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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#252: Obsession

The Netflix series Baby Reindeer, inspired by a real-life stalker story, has garnered millions of views over the past month while receiving both critical acclaim and heavy backlash. In the show, a chance encounter between a barman and a total stranger descends into a chaotic tale of stalking, destruction, and mutual obsession. Delving into themes of personal boundaries, power dynamics, identity struggles, and mental health problems, the show depicts some of the complexities and contradictions inherent in human psychology.


Inspired by Baby Reindeer, this week's prompts are an invitation to explore some of the nuances of human behavior. Whether you write a witty story, a heartwarming tale, or something tense and gripping is up to you!

This week's prompts

Start your story with a character being followed.

Dramatic – 99 stories

Write about a character who struggles to do the right thing.

Character – 35 stories

Write a story in which one of the characters is a narcissist.

Character – 39 stories

Make a character’s obsession or addiction an important element of your story.

Dramatic – 129 stories

Write a story that includes someone saying, “Be careful what you wish for.”

Character – 55 stories

Stories

“A Well-Formed Vocabulary” by Daryl Kulak

Submitted to Contest #252

CW: Sexual acts are described in metaphor.I picked up the redheaded guy by his collar and carried him towards the door. My colleague, Harold, had control of the bearded dude so the fight was definitely over. The bartender, Lilian, gave us an appreciative glance as we rid the bar of the two troublemakers.To be honest, this was my favorite part of the job – pulling fights apart and tossing guys into the parking lot. I did it as often as I could. Well, second favorite part. My favorite part was when Doreen came into the bar on Thursday nights. ...

5 comments 5
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“Lie With Me” by Michael Ginsberg

Submitted to Contest #252

LIE WITH MEMichael Ginsberg2024 I met Susan in October 1976, at a dinner hosted by mutual friends who thought we might make a good couple. During appetizers, I was interested. By dessert, I was sure. At the end of the evening, I invited Susan for dinner, and she accepted. A few days later, we were standing side by side in my kitchen, chatting and chopping vegetables for a stir fry. Halfway through the zucchini, Susan asked if we could hear some music. “‘Do you have “The Four Seasons?” she asked, as I headed for my albums. I pulled out “F...

4 comments 4
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“Black and White and Red... All Over” by Carol Stewart

Submitted to Contest #252

*** Frequent profanity ***Joe had done a bad thing. He hadn’t meant to, and wouldn’t have if things had gone to plan, had his wife been more understanding instead of nipping his head, wittering on. And if that daughter of theirs hadn’t messed up and been sacked from her job – or whatever the hell it was that had happened - then everything would have carried on as normal, and the dog would not be dead.Much like the weather, the day had started out fine, at least as fine as could be expected, for what was life without a few clouds? He had mone...

6 comments 6
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“Books--The Food of Life” by Beverly Goldberg

Submitted to Contest #252

After two years of enjoyment, the closing of my town’s little library brought me misery. Not only did I lose the lovely early evening walk down the lane to the town square, with its cozy library on the busy little street on the east side, and the Coffee Pot Café next to it, but I lost the weekly Tuesday meeting with people I felt comfortable with. The five members of the club had welcomed me when I moved back to the small Midwestern town I’d grown up in to live in my parents’ old home, left to me after the awful car crash that took them and ...

15 comments 15
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“The Wise Goblin” by Cindy Calder

Submitted to Contest #252

Every night at midnight, the purple clouds appeared in the blushing sky. With their arrival, pink flower petals fell from their depths for a solid hour each night. With the rain came a knowledge of things beyond the average person’s ken, but such was not the case with Aoife. Even though she was sixty-four, she awaited the rain each night for she knew it held mystery and power able to change her life. This evening was no different. From the bedroom window, Aoife could hear the chirping of crickets and the see the pink petals floating across d...

6 comments 6
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“Lose My Number” by Elizabeth Loman

Submitted to Contest #252

When Ashley’s Uber pulled up curbside, she sent a text. A:Just pulled up, cant wait to see you <3 She waited on the sidewalk for a minute as the car pulled away, not really expecting a reply. Scott wasnt always the best texter, one of the downsides of dating an older man.  A few steps down the sidewalk and Ashley was walking up the immaculate concrete driveway of one of the upsides, Scotts massive, modern house located in The Woodlands, Houston. She passed the sleek, shiny black Bentley in the driveway that signalled Scott was home a...

5 comments 5
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“Cracks” by Hannah Shepherd

Submitted to Contest #252

For the six months following his nineteenth birthday, Tanner did so many drugs that it took him a year to recover.  So when Gerald pulls the hand-rolled joint from his pocket and offers it to Tanner, he shakes his head. He is twenty-three now. Gerald is twenty-five, and he offers Tanner something to smoke every time his break follows his. During work, Gerald pulls his hair into a low ponytail that hangs along his spine. He knocked up Tanner’s sister when she was eighteen but didn’t marry her. Tanner’s nephew is three now and his sister ...

