Gemotions

The salt air stung Maya's face as she walked the same stretch of beach she'd walked for years. The rhythmic crashing of waves against the shore only seemed to amplify the silence in her life. Her art, her passion, was collecting dust in a cluttered studio, the canvases staring back at her, blank and accusing. A letter from her former best friend, Sarah, arrived that day. An apology for a petty act of cruelty, years ago. The words felt like a phantom limb, a reminder of the person she used to be. She tossed it in the trash, the act echoing the hollowness within her.