Harry Stuart

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Jan, 2024

Stories (8)

8 Stories

470 karma pts

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“How Many Ways to Drown” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #247

Sitting on the boat, listing with its movement as it cut through the hard water, Drew looked over at Tilly. She was donned up in her black wetsuit, perched with an eagerness. It made him sick to his stomach. Most of the other divers on the boat would have attributed his queasiness to the rough waves, but he knew it ran deeper to a loathing he carried for his wife. It was persistent. What had started as an annoyance was a full-fledged paranoia. Tilly was imperfect in all her perfection, wavy blonde hair, a round face, full lips, and a slender...

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“Playground” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #246

“Seriously, Laura? You want to go down that path?” Sam weighted her upward on the seesaw with the question.She hung suspended in air, her legs dangling over the sides of the rotting board. “There’s no sense in ignoring it, skirting around the truth. Is there?” She was taxed with his inability to see her in the moment, to feel her tilted anguish.He shook his head with a mix of exasperation and annoyance, “How can we make it different? I want nothing better than for you to explain it to me.” With his insincere statement, he lifted himself off ...

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“The Full Picture” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #245

…February“Ummm, that’s my car you just backed into!” Fern shrieked, clutching her shopping bags while banging her fist on the driver’s side window of the beat-up Datsun. The driver, a young male, vacantly looked at her as he finished rolling up the window and then sped away, smoke billowing from the exhaust. Fern made an ill attempt at juggling her bags and purse, trying to retrieve her phone to snap a pic of the once-white vehicle, the one covered in dirt, dents, scraped paint, and bumper stickers. It hurtled through the parking lot, nearly...

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“Shutter Speed” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #244

My camera positioned on the tripod, I take a quick selfie, documenting my loathsome mood. The September night is crisp, an early arrival of a northern front expected in Chicago, and I’m couched in the background, in my tired suit and tie, trying my best to blend in with the wedding guests while snapping pictures from the most advantageous angles. An outdoor ceremony this time of season is suspect, but princesses dream big, and mind you, they are all princesses. With my camera calibrated and ready, I simultaneously watch and click off some sh...

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“Tick Tock” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #243

After the explosion, time ceased to be linear. It collapsed on itself, pulling and forcing everything into a shifting nothingness. In retrospect, it is funny how we accepted time in its original, primordial flow, never questioning the laid-out sequence, the logical plan of that forward momentum. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.There was comfort in its predictability, one that no longer exists. I hunker down in the past only leaving the confines of my bedroom when it is necessary, when it becomes an absolute requirement for a semblance of normal livin...

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“In the Eye of the Beholder” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #242

Trigger Warning: Ideas/Suggestions of SexLeaning against the wall opposite the ticket desk, I have two thoughts suspended in my mind’s grasp. One, will this shift ever end? The day has felt interminable in its lack of function. And the other thought is on a perpetual loop. Some days it gets recycled as freely as the flow of beautiful women who pass by, and on other days more infrequent. Okay, never less than once every couple of hours. I don’t intend to sell men out, but you’ve guessed it. Sex is the four-letter word that encompasses the uni...

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“The Kiss of Judas” by Harry Stuart

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #241

The betrayal needled me at a 45-degree angle. It was caustic and driven, sinking its teeth into my flesh, razor-sharp in its edge and piercing. I sat there, staring at the Skype screen, wondering if I had heard my sister correctly, an out-of-body experience that had me floating between a time when I was complete and this moment when the wind was sucked out of my lungs. I couldn't breathe; I couldn't exhale. I was suspended in a repetition of a phrase, "We are flying into St. Louis first. We won't be arriving in Memphis until the fourth of Oc...

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“Reckonings” by Harry Stuart

Submitted to Contest #240

Nikki was unaware of the confluence of events that would up-end her world on this day, as the gentle breeze wafted in from the open window. It touched her skin with a light movement that was life-giving and ephemeral. There was nothing extraordinary in its offering, the day or the light gusts that rustled her brown, non-descript hair. The sky was a sullen grey, a tint of melancholy that was growing darker with each passing minute. Looking out the window, she thought of how the tones, monochromatic and blurred, were reminiscent of a watercolo...

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Author bio

San Francisco native. Enjoys crafting truths into words.

Shortlisted 1 story ⭐️

Contest #241
The Kiss of Judas – read story