Gemotions

The email had been a gut punch, the kind that steals your breath. The gallery had taken her meticulously crafted sculptures and displayed them without her knowledge or consent. Now, standing here, surrounded by the admiring murmurs of the patrons, the panic receded.

She'd braced herself for fury, for a fight. Instead, the gallery owner, an older woman with kind eyes, had simply said, "Your talent deserved to be shared."

Her shoulders slumped in quiet satisfaction. She had expected to be angry. To be ready to argue with the gallery owner. She wasn't. The artwork, her artwork, was finally seen. She felt a lightness in her limbs.