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Natalie Haslam-Conroy

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Jun, 2024

Stories (3)

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3 Stories

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A solitudinous state

Natalie Haslam-Conroy

Submitted to Contest #258

Loneliness had been our familiar affliction. My mum was an only child to an only child who had never really wanted kids. She had played alone while my grandparents argued about their lost youth and missed opportunities, my mother constantly being the source of the blame.By the time she was eight, my mother had found solace in her isolation. She sat in silence, reading good books and watching bad TV.Ten years later, she met a man who was as quiet as she was and tried his best to make her happy. He provided this only child with her own only ch...

5 likes

The rise and fall of Lear Magazine

Natalie Haslam-Conroy

Submitted to Contest #257

CORDELIA I had been walking up the steps of the Park Place subway for the past twelve years, but today was different. Today, I was thinking about how I had climbed these steps all those years ago on my first day at Lear magazine. I had spent the three years prior working four jobs while living in a coffin room in Bushwick. Eventually, I summoned the courage to submit a feature idea to Editor-in-Chief Margaret Lear, who read it and hired me on the spot. Working at Lear had been my dream—the reason I moved to New York—and the reality of it was...

8 likes

TORNADO

Natalie Haslam-Conroy

Submitted to Contest #255

I’d always heard that when people were angry, they saw red, like a bull in a ring, like that monkey from the zombie movie I watched. But for me, when the time came, it wasn’t like that. It wasn’t a cascade of emotions, nor was it like a missile ready to go off. It was a tornado, a whirlwind of thoughts, ideas, assumptions, and feelings wrapping itself around me, sucking the air from my lungs and the sense from my head. I was in the middle, in the eye, with no way to get out, no way to breathe, and no way to think clearly. Once you’re in the ...

7 likes