Gemotions

The attic air hung thick with dust motes dancing in the lone sunbeam. Clara coughed, waving a hand in front of her face as she sifted through a trunk crammed with forgotten memories. She'd expected to find her grandmother’s wedding dress, not this. A stack of photographs, brittle with age, depicting a woman she barely recognized as her grandmother.

The woman in the pictures wasn’t the meek, church-going matriarch Clara knew. This woman laughed, her head thrown back, with a bottle of something dark clutched in her hand. One photo showed her flirting with a man who was clearly not her grandfather. Clara’s breath caught in her throat. She understood then that she'd been living a half-truth, but her heart softened.

Clara traced a finger over the smooth surface of the photograph. "Grandma," she whispered, her voice barely audible.