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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#50: A Moment Like This

Throughout this contest, we’ve read wonderful entries that provide sweeping overviews of characters' lives (such as "The Tree"), as well as submissions that offer glimpses into distinct life-phases (like "Time Bomb"). We’ve also been captured by stories book-ended by the start and end of one particular moment in time: such as "The Price of a Nice Guy" (a woman gets a flat tire and parks on the side of the road), "Who Speaks to Death" (a story told through a single text conversation), and "To You" (a 50th birthday party).

In the spirit of those last three examples, this week's prompts challenge you to embrace the short story's ability to really dive into and explore one single scene.

This week's prompts

Write a story about a proposal.

Valentine's Day – 211 stories

Write a story about an argument that seems to be about one thing, but is actually about another.

Dialogue – 121 stories

Write a story about a person experiencing pre-performance jitters.

High School – 162 stories

Write a story told entirely through one chase scene.

Thriller and Suspense – 143 stories

Write a story about a summer afternoon spent in a treehouse.

Summer – 303 stories

Stories

“Treehouse Soul” by Annie Hartman

Submitted to Contest #50

I take a deep breath of summer-fresh air, the kind where you have to close your eyes and stretch your arms toward the sky. I look back at the house I just left, the home of my childhood. Three figures sit reverently on the porch. One is my wife, two are my children. They know what I need to do. My wife waves, as if she is pushing the air to blow me away, into the grove of trees. I wrench my eyes away from them and step into the shade of the ash trees. I step slowly and lightly, like I am treading on holy ground. The leaves flutter an...

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“The Fall” by John Barrett

Submitted to Contest #50

Lindsey dreaded the coming fall. All summer, she and Josh had spent every day building their treehouse. They were going to be eighth grade. Things had changed. Tears streamed down Lindsey’s face as she gripped the tool with her hands. She let loose a primal scream and tossed the hammer against the wall as she dropped to the floor of the treehouse that she and Josh had built. She wept in defiance of her situation. Her eyes glanced about the treehouse, perched some twelve feet off the ground in the large maple tree that spread out over th...

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“A Drop of Summer ” by Lisa Katz

Submitted to Contest #50

The candy exploded in colorful bursts along our tongues, sticky rainbows of red, green and blue. Our breathing was short and fast after racing back from the convenience store, our loose rubber soles flapping wildly against the concrete. In front of the house on our corner Mrs. Bellamy had squinted up from behind her daisies, shaking a large watering can at us that we thought too heavy for her bony arms as we passed. But we didn’t mind, the spray of cool droplets felt like kisses on our sunburned skin. High overhead the sun was glowin...

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“The Chance” by Shiloh G.

Submitted to Contest #50

Being in love is a sickness. Being in love is a plague. A plague which raids the mind filling it with far distant fantasies one could dream of. Silly placeholders of dopamine excretions until said individual gets their heart “broken”. Yet, for the most part, we choose to let it wander. We choose, to let it swarm and take over us in its entirety. Sentimentality for objects is one thing but heart palpitations for somebody that you truly adore and admire is rather beautiful. A special longing. Perhaps she already saw through my act.&n...

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“Mr. Sault Peppers” by Steven Thompson

Submitted to Contest #50

Eleven-year-old Stan Littleton closes and locks the empty bathroom door. He turns around and passes the toilet and stands directly in front of the large mirror. “Look at my fine behind, I am so viciously handsome. No more Stan Littleton call me Mr. Sault Peppers, I am the seasoning that makes her food delicious, yeah! This bathroom mirror better appreciates me letting it view my deep seductive looks. This wedding is jamming, but it would not have been lit without the Pepper Man, whoop, whoop”. Stan spins around gestures his hands like a...

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“What You Really Look Like” by Ollie Joyner

Submitted to Contest #50

No one expects to be in a car crash.Many "if only"s crowded my mind as I lay in the hospital bed, hooked up to many machines that monitored me, helped to heal me, and constantly remind me that I would never be the same again.If only I had said no.If only I had left my apartment a few minutes later.If only I had not felt the need to purchase a new outfit for our date.If any of these things had happened, maybe I wouldn't have been hit by the drunk driver on my way to Kohls.But I had, and now I would never be able to walk again, and my face was...

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“The Boss' Proposal” by Karen N

Submitted to Contest #50

Riley stared at Mr. Cray’s tall, broad back, certain that she’d misheard her boss. She was sitting in his spacious office, his huge mahogany desk the only thing between where she perched on the edge of the cushioned chair and where Mr. Cray stood staring out the wall of windows. She continued to watch him, waiting for the punch line to his joke, as he looked out over the city. Finally, she could take the silence no longer. “I’m sorry, sir. I think I must have misheard you,” she said in a strained voice before clearing her throat. She shifted...

