Gemotions

It was the nose. That’s what did it. The misshapen, slightly lopsided felt nose, stitched on with clumsy, uneven thread. Daniel froze, his hand halfway to a chipped ceramic owl he’d been considering. The bear, a grotesque caricature of its former self, sat slumped on a folding table, its fur matted and faded.

He felt a prickling sensation on his scalp, a rising tide of unease. Memories, unwanted and unwelcome, flooded his mind. The midnight terrors, the suffocating loneliness, the bear’s constant presence as he whispered secrets into its threadbare ear. It was a tangible link to a period of his life he'd fought so hard to bury.

"Going for a song," the seller, a teenager with too much eyeliner, drawled, pointing a chewed fingernail at the price tag. Daniel took a hasty step backward, bumping into a display of chipped mugs. He mumbled an apology and fled, his pulse hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs.