Gemotions

The vinyl record player crackled to life, filling my small apartment with the strains of an old jazz tune, a familiar melody that always seemed to take me back to simpler times. I watched, from my window, as Mr. Peterson, my unassuming neighbor, returned home in a car I couldn’t even identify. It was sleek, expensive, utterly out of place in our modest neighborhood.

I recalled the old, dented pickup truck he used to drive, the one he'd always be working on, the same truck I would watch him fix as a kid from my window. Now, everything felt like a photograph, slightly faded, slightly unreal. The feeling spread through me, heavy and slow, like the first snowfall, blanketing everything in white.

He used to wave. He used to be so friendly. Then, his car passed my window, the windows dark. It was as if someone had just closed a door on a memory I had been standing in.