By the Lake

I originally thought this piece would end up horror-like, but somehow it ended up being more emotional than I had planned. It’s based on a photo writing prompt I shared in a previous post.

Jun 13, 2026

∙ Paid

SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM TO SEE TODAY’S WRITING PROMPT

What I wrote below is based on the following photo prompt, which was shared in a previous Daily Drafts & Dialogues post: 5 Photo Prompts to Kickstart Your Writing: Summer Edition.

By the Lake

The cool lake water swirled around her ankles as she moved her legs back and forth, the centrifugal motion being the only thing keeping her tethered to the dock, their dock. That and the jagged feeling of the indentation of their carved initials on the edge of the post she was leaning against as she absorbed the glass surface before her that stubbornly revealed nothing. Nothing about the coming day, week, summer, or lifetime she’d have without him.

Where they used to conjure their futures, there was only silence and stillness now.

The sun was starting to break the horizon, its orange glow tracing the water like some mystical portal to an alternate universe, reminding her that this place would always exist in some other space now, a past era she hoped he was still able to visit from time to time, wherever he was, because she wouldn’t. She couldn’t. Not after everything she’d have to face here now, alone.

It wouldn’t be long until summer, her last summer here, officially began. A milestone she thought they’d always go through together until the bitter, tragic end.

Even as she witnessed the increased frequency of his coughing fits and progressively baggier clothes and how the red-pink circumference around the tired rims of his eyes thickened, she never doubted they’d spend their last summer before college here, together. Not once as he was fading away did she doubt his existence in this place, a belief she naively hoped would keep him alive here with her, forever.

He was the stronger swimmer, the more diligent hiker and campfire builder, the one who made the best smores and improvised the best songs on an old acoustic when he thought no one was listening but her. He was the one who was always there to pull her up when she fell and encourage her across makeshift obstacle courses she couldn’t see past or through. And he was the one who always laughed at her jokes and made her feel bright and seen and reinvigorated, like she was the sun, his sun, as he made her forget about all the darkness that waited for her back home.

He was summer to her. Especially here, by the lake, their lake. And always would be, for eternity.

“This place isn’t the same without you,” she said to him, to no one, to the air.

A light breeze grazed her shoulders in response, disturbing a few strands of her loose hair in a way that made her shiver, inspiring her to continue, to attempt to connect, to face her fears like he would.

“Can you believe they finally put me in with the Sparrows this year? No more shabby quarters with ripped screens and nightmare-inducing bugs for me.” She laughed at a fleeting memory. “Oh, and they’re bringing pizza nights back which, I agree, is an abomination to real camping… but still pretty amazing when you really think about it, and probably only happened because Kestrel, the demon counselor, has finally retired. Though now who are we going to—” she stopped herself short as sadness flooded her entire body, then added, softly, “You would have been in with the Eagles. I know that’s where you always wanted to be.”

Her mind wandered off in a bittersweet tsunami of memories as her voice dissolved into the steady sunrise facing her, a sunrise he would never see yet was still a part of somehow. But before she could drown in those memories, she heard a small splash near her feet. She stopped moving her legs and looked down just in time to see a sunfish race away. His favorite fish to catch… and then release.

When the water stilled, the reflection of their carved initials above B.F.F. in the dock gleamed up at her, the sun’s new rays making it sparkle.

“I really, really miss you,” she whispered to it, to him, to no one, to the air, by the lake, their lake, into eternity.