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Author on Reedsy Prompts since Jun, 2020
Submitted to Contest #337
THE PLANET THAT KNEW OUR NAMES Chapter One-The World That Listened Ilyra did not spin the way other planets did. Its rotation lagged, like it was thinking things over. The scientists called it gravitational drag from its twin suns. The Ilyrans called it consideration. Elian Marek arrived on Ilyra with two suitcases, a contract that promised three years of hazard pay, and a grief he hadn’t bothered unpacking since Earth. His wife had died in a shuttle malfunction above Mars-quick, they said, merciful, they lied-and since then Elian preferred ...
Submitted to Contest #336
1975The radio hummed low on the kitchen counter, the announcer’s voice steady as he spoke about Saigon-about helicopters lifting from rooftops, about a war that was finally, officially over. Jamie stood at the sink, hands submerged in soapy water, listening anyway. She had been listening for years. Holly sat at the small oak table behind her, a mug of coffee cooling between her palms. The morning light caught the edge of her wedding ring as she turned it absentmindedly, round and round, as if worrying at a thought she couldn’t quite set down...
Submitted to Contest #335
GIFT OF LOVE 1943The snow fell softly in the narrow space between Christmas and New Year’s, that quiet suspended week when time seemed unsure whether to move forward or linger. In December of 1943, the war had made that feeling sharper-life paused between dread and hope, breath held between telegrams and prayers. Julia Bennett stood at the kitchen window of her mother’s house in rural Pennsylvania watching the frost lace itself across the glass. Outside, the world looked peaceful enough to forget that across the ocean, men were sleeping in m...
Submitted to Contest #333
LAVENDER HONEY PIEEmma Hart had bult her small bakery the way some people build hope-carefully, quietly, determinedly. “Sweet Briar Bakery” sat on the corner of Willowbend and Clairemont where the wind always seemed to carry the smell of sugar and where the bell on the door chimed like someone whispering welcome home. She’d spent the last year learning the rhythms of the place: the hum of early-morning ovens, the soft sigh of dough as it rose, the way the first light of dawn slipped through the front windows. The townspeople had quickly fall...
Submitted to Contest #332
THE WIND AT WILLOW STREETWillow street came alive every October, but only in the way small towns know how-gently. The lanterns strung between lampposts glowed like captured fireflies, vendors set out jars of spiced honey and apple butter, and the old record shop spun vinyl’s of jazz guitar that threaded warmly through the air. Nora Weston liked the festival for one reason: no one expected anything from her there. She didn’t have to smile because someone was watching. She didn’t have to pretend she had her life mapped out. She could just flic...
Submitted to Contest #331
BENEATH THE FROSTLINEThe wind on silver reach Glacier never simply blew-it howled, curling around the jagged peaks like a living thing searching for warmth it would never find. At the glacier’s center, where the ice was older than recorded time, a pale blue light shimmered faintly beneath layers so compacted they were nearly stone. Most people never noticed it. Most people never came this far north. But Aria Kestrel had followed that glow for three straight days, guided by rumors that the ice here hid something priceless-not treasure, not in...
Submitted to Contest #330
THE NIGHT THE STARS LEANED IN The Summer Felt like Forever If anyone ever asked me when everything changed, I would point to that last week of August-the week when the air smelled like warm asphalt and sea salt, when the sunsets bled gold and pink like someone had spilled water color across the sky. The week when the carnival came to town. And you. You, with your quiet laugh and untamable hair, showing up everywhere I least expected and most hoped for. That summer had slipped through my fingers too quickly. Maybe that’s why we spent so much ...
Submitted to Contest #329
LOST IN THE MEMORIESI remember the way the sunlight used to fall across your face, golden and forgiving, as if it could soften all the sharp edges of the world. I keep replaying that memory like a favorite song, each note tinged with the ache of knowing I can’t press pause and step back into it. I lost you before I understood what it meant to truly hold on. I thought time could mend what distance had broken, that absence could be soothed with letters and phone calls. But even the words I wrote felt hollow, ghosts of something real, and becam...
Submitted to Contest #328
THE LAST ORCHARDTimeline One-1942 The evening sun rested low over the apple orchard throwing gold light across the rows of trees. The air smelled of leaves and ripening fruit. Evelyn Harrow ran her fingers along the rough bark of a tree she’d known all her life. This orchard was her family’s pride-and their burden especially know that war had taken the men away. She heard boots crunch behind her. “You disappear out more than you should,” said a familiar voice. Evelyn turned to see Lieutenant Daniel Whitaker, his uniform jacket draped across ...
Submitted to Contest #327
MIDNIGHT’S PROMISEThe first thing I ever remember is the sound of her voice. Soft as moonlight, steady as an old song. “Hello there, little one,” she said. “I think I’ll call you midnight.” I blinked open my tiny kitten eyes, and there she was-Elara, a young witch with hair the color of autumn leaves and eyes full of kindness and secrets. She smelled like lavender and old spellbooks, and from that moment on she was my world. **Life in the cottage was simple, warm and full of magic. Elara and I lived at the ed...
Submitted to Contest #326
The mirror had been in Clara’s family for generations-a tall, silver-framed monstrosity that stood in the upstairs hallway like a sentry. No one remembered who bought it, or why it never reflected quite right. When Clara moved into her grandmother’s old house, she kept it only because it wouldn’t fit down the stairs to throw out. The first time she noticed something was off, it was small. She brushed her teeth one morning and saw just behind her shoulder in the mirror’s reflection, the faintest fog of breath against the glass. She turned aro...
Submitted to Contest #325
THE WIND KNOWSThe breeze touched my skin like a whisper-cool, deliberate, almost curious. It carried the scent of pine and wet stone, the kind of scent that clings to the skin long after you’ve left the forest. I paused, one boot half-sunk in moss, my crossbow slung low against my hip. The wind ways shifting. That meant he was close. I’d tracked him for three nights. Through the ravine where the moonlight pooled like sliver blood, across the ridge where the trees bent like old men and now here in the hollow where the wind spoke in riddles. T...
Submitted to Contest #324
The Skyfish AccordTold in three voices: Thalassa, Nymira and CorraThalassa, eldest, Keeper of CurrentsWe first saw her tangled in kelp, gasping. Not drowning-no she was not ours. She had fallen from the sky, a creature of feather and bone, not fin and scale. Her wings shimmered like the surface at dawn, and her eyes held the panic of something misplaced. "Like a fish out of water," Nymira whispered, circling her with curiosity. But I saw no fish. I saw a sky-being, torn from her element, flung into ours. She did not speak our tongue, but she...
Submitted to Contest #323
Told through the eyes of the Ballerina Every performance begins with a ritual. I arrive two hours early always.The theater is empty, the stage still asleep. I unlock the dressing room with the key I've kept since my first solo-its brass teeth worn smooth by years of nervous fingers. I light the candle. One wick, unscented, white. It burns beside the mirror, not for luck, not for ghosts, but for the silence it brings. I need that silence before the music begins. I lay out the shoes. Three pairs each with a ribbon stitched by hand. I choose th...
Submitted to Contest #322
The BallerinaAs told by by her dresser, MinaThey don't see the way her feet bleed. Not on stage, not under the lights. They see the turn, the lift, the impossible stillness mid-air. They see the Swan Queen, the final bow, the bouquet. But I see the moment before-when she's crouched behind the curtain, trembling, her hands pressed to her ribs like she's holding herself together. Tonight was the gala. The one they said she wasn't ready for. Too quiet, too inward. Not enough fire. But fire isn't always loud. Sometimes it's the way she rehearses...
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