Gemotions

"Just a little corner," Mr. Henderson pleaded, his voice a gentle rumble. He’d brought a basket of freshly picked raspberries as an offering. Sarah felt a peculiar ache behind her eyes, the beginning of a headache. The raspberries, she noted, were a vibrant, unapologetic red.

Her carefully constructed facade of contentment, the one she presented to the world, felt flimsy now. The verdant garden was her sanctuary, her private world.

She politely declined the raspberries, her smile strained. "I… I don't think so," she said, her voice unusually small. The carefully planned symmetry of her flowerbeds felt suddenly disrupted, as if someone had rearranged the furniture in her living room without asking.