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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

Start your story with the line, “By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire.” (Whether this is a literal fire is up to you.)

Posted in General on Oct 24, 2020

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✍️ 361 stories

“Perfect as it Gets” by Julia Boddie

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. I was too late.~~~~~~~~~~The day started when my alarm clock woke me up that morning. I got out of bed and went to go wake up my five-year-old daughter. I walked down the hallway and to the doorway of her room.“Good morning sleepyhead. It’s time to get up for school.”She sat up. Veronica stretched and yawned. I looked at her, looking at her light brown hair, which was a tangled mess. She started to get up and I w...

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“Leaves the Fire 🔥” by Vicky S

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire.The air was thick with smoke and clumps of ash seemed to be falling from the sky. Not that the sky could be seen. It looked like it was midnight. The sun had been blocked by the smoke, great swirls of grey and black and the eerie glow of red as the fire came closer.“Come on Abby, don’t just stand there!”, my dad cried as he ran past, the garden hose clutched in his hands.A trickle of water squirted out of the end as he aimed it at the leaves.The water suppl...

53 comments 53
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“One Last Day” by Felicity Williams

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. Brilliant ruby reds, bright golds, and fluorescent oranges danced across the trees, giving the illusion of flickering. It has been so long since I’ve smelled the fresh, clean air of autumn. A long time since I’ve smelled any fresh air, actually.  “Are you alright, Eliza?” Noah asked, putting an arm around my shoulders to comfort me. He had been there through...

26 comments 26
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“Among Us” by Ｓａｎｔａ Ｃｌａｗｓ

By the time I stepped outside of my house, the leaves were on fire. Literally. It was so, super hot. The whole reason I even had to step outside was to get a break from that stupid party of my sister’s.She got into Oxford. So what? It doesn’t mean that you should get a whole party! (Alright fine, maybe she does deserve it, but still!)Mark my words, I’m going to be even better than her. I’m going to be one of the first astronauts to get into The Skeld, the first spaceship to Mars. Human...

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“Rags to Riches” by ♡ 𝕂𝕪𝕝𝕚𝕖 ♡

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. I heard screams, but the echo was swallowed by the crackling of fire and screams. Horrified screams, but the source was unknown.  Fire was pouring out of me, immersing my entire body in flames. It quickly seared my thin clothing, burning the fabric with ease.  But it didn’t burn me. I didn’t even feel the warmth of the flames whose mission was to devou...

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“Called” by Zilla Babbitt

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. The whole ragged forest of maples, oaks, and pecans was soaked in flames, curling up into delicate black butterflies, drifting to the ground and flung to the sky to smear the gentle early morning with charcoal and ash. I stood for a second on the stone in front of the door, bewildered by cold morning wind mixed with roaring flames that poured in from the south and flickered their way north. This time of year the maples and...

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“To Live for the Future” by Leo Greer

To Live for the FutureBy Caden HillBy the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire.Inside my mind, a forest went up in flames….Have you ever wondered about your future?What it will be like?What does future you look like?How do you dress?Are you married? Engaged? To whom?Children? Two....three….four?Do you finally like that vegetable you never liked as a kid?Do you understand what you’ve lived for?You see, these question are pre...

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“Waiting For Twilight” by ✨ ɪᴍᴀᴀɴ ᴋʜᴀᴋɪ ✨

By the time I step outside, the leaves are on fire. Well, they might as well be. The wind comes alive and sends swirls of crimsons, oranges, yellows and golds dancing through the air like flames. A fitting description—for me, the cool, crisp autumn days are nothing short of hell.Suddenly, a thick, cool grey mass obscures my vision. I glare in frustration, trying to break through its dense, watery coat with a beam of warmth, but to no avail. My rays become faint and diluted, powerless against the heavy clumps that have bu...

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“Burning Desire” by Charles Stucker

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. Life in Texas has changed me from the woman I once was. Clearing brush involves eliminating leaves, so Mike burns them late every spring, when seasonal rain means the fire won't spread. This year he's off chasing someone on ranger business, so our nine-years-old son, Cecil, must take the part of a man."You're doing wonderfully, Cece." He grins at the complement. With school out for the summer, we are both at loose ends, though I am still weeping for a daughter, little Gloria, ...

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“Demon in the Woods” by Leviathan Five

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. In the valley below our cabin, a grove of black walnut, sycamore, and cottonwood trees flickered and popped in the dawn. The stench of acrid smoke filled my lungs as I calculated how far the wildfire had spread overnight. How safe we felt before going to bed. Looking down at the tangle of mountain roads, I wondered fretfully which ones were still passable. We had arrived two days before, a veritable lifetime ago. I...

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“Coming Home Again” by Sarah Greenwood

       By the time I stepped outside the leaves were on fire. It was a good time of year for a funeral. Dad had died Tuesday after a long battle with throat cancer, so I had flown in on the red-eye from California to Rhode Island.             I got to TF Green at seven a.m. and went straight to Dad’s house. I guess now it was Beth’s house now. Beth was my younger sister. She moved in a few months ago to help Dad when he got too sick ...

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“Cockroaches” by Amy Utami

By the time I step outside, the leaves were on fire. Greet me with the summer breeze of zero degrees land. This land was in its summer all the time, without ever experienced the beauty of winter. The leaves have fallen together with their dignity, imitating the autumn that they have never seen. Shannon told me that it was a sign for rain to come, with only two seasons the change often unclear. Indeed, this earth was getting older and human gets more and more greedy.A week ago, Shann...

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“The True Meaning of Autumn ” by ℍ𝕒𝕣𝕚𝕡𝕣𝕚𝕪𝕒 🧛🏻‍♀️👻 𝔸𝕟𝕒𝕟𝕕

The True Meaning of Autumn  By: Haripriya   By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. I couldn’t believe the beauty of the golden shimmers, decorating the floor, with its bright, vivid colors. In multiple shades of yellow, orange, red, green, and dusk brown, there it was, making the ground more colorful. It really was that time of year...

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“Fireflies of Manhattan” by 𝗢.𝗦. 𝗦𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗿

By the time I’ve stepped outside, the leaves are on fire, and the autumn light is so clean it could cut you. All around, everything is just dying away in glory on another rainless upstate day. Behind me, the prison gate clangs shut, and the guy in the guard-house says I can catch a bus down the road. So, I search my pockets for money and find it: the fifty-two dollars I had when I went in. And I breathe. I just breathe the air. It’s clean, and I’m out, and I feel a bit of hope for the first time in almost a year. I think of Dr Paulson’s w...

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“The Third Lotus Prince” by Yolanda Wu

Trigger warning: Description of suicide, not super graphic, but just something to be warned about.By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. All around me, my temple had gone up in flames.However, we are not up to that part yet.Let us start, as all lives start – with my birth.My Mother, Lady Yin, was pregnant with me for three years and six months.The night before I was born, she had a dream. There was a Taoist, he placed something in her bosom and told her it was a child...

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Contest #63

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This week's theme: Autumnal

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Ended on 23:59 - Oct 16, 2020 EST

Won by Masha Kurbatova 🏆

Title: come to atlanta!

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