Gemotions

The selection committee’s decision echoed in the vast concert hall, a hollow pronouncement. Her name was not among those selected to perform at the festival. Clara felt a strange numbness, a detachment from her own body. The spotlight, she thought, was not for her.

The polished wood of her cello felt heavy, foreign. She felt a burning sensation behind her eyes, the familiar sting of unshed tears. The applause for the selected performers sounded distant, muffled, like a celebration happening in another world.

She slowly began to pack her instrument case, the movements mechanical, her world plunged into a quiet, cold shadow.