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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#148: The Lease I Can Do

Most of us at one time or another will live in an apartment building. Whether you live in a dorm while at college, or you live in a high-rise in Manhattan, sharing a wall or two with your neighbors certainly keeps things interesting. And living in such close proximity to other people has its pros and cons — you’re never too far from help if you need it, but you’re also never too far from the party your downstairs neighbors seem to throw every weekend.


What are some of your fondest (or least fond) memories of apartment living? Use these five prompts to explore what it’s really like to live in an apartment building — or just a little too close to your neighbors for comfort.

🥇 Winner

“Two Stubborn Women” by S.K. Wulf

The night is thick and heavy with clouds when I paint the front of The House yellow. I paint quickly and quietly. I don’t want to wake my neighbor up. The brush goes shhh shhh against the wall and even that is loud.  My feet crunch on gravel as I finish up and slip into my home.  My neighbor’s cursing wakes me up in the morning. I hear fuck! and shit! I split the blinds with two fingers. The sun shines very bright and I squint to see my other neighbors file outside. They see the yellow paint and shake the...

124 comments 124 WINNER 🏆
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⭐️ Shortlisted

“The Storm of the Decade” by Zack Powell

Content warning: Swearing, mentions of deathThe worst part of the divorce a year ago wasn't losing half my stuff. Back then, I could only watch as Linda descended upon our possessions like royalty, simply pointed to the couch and the blender and my favorite bottle of shampoo, and the lawyer made it so. If we had a baby, I'm sure she would've King Solomoned that too. And I was fine with it, had come to expect that much. It was a small price to pay for my peace of mind.The worst part—what I hadn't expecte...

71 comments 71 SHORTLIST ⭐️
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“The Threads that Hold Us Together” by Zelda C. Thorne

Arthur glared at the flimsy plasterboard wall that separated his student room from Tahlia’s – it was undulating. He forced his attention back to ‘Enchanted Flora: A Guide’ and tried to shut out the roaring crescendo of thrash metal and the faint tinkling of wind chimes.It didn’t work.Again, the wall wobbled, sending his already-cracked picture frames tumbling to the floor. He closed the book, pinched the bridge of his nose.He’d already complained about the noise to the housing officer, but all he’d g...

67 comments 67 SHORTLIST ⭐️
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“Like Clockwork” by J.C. Lovero

If you would have told me a year ago that I’d fall in love with the noisy neighbor in Apt. 2704-110B after he had me poisoned, I wouldn’t have believed you.Before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s go back to the beginning. Me: Professor Clive Hargraves of Gaslight City’s School of Magic. A refined gent and one of the last remaining practicing magicians in London. In fact, magic had fallen so out of favor that the scholars of our time, the likes of Darwin and Huxley, suggested that humans were evolving past it! Poppycock, I say!<...

34 comments 34 SHORTLIST ⭐️
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“Dust in the Air” by Shawn Wier

I can breathe.They say that it takes approximately seven years for every cell in one’s body to replace itself. This is a wildly inaccurate myth, but it’s nice to think about. It’s nice to feel like that could be the truth - that after seven years, there is no part of you that has ever been touched by the trauma you want so desperately to outlive.It isn’t, though. Many of our cells live from their initial development in the womb to the moment respiration stops, whether death comes at 100 days ...

4 comments 4 SHORTLIST ⭐️
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This week's prompts

Write about two neighbors who cannot stand each other.

Sad – 44 stories

Write a story involving a noise complaint.

Sad – 48 stories

Include a character in your story that is often in an apartment building, but doesn’t actually live there.

High School – 38 stories

Write about a couple touring an empty apartment they might rent.

Narrative – 27 stories

Write about an apartment building being demolished.

Sad – 44 stories

Stories

“Two Stubborn Women” by S.K. Wulf

The night is thick and heavy with clouds when I paint the front of The House yellow. I paint quickly and quietly. I don’t want to wake my neighbor up. The brush goes shhh shhh against the wall and even that is loud.  My feet crunch on gravel as I finish up and slip into my home.  My neighbor’s cursing wakes me up in the morning. I hear fuck! and shit! I split the blinds with two fingers. The sun shines very bright and I squint to see my other neighbors file outside. They see the yellow paint and shake the...

124 comments 124 WINNER 🏆
Read story

“9 Marines” by Alex Sultan

None of the marines could sleep at night.If they caught any shut-eye, it wouldn’t be for more than an hour at a time. The guards would poke them with sharpened bamboo sticks. There’d be blood on the straw mats come morning. Or they would wake them up to taunt them, kicking, spitting, and throwing insults in a language the marines couldn’t understand.They yelled about how Japan would soon win the war, and America would fail.Shoji walked past another guard on his way to the barracks. It would be his turn to watch over t...

61 comments 61
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“No Class Room” by Deidra Whitt Lovegren

“You’re sharing a classroom with Mister Galanis,” Principal Twomey says, heavyset and out of breath from climbing up the stairs to the 3rd floor. The 3rd floor is the inner sanctum of the English Department. We don’t appreciate visitors here, especially ones from administration. Rarely do they bring good news. And notification of sharing a classroom? There isn’t any worse news to be had.“I am not sharing my classroom,” I say, capping my red pen. As a rebuttal, I motion around the room—from the busts of stately literary masters on t...

48 comments 48
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“The Storm of the Decade” by Zack Powell

Content warning: Swearing, mentions of deathThe worst part of the divorce a year ago wasn't losing half my stuff. Back then, I could only watch as Linda descended upon our possessions like royalty, simply pointed to the couch and the blender and my favorite bottle of shampoo, and the lawyer made it so. If we had a baby, I'm sure she would've King Solomoned that too. And I was fine with it, had come to expect that much. It was a small price to pay for my peace of mind.The worst part—what I hadn't expecte...

