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Hide something from your reader until the very end.

Posted in Dramatic on Jul 25, 2025

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✍️ 121 stories

The Runaway Wife

Submitted to Contest #313

I hate matrimonial cases, especially runaway wives. They always remind me of Tara. Charlie was wearing red high heels, white capri pants, and a top that left nothing to the imagination. The smile on her face was of a woman that knew exactly what she wanted. The man next to her was mid-50s, tan, wearing a short sleeve linen button-down, jeans, and loafers. He put his arm around her as they walked down from Pier A and into the W Hotel in Hoboken. Keeping a safe distance, I managed to get a half dozen shots off with my Canon SX620. I waited in ...

37 likes 21 comments 21
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Big Little Man

Submitted to Contest #313

The curtains were drawn against the mid-June light. The heat it brought to this London afternoon was uncomfortable, within and without. A woman in a nursing uniform sat near the window, knitting a baby’s layette and marking the rows on a cylindrical counter at the end of her needle. The other woman, on the other side of the bed which divided them, was reading a newspaper and tutting at its content. ‘I swear there’s going to be another war,’ she said to the nurse opposite. ‘And then there’s our erstwhile king living abroad with his American w...

24 likes 14 comments 14
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Culinary Deviant

Submitted to Contest #313

The door to the manor’s third floor private chamber creaked as it opened, revealing a frail silhouette lit by the soft glow of beeswax candlelight. Alice Read crept through the unoccupied room and awoke the dormant hearth. Sweat glistened off the young girl's tired face as she sat at the foot of the large oak bedframe to catch her breath and calm her nerves in front of the growing fire. Though Alice was many moons away from womanhood, a life of poverty and servitude had robbed her of her youth. Her hardened face had long abandoned its he...

21 likes 4 comments 4
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Seeds

Shortlisted for Contest #313 ⭐️

Will lifted the bread roll towards his mouth without cutting it. The plate was too far away, as usual, and he moved without care, as always.A trail of poppy seeds marked the path his hand took from porcelain to mouth, puncturing the surface of the white tablecloth like a blood splatter. He was marking his territory. Lording over everyone else. He owned the space. He could do as he liked.Of course, he’d simply think she was fussing. Reading too much into it. It’s only a few bloody seeds, Sophie. She looked up, and their eyes locked over the s...

19 likes 11 comments 11
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Unsolved Disappearances

Submitted to Contest #313

There have been many missing people reported over the last few weeks. Twelve, to be exact. The last one was 3 days ago. A 21 year old man named Garnet Wells. Black hair, grey eyes, peachy skin. Height: 5 feet, 9¾ inches. Weight: unknown. He was last seen at the bar on 3rd street. Why do I know all of this? Because I’ve offered to help Detective Marralin with the case. I’ve had some experience with solving mysteries. My father was a police officer. He was also the investigator for his search team. And my mother was on a crime show for a littl...

15 likes 0 comments 0
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Legacy

Submitted to Contest #313

Ted Pierce entered the country club his father had belonged to most of his life. He looked around, unimpressed.Looks like any old country club to me. He kept inviting me. For what? Glad I didn’t waste my time.A staff assistant approached.“Mr. Pierce?”Ted nodded.“Sorry for your loss.”“It’s alright. Better late than never…”The staff assistant nodded and did not comment. “Come with me. The others are in the conference room awaiting your arrival. Mr. Woodrow will read your father’s will in a few minutes.”Ted gestured at their surroundings. “So, ...

15 likes 4 comments 4
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Captain Billy Chunk: Cold Bay or Bust!

Submitted to Contest #313

Cheese and Crackers! What is that Captain Billy Chunk up to now? Well, suspend your disbelief and grab a steaming cuppa of Folger's, light up a Camel no filter & enjoy this tangled mess of a yarn..... Captain Billy Chunk: Cold Bay or Bust! Chapter One: Mouth of the Rat Magnus was cold. Magnus was old. He had been cold since birth, there in the shadow of his big brother Wernher. He had been cold at Peenemunde with the chill North Wind blowing off the Baltic Sea watching his big brother's firework show. Now, 86 years old, he was in Florida...

