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Alex Marmalade

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Feb, 2020

Stories (173)

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85 Followers

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173 Stories

2081 karma pts

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When Lions Remember Their Names

The torch flames cast dancing shadows across the council chamber as Queen Amytis entered flanked by guards, her chains clinking softly against the marble floor. Seven years of sleeping in gardens and managing an empire's slow collapse had taught her many things, but the most valuable lesson was this: when facing a tribunal of ambitious men, posture was everything.She walked like a queen.Behind the crescent-shaped table sat nine members of the Babylonian High Council, their faces masks of practiced neutrality. But Amytis could read the tells—...

1 like

Birds Don't Fly Backwards

Kofi adjusted his knock-off Adidas tracksuit—purchased from Peckham Market for three pounds—and tried not to laugh as his cousin Akwasi introduced him to the funeral gathering as "our poor Kofi who cleans toilets in London." The assembled mourners made the appropriate sympathetic sounds, their faces carefully arranged in expressions that said what a waste of a good education.His uncle's funeral had drawn the entire extended family back to Ddamba, including his brother Samuel, who stood beside their father wearing a pristine white coat despit...

2 likes

Exhibit A

SUPERIOR COURT OF OREGONMULTNOMAH COUNTYCase No. 2025-CV-08471EXHIBIT A: Digital Communications RecordEmail correspondence between Marcus K. Rivers and Nova Fields/Nova Fields ManagementMarch 3, 2025 - September 15, 2025Names have been redacted where legally required ***From: marcus.k.rivers@gmail.comTo: hello@novafields.comSubject: Your songs saved my brother's lifeDate: March 3, 2025, 11:47 PMDear Nova,I know you get thousands of emails, but I had to write. Your song "Exhibit A" was playing when I got the call about my brother Jake's motor...

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Revision Notes

FADE IN:EXT. BISTRO MARCEL - DAYELENA (32, wedding ring catching light, phone buzzing) sits across from MARCUS (45, sketching on napkin). Architectural plans between them. The WAITER (20s) hovers nearby, pitcher in left hand. He adjusts the small succulent on their table - moving it slightly left.ELENA I just need to get this Henderson project right. The community deserves something special.MARCUS You always overthink the structural elements, Elena.WAITER Everything satisfactory?ELENA Perfect, thank you.Elena checks phone - 2:47 PM. Emma's p...

2 likes

Fish Out of Water

"—so the Morrison case, you see, the appendix had perforated three days earlier, but the omentum had walled off the infection. Fascinating presentation."Kiptoo shifted in the leather chair across from his father's desk. Through the window, Nairobi's afternoon heat shimmered off the hospital parking lot. The brass nameplate caught the light: Dr. Samuel Mwangi, MBBS, FRCS - Chief of Surgery."The patient—a matatu driver—came in complaining of abdominal pain. Initially presented to a private clinic in Eastlands. They gave him antacids. For three...

3 likes

Memory Palace™ Premium Neural Implant - Perfect Recall for Students & Professionals - Advanced Brain Enhancement with Emotional Regulation - Lifetime Warranty - FDA Approved MP-2024

Product DescriptionMemory Palace™ represents the pinnacle of neurological enhancement technology. This revolutionary cognitive amplification system transforms ordinary minds into supercomputers of recall, analysis, and creative synthesis. Developed by Mnemonic Industries after fifteen years of classified research, Memory Palace™ delivers unprecedented mental performance through our proprietary Neural Architecture Mapping™ technology.Key Features:Instant recall of any information encounteredEnhanced pattern recognition capabilitiesAccelerated...

3 likes

HELP: Family thinks DH is gambling addict - am I wrong?

SupportiveSpousalForum.net - Username: LostInTranslation Posted: January 15, 2001 | 11:47 PMFirst time posting. Don't know where else to turn.My husband Michael thinks he's the next Warren Buffett. My family thinks he's a gambling addict. I'm caught in the middle, watching our savings disappear into companies I've never heard of.It started small - a few hundred here and there. "Just testing the waters," he said. Now it's thousands. Amazon, Google, something called PayPal. Names that sound made-up.The worst part? He talks to me like I'm stupi...

3 likes

Back to School

Margaret Okonkwo's hands shook as she counted the twenty-pound notes for the third time. Sixty pounds. Enough for Robert's prescription or the electric bill, but not both. The hospital bill lay open on their kitchen table: Experimental treatment: £847 per week. Insurance coverage: £0. Because apparently, staying alive was considered an optional extra.One day's work at Millbrook Academy would cover the prescription. One day. After eight years of retirement, eight years of believing she'd escaped thirty hormonal adolescents armed with smartpho...

