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Write a story in which a stranger warns someone about events yet to come.

Posted in Dramatic on Aug 22, 2025

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✍️ 44 stories

The Sub in Question

Submitted to Contest #317

Introduction and First ReadingAnd the multitudes proclaimed that he who had cast the first sandwich was without sin.Councilman Plessy dissented.“I mean, it was a fucking sandwich,” the mayor murmured, as the Third Ward rep swiped macerated tuna and mayo from his cheeks and his favorite red Monday night polo.“It was fucking assault is what it was!” Plessy raged. “It was malice of forethought, incitation, terrorism against a public official, and I could have been seriously injured.”“Maybe, it’d been toasted or a footlong,” Detective Mead mulle...

31 likes 12 comments 12
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Dear Diary: My Week in Hell (Thanks, Horoscope)

Shortlisted for Contest #317 ⭐️

Monday, 23rd OctoberDear Diary,Well, I've officially hit rock bottom. And it's all because I'm apparently an idiot who believes in astrology now.It started this morning when I grabbed a coffee and saw the newspaper horoscope. "Beware of water today, Scorpio." Normally, I'd ignore this rubbish, but something made me read it. Maybe because Karen from accounting is always going on about "the universe sending signs."So I decided to be extra careful around water. Skipped my shower (gross, I know). Avoided the coffee machine. Carried my umbrella e...

25 likes 17 comments 17
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Knock at the Door

Submitted to Contest #317

The sun had just begun to dip behind the limestone cliffs of Cavtat, painting the sky in molten gold and amber, when Ana noticed him. She had come down to the small, stony harbour to escape the stale air of her apartment and the ceaseless hum of her own thoughts. The town was quieter now, the tourist buses gone, leaving only the low cries of gulls and the gentle slap of waves against the boats.He stood by the edge of the water, motionless, his figure almost blending with the shadows cast by the tall cypresses lining the promenade. Ana first ...

23 likes 7 comments 7
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That Close to the Ceiling

Submitted to Contest #317

I was eating strawberries in the tub when the doorbell rang. Throwing on my blue diamond robe, I dripped all the way to the front door where an old woman was waiting with a basket of apples. For a moment, I wondered if she was going to offer me a trade. My strawberries for her apples. She was wearing a large cloak, and her face was turned down. I realized that this must be the strega who had moved in next door. We hadn’t had a chance to meet, and there was a note on my fridge instructing me to bake croissants for her. The trouble was that cr...

22 likes 11 comments 11
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Silence beneath the soil

Submitted to Contest #317

It was early autumn, a time of year that Beatie adored. Her inner world felt calmer, wrapped in a kind of golden melancholy, the heat and noise of the summer now put quietly to bed. The trees along the path to the allotments had begun to change as their leaves were touched with shades of amber, rust, and crimson, while the air was laden with the scent of damp earth and moss, and the setting in of decay. Beneath her boots the pavement was scattered with green horse chestnut shells, taken from the trees too early in the gale that had blown...

15 likes 14 comments 14
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Watch Your Step

Submitted to Contest #317

My alarm woke me up. Groaning, I rolled over to turn it off. Another day in the middle of nowhere working in a tiny coffee shop. It wasn’t a terrible life. I liked that the town was so small. I was new to it, but everyone seemed to be happy and kind. I was on a first name basis with the mailman already and I’ve only been here a month. I put on my all black uniform, grabbing my black apron. Shoving my arms in my hoodie, I left for the early morning shift. I desperately needed the entire first pot of coffee from the shop. I locked my ap...

14 likes 2 comments 2
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A Love From Beyond

Submitted to Contest #317

A LOVE FROM BEYONDDedicated to my Uncle Paul, whose singing cello led me into music If you could bring back your loved ones back from the dead, this planet would collapse under the weight of all the souls.But I believe they’re all around us, in the wind and the rain, in the morning gold and the twilight blue. We can’t see them anymore but the veil between the worlds is thin. Every now and then the veil tears open and a soul slips through. How else can I explain what happened to me and those around me, changing our lives forever?It began last...

