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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#196: In Another Life

Recently, I’ve been reflecting on the way making a single decision, big or small, can cause your life to fork off in an entirely new direction. There are the obvious crossroads, the big life choices, and then there are the tiny ones; ones we fail to notice are taking place every single day. Waiting at the crosswalk instead of jaywalking, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, spending an extra 10 minutes scrolling through social media — even these non-events can make the difference between a life-altering incident happening, or not happening.

But what if we could access those paths we didn’t take? Would we go back and choose a different route for our lives? What if we could sense those “sliding doors” moments as they happened? This week's prompts are inspired by this classic sci-fi dilemma, and by the coulda, shoulda, woulda’s we all live with every day.

This week's prompts

Write about a character unknowingly experiencing a “sliding doors” moment. Write your story in two halves; what could have been, and what actually happened.

Dramatic – 62 stories

Write a story that includes the phrase “Maybe in another life.”

Dialogue – 74 stories

You’re walking down the street, when you spot a familiar figure. It’s another you. And they’ve come from an alternate reality to warn you about something.

Thriller and Suspense – 32 stories

Write a story involving a portal into a parallel universe.

Science Fiction – 61 stories

Set your story in a world where time travel has been perfected, and people can use it to hop between alternate timelines — but at a cost.

Dystopian – 50 stories

Stories

“Transversal” by Chris Campbell

Submitted to Contest #196

The jungle fauna crept quietly and resolutely around Private Henry Willoughby’s feet. In this theatre of war, it was the only living thing to flourish, to grow, to last. Nothing else stood a chance under its stifling canopy. If Henry didn’t move, he’d be consumed by slow creeping vines, fire ants, foot rot, and all kinds of potential alien ailments. Should he choose to move, he risked exposing himself to the hellfire performance of a jungle war entertaining its combative audience. For Henry, the choice was simple. Killing biting insects in ...

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“The Waiting Room” by Paul Besancon

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #196

Eric watched them through the window. The night was cold, yet no breath fogged the glass when he leaned closer. That took some getting used to the first few journeys he made. Now, it was trivial. As always, the glass was dirty. She regularly teased him to help out around the house more. He kept up with the maintenance, but cleaning was never his forte. Still, he could have helped out more. One of many regrets. That was when he felt it. God damn hands. They were shaking again, but he never let go of the cylindrical key fob resting tightly in...

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“Parallel” by Mihnea Balan

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #196

Horace wakes up at 6:30 AM. He gazes toward his wife but she’s brazenly curled up in a ball with her back toward him. After sighing his morning sigh, Horace gets up and walks to his study. He glances at his bonsai tree. It’s obsessively trimmed. He then sets Newton’s cradle in motion and begins his ritual of looking into the brown eyes reflecting back at him from the mirror, putting on his suit, and rehearsing the meeting’s talking points. Newton’s restless balls set the rhythm. As he’s mentally orating, Horace fixates on certain words in hi...

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“Election Fever: Leftie Lucy Vs Rye T Tie Tee” by Graham Kinross

Submitted to Contest #196

With the election just days away Leftie Lucy faces Rye T Tie Tea, a battle for the soul of the country. Never in the country’s circular history has the nation been so divided. Leftie has accused Rye T of importing voters from the 1940s to supplement his shrinking voter base. Tie Tea in turn asserts that Lucy has artificially inflated her numbers by giving every slice of avocado toast a vote. Capital Will, named for our forefather Will I Am the Read, looks like the scene of an impending battle to rival Sekigahara. Banners declaring Rye T the ...

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“Eden in the Rearview Mirror” by Delbert Griffith

Submitted to Contest #196

Jarod plopped the bag of food down on the desk and likewise plopped himself in a chair. The afternoon sun had creeped in through the windows, showing off angular shapes and making the shadows appear denser, solid. Sounds from outside the room were muted. No one, it seemed, wanted to further fracture a day that had already been horribly shattered. “Thanks, bro,” Fenny opened the bag and poured the contents out. Two Filet-O-Fish sandwiches and a double cheeseburger. “Lot of cops out there, Fenny.” Fenny took a large bite out of the first fish...

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“Bubbles On the Horizon” by Mary Bendickson

Submitted to Contest #196

Bubbles on the HorizonThe wagon master, Mr. Marcy, traveled with his new scout trying to catch up with their lumbering wagon train snaking across the grassy Nebraska prairie.As they approached the line of canvas covered wagons looked like bubbles silhouetted on the horizon. Each wagon was like a little bubble world all of their own floating in a sea of the unknown tethered together with others for survival.The Indian scout wasn't one for talking so the leader's thoughts wandered back to the spirited charmer he had to leave behind. They neede...

