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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#168: Choo Choo!

The concept of train travel has always been a powerful motif in story telling. Train wagons can be a great setting for serendipitous love encounters, like for Jesse and Céline in Before Sunrise, or mysterious murders, like in Agatha Christie's classic Orient Express.

On a train, the mind wanders, time shifts, and life… unfolds. We hope that these train-inspired prompts will put you on the right track to writing some great stories.

This week's prompts

Start your story with someone looking out a train window.

Middle School – 98 stories

Write a story about a character who is moving on, literally or figuratively.

Narrative – 58 stories

Make a train station an important part of your story.

Narrative – 74 stories

Write a story about a character who misses a train, for better or worse.

Adults – 33 stories

Write a story that includes someone saying, “Bon voyage.”

Adults – 17 stories

Stories

“The witch's love potion” by Rey Ivie

Submitted to Contest #168

The witch love potion The crisp autumn air was warm, people stood by a train station as a light rumble started. The train was coming. It was a large barreled train with red accents. The light was a pale yellow that was barely seen in the afternoon air. When the train got closer you could hear the screams and yells of people by the tracks. “Please don’t do this. Do you want to be a murderer? I swear I’m not a witch, I was just tending to my moth garden and- and my pet raven was helping me… please believe me” the witch pleads as she look...

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“The gentleman in the tailored suit and the doctor” by Cosma Nova

Submitted to Contest #168

Wood crackled and glowed in a brick fireplace. If you stared at it long enough with a cup of cocoa engulfed in your hands and had a woolen blanket wrapped around your shoulders, you could've fallen asleep.But the ominous goings on surrounding the mantle suggest otherwise.An old, wrinkly lady rocked back and forth in her faded green rocking chair. She was sitting adjacent to the fireplace keeping warm by the heat of the flames and was watching her favorite show, jeopardy. Her beady eyes squinted at the glow of the little t.v., scrutinizing th...

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“Last I met Atticus” by Wyatt W. Krauklis

Submitted to Contest #168

CW | mentions of addiction and drugs, murder, mental health (delusions, depression), religious talk that's generally negative ("god abandoned me"), slight talk of violence and ambiguous endings. Read at discretion.I write when I'm in pain and I can't focus on anything but the little things, this tiny bit of introspection of my environment, the analysis of my ceilings and vertices of my walls, these make me who I am. Personality traits bundled up into tiny packages, delivered onto my metaphorical doorstep like amazon drone delivery bots. Good...

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“The Boy and the Pocahontas” by Tate Carlson

Submitted to Contest #168

Timmy woke up from a restless sleep. He was taking the Capitol Limited to stay with his mother in Washington D.C. for the summer, and this was a journey he had never experienced, but there was something more to it than he ever thought. Timmy couldn't get a wink of sleep, so he rubbed his eyes, and made his way to a car called the Sightseer's Lounge. It was early in the morning, and the sun poured its light into the lounge car windows. Timmy stared out the window in awe of the vibrant sunrise and there sitting in the opposite seat was an old...

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“The Train Ride Home” by Janelle Baker

Submitted to Contest #168

THE TRAIN RIDE HOME By Irene Lee As I looked out the window at the snow-covered ground, I prayed, God, please let Judy be at the train station when I get to Jacksonville, Florida. I couldn't help crying and wondering how all the other people on the train could be laughing and sharing good times with their seatmate. I wanted to jump up and scream at them to just shut up. My world would never be the same again. I watched as the train pulled...

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“Last chance to Live” by Darcie Zephier

Submitted to Contest #168

I stare out the train window, watching the silhouettes of trees and distant mountains passing by. The moon illuminates the snow so that it sparkles and glistens on the mountain tops. I haven’t seen scenery like this in years and it helps bring a calmness to me. I know I should be sleeping because it is the middle of the night, but I keep having moments of anxiety. I can’t help but worry that he will find a way to find me. I look at my watch. A Walmart watch that I bought last week, while I was supposed to be strictly grocery shopping. C...

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“Reverie on the 17:11” by Alasdair Perry

Submitted to Contest #168

Coming along the mountain path I noticed something endearing About violets - Bashо̄ | 1644–1694 At peace I fly, as the country reels by. A pastoral vignette of England plays through the window as the train courses elegantly through sun-sotted wheat fields, rolling low hills and chunky stone tunnels. Needle and thread. I am carried towards a new beginning. The miles accumulate between me and the old terraced house, the friends, the quaint, gentle streets. Promise certainly aw...

