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Make a character’s addiction or obsession an important element of your story.

Posted in Dramatic on Nov 14, 2025

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✍️ 47 stories

The Cursor Blinks

Submitted to Contest #329

The cursor blinks. 2:47 AM. Mikayla's hands hover over the keyboard, not quite touching, as if the keys might burn her. Or save her. She isn't sure which.The writing community's weekly prompt glows on her second monitor: Write a story about a character who is haunted by something or someone. She's read Clive Barker since she was fifteen—she knows haunting. She knows how desire and dread weave together until you can't tell which thread is which. But knowing and doing are different animals, and right now, sitting in her apartment with the radi...

29 likes 27 comments 27
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Plastic, Cutlery, Freezers, and Flame: A Night of Support

Submitted to Contest #329

TW: Offensive language, and parody of support groups and addiction/trauma. BEEP—fabric softener.BEEP—deodorant.I smiled at the curly-haired mother of three, her kids clinging to her and the cart. “Did you find everything okay?”BEEP—dish soap.“Yes. Thank you,” she said, smile soft.I nodded once, ending my polite performance, and continued scanning.BEEP—diapers.BEEP—formula.BEEP—a doll… A twitch hit my eyelid. The small, plastic woman’s pink lips were stretched tight, like she was in pain. Her yellow dress like caution tape. And her eyes—those...

18 likes 19 comments 19
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Pretty, Fit, Hypocrite

Submitted to Contest #329

TW: Eating Disorders, Eating Disorder Behaviours Kiera checked the lighting in her phone’s camera, adjusting her platinum blonde hair to make sure no unruly strands were sticking out. Satisfied with her soft makeup look, she reapplied her dusty pink lipstick, smacking her lips together and flashing a quick smile to make sure nothing was in her teeth. Her outfit for the video—a matching activewear crop top and leggings—had been carefully selected to flatter her figure.Everything was laid out on the kitchen counter in front of her, Pinterest-w...

16 likes 13 comments 13
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Circe

Submitted to Contest #329

The tide rolled in, grabbing sand from the shore and pulling it back into the sea, claiming it for Poseidon. High above the beach, a woman dressed in a simple off white gown that fluttered in the wind, stared at the sea expectantly. The saltwater air caressed her skin and played with the dark colored curls of her hair. The air shimmered beside her revealing the lithe figure of a water nymph took shape, her main companion on the island. “Poseidon continues to press his claim on the island”, the nymph remarked in her liquid voice. The wo...

12 likes 4 comments 4
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Two hundred and fifty-five reasons

Submitted to Contest #329

When he was an orphaned boy with no money or chances, Pitman 255 tried to simplify his life by stealing a diamond necklace, and got everything he ever wanted. Three-hundred twenty-six. And the sun died behind the hill.For twenty-five years, his life was simple indeed.Reduced to swings of the hammer, to keeping count. It was the one thing in his life that held any sense of progress, even if it was one reset by the end of each day. The one thing that kept him sane.As sane as a Pitman could be, anyway. What little sleep he got, he needed to tak...

12 likes 3 comments 3
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Domestic Refrigeration

Submitted to Contest #329

The first time Wendy found maggots in the fridge, she remained quite calm, considering they were maggots. And they were in the fridge. The second time she found maggots in the fridge, she contained her anger by channelling it into a bowl of vanilla ice-cream, served in the posh crockery they’d received as a wedding present, with maple syrup (from Canada, allegedly), all accompanied by a cheeky little wafer she found at the back of the cupboard. After all, she thought, it was Gerald’s hobby, and surely better this than having him shove notes ...

11 likes 8 comments 8
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A Mage, His Seagull, and a Serpent with a Broken Heart.

Submitted to Contest #329

'You keep going like that,' the seagull says to me, 'and you'll be jumping off this island when the smokes run out.' I nod and ignite the pipe anyway. The leaves fail to light. 'This stuff is getting worse somehow.' The seagull pauses his search for a butter knife, 'Almost enough to quit?' Saying ancient words, I jam a bright flame suspended from my index finger into the pipe. Earthy tastes of awful leaves envelop me. 'Not enough.' Outside, a wave almost topples our island. A hard slab of water slammed against an improbable spire our cottage...

