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Author on Reedsy Prompts since Feb, 2022
Submitted to Contest #156
Cyril Cassidy and Tripp Killian cross themselves as Hunter “The King” Kingsley’s casket is lowered into the ground. Much like his reckless spendthrift life, baseball’s most exalted player, Kingsley, the Los Angeles Angels All-Star centerfielder, has been afforded an extravagant sendoff in death. His casket has a plush velvet interior, and the outside is made of solid bronze with “The King” written in script in 14 karat gold. Hunter’s body looks bronzed, brawny, and beautiful as if he could step out of the casket and smash the winning hit. ...
Submitted to Contest #155
The good news for Hector Bestwick was he was in line to inherit Rosewood. The sad news was his father would have to die for him to get it. Rosewood was his grandparent’s cozy two-story colonial home, so called because of the prodigious rose bushes that grew on both sides of the house. His grandfather, Priam (known as Billy), had planted the rose bushes. A former shipyard welder, Billy was a little under five and a half feet tall, but he was James Cagney tough - quiet, and hard, with a talent for keeping his emotions in check. Matti...
Submitted to Contest #154
Edison Gates tries to remember what he does for a living, where he lives, and who he loves, but his memory is a scrambled haze. He only knows that wherever he is going is better than wherever he had been. Edison looks at himself in the rear-view mirror. North of forty, he’s hollow-eyed, his skin is blotchy, his dark hair is thinning, and his lean physique lacks muscle. “…Must have a desk job…,” he mutters. The radio blasts Golden Earring’s “Radar Love.” He steps on the gas, trying to ignore the darkening sky ahead. The first crack of th...
Submitted to Contest #153
Bullhead City, Arizona 1888 Connor Green stares into his empty whiskey glass. Husky, scruffy, with dirt under his fingernails, Connor is calm and good-natured, traits being put to the test by Cass Armbrister. “She’s my wife,” Cass says. Reedy, with skintight, angular features and a pencil-thin mustache, card sharp Cass Armbrister is animated, impatient, easy to rile, and always right. “I have a marriage license. What do you have?” “Six years of bliss,” Connor replies. “Bosh. The law’s on my side.” “Eliza loves me. You just love her...
Submitted to Contest #152
King Toliver Nesbitt flashes his million-dollar caps and wiggles his bushy eyebrows at Chancellor Manville Dubois, a sure sign the monarch will try to coerce Manville into doing the impossible. “I’m looking forward to seeing Queen Esther,” King Toliver says. “How is the queen feeling these days?” Manville asks. Distinguished, yet unassuming, Chancellor Dubois’s lanky build, fluffy brown hair, and glasses make him look more like a college professor than Andorra’s most accomplished diplomat. “She’s fragile. I can’t thank you enough for co...
Submitted to Contest #151
Dr. Jordan Hart and Ensign Asher Cartwright shake their heads as they look down at an unconscious Montgomery “Moose” Albertson. Short, with black-rimmed glasses, affable Ensign Cartwright hopes to have his own command someday. A twenty-five-year Navy veteran, Dr. Hart’s ever-present frown and grumpy countenance fail to hide his concern for others. “He’s the most knocked out man I’ve ever seen,” Ensign Cartwrigh...
Submitted to Contest #150
The four-year war between the Imperial Empire and the rebel factions of the Gypsums appears to be near an end. Colonel Manfred “The Beast” Everhardt has trapped a large group of the Gypsum rebels in the sacred city of St. Leone on the planet Erebus. Everhardt is an excellent commander and strategist, whose savagery comes from the injury he received during the siege of Saint Augustine. When the city was about to fall, a group of Gypsum resistance fighters got close enough to throw homemade bombs at Everhardt’s tank. He was struck in the left...
Submitted to Contest #149
Everyone has a motivator who possesses the raw energy of a cattle prod placed in their naughty bits. Katherine O’Donnell was my cattle prod. We met in the third grade when I was a stuttering, insecure, buck-toothed bookworm hoping to find anonymity in the school chorus. I figured I’d been found out as a vocal imposter when our music teacher, Mrs. Herbert, stood next to me with her head cocked in my direction. &...
Submitted to Contest #148
Wade Wakeman is worried that Winter has stopped taking his lithium. Winter’s real name is Bartholomew Winter Pomerantz, but everyone calls him by his middle name because of his disarming personality and ice-blue eyes. A striking, wavy-haired charmer, Winter comes from old money, and not getting his own way is foreign to him. Wade Wakeman is a pleasant, practical, underachieving red-headed rube from Odell, Illinois who barely has enough money for tuition. Living in a paid-for luxury apartment in busy Carson City, partying with classy co-ed...
Submitted to Contest #147
“Excited?” Marisa asks. “Are you kidding? Conor Overton! I get to interview the man who played Captain Cosmos in the “Astral Traveler” series, was Raz Vadish in “The Pirates of Port Royal,” and played George Victory, the rootin’ tootin’ shootinist cowboy west of the Pecos!” “What was his famous line as Captain Cosmos?” “’ As long as I have a heart...
Submitted to Contest #146
Houck, Arizona May 1892 “You really think you’re going to get away with this?” Calvin Roach asks. “You’re not even wearing masks. I know who you are.” Lothar Hoke pokes his shotgun through the teller’s window. “Well, Cal, if you know it’s me, then you know I won’t hesitate to blow that spittoon you call a face off your shoulders.” “Give them the...
Submitted to Contest #145
One of the most daunting tasks I faced when my mother died in 2020 was emptying the family home of more than 50 years of memories. While tossing aside, books, tools, and broken exercise equipment like a deadly scythe, I came across the remnants of my Tin Man outfit from the early seventies. I was immediately transported back to when I was eighteen, had a full head of hair, weighed eighty pounds less., and dated ...
Submitted to Contest #144
Phillip Lavender eases into his chair, hoping its plush cushioning will inspire him to tear into his long-overdue review of the architectural plans for his client’s summer home. Pushing the chair closer to the computer screen, Phillip feels something scrape against his left knee. Looking underneath the desk, he sees an envelope taped to its side. Opening the envelope, he finds an undeveloped roll of film and a n...
Submitted to Contest #143
The bushes rustled. The taunting hoot of an owl sent shivers through him. Trapper Mike heard soft, hesitant footfalls. Someone was watching him, sneaking up on him. All he had wanted to do was find Frankie Cincinnati’s party. Now he was lost in a pitch-black forest and was about to be eaten. How did his life come to this? The saga of Scout Ken and Trapper Mike began one August night in the early 1980s. Before then, they were simply Ken Radford and Mike Harrison. Their friends tagged them with their nicknames because they had an amusing ...
Submitted to Contest #142
Detective Steve Swanson clips the potted gardenia on his desk, then carefully waters it. Chief Pasquale Puglisi drops a folder on Steve’s desk. “Something for you to look into besides domestic scuffles.” Steve opens the folder, gazing curiously at the black and white photograph of a muscular young man with greasy hair, a monobrow, and an uneasy smile. &...
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