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John Ripma

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Dec, 2024

Stories (6)

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18 Followers

21 Following

6 Stories

139 karma pts

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Sometimes Mercy is Sharp

John Ripma

Submitted to Contest #327

Have you ever eaten ants?They taste like truth...sharp, acidic, metallic against the tongue. They wake some wild corner of our primal minds, something older than mirrors and well-worn spellwork. Witches cross oceans for rare resins and silver salts, forgetting our earthly home keeps bitter compounds right underfoot. Ants sting as they go down, but they sharpen too. They remind us that we were born feral before we learned to be good boys or girls.Iris had not eaten ants since she was a child in the woods, daring herself to be unshaped, un-hum...

14 likes

Hi, I'm Bloom

John Ripma

Submitted to Contest #326

Contains mildly coarse language.“Please lock up your cheese graters and broom handles,” she said. “I need you alive till I get paid.”Laughter filled the room.She wanted them laughing before she jumped in their shit.Dr. Iris Bloom leaned back and smiled; nervous chuckles floated through her office like cheap perfume. The couple was about to reveal the rot in their marriage; she needed them to be loose.Humor was her drug of choice.She knew that better than anyone.Her mother was a ghost with a job - always away, always busy, always forgetting t...

16 likes

Service Begins at Four

John Ripma

Submitted to Contest #325

Feeling dazed and out of focus, she hung up the phone. The man’s voice, smooth, measured, and faintly German, swirled in her mind like a waterspout off the coast of Miami Beach, her hometown. Her mother once ran a tiny Cuban café on Collins Avenue. Elena had learned to set tables before she could write her name. Every afternoon at the same time, her mother clapped her hands and called out, “Service begins at four!” The words meant love, order, and the smell of roasted pork in the air, and that she’d better not be late.Forty years later, Chef...

11 likes

The Seventy Mile Per Hour Blur is the Big Event

John Ripma

Submitted to Contest #301

I drank a vanilla milkshake at the Dairy Queen, walked down the sidewalk to the liquor store, bought a fifth of Cutty Sark scotch, went back to my motel room, stripped off my clothes, and lay naked on the bed. I hadn’t touched a drop the whole way out here, but now I needed a shot or two to fall asleep.For the past two days, all I wanted was to see was the world streaming past me from the cab of my pickup, the steady growl of the engine purring in my ears like a big cat. I watched the tree-covered mountains of northern Georgia flatten into t...

9 likes

Two Big Things

John Ripma

Submitted to Contest #299

I drank a vanilla milkshake at the Dairy Queen, walked down the sidewalk to the liquor store and bought a fifth of Cutty Sark scotch, went back to my motel room, stripped off my clothes, and lay naked on the bed. I hadn’t had a drop of alcohol the whole way out here and I needed a shot or two now to fall asleep. For the past three days, all I wanted was to see the world whoosh by me from the cab of my pickup and let the steady growl of the motor calm my mind like a purring cat.I watched the tree-filled Appalachians of Georgia give way to the...

9 likes

(Contains Sensitive Racial Content) A Witness to Hatred

John Ripma

Submitted to Contest #296

Saturday, October 12, 1958 - 4:39 a.m.Rabbi Jacob Emden’s phone rang. It was bright green, a fancy new color Southern Bell had just introduced to the Atlanta market. The rabbi’s congregation presented it to him on his fifty-first birthday. He took one look at the colorful gift and, showing off his legendary Talmudic humor, said, "A green phone. Oy vey! Now when I call God, I'll be sure I'm using the ‘kosher’ line!"The blessed thing rang…and rang…and rang mercilessly in the dark, shattering the silent stillness of his bedroom. Rabbi jerked in...

8 likes