1 comment 1
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“The Waitress Likes Me” by BD Smith

Submitted to Contest #252

They only had the one car, so she had to load up the girls to pick him up. They were always together, the three Musketeers, and always without him. He always had better things to do than to be with his family. Today was no different.Typical Sunday, she was taking the girls to church like she always did – alone – because he no longer attended. He had stopped sometime between her having their first daughter and becoming pregnant with the second. A lot of things stopped during that period of time, but that’s a story for another day. Just like e...

1 comment 1
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“Something I Can Never Have” by Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #252

By all accounts, John was a nice bloke. Not a very nice bloke. Just nice. Nice being the go to word for people who didn’t have anything else nice to say about a person. Using nice to describe someone was in itself not nice. It wasn’t just that there was a lacklustre laziness at play in the use of this go-to word, it was that the underlying meaning of nice was pathetically negative. By describing John as nice, a person was telling the world that they were bored with John. Never was there an excuse to be bored, and so this should hav...

10 comments 10
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“BE CAREFUL!” by Cindy Thompson

Submitted to Contest #252

©TRT…BECAREFUL52424   BE CAREFUL “Someday, I’ll be rich, independent, admired, and beautiful,” the twelve-year-old girl told her Grandma. Grandma rolled her eyes and smiled, saying, “Be careful what you wish for.” The girl hadn’t heard this expression before. She remembered ‘be careful what you wish for’ decades later. All she had wished for as a preteenager had come true. The 64-year-old woman was unhappy despite being rich, independent, admired, and still good-looking. The irony of her situation was not l...

4 comments 4
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“A Change of Heart” by Diana Davis

Submitted to Contest #252

Dear Reader, This story contains hints of bullying, sexual assault, and physical violence. It is not graphic, however, I must put a trigger warning here. I hope you can enjoy my story otherwise. Thank you for your time “Guys I don’t know about this.” Cami shifted her feet and crossed her arms. She and her friends, Jade and Abby stood on the edges of the property on a Saturday night, where a party thrown by a couple of brothers on the school football team was in full swing. By now most of the partygoers were at least tipsy...

1 comment 1
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“Barbie & Ken” by Lily Lloyd

Submitted to Contest #252

*TW for emotional abuse*“Remind me again why we can’t put the top up,” I asked, very conscious of the fact that I looked like a wet dog as the rain pelted my hair. “Cuz I’m mad at you,” Billy replied matter of factly. I turned to stare at him unamused.“Are you being serious?”He huffed dramatically. “Yes.”"Billy," I sighed, "Let's not do this right now. Please? You're gonna ruin your car and our clothes."After a minute of contemplation, Billy slowly reached for the roof button and pressed it half-heartedly. As the sound of the closi...

4 comments 4
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“Family Business” by Jed Cope

Submitted to Contest #252

As Bill walked home he put his unease down to the fact that he had not been feeling right all day. The day itself had taken against him from the outset. Rising from the messy pit of his bed he’d paused in his half-arsed redistribution of his duvet. Dumped the forgotten duvet at the foot of the bed and patted at a spot on the sheet that looked about as wrong as it had any business looking. The situation of this patch was embarrassing, being in the area where his crotch and backside vied for position as he tossed and turned in the grip of the ...

8 comments 8
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“The Burning Past” by Martin Maynard

Submitted to Contest #252

Elizabeth Walker stood on the porch of her charming, two-story house in the small town of Millbrook, Indiana. The evening sun cast a warm, golden glow over the neatly trimmed lawns and picket fences, but Elizabeth couldn’t shake the chill that settled in her bones. She brushed a strand of auburn hair behind her ear, glancing nervously down the quiet street.Inside the house, Allen Foster, her boyfriend and the town’s Police Chief, was helping his daughter, Anne, with her homework at the kitchen table. Allen’s broad shoulders and calm demeanor...

5 comments 5
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“Small in His T-Shirt” by Carina Caccia

Submitted to Contest #252

1I run my finger over the surface of an old dressing table—dust, silver thimble—and perch myself on a precariously wobbly stool. I stare into the mirror, into its wonky rendition of myself. It has a cloudy, greenish hue and its circumference is freckled with dark spots—a few of which are superimposed on my collarbone—and I’m unsettled by the ashen face that glares back, the purple beneath her eyes, the eeriness of her white dress. It’s the mirror. Even the sunlit bookshelves behind me have lost their glow, the grass has lost its green, and t...

0 comments 0
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$250

Prize money

357

Contest entries

143

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - May 31, 2024 EST

Won by Danielle LeBlanc 🏆

Title: Seven Hundred and Thirty Days

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!

Prompts | Big Blue Hand | 2024-11

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