Gemotions

The crayon lines on the living room floor were an affront. Little Maya, oblivious, chattered at the figure she'd scrawled. It was a lopsided creature with too many eyes and a perpetually grinning mouth. Aunt Clara, who had known the creature intimately once, felt a coldness spread from her chest.

She picked up the drawing, the paper crinkling in her grasp. "Who's this, sweetie?" she asked, her voice tight, a smile plastered on her face that didn't reach her eyes. Maya bounced on her heels. "It's Gloom! He lives under the stairs with the monsters!" The under-the-stairs cupboard had *always* been a source of childish nightmares.

Clara imagined a reckoning, a finality. It had been decades, but the memory, the ache, was still fresh. She'd fix this, she decided. She would ensure the horrors she lived with as a child wouldn't haunt her family’s future.