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Jed Cope

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Jun, 2022

Stories (285)

Comments

Library

158 Followers

47 Following

285 Stories

6420 karma pts

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It Wasn't Me

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #195

“You killed him!” “Well, I…” says the round shouldered man, intently hunched over his computer, his tired, saggy face illuminated by the blue screen glow. The lighting helps him look like a forlorn gargoyle. “He’s dead! And you did it!” says the other occupant of the room as he leans back in his chair watching another screen, a screen linked to CCTV in a way that isn’t at all usual. CCTV that unwittingly records the demise of the latest ordered hit. “It wasn’t me,” says the hunched man. His name is Gareth and he isn’t used to conversat...

10 likes

Politic

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #195

They tell me I run the universe. I tell them to bugger off and leave me alone. They say that no one can ever know about the power that I wield. I tell them that I wield no such power. They nod and seem happy with this. Then I tell them to bugger off again. The problem is that they don’t bugger off, not until I listen to the puzzle they have brought with them. Then they linger until I state the bleeding obvious to them. They leave in a hurry, barely supressing their excitement, and I watch them go, wondering not for the first time...

15 likes

Grey Matter

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #194

The night was in grim mood and wanted the whole world to know about it. The quality of the darkness of this night was brooding and almost teenaged in nature, but the night wasn’t quite in that sort of mood and knew better than to go there. No one needed that in their lives. However, not content with the oppressive darkness, the night wrapped itself in a shroud of clouds and then it wrung them out fiercely. Still this did not suit the night, it wanted to express its grim mood some more, so it lit the night with a chaotic streak of lightenin...

14 likes

One Little Kiss

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #193

“I did it for you, darling!” Fran is pouting and trying for a look that she cannot land. She does a lot of this as far as Samuel is concerned, and right now, it is not at all endearing and neither is it alluring. Well, it might be partially alluring. Alluring to a certain extent. A disconcerting extent now that Samuel thinks about it. Those full red lips speak to him, and as for her eyes. The too large to be real eyes, that are pools he could drown in. No! This is what she does! This is what she did… “I don’t know why you did it at...

12 likes

Reunion

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #192

“You came…” The impossibly old man raises a weary and frail hand in greeting, it does not quite reach the heights it once did, it barely hangs half way to its intended destination, as though it forgot what it was supposed to do. John supposes that this is how it goes at this age, the wiring is wearing out and the signal is weak. “I did,” John says, his voice is quieter than he’d intended. Even after all this time, he feels strained. He eyes the old man and wonders how he got so old. Not for the first time, he wonders where all the years ...

11 likes

Here I Grow Again

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #191

The single, pale cherry blossom petal lays before me, asking me a world of questions. Ignoring its voice, I instead choose a moment of fantastical hope. He has been here. He walked into this room, the petal is testament to his continuing presence in the world. Only he could convey the petal to this place and press it to the cold tile on the kitchen floor, pinning it there for me to discover. A subtle love note to his beloved. It is fitting, that petal is for me, and only me. The petal is a messenger, it brings with it glad tidings ...

14 likes

Vengeance is Mine

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #190

The sun beat down upon the scorched earth, earth that it had already scorched many times before this day. But the sun was bored and didn’t know what else to do with itself. That was the only explanation for its relentless scorching of the same patch of earth, and it didn’t look like it was going to give it up any time soon.  The heat danced a taunting dance that took the moisture from a man’s mouth. The heat didn’t have the same effect on a woman’s mouth, but women weren’t about to reveal their secrets when it came to their avoidance ...

7 likes

The Bad Apple

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #190

He hates flying. He’s the most frequent of fliers and yet, even now, he feels the tension building in his body, and sweat beading on his forehead. Climbing into a glorified Pringle’s tube and being propelled at frightening speeds by one of the most combustible liquids known to science is not his idea of a good time. Henry knows this. Henry is one of the few who know him well enough to understand this about him. He’s also not a fan of the Big Apple. Give him the peace and quiet of the Scottish countryside any day of the week. But needs ...

14 likes

More Than A Match

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #189

It was so terribly cold. Snow was falling, and it was almost dark… The timid, little girl peered in through the brightly lit window and wanted with all her heart to be in the room beyond. The glowing and welcoming room, with its roaring fire and the laughing and cheering throng in the throes of such fun and jollity. Her desire to be a part of the tableau presented to her was boundless, and yet here she was in the freezing cold, in her threadbare clothing, clothing that barely covered her, let alone kept her warm. She stared in through th...

11 likes

Bedtime Stories

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #189

“You have awoken me.”The little man’s face grew comically wide, his eyes threaten to pop from their sockets. There was fear there and a generous helping of it, but there was also another emotion vying for territory upon his features, and the result of this battle pulled his facial muscles this way and that. It were as though he was suffering from the worst case of facial cramps in history. There were doctors, who if present, would make a name for themselves with this man in their care.This was a one-off show though, and the show on his face ...

6 likes

Mark Two

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #188

I saw her this morning on the way to work. The traffic had backed up and I was in danger of being late, so I peeled off the main route and tried a back route, safe in the knowledge that whatever I did, I was going to add to my journey time. I was always going to be late to work that morning.  Some things seem preordained, especially the crap that comes at you in life. Late and pissed off, I saw her all the same. Despite the stressed fog in my mind, and the building anxiety of my tardiness, she stood out at the side of the road a...

11 likes

A Thing For Happiness

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #188

I could be happy. I could be so happy. I really could. I know this with every fibre of my bloody being. There is a hole where the happiness should be. And that happiness is so very close, it awaits me in the next room. Happiness is so tantalisingly close. So bloody achievable, and yet it is locked away and kept from me, in a travesty of fate. I have found happiness, and yet I am no closer to attaining it than were it to be a world away from me. Having strived and laboured, I have found where happiness resides. I have discovered i...

10 likes

The War of Art

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #187

“No?” The cat doesn’t stick around to answer, which is answer enough to the question. The man takes another look and shakes his head. He could have sworn that this was real. That it was genuine. That it had something about it that made it count. He lingers a while longer and fights a shocking urge to cry. There is sadness there, but also a rage. He wants to rage over the injustice of it all, but how can he when it’s as much his fault as anyone else’s. He walks into the next room, the room that moments earlier, the cat casually walked i...

11 likes

The Sacred Curse

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #187

The cat sauntered through the temple. Sauntering in the haughty way only a cat can, but this was haughty sauntering taken to a whole other level. Temple cat level.When the cat sat, it was evident why the Egyptians of old held a special place for its kind. Revered, divine beings, placed on the Earth to remind people of what awaited them in the next life. How that reminder worked on a detailed level was left to a lot of interpretation and divination. A job left to the learned and devout temple priests.The cat’s aloofness afforded it an invisib...

16 likes

The Ninth Life

Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #187

The two black limousines pulled up outside the singular house. She had hired two, because that was the way it was done. That was the way it had always been done, and so she did it that way. She made the arrangements and she gave her instructions, so there was not a batting of one eyelid and no eyebrow arose as she made her dignified way out of the house and climbed into the second of the two cars.  She sat rigidly as the two dark cars awaited their cue. There was no movement from her as the cars joined the hearse in a procession to th...

16 likes