10 likes 2 comments 2
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What He Deserved

Submitted to Contest #329

The wind whipped the branches of the barren tree against the window, creating shadows on the wall that danced like claws. A fitting night for Elmer Corbett’s task at hand. At least the rain would keep away any unwanted visitors and obscure him from any prying eyes lurking in the darkness. If all went according to his plan, no one would ever know he had even been there. Luck hadn’t been on Elmer’s side recently, and counting on it was what had gotten him into this situation in the first place. He had reached the end of the line. Either he c...

10 likes 5 comments 5
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THE WHISPER ARCHIVIST

Submitted to Contest #329

CW: Psychological horror and implied childhood trauma. People say archives are silent places — mausoleums for paper, shrines to quietude.Marin Hart knows better.Silence has shape here. Silence has teeth.It begins each night around two in the morning, when the city finally exhales and the electricity hums in a slightly different register. The world above sleeps; the world below stirs. The fluorescent lights tremble as if they’re afraid of the dark, and the stacks begin to murmur — tiny shifts of paper, sighs of old glue, whispers of knowledge...

9 likes 3 comments 3
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Tap, Tap, Flicker

Submitted to Contest #329

“See, here is the thing.” I am being lectured by the stranger next to me at the blackjack table. “You have to only bring what you are willing to lose.” His thick black mustache, Southern drawl, and flannel jacket contrast with his weathered face and thinning hairline. “Until you are good enough to win. Y’all have to be prepared to lose.” He is winning. Again. Annoyingly. And if it is routine, he shows a twenty. It is my turn now, and I show an unfortunate four. I tap my finger on the table twice. Six. Tap. Tap. One. Tap. Tap. Eight. The ...

9 likes 3 comments 3
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The Hair of Another

Submitted to Contest #329

Inspired by Tatsuya Nakadai (December 13, 1932 – November 8, 2025) A kiss goodnight. That was all Kyoka gave to Josh. That was all she ever seemed to give him lately, before she curled up with some book about hyperfungated soil or whatever agricultural nonsense her job involved. It had barely even been on his lips tonight. There was no two ways about it. Josh knew exactly why she refused to touch him lately. She could try to hide it, and Buddha knows she tried. The root of the problem was as clear as day. Male pattern baldness. She thought h...

9 likes 8 comments 8
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Digging It Up

Submitted to Contest #329

Dirt flies up into the moonlight as you bend over the grave, morbid confetti falling back into the sheet of your hair. You blow it away and keep digging. Finally, the shovel hits wood. Not just wood, mahogany. You spared no expense for her. Juliette Windsor. You had the name carved in pretty black calligraphy above the simple word: beloved. She is not friend or family, but some combination of everything. She is the first girl you ever loved. You brush dirt off the casket and reach for the lid. It groans open easily; the hinges are used to pa...

8 likes 4 comments 4
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Living in Your Echo

Submitted to Contest #329

CW: References to addiction/recovery behavior. By 2:17 a.m., the hotel is quiet enough for me to hear my own bad decisions. The ice machine groans in the hallway. The elevator hums. But here at the front desk, under the soft yellow glow of the lobby lamps, the loudest thing in the building is my brain replaying the same three seconds of an old video: Lena laughing, turning away from the camera, her hair in that messy bun, saying, “Stop filming me, Charlene, I look like trash.” She never looked like trash. She looked like the exact problem I ...

8 likes 2 comments 2
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The Gilded Cage of Memory

Submitted to Contest #329

CW: Substance abuse, mental health Don Rafael began to slump in the chair. He vaguely caught the light sound of the needle and syringe hitting the floor, and he slowly began to realize a pressure had been alleviated from his forearm. He glanced down and saw the leather tourniquet was also lying on the ground, though he could barely recall having taken it off. His eyes were beginning to feel weary, and he was slouching more, practically laying on top of the writing desk. He rested his head on it, running his hands over the artisan carvings th...

7 likes 2 comments 2
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The Battle Fought in Silence

Submitted to Contest #329

Nicholas had checked his homework only once so far, so going to the bowling alley was simply impossible. As advanced as Kcizky seemed to be to all the Kcizkians, they had no help for internal wars, and there was no one who understood him well enough to offer advice. But his younger sister Phoebe insisted he come along for her birthday. He never had agreed, only said it was a nice idea. Now here he was, being dragged there against his will. He stuffed as many pages of homework under his arm as he could while his adopted father hauled him out ...

6 likes 0 comments 0
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