Gemotions

The antique music box sat on her desk, nestled amongst a stack of ungraded essays. A polished mahogany rectangle, tied with a cheap, gaudy ribbon. Sarah felt a surge of heat crawl up her neck. It was from Mark, the perennial class clown. He’d barely scraped a C in her history class. She ripped the ribbon off, sending it fluttering to the floor.

A tiny card was attached. "Thanks for everything, Mrs. Davis!" it chirped, in Mark’s familiar, loopy handwriting. She crumpled the card, her knuckles white. *Everything*? What, exactly, was he thanking her for? The endless detention slips? The lectures on the importance of paying attention?

She slammed the music box onto the desk. A tinny, off-key melody filled the room. The cheapness of it all, the blatant lack of thought, intensified her mounting displeasure. She wanted to smash it against the wall. Instead, she took a deep breath, and began to correct the papers.