15 likes 5 comments 5
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The Child

Submitted to Contest #313

Short Story: The Child by Frances Gaudiano Each farm was its own nation, complete with its own people. And those people had their rules and customs - what they ate for Sunday dinner, if they went to chapel or not. The women had their regular costume as did the men. They even spoke their own language, in words veiled with generations of meaning. Stepping in as an outsider, I felt the fog close around me, shutting me off from the rest of the world. I could no longer see the main road where I had left my car, only the house before me. Stone p...

13 likes 4 comments 4
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The Unexpected Stranger

Submitted to Contest #313

The knocking had seeped into her dreams, along with the wailing of the wind. She dreamed she was being chased through a graveyard, alone in the night, running for her life. She heard heavy footsteps behind her and knew he was getting closer. Her small legs pushed forward, but his hand reached out and caught the hood of her jacket, and she knew this was the end.Her screams rattled her awake, but she still didn’t feel safe. The branches of the huge maple tree in the front yard, outside the two windows at the front of her room, were now complet...

12 likes 0 comments 0
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A Fight For Peace

Submitted to Contest #313

When the clouds come around you, You will reach for the sun, When life tries to force you, stay true, You will learn to find peace when the day is done, When the danger engulfs you, don’t run. By saving their lives you will conquer all harm, When you see, you will die in my arms. The words played in August’s head as the blue sky soared above him, through the dappled leaves of the yard’s oak. He sat in its lowest branch, as he always did with his free time, content to daydream. Before he could spend time considering the words, his older sist...

12 likes 6 comments 6
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Pages Taken Out of a Journal Behind a Diner in Kansas

Submitted to Contest #313

Monday I left them a letter, so they’ll know why I’m going. I didn’t tell them where, though, so they won’t be able to follow me. I first planned on just walking the whole way, but, once my original enthusiasm for the idea had worn down a bit, and once I started to get hungry, I stopped by the side of the road and held out my thumb. Not expecting much of it, I was about to turn to walk back to the gas station I’d seen about a mile before when somebody actually stopped. It was a big truck, with a big man sitting in front who had a...

12 likes 2 comments 2
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The Battle of Maldon, August 991 CE

Submitted to Contest #313

(Warning: this story contains physical violence appropriate to the historical period) The pain was intense but only for a moment. My blade swept my foe’s spear aside at the last moment. Mighty Odin had saved me again and granted me the victory, my enemy’s body laid out at my feet. I shook my head to clear his blood from my eyes.All around me, Saxon bodies lay strewn on the earth. Their foolish lord, what was his name? Byrthnoth, or some such unpronounceable Saxon name. Olaf Trygvasson had led our fleet to this small isle where we planned our...

12 likes 8 comments 8
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The Schonberg Hoax

Submitted to Contest #313

Can someone disappear right before your eyes? Magicians and illusionists have sold us on this idea for centuries, but in the concrete world of investigation, this type of hocus-pocus is not considered feasible. When covert criminal activity is involved, there is always a victim and perpetrator. My professional instincts have usually prevailed or so I thought until a few years before I hung up my badge for good. Sitting on my front porch with my coffee in one hand and my book in the other, I enjoy the peace and solitude earned with forty yea...

12 likes 5 comments 5
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Time to go

Submitted to Contest #313

Where’s your shoes? Come on guys, seriously, we need to move”“Mum, where’s my oodie?”“I’ve packed it already, just grab your bags, we need to leave”“But I need my oodie”“Now! let’s go, grab your bags and get in the damn car”I laughed as my best friend marched her tribe out to the van. She smiled at me as her 4 kids piled out the door. Bags and hats, shoes in hands. They had been planning this trip for months. I was looking after the house and the animals for them while they were away for a two-week camping trip to the Blue Mountains.The van ...

11 likes 3 comments 3
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The House On 13th Street

Submitted to Contest #313

I return to the house every day, just as I always have. It sits on the corner of Thirteenth and Badger, a tired skeleton of what it once was. The white paint flakes like dry skin. The porch sags on the right side, where Daddy used to stack firewood every fall. The windows are boarded up now, but I still know them by heart—the one in Mama's room with the pink curtains, the one in mine that faced the street, where I used to press my forehead against the glass and watch the rain run like tears. The grass is high, swallowing the walkway, like th...

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