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Riot 45

Author on Reedsy Prompts since May, 2025

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8 Followers
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8 Stories

152 karma pts

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Eyes Wide Open

Weekly Contest #313

It’s Friday, and the macaroni’s crusted over like a scab. Joanie picks at hers with a plastic fork, chasing a cold bite around the tray, one shoe half-kicked off under the table. Her braids are tied high today, a puff of defiance on her crown, and the way the sun cuts across her face makes her look carved from something ancient and golden. I walk up to her empty table.“Can I sit?”“You looking for trouble, or for company?”“Both, maybe.”Joanie side-eyes me, then scoots over just enough to make room on the concrete ledge. “Shit, Ellen, you look...

6 likes 1 comment 1
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Funerals Are for the Living

Weekly Contest #311

(Content warning: abortion [moderate], abuse [minor] discussed, mentioned or implied) I am no murderer. But the steam rises in the corner of the kitchen like smoke, and I cannot tell candlelight from hellfire. She shakes on the floor, head buried in arms as the shivering womb of her throat softly cradling my name.“Ellen,” she says. “Ellen, baby, I’m so sorry.”“I know, mama. It’ll be alright.”Her name is Ruth Jones, though the state’ll tell you it’s Whitlow, and no God I know could call her a sinner. She is my mother, and my pride and joy, an...

7 likes 5 comments 5
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Sub Mari Silentium

Weekly Contest #307

All places have a sound, and I've learnt to recognise them instantly. Some are quiet, humming, omnipresent but invisible. The common room after lights out. The East Wing hallway after lessons end and the practice rooms are empty. And some; some are unflinchingly, orchestrally deafening. Brighton Pier is the latter, and I prefer it that way. The sea, grey and roiling, crashes against the rock in foaming waves, the rides sing, oil sputters and the gulls scream like something's dying. It’s not quite summer yet - the April wind still bites throu...

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In Memoriam

Weekly Contest #307

I don’t think Marla hears the first knock. She dips her fountain pen again, dragging a line of cursive across the bottom of the page — Chaucer. The ink bleeds slightly. She winces, stretches her fingers, and keeps going.So I knock again, still standing on tiptoes, peering through the frosted glass of the Head Girl’s chambers. This time, she looks up. Her face softens. It looks like pity, before she's even seen me.“Come in,” she says, tying her hair up in a ribbon.The door creaks open. The room is immaculate. Books stacked in precise, spine-a...

18 likes 4 comments 4
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Glossolalia

Weekly Contest #307

Julian Moss has always smiled. On stage. In photographs. In victory, and once, just once, in grief, at his mother’s funeral, the corners of his mouth twitching upward like it was a nervous tic he couldn’t unlearn. He smiles because the world smiles back. Because it’s easy for him.He smiles at me now, as the May air hums between us, muggy warmth and the premonition of rain rippling throughout the courtyard. He wears James Miller’s blazer, the same way he always has since Halvorsen gifted the uniforms of the first Head Boy and Girl of St Anne’...

5 likes 1 comment 1
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Sapientia per Sacrificium

Weekly Contest #306

“Good evening, faculty, families, and fellow graduates.My name is Marla Holloway, and I have been Head Girl here since September of this year.Our school, Saint Anne’s Academy for the Gifted, was founded in 1883. Its motto? “Sapientia per Sacrificium.” Wisdom through sacrifice.Knowing this, I’d like to start with a moment of silence for those who could not make it today. For all family, friends, staff and siblings with whom we cannot share this celebratory moment. And of course, for my late counterpart, Julian Moss. As some of you may know, w...

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Prologue (Draft Script 1)

Weekly Contest #306

WIP TITLE: “THE ROAD LESS TRAVELLED”Draft - script 1A 3D rendered narrative driven choice-based adventure game. ***FADE IN:EXT. AN NEAR-EMPTY MOTORWAY – DUSKGrey skies bruise the horizon. Wind dances through hedgerows and fields. The road is vast and grey, stretching onwards. The odd car speeds past. A STRANGER (a boy, late adolescence, dressed in worn layers) walks slowly by the roadside, silhouetted. He carries a large backpack.CLOSE ON:A BLACK DOG — still, lying half in a ditch.THE STRANGER, kneels beside it. His breath fogs the air. He s...

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All Six

Weekly Contest #305

(Content warning: substance abuse [heavy], sexual assault [moderate], suicidality and HIV [minor] all discussed, mentioned or implied) I am three minutes into Tuesday the 22nd and exactly where I’m not supposed to be. When we walked out of the clinic on Monday evening, I was fine. You hugged me - hesitated - smiled, and bought me a coffee, ordered under a fake name like you always do. That day, you were an Aaron, and I burst out laughing behind you in the queue - it wasn’t you at all. I didn't want it, but it cost you a fiver, so you tried ...

7 likes 4 comments 4
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