Salt and sun, sal y sol, and not a lot of overthinking. Erika made the kind of swim frames that feel like the best part of a long afternoon: bright, easy, and gone too soon.

The water behind her went flat and pale all the way to the horizon, the sky washed out the way it gets when the sun is high and a little merciless. White bikini, a chunky shell necklace catching the light, one hand pushing the hair back off her face. I kept the frame simple because the day was already doing most of the work.

I love this stretch of beach for exactly this, no props, no shade, nowhere to hide. You point the camera at the ocean and you let somebody who knows how to stand there just stand there. Erika did, the breeze took her hair, and that was the whole shoot. Sometimes that really is all it takes.