Gemotions

Eliza slammed her textbook shut, the sound a sharp crack in the silence of her dorm room. Anger burned inside her. The injustice of it. The scholarship, the thing that had allowed her to escape her hometown, was now gone. She paced back and forth, the cramped space feeling smaller with each step.

She felt a hot flush creep up her neck. Her carefully planned future – the internship, the graduate program, the life she had envisioned – now felt fragile, teetering on the edge of nothingness. She punched her pillow, a futile act of defiance against the crushing weight of disappointment. She didn't want to accept it, didn't want to admit it, but a deep sense of despair began to settle in her heart.