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Author on Reedsy Prompts since Aug, 2019
Submitted to Contest #79
The sun-soaked evergreen of Dora Park darkens in the presence of this mold of bearded flesh in nicotine cologne, cross-body bag, unkempt business casual clothes, wan smile. Yellowed teeth and four-dollar cigarette breath greet me before anything else. Claims he's my father. I scoff toward the trees as a group of scattered wise oaks bend over to hear us. My dad is an outline of a man, I deadpan. A silhouette of boozy nights and casual trysts with countless women. His lanky chest caves, glassy eyes the color of rain clouds sink into thei...
Submitted to Contest #78
Last night, I wrestled a brown bear in the woods. It was in my dreams but I wrestled one in the woods. I had it in a tight headlock by a river because it claimed I couldn't stick with a hobby, that Tamara Nelson doesn't do hobbies. That's when it clawed my forearms and a list of all the hobbies I quit sprung out and rolled through the trees past the river from pole dancing to needlepoint and axe throwing. And then I leaped awake with an urge to tackle a mess of hobbies and that nosy brown bear. Tennis There’s a tennis court some mi...
Submitted to Contest #77
BANG. The knife spins out like and his clay pigeon body takes my blade. His body as in Parker Darby's body. A body that covers the snow in O- blood. The blood that attracts mosquitoes most, I think. Blood that trails back through red slush to the cabin. Parker Darby was a liability, a jittery motormouth with his pulse on criminal hangouts. A heavy drinker with a snitching streak, he made the rounds in crooked circles as a police informant. Unfortunate for him, one of those officers ratted him out to every top-tier lowlife in ...
Submitted to Contest #76
“Are you a girl, Shaheed? Answer me.” “No, Dad.” “Then why the hell are you wearing a girl's sweater, huh?” “Clothes don't have genders.” “Hmm alright, smart ass. Where did you get that sweater?” “From the women's-” “I rest my case. Take that off before I tear it off your back.” “Dad, some of my coworkers wear clothes like this. It's normal.” “Do any of them live here?” “No.” “Exactly and there ain't nothing normal about wearing women's clothes. Now, give me your sweater, and I won't repeat it.” “Here.” “Good. B...
Submitted to Contest #74
Austin's au gratin potato salad and sauteed green beans couldn't be more perfect. The rose and candlelight set up on the dining room table couldn't be more perfect. The moonlight that peers through the windows couldn't be more perfect. That's when the front door flies off the hinges coupled with our screams and a handgun and a bullet for two bodies. This happens in ten seconds time and all I wish for is a fresh ten seconds. Austin's au gratin potato salad and sauteed green beans appear starched to perfection. The rose and candlelight...
Submitted to Contest #71
Who would ransack Clarissa’s Confectionery- the bastion of all treats sweet, salty, and savory- for the chocolate crumble secret ingredient? Is it Charlie Confiserie, the clumsy and doe-eyed scone connoisseur who apologizes for everything? Could it be The Saccharine Twins, Eddie and Edie, who adore apple fritters and finishing each other’s... salted caramel? How about Sister Sucrose who has a hidden stash of blueberry jelly rolls and playing cards in her office? What about the slick-talker Dr. Dean Dextrose who needs a slice of pumpk...
Submitted to Contest #69
Toni’s mother Janice stands in the juice bar entrance with an incredulous stare for her only child; her only child who expresses disillusionment with selling clementine-centric desserts to customers. The snow outside that compounds itself into tiny mountains scattered around the neighborhood pales in comparison to the chill that blows through the room. For fourteen years, the job and the requirements therein have gone uncontested on Toni’s end. For fourteen years, Toni has maintained a pseudo-pleasant demeanor while she and a revolving door ...
Submitted to Contest #65
Janet sobs over the gaping hole in her hand-me-down vampire costume. “Halloween is ruined,” she sighs with her head braced against my leg. Loretta can stitch the roughest patch in a marriage together with her thread and needle. OK, that’s a stretch but the massive hole in this vampire cape would be effortless for her. Not to mention, she scoured the entire house and dug up my old vampire costume; of all the nights to cover someone’s shift, why did it have to be this one? “I’ll do my best with it,” I wipe Janet’s tears back ...
Submitted to Contest #64
There is a sparse air about Dad tonight. His entire body, from head to toes, sags forward when he shakes Shonda’s hand. He appears hollow in every trudge to the bathroom and returns lethargic in a deeper sense. Mom shoots him cursory glances and cracks a few knuckles when his exhausted head bows over the table. Shonda knows about his sluggishness from my morbid stories about his health scares and near-fatal experience on the toilet but this preternatural slog is unfamiliar. “Shonda, when did you and Lamar meet?” Mom croaks in a...
Submitted to Contest #63
By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. Jennifer put a lighter to one to see if she could tempt the maple out of it and torched the rest. It was out of a senseless principle but it was a principle that smelled like burnt maple. Lord knew she thought this was a way to craft maple syrup but you couldn't sway her another way. I was stunned but not shocked because she first bought the lighter to burn a straw dummy of her college ex-boyfriend. “I need maple syrup and Mother Nature won't tell the leaves to lend me some,” sh...
Submitted to Contest #62
I have a charmed life with hired hands who wait on me, friends who appear out of nowhere with a phone call, and the heavy job of being some wealthy girl’s boyfriend. I am afforded luxuries I can't spell from names I wasn't taught to pronounce but this is a precious life. It is my precious life and neither death nor age will fracture my youth. I will be eternal in this 23-year-old cocoon flung into a future everyone around me will be too deceased to experience with me. I hear the process is something about cryogenic stasis which I can't spell...
Submitted to Contest #56
It is August 9th when I realize I am a parent. My child Charise Tessa Lyon was six months ago. Where is my mind? I don't recall because it's soaked in the heat of heavy traffic. It is taut with anger over a lost promotion at the ad agency. It is fraught with stress over dinner reservations. It is August 9th when I realize my child is named Charise. I think my wife is named Nakia and I believe she calls me-“Deion, be still for a second and try this.” Nakia feeds me a spoonful of tomato soup and cherry-braised something else. It hark...
Submitted to Contest #54
What are the odds of sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic? One idiot doesn’t wait to text his mother and rear-ends a muscle car. I was supposed to make a christening, but these car horns surround me instead. I scramble to answer my buzzy phone before someone rear-ends me. My lane shifts forward three inches when I answer. “Elena, traffic is sluggish at best right now”, I explain, “Does shrimp fettuccine work for you?” “If it is served on a square plate with arugula, save it”, Elena replies. She is uptight but square pl...
Submitted to Contest #53
Day 1 In the din of the apricot sun, my skin is melting into my couch. I’m sprawled across it like chocolate on a scalding leather car seat. A burst of central air whips around my face, short and sweet like my girlfriend Tahira who emerges from our room dripping sweat. Her mouth contorts to form words but nothing leaves except a wispy “My God, this virus” before slapping my hairy thighs to vacate a space. She releases a heavy sigh against the base of my stomach and this is the first day of life beneath the shadow of an airborne virus. ...
Submitted to Contest #51
The stars above me shine as if they don’t do it often. They flicker from my porch chair and maybe they’re too tired to shoot across this dark expanse we call the sky. I know I would be if expected to sit up there glistening every night for people I won’t ever meet. Even if the same people watch me, none of them would feel familiar and it wouldn’t matter if they thought about me or not. Maybe if they wanted to transport themselves by my side telepathically, I’d be endlessly grateful but then they’d grow lonely and annoyed with the same plagui...
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