2 likes

Left Turn at Miguel's

Harold Kleinman's left eye twitched as he adjusted his rearview mirror for the fourth time. Forty-five years old, polo shirt buttoned precisely to his throat, hair combed with mathematical precision. His mother's grocery list sat folded into a perfect square: "Goldstein's pumpernickel. The dense kind. Count your change twice."Seventeen years of Thursday afternoon bread runs. Same route, same store, same Mrs. Goldstein asking if he'd found work yet with the particular tone reserved for middle-aged men still living with their mothers.The inter...

2 likes

Blood Constellation

The pre-op needle slides into my arm at 6:47 AM, drawing proof of compatibility that glints like liquid garnets under surgical lighting. Third vial this month. Vera squeezes my free hand, her engagement ring pressing morse code reassurance against my palm."Still a perfect match," Dr. Martinez confirms. "AB-negative with the Kidd antigen complex."Vera's kidneys are shutting down at twenty-seven. I'm her genetic lottery ticket. Six months engaged, already fluent in compatibility tests and pre-surgical protocols."Two hours until we wheel you bo...

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Pilate's Laundromat

The old man's hands wouldn't stop moving under the faucet. Scrub, rinse, repeat. Same obsessive ritual, three times a day, for the past eight months."Mr. Pontius, the new doctor's here for your evaluation," I said, checking my phone. Two missed calls from my landlord, three from student loan services, and a text from Sarah: Jake, I'm moving out this weekend. We need to talk about the rent.Great. Another crisis I couldn't afford to deal with.Name's Jake Reeves. Twenty-two, psychology major dropout working as a psychiatric aide because the gig...

2 likes

The Way We Welcome Wives

The scent of tiger nuts and dried fish hung thick in Uncle Emeka's compound, mixing with the October heat that made Catherine's cotton dress cling to her back. She pressed her palm against the rough concrete wall, steadying herself as another wave of that familiar vertigo washed over her—the sensation that had plagued her for months now, as if the ground beneath her feet existed at a slightly different angle than everyone else's.The symptoms had started small. Car keys disappearing from where she'd placed them, only to reappear in impossible...

3 likes

Babel's Children

Submitted to Contest #304

The silence stretched like a taut wire.Hassan's notebook trembled, pages fluttering like prayer flags. Around the circle, four faces stared with the careful stillness of people trying not to shatter something fragile.Hassan had just read them a story about a twelve-year-old boy forced to choose which parent died first while soldiers laughed. The writing was devastating—present tense, sensory details that crawled under your skin, dialogue that cut like surgical steel.It was also, Marcus was beginning to understand, not fiction.Amara gripped h...

7 likes

Breathing Between Words

Contractions.Mei-Lin counted them like she counted syllables—obsessively, incorrectly, losing track each time her breath caught between one beat and the next. Four minutes apart. No, three and a half. The spaces between were shrinking, like margins on a page running out of room for revision.Her phone buzzed. Kenneth again. She'd been ignoring his calls since the contractions started because explaining why she was on public transport during labor would require admitting she'd lied about the due date. Again.The thing was, she'd known for weeks...

3 likes

Midnight Markets

Midnight.The grandfather clock in Marcus's hallway chimed twelve times, each resonance a starter's pistol firing through his bones. His wife Sarah rolled over in their bed upstairs, mumbling something about checking on the baby, but sleep reclaimed her before the thought fully formed. Marcus sat perfectly still in his home office, laptop closed, waiting.The transformation wasn't like the movies. Instead, it felt like finally exhaling after holding his breath all day. His shoulders straightened, his mind sharpened, and the familiar electric c...

3 likes

Author bio

Hi, I'm Alex Marmalade. I'm a working author building something in public—turning my journey into story structure insights that help readers become storytellers.
After decades of burying my writer identity under "you're supposed to be a doctor first," I'm finally becoming the writer I always hoped I could be. One story every weekday, sharing what I learn along the way.
My breakthrough came reading Robert McKee's "Story" in one sitting—16 hours that changed how I see narrative forever. Now I write stories that explore authentic human moments while teaching the structural foundations that make them work.
Want to see behind the scenes? I share beat sheets and creative insights at: https://alexmarmalade.substack.com
Mon-Fri story breakdowns, weekend Extended versions on Amazon KDP. Learning structure together, one story at a time.
The garden gate is always unlocked. ✨

1 winning story 🏆

Contest #294

Unspoken Orders – read story