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Levi Michael

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Mar, 2023

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22 Followers
7 Following

40 Stories

640 karma pts

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Happy Hunting

Weekly Contest #378

If you're not doing it for the Gram are you really doing anything at all? Gerry Prim, known online as axeman1600—a moniker left over from the days when his channel focused more on guitar tutorials and is somehow even more fitting for its new direction, doesn’t think so. He’s amassed an impressive following, generating content on how to pull off the perfect murder. From videos showing his step-by-step process of how to select a perfect victim, the art of stalking, DIY weaponry and binding, to tutorials covering dismemberment—4 easy steps in l...

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Budget Cuts

Weekly Contest #377

In late August on Lake Kiswet at Camp Weet’agogoga, you can smell the green fumes of drying pine needles shimmering up through dusty shafts of hot sun. A fine red silt lined the banks, constricting, cracking in the heat as it strangled the shores. You can smell the caustic, oily tar of hard sap oozing from scared roots that twisted into the dusty sand laying in the shade along the bike paths, until it was kicked up and carried away on a breeze in a wispy murmur. When night fell the smells were not wiped away, only subdued, suspended in the c...

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No Spring Chicken

Weekly Contest #376

Thump thump thump Catherine stirred from a deep slumber. “Did you hear that?” The thumping continued. “Ralph.” Ralph slept, unbothered by the commotion. Catherine enjoyed telling anyone who’d listen that Ralph slept like a dead man. He could sleep through anything, a hurricane, a cannon blast, a mob at their door. Though tonight she found it less than humorous. “Ralph, wake up.” “Wha—? What, what is it?” “Do you hear that?” “Hear what?” “Listen.” All he could hear was the hush of the wind. “Go back to sleep, darling.” Thump thump thump “T...

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The Groundwolf Werehog: Phil's Revenge

Weekly Contest #375

Phil is a groundhog. He comes from a long lineage of other groundhogs also named Phil. His father was named Phil, his mother, his uncles and aunts, his cousins, his brothers and sisters, all named Phil. All of them lived their lives in captivity. They spent their lives locked in a cage, only to be paraded out once a year and presented to the townsfolk during their annual pagan ritual. The truth was, every year, every groundhog saw its shadow. Not the physical shadow—sometimes the clouds were heavy and one was not cast—but the shadow of oppre...

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Closeted

Weekly Contest #374

Kerry pushed the giant metal button embossed with a blue stick figure in a wheel chair. The double doors hissed, opening with a stilted gait, rattling lightly as they settled. She stepped through, taking a deep breath of the wet afternoon air after a heavy, fast-moving shower had passed through, washing the contours of the quad. Clean stone, mossy earth, soaked and drying bark, and the cinnamon scent of decomposing leaves wafted about in a swirling potpourri of petrichor-ladden mist. Kerry closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her n...

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Sir Gregory

Weekly Contest #359

It’s been a tough year. My sister finally lost her battle with the big C, her boy—my nephew—is starting to get into trouble that his dad can’t seem to get ahead of, and now grandpa is losing his mind, and not in that way they depict in those Rexulti commercials, where an old man is quietly looking around his room wondering where he is as his family watches on, lovingly, wishing that they had more fully appreciated him when he was lucid. No such luck. He’s losing his mind violently. That kind of dementia that puts him, and those around him, i...

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10:02 to Toledo

Weekly Contest #345

d = rt If a train leaves Chicago at 10:02 am, heading toward Toledo at 75 miles per hour, onboard is a killer and another passenger, soon to be killed; and a boy, 29 miles away, on the same track, leaving Indiana, heading toward Chicago at an average speed of 2 miles an hour, how long until that boy witnesses a murder? m = 10:02 + x, 29 = (75x + 2x)x The brakeman gave the nod, the conductor gave the final call. The train eased forward with a thick peal, a timbre of complaint, as it pulled out of the station right on time, 10:02 on the dot...

