Gemotions

Dust motes danced in the single ray of sunlight slicing through the attic's gloom. Amelia, newly single after a particularly messy breakup, coughed, waving a hand in front of her face. The air, thick with the scent of aged wood and forgotten things, felt heavy. She'd been avoiding this space for weeks, ever since she'd closed on the house. Now, with nothing but silence and a weekend stretching before her, she decided to explore.

Her fingers traced the chipped paint of a trunk. It was heavy, and she grunted as she wrestled it open. Inside, meticulously folded, were dresses, their colours faded but fabric still remarkably soft. An old photograph, tucked inside a worn Bible, showed a smiling couple, arm-in-arm, standing in front of what looked like her very house. She traced the woman's face with a finger, a strange ache blooming in her chest.

She spent the afternoon sifting through the remnants of a life she didn't know, each object a whisper of a past she wasn't a part of. The attic's silence pressed in on her, amplifying the quiet in her own life, a quiet she was suddenly acutely aware of.