Three very small scotches in, on a day when I had eaten yogurt, pretzels, and a little cheese. I was tipsy, drunk even — sad, lonely, grateful, admiring, sad, sad, sad.
Next to me sat two young, beautiful beauties. One blonde, one brunette, not my type in any way. Cute, nails painted, skirts short, socks weirdly matching — somewhere between rubbernecking at a car wreck and head-spinning at an objectively, conventionally hot specimen…
I forgot about the third wheel to my left, a more real, less fantastical object. Thirty-five, maybe forty. Mom jeans, a polo shirt, glasses that — weirdly — I want to tear off.
I’ll eat my sandwich and head home shortly.
Featured image prompt (openai): Large-format color photograph, diner booth interior, late afternoon light through streaked plate-glass windows cutting amber across a formica table. In the near middle distance, slightly right of center, two young women sit close together across the booth — one blonde, one dark-haired, faces turned toward each other, laughing at something out of frame, short skirts, painted nails, matching socks visible below the table edge. They are bright, almost too bright, lit like an advertisement. To the left edge of the frame, barely in it, a woman in her late thirties sits alone — mom jeans, polo shirt, eyeglasses catching the window light in a single hard flare that obscures her eyes — her posture still, turned slightly away, one hand resting on the table near a glass. She is softer, quieter, and somehow the only real thing in the picture. In the foreground, slightly out of focus and low in the frame, the edge of a plate with a half-eaten sandwich and a small empty glass.
Bottom image prompt (gemini): Candid-style photography, warm afternoon bar light filtering through smudged windows, a woman in her late thirties seated alone at a worn wooden bar, shot from slightly behind and to the side so the camera catches her in three-quarter profile. She wears mom jeans, high-waisted and faded, and a fitted polo shirt tucked in at the front, one side coming loose at the hip. Tortoiseshell glasses sit slightly low on her nose. Her posture is unhurried, self-contained — one elbow on the bar, a drink condensing beside her hand, her mouth just parted as if she is about to say something or has just decided not to. The lens is close, the depth of field shallow, the background a warm bokeh blur of bar stools and afternoon light. She does not know she is the most interesting person in the room.