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Annual Purge

Submitted to Contest #317

Woodsbourne should have been a place where life slowed down—a place of quiet streets and friendly faces, the perfect setting for a new chapter. My husband, Matthew, and I had been searching for a home in a small rural town when we stumbled across it: a charming bungalow on the edge of the suburbs, its back garden spilling into a forest that stretched for miles. It felt too perfect to pass up.I was nearly finished unpacking, fluffing the sofa pillows in the living room, when the doorbell rang. At the door stood a middle-aged woman in a patter...

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Luck

Submitted to Contest #317

She held his hand with what seemed like unnecessary force, giving it an occasional squeeze. “And this line is your heart line.” “Of course,” he said, unsure what that meant. She took her right index finger and traced it, languidly drawing a path from one side of his palm to another before swiftly crossing it through in a kiss. She paused and looked up, meeting his eye, then tickling the centre of his hand with the tip of her finger three times. It was a strange sensation. Both irritating and intimate at once. “Very interesting.” Her voice w...

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Journey

Submitted to Contest #317

25.2 Sarah climbed back into the boat, pushed off the dock, and turned on the engine as the smell of gasoline filled the air and the first dribble of rainfall fell onto her coat. (Who, where). Ten minutes later, as rain drops fell hard on Sarah and the mist became like a curtain, Sarah pulled at the collar of her raincoat. (Theme signal) She wanted to go home. She wanted to get back in bed with Annalee and tell her Mommy loves her and she’s sorry for not being there before. That after tonight things w...

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Tomorrow's Child

Submitted to Contest #317

Seven-year-old Maya had always been a peculiar child, but it wasn't until the morning she warned her father about the broken coffee mug that anyone began to take notice."Daddy, don't use the blue mug today," she said, tugging at his pajama sleeve as he reached for his favorite ceramic cup.David chuckled, ruffling her dark curls. "Why not, sweetheart?""It's going to break. I saw it fall and make a big mess." Her brown eyes held an unsettling seriousness, unnaturally grave for such a young face."Maya, don't be silly," her mother Sarah called f...

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Chocolate Mousse

Submitted to Contest #317

The stranger sitting on my kitchen floor has stolen two things from us: a pot of Bubbles of Joy, and my mother’s face. I only know it’s not really her because of the mole swelling out on her nose, in the same place as mine, and the fact mum would never wear a three-piece of such drab black and white.The stranger grins as she places another spoonful of the mousse in her mouth. Her head cocks back, banging the cupboard door she’s leaning against, but she seems to register no pain. There’s a wealth of blood trickling down the side of her head, ...

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Under Her Frayed Hem

Submitted to Contest #317

The taco truck on Santa Monica Boulevard was a living thing. Its fryer hissed like it was whispering secrets, and the air around it shimmered with grease heat and gasoline fumes. I’d been on my feet for twelve hours at the treatment center, scrubs wrinkled, badge half flipped, hair barely holding on under a headband. I’d told myself I wasn’t hungry, but the truck’s pull was gravitational, like gravity itself smelled like carne asada and cilantro. El Grito was painted in screaming reds and sunburned yellows, a skeletal calavera grinning wide ...

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A dream so real

Submitted to Contest #317

Tamara woke suddenly from the oddest of dreams, Her pink betty boop night gown drenched in sweat. Moments after waking up she couldn't remember the dream, panic and anxiety ran through her body as she scrambled through memories trying to capture a glimpse of the dream she had, one that seemed all to real. The next day her heart felt troubled as she felt something was missing, but like most of us she tried to shrug it off and continue throughout the day. She couldn't shake this feeling she couldn't shake this dream. She knew that this dream m...

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The Letter

Submitted to Contest #317

The Letter The junior letter sorter held an envelope up in the air and waved it around to attract the senior letter sorter’s attention. “It’s one of them,” he said, a bit anxiously. “I read about letters with years written in the address bars.” The senior clerk plucked the letter from her subordinate’s pincer grip and looked at the writing on its back. SEND THIS TO July 4th 2025! “These are collectibles. Some guy buys them up for research or something. Big money.” He tapped the thin rectangular envelope wit...

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