Gemotions

The attic air hung thick with dust and the ghosts of forgotten summers. Maya pulled a grimy box from the shadows, her lip curling involuntarily as she wrestled with the lid. Inside, a monument to her younger self: meticulously preserved spelling tests, art projects featuring lopsided horses, and essays riddled with the awkward syntax of adolescence. She could practically hear her mother’s voice, chirping with pride, a sound that now grated on her nerves like nails on a chalkboard.

"Oh, really?" she muttered, tossing a crayon drawing of a particularly grotesque house onto a pile. The house was her own. She thought, how predictable.

She knew she should probably feel something more than the dull ache of annoyance, but all she felt was the need to scrub her hands raw. The sheer, unwavering belief her mother had in every single, mediocre thing she'd ever produced felt… suffocating.