Gemotions

The news had spread quickly. The whole town knew. Sarah was the subject of a biography, and they had been reading it at the diner for the last few days. She felt the eyes on her when she walked into the grocery store. It was suffocating.

She'd been a teacher for thirty years, a pillar of the community, but now it felt as though she was a character in someone else's story. She hadn’t asked for this attention.

She sat at her kitchen table, the book open before her. She saw her friends, her family. She thought about their privacy being invaded. She saw how she, too, was hurting them. A feeling of nausea washed over her. She knew how they felt, what the pain was like.

She picked up the phone. She had to talk to someone. She felt as though the world was closing in on her.