David G.

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Sep, 2020

Stories (29)

29 Stories

1816 karma pts

?

“The Bird and Me” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #73

Across my five-hundred-ten square foot apartment on the twenty-third floor of an early-1980s utilitarian building at the southern end of the Bronx come a few staccato chirps and whistles of the American goldfinch that now resides with me. His name is Charlie.I open my eyes. I'm in bed. On the ceiling above me there is a faint crack in the plaster. It starts about an inch from the wall straight above my right shoulder and then winds its way in a jagged pattern toward the center of the room, where it disappears briefly behind the light fixture...

Read story

“How to Visit an Inmate at the Coxsackie Correctional Facility” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #72

When traffic is light, the drive to the Coxsackie Correctional Facility takes two hours and eighteen minutes. In the early spring, the view north as you pull onto the Henry Hudson Bridge can be disorienting. The grey of the city with its still-melting mounds of snow piled high in the corners of municipal parking lots and along street curbs replaced, suddenly, with a seemingly endless landscape of first-bud forests. It will look like the greenest green you have ever seen. You will follow Route 9A to the Saw Mill Parkway, which takes you past ...

Read story

“Le Grand Biscuit” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #71

As it so happened, the fate of the small village situated on the bank of a forlorn and mostly dry riverbed was sealed on a dreary and otherwise quite unremarkable December afternoon. It was the Assistant Deputy Treasurer who sealed it, although, in fairness, it was not his fault. He was only doing his job. And his intentions were good.In the precise center of this particular village sat the municipal building, an ashen grey, squat, two-story structure whose marquee had recently fallen askew. The building was crumbling prematurely, the concre...

Read story

“Knobby Knuckles” by David G.

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #70

When had his knuckles gotten so knobby?They didn’t used to be this way - his knuckles. He was sure of that. There was definitely a time when the skin was smooth and taut over the joints, the lines thin and shallow.Now the bone protruded sharply beyond the fleshy parts. An old man’s hands. Deep creases wove between pink and white splotches, winding their way to his palms where they zigged and zagged, combining in places and separating in others like tributaries in an ancient river delta. On the fourth finger of his left hand, a pale depressio...

Read story

“The Deliberate Walker” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #69

The old man likes to walk.The rhythmic footsteps, the sense of progress, the chance to think things through, to pray, to deliberate, to purposefully plod, the series of small decisions that the walking inevitably includes, the brief stop on the corner of 7th Avenue and 49th Street or Fort Hamilton and New Utrecht, the quick glances, first left, then right, then straight ahead, always in that order, before the controlled and, at the same time, gut-instinct determination is made on the optimal path to take on that particular day, at that parti...

Read story

“Fate of the Mayfly” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #68

The soft shades of pink and orange on the undersides of the few wispy clouds scattered across the western sky signaled the coming of the great light. Below, the water was placid, disturbed only here and there by the briefest flick of a trout’s tail.From the primordial depths, the pupal larva of the mayfly shrugged free from the muck, wound past the slowly swaying reeds on her way toward the surface, and emerged into a new world. She blinked her primitive, unfocusing eyes.Water, air, sky, light.By the side of the lake perched an ominous form,...

Read story

“A Pirate's Life For Me” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #67

Here are some things that are said by, and about, alcoholics. Mostly these come from famous men celebrated for their genius and their drunkenness. Others I learned during my years of AA meetings. 1) First you take a drink. Then the drink takes a drink. Then the drink takes you; 2) As an alcoholic, you will violate your standards quicker than you can lower them; 3) Work the program. Hang in. Keep coming. Believe that a power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity.And here are some things that are said by, and about, pirates. 1) Yo ho...

Read story

“Mahalo King Cod Filet” by David G.

🏆 Winner of Contest #66

A slate-grey sky hung heavy over the President James K. Polk Memorial rest area on Interstate 64 in southern Indiana. At the fueling station, eighteen wheelers lined up under bright green lights for diesel and windshield wiper fluid from an army of apathetic attendants. A mother carrying a styrofoam coffee cup emerged from the Kwik Mart, pulling the collar of her neon pink and light purple ski jacket tight around her neck with her free hand and hurrying her two children across the broad expanse of cracked tarmac. A grove of oak trees, damp b...

