Gemotions

"Just…five more minutes," Mark mumbled, his voice thick with sleep. The aroma of brewing coffee, a morning ritual he usually cherished, couldn’t penetrate the heavy blanket of inertia clinging to him. His wife, Carol, had found it. The secret TikTok account. A cascade of carefully curated videos, dances, and challenges – all a carefully constructed façade of his daughter, Chloe.

He should be furious. He should be concerned. He *should* be doing something, anything. But the mere idea of rising, of putting on his "concerned parent" face, of engaging in that inevitable, tedious conversation…it was too much. He rolled over, pulling the covers over his head, the world outside a distant, blurry noise.