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Author on Reedsy Prompts since Apr, 2024
Submitted to Contest #324
The night I wash ashore, the stars look like barnacles—small and stubborn, clinging to a dark hull I can’t name. Waves unmake themselves around my ribs. The tide tries to pull me back, then changes its mind, foaming away like a friend unsure if they’re still invited.I crawl from the water on my knees, palms, and pride. I have legs again; they remember me like old scars remember knives—with a twitch.The lighthouse above me turns its slow white eye. Its beam slices the fog, leaving a metallic taste in the air. I press my cheek to a tide pool a...
Submitted to Contest #313
There is a rhythm to the mornings now.By the time sunlight creeps over the hedgerow and lights up the tangled rose trellis, Elsie is already out back, garden gloves pulled snug, kneeling before her patch of half-dead marigolds as if they are something holy. Next door, Charles wheels out a metal folding chair, dusts off the cushion, and sits with a crossword and a cup of tea. They always exchange the same greetings: variations on weather and aches, did-you-see-the-news-recently.“You’d think the sun would help these knees, but I swear it just ...
Submitted to Contest #312
There are three times when I can sense Calliope’s presence: twilight, dawn, and when my bedroom is pitch black, not a sound to be heard, and I’m writing. Tonight is one of those nights. My asthmatic lungs have kept me up for another restless night of no sleep, and with my computer monitor as the only light in the room, as fluorescent and blue as always, I can feel her. Watching me, waiting for me, pleading with me. Calliope went missing about six months ago, snatched from her twin bed in the bedroom we shared, gone without trace nor sound. T...
Submitted to Contest #278
The steady beep of the heart monitor punctuated the silence of the hospital room. Samuel sat beside his grandmother, Brigita, her frail hand resting in his, the loose skin mottled with age spots. The air smelled faintly of antiseptic and flowers, an odd combination that felt wrong. Outside, the evening darkened, streaks of pink and gold fading into deep blue. Everyone else had left to find dinner in the hospital cafeteria. Samuel had stayed, claiming he wasn’t hungry, though that wasn’t true. He just didn’t like leaving Grandma alone. “You’r...
Submitted to Contest #277
The interrogation room was small, made entirely of gray brick, and had only two straight-back wooden chairs and a flimsy black card table. The flickering fluorescent light buzzed like a trapped fly. Wiley Stuart sat, cuffed, in one of the chairs, looking relatively at ease. If one didn’t know where to look. Officer Elaina Pembroke sighed, looking at the scene through the one-way mirror. She clutched a half-used notepad and a pen in a white-knuckled grip. “All you have to do,” Lieutenant Gregori said, “is get him to confess....
Submitted to Contest #255
“I don’t want to see you anymore.” I should have known. Curse my unrelenting optimism. The signs were glaringly obvious, now that I look back. We had been seeing each other casually for five months with nothing to show for it. I’d asked him multiple times if we were exclusive, and each time he’d changed the subject. I felt like such an idiot. The morning sun shone brightly through the floor-to-ceiling windows, the chipped sunflower-patterned coffee mug steaming where it sat in front of me. My fingernails tapped the mahogany table delic...
Submitted to Contest #253
One would never guess that Maxine Ravenwood was in her mid sixties at first glance. With long, wild black hair and smooth, freckled skin, she looked the same as she did when was in her late thirties. Maxine plaited her hair so it was away from her face and sighed, adjusting the wide-brimmed hat sitting atop her head. She thought the hat, cloak, and birchwood, orb-topped staff were a little too on the nose for her place of work, but it was her last day before retirement, so she decided to ignore her costumed appearance for once. She grabbed h...
Submitted to Contest #250
The night was inky black, the stars bright. The sound of music pulsated from the gymnasium a dozen feet away. Goosebumps pimpled my skin, and my breath clouded in the freezing cold air. But none of that mattered. I was outside with Malia St. Michaels. She was beautiful, per usual. With long, gold-tipped black box braids, smoky eyeliner, and a form-fitting blazer dress, she looked years beyond her age. I was totally, absolutely enamored with her, and I had been since the day we met, our first day of freshmen year. I never imagined I’d g...
Submitted to Contest #249
“The sky is looking ugly, Trav.”I glance upward, my attention on driving momentarily forgotten. Rosie and I have been driving through the back roads of Iowa for the past four hours, and my vision is starting to get blurry. The sky is turning an ugly slate gray, a color similar to the road winding ahead of us. In the far distance, thunder clouds roil.“Maybe we should find a place to spend the night?” Rosie asks, shifting in the passenger’s seat. Her thighs make a slurping noise as she adjusts, the hot vinyl unforgiving. When the mechanic had ...
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