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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#140: Down Memory Lane

It’s no secret that many writers draw inspiration for their writing from real life, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. In fact, when you’re searching for things to write about, taking a memory of your own and altering it is a reliable way to get out of a bout of writer’s block.

Memory is an important concept when writing fiction, as it helps connect the past to the present — so this week, let’s take a trip down memory lane.

This week's prompts

Start your story with the narrator or a character saying “I remember…”

Angst – 102 stories

Write about a character with an unreliable memory.

Character – 46 stories

End your story with total oblivion.

Horror – 24 stories

Write a story that involves a flashback.

Fiction – 71 stories

Write a story inspired by a memory of yours.

Nonfiction – 90 stories

Stories

“What Should Your Gravestone Say?” by Daria White

Submitted to Contest #140

Warning: dark humor, death, grief.You might think that as a funeral director, I would be completely desensitized to grief; however, between my work and my personal experience, truth be told, grief and I are uneasy partners. This is the business no one wants any part of — second only, maybe, to the IRS. But at some point, you’re going to need me or my competitors. My line of work demands a delicate balance between being business oriented, yet sensitive to my clients’ needs at a time when their lives feel entirely ...

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“A Chronology of You” by Emma Harris

Submitted to Contest #140

Trigger warning: Mention of infertility.October 9, 2003. 1:00 am.On the sixteen-hour flight from Seoul, your spine digs uncomfortably into the plastic flimsy door, hinges shuddering beneath the weight of your fear, as the creature spooned against the jut of your collarbone begins to sob. The fluorescent glare paints the tear stains on her chubby cheeks an angry red. Her lips parted in a rolling wail of protest, eyes dark and pooling with moisture. She lets out a hiccupping gasp, her tiny fist strangling the sleeve of your blouse. There’s a g...

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“Where Are You From?” by Dania Azher

Submitted to Contest #140

I'm not sure exactly what trigger warning pertains to my story but as I still have trouble recalling it out loud, I wouldn't be surprised if others feel the same. It's sort of about mental health, self-hatred, low self-esteem, loss of culture, Islamophobia, etc. Also, it's a true story from when I was in sixth grade with my best friend.“You still haven’t told me when you were born!” She exclaimed, elbowing me as we walked side by side down the hall past classrooms on either side. “How am I gonna answer the survey without that?” “Bro, wh...

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“Memory” by Jenna RossRodriguez

Submitted to Contest #140

In Memory Of My Uncle RandyI was fifteen when I heard the news. I came out of the locker room at my school after my soccer practice, happy that I was getting better at soccer, learning tricks, harder ones, ones that my friends would be impressed with. My mom was waiting outside and led me and my two siblings to the car. She looked sad; something was in her expression that I couldn’t read. But at the moment I was so into my tricks that I didn’t pay attention to it. Not until she brought it up. “Hey, guys, please be really kind to your da...

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“I Remember a Tree” by K. Lyra

Submitted to Contest #140

Trigger warning: references non-explicit abuse involving minors I remember a tree. It was a large oak tree in the center of a rectangular yard fronting a set of townhouses. Although its branches and trunk were large and stretched high up, it wasn't a very good climbing tree. It was much too wide and tall for a child to grasp onto. But its leaves provided shade in the spring and summer and beauty in the fall. My brother and I would never climb this tree, but we might sit on its roots and make flower chains or mud pies. We would use ...

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“Ospedaletti” by Natascia Tornetta Mallin

Submitted to Contest #140

I remember when Aerosmith’s Crazy was at the top of the charts. My brother and I were eleven and nine, respectively, and stuck in the room for unaccompanied children at Charles De Gaulle airport watching MTV videos on loop. It was the first time we were going back to Italy without our parents. During the two-hour layover between Paris and Turin, Steven Tyler stepped in like a surrogate father as I tried desperately to pick out the watermelon bubble gum my brother had smooshed into my hair on the flight over from L.A. I’m losin...

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“Last Night” by Emma Mo

Submitted to Contest #140

8 April. 2022 LAST NIGHT I remember last night, the snow, the car, and their faces pale like an old black-and-white photographs. I recall seeing my breath turn to mist in the air and hearing the sirens pierce the peaceful silence with their raucous shrieking. My head burned with the sound and I had covered my ears with my gloved hands. The screeching continued to approach, soon the lights were so close I could see the red and blue flashes through my closed eyelids. The first thing I asked as soon I regained consciousness was: “Where am I...