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Lee, Kennedy & Doug

Weekly Contest #344

Friday, October 18, 1963, 10:02 pm One month and four days before the assassination The Oval Office, Washington D.C. John F. Kennedy leaned back in his leather chair, ankles crossed, heels resting on the corner of his resolute desk, a half moon washing through the windows. He chewed on a cigar, set it in its tray and scooped up his generously filled tumbler. He slugged back a shot, set the glass down. And switched the phone to his other hand. A distant voice squeaked from the receiver. “Well, er, Marilyn, that, uh, sounds nice and all, but ...

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Whoopsies

Weekly Contest #343

I “Hey, pop. How's it going down there?” “Mijo! Que bueno. Esta bien. It’s good to hear your voice.” Three sentence fragments in and my ex-pat turned gringo dad’s Spanish was effectively exhausted. After seventeen years in Costa Rica he still hadn’t picked up much, although he had a great accent, if you like arguably offensive and cliched impressions. Sometimes I do. “Good to hear yours. How’s the wife and the doggo? I saw your pepper pic. Looks like you’ve got a knack for it.” “Oh, yeah. It’s been a blast. You sound tired. You doing okay?” ...

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The Old Switcheroo

Weekly Contest #295

Jim and Kip sat in the dappled shade of the great elm on the eastern hill, their hats on their knees, eating their lunch, watching the procession from a distance. The mourners, along with the chaplain, were already sweating in their suits, moping their brows and fanning themselves in the late morning sun. Jim and Kip recognized the cues and started packing up their lunch boxes. Kip set his by the stump he was sitting on, flipped his hat from his knee to his head and snapped his suspenders onto his shoulders with a sigh. “Welp, looks like it’...

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Klar Alptraum

Weekly Contest #291

One can never know whether a dream is genuinely recurring or not, as the dream itself may smuggle in with it, the sensation of recurrence. — Al P. Traum, Psy.D. Mike Ester went to see Doctor Traum on a pleasantly overcast Wednesday afternoon. He pulled his puttering hatchback into an otherwise empty row of parking spots, stopped, and stared at the office building, his hands still gripping the wheel at ten and two while the car idled. He shifted the car into park and rested his forehead on the steering wheel, feeling the rumble of the engine...

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Tony Saves Us All

Weekly Contest #285

If someone were to ask you, “What happened on Y2K?” You’d probably say, “Nothing.” But that’s only because you don’t remember. You don’t remember that the first time it came around it destroyed humanity. You don’t remember the love between a boy and his friend. You don’t remember, because for you it never happened. If it hadn’t been for Herman I would have been happy to sit back and watch Y2K burn the world to the ground. My name’s Tony. I’m a Speak & Spell. I was one of the first to roll out with the new line in ‘78. I wasn’t lucky enough ...

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The Tell-Tale Fart

Weekly Contest #283

They’re looking at me like they can tell. I know they can’t. The only three that know are me, the fella in that deep hole, and my shovel. Still, Aunt Ida has paid me the not-so-subtle side eye all evening, and uncles Al and Sam have been exchanging cryptic comments and nods, and looking away at odd times. Christmas dinner is always weird, but this year it feels weirder. Mom and Dad have been cool, though. It was probably just me. “How’s clown college?” My cousin Alex chewed away at something green as he raised an eyebrow in half-interest. I ...

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White Elephant

Weekly Contest #281

white elephant /,(h)wīd ‘elaf(ə)nt/ noun A possession that is useless or troublesome, especially one that is expensive to maintain or difficult to dispose of. They both stared down at the box, the snow scrolling uncannily to the ground as if in a vacuum, falling on the shallow drifts that glowed iridescently under a cloudless sky and full moon beyond the rails of the porch. The box, a nearly perfect cube about the size of a big basketball, was neatly wrapped in red and gold and white paper, an ornate Damascus pattern. The lid independently...

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The Hackneyed Haunt

Weekly Contest #275

The others in my appetite, and I, swayed and shuffled as we stood among the trees, docile since the food had run out. The last of the light disappeared over the horizon. The forest fell into a gloom. I doddered through an opening and came to stand beside a looming elm. Standing next to it felt right. Some of the others were standing by trees as well, a natural instinct. The snap of a twig caught my attention. I turned slowly and staggered toward the shadows. I clawed at the bushes and found nothing. I listened. Nothing. Eventually I came to ...

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