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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#191: Sakura

Spring is finally here! In Japan, the season is famously marked by the mass blooming of cherry blossoms, also known as sakura, an event so beautiful it attracts tourists from all over the world. Due to its impressive yet short-lived blooming, the flower symbolizes the fascinatingly transient nature of life — but it’s also associated with a message of renewal, and hope for the future.

To celebrate the new season, this week’s prompts are inspired by cherry blossoms and the feelings they evoke year after year 一 we hope they’ll bloom into great stories!

This week's prompts

Start your story with your character(s) going to buy some flowers.

Spring – 78 stories

Write about a character who is starting to open up to life again.

Character – 68 stories

Write a story about a character who’s late to witness a special event.

Funny – 25 stories

Make Japan (or Japanese culture) an element of your story.

Narrative – 37 stories

Write a story that includes someone saying, “I feel alive.”

Dialogue – 68 stories

Stories

“Lost Moment” by Manmohan Sadana

Submitted to Contest #191

Travel by Tokyo Metro is an experience. Initially it looks very confusing as compared to the metros in Paris and Stockholm, but once, one gets a hang of things it is indeed a pleasure to travel by it. The Tokyo Metro has come a long way since Tokyo Underground Railway Company opened the first subway section between Asakusa and Ueno. I feel that one can get a bird’s eye view of Japanese society on some sectors, while travelling in the subway trains. Tokyo Metro’s Ginza, Kyobashi, Toranomon, Gaienmae and Aoyama-Itchome stations now presen...

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“A Whisper Amongst the Petals” by Sage E. Seever

Submitted to Contest #191

(A side-story to: Might as Well Have Been Wind in the Bells) I only came to the village for a look, fraternizing with humans has been highly discouraged throughout my life. But I find myself standing stock still, just outside town. Something’s calling to me, an electric feel in the air. I can’t place it. My keen eyes flicker across the landscape, searching for the source. The scenery is mountainous and green, full of beautiful rock formations and ornamented with twisted trees and bushes. The scene is alluring and peaceful, and yet, uns...

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“New Beginning's ” by Candy Greeson

Submitted to Contest #191

cw: gore, blood, language Finally made it to the flower shop. It took a few wrong turns to finally arrive. I step out of my car and look at the sign, "Bonnies Flower Shop". It was a bit difficult to find since I am new to this small town. I close the door to my car and make my way up to the store. I'm not sure what I am looking for today, just something for my wife Nemy. She is a plant fanatic, our new house is already covered in all kinds of plants and flowers. Her birthday is coming up so I figured I would try and get a plant she doe...

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“Self Harm” by Michelle Mahoney

Submitted to Contest #191

I want to cut so badly. I haven't told anyone. I feel ashamed. I know it's not a healthy coping mechanism yet I find myself craving the pain. I know I need help. I need therapy. I promise myself I am going to get it. I really want to hold out but I am not sure I will be able to. I am a broken woman. Will I forever be whole? Will I someday succumb to this addiction? I worry that I will. I have been cut free since Nov 23, 2023. Funny how I am writing this on Mar 23, 2023 Is this some sick coincidence? It has b...

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“Deep Breaths” by Nona Yobis

Submitted to Contest #191

Deep breaths. Deep breaths. In, out, 1, 2, 3, 4. Smell the roses, blow out the candle. Focus on the sound and feel of the breath as it enters and exits the body. It’s just the grocery store. Everyone goes to the grocery store. It’s not a big deal. Just go inside, get what you need, and get out. Deep breaths. 1,2,3,4. Focus. Focus. Sitting in the car in the parking lot for 27 minutes gripping the steering wheel is not going to fulfill the shopping list. Entertaining the gut-wrenching terror of being a...

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“Ice and fire” by Jennifer Cameron

Submitted to Contest #191

Brandon and Margo. The two names that would forever be fused together because one killed the other and that kind of makes them inseparable in people’s stories. Apples had littered the street, outlining parked cars and folding in on themselves as the wind took bites out of them. Margo pulled her coat closer to her body, Brandon kicked an apple out of the road and onto the cobbled path in front of her. That’s how they met, via rotten apples. And in a way there’s a sort of poetry to the symmetry because that was how they departed each other to...

