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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

Write about a character who is being asked for their blessing, but is reluctant to give it.

Posted in Angst on Oct 26, 2022

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✍️ 14 stories

“Benediction” by Danny G

Submitted to Contest #116

“Can you believe this bullshit?” Commander Michael Allen burst into the office and tossed a handful of papers on Tim’s desk. Tim sat back in his chair, feet up on his desk and spinning his Akubra hat around his finger. He raised a lazy eyebrow at his boss and said in his laconic drawl, “I make it a habit to not believe in bullshit.” “Adrian Naughton,” Allen said, hefting up the pants that kept slipping over his round belly. “Asshole got off.” This had Tim’s feet off his desk and picking up the paper, “You’re jokin’?” The constant buzzing of ...

13 comments 13
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“The Picnic” by Amanda Lieser

Submitted to Contest #116

   The man walking along the gravel path looks too young to be here. He doesn’t have wrinkles on his face and his hair is still a roasted chestnut brown and full of boyish curls. He needs a haircut. It makes me smile. This visitor knows his path well. He bobs and weaves through the maze of stones. It’s almost picture perfect as bright Autumn leaves tumble all around him. I still have this fantasy of him dropping his grandmother’s wicker picnic basket and twirling as the orchestra swells around him. He doesn’t. Instead, he just...

8 comments 8
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“States of Matter” by Goblin King

Submitted to Contest #116

“Could I ask her out?” He says. My head almost spins straight off and lands in the dirt, like a loose toddler on a merry-go-round before I stop it. I stare at him while my thoughts catch up with my body. I close my mouth and look back forward. He squints at me for a second before looking back forward. The sun keeps him from looking at me for too long. I appreciate that. The wind plays with a few dead leaves on the ground as we walk by them. It tosses them around in a circle before getting bored and leaving them lying there, like a loose tod...

5 comments 5
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“The Water Is Perfect” by Kate Rich

Submitted to Contest #116

Normally I'm the one who skips the hot tub and helps with the dishes because hot tubs at parties kinda gross me out a little-- you know when you see little flakes of skin or hairs or whatever floating on the surface?--but I have a sprained shoulder and think it might help. The host is my co-worker, Kelly, who works beside me in the warehouse, and has become more or less my supervisor.  She invites me to these things all the time, and I almost always say no, because big social gatherings stress me out.  The tub is aglow with blue li...

3 comments 3
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“Queen Dumpling” by Chris Riffle

Submitted to Contest #116

It was very late in the night when she texted me: ‘Meet me at Queen Dumpling tomorrow night. Nine.’ It was odd seeing her text that way – proper punctuation, to the point – but then again I hadn’t gotten a text from her in two years. People change and their styles change too. I only wished that she had called. I missed her voice. I had this voicemail saved on my phone from when we were married. I listened to it on lonely, drunken nights. She’d been drinking and I was out of town, sleeping. The voicemail was mostly thoughtless rambling. She...

5 comments 5
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“La notte è un grande mare” by Daryna Tovkach

Submitted to Contest #116

«We are not good for each other.»«No.» We have been saying this same thing for years, since before our first break-up. We are just that, just not good. Not really friends, not lovers anymore. Whatever it is that bound us is long lost and forgotten, but the spell holds. I only wish I knew how to dare break it. By the time we get to the beach, it’s already dark. November is setting in. This year, the coming of winter is getting to me as never before. I fear your leaving, though I have to think it a deliverance. I envy it too. Wh...

1 comment 1
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“Inviolate” by Noelle C. Lee

Submitted to Contest #116

(TW-Sad, violent)“Holy crap, did you find something?” Shh…came a voice from beyond the stacks. “Sorry.” “This is crazy stuff, is it real?”I pushed myself over to see the screen of the bulky microfiche machine. Andrea was scrolling. “I think I found it.” ‘What does it say?” I gasped.Together we read an unbelievable story involving our mutual best friend. We were trying to control our excitement, our shock. We researched this on a hunch, and to see it in print, was overwhelming. The most astonishing piece of our discovery was that an insignifi...

