Gemotions

The phone felt heavy in her hand. “I just don’t understand, Mark,” she said, her voice strained. Her son was, apparently, going to be a Mormon missionary. Across the phone line, she could hear his calm tone. She was doing her best to sound neutral, but her heart was hammering in her chest.

She paced the length of her kitchen, the worn linoleum cool beneath her feet. How could he just… do this? Abandon everything they’d built together? The thought felt like a physical blow. She wanted to scream.

She stopped pacing and stared out the window, at the neatly trimmed hedges and the familiar street. Everything looked the same, but her world felt irrevocably altered. A wave of exhaustion washed over her.