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Susan Struthers

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Dec, 2024

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8 Stories

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STARTING ANEW

A notice hanging in the high school hall made her stop short. There was an offer to start college one year sooner. This would get her out of the house that had become a hell hole because of a violent stepfather. He beat her brother but molested her. Her brother had decided to move to a rental with friends, but she was still there.Fred kept an eye on events across the street, where Alice, a lithe 17-year-old with a beautiful head of hair, was heading down to the mailbox at street level to check if a letter has arrived from a college she has w...

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STARTING ANEW

Weekly Contest #342

A notice hanging in the high school hall made her stop short. There was an offer to start college one year sooner. This would get her out of the house that had become a hell hole because of a violent stepfather. He beat her brother but molested her. Her brother had decided to move to a rental with friends, but she was still there.Fred kept an eye on events across the street, where Alice, a lithe 17-year-old with a beautiful head of hair, was heading down to the mailbox at street level to check if a letter has arrived from a college she has w...

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STUFFED SQUID, learning English

New home, new country, new Christmas. I was determined to make a good first impression. Christmas Eve dinner should be based on fish dishes, in the Italian tradition. This tradition made it across the water so it was also a tradition among some families in the US. Therefore I was a bit taken aback to discover that this part of Italy, didn’t go for fish on Christmas eve. Later, I realized I could have gotten away with smoked herring that is sold in convenient plastic packages without fish bones or skin. In the North, where I happened to be th...

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STUFFED SQUID

Weekly Contest #333

New home, new country, new Christmas. I was determined to make a good first impression. Christmas Eve dinner should be based on fish dishes, in the Italian tradition. This tradition made it across the water so it was also a tradition among some families in the US. Therefore I was a bit taken aback to discover that this part of Italy, didn't go for fish on Christmas eve. Later, I realized I could have gotten away with smoked herring that is sold in convenient plastic packages without fish bones or skin. In the North, where I happened to be th...

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RAIN RAIN GO AWAY

It was raining again. It had rained all week. There was no sign it would stop. I had to go shopping for food for next week. I went to get in my car and there he was, the neighbor I didn't really like, the one who said I needed to pay 70 dollars for a few months.There he was always in the way. This time he was right behind the car. I had to hope he would stay out of the way as I backed up.I didn’t have time to think about it being wrong or maybe complaining, so I started paying the fee. I didn’t want to be surrounded by trash. Differences bet...

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Spirit of the lake

Mamma is always your mamma they say in Italy. Whether or not she’s been good to you. After a long drive I finally arrive at an old building, at the end of an uphill driveway in soft light not very visible, not at night in November, as though someone didn’t want it found, though this was now near an international airport. I had an 11 hour flight ahead of me, there were low-cost options now, so I was going to my mother for Thanksgiving. The airport still has a lot of earth moving equipment here and there so it isn’t completed yet. But at night...

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A night at the lake

Weekly Contest #323

A new, bigger airport for Milan for which tickets were on offer for less had to be tried, so we made plans to go for Thanksgiving dinner at my sister's. There was a huge amount of publicity and controversy over the location, an hour from the city. We were also acquainted with one of the architects, responsible for some of the interior design, who worked on it. It turned out to be in the middle of the woods, not where you’d expect to find an international airport. It is new, so there is not the usual collection of one-night airport hotels. Th...

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RECREATION IN THE EARLY 1970's

Weekly Contest #316

As a college student without a lot of money to spend, hiking with friends is a good option. Therefore on Memorial Day weekend, which coincided with his birthday, FRED decided to celebrate by going for a hike near Sequoia National Park. A bit of a drive from Los Angeles, but Fred had it all planned out.We parked at the beginning of the trail and hiked for a hour to get to the Forest Ranger , to ask permission to camp for two days. He granted permission but warned of a mamma bar with cub who was fond of ransacking backpacks for food. He gave a...

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