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Start or end your story with someone running away from something, literally or metaphorically.

Posted in Dramatic on Oct 11, 2024

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✍️ 81 stories

Call of the Merrow

Submitted to Contest #272

Having loaded ice chests full of freshly caught crab into the back of his muddy 4x4, secured his sixteen-foot, red and white Orkney Strikeliner to the trailer attached to the vehicle, and returned to the pier to retrieve the nylon-mesh crab pots left behind, Myles Burke caught sight of something bobbing in the water, an object he hadn’t noticed there before.He recognised it at once as an old-style lobster pot, its slats covered in thick, brown seaweed, its netting encrusted with barnacles. Mud and silt clung to its frame, and plant matter da...

62 likes 35 comments 35
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The hour approaches

Submitted to Contest #272

Turn over your shoes to stop the pixies and ogres walking in them. Shut the drapes so the moonlight doesn’t drive you mad.Keep your ladies of the bedchamber close for tis now you need them most.Gold and silver thread shimmer in my candlelit chamber. The figures of three noblewomen standing beneath a garden tree in the tapestry opposite feel as much part of me as the veins in my still slender hands. One holds a bunch of flowers, one carries a basket of eggs, and the third stretches out her hand to a pelican. Symbol of motherhood, it is said t...

46 likes 18 comments 18
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Floating Islands of Peru - Voyages of the Ship Destiny's Dreams

Submitted to Contest #272

Despite the fright from the puma who followed us, we wanted to continue the trek up the mountains after being at sea on the ship for so long.Afraid, yet exhilarated, shivering with thrills, sometimes running in fear with our hearts pounding, we continued into the unknown and wondered if the legends were true.These handwritten words in faded ink were in one of the journals in the wooden trunk. It was found in the attic of a lighthouse on the Mystical Coast. Some of the pages were torn or lost.The journals told the tales of the long-ago v...

42 likes 28 comments 28
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John Field

Submitted to Contest #272

A ghost from the past.Like a haunting ghost story in the literal sense, it is sometimes an event in life that continues to nag and tug at our morals, the challenges to the basic spirit of one’s existence. An event or a series of events where a version of ourselves, the main character in our story, is learning about moral values, and summoning the courage to face adversity in uncomfortable circumstances, both defining character, and the spirit in one’s life.It was the fall of 1971, when Joe was packing his bags for Australia. The thoughts of ...

39 likes 16 comments 16
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The Thrill of The Chase

Submitted to Contest #272

It was already too late. I was a dead man, and I knew it.Her teeth were out and she was coming for me at a full sprint with that insane glazed-over look in her eyes. There would be no reasoning with her. No negotiations. No quarter given. I knew all this and I also knew it wouldn’t be long before she overtook me. Still, self-preservation is a basic human instinct so I ran and I ran hard. I ran for all I was worth.When I reached the fence I had just enough time to slam the gate shut behind me, and I’m sure if I had not she would have taken me...

37 likes 25 comments 25
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Shadowed Intentions

Submitted to Contest #272

Three women missing, so far. Three women in just six months. The daily news has become obsessed with the narrative, smothering us in stories from every angle. It’s all anyone is talking about, since everyone has an opinion. “It’s always the husband,” the shopkeeper says matter-of-factly, crossing her arms. “Did you hear that she turned down a colleague for a date? Sounds like he was bitter about it,” murmurs the waitress at the local café. “Maybe if she didn’t sleep around so much, she wouldn’t have gotten herself into trouble,” says the bar...

35 likes 10 comments 10
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Halloween came early this year.

Submitted to Contest #272

Halloween came early this year.For the history on Miss Abigail Forrest and Captain Jonah Heisson, please see "The house with five doors" Contest 251.Behind the old Victorian house I bought last year is a small one-room church with a Civil War era cemetery. There are twenty-eight gravestones in the yard. Three of the graves are empty.It didn’t taken long before I met Abigail Forrest, a lady, or more precise, a lady of the evening who had lived in the house soon after the Civil War. She had allowed me to read her diary and the letters to the s...