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“Memory of the Scar” by RD Smith

Submitted to Contest #50

Cal laid on his side next to Aubrey on top of the furrowed sheets. He stared at her, gently smiling, as everything in the room remained silent while his eyes met hers to carry on the conversation. A gentle, “What?” came out of Aubrey with a laugh at a decibel level that competed with pins on floors. “Nothing,” Cal responds with a smile. And in that moment, he genuinely means it, his own brain unaware of what’s to come. After six years, he knew he could have these two-word conversations forever. To him, they car...

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“TEAMWORK” by Dolapo Omoleme

Submitted to Contest #50

The room stank, but only to outsiders. For the six men who had taken up residence in the room, nothing seemed unusual as far as the air in the room was concerned. It was only when they took the occasional break that they noticed something was off, but even then, it was quickly nudged to the back of their minds by more pressing issues. It had been eight days since they moved into the conference room. It was not unusual to find team members staring longingly at family photos stashed in their wallets; on one occasion, Drew swore he saw Max c...

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“Kibworth Crosses and Golden Eggs” by Cain Adomnain

Submitted to Contest #50

Sit down, son. I want you to learn something about your family and your father. I had hoped I wouldn’t have to tell you this story. I kind of wanted to keep it a secret. But I watched you today going about your business, and frankly, I didn’t like what I saw. Now, now. Yes, I know. But. Here’s the key: You’re not a “de Wystan,” but I am your father. You’re not a “de Wystan” because I’m not one either. I wasn’t born Jean de Wystan. I was born simple Jack Nash. I grew up in a shack. We had nothing, and we were hungry most days. Until I got som...

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“A PROPOSAL?” by Akinkunmi Marvelous

Submitted to Contest #50

It was a gloomy Tuesday. The sky was ring wormed with white patches on the blue ceiling of the sky. The weather forecast had stated that rain would fall for the past four days. As if knowing this, the elements of the earth failed to heed to this man’s forecasting; rather threatening to fall at any split seconds. Monica waited calmly in the Nigerian restaurant on the raucous streets of Rio De Janeiro, her compatriot boyfriend-Gbenga, who had asked for her presence in the restaurant where they had first met. She didn’t know what it was about, ...

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“Cherry blossoms” by Bipasha Mandal

Submitted to Contest #50

“I really do not understand what you mean.”A wild thing hammered in Teesta’s chest as she tiredly said,” Please give me some time to sort things out,” and turned away from Shayon’s face. It was painful to look at him right now. The night breathed, scattering the cherry blossom petals against a sky bright with the ascending full moon. The stinging coolness made her aware of the rivulets down her cheeks for the first time. Aaah…she thought, looking up, the cherry tree, so beautiful…as always. Unaware of hereself, she smiled at...

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“Forever & Always” by Lost Soul

Submitted to Contest #50

“It’s almost time,” Percy thought as he paced back and forth on the lawn. “Today is the day that I’ll ask the one I love to marry me.” Many students have an array of things on their mind on the day of their graduation; if they are going to continue for a higher degree, their friends, their family, parties, career. But not Percy. The only thing he was thinking about is how not to stumble over his words when he asked his childhood best friend and the boy of his dreams to spend the rest of his life with him. He had gone over the list of i...

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“HANKY PANKY & THE MEETING OF THE NINE” by Catherine Teresa

Submitted to Contest #50

October 13, 2008 A sudden flash on the screen alerted the air traffic controller at Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C., that she was going to have to jockey her incomings to accommodate eight corporates: seven via JFK in New York and one by way of CLT in Charlotte. There was also a third party coming in on a commercial airliner from San Francisco, California. Of the 177 souls on board that flight, only the arrival of one seemed to garner any interest: Passenger 4B was to be escorted from his business class seat directly to a ...

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“Nothing but Time” by Brin Lonsway

Submitted to Contest #50

Her heart dropped in her chest when she unlocked the door. Please, no. She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping what she had just seen a glimpse of was a hologram concocted by a 12 hour shift. But, much to her chagrin, when her eyelids opened the scene was still before her. The apartment door was cracked open, her white knuckles on the doorknob. And through the crack there was Shawn, candles cluttering every surface. Rose petals were scattered from the doorway to where he was standing- or, even more to her horror, was kneeling. Rea...

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$50

Prize money

940

Contest entries

0

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Jul 17, 2020 EST

Won by Emily Hemmings 🏆

Title: Life in the Trees

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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