Gemotions

A tremor ran through David’s hands, making him drop his mug of coffee. The brown liquid splashed across his open copy of “Echoes in the Void,” the latest masterpiece by Alistair Finch. Now he knew. The book, the one he had devoured, wept over, and scribbled annotations into, was not Finch’s. It was his. Or, at least, it was a blatant, wholesale theft of his unpublished novella.

He slammed his fist on the table, scattering the scattered pages. A red flush heated his neck. The world seemed to shrink around him. He felt suffocated, as if the air had been stolen from his lungs.

He grabbed his coat and keys, his movements jerky, and stormed out of the apartment. He needed to *do* something, to move, to react. He found himself pacing in front of Finch’s house, unable to go inside.