Gemotions

The attic air hung thick and dusty, catching in Eleanor’s throat as she wrestled the trunk open. Inside, crammed beneath moth-eaten shawls and yellowed photographs, she found it: a thin, brittle envelope addressed in her own spidery handwriting. Her pulse hammered against her ribs as she recognized the name scrawled across the front – “David, My Dearest.” David, the man who'd shattered her heart twenty years ago.

She ripped the envelope open, her fingers trembling. The words on the page, penned in furious ink, were a litany of hurt, of betrayal. "How *dare* he," she thought, the words a silent roar in her mind. She crumpled the letter, the paper crackling in her tight grip. Then she threw it down and slammed her fist onto the trunk lid, the wood vibrating beneath her knuckles.