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Kathleen March

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Jan, 2020

Stories (416)

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416 Stories

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Lavinia Sees the Light (L2.15)

Part ILavinia sees the lights flicker as she is finally enjoying a quiet evening with a book instead of staring at an eye-drying screen. It seems so odd to feel the pages, the texture of real paper. Her only wish is that books, real books, were as light as pixels. Sometimes a person cares little for the objects with all those words printed on (usually) white pages and only wants to find the ideas, history, and myths contained in the black letters, so magically arranged for readers. On those occasions, when the book itself is of lesser i...

5 likes

XOXOXO

X and O were nothing at all alike and they knew it, although maybe it wasn’t completely clear at the beginning.Language was something that fooled them from the get-go. They both loved learning, thought it was a real common bond. Except it wasn’t. X had selected German, igbo, Malagasy, and Quechua. O preferred to chip away (very seriously, too) at Ukrainian, Portuguese, Turkish, and Had recently reached a decent level of Korean. They thus had only one common language, which could have been Dutch or Bavarian.Class was an interesting connection...

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In my head

Parable About Mental Health  Dialogue They’re after me, all of them. I know they are. I can feel it. I know I’m having a nervous breakdown. My dear, there is no such thing as a nervous breakdown. Doctors don’t use the term. It’s just a way of describing several emotional conditions. You know, paranoia, depression, anxiety… I don’t care what you call it, I’m having a serious crisis. I’m going to explode! Now, now, dear, don’t talk like that. You know it’s all in your head. None of what you’re feeling is real. You know that, r...

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Roads taken

Neither straight nor narrow. A path. A lane. Many of them. Labyrinths, some with laurel trees. Spaces for the body to move through, to know. Perpendicular eyes. Finding all the stones. We have all this. So. I said, “Let’s take a walk.” (I meant it with all my heart.) I spoke, and waited. We no longer needed to hurry. You said, “Great idea. Where shall we go?” You seemed open to suggestions. Your eyes were looking, and seeing. The way was out there, to be determined by one of us, you or me.  Then I said, “Oh, you should deci...

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All that glitters (L2.14)

Lavinia had really never thought about what people called lucky charms. She didn’t believe in luck, for starters. Now chance or randomness which might result in a positive outcome or event was something else. (She tried not to think about Jung and synchronicity. That did unnerve her, even though she attributed synchronic happenings to having a word or an idea in her head which made her more aware of the occurrence of similar phenomena. Like when the same odd geographical location pops up in two places at once. Or when something on telev...

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Lost Without Words

Author’s disclaimer: WARNING!!! THIS STORY MAY CONTAIN INAPPROPRIATE LANGUAGE!!! JUDGE FOR YOURSELF IF YOU ARE CAPABLE OF READING IT!!!  ****** I think it is only fair to let you readers know that either you are going to read this and weep or you are going to miss the point entirely. If you are in the second group, this story could prove to be dangerous to your health. By this I mean that it could reinforce some already poor habits you may have.  Unfortunately, I cannot accept any responsibility for the consequences of ...

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Dance to the Music

There were five friends, and some people know that five is a good number for many things. In this case it was a good number for a special club. The friends didn’t think of themselves as a club, however, but as a group that had formed for no reason any of them quite understood. It had just happened, spontaneously. Perhaps that made them even more unique. One of the group thought that they might have been influenced by other books about clubs, because there had been a few published recently and even years ago. They were all avid readers, s...

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Eyes Wide Open (L2.13)

Magic, a concept used to describe a mode of rationality or way of thinking that looks to invisible forces to influence events, effect change in material conditions, or present the illusion of change. Within the Western tradition, this way of thinking is distinct from religious or scientific modes; however, such distinctions and even the definition of magic are subject to wide debate. Lavinia had been reading online. She had started her research at the link she had just opened again: https://www.britannica.com/topic/magic-supernatural-ph...

10 likes

Pair Trees

I. Two people were planting a chestnut tree. Or more, since they had four chestnuts. One of them surely would sprout. One would become a tree. The chestnut was full of promise and life. That was what mattered. It was a promise that would never be betrayed and if it was never to be realized, the reason would be that it had been abandoned or forgotten. At this point we seem to be reading a parable. Not ‘you reap what you sow’ or anything pertaining to some religion. Instead, this could be one of those life lessons or teachable moments. F...

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Self-taught

Write a story about coming to terms with how different you are from your younger self.That was the assignment we just received for English 101. It obviously assumes there will be differences of varying degrees, but key here is the difficulty of dealing with the difference. A younger self? Or the self we wear inside us? Coming to terms means accepting, getting used to a situation. It is not easy.What, we must ask, or who, was responsible for the big difference? Then we need to know if difference, in this case, is a good thing that has happene...

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Just What I Wanted

(Looking at something she’s holding in her hands.)  Thank you, it’s just what I wanted. Thank you so much!  (She adds an enthusiastic but brief hug to the exclamation point.) Really? Are you telling the truth or just trying to make me feel good? I mean, it’s not necessary. It won’t hurt my feelings, you know. It’s always better for friends to be honest with each other. Oh, it’s the truth. How did you guess what I wanted? I never told you. And this is perfect. You are so perceptive. Nobody in the world could have guessed...

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Meaningful Gift

She had had trouble choosing a major in college. She had thought about Biology because she’d liked the illustrations in the textbook when she was a sophomore. She had considered Nutrition because she had enjoyed the cooking classes part of her high school course called Life Skills. There had also been the possibility of majoring in Marine Science or Environmental Studies, because she loved nature. Other disciplines had caught her attention too, but in the end she chose to ‘double major’ as they call it. English and Art. Or Art and Engli...

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Now You Say It

You’re asking if there is something I should have said that would have changed my life?That’s certainly easy to answer: yes.  I should have said yes. Literally. Yes and let’s go! Vamos! No, not like that, not so exaggerated. I just see saying yes as a way to deal with an opportunity. A lot of people say they should have said no and if they had, they wouldn’t have gotten into trouble. There were times I should have said no, too, but what really matters as I think back over the years is the number of doors remained unopened, uNOpene...

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Bells

    She put down the book and her notebook, but kept hold of the fountain pen in her hands, moving it from one to the other, sliding it between her fingers, as if there were words itching to come out of the nib, or even out of her fingers. She was a bit disoriented, uncertain about her feelings. More uncertain than she would like, because what she had been reading was not new to her; she had read the pages often, some more than others. It was too late to go today, but tomorrow she would visit the place mentioned in the ...

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The Architect

Prologue Most houses and other types of constructions these days are designed by an architect, unless a person is way out in the sticks slapping lumber together. Years ago, according to eighteenth century Gothic novels, many buildings had secret chambers, false bookshelves, basement passages. That was part of the dark, haunted atmosphere the readers of those books were seeking. That darkness has many explanations, but we’ll just assume you have some familiarity with their psychological dimensions. The existence alone of these hidden co...

5 likes