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Steven Lowe

Author on Reedsy Prompts since Mar, 2025

Stories (21)

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10 Followers

4 Following

21 Stories

211 karma pts

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THE RELUCTANT HERO

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #316

Eric Markson was short, plump, shy, middle-aged. He wore thick pebble glasses. He was not athletic or strong. He worked in a small mart a half-hour drive from home. His wife was in many ways similar to Eric. Not a great beauty, but kind and gentle. Even after all these years of marriage he had never really overcome his surprise that such a wonderful woman loved him.It was late at night. His co-worker Dave, young, overconfident and pushy, had again dropped him in it. ‘I have to leave early tonight. You’ll close up, won’t you?’ And Eric had co...

2 likes

A NAME FOR THE JOEY

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #313

The rough asphalt scraped against his skin as he skidded across the road, stripping flesh from his elbows and knees. His motorcycle, rotating through the air, crashed into the roadside trees as he finally came to a stop on the ground. He lay there for a minute or two, collecting his thoughts, trying to recover his senses.‘Well, that was certainly interesting,’ he said to himself. ‘What you might call a near-death experience.’ He got up and limped painfully over to the twisted remains of his motorcycle. ‘What a disaster,’ he said. ‘There’s no...

2 likes

THE LAWYER'S CONTRACT

Steven Lowe

The man stood there in the doorway, a slight smile on his face. He seemed amused with the situation. He was tall, thin, the corpse-like pallor of his skin in stark contrast with his dark clothes and dark hair – he seemed to exude an aura of darkness. A touch of beard, and a slight hint of sulphur in the air. Dark-tinted glasses at the end of his nose - a glimpse of pale reptilian eyes over the top of the lenses.‘Are you my contact?’ asked Ericsson.‘Could be,’ replied the stranger. ‘Are you Ericsson?’‘That’s right. Your name?’‘Not important. ...

1 like

THE HERO

Steven Lowe

He’d always been the Fat Kid. The one who hung around the popular kids – tolerated but never taken any notice of, never listened to, never agreed with. The one who was bullied or if he was lucky, ignored. The last one to be picked when kids chose teams to play games – the Fat Kid. Or worse. Piggy, Fatso, Lard-ass. Or Four-eyes – yes, the pebble glasses didn’t help, either. Without them he was almost blind. He couldn’t see or focus on anything. Slow, useless at sports. And not all that sharp intellectually. One of Nature’s losers. It was as i...

2 likes

THE INFERNAL BARGAIN

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #310

‘So you want to sell me your soul,’ said the demon. ‘What do you want in return? Power? Riches? World domination? A woman?’ ‘I want to go viral on social media.’‘What’s that?’‘Have you heard of the internet?’ asked Max.‘Vaguely. It’s some kind of electronic thing, isn’t it? Or something to do with spider webs?’‘No, the World-wide Web. It’s a means of communication. You know what a computer is, don’t you?’‘Someone who works with figures?’ The demon was looking progressively more baffled and he obviously felt out of his depth.‘No, it’s a machi...

3 likes

HAPPY NEVER AFTER

Steven Lowe

I sat in the long grass watching her, the warm smell in my nostrils, like new-mown hay. She was beautiful, so beautiful. Her hair like gold in the sun, shimmering with highlights as the sunlight caught it, little strips of lighter gold here and there, the ends slightly frayed, it needed cutting soon. Her slim body – she was so skinny in those days, so long ago. She gained weight as we grew older – she was always worried about it, no matter how I tried to reassure her. But to me she was always beautiful, all the time I knew her, like some kin...

2 likes

TOSTIG'S REVENGE

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #309

Note: This story is fiction, but based upon real historical events. Tostig Godwinson, the man who had been Earl of Northumbria, one of the most powerful men in England, lay dying on the battlefield, his household troops slaughtered around him. The battle still raged, but he knew the day was lost. His thoughts fled back to what led him to this. Regret for his shattered plans, for his sins which would now never be forgiven, because he would die unshriven with them heavy on his conscience. How had it all gone so wrong?‘Pride, my son,’ the Arch...