35 likes 32 comments 32
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Forever Haunted

Submitted to Contest #272

I know, I have to run, get away but as yet have't the courage. I am in the corner huddled, naked. I’m more colorful than any clothes I could wear. I’m red, black, purple and blue. Battered and bruised, my crime inquiring about his whereabouts. Together for 6 years now, our beautiful son asleep upstairs and I’m not entitled, according to him, to ask him anything. I am not and never will be the boss of him.I’m replaying my actions and conversation over and over again. He’s never raised his hand to me before, verbal abuse yes, threats yes. but ...

35 likes 10 comments 10
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Bad Reflections

Submitted to Contest #272

I am not a well person. That isn’t easy to admit, even though I understand that it is important to acknowledge that as fact. I am convinced that it all started the night of the storm.After the lightning strike and subsequent power surge from the night before, both washing machines at my apartment complex were on the fritz. It was a minor miracle that we had lost power for only a few minutes. And thank God my expensive surge suppressors did their job. As a combined freelance writer / web designer, I rely heavily on my computers for my livelih...

33 likes 16 comments 16
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The rooftop

Submitted to Contest #272

‘Wait!’ I scream, between coughs. I remember when I used to run up those stairs that fast, with as much ease as she does now. Those were the days!               What I fear has happened, she passed by the science labs and classrooms. She’s not going to stop until she reaches the top. I have to join her. 47 is no age for such barbary. I’m pretty sure I sprained my ancle a couple of floors ago. ‘Miranda, a little help…’ I ask, but my wife’s voice is far behind. I hear her p...

32 likes 5 comments 5
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Obituary

Submitted to Contest #272

I look frantically from left to right, trying to decide which way to go. I don’t know these Pennsylvania woods, and that’s a problem right now. When I hear footsteps crunching through the leaves I just ran through, my heart starts to race even faster. I’m fighting to breathe normally, lest my heavy breathing be overheard by the man who has been chasing me for the past ten minutes. Were it not for my history as a sprinter and the morning jogs I’ve taken every day for the past three years, I’d probably be dead by now. I crouch behind a wide oa...

26 likes 7 comments 7
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Running Toward Yesterday

Submitted to Contest #272

If not for the deafening beat of my heart, the sound of his footsteps would give me the strength to finish the race. Reality quickly confronts me as I peer over my knee; the finish line is only seconds away. However, my body and my mind have reached their breaking point. The once crisp lines dividing imagination and reality, blur in an instant. Those not blurred beyond recognition, divide in two, three, or even four to skew my perception, and the worst of them do both. With my back against the wall, I push through the burning sensation in my...

24 likes 4 comments 4
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The Mirror Maze

Submitted to Contest #272

Content warning: Death of a parent, mental health issues, minor injuries “Happy birthday, honey!” Her Dad walks to the dining table, hand covering the candle’s flickering flame from the fan’s breeze. He smiles with all his teeth. Sarah wishes the smile reached his eyes. As her gathered friends and family sing to her, she smiles but looks past them, locking eyes with the portrait of her mother on the wall. “1…2…3” She has blonde hair, light blue eyes, and a dimple on her chin that only shows when she smiles. It feels like staring into a mirro...

21 likes 6 comments 6
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A CRY IN THE NIGHT

Submitted to Contest #272

A CRY IN THE NIGHTBy Sarah Elizabeth Coulbourn        IT ALL LOOKED THE SAME, damp leaves, fallen branches, patches of snow, mud. Fallon took soft steps.Fallon attuned her attention to her surroundings, steadying herself, careful not to slip, gripping her backpack. Darkness settled in leaving a hazy, maroon blanket of color on the horizon.The girl convinced herself she could still find the way back to her car. Soon she would find a familiar marking, a tree worth remembering from her trek in. Soon she w...

20 likes 3 comments 3
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What She Heard

Submitted to Contest #272

Teresa peered out the window into the blue violet darkness while Joanie cowered behind her. “What was that?” It was a windy night, and the oak tree’s branches danced in the wind, far too close to the shutters“It’s so dark, and I’m scared, Terri.” The girl wrapped her face in the folds of Terri’s slate maxi skirt. “We’re safe. There’s nothing out there.” She pulled the curtain back into place with a trembling hand, then jiggled the lock on the back door. Joanie moved with her. ”I want my mommy, Terri.” She threw herself onto the til...

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