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Write a story about someone who has put “Blood Sweat & Tears” into getting where they are — only to question whether it was worth it.

Posted in Angst on Jun 2, 2023

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✍️ 47 stories

The Bequest

Winner of Contest #201 🏆

“I’ve always said it was a great big rat. You know the ones. Big as a puppy. A Parisian tourist terrifier. But any rat looks big when you find it lying dead in a box on your doorstep. It makes an impression.”I picked up the block of Perspex from my desk and leaned back in my creaking leather chair.“As you can see, it’s probably only about average size, if that. Although it looks much smaller stripped of flesh and fur.”The shearing jaws were set in a perfect pincer. The thin spine and the ribs so fine, they wouldn’t have looked out of place l...

117 likes 92 comments 92
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Neptune's Lair

Shortlisted for Contest #201 ⭐️

When I met her, word on the street was that Esmay was beyond help.Her friends called her “crazy” and “borderline.” By the religiously-inclined of former times, she might’ve been thought of as demon-possessed.During drunken fits she’d get into fist fights or threaten to throw herself from freeway overpasses.She walked a thin line and repeatedly upset rumors of her demise, taking immense pride in being what she called “stronger than dirt.”She had a breathalyzer in her car. Two years ago, she’d overturned her Hyundai in an incident where s...

48 likes 50 comments 50
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Maximum Pump

Submitted to Contest #201

(Content Warning: Blood, Gore, Violence, Crude Humor, Language.) Tom Lawry slowly wrapped his fingers around a cold black iron bar loaded with five-hundred pounds of solid steel plates and took a deep breath. His heart was pounding, but it wasn’t from the thousands of onlookers in the arena waiting for him to make an appearance. No, it was an overwhelming fear of failing and what that would mean to his illustrious bodybuilding career. In the solemn words of his late father—failure was something only losers did, and Tom Lawry was not ...

36 likes 25 comments 25
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Arthas Needs a Hand

Submitted to Contest #201

TW: Fu**ing swe@ring.“We have to remove the leg, probably the arm as well.” The droid doctor said it to newly reinstated Detective Arthas Jacques in a calm New Delhi accent.The detective fought back sobs, body trembling as his blue eyes scanned from his functional black metal right hand to the mangled leg in a cast, held tightly in place above the bed. His prosthetic left leg was right as rain, unlike his crushed left hand.“Save my hand, please.” Tears rolled down the stubble on his papyrus coloured cheeks. His accent was the Arab-French ble...

30 likes 42 comments 42
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There, Now I Can Breathe

Shortlisted for Contest #201 ⭐️

Content warning: Depictions of anxiety.It feels like the walls are closing in; the stench of linseed oil, body odor, sweat, and rusted metal permeates the air around me. Closing my eyes, I attempt to ignore all the unfinished projects, but I can't keep my eyes from darting around all the tiny parts littering the table.It was the bezel that did me in. Whatever tenuous hold I have on my sanity slips as my hands shake, and I wipe my sweaty palm on my denim apron and try once more to smooth out the bezeled piece, rounding the edge of the pocket ...

28 likes 18 comments 18
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The Fallen

Submitted to Contest #201

I stare at the cracked mirror in the dimly lit backstage room, trying to recognise the person staring back at me. The once vibrant eyes now carry a weariness that no amount of success can erase. My name is Jake, and I've poured every ounce of my being into becoming a rock star, but lately, I've begun to question if it was worth it. Our band, "The Fallen," was born in the dingy basement of a rundown apartment building. We were just a group of misfits with a shared dream and an insatiable hunger for music. Countless hours were spent rehearsi...

23 likes 12 comments 12
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Falling Like Rain, Burning Like Fire

Submitted to Contest #201

Malcolm looked around. Everything was in place. The interview could begin as soon as Jackson Keller finished wiping the residue of white powder from his nose. Malcolm Hall was excited, nervous, and a little star struck. Getting the reclusive author to agree to an interview was a major coup, one that could propel him to a bigger office and a better salary. “The son of a bitch offered me some coke – and a ride on the Keller rocket,” Jill whispered to Malcolm. Malcolm looked at her, surprised and alarmed. Jill smiled reassuringly. “Don’t worry....