2 comments 2
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“Over my Dead Body” by D.A. Cairns

Submitted to Contest #116

‘Would you like some pineapple, Michael?’            Am offered a plastic bag filled with chunky pieces of freshly cut pineapple to him with a smile which he failed to return. He was hungry but he didn’t like pineapple. That was how it started.            Later she told him how rude she thought he was, and how serious and unfriendly, and he explained that he was unaware of the social convention which dictated a person take some of wh...

2 comments 2
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“Happily Ever AfterLife” by Adelaide Jaques

Submitted to Contest #116

      It’s amazing how we can wake up, starting a day with thoughts of what we had to do and thinking we know how the day will go. We walk around in genuine oblivion about all the possibilities, I was working at our family bar and grill, as it was any other day of work. Per usual the game was on, I was working the tables as a waitress, and I smiled although I was thinking of a school assignment due tonight. Laughing at a joke a regular customer made whilst pouring him a glass of water.     &n...

1 comment 1
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“My Last Goodbye” by Lucy Barnes

Submitted to Contest #116

CW: Death, car accident Her eyes are what I noticed first. One eye a brilliant blue and the other an emerald green. Her eyes seemed to hold a secret, twinkling as if they knew something I didn’t, waiting for me figure it out. Her smile was the same, teasing me and beckoning me to approach her. I’d never seen a woman as beautiful as her. It was love at first sight and after three years of marriage, she still looked at me with the same expression. Each morning I would turn over and get lost in those eyes, still trying to learn their great s...

4 comments 4
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“A Good Wife” by Emily Snyder

Submitted to Contest #116

CW: Violence, Addiction “We haven’t known him very long.” I poured a martini and sat next to my wife.  She looked angry, but that was normal. “Do you really think it would stop her if you said ‘no’?”  I flexed my jaw. Of course it should stop her. I’m her father, my opinion should count for something. I took a sip of the harsh liquid and glared at the door. “What makes you think he’s even going to ask?” Stacy rolled her eyes. “Because I know our daughter. Why else would he be taking you to dinner?” I shook my head. “In my day,...

0 comments 0
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“The Confession” by Cliff Pratt

Submitted to Contest #116

“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. This is my first confession.” Father Michael seemed to hear the word “ever’ in the whispers and echoes of the old church. He was an older man, verging on elderly. He had been the parish priest for a decade or so, and was almost unflappable, having seen many unusual things in his long life in the church. There was a long pause. He scratched his balding head. “Go on, my son,” said the priest. In case the penitent was unfamiliar with the sacrament of confession, he added “You need to list your sins.” ...

2 comments 2
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“First Night at the Hall” by Christopher Cayen-Cyr

Submitted to Contest #116

She had told Mindy in the office her only wish was never to cross paths with me again, but surely she didn’t mean it. The Carla I knew couldn’t be this spiteful. There were many good memories, too many of them to discard: halls filled with concertgoers for whom we played in solidarity; cocktail-fueled afterparties where we laughed on and on; vibrant discussions that revolved around the most brilliant composers, our opinions always perfectly aligned. I refused to believe it, and so I drove on and on in the rain, like a stalker, searching for ...

0 comments 0
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“A Day At The Beach” by Danielle Sanchez

Submitted to Contest #116

“Good Morning!” Yelled Mom and Dad. “Time to get up!” Alex opened his eyes slowly and looked up at his mom and dad standing by his bed holding a breakfast muffin with one lit candle. He looked around the room and found it to be full of balloons and streamers. It’s not my birthday, he thought. By the look on his parents face, he knew that today was a day of celebration. “What’s going on?” He asked. “Who’s birthday is it?” His parents chuckled softly and in unison said with glee, “It’s our gotcha day! Today marks one whole year since we became...

1 comment 1
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