Gemotions

The rejection letter felt unusually heavy in Amelia's hands, like a physical weight she couldn't immediately set down. She reread the polite, impersonal phrases, the gentle criticisms, the standard closing. Her fingers traced the elegant logo of "Veridian Books," a publisher she’d dreamt of joining for years. Why? The question echoed in the sudden emptiness of her small apartment, a space that now felt impossibly large, the manuscript’s absence on her desk a glaring, vacant spot. She walked to the window, staring out at the rain-slicked city, and bit her lip, the taste of metal strangely present.