Gemotions

The crayon slipped from Amelia’s numb fingers, clattering onto the laminated table. Her vision swam. Tears pricked at her eyes, blurring the cheerful cartoon characters plastered on the walls of her sister’s kitchen. This wasn't happening. It couldn't be. The drawing, a crude but recognizable depiction of Barnaby, her childhood companion, leered up at her, drawn by her five-year-old niece, Lily. Her chest felt constricted, as though a vise was slowly tightening.

"Lily, sweetie, who is this?" Amelia managed to croak out, her voice barely a whisper. Lily, oblivious to the storm brewing within her aunt, simply shrugged, her face smeared with purple crayon.

Amelia’s head throbbed. Barnaby. The imaginary friend she'd invented to cope with her parents’ constant fighting. He was gone, banished to the recesses of her forgotten childhood. Now, he was here, resurrected in a child’s drawing. She fought the urge to bolt from the room, to escape the suffocating reality.