Ralph Emery Barhydt

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Sep, 2021

Stories (27)

27 Stories

454 karma pts

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“Watch Your Back” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #273

Watch Your Back I had been following Christine Manning for almost a year and had seen many, many things. She was a spy working for the Iranian government. I have yet to understand why.She seems to like Iranian men were in great favor based on all of her trysts. Of course, they like her. She "entertains" frequently, but I have fallen in love with her. It's really an unfair twist of fate, but there you have it.     Then, one day, when I went to my usual intercept spot there was no Christine. I spent the whole day going...

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“My Funny Vampires” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #251

Shirley grabbed Monty by the shoulders and yelled, ”Monty, you have to at least look at this. In five different vampire novels there is a vampire named Grior who drains the blood of a girl named Shirley. The authors are German, American, French, Czech, and Dutch. I have contacted all of the authors and they don’t know each other. Hell, they were unaware of each other.” Monty lolled his eyes and said “Good grief Shirley, you are really paranoid---or stupid. Do you think some vampire is trolling you? Let me ask you, do you actually believe in ...

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“Bouncing Ball” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #250

Bouncing Ball “Jimmy, Jimmy, get over here. Sit here with Mom, Terry and me and watch this incredible sunset. Of course, Jimmy being 17 and a senior in high school, had little interest in the sunset. He was too busy trying to catch a fish with his hands in the fast-moving little stream next to the cabin on Pike’s Peak. It was the last day of their vacation and he still had not caught a fish. He didn’t want to spend time with his little sister who was blind, but heard everything Terrence and Marlene were sitting comfortably in the lawn chairs...

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“No Name Museum” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #242

“I always thought that museum in the weird little building at the end of Harrison Street was odd, more than unusual, but it displayed incredible art. Masters all. I told my friends about it constantly but they could never find it.  That used to make me so angry. I would rant and rave, jump up and down, wave my arms and beat my chest, but I would not take them there. It was ridiculous. They should just drive right to it and they were running a con on me. Hell with them.” Monet, DaVinci, Manet, van Gogh, Rembrandt, Gaugin, Picasso, D...

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“Susan's Wish” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #238

(This story contains one sexual episode) Very early in the morning, Susan walked down to the lake’s edge to watch the ducks.  Gentle light drifted above still, calm water. Mirror like, the lake reflected the great green forest that surrounded it.  All was peace. Except Susan. Susan stood bathed in grief and sadness. Marianne was so close to dying now with her unique form of cancer, uncurable even untreatable. Fortunately, she was not experiencing much pain. It was a blood cancer that after about four to six weeks jus...

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“The Devil's Time” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #234

George was sweating and it was 11:30 on Christmas Eve. The Devil was coming for him at midnight thanks to a difficult deal he cut early in the year. His sweet, beloved daughter was dying of an incurable form of cancer. A desperate man, George begged the Devil to save his daughter’s life and the Devil agreed—on one condition. George would kill one other person to take his daughter’s place by Christmas Day. The Devil thought that was quite fair as he was giving George almost a year to pay his debt. “Quite fair,” said the Devil. The problem ...

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“Me Epiphany” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #232

It’s been a long time since I was born and I have been thinking a lot about that life I have lived.There are some issues. I received an invitation to attend a self-reflective seminar all the way up in Alaska, Denali Lodge in fact. Sounded like a great idea. Denali, snow, isolation and focus. Maybe I would learn something. I’m going. I was late. My plane had been delayed at the Seattle International Airport for several hours and we arrived in Anchorage around 7:30—dead of winter. I rushed to the rental car counter and picked up a really nice...

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“Raging River” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #216

Raging RiverRalph Emery BarhydtSeptember 21, 2023Caroline went down to the river to pray. The river was raging, roaring, rushing as she had never seen it. “Dear God, please come to our aid. Calm the river, restore it. Please make it gentle and helpful again. Please Lord, this is too much and I am afraid that it is going to get worse.”Hurricane Albert was just sitting off the North Carolina coast. It was a category five storm and ferocious. It was a strange hurricane as it had made land fall in Northern Florida and Southern South Carolina, th...

