Gemotions

The note, scrawled on pink stationery, lay like a tiny, accusing hand on her doorstep. “Excessive noise” it declared, followed by the polite but pointed request to “keep things down.” She crumpled it, a smile playing on her lips, and chucked it in the bin.

Later, she adjusted the volume on her new surround sound system, a gift she’d been saving for just such an occasion. A deep bass line rumbled through her floorboards, a physical thrumming that she imagined her neighbor feeling in their own home.

She found herself, at 2 AM, practicing her trumpet. A low, mournful wail drifted out into the night. She put extra effort into the vibrato, letting the sound echo and reverberate.