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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#187: Cat People

I love cats. Independent, sassy, badass, unbothered, adorable, playful, and cuddlier than popular culture makes them out to be, they’re one of life’s everyday miracles. 


They live with us, but they are mysteries to us, and it can be incredibly fun to imagine their secret lives — and all the parts of their realities we aren’t privy to. This week, let’s think about ordinary and unusual cats alike, and take a moment to appreciate the magic they bring to our lives.

This week's prompts

Start your story with a character being led somewhere by a stray cat.

Adventure – 109 stories

Write a story from the point of view of a big cat — whether that’s a lion, cheetah, etc., or just a chunky pet.

Funny – 48 stories

Write about a cat living in an ancient temple, like the Acropolis.

Fiction – 17 stories

Set your story in a cat shelter.

Fiction – 24 stories

Write about a human and a cat that come to some kind of mutual understanding.

Character – 126 stories

Stories

“Meow” by Kathryn Kahn

Submitted to Contest #187

Curled like a giant fuzzy prawn, he slept. Nicholas (AKA Big Nick, Nicky, and His Nicholasness) completely filled the soft cat bed and spilled over the edges, even though the bed itself was billed as Large, and described as “a roomy rest for your most formidable feline.” Nicholas weighed upwards of twenty-five pounds, and carried it well. He was old enough to have developed dignified aplomb, which was only enhanced by the fact that his belly hung close to the ground these days in spite of his impressive height. But he was young enough to s...

8 comments 8
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“Cats and Pigs” by Mad Bennett

Submitted to Contest #187

The worst part about working for the city is that I know exactly where taxpayer money is going. Ticketing Doordashers while they’re inside a chain Chinese place waiting for the egg rolls some college student ordered to come up. Following 20-somethings into a garage at night to let them know they’ve got a running light out. Asking drifters if they’re planning on sleeping under the bridge again or if they’ve scrounged up $1,200 for an apartment deposit since last night. It turns you into your dad in the most insidious way.  That’s all I’...

4 comments 4
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“Princess, the Writers Muse” by Marty B

Submitted to Contest #187

Every great writer needs a muse Annie believed, hers just had a fuzzy tail and a cute face. Princess was her partner and writing companion. The romance novels she wrote were a fun hobby, but even she knew they were missing something, her plots were lifeless.  She wrote about what she knew, her heroines all had loving, adoring cats, and her heroes were modeled after her perfect husband Walter, the brilliant scientist. Annie wanted to spark up her stories, but did not know how.   She loved what she wrote, but no one else di...

17 comments 17
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“CatWalk” by Tricia Cundiff

Submitted to Contest #187

“I will never understand why I must go on walks with you. It is quite unseemly.” “Don’t be silly. You know they only want us to be one big happy family. We must do things together and be close to one another. You are much too self-centered, you know. And we both could use the exercise, if you don’t mind me mentioning it.” “Me?! Ridiculous. I am a large cat; I’m not supposed to be skin and bones! I simply know what I deserve and wish that this family, as you call it, would understand that I deserve much more than a companion like yourself.” “...

6 comments 6
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“Sawbones” by Katharine Widdows

Submitted to Contest #187

REWARD FOR MISSING SHIP’S CATBLACK AND WHITE - ANCHOR ON COLLARRETURN HIM TO THE SUZANNA BY SUNDOWN ON ST DAVID'S DAY AND BE PAID IN GOLD!Jimmy curled his fingers round the corner of the brewery wall and his smudged face followed, wide eyes peering into the uneven alleyway behind. Hops and barley overpowered the faint scent of herring this far from the water and Jimmy breathed a little easier.There he was. Black and white, pewter anchor on his collar. The two-toned cat stood out against the red brick building as he stopped to lick his paw an...

15 comments 15
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“Another Pretender” by Nathaniel Miller

Submitted to Contest #187

The finally finished Dartmouth application loomed as imminent as Satty imagined the buildings would in person. Pansy, her collectively-agreed-to-be-perfect mother, stood behind her, equally as nervous.“Go on, hun. I know you’ve done your best. You know it, too. This is what you want, you’ve worked for this, your father works there. There’s a million reasons you’ll make it. Also, your essays were killer.”“Takes one to know one.”Snickers broke the pungent silence that had fallen. The Fate of Aunt Rita’s Cat: an often-repeated story, one Satty ...

15 comments 15
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“Familiar” by Christina Reynolds

Submitted to Contest #187

There is a point past weeping, Dr. Christensen thought to himself, when the pain numbs.He peered at his face in the back of a spoon. The distorted image magnified the broken capillaries under his eyes. From medical school, he knew his lacrimal glands were responsible for his bloodshot eyes and dilated pupils. He maneuvered the spoon to view the extent of his puffy red face, caused mainly by the salt from his tears.The spoon’s reflection revealed the monster he felt he had become.No wonder his wife had left. No wonder his son had been taken.F...