2 likes

ABOUT THAT SUMMER

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #308

The old man sat in the sunshine, reminiscing. He remembered when he was young, growing up in the 1960’s - a time so different from today. Somehow more innocent, more open, despite the things going on around them – the Vietnam war, racism, the fight for women’s rights. He had gone to school, had friends, taken part in sports (though he had not been very good at them – he was the studious type). Looking back, he realised he was what would now be called a nerd – the word didn’t exist back then. Skinny – he had shot up in height but hadn’t gaine...

11 likes

THE REAL MEANING OF DREAMS

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #308

Mia found herself in the examination without having done the preparatory work, as she had feared she would. The first question left her gasping – she knew she had no way of answering it – she simply had not done the study. She quickly flicked through the question book – if anything the questions got harder, not easier. And it was supposed to be an open book exam, but she had not brought her textbooks, nor her notes. In fact, she couldn’t remember ever having taken notes for this subject, or even attended lectures. What was she doing here? Sh...

3 likes

DANCERS IN A TIME OF GRIEF

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #306

July 25. I have begun this journal as a record of my thoughts now that I have moved out to this small cottage in the woods. I need time and space and peace to recover from a very messy and bitter divorce from the man I thought loved me, whom I’d loved with all my heart for all the time we were together, only to find that he’d been cheating on me for years with my best friend. The feeling of betrayal nearly destroyed me. I have quit my job, collected my savings – what was left after the divorce – at least the settlement was civilised – and mo...

5 likes

THE SUBSTITUTE VIRGIN

Steven Lowe

Arglemos, the youngest ever High Priest of the Dread hippopotamus god Minaster, held his wickedly curved, razor sharp knife high above the young woman in the long white diaphanous robe chained to the altar and said in a voice of thunder ‘WHY DO I HAVE TO MAKE ALL THE SACRIFICES?’ And old joke, but a good one.He looked around. Nobody laughed. No response, nothing. Well, he hadn’t expected the heavily armed guards who lined the walls of the temple to get the joke. Solid oak from ear to ear. And Bospho his deputy priest was even stupider, if th...

0 likes

THE WRONG TURN

Steven Lowe

Marcus Johnson was driving home after another boring, frustrating day, resentful of the way he was treated by his boss, of his position in the world, of the way his life had turned out. When he was young, the world had seemed full of opportunities, the future had seemed so bright. What had happened to him? Why had everything gone wrong? As he drove, he pondered over the missed opportunities, his regrets for the decisions he’d taken, that had ended up with him being where he was – a lowly architectural draftsman, unqualified, badly paid, doin...

1 like

PRIDE AND PUBLICATION

Steven Lowe

Submitted to Contest #304

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a person in the process of writing a historical novel, must be in want of a Retreat. Which is how I found my niche. I provide a service clamoured after by historical novelists. It must be successful – the waiting list is so long that the bookings stretch out for a year in advance, despite their being a week long and at two-week intervals.Problems? Certainly. Fitting together the wants and needs of the multiplicity of types of historical novelist would be a huge issue if I hadn’t managed to categor...

12 likes

THE MUSE

Steven Lowe

‘Here I am,’ thought Brian Mastersen. ‘At yet another Writers’ Retreat. I don’t know why I bother. I haven’t succeeded in overcoming my writer’s block at any of the others. Why do I keep on hoping? But hope rises eternally in the human breast, or whatever. Maybe this time I’ll get lucky, but If I hear yet another platitude about keeping on going, about getting anything down so long as it’s on the page, about how your first draft is always crap, I think I’ll end up punching someone out.’He looked around. The venue, at least, was pleasant. A l...

1 like

I CAN EXPLAIN . . .

Steven Lowe

Look, it really isn’t my fault. I think my side of the story deserves to be heard as well. If it hadn’t been for that big over-muscled lantern-jawed Hero-type causing trouble, everything would have been fine. I was just minding my own business, trying to get on in life, you know?Just to let you know, I run a small operation – let’s call it import-export. I import stuff – Denebian sqryll eggs, dried bwirth leaves from Markab, szxler wood from Alpha Centauri. Sure, I know they’re endangered – well, ok, almost extinct. But hey, some people are ...

2 likes