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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#31: The Ordinary

The very last line of the NBC sitcom The Office is spoken by former receptionist Pam Beasley. She says: "There’s a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn’t that kind of the point?"

This week's writing prompts embrace that sentiment, and challenge you to write stories that take ordinary, everyday tasks and turn them into meaningful pieces of short fiction.

This week's prompts

Write a short story about someone doing laundry.

Adults – 95 stories

Write a short story about someone tending to their garden.

Spring – 77 stories

Write a short story about someone cooking dinner.

Nonfiction – 56 stories

Write a short story about someone going to the corner store to buy an everyday item.

Nonfiction – 64 stories

Write a short story about someone heading home from work.

Nonfiction – 81 stories

Stories

“One More Snack” by Iona Cottle

Submitted to Contest #31

It’s been a lazy day. It has been a long week, and I was completely done with everything, but I don’t think that’s really an excuse. I know I had a whole list of chores to do, but I honestly couldn’t be bothered. I spent the day curled up on the sofa binging Netflix, and am feeling better and worse for it. Zara calls them ‘self-care days’, but then Zara actually has a clinically diagnosed mental illness. She needs self-care days; I’m just lazy and really bad at being a grown-up. So far I’ve managed to get away without leaving the flat all da...

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“The 6 W's of Doing Laundry” by Kimberly Yu

Submitted to Contest #31

It’s midnight, and I really need to find my favorite shirt. I fumble my way through all the potential places in my living quarters where my shirt could hide. The drawers full of once neatly-folded clothes? Nope. The pile of clothes thrown on top of my dresser after being worn once? Not there either. The mess of clean clothes on the couch that I hadn’t gotten to folding yet? Sadly no. The stack of seemingly unrelated clothes in my hanging clothes organizer I bought from IKEA? Unsurprisingly no. Oh, I almost forgot - the assortment of clothes ...

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“Give Caesar his chicken.” by Peace Nakiyemba

Submitted to Contest #31

Tonight’s menuDrink - Strawberry lemonade spritzerStarter - A bowl of fruit saladMain course - Caesar chicken served with pilao rice, a side dish of cabbage rollsDessert - Lemon pudding cakeGuaranteed - White wine & waterDress code - The little black dress you’ve been saving for my funeral. I told my mother ‘no’ when she suggested I have a dinner party. And yet the woman has an uncanny way of always getting what she wants. She’s getting concerned that I may not maintain my marriage, which I’m yet to enter, if I can’t cook. She is al...

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“Light at the End of the Trudge” by Deborah Mercer

Submitted to Contest #31

Leah didn’t in the least mind being expected to do some work in order to get her benefit money. It seemed fair enough. And she knew that volunteering at the Hospice Shop was a cushy number. She didn’t really mind the walk to and from the shop from her house on the outskirts of town, and if the weather really was atrocious, or she was feeling a bit under the weather, she could take the money for a cab from petty cash, though she always had to get a receipt (or at any rate, a note of it on one of their little cards). But that di...

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“A Painted Gull ” by Dustin Softman

Submitted to Contest #31

Antony Brook of TemperYahealth Ltd put down the phone on his company’s most reliable first-aid trainer and let out a sigh of contentment. ‘Debbs nailed it again, finished up in Pambula without a hitch. Knew she’d make all 35’. Antony’s nonchalant exhilaration was matched similarly by his remaining colleagues spread out in varying degrees of lassitude as they raised a Friday beer in the name of Debbs’ perfect streak. At 5.35 the handful of TemperYahealth employees still at work threw back the dregs of their stubbies and slowly weaved their wa...

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“Reclaiming the Raspberry Ripple” by Deborah Mercer

Submitted to Contest #31

Simone is looking forward to her godson Oliver visiting. It’s a year since she’s seen him, at least in the real and not the online world, though Skype is a wonderful thing and though she more or less had to be dragged into such matters kicking and screaming, she wonders how she’d manage without it now. But though it’s by no means a bad substitute, it’s still a substitute. Oliver. Her best friend Rachel’s son, the late arrival, the “on the change” child, who’s ten now, and loves dinosaurs (and knows far more about them tha...

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“The Chocolate March” by Karen McDermott

Submitted to Contest #31

Chocolate. The ‘ch’ sound for ‘cheap’. The heady sigh of ‘co’. Finally the tongue tripping at the back of the teeth on ‘late’. Cho-co-late. It was the soothing mantra Gemma concentrated on repeating to herself, timing her footsteps to. Her mouth watered as she rounded a corner and saw the store. ‘EZ HOURS’ said the dusty looking sign. Known with a touch of fondness as ‘sleazy hours’, it served the local communit...

