Menu

More apps built by Reedsy

Assemble a team of professionals

The writing app for authors

Writing courses, events and memberships

Get your book reviewed

Weekly writing prompts and contests

Menu
Prompts
Contests
Stories
Blog
Featured stories
Activity feed

Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of friendship short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

Friendship Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. Some would say that tales of friendship are some of the most moving of all. From childhood friends to brand new buds, you'll find a story to warm your heart here.

Friendship Short Stories – Page 3

Social Interactions and How to F*cking Maneuver Them; A Guidebook to Normalcy by Sören and Kai

Weekly Contest #374

In the way that the sky has always been blue and the grass has always been green, Sören has always been awkward. It was something he couldn’t control; like watching himself be painstakingly uncomfortable in third person with no way to intervene, and it became glaringly obvious just how awkward he was when he got transferred to public school. He used to loathe his private tutors, but somehow, public school was worse than pompous Englishmen and stuffy afternoons locked away in the library of their summer home in Milano. Public school meant con...

7 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

The Old Ladies and Big Cheese

Weekly Contest #374

My parents are out of town this weekend! Are you guys up for something fun? Kate messaged in the Old Ladies WhatsApp group. None of them remembered why they had chosen that name year ago. “At least it’s going to last!” Ilaria had commented. Sleepover? Elyse replied. How old are you? Twelve? I’m thinking of something crazy! Kate texted back, adding the monkey-covering-its-mouth emoji. Kate's plan was simple. The four friends would meet at her place, order pizza, and then drive to a club thirty miles away. Afterward, they would all sleep at he...

5 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

THE DISASTER

Weekly Contest #374

Their relationship began wonderfully. She thought he was cute and wanted me to meet him. He was her type. Quiet, not aggressive, but sports-minded. She had no idea that the boy she wanted to marry one day lacked ambition and was a mamma’s boy who liked to drink far too much for her liking. She liked to drink, too, but not as much as he did. But she was four years younger and still figuring things out in life, while he should have already figured those things out by now. His selfishness irritated her because he always bought beer and had mone...

5 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

Five Plus One

Weekly Contest #374

When the cashier looked at Cole with something like recognition, a warning flare shot through his body. It had been so long since someone had looked at him like that— in a way that made Cole feel like a solid presence in the world, rather than the out-of-focus extra that he normally embodied. He couldn’t tell what was behind the cashier’s stare: desire? fear? It had been an age since Cole had been on the other side of anyone’s desire other than Alonzo’s or Fannie’s or sometimes Olu’s, when he was in a particular mood. But his friends all vie...

4 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

The Countdown Party

Weekly Contest #374

“I serve you dust when I kill the light. I catch the smokeless without a fight.” A dozen thoughts fly through my head as I set down my half-full wineglass on our cocktail table. I mouth the inaudible until I speak one word that rises above the rest: “Ashtray.” Holding up her icebreaker card, Margaux rolls her eyes, then nods. Booyah! My smartwatch lights up green with a black “+3” in the middle; Margaux’s lights up red with a “-3.” I’m closing the gap and coming for the tenants. Geoffrey, our host, calls the game’s final five players the ten...

3 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

The Fare

Weekly Contest #374

The Fare. Charlie, a middle-aged Cockney cab driver, dozed in his cab and dreamt of a different life. Years of dealing with the public had left him indifferent to most fares. Unlike many cabbies, he didn’t mind waiting. Fishing had taught him patience. As he sat, his mind empty, peace enveloped him. In another world, he jumped when his radio blasted into life. “Charlie, it’s collect and deliver. Mrs Page, Chester Road. Drop off at Sunny Bay Rest Home.” “Tell her I’m on my way. Fifteen minutes.” While he drove, the traffic snaked along two l...

16 likes 3 comments 3
Read story

Many conservations... finally our first meeting

Weekly Contest #374

Many conversations… finally our first meeting I was free. My own master. Responsible for my own destiny. Memories of school and university were slowly being lost in the mists of the past. But probably what I found most emotionally satisfying was that I was no longer under the influence and umbrella of my parents. This protection took on many subtle and interesting forms. As a baby, I relied on their love to feed and protect me. As a young adult, their teachings and life experience, always present, were a welcome influence. In my teenage yea...

