Gemotions

Michael stared at the list, his brow furrowed. It was tucked inside his father’s old tackle box, alongside rusty hooks and weathered lures. "Climb Mount Kilimanjaro. Learn to speak Italian. Write a novel." His father, a quiet man of routine, had never mentioned any of this.

He wandered out to the porch, the setting sun painting the sky in fiery hues. He lit a cigarette, the smoke curling and dissipating into the evening air. The list’s aspirations felt impossibly large, a stark contrast to his dad's simple life of fishing and watching baseball. He felt a hollowness in his chest, a sense of missed connections, a feeling that something important had been overlooked. He ran a hand over his tired face.