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“The Devil is in the Deal” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #215

The Devil is in the Deal Ralph Emery Barhydt September 15, 2023 “Jenna, please, don’t do this,” Gary was on the verge of tears. In fact, he was crying. He had been up all night and was exhausted, he looked like hell. Jenna didn’t look so good either. They were in their marvelous suite at a five star hotel on Tahiti. They weren’t really rich, they had just saved up a lot of money for that special vacation. They had flown to Tahiti in first class with upgrades from all of Jenna’s work traveling and Gary had tucked away a stunning, bril...

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“A Vacation to Die For” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #214

A Vacation to Die For Ralph Emery Barhydt "Woo hooo," yelled Karen. "Vacation time! Where are we going this year?" Karen had walked in from school, the last day of the school year, thrown her books on the floor and broke into the biggest smile you ever saw. Stanley, her younger brother had been napping on the couch and jumped about a foot. Sean, her older brother walked in right behind her also carrying a huge smile.  "Yes," he exclaimed. "Barcelona!" Can you believe it. Barcelona, the east coast of Spain, probably some time in Gi...

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“Jessica the Librarian” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #211

Jessica the Librarian By Ralph Barhydt Jessica was such a beautiful, warm, well-meaning young woman. If I had been a lot younger and if she weren’t engaged, I might have asked her out. What I did ask her to do is find this ancient text of witchcraft that focused on spells. I had solid evidence that it was resting in this particular library. Of course, with a book like this there is always talk that “oh, ooh, ah, the book is alive.” Right. Makes it a lot more interesting. “Jessica, I am looking for an old book, maybe ancient actually, ...

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“Little Guy” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #208

Little Guy Ralph Barhydt “C’mon Aaron, give the kid a chance. He’s little but I seen him run and there is no one faster on this team.” “Look Matt, I just don’t like shrimps. The kid is a shrimp. He’ll get hurt, his parents will be a problem and he will always be whining about something. Plus, frankly, I just don’t like little people. They are worse than blacks and blacks are bad enough, although that one boy can sure throw the ball.” “Aaron, man, you are way out of line. This is little league baseball. These kids are in the seventh gr...

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“Too Much Talk” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #186

Note: this story is about random sexuality, with a twist.“Take off your clothes.”“What?”“You heard me, take off your clothes.”“Who in holy hell are you?”“I am your next lover.”“Oh my god. Are you crazy? Go back under the rock you slithered out from.”“Am I good looking?”“Who cares?”“Just ask yourself, ‘is this dude good looking.’”“Why should I do that”“It’s important. Just do it.”“OK. Jane is this piece of garbage good looking. Hmm. Well, yes, he is good looking, I suppose. Why would you care?”“Good start. Now, ask yourself, ‘is he muscular? ...

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“Please enter this in this weeks contest. I missed the timing. it's called Horgare and the Witches. Please. It's still Friday here.” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #186

Horgare rose up slowly. It had been a long successful night of burning villages, eating women, and taking more treasure. “In fact” thought Horgare, “it was a record night. “Three of those women were really tasty. Yum.” And. “Look at all this loot. I could barely carry it all home and it’s almost completely filled the room.” The cavern was huge, with lots and lots of smaller caves and nasty crevices that only his body could breach. His treasure room was large and protected by four crevices. Even if some of those nasty men got in, they woul...

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“Midnight Luck” by Ralph Emery Barhydt

Submitted to Contest #180

It was late on a Thursday night. Ralph had driven all the way to Santa Rosa earlier to buy this extra special rifle because he liked the gun shop. Well, and it was one of the very few left in the Bay Area, anti-gun buying capital of the world. The Bay Area had it’s share of random killings and had even started the trend of mass killings back in the early ‘70s when some lunatic took is automatic weapon into a law firm and start killing people. The firm was in tall, modern building in downtown San Francisco and the world was shocked. People ju...

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Author bio

Chilling in the most marvelous town, in the most beautiful county, in the best state, in the most wonderful country in the world, Larkspur, California, USA. Out of the dregs of IBM comes a writer.