AnneMarie Miles

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Mar, 2021

Stories (52)

52 Stories

3222 karma pts

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“Tethered” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #221

Sometimes I like to stand outside and watch the wind. I try to remember what it felt like, rustling through the tiny hairs on my arm, filtering through my thick beard. They say you don’t know what you have until it’s gone. I watch the six-foot branches of the redwood in our yard shake and shimmy and regret that I ever took such a powerful and beautiful force for granted. I’m not sure I will ever grow used to this numbness. Of course, time has no sense anymore, but this existence – if that’s a fair name for it – has felt like an eternity. It ...

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“Doodle” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #220

9:17 AMThe Office LobbyThe yucca tree is no longer alone among the impressive boulder formation and cloudy pink sunset of Joshua Tree National Park.“That shouldn’t be there,” Milton says to no one. He has been staring at the landscape for nearly ten minutes while he sips his coffee, letting the image before him sink in. Sometimes you see something that is so unbelievable, so out of place, it can take a moment for the emotions to settle. His therapist – who is not really his therapist but a barista at the coffee shop on 4th Avenue – tells him...

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“Happy Place” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #219

I am dancing, but it is more like existing. Existing here, in this perfectly beautiful place. My body absorbs everything around me: the delicious warmth of a never-setting sun, the reggae music, the luscious greenery of the mountains and valleys, the brightly colored flowers, the bare skinned people brushing up against me. My body can’t help it: it is swaying slowly, rhythmically. It is liquid in its movements, gliding up and down and side to side. The music travels through my whole body like a river. Nowhere for it to escape, it just kee...

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“Rec Time” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #219

I was never a morning person. I’d cling to my fur blankets and Egyptian cotton, pulling them up over my head at the first hint of daylight. I’d inhale the newfound darkness of my fuzzy veil and the plush promise of more precious slumber and moan myself back to sleep. If I’d had it my way, I’d wrap my consciousness up like a present and gift myself to the moon to be unwrapped every evening under its worthy gleam.I sigh at the luxurious memory. It is an ache in my body like a phantom limb, though its weight holds nothing against the absence of...

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“Crochet” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #218

For family members of terminally ill individuals.You take your time walking down the aisle, running your hand along the rows of skeins, giving each a gentle squeeze. Some are fluffy, thick cords of feathery fibers, while others are fuzzy like one long rope of pom poms. Some are thinner, strings of intertwining wool and cotton and silk, acrylic even. Some are rougher, not like hemp, but textured like a thousand individual hairs twisted together. You can feel the invisible fly away strands spiking upwards and yielding down against your touch.T...

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“Beowulf: A Guard Dog's Tale” by AnneMarie Miles

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #217

Dedicated to my furstborn, who thinks he is much braver than he is, but really just has the sweetest and most tender heart, and often gets the short end of the stick now that he has a human sister. The day I slayed my first dragon started off like any other. The sun greeted me with a gentle touch, and though my nose welcomed its warmth, I felt my body tight and tense: my toes still squeezed together, my hair still up, my jaw still clenched. Last night had been an all-too-real slaughter of tree-dwellers, and I was convinced I’d find myself am...

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“Widower” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #216

TW: swearing.“’Do you like cheese?’” Bobby asks, incredulously.Kurtis shrugs. “Seems like a valid question to me.”Bobby deadpans.“What? I saw it in a movie,” Kurtis defends.“And how did that go? For the person who asked his date that question?”“I don’t know. I didn’t finish the movie. Fell asleep.” Kurtis shrugs again, taking a sip of his drink.Bobby slaps his hand to the side of his head. “Kurtis, come on, man. I know it’s been a long time since Barb passed – ““Hey, don’t talk about her like that!” Kurtis interjects, elbow to table, finger ...

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“Alteration” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #216

Some Time and Somewhere, something agreed that tonight was important. Eleanor was grateful, at least, for that sliver of Knowing. It was the only thing driving her from wall to wall as she shuffled hastily, gathering a bottle from here, a jar from there, preparing. The mice scampered along with Eleanor from corner to corner, their tattling a rhythmic hum that made the cobwebs dance. The single pane windows on the front of the house rattled their response to the thunderclaps outside, each louder and more vibrative than the last. Beneath ...

