Gemotions

The box felt heavy in her hands, heavier than it should. Sarah dumped the contents onto the table: a kaleidoscope of faded images. The portrait of her uncle, the war hero, was there, stiff and formal. Then, she unearthed a different photo: her uncle in a striped shirt, grinning, arm around a woman who clearly wasn’t his wife, surrounded by others, all of them laughing. Sarah felt a pressure build in her skull. The righteous indignation he’d always preached about his life, she realized it was a lie. A carefully crafted lie.