Gemotions

The cardboard box sat on the doorstep, a beige rectangle looking accusingly at Amelia. She’d been staring at it for a good ten minutes, the steam from her lukewarm coffee already beginning to dissipate. It was addressed to "Mr. Thomas Finch," the previous occupant of her apartment. Her jaw clenched. Everything felt like an uphill battle lately. Even the sun, trying to peek through the perpetually grey sky, seemed to be mocking her.

She kicked the box inside, the mundane thud a jarring counterpoint to the quiet desperation that hummed beneath her skin. This was the third package for Finch this month. Why couldn’t people just get their addresses right? Or, she thought, with a flicker of resentment, why did everything have to be so difficult?

She didn't open it. She wouldn't. It belonged to someone else, to a life that wasn't hers. Later, she would leave it outside the door, another act of futile defiance against the relentless, slow erosion of her good spirits.