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“Vanish” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #215

I tried to be gentle. I tried to come to you slowly, revealing myself in fragments under the growing dimness of dusk. I stepped ever so carefully into the downward cast of the yellow streetlamp’s sepia light, sending forth first a finger, then, a tentative but eager-to-caress hand. I moved so gently, so slowly that I felt the cloak of darkness removed from my face inch by inch, nose first, before there was no more hiding. I did this for you, as not to startle you, didn’t you see?I even smiled, those sparks of kindness you all boast so easily...

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“Potion-making” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #214

Jayce is sprinting across the yard towards me, waving his arm high, triumphantly. “I found a feather, Mom! Look, it’s blue! It must be from a blue jay.”I squat down to inspect it. “I think you’re right. Excellent job, sweetheart. Let’s put it in the jar.”Jayce wastes no time, uncorking the tiny plastic jar before jamming the feather into it.“Is that our last thing?” Jayce asks, still stuffing the feather with his index finger. Once it’s mostly in, a few stray strands of the feather are popping up out of the mouth of the container, Jayce push...

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“The Lucky Ones” by AnneMarie Miles

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #213

“She is definitely a robot,” Carly leans in and whispers in my ear.I stifle the involuntary laughter rising up my chest by covering my mouth with one hand, swatting her playfully with another. “Oh my god, Carly, shhh!” I press an index finger over my parting lips.She snickers. “Seriously! There’s no way this chick is real. Look at her,” she’s extending her arm out, palm facing up, gesturing to the woman speaking on stage. “Who looks like that? She seriously hasn’t stopped smiling since she started talking. It doesn’t even look real! That’s d...

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“Who Will Clean Out My Sister's Tent Now That She Is Gone?” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #179

TW: drug use, addiction, death.Having risen several inches since the recent storm, the river’s level is high. Its rushing stream should be sonorous, but instead it is just a hushed drone mumbling in the back of my mind as I watch it bustling by, silenced by the overwhelming odiferous wave of decay and manure. They pulled out one thousand tires, tens of mattresses, car parts, animal carcasses, batteries, and other debris from the brown sludge last year in their efforts to “clean up the city”, yet standing here, I cannot tell. "Clean" is certa...

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“New Year's Eve Annual Streaking Race” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #178

TW: Strong language, allusions to sex, and nudity.Kissing Jamie’s knuckles, Willy said, “You do not have to do this.”Her smile begged his lips to linger. “If I knew what this was, it would be a lot easier to say no to,” she flirted.Willy chuckled. Keeping a hold on her hand, he cupped her cheek in his other, stroking his thumb over her freckles. “Ah, ah, now, that, I cannot reveal,” he teased, pulling her in for a kiss. Their lips moved slowly, but Jamie could feel the passion building, their tongues growing more inquisitive with each touch....

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“Becoming Mama” by AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #177

December 2018With her daughter nursing in her arms, Macy uses her elbow to push down on the door handle and open the door into the conference room, careful not to bump little Isla’s head as she does. Her diaper bag is slung over her shoulder, bouncing against her legs as she walks, and her daughter’s car seat is hooked around her other arm.“You’re getting good at that,” says Elena, one of Macy’s closest friends at the mom group, clearly amused by Macy’s multi-tasking skills.Macy nods a hello at her friend before settling into a spot on the f...

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“Opening Geraldine's” by AnneMarie Miles

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #176

Carla inserted her skeleton key into the keyhole, turned it, and heard the unlocking of the bookshop’s door. When she pushed it open, the bell on the other side of it jingled its welcome tune into the stillness of Geraldine’s Books and Bits Bookshop.Carla inhaled the shop’s sleepy aroma, a mixture of must and ambrosia, her mascaraed eyes gleaming excitedly through her bright red cat-eye-framed glasses. “Hello, my dears! Good morning, good morning!” she sang her dark crimson lips into a wide smile. “How was your weekend?”A quiet creak weakly ...

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Author bio

AnneMarie Miles is a mother, a published poet, a children’s music teacher, and a forever student. When she isn’t writing, AnneMarie is doing yoga, dancing in the kitchen over some deceptively easy vegan meals, cuddled up with the family, or buried in a book somewhere, completely unavailable to the world. IG - @amzma7 Copyright © 2024 AnneMarie Miles - All Rights Reserved. Using content without written permission is prohibited

Winning 1 story 🏆

Contest #223

Cerulean – read story

Shortlisted 8 stories ⭐️

Contest #227

Blizzard – read story

Contest #221

A Ghost's Testimony – read story

Contest #217

Beowulf: A Guard Dog's Tale – read story

Contest #213

The Lucky Ones – read story

Contest #176

Opening Geraldine's – read story