3 likes 1 comment 1
Read story

Man's Best Friend

Weekly Contest #374

“Stella! Stella! Stella!” I understand that Fred named me as some kind of human joke. Specifically for calling me back in from the yard. I know because it always makes him laugh when he does it, and the neighbors shake their heads when they hear it. I go back into the house anyway, and he gives me a treat and scratches the base of my tail. I can see by his clothes that we’re going on one of our special nighttime walks. I love these. We walk around a neighborhood I’ve never seen before, and I get to sniff around as much as I want. Fred is ne...

8 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Secret Magic Tree

Weekly Contest #374

My name is Karl. I am a senior, and my life—along with the lives of others close to me—have been transformed in ways I can scarcely believe. I want to share my good fortune with the world, though I must keep certain details hidden. The names, the places, even the exact setting must remain secret. A tree in a park is central to what happened, and as a living thing, it is in my emotional feeling that the tree is demanding privacy, and I feel compelled to honor that. The Park About ten minutes’ walk from my home lies a public park. It is a pla...

7 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Vegetable Soup.

Weekly Contest #374

"Oh goodness! It's so beautiful!" Hazel's blue eyes widened as she held up the glass in both hands. Her fingers traced the white rabbits painted on the glass. One stood up straight and looked forward, and the other, a much smaller rabbit, ate the grass at the feet of the first. "I thought you might like it," Isaac said. "I found the set at a thrift store last week. Aren't they adorable?" "I think this is the best cup I have ever seen." She smiled. "Can I have some juice in the rabbit glass, please?" "Sure." Isaac turned on his heel and opene...

6 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Vents Open Anyway

Weekly Contest #374

Have you ever heard the saying “Be careful who you vent to. Vents lead to other rooms”? Like the way air passes effortlessly from person to person. And despite trying your best to contain your thoughts in your brain, keeping that air trapped within a 4-by-4 wall of private, unshared thoughts, the stagnant air and depleting oxygen can cause a mental version of ‘cerebral hypoxia’. The world tells you repeatedly to hold your thoughts to yourself. But while that may make you all the wiser, that kind of paranoia would ultimately cause you to suff...

3 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

The Tidemark Creature

Weekly Contest #373

Brineford was the kind of coastal town where nothing ever changed except the tide schedule. The sea pressed against its eastern edge, while the other three sides were hemmed in by wilderness so thick it looked like the world had grown tired of expanding and simply stopped. Lenny Barrow lived in a small house perched on a dune overlooking the water. He was twelve, curious, and possessed a pair of eyes that behaved like independent creatures — always darting, scanning, catching details that others politely ignored. He noticed the crescent trac...

12 likes 1 comment 1
Read story

The Rest Stop

Weekly Contest #373

“I need to pee,” I pronounce. My passengers sigh in syncopation. Irene, in all her engaged majesty, gruffs. “O, c’mon Hilary, hold it. We’re almost at the border.” I cast a long, languid side eye in her hunched direction. “Irene, it’s been two hours. I am human, after all.” Wryly, “and I need to be loved.” She’s loud in her silence; her clenching tensing me more than my own nether-y urges. We keep rolling down the pine lined highway, open windows airing out the final hours of an abysmal bachelorette getaway. All that’s left is my overwhelmin...

11 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

The Faults that Follow

Weekly Contest #373

“Are you even listening?” Gina huffed. She slumped over her half melted milkshake, a heavy head cradled in her palm, and her other hand aimlessly stirred the contents of her glass until the dark chocolate sludge un-whipped the remaining cream. The cherry and its bent stem sank to the bottom. She sighed and sat up, pushing the dessert away. Her stormy grey eyes scanned me from across the table before finally deciding to stick to the complaint. “Do you even care, Laura?” I slowly turned my attention from the chaos outside, which was only a loo...

7 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

Proof of Life

Weekly Contest #373

PROOF OF LIFE A true story about crime shows, imagination, and two spectacularly unqualified investigators Send proof of life. The text went through at 6:03 a.m. Three dots appeared almost immediately. Alive. Good. One potential homicide avoided before breakfast. My friend and I lived several states apart, which ordinarily would have made us spectacularly unqualified to investigate crimes together. We had no badges, no investigative training, no access to criminal databases and—perhaps most importantly—no actual evidence that a crime had occ...

7 likes 0 comments 0
Read story
RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

Bring your short stories to life

Fuse character, story, and conflict with tools in Reedsy Studio. All for free.