71 comments 71 SHORTLIST ⭐️
Read story

“The Threads that Hold Us Together” by Zelda C. Thorne

Arthur glared at the flimsy plasterboard wall that separated his student room from Tahlia’s – it was undulating. He forced his attention back to ‘Enchanted Flora: A Guide’ and tried to shut out the roaring crescendo of thrash metal and the faint tinkling of wind chimes.It didn’t work.Again, the wall wobbled, sending his already-cracked picture frames tumbling to the floor. He closed the book, pinched the bridge of his nose.He’d already complained about the noise to the housing officer, but all he’d g...

67 comments 67 SHORTLIST ⭐️
Read story

“A Perfect Lie” by Beth Jackson

She’s there. She’s always bloody there. In the driveway, with her white hotpants and pink oversized tee sloping off one shoulder at a jaunty angle.I slow to a jog and wipe my forehead. My face is hot. Probably red. And blotchy. Running doesn’t agree with me.I avoid eye contact as I turn into my driveway. She’s standing by the roses, secateurs primed, deciding which beauty she’ll castrate from the bush.Their garden is all straight edges and manicured lawns. Roses and dainty flowers jost...

57 comments 57
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“Three Loud Bangs on the Door” by Michał Przywara

Three loud bangs on the door startle Leslie out of her reverie. The noise reverberates through her empty apartment, bouncing off the parquet floor and past the unopened moving boxes. Rattling her bones. The echoes fade but never quite disappear. They sink into the mute white walls, drown in the shadow bog under the sofa. She sets her bottle of water on the kitchen counter. Her muscles still ache, but the high of t...

40 comments 40
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“Releasing the Spirits of The Webster” by Sharon Hancock

WARNING: this one was inspired by a true crime/serial killer story you may recognize. Although the events of the story are fictional, they are graphic and might be disturbing.    Before this happened, if someone had asked me to quit my job as a wrecking ball operator, I would have told them to jump in a lake. I loved my job, who wouldn’t? Watching that giant ball smash into the sturdiest walls like they ...

17 comments 17
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“Every Breath You Take” by Rebekah Jordan

Logan heard a faint click as she walked through the big glass door and another as she stepped inside. The noises were small and hard to latch onto, and for a moment, she thought she’d imagined them.  Another click sounded as her perfectly white sneakers squeaked on the black and white tile taking her down the skinny hallway towards the bank of mailboxes.  She ducked her head to rummage thr...

22 comments 22
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“Sinatra on the Lawn” by Kevin Broccoli

Maureen, she’s done it again. I looked outside this morning and he’s missing. Frank is missing. This is the third time this month. Every day I live in fear of that woman stealing an innocent lawn statue just to get back at me, because I told her I didn’t like her peach cobbler. Francine has lived across the street from me for thirty years and we’ve never had a problem until she invited me ...

25 comments 25
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“Like Clockwork” by J.C. Lovero

If you would have told me a year ago that I’d fall in love with the noisy neighbor in Apt. 2704-110B after he had me poisoned, I wouldn’t have believed you.Before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s go back to the beginning. Me: Professor Clive Hargraves of Gaslight City’s School of Magic. A refined gent and one of the last remaining practicing magicians in London. In fact, magic had fallen so out of favor that the scholars of our time, the likes of Darwin and Huxley, suggested that humans were evolving past it! Poppycock, I say!<...

34 comments 34 SHORTLIST ⭐️
Read story

“Doctor, Heal Thyself” by Glen Gabel

"Doctor, heal thyself," I hear the first-year intern mumble to his cohort and the murmur of the newly degreed physicians as they leave my room.I've forgotten my case files, and my hair is windblown and drenched from the rainy walk across the street to the patient pre-op apartment tower. But as Saint Bernadette's leading psychiatrist and a woman nearing her thirtieth year in practice with the remnants of menopause clinging to my body, they don't dare say a word more. A sudden hot flash would burn through my eyes and char ...

26 comments 26
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“Love Bites” by Riel Rosehill

My neighbour's biting problem is getting out of hand: the other day she got her teeth into my man's ass. That was the last straw. That was a stride too far. Sally was what you could call a neighbour from hell: I had already complained about the noise, her constant banging on the wall in the morning before breakfast time, and a few other issues like giving us the death stare, but it was the...

26 comments 26
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“A Sad Song” by Kelsey H

It was 2AM and daylight felt forever away. Janie lay in her bed, staring at the lines of shadow cast around the room as the sodium light outside burned ceaselessly through the slat blinds.She couldn’t sleep. The house felt new and strange and empty, and the sound of a guitar vibrated through the wall from the unit which adjoined hers. What sort of person played guitar at 2AM? It wasn’t even a tune, just a twanging sound. Like he was plucking at the strings with his fingers. A small sound, as if he ...

26 comments 26
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“May We Start?” by PJ Aitken

Are you sitting comfortably? Why? How can you be so relaxed? That’s not what I expected. I can’t tell you this story when you’re chilled and half asleep. Stand up! COME ON! Stand up and shake your arms. That’s it, both arms, shake them like they’re covered in spiders. Faster, keep going! If you had spiders crawling around you’d be shaking much faster than that. Now shake your legs as well. Good. Shake your arms, legs and...

10 comments 10
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$250

Prize money

201

Contest entries

94

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Jun 03, 2022 EST

Won by S.K. Wulf 🏆

Title: Two Stubborn Women

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.

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