reedsymarketplace
Hire professionals for your project
reedsyblog
Advice, insights and news
reedsylearning
Online publishing courses
reedsylive
Free publishing webinars
reedsydiscovery
Launch your book in style
Author on Reedsy Prompts since May, 2025
Submitted to Contest #316
I’m a last-pickin’s, catfaced tomato kind of girl. Not pretty, barely worth the skillet. Still, I agreed to meet him.Plump heirlooms bow on the sill, green-vine scent drifting in. A gecko scurries across cracked paint, claws like the tick of the wall clock. I have thirty minutes until supper in town, where I'll finally see him. And he'll see me.Past the garden, plum hills and mulberry skies almost help me forget the tightness in my chest. Forget I’ll have to bare myself to a strange man, no filter to smooth me like my shiny heirlooms.“He’s l...
Winner of Contest #313 🏆
Content warning: This story includes themes of grief and the death of a child. “Are you there, God? It’s me. Help me break her heart today. And can you bring back the sun?”But the clouds burst. I breathe in earth and taste mineral tang, wet wind whipping my face. I should’ve known not to come—should’ve stopped when the steeple down the road knifed dark clouds. But she begged, and I couldn't refuse. Not today.I fumble with an umbrella before the wind yanks it, tossing it against the monkey bars. I leap from the bench. Bigger kids shriek and r...
Winner of Contest #308 🏆
Content warning: brief mentions of child abuse and domestic violence. I can’t tell if the yowling’s for the dead or the heat. It’s cicada hiss and lawn mower growl hot—so hot, it’s disrespectful. But as Dad shovels dirt over Papa, I’m cold. I can't cry, and it feels like sin.“It's alright to grieve,” Aunt June whispers. “Ain't no shame in it.”She fans herself with a program as tears drip below her sunglasses. She means it's shameful not to cry, especially for your own. But I can't put on grief like wide-brimmed hats and pearls and black dres...
Shortlisted for Contest #304 ⭐️
Content warning: Contains themes of pregnancy loss and griefSunbeams turned floating flour into glitter—too pretty for the mess I’d made. My fingers twisted through sticky dough, a ball of goop on the counter. Outside, mina birds chirped. The sea sighed against the sand across the street, breeze heavy with salt and sweet plumeria. I breathed it in like it might help.But the birds didn’t care. The sea didn’t care. They carried on, like the world hadn’t burned down.Mine had.BEEP.The pre-heated oven broke my thoughts. And so did a smack on my b...
Oops, you need an account for that!
Log in with your social account:
Or enter your email:
5 likes
