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Author on Reedsy Prompts since Dec, 2023
Submitted to Contest #254
Richard cleared his throat in a futile attempt to restart his shocked heart. An itch nagged at his scalp as fresh sweat began trickling around his hair follicles. The space inside his top hat was quickly becoming a sauna. "Well?" Joanne pressed airily, her smiling eyes flittering with false innocence. "I presume you, a gentleman, can hardly do more than politely deny the accusations, but I'm afraid my husband absolutely insisted that it was true." "Madam," Richard began warmly, shifting his hat around to allow the steam to exit at the back o...
Submitted to Contest #253
I closed my eyes, pulling in a long, deep breath. Silent darkness encompassed me and a frigid stillness prickled my skin. I breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of a familiar, hollow face with sharp bony cheeks and deep, empty eyes set in ghostly pale skin. His long white beard trailed down his torso, flowing like his black robe with no hems and no edge. His clothing just flowed down forever into the blackness of the space, rippling and waving like the river which babbled by in perfect harmony through the featureless void. The water reflec...
Shortlisted for Contest #253 ⭐️
"Please do not enter the vehicle." "Excuse me?" A bolt of lightning shot through Shannon's heart as she climbed into the autonomous taxi and closed the door. Immediately the locks triggered and she felt a cold sweat explode onto her forehead. The taxi's smooth, friendly computer generated voice fired up again with the tenderness of a new mother. "What is your name?" it asked. "Shannon." She said it with the rising tone of a question while she pulled at the disabled door handle. Her heart began pounding wildly in her tightening chest. "What's...
Submitted to Contest #252
Anabel shifted her weight uncomfortably. A strong ache had been working its way through her fleshy backside while it was crushed between her bones and the wrought iron park bench where she waited. She lifted her left leg and crossed it over her right knee, glancing hopefully up at the bench across the way where a man sat, scanning casually around the park. He didn't seem to notice her, despite her criminally short skirt, low cut crop top, and tight, smooth ponytail. She was sure he'd notice her, but was she sure she wanted him to notice her?...
Submitted to Contest #251
"Sharon..." I called, projecting my voice behind me while I stared, wide eyed, at the body in my living room. He appeared to have crumpled dramatically into a pool of his own blood, a tangle of limbs wrapped in a loose robe or cloak. His face was obscured, but he was definitely dead. There was a mangled, gaping cave in his back, exposing parts of his innards that I had only ever read about in text books."What is it babe?" Sharon emerged from our bedroom stretching and shuffling her feet. She froze.I had stepped carefully around to try to get...
Submitted to Contest #250
A polite nausea rose up in Emmett's abdomen as he plunged back into the swarm of hungry entrepreneurs, investors, and politicians on the main floor of Hampshire Manor. His palms and armpits were swampy. He grimaced eloquently and nodded subtly at people who may have been making eye contact with him as he slipped through the crowd. Soon, he thought, you will all be dead. He tugged at his shirt collar, wishing he could loosen the tight bowtie that was ruthlessly strangling him.Moments earlier, wandering aimlessly through the halls of the mansi...
Submitted to Contest #249
"It seems the Bermuda Triangle has moved to the backwoods," Andrew muttered to himself. He glanced over at his phone, where the navigation app was still confidently tracing out a path deeper and deeper into the woods. He checked the time and his heart jumped. An hour ago he was supposed to be five minutes away from his destination. An hour ago? he thought. "OK, something is definitely wrong," he announced aloud to himself, pulling over on the dirt road that cut a rough, untraveled path through a dense standing of ancient trees.Grabbing his p...
Kevin didn't believe in coincidences. His heart, however, wanted to believe. He could feel his pulse throbbing throughout his entire body. Even his fingertips seemed to be twitching to the beat of his spooked nervous system. He hadn't gotten out of bed that morning expecting anything, but seeing Sarah at the grocery store was a spectacular surprise.A bolt of lightning jolted through his chest. She was looking right at him. His scalp tightened and a cold sweat beaded up along his brow. He winced. It was supposed to be a smile. He tried again....
Submitted to Contest #248
Aria gently touched her fingertips to her lower lip, lightly sliding the pad of her index finger back and forth. The deep ridges were gone. Her fingers were... smooth. She'd never felt anything so soft and sensual before. Even the sounds around her were more vibrant and broad. She listened intently as the waves gently rolled under the ship, straining its great, tense timbers. The creaking alone was full of high clicks and low croaks, a whole range of tones flying through the air to reach her ears. Air! She took a long, deep breath, letting i...
Submitted to Contest #247
"Need I remind you of the severe penalties we face if we're caught outside the fence?" Rignon was barking at Caprin through a clenched jaw. She looked over at him and smiled. A glistening sheen of sweat streamed down his forehead and temples. "If you're nervous, just go home. I can manage on my own." She gazed out at the fields beyond the fence, savoring the beating of her own heart, soaking in the still morning air. She'd spent the better part of the last year finding every opportunity she could to stand at the fence and gaze out at the lan...
Submitted to Contest #246
I watched in horror as Amy's bloody, lifeless body was covered by police investigators. The dark tarp did nothing to highlight her wonderful shapes, her pristine figure. But the blackness was better than seeing all that red. I shivered, looking around over my shoulders, trying to find the cop who had gone off to bring me a blanket. "Mr. Martin," the lead investigator said impatiently. He pulled out a small notebook and a pair of delicate reading glasses which he slipped on. "Please, just James." I continued glancing around while doing my bes...
Submitted to Contest #244
I had been staring at the photograph so long it was just a blurry smudge wobbling between my fingers. I tried to will my hand to stop shaking, but instead the tremor traveled up my arm and embedded itself in my core. I turned my attention back to the photo that I had retrieved from my vintage Polaroid moments earlier.It had only just begun to develop, the image still fading into existence, the mild chemical stink of the development process still clinging to the film, the photo still pinched in the exit chute in the front of the bulky camera ...
"I'm dying," Amber wheezed, tears streaking down her cheeks. She doubled over and gasped for air, her windpipe croaking dramatically as she heaved and worked to force air back into her lungs. Beth rolled her eyes. "Shut up," she said, scrolling nervously through the comments on her recent Instagram post. There were tens of thousands of them. Most were just some variation on 'The King!' but few were any wittier. She closed her eyes and shook her head while Amber continued her steady march toward an imminent death. "Your first viral post and i...
Submitted to Contest #243
I stood by the bedside and gazed directly ahead at his peacefully closed eyes, listening to his rhythmic, slow breaths. I watched as his nostrils flared and bulges under his eyelids danced around erratically.Thirty-two inches. I didn't know how I knew it, but that was my height. I could just barely see over the edge of the side of his mattress. My eyes were drawn to the window beyond his bed, up to a bright, eerie burst of celestial light. It was a magnificent display of galactic power, an astronomical reminder of how puny and insignificant ...
I was trembling like a vibrating massage tool. It wasn't possible. I didn't want to look. My landlord's words haunted my memories. "Just don't, for any reason, go into the attic." At the time I had shrugged it off. The rent was affordable and the location convenient. Everything was perfect, so why worry about the attic?I let my eyes drift back to the attic access hatch in the ceiling and I realized my heart was pounding furiously. I could hear the blood coursing through my constricted, tense blood vessels. I watched, hardly breathing, as the...
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