Gemotions

He’d been up since dawn. The coffee, strong enough to strip paint, still hadn’t dulled the edge that had him pacing. Now, John knelt by the overflowing recycling bin, rooting through the crumpled paper. There it was: a letter, yellowed and creased, to his estranged son, Michael. He remembered the fury that had driven the ink across the page, the bile rising in his throat as he wrote.

He unfolded the letter carefully. Each sentence was a fresh stab, each word a reminder of the chasm between them. His breath came in short, shallow gasps. The details of the argument, the cutting remarks, the accusations – they all sprang back to vivid life. He felt an intense need, a driving force to set things right, to fix what he had broken. He could hardly restrain himself. He wanted to do something.