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“TOMATOES ” by Sandra Claros

Submitted to Contest #31

- - You wash the tomatoes with a brush – the wrinkled - greyed hair woman said to a chubby young man who was accompanying her.- Toothbrush? – he asked, smiling at her. - No! It can’t be a toothbrush if it is not one used just for fruits and vegetables. - and peel some tomatoes disinfect some lettuce leaves together with some onion rings. You can also add some olives as they give an extra flavour to the salad – and she invited one to him.- - Yeap, I already know that I have a round-pizza-like face, and I need and the...

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“Everything Counts” by Carlie Beth

Submitted to Contest #31

115“One….two….three….four….five….six…...ten….eleven….twelve….thirteen….twenty.... twenty-one…..twenty-two….twenty-three.…...thirty-two….” “Ana!”“Thirty-seven….thirty-eight…….forty-two….forty-three….forty-four…. Sixty-one….sixty-two….sixty-three….sixty-four….”“Ana! Dinner’s here!!”“Seventy-one….seventy-two….seventy-three….eight-one….eighty-two….eighty-three…..eighty-four….eighty-five….eighty-six….”“ANA!!”“ONE MINUTE!!!!......ninety-four…. ninety-five.. .ninety-six… ninety-seven….. ninety-eight….ninety-nine….one hundred. I fell flat...

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“A Girl and Her Garden” by Maarit Mattson

Submitted to Contest #31

I sit upon a stray pot, tarnished and coated in a fine layer of dust. “Give me a flower Momma,” I say, my voice sweet and innocent, a toddler’s. In response, she bends over the blushing blue hydrangeas and plucks a bloom from its stem. As she turns to me her dark chestnut hair swings over her shoulder, she pushes it away.“Here,” she says, “a flower for my little flower.” As she speaks, a kind smile spreads across her face. I take the flower in my hand and pick the petals one by one. “I’ll make a wish,” I say and Momma laughs, conti...

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“Reuben's Trip to the Store” by CJ Shutt

Submitted to Contest #31

Reuben cracked his front door open and cautiously looked up and down the street. When he was satisfied he slowly crept down the sidewalk, while he fumbled in his pocket for his car keys. He finally grasped them when he got to his car door, which he quickly unlocked, then he leapt inside the vehicle. He let out a sigh of relief, “Made it so far.” He said under his breath. Inserting his key, he started the car, after checking all of the mirrors and making sure no one was watching...

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“Violet's Cure” by Eva Gryder

Submitted to Contest #31

Violet sighed as she dumped her family's clothes into the washing machine. The load was large because she had a family of five. Her three children were staying at their grandmother, Margaret's house for the night. Violet absentmindedly turned the knobs that changed the settings of the washing machine. She cursed as she stubbed her toe on one of Connor, her two-year-old son's toys. Violet occasionally regretted her decision to become a stay-at-home mother to her three children. She resigned from her job as a dentist a week before Amber, her o...

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“Super Market” by Amy DeMatt

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #31

Chicken. That was the reason I’d had to stop. It seemed that there was always an item or two missing from the inventory we’d gathered from the good old Handi-Mart that weekend, and now, Thursday night after work, I thought I’d better pick up the chicken. To that list, I’d added shampoo, milk, cornmeal and two packages of gummy bears, a special request from the kids. The list always grew when we had one item to pick up. Joe’s Market is...

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“Khakis for Ahmed” by Daniel Nest

Submitted to Contest #31

Yara sinks her hands into the icy water and immediately withdraws them as her veins constrict. Slowly now; don’t rush it. She clenches her jaw and tries again, this time lowering the tips of her fingers in first and only then letting the rest of her hands follow.Careful not to damage the fragile fabric, Yara picks up a few soaked items of clothing. Now on to scrub away the worst stains. She can’t hope to ever get the clothes fully clean; the water’s already been used by three other families and is filled with specks of dirt and loose blades ...

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“Autumn ” by Sandra Frye

Submitted to Contest #31

Summer passed without Bear to keep me company. I ran away often to the creek across the highway. I filled an entire notebook with poems. Sixth grade began, and in the fall we visited my father for the last time. The Wisconsin days had turned cold and windy. When Mother put us on the bus to Racine, I didn’t know something would happen to prevent us from visiting Father again.My father and Betty’s red brick apartment building was a few blocks from a corner grocery store. We kids were often sent to the store on shopping errands whenever we visi...

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$50

Prize money

373

Contest entries

0

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Mar 06, 2020 EST

Won by Ariel Kalati 🏆

Title: The Memory Garden

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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