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Author on Reedsy Prompts since Aug, 2020
Submitted to Contest #216
You can’t go home right now. Go to that pizza place that’s always open. Order the buffalo chicken. You have some cash on you from the other day when Uncle Greg slipped you a twenty. That’s enough for two slices. You can have some pizza and check your phone. Play some chess. You need to play more chess. You’re good, but you could be better. You always give up your bishops right off the bat. That’s no way to play. You gotta protect your pieces. I don’t care if the other guy is willing to give up his good pieces; that doesn’t mean you have to...
Submitted to Contest #215
The family left Gardenia around five in the morning. They quietly packed their things and left, stopping only to clean the fridge, because they felt strongly that a dirty fridge would speak poorly of them and their abrupt departure. When they left, the fridge was clean, and there was still blood all over the walls. The blood did not belong to anyone in the family. It had started pouring down from the ceiling, and the family decided that was the final straw. It was one thing when specters appeared at the top of the stairs with two heads and...
Submitted to Contest #214
If it was a Wednesday, we’d get pizza after midnight. Grandpa Ed would wake me up from my spot on the couch. The television would be playing reruns of a show from the 1950’s about a talking cat or a horse that solves crime. The black and white would cross my face, and I’d fear for a moment that the world had lost its color. Then, warmth. I’d be scooped up into arms that smelled like tweed and Aramis. I’d pretend to still be asleep, but I don’t know why. I don’t know why that was my favorite thing to do. Fight going to bed only to continue ...
Submitted to Contest #213
Jeremiah had no intention of turning his dog into Napoleon. He woke up one day and when Scotch Tape came to greet him in bed with a lick of the feet and a wag of the tail, Jeremiah gave him a pat on the head as he had always done, and the next thing he knew, there was a tiny tyrant standing before him. “Well, now you’ve done it,” said Napoleon, “Look at me. Just look at me. I’ve been dead for almost two hundred years, and you brought me back just to fetch a frisbee.” Jeremiah assured Napoleon that he didn’t mean to resurrect him. He ha...
Submitted to Contest #212
I had always thought that the Muscatellos had a perfect marriage. Lindy Muscatello would often leave the windows open whenever they made love. During one of their sessions, Oscar Muscatello would sing opera at the top of his lungs. I’d be lying in bed next to Robert and he would beg me to shut the window. The whole thing made him uncomfortable. When we made love, there was no sound at all. Just a quiet gasp when Robert decided to land the plane, so to speak. My plane never landed. It just circled endlessly until it ran out of fuel and plum...
Submitted to Contest #211
Althea woke up and remembered it was Christmas. She pushed off the blankets that were feeling exceedingly heavier with each passing morning, and placed her feet down on the warm, wooden floors. “Warm floors,” she said to herself, “I’ll never get over warm floors.” When she was a little girl, there were things promised from the future and things that couldn’t even be imagined. Althea was still waiting on the things promised, but the unimaginable had arrived time and again, and each time, she couldn’t believe how much energy people expen...
Submitted to Contest #210
The aliens were not going to leave the Olive Garden. Originally, they had no plans to try out any of the fast casual restaurants the world had to offer. They were on a very strict timeline-- Arrive on Earth. Bring together mankind under an umbrella of peace and kindness. Meet Paul Simon. Go home. Peace and kindness didn’t take very long, but Paul Simon was a hard man to pin down. When the aliens finally got him on the phone, he cautiously agreed to meet with them provided they did not force him to sing “Call Me Al.” Of course, this...
Shortlisted for Contest #209 ⭐️
I need a second.I really had no intention of, you know, returning to this house. So many bad memories here. So much trauma. Is it okay if I just sit for a second? If I remember correctly, they only had the two chairs. Well, technically, they had three chairs. And I, an innocent little girl of fifteen, sat in one of the three chairs, and immediately felt as though I was being set upon by the fabric. Certain people recounting my story have said that it was too soft, that first chair, but it wasn’t just that it was soft, it was that I have...
Submitted to Contest #208
It would be one thing if we were stuck in a book. There’s a respectability to being characters in a book. I was discussing it with my husband last night, and we both agreed that a novel--or even a novella--would be just fine. Not that we know the difference between a novel and a novella, but I think a novella is sexier. Not that I’m opposed to being in something sexy as long as I’m not the one supplying the sex. I’m not a prude, mind you, but I’m not doing anything prurient just so Reese Witherspoon can read all about it and then tell her ...
Submitted to Contest #207
The mayonnaise has not been made.As the onion contemplates how long it will be until someone notices that the mayonnaise has not been made, it sees Chef Doyle trying not to cry.Chef Doyle does not cry at work. In general, Chef Doyle does not cry at all, but the onion has no way of knowing that. We only know what the onion knows, and the onion knows that, for the most part, crying at work is frowned upon. The onion also knows that crying in a busy kitchen on a Saturday night is not helpful when the tickets are already piling up and the weeds ...
Submitted to Contest #206
As the raft made its way across the river, Emerson Carver forgot his own name. He looked down into the prized water of the Philipse and couldn’t find his face. The surface was coated with gray algae and there were disturbances from the paddles pushing through the tension. He sat back down and rubbed his hands over the life vest that was too small for him. Could it really hold him up if something occurred? He tried to remember his first name. He couldn’t. He knew the last name sounded like Shaver. He was close, but would never get any closer ...
Submitted to Contest #205
Near the rock where tourists pose for photos, there is a set of spot where you're not supposed to sit. Constance climbs the rock under the Buck Moon and sits down right at the tip. The spot where you’re not supposed to sit. She has a small, white paper bag with her and a copy of People magazine from three weeks ago. The bargain was to bring the most recent issue, but she didn’t have time to stop at the drugstore and grab the new one, so three weeks old would have to do. Although there were rules, whoever was in charge of the bargain seemed t...
Submitted to Contest #204
She got sent out with a basket of pecan bread and a bad cough. The flu had whipped through and nearly killed Rebecca the same way it had four other little girls in town. This was going to be her first outing since she recovered, and her mother pulled the red bonnet tight on her head as though sunshine might end up bringing back Death to finish the job. “Straight there,” her mother said, “I don’t want to find out you stopped to look at the horses at Friedman Ranch. This is a test errand. See if you can get there and back without collapsing. Y...
Submitted to Contest #203
They are very excited to graduate. When the diplomas have been distributed, they will step out onto the sidewalk that stretches far enough to accommodate the audiences that typically pour out of the downtown theater where, once a year, Joseph Silberman High School has their graduation. The sidewalk has seen the tuxedo crowd turn into the shorts-and-a-t-shirt crowd after tours headlined by stars from Broadway became non-equity three-show stays. The sidewalk had opinions about theater, but we have no need to interrogate a sidewalk. We have...
That tree was nothing but a seedling when first we sized up each other. Running up to me to check my pulse. Egads, the mouse is a man! Nothing to be afraid of, but turquoise flints in my vocabulary. You dared my hand to find yours and away we went. Twice down the long hill, once down the rocks. Stop where you see the sign for Brandy Hollow. Well, I don’t see us going back there anytime soon. Not for me to tell you what age prevents, but we are not a sonic boom. Maybe if they reinvent the way of breath and oxygen. Nickel i...
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