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Daniel Sheley

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Jul, 2025

Stories (10)

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17 Followers

17 Following

10 Stories

208 karma pts

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Past the Threshold

Submitted to Contest #320

Tia sniffed under the canopy, breath sharp with salt where tears had dried. She had wandered here before, but never this far, and the hush pressed closer than it should. Her mother’s hush, her father’s bark carried in the leaves that whispered above.Knees drawn tight, cheek pressed against them, she let her breath thin. A strand of pale hair clung damp to her cheek; she shoved it aside to see. A twig cracked deeper in the wood. Her wings pressed flat, glassy veins trembling.Light had gone. Oak and elm no longer shimmered green and gold. The ...

12 likes

The Bowl Waits

Submitted to Contest #319

New ones are coming. Pad feels it in the stones. The cottage shifts, beams sigh like tired lungs. Dust stirs where no wind blows. Houses know when hands are changing. So does he.Thomas is gone. Kind, warm as rising bread. He left cream, left crusts, winked toward the counter as if he truly saw. “Padraigín, my lad,” he’d say, and then only “Pad,” as if the shortness were a secret. Now Thomas is earth. Quiet. And Pad tends alone.A week of strangers. The cream bowl stays empty. Pad recalls Thomas’s words: “Here you go, Pad—little cream to keep ...

14 likes

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow - Sif's Story

Submitted to Contest #318

Sif woke to silence. That alone was suspicious. Thor usually snored like a frost giant drowning in mead, rattling the beams until she threatened him with a pillow. But this morning—quiet.She stretched, reached to rake her fingers through her hair…and froze. Her hand brushed only smooth skin.Her heart thudded. She bolted upright, staggered to the bronze mirror. The blanket slid off her shoulders. A bald woman stared back at her—bare, exposed, wrong.“No. No, no, no.”Thor stirred, blinking groggily. He squinted, rubbed his eyes, then gaped. “Yo...

13 likes

Riposte

Submitted to Contest #316

The hum from the ceiling lights has been stuck at a steady B-flat since Monday. I keep track of these things. Patterns keep me sane.Numbers fill my screen — quarterly reports, projections, the kind of numbers my boss pretends to understand before forwarding to someone higher up. I’m halfway through reconciling a set of discrepancies in the Carter file when a shadow falls across my desk.A thump. The stale smell of ink. “Hot off the press,” Miller says, grinning like he wrote the damn thing himself. His shirt collar’s folded under on one side ...

4 likes

What the Stars Want

Submitted to Contest #314

The apple was half-eaten, half-rotted, and sweating in the heat — still the best thing Tommy had seen all day.It was buried beneath a pizza box and a broken umbrella, slick with rainwater and the faint stench of something older. He didn’t care. Hunger had no pride—and he was done pretending to have any left. He dug it out of the dumpster, wiped it on the least-filthy patch of his sleeve, and sat down beside a cardboard box that would serve as his shelter for the night. His fingers trembled. Hunger, mostly. But part of him knew it wasn’t just...

7 likes

Letters

Submitted to Contest #313

The house settled around him with the kind of hush that only came after long years and longer routines. Abe shuffled across the kitchen tile in worn slippers, still in the khaki slacks he'd fallen asleep in, one hand rubbing at the knot in his shoulder like it might finally work loose after twenty years of complaints.The morning light had that flat, pewter tone to it, like the sky hadn’t decided whether to clear or keep brooding. He didn’t check the weather. Didn’t care. The pot on the counter still held yesterday’s brew, and that was enough...

5 likes

ReWritten

Submitted to Contest #312

Jeff sat at his desk, staring at the blinking cursor like it was daring him to flinch. The document was titled Last Good Day. That part came easy. The rest didn’t.Outside, the sky was caught between storm and sun, the kind of afternoon that couldn't make up its mind. Inside, everything was still: the mug of half-drunk coffee, the fading list of plot beats on the corkboard, the framed photo of Murphy, his old Labrador, perched beside a row of empty pens. It was meant to be a story about grief. About quiet things. About a man and his dog, and ...

18 likes

Fog and Chamomile

Submitted to Contest #311

The bell above the door gave a weary chime as Patricia stepped into the shop, trailing fog and damp wool behind her. Her coat was a deep charcoal, its hem wet from the street, and a small netted mourning veil clung to the brim of her hat. Wisps of chestnut hair escaped the pinned roll beneath it. Her eyes, green, reddened, restless, scanned the shop like someone waking from a nightmare and not quite sure if they’d truly left it behind.The gaslight outside flickered, throwing shadows across the window sign: Ash & Ember — Restorative Teas....

14 likes

The Book That Wasn't

Submitted to Contest #310

Mark never meant for anyone to read it.He called it The Echo and the Sock: A Nonlinear Treatise on Perception and Choice. A joke title, for a joke book, written in a haze of caffeine, bourbon, and sleep-deprivation. It was a fever dream of metaphors and contradictions - a stream-of-consciousness wreckage filled with sentences like:"All clocks are liars, except the one in your belly button.""To become truly free, one must first befriend a duck and rename it Harold.""Hope is a sandwich left on a windowsill during a thunderstorm."He self-publis...

12 likes

Anthony's Brew

Submitted to Contest #309

The snow came down like it meant something. Thick flakes spun under the streetlamps, catching in the cracks of brick facades and swirling down Allen Street in soft, bitter spirals. Most of the shops had long since closed. The galleries were dark, the cafés shuttered, and the tattoo parlor on the corner had its neon flickering like a heartbeat trying to quit.But halfway down the block, beneath a rusted iron sign that read Anthony’s Brew, a single window glowed gold.Inside, the bar smelled of cinnamon, molasses, and old oak. The kind of scent ...

8 likes

Author bio

Daniel Sheley is the author of Heartcoil, Lux Mendacium, and the mythic fantasy Vaeritas Saga. His upcoming works include For Scales Alone and The Soul-Sung, which was named a finalist in the Writers’ League of Texas Manuscript Contest.

He was born in Bradenton, Florida, where he grew up on the rough side of the city. Each day brought a new struggle. Later he moved to Westfield, New York — the first place he could truly call home. There he became involved in community and sports and discovered a love for music. That rhythm and cadence would later shape his prose.

After high school, Daniel attended college and then joined the U.S. Navy, serving in both technical and leadership roles. Today he lives in Midland, Texas with his wife and their blended family.

When he is not writing, Daniel is often chasing children, managing four dogs, painting, or dreaming of lakes and rivers. He continues to pursue storytelling not only through words but also through art and music, always searching for the resonance between myth, memory, and meaning.

https://danielsheley.squarespace.com/