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“Worldsmith” by Jamie Campbell

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #196

Jon Trevino sat at his computer doing his very favorite thing in the world: writing of adventures in his fictional world of Oaleth with his six-year-old son on his lap. Jon watched Henry read the paragraph he’d just typed, the boy’s delighted eyes scanning across the screen in the blue glow of the monitor. Teaching his young son to read had been the most fulfilling experience of Jon’s life. He felt that he’d instilled in Henry the same love of story and of fantasy that drove Jon to write, and having seen the boy devour the old children’...

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“Stolen Blood and Form” by Graham Kinross

Submitted to Contest #196

Nuzzling against Lady Jezra Azt’s neck, Lord Kelvin Celsius smiled at the discovery of a freckle he had never seen before. Her ringed hand held tight in his hair as she talked. Kelvin struggled to listen as his senses absorbed every detail of her, lips kissing their way from her neck to her gasping mouth. Their eyes met, her knowing azure blue orbs invited his hazel portals to drink up the sight of her. Biting her lip, she closed her blue shadowed eyes and leaned towards him, pressing her chest to his. Lord Celsius could no longer tell if th...

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“To Bake Under the Sun” by Sam Jacobsen

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #196

Earth is now a whisper--sad, desolate. For many miles, crags drone on in a ceaseless field of black. The rocks left behind are sharp and cracking, their shale falling down into pits of tar and sludge. At the peak of the highest crag is a glowing portal--our slip. It is a gate to another time; another place. We funnel through the slip like lemmings to the cliff, our eyes glazed and desperate. We being the last of us, that is. We come, warped and damaged by radiation, drought, famine, to escape. The seas and forests are gone, our beloved anima...

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“In the Shadow” by Kelsey H

Submitted to Contest #196

I have relived this day a thousand times, and it always starts the same way: with the hiss of the coffee machine piercing the silence.At 5.45AM in summer the kitchen was already light. Since returning to work after maternity leave, I’d been getting up increasingly earlier each morning, in an attempt to grab a moment of stillness before the day began and everyone else’s needs started pulling at me.Sun filtered through the curtains, illuminating the living room and the debris left from our children sweeping through.Beside the couch was Thomas’...

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“Click” by Marty B

Submitted to Contest #196

A good photograph tells the truth, but slant, a trick of light and shadow, at times telling what could be or, could have been. Cory scuffled at the envelope, his thick fingers unable to release the simple tabs tucked into the slots, until he gave up and ripped it open. Once a professional photographer, he knew the power of photographs, and still in his suit jacket and dress shirt sat down at his kitchen table, anxious to see what was on these photos. Did his son Ethan take the pictures? Maybe, when he was younger, before…...

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“Lies Hurt Less Than The Truth” by Jane Andrews

Submitted to Contest #196

It’s almost 9 by the time the obligatory drinks party is over and my jaw aches from smiling at people I don’t know while I listen to their self-indulgent self-promotion. I’m a last-minute replacement for Helen, my team leader, who has food poisoning. Allegedly. To be honest, I’m pretty sure salmonella is just an excuse: her way of avoiding yet another tedious conference with endless slides of sales figures and excruciating small talk with people who actually care about data systems. &nbsp...

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“Scratched Wax” by Chris Miller

Submitted to Contest #196

“I see that you cannot take your eyes from the gifts time has bestowed upon me.” The Dealer’s eyes glinted through a fringe that lay over his face like the unearthed roots of a mangrove swamp. The roots fed a great vine of matted hair that climbed over his head in a dense coil and looped down to twist like a constrictor several times around his body. “Stare,” he said in a delicate breath barely strong enough to carry the word, “every second you spend staring at me becomes mine.” He raised a thin hand and used the edge of a long, twisted fin...

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“Folding Clothes in the Baby Department” by Shauni Cardenas

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #196

Trigger warning: miscarriage, griefI am folding clothes in the baby department for my dumb retail job. The music is god-awful garbage, mind numbing, and offensively inoffensive. I detest that I have been stationed here in this tiny little corner surrounded by such tiny little things. How do you fold miniature pants that are only even inches long? Somehow, I doubt the babies will be impressed by the neat creases and color-coded shelves. I know their mothers don’t care since they’re the ones who mess it all up for me again as they search thoro...

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“Not Meant To Be, Never Will Be” by Anesa Feratovic

Submitted to Contest #196

“From the moment I met you, I knew there was something special about you,” he starts, tucking a loose strand of my curly brown hair behind my ear.I smile, thinking of the first time I heard that line. The boy who said it was my first love. And for a time, I thought, the one. But he’s not the one standing in front of me now. Instead it’s Adrian, my boyfriend of four years, wearing that cheeky little grin of his.“You have this warmth and kindness that shines through in everyone you meet, and everything you do. You make me laugh, you challenge ...

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$250

Prize money

279

Contest entries

149

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - May 05, 2023 EST

Won by Delbert Griffith 🏆

Title: The Bullet that Esther Stopped

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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