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“Caretakers” by M B

Submitted to Contest #191

The female vulpine looked out over the vast expanse of trees from her mountaintop perch. Found guilty on about eight thousand counts of financial fraud, coercion, and a half-dozen other crimes that the Council could pin her on, at least... ...A seventeen-thousand-year sentence. Ironic that what had once held someone else for a time was now being used to hold her. The Cat’s Paw was no ordinary ship: A nature preserve flying through space. A giant greenhouse and wildlife sanctuary. For the vixen it was to be h...

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“Here I Grow Again” by Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #191

The single, pale cherry blossom petal lays before me, asking me a world of questions. Ignoring its voice, I instead choose a moment of fantastical hope. He has been here. He walked into this room, the petal is testament to his continuing presence in the world. Only he could convey the petal to this place and press it to the cold tile on the kitchen floor, pinning it there for me to discover. A subtle love note to his beloved. It is fitting, that petal is for me, and only me. The petal is a messenger, it brings with it glad tidings ...

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“Flowers and a Funeral” by Marisa Billions

Submitted to Contest #191

My House…My house has been in my family for three generations. My grandfather, who passed it down to my father, who passed it down to me. He wanted a son, but I was his daughter and only child. But we will come back to that. Right now, we are talking about my house. My house is not typical. It’s a funeral home. My grandfather was a mortician, my father was a mortician, and now I am one too. The house is Victorian, but the colors are muted, tasteful and appropriate for the type of business that is run out of it. The landscaping is n...

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“A Thousand gates” by Christopher Law

Submitted to Contest #191

“I feel alive.” “And again Mr Maxwell I can very much assure you that you are in fact very dead” said the gentleman behind the podium whilst fixing some errant paperwork in front of him. “How can I be dead if I feel this great?” asked the aforementioned Mr Maxwell becoming steadily more incredulous “well according to the paperwork the how is a traffic accident and as to the why you feel so good, I mean it would be a hard sell to convince people to cross over if you felt like you were dead the whole time you were here”. “Surely you’ve mad...

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“Sakura Tea” by Cassandra Fan

Submitted to Contest #191

The shopkeeper's bell rang a frantic ‘ding-a-ling’. Yes, that clattering bell sound followed by the heavy door slamming shut as busy footsteps clambered into the shop. Aspen knew it well. He’d worked here long enough to tell most of what he needed to know just from a customer’s entrance. What'd it be this time? Man in a sweaty business suit who ran here from work looking for a quick anniversary gift? Parents getting a bouquet for their kid’s choir show? Teenager home alone trying to replace the flowers he let die? That happened unnaturally o...

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“The Home Run” by Murray Burns

Submitted to Contest #191

The Home Run “Regrets, I’ve had a few &...

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“Sakura's Spring Festivities” by Darene Staniszewski

Submitted to Contest #191

Once upon a time, in the beautiful country of Japan, there lived a young girl named Sakura. She was named after the beautiful cherry blossom tree that blooms every spring in Japan. Sakura had always loved this time of year when the cherry blossoms would start to appear, and the entire country would come alive with festivities and celebrations. Every year, Sakura would eagerly wait for the cherry blossoms to start blooming. She loved watching the delicate pink and white petals slowly opening up, and she would spend hours sitting under the tre...

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“The Date” by Amy Rosenthal

Submitted to Contest #191

The bell above the door tinkled welcomingly as he entered the florist’s shop and he paused at the threshold to allow his senses to acclimate to the onslaught of sight and scent. Roses posed prettily in the front window. Chrysanthemums waited patiently for customers in their bucket of water. Sunflowers bloomed in the corner bringing sunlight to an otherwise shadowed nook. The perfume from the garden of flowers mixed pleasantly as he tiptoed carefully to the counter which was partially obscured by the leaves of large ferns. A woman bust...

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“Yahura the Kitsune: In Transience Being” by Kris Caves

Submitted to Contest #191

Yahura languished under the floating branches of the sakura trees. Like a master’s brushstrokes, the dark wickering branches embodied the virtues of elegance, balance, and beauty. She leaned against the fence as she dedicated her time to absorbing the citrus-washed spectacle of sky. Her dark, black fox ears drooped in relaxation as she spent the hour in beatitude. No time could pass so quickly just as then, when the fluttering petals from the sakura tree dripped like years in a person’s lifetime. The scattered, fragile petals formed puddles ...

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$250

Prize money

276

Contest entries

170

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Mar 31, 2023 EST

Won by Pari Ghodsi 🏆

Title: Lilies

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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