung low and heavy, a seamless wash of gray that blurred the boundary between sea and air. There was no clear horizon, no definite line to tell where one ended and the o