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“What makes a Country By Michael Hernandez” by Michael Hernandez

Submitted to Contest #140

I remember the days the bombs fell. I had just stormed out of my local coffee shop. The barista made my drink hot when it should've been iced. Part of me wanted to march right back in, but I kept going. It's dust now, that little coffee shop, it’s all dust now. If Twitter or Facebook had killed us it would've been more shocking than bombs and a hell of a lot funnier. No, social media, celebrities, and politics were just a long chain of results that all lead to the death of America. Division killed the United States. ...

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“A lesson for life” by David Nutt

Submitted to Contest #140

A lesson for life I remember. Somewhere deep inside my being I had condemned myself to always remembering the following event. I was shamed, humiliated and marked for life by the sight of a family's eyes glaring at me with such anger like the red hot coals of the blacksmith’s fire. As one gets older the memory tends to fade, it also becomes very selective, but an event that deeply touched your feelings always seems constantly to be present like a drip of water you cannot turn off. Several years ago I worked for a team of photographers that h...

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“Ignis House” by Tiffany Simmons

Submitted to Contest #140

Trigger Warning: Character death “I remember when the road stretched over the horizon and into the mountains,” Uasal said looking longingly towards the east. She was only 39 years old, but she seemed much older to the young girls under her care. They knew she had seen much before and after the wall was raised. Rós Ignites, the oldest of the girls of Ignis House at 18 and Uasal’s niece, glanced at the gated wall of granite. It shimmered as a slanted ray of light drove through the clouds and hit the protective glyphs etched into its surf...

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“Dodging a Bullet” by VJ Hamilton

Submitted to Contest #140

“I remember the shooting… but even more… I remember the silence once the guns stopped,” Grimsby said. He paused and fixed an eye on his son, Grimsby Junior. “Does this speech sound like a barnburner or what?” The two men were in the side room to the stage, getting ready before the school assembly. Centering his tie knot, Junior grinned at their reflections in the full-length mirror. “Sounds great… go on.” Grimsby adjusted his service ribbon pin, newly transferred that morning from Fred’s old moth-eaten uniform that had hung in the back of th...

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“The Art of Remembering ” by Chrissy Marshall

Submitted to Contest #140

The Art of Remembering Inside of a red brick building, is Covenant Village, an assisted living home. On the second floor, down the red carpet hall with a plant that almost looks real is the home of two significant people. Behind the door of 1508 is a welcoming sight. The dining table, though brown is soft and cool to the touch. The tablecloth is a silky white, with lace surrounding all four corners. Two tall, light blue candles sit in the center. The yellow and orange flame glows on the fresh wicks, creating a sense of ho...

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“5, Memory Lane” by Liena Croquette

Submitted to Contest #140

It was almost impossible to pass before 5 Memory Lane and not stop for a second, not look back, not take a second to wonder what exactly it was about this place that looked so impossibly familiar. It was a building just like any other of the other buildings on the street: an ordinary flat roof, washed-out grey bricks, a black front door, the shine of the paint dulled by the years. The only feature that distinguished it from the neighbouring houses were the vines that crept up the left wall; in the winter, those too blended in with the rest o...

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“One way or another - the end was a million years in the making” by David Adams

Submitted to Contest #140

In a small town deep in the provincial heart of the largest continent, one nerd stared at her screen. How had this been missed? Surely someone else must have downloaded the same data and found the anomaly. Had everyone else just ignored it? Why? Did they fear ridicule if they were proven wrong? Can I say anything? I’m just me. The university is so far from here. Will they listen? Have they already rejected other people in the capital but not said this is rubbish? She had been downloading data from the orbiting telescope since she could use...

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“The Frog Pond” by Erin DiLorenzo

Submitted to Contest #140

Ruby began her day with a cigarette, as always. Normally she’d take it with a cup of the blackest coffee; she decided to forgo caffeine that morning, fearing it would heighten her anxiety. She sat in her car, engine shuddering from the cold and flicked a flame from her clear BIC lighter. It was a bit of a routine for her. Not just the cigarettes but the way she lit them. She would purchase the most nondescript lighter available from the Mobile down the road and scrape off the plastic design so it was perfectly clear. Then, she would u...

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$250

Prize money

333

Contest entries

170

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Apr 08, 2022 EST

Won by Cecilia Maddison 🏆

Title: Old Soul

Submissions must be between 1,000 - 3,000 words and will be approved and published on Reedsy Prompts within 7 days of the contest closing.

Read the full terms & conditions or check out the FAQ if you have any questions!

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