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#170 Best Laid Plans

As the old saying goes, "We plan, God laughs"; no matter how carefully we try and prepare for the future, life tends to get in the way. Sometimes these obstacles are actually opportunities, and things work out for the better. Sometimes, these disappointments don’t have a happy ending. Either way, we have to muddle through.

This week’s prompts are all about plans — whether they work out, they don’t, or we never had one to begin with!

This week's prompts

Start your story with the line “I’ve got a plan”.

Dialogue – 59 stories

Write a story about a character who tries to control their life down to the most minute detail — but has to learn to let go.

Character – 24 stories

Write about a plan that goes wrong, for the better.

Middle School – 37 stories

Write a story that involves the architectural plans for a building.

Mystery – 10 stories

Fly by the seat of your pants and write a story without a plan.

Short Story – 68 stories

Stories

Fall

Submitted to Contest #170

Just thinking about way too much as I'm standing at the top of the stairs. I stop to hear people walking by my house, the rustling of leaves pulling my attention away as I put my left foot in the direction of the first step into space. The brisk, scratchy sound of leaves swooshing up into the air with each step of the unknown persons outside my perception. Taking me to a moment in time, not this one. Taking me away from where I should be focusing my attention. Stealing my attention from this critical moment. Now I'm falling, and all though...

15 likes

The cliffs

Susana Sela

Submitted to Contest #170

I’ve got a plan. I have defined it carefully, day by day, night by night. I have studied every detail and marked out my steps so as not to make a single mistake. At first, it was just an idea, but it has slowly taken over my head and now my whole life revolves around it. It all started about seven years ago, on November 1st. I parked my car near the cliff, to get closer to the sea and photograph the waves. A storm was approaching and the white eddies bouncing over the rocks, wrapped in a wild murmur of water and salt, totally captured my att...

14 likes

God had a better plan

Weeza Warren

Submitted to Contest #170

Soleil had a good life growing up. She had dreams of having the perfect husband, two children, and a house with a white picket fence. She was a cheerleader, she had a good family and she was popular. Soleil also had plans to complete high school, go to college and become a professor. However during her senior year she got pregnant and had a baby boy after high school. With the help of her mom, Zarina, Soleil was able to go on to college. She was living her best life in college and things were going as planned until she went through a bad rel...

14 likes

(Almost) Home for the Holidays

AnneMarie Miles

Submitted to Contest #170

TW: death.When she’d left for her trip, they had been fighting. It hadn't been a big fight, but they'd been irritated with each other. Her more with him.He always did this. Whenever the holidays came around, it was like some big surprise that her parents would want them to spend the holidays with them. And now that they had little Zia, the ask had become more of a beg. But with her parents being several states away, that meant traveling a small bit to get to them, which seemed to complicate things. At least for Jerry. Every year, bookin...

14 likes

THE WRONG SIDE OF NOWHERE

David D'EttoreUser

Submitted to Contest #170

THE WRONG SIDE OF NOWHERE It was a lazy afternoon, one of those hot and humid days when people look for a cool place and a cold drink and dogs seek out the shade to lie down and not move unless they have to. Danny Weston pushed open the dusty tavern door and scanned the premises as he headed to the end of the bar. Not many people he observed. Two people were at the bar. Two others were playing pool. A third group sat in a ...

14 likes

Pheromone

Virtual Chesse Emporium

Submitted to Contest #170

Our footsteps and laughter echoed loudly in my apartment building's narrow hallways. The shopping bags we tugged along banged against our legs, but we didn’t notice. After a day of shopping, eating a luxurious dinner and karaoke, nothing could dampen our moods. Our laughter finally died when we reached my door. “Thank you so much for inviting me, this was amazing!” I said happily. “Of course baby, you needed a night out after the shitty week you had!” My friend Lili said with a grin. I grabbed my keys and opened my door. “Oh, before you go...

14 likes

Dizzying Adventures

Submitted to Contest #170

As I sit in the chair in his room, the midmorning sunlight shines in through the window illuminating his rocking horse. Two years’ worth of dust caked the antique toy. The dust that has yet to find its final resting place dances in the beams of light. I rarely come in here. I miss him so much. I left it just as it was before he disappeared two years ago at the age of six. I’m too hurt to cry. Maybe this is just how some men are, or maybe I have no tears left. First my wife leaves us, then my son vanishes in the night. Our son Joshua always p...

