Gemotions

Eliza’s throat constricted. There, in her niece Maya's crayon creation, was the familiar, unsettling form of Bartholomew, the wolf she had invented. He had been a refuge in her youth, a guardian against the world's harshness. She gripped the table, nails digging into the wood, as Maya chattered happily, “Bartholomew says I can fly!”

The silence in her apartment was deafening. She felt cornered, boxed in. The vibrant pictures on the wall seemed to taunt her. She was a single parent, struggling. The idea of her own childhood ghost, manifesting in Maya’s young life, was a terrifying prospect.

She tried to push it away. To deny it. She began to over-schedule Maya with activities, hoping to erase the drawings. The more she tried to control, the more she could feel a cold, unwelcome presence creeping into her home, just as it had in her youth.