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Rebecca Lewis

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Oct, 2023

Stories
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60 Followers
59 Following

150 Stories

1511 karma pts

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The Still Place Below

Allison had always been afraid of the water.Not the polite, careful kind of fear. Not the kind that makes you avoid the deep end at pool parties and laugh it off. Hers was the kind that lived in her chest. The kind that tightened her throat at the smell of chlorine and woke her at night with the memory of cold, dark pressure closing over her head.She was eight when the river took her under. Slipped on moss. Hit her chin on rock. Saw nothing but brown churn and white bubbles. Her father’s hands pulled her out in time, but something stayed beh...

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Where the Light Found Her

The car door is still open when the siren starts.It’s a thin sound at first, somewhere far off, easy to mistake for wind pushing through the parking garage. Samantha has one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the envelope in her lap. The paper is soft from being folded and unfolded all morning. Her name is written on the front in her mother’s careful, slanted handwriting.Her fingers press into it without meaning to, creasing the corner.The siren grows louder.Across the concrete levels, tires screech. A door slams. Someone shouts, “H...

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The Shape of Expectation

Weekly Contest #343

Everyone knew the dragon would come at dawn.That’s what the prophecy said. The scroll was very clear about it. Dawn, smoke, fire, screaming, a chosen hero with a birthmark shaped like a crescent moon. The whole thing had been workshopped for centuries.So the town prepared.Blacksmiths hammered through the night. Bakers handed out free bread to nervous families. Parents hugged their children a little too long. And at the center of it all stood Adam, who had the crescent moon birthmark and a sword that was slightly too heavy for him.He practice...

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The Morning After Rain

The last time I kissed John, it was raining.Not the dramatic kind of rain you see in movies. Just a steady, gray drizzle that made everything feel smaller. The parking lot outside my apartment smelled like wet asphalt and pine from the trees lining the curb. His car idled at the edge of the sidewalk, exhaust curling into the damp air.We’d been standing there for ten minutes, talking in circles.“It doesn’t have to end like this,” he said again, pushing his hands into the pockets of his jacket. His hair was plastered to his forehead. He hadn’t...

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Two Dollar Bills

When Chelsea first noticed him, he was arguing with a vending machine.It was late, close to midnight, and the hospital lobby had the washed-out look of a place that never truly sleeps. The fluorescent lights hummed. The coffee in her paper cup tasted burnt and thin. She had been there for nine hours, sitting with her younger brother after his surgery, and the world had narrowed to plastic chairs and the slow crawl of the clock.The vending machine swallowed his dollar and gave nothing in return.“You can’t just take it,” he said, pressing his ...

8 likes 5 comments 5
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After We're Gone

The bus dropped her at the corner like it always had, a half block short, as if the town itself didn’t want to claim responsibility for her arrival.She stood there longer than necessary, hands in her coat pockets, staring at the rusted grocery sign across the street. It still said Fresh Meats even though the windows were boarded and the paint had peeled into something that looked like scabs. Some details never changed. That was the problem.She’d sworn she wouldn’t come back. Not after the funeral. Not after the last argument in the driveway,...

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What We Set Down

Letter One Dear N.,I’m writing this on the bus because if I wait until I’m home, I won’t. There’s something about motion that makes honesty easier. You can blame the road if the words wobble.I found your spare key today. It was taped inside the old cookbook, right where you said it wouldn’t be. I laughed out loud in the kitchen, which felt strange, like laughing in a closed room after the air’s already gone stale.I didn’t use the key. I just wanted to know it was real.You asked, last time we spoke, why I stopped answering. I’ve been rehea...

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Tomorrow, I Promise

Weekly Contest #340

The baby monitor crackled to life at 2:17 a.m.Heidi had only fallen asleep an hour earlier. She’d been at the kitchen table with her laptop, answering emails that could have waited, telling herself she’d stop after one more. She always said that. Her neck still ached from hunching over the screen.At first, she thought it was static. The old house breathed at night. Pipes clicked. Floors sighed. She rolled over and pulled the blanket higher.Then she heard it again.“Mama?”She sat up so fast the room spun. The monitor’s green light glowed on th...

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What We Meant to Do

The call comes just before sunset, when the light in the kitchen turns the color of old paper.Mariella lets it ring.Then again.No one else calls her this late. No one else still uses that number.She wipes her hands on a dish towel she keeps meaning to replace and never does. It smells faintly of lemon soap and something older.“Hello?”Breathing on the other end.For a second, she thinks the call has dropped and she’s talking to herself. Then she recognizes the rhythm of it.She imagines him on a sidewalk somewhere, one hand in his pocket, stari...

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Revisions

I wake up mid-sentence again.Not the gentle kind of waking, either. I’m talking, or thinking, or doing something brave with my hands, and then — snap — the world blurs and I’m suddenly standing somewhere else with a different emotion stapled to my chest.“Oh no,” I say. “You changed it.”Silence. That thick, godlike silence that smells like coffee and indecision.Last time, I was angry. Righteously so. I had a whole speech ready. Now I’m… wistful? Why am I wistful. I don’t want to be wistful. Wistful people stare out windows and accept things.“...

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On the Other End

Every night at 11:47, the phone rang.Jeff never answered it on the first ring. He let it ring twice, always twice, the way he’d been trained. On the third ring, he picked up and said, “Emergency response. What’s your location?”Sometimes there was screaming. Sometimes crying. Sometimes just breathing, fast and panicked, like the caller was running out of air and hoped Jeff had some to spare.He took the calls calmly. He followed the script. He stayed on the line until help arrived or until the line went dead.That was the job.Tonight felt heavi...

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The Quiet Between Alarms

I’m the smoke detector in the hallway.People think I only exist to scream at them.I see everything from the ceiling. That’s the advantage of being ignored. No one looks up unless I’m loud, and by then it’s already too late.I notice the small things first. The way the father pauses before opening the bedroom door at night, listening to make sure no one’s crying. The way the mother always burns toast when she’s pretending she’s not stressed. The kid practices apologies out loud when he thinks he’s home alone. He never is.I smell moods before w...

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Chance

On the day the town lost its post office cat, the mail still arrived on time.That mattered to Mrs. Powers, who stood by her window every morning at 10:07, purse on her arm, waiting for the truck. She said it was for the coupons, but everyone knew she just liked to wave.The cat’s name was Oliver. He’d shown up years earlier with one torn ear and the confidence of someone who had already decided where he belonged. He slept on outgoing parcels, supervised stamp purchases, and once chased a raccoon out the back door like it was part of his job d...

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A Reason to Open

The bell over the door rang the way it always did, thin and hopeful, like it still believed someone might come in just to browse.Julie looked up from the counter and waited. The waiting had become part of the job. Not just for customers, but for a reason to keep the place open another day.The shop was narrow and long, with shelves that bowed slightly from the weight of years. Used paperbacks leaned into hardcovers. Handwritten notes were tucked into spines. Someone long ago had penciled prices on the first page of every book, careful and nea...

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A Small Window

The smell caught her before the thought did.Burnt sugar, a little bitter at the edges, floating up from the street-level bakery as Ondrea waited for the crosswalk light to change. She hadn’t planned to stop. She was late. Her phone buzzed again in her pocket. Still, her feet slowed, then stopped.It smelled like caramel that had gone a second too far. Not candy-sweet. Something darker. Almost apologetic.Her stomach tightened. Not hunger. Recognition.She closed her eyes without meaning to, and suddenly she was twelve again, standing on a chair...

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