Gemotions

He stared at the overflowing ashtray, the residue of countless cigarettes. The noise, the laughter, the music, it had all been a desperate attempt to feel something, anything, other than this… emptiness. The complaint from the downstairs neighbor, a curt note slipped under his door, had stripped away the thin veneer of control he had been clinging to.

His chest ached. He felt hollow, like a shell. The weight of his loneliness, his failures, pressed down on him, crushing his spirit. The room seemed to spin. He needed to escape, but there was nowhere to go.