14 likes

The Ghost of Music Past

Miranda Crenshaw

Submitted to Contest #170

I told him not to go into that music store, and maybe that’s why he went. He didn’t like to be told things. You could ask him not to do it, but if you told him that he wouldn’t… Well, he just would… Logan didn’t notice anything weird when he went into the music store. One of a dying breed, music stores still sold CDs and some even had old vinyl on their shelves. The vinyl sold more these days as collectors bought them up. He wasn’t really here to shop; his girlfriend had pissed him off, and a nice walkabout seemed a good solution. He just ...

14 likes

The Little Things

Submitted to Contest #170

I didn’t want to go out tonight, but Marla said she thought it might be good for me. It's hard to argue with that logic, I haven’t really gotten out much since Owen passed. What’s good for you is rarely what’s easy. Losing him really knocked the wind out of my sails. I never thought I’d be a widow and social recluse at the age of twenty-two, but here I am; a hermit in my prime. It’s funny how things work out sometimes. What’s that old saying? “Man plans, and God laughs.” It was just a small get together at Marla’s house, but anxiety rar...

14 likes

In the Garden Where Nothing Grows

Submitted to Contest #170

*Contains sensitive content of abuse and mental health* Standing in the dead garden, the mother pulled her thin sweater tighter against her frail body. She shivered in the chill, the seasons for growing and harvesting long past. Only the husks of pole beans with their brown tendrils still clinging to the wire trellis remained there. She often came out to her garden to clear the cobwebs in her mind, but it was of little comfort today. Overhead, slate clouds hovered low, misty. Winter was here now. Her eldest daughter, Kathleen...

14 likes

The Fool Circle

Munira Lokhandwala

Submitted to Contest #170

The Fool Circle “I've got a plan”, I coughed into my hand. The Elder Bishop-Dromo looked up and said, “Eh?” All faces around the round table turned towards me. I froze, I was where I always hated to be: in the spotlight. My neighbor took my hand in his hand and that was enough; his clammy hands could even warm up the dead. I rearranged my facial features to portray an air of contemplation and plod on, “I have a plan to take care of our complaints.” This air of contemplation was crucial because I was the youngest in our team of Elders and th...

14 likes

An Evening with a Writer Without a Plan

Kathryn Minicozzi

Submitted to Contest #170

“Fly by the Seat of Your Pants and Write a Story Without a Plan.” - Reedsy Reedsy, you don’t know what you are asking me to do. I don’t know what I am doing, which is a definite drawback to good writing. With no plan, I am like James Dean in “Rebel Without a Cause,” running around and getting into trouble. Well, you asked for it. Just remember, this was not my idea. The problem with flying by the seat of my pants and writing a story without a plan is I don’t know what to write about.&nb...

13 likes

Loving Who I Can't Have

Ruby Fink

Submitted to Contest #170

Dear K_____, You’ll never read this, which is why I suppose I can finally be honest. Finally be honest and talk about the feelings I have kept inside me all these years. The first time I saw you was a week after my fourteenth birthday. In those days I was gangly, with a forehead of pimples hidden under dull brown bangs, wearing loose shirts and shorts to hide the budding breasts and wider hips that were taking shape underneath. Over the last year, I’d started wearing clothes from my brother’s closet, eschewing the cute blouses and sh...

13 likes

Ellie and the Ethereally Endeared

Ryan Roarke

Submitted to Contest #170

“I only have three hours?” I asked incredulously. “Less than that, actually: two hours, 39 minutes, 11 seconds.” She was calm and serene, which of course did nothing but add to my already increasing nerves. “But I have nothing to write about!” I argued. “How am I supposed to write a story—with no plan—before midnight?” “Well, you should probably start with a name,” she mused. I paused for a moment, staring at an empty word document on my screen. I’ve always thought that a blank page, cursor blinking on a vacant first line, was one of...

13 likes

The Spire

Submitted to Contest #170

Alrin looked up towards where the glaring desert sun sat in its celestial throne. The sun looked back at him with its own mocking gaze. He pushed back a long lock of dark, sweat-soaked hair from his forehead and cursed at the sun, then resumed trudging onward; vast, unchanging, blindingly radiant desert sprawling as far as his dry bloodshot eyes could see. Even though he had known his platoon was underprepared for this expedition, he was still in shock from the extent of his failure. His men, soldiers under his command, all perished in last ...

13 likes

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Contest #171

This contest has ended. Thank you for your submissions.

$250

Prize money

198

Entries

124

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Nov 04, 2022 EST

Won by Camphor White 🏆

Title: Fini Flight

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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