Gemotions

Clara stared at the blank canvas in front of her. The studio was normally a sanctuary, a place where colors and shapes flowed effortlessly from her fingertips. Today, however, her creative spirit felt blocked, the air thick with an unspoken pressure. Her phone buzzed, a text from her brother. His daughter, Lily, had been drawing a strange friend.

Clara turned to the drawing, now framed in her phone. It brought a strange sense of loss, a faint ache in her chest. She stared at the canvas again, and then began to sketch.

The images poured out of her, raw and primal, a story she couldn’t articulate in words, only in the dance of charcoal on paper. She sketched the figure. Tall. Slender.