22 likes 17 comments 17
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The Chevelle

Shortlisted for Contest #201 ⭐️

The white lines flashed by in the headlights of the Chevelle as it rolled along the highway. The clock on the dash read a little after three; the road was empty. The morning commuters wouldn’t hit the road for another hour or so and the late shifters were already gone. The car was a ‘70, fully factory restored. Cole had done all the work he could himself and sent away for the work he couldn’t. Rewelded, repainted, rewired, and rebuilt. It even had the original radio. After the ranch, it was the first thing he had bought himself once the...

21 likes 18 comments 18
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THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC

Submitted to Contest #201

The sweet, little grey-haired lady reminds me of my Grandma as she smiles up at me while I sign her program. “I remember you when you were first starting out,” she says with a twinkle in her eye. “Ginny said I just had to come to see you perform at the Springbrook Bandshell because you were releasing your first CD and all your classmates were coming out to support you. You remember Ginny, don’t you?” I’m trying to conjure up a picture of Ginny, but after all, that was over 20 years, scores of shows, and hundreds of people ago if you incl...

20 likes 18 comments 18
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The "O" in OSLA

Submitted to Contest #201

I want to be Ophelia. But apparently, I can’t. “Oh we’re too famous, we’re a big group, we can’t just split up!” Ally would say that. Ally isn’t even her real name. She’s just pretending We’re all pretending. That’s what stars do. No, not idols. I don’t like that word. Idol, an image or representation of a god used as an object of worship. I don’t like that. But that’s what I am. And OSLA is an idol group. Ophi, Syl, Lia, Ally. Or if you would prefer our real names, Ophelia, Sylvia, Livera, Alyssa. O. S. L....

19 likes 8 comments 8
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Broken Clocks

Submitted to Contest #201

“…so, tonight we have the rising young, or should I say rising OLDER star, author of bestselling novel Broken Clocks, Ronnie FORDman.” said Marion Maestro, host of nightly entertainment broadcast, This is It.*Speaker generated crowd noise*Ronnie gazed into the crowd with a vacuous stare, the studio lights blurred out the people in attendance, he barely noticed Marion pronounced his name incorrectly, a common occurrence due to the phonetic similarities of the two, but this IS showbiz. You’d think he would get my name correct, Ronnie thought.“...

19 likes 5 comments 5
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Dreaming to Distraction

Submitted to Contest #201

The morning sun of September's fourth day came bright through the classroom window. Its light held a promise, but I knew it would only deliver the ghost of summer warmth. I stood at the front of my empty classroom, inspecting the product of my summer toils. I had complete confidence in my seating plan; the desk layout carefully planned to avoid bottlenecks; the children I knew to be disruptive artfully insulated from one another. Each desk tidy held precisely the correct number of supplies: just enough to prevent wandering trips to neighb...

14 likes 0 comments 0
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I Think; Therefore, I Matter

Submitted to Contest #201

In the year 1650, Rene Descarte lay on his deathbed, winding down the final hours of his mortal coil. The pre-dawn daily tutoring of Queen Christina had proven too taxing for his weak and feeble body. He had succumbed to pneumonia and had been bedridden for the last week. Queen Christina had missed a full week of tutoring, but Descartes hardly cared. His mind was focused on what he believed, until today, to be his most important philosophical discovery. He had proven that the foundations of knowledge could be trusted by the simple but p...

14 likes 2 comments 2
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Benali's Finale

Submitted to Contest #201

Johnny Benali took two solid shots to the face, ignoring his coach’s countdown from the corner. Everybody in the Milton Arena, including Johnny, knew he’d lost the first round. Staring into his opponent’s face, he mouthed “Come on, punk!” as best he could without losing his mouthpiece. Not having the right angle to throw an elbow or enough time to take Johnny to the ground, Diego Alonzo--the number one light heavyweight contender--seemed content with doing exactly what Johnny had told him to do. Alonzo threw two undefended punches, one to ea...

13 likes 1 comment 1
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What Can't Be Seen

Submitted to Contest #201

Discussion of hardship and death.It wasn’t my life that was being reviewed. It was their idea of me. I never had a say in it. Like a book that you open at a random page, their ideas of me were always lacking a context.What context could there be to make sense of everything? See that is the problem. I could be anything or anyone and without knowing anything about me, you can’t make sense of my life at all. Like a bare light shining into an empty dark room, the glare is all you see.Like that time when my sister didn’t share with me those miser...

13 likes 4 comments 4
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