Gemotions

The air in the library felt thick, heavy, as though the silence itself was a pressure. Marcus sat hunched over his laptop, but the words swam before his eyes. The closing of the university, a blow to his carefully laid plans, had knocked the wind out of him.

He kept running his fingers through his hair, tugging at the strands. Every noise – a turning page, a cough, the clicking of keys – grated on his nerves. He felt a desperate urge to flee, to escape the suffocating weight of this new reality, that he felt in his chest.