121 comments 121

Read story

“Vampire Lawn Care” by David G.

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #65

He couldn’t recall exactly when having a nice lawn had started to matter to him.He and Mary used to joke about it when they’d moved out from the city, how the neighbors would talk about grass treatments and how tall to mow the blades, how they all had the same houses with the portico and the dormer windows and the multi-crested roofs and the two-car garage with the same foreign SUV out front, how they dressed in identical fleece pullovers with logos displayed across the chest and named their children after presidents – Madison, Lincoln, Kenn...

Read story

“Miracle and Grace” by David G.

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #63

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. The pre-dawn sky above Garnett Ridge flickered, casting an orange glow into the starless, smoke-filled night. I stood on dad's patio, embers racing past me like dancing pixies, hopping and twirling and twisting and pirouetting on the hot wind that whipped down the hillside into the canyon. It was oddly beautiful. Magical, even.I put out my hand for one of the larger ones, paper thin and aglow like a bioluminescent moth. It burned slightly as it settled on my palm and then went dark. I c...

Read story

“LiveLater, Inc.” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #62

“FED UP WITH THE PRESENT?”The question was elegant in its simplicity and design, laid out in bold eight-inch lettering, white Helvetica against a black background.The overhead lights flickered and the subway car rocked as it rounded a bend in the tracks. The passengers swayed in unison. Daniel Feldman mouthed the words silently as he read and then nodded to himself. He looked around. Morning rush hour. Men and women on their way to the office, black and grey suited, ties in acceptably bland shades of blue and red. One nearly indistinguishabl...

Read story

“Dearest Henrietta” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #61

Harold Cranston held the molded plastic figurine and ran the pad of his index finger along its delicate contours. The brim of the Union cap, the ammunition satchel, the bayoneted rifle. Though he was alone, Harold spoke aloud. “Private First Class Hartigan Smith, I presume.” In the mid-afternoon light streaming through his now-grown son’s commandeered second floor bedroom window, floating particles of dust glowed a soft yellow. The wooden stool Harold sat on creaked as he shifted his weight and reached for the mounted magnifying glass and sw...

Read story

“The Lady at the Post Office” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #60

It has to be, what, two o’clock in the morning. Hard to know for sure with these goddamned lights on. Two rows of fluorescent bulbs all the way across the ceiling. One edge right to the opposite edge. The light could be part of it. Part of their plan. Keep me awake, get me talking. Easier to squeeze information out of me that way. If it's two o'clock in the morning, then by now they’re all dead.The jackboots who put me in here want access to The Keyhole. They might even think they can get to The Locksmith himself. Good luck with that. He’s f...

Read story

“A Journey to the Arctic with Malthe Agard” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #59

Before I begin writing, dear reader, I must first beg your forgiveness. I am a journalist. I pride myself on that fact and I have always tried to be respectful of that title, to uphold the highest standards of the profession. Over the course of my career, I have had the privilege of working for, and alongside, a number of outstanding editors and journalist colleagues, all of whom have taught me things about the profession that have made me a better writer, reporter, and observer of the human condition. If there is one universal tenet that ha...

Read story

Author bio

Father of two. Husband. Bureaucrat. I wrote a 95,000 word novel. Maybe I'll read it one day. Retired from short story writing (at least for now!). Thank you for all of the support and great feedback! Winning Stories: Mahalo King Cod Filet Shortlisted: Knobby Knuckles Vampire Lawn Care Miracle and Grace

Winning 1 story 🏆

Contest #66

Mahalo King Cod Filet – read story

Shortlisted 3 stories ⭐️

Contest #70

Knobby Knuckles – read story

Contest #65

Vampire Lawn Care – read story

Contest #63

Miracle and Grace – read story