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“The Scottish Connection” by Sandi Beaumont

Submitted to Contest #168

Daniel settled himself into his window seat and gazed at Glasgow’s red sandstone buildings for the last time. The train snaked across the criss-cross of tracks as Daniel’s thoughts turned to the north, to the Isle of Lewis.Hopes of finding clues about his family had quickly turned to frus...

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“Random Acts of Kindness” by Faith Richardson

Submitted to Contest #168

I sank in the rigid seat and pressed the side of my head against the cool window. I closed my eyes and hoped I was making the right decision. With only the clothes on my back and what little cash I had in my wallet, I ran. I changed my name. I dyed my hair, and I left all those people I knew back there. The scenery whizzed past me. It was intoxicating to watch yet sickening. I was mesmerized and shaken at the same time. I closed my eyes and prayed the train would go faster and get me further away. My heart raced in my chest and throat. I h...

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“Blue” by Lee Kerr

Submitted to Contest #168

Salt water blurred my vision as I stared numbly out the window, the gentle clickity-clack of the train adding to my hypnotic gaze. I blinked, encouraging a small tear to release its grip and fall down my cheek. Then another, and another. I sniffed and let them fall freely, no longer needing to maintain a solid front. I was alone, there was no one to see me cry, no one to remain strong for. The day’s events washed through my mind in unrelenting cycles. Ebbing and flowing like a tide, drifting between would have and could have, words said a...

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“You Should Be Happy” by Kari Larsen

Submitted to Contest #168

Every weekday morning Angela drops her husband at the train station and watches as the 7:10am train pulls away from the station. Within minutes the platform is empty and the train is headed westbound into the city. Angela clears her throat and promptly drives home to eat breakfast and change into her work attire. Somedays it is a dress, other days it is a skirt and blouse, always with heels. The minute Florence, their nanny, arrives Angela hands off Lily and returns to the train station to catch the off peak 9:10 train. Angela has her s...

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“Home Again” by L.L. Williams

Submitted to Contest #168

The trees passing by the train window were taller than he remembered. When Leroy took the train out of town headed to university more than ten years ago, the trees didn’t look as tall then. During their last stop at a neighboring town, he noticed that the paint on the “Welcome” sign looked a bit more worn. Years of being in extreme cold and the baking sun would do that to an old wooden sign, he thought. He sat on the train, his hands sweaty, knee bouncing, and his left-hand scratching at the stubble he had let grow on his face. The creases i...

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“East at Dusk” by Jonathan Passmore

Submitted to Contest #168

Disclaimer: this story contains topics of sexual and physical violence as well as death and gore. Reader's discretion is advised. That night there were hundreds of them. Some weeping. Some wailing. Some fighting and throwing themselves in resistance amidst gunfire and guards beating them to a lifeless pulp with their rods. But they were mourning in whatever way they deemed best. At least that’s what it looked like from the train window. That’s the vision it gave me every night. This train was a curse for many cities and their people. What ...

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“The Green Heron” by Mitchell Awisus

Submitted to Contest #168

Even the gentle breeze from the train’s window caused her cheek to pulse. The air from outside tiptoed across her bruised face and dried her cracked lip, but makeup and lipstick could hide almost anything. Glorious pinks and blues splattered the morning sky while the sun pulled itself from behind the mountains in the far distance. The sunrise was beautiful, but that is not what caught her attention. Geese flew over the purple lavender fields in an echelon shape. “I wonder why they fly like that.” A young man sitting across ...

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“224: the extraction ” by Rya Johnson

Submitted to Contest #168

There’s something serene about staring out the window as the train passes the skyscrapers and the people busy with life. It’s so serene it could almost lull you into the belief that life was that simple. It could almost make Annabelle Harris forget what she was going to have to do. What her mission is and how she couldn’t fail or her sister, Oakley, would die. And her sister is her everything. Oakley is only thirteen months younger than Anna but she mothered her baby sister like she was her daughter. She raised Oakley since their ...

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$250

Prize money

280

Contest entries

105

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Oct 21, 2022 EST

Won by David Sweet 🏆

Title: SOUTHBOUND

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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