4 comments 4
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“Master Onyx's Project” by Sonja Wallace

Submitted to Contest #187

“Lewis?” Master Onyx whispers searching for his counterpart. It's 0400 and his dad is still tucked snuggly in his bed.“Lew?” he calls a little louder. His dad flips over tossing one long leg out from the covers. MO knew that his dad couldn't understand him. To Syd, all MO's vocalizations were mere mewing, only the animals in earshot could truly interpret the language.However, MO didn't want to wake Syd yet. He needed time to start his project, so he held off calling for Lewis again until he made it to the home office. Entering the small...

6 comments 6
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“Hit Me Again, Bob” by Tommy Goround

Submitted to Contest #187

T/W: Aunt Jemima used as a seductive pancake maker. A song from 1893 by Henry Miller is quoted. Both of these are found in the free use policy of international satire law. There's also some religious language. Don't read this if you go to a non-denominational church. ########### You know when the judge gives you three to five … Hours  of community service He's not asking you to train for a new profession. I throw my shovel down and tell big David Bagelwood that he needs to take care of the carcass himself. My name is not Animal ...

28 comments 28
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“The Pond” by Nick Baldino

Submitted to Contest #187

My little brother, Carter, he always had the wildest imagination. I never blamed him- in a town like Bell Buckle, you needed one- but I never got it, either. Where he saw dragons, I saw spindly oak trees. Granite overhangs became alien hideouts. He’d try to include me in these escapades, and I’d play along, wielding my stick in whatever weapon-of-the-day was necessary. Yet I knew that world was never meant for me, and I felt that’s what being an older brother was. Making the fantasy last longer by fending off the real. He believed in supe...

3 comments 3
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“Pests” by Kat Moreno

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #187

I have a black cat. I picked her up from the parking lot of my local Dairy Queen as a kitten, and I had to quickly get used to the sound and commotion she made in the night. I laugh at myself when I think back to when I first got my cat and I used to get up several times a night because I thought I someone had broken into the apartment. I would sneak down my hallway my hand would cover my heart as icy dread spread over my skin, seeing two round eyes reflected green in the dark. "You scared me," I used to tell my cat in a breathy laugh, rea...

8 comments 8
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“Transmeowtation” by J. D. Lair

Submitted to Contest #187

I was staring out my office window again. The sun was shining through the oak leaves of the tree out back. The various birds of the yard created a euphony of song. The little brown ground squirrels ran up, down and around the lawn like they had too much caffeine this morning. Part of me wanted to join them, leave this world behind with all its responsibilities, but I would have to settle for taking my lunch out at the picnic table. A knock at my door caused my daydream to evaporate. “Come in!” I shouted at the intruder. “Andy, looks like...

23 comments 23
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“Mother Nature - The Story of A Serial Killer” by Tara Leigh Parks

Submitted to Contest #187

This story contains sex and violence.---I don't think fuck, or any other derivative of that monumental word, should be changed to duck when I finger-bang my passion into a text. If I ask a man to come over, we're not going to duck anything. So.Also: Do you know that ducks take part in forced copulation? Biologists and other smart-ass-types say that ducks waddle in a line because it makes them less suspectable to predators. They say the waddle also helps them forage for food. But I think they do it because back at the duck pond, the male duck...

22 comments 22
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“The Cat Burglar” by Darryl Roberts

Submitted to Contest #187

I do believe I am a living oxymoron, a fat cat burglar. When I mentioned this to my criminal colleagues, they just laughed and called me a fat moron, which I find highly impolite, not to mention politically incorrect.Of course, it is well known that some people of the overweight kind can be remarkably agile, and that is how I have managed to ply my trade all these years without being caught even once.As for my underworld companions, they shrugged and told me that everyone gets caught eventually, and that the main reason I haven’t yet is that...

14 comments 14
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“A Tiger's Tale” by Howard Seeley

Submitted to Contest #187

Being born a Hindu, reincarnation is an important part of my belief, and by some miracle, I have a memory of what’s happening to me. In my past life, my name was Advik, and I was a simple merchant who sold my wares to anyone with a few rupees in their pocket. During my lifetime, I tried to be fair to my customers, and I was doing well, but Vishnu, the protector of the world, must have thought differently. As I passed from my old life into the cycle of samsara, I found myself not to be reincarnated as a person, but as some beast yet unknown t...

11 comments 11
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$250

Prize money

324

Contest entries

117

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Mar 03, 2023 EST

Won by Michelle Oliver 🏆

Title: Mitzee’s Moment

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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