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Write a story where someone’s paranoia is justified.

Posted in Mystery on Jan 20, 2023

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✍️ 77 stories

Careful—You’ll Slip, Fall, and Die on Those Slippery Slopes

Winner of Contest #182 🏆

cw: references to sexual assault, kidnapping, and murderThe first time I crossed a street by myself—as in, without one or both of my parents present—I was seventeen. My parents warned me that the outside world was dangerous, and that, if something were to happen to me, I wouldn't know what to do. According to my parents, kidnappers, murderers, and kidnapper-murderers lurked on every corner of our small, suburban town where, statistically, my chances of becoming the victim of a violent crime were less than my chances of being allowed to ...

221 likes 198 comments 198
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Critical Message

Shortlisted for Contest #182 ⭐️

Breath in. Breath out.Please pay attention. What I am about to tell you is of paramount importance.I don’t have much time before she figures it out. I know what I am about to say may be confusing, but if you listen carefully, you will make the right decision.A patter of footsteps on tile down a hallway. The world won’t be what you think it will be in the future.You see, I’m speaking to you from a time beyond your own. It hasn’t happened to you, yet.Voices, muffled through walls.You may be thinking that I am writing this messag...

80 likes 42 comments 42
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Rural Route 12: Bev's Shoes Attend a Party

Submitted to Contest #182

Allergen Warning: Profanity A pink palace in a sea of perfectly-manicured green lawn, the large "shoe-shed" at the back of Beverly Meeks’ property was a beauty to behold and a testament to depraved matrimony. Originally a mid-sized industrial chicken coop, the customized shed now held the footwear trophies of her successful behavior modification experiments on her husband, Dan, throughout the 17 years of their marriage (he remained oblivious). Yards of unending styles and colors “popped” – metaphorically – as the door opened, along with aut...

63 likes 115 comments 115
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Save the Last Dance for Me

Submitted to Contest #182

You look beautiful in that dress, floating under the disco lights like silver smoke. You dance in his arms, but I imagine you spooling apart, drifting out of his hold, back to me. No one else can see the ten slight pressure marks where his fingers meet the softness of your flesh, but I feel them like his hands are on me, not you. And you are smiling against his cheek, wearing a lipstick I have never seen you in, never kissed you in, before. Your first dance of the night is over and others stream onto the dancefloor as the music cranks u...

37 likes 37 comments 37
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The Guest House

Shortlisted for Contest #182 ⭐️

Carson Liao was the richest man in the world, so of course he was always being watched. Reporters were on him like flies on shit the second he stepped out in public. He had bodyguards, bulletproof windows on his limousines, and a security system so high-tech that anyone who breathed in the direction of his front gate got flagged. But this. This was different. This was a nagging feeling, a prickle at the back of his neck. It made him constantly want to glance over his shoulder. He felt it when he was in the back garden giving Gary his we...

36 likes 19 comments 19
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Eyes in the Clouds

Shortlisted for Contest #182 ⭐️

[Content warning: fantasy violence, horror, mentions of suicide] The local folk of the Phantom Stretch had always whispered of eyes in the clouds, but some kinds of terror must be suffered before they can be understood. Foolhardy wanderers paid little mind to what they called the idle chattering of superstitious forest dwellers. The gunslinger had burned the discovered corpses of a few such ignorant outsiders in her time. She’d burned friends, as well, and lost more of those than she’d burned. Some had left border towns destined for the wa...

33 likes 10 comments 10
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Mike didn't come home last night

Shortlisted for Contest #182 ⭐️

“Mike didn’t come home last night.”I gaze at Mia, her lip trembling as the words escape in a jerky sob, and try to find the right platitudes to make her feel better. He loves you. He wouldn’t cheat on you. He probably just needs a bit of alone time. I know I should feel sympathy but I can’t help thinking, I told you so.The first time I met him, I knew Mike Dalton was bad news. Tall and dark with just the right amount of designer stubble and eyes that invited you to bed the moment you looked at him, he smouldered raw sexuality. He wouldn’t be...

32 likes 19 comments 19
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Cicero and Catiline

Submitted to Contest #182

My face burned with humiliation as the other Senators laughed and jeered at me. The entire Senate hall, or curia, as we called it, had turned against me. And the instigator of my shame? Catiline. Who else would it be? That he, an ignorant disgrace to Rome, wished to insult my reputation was no surprise. But that my fellow senators, men of honour and distinction, valued his birth and breeding over my cold logic and flawless rhetoric was a savage blow indeed.I had just completed a lengthy and thoroughly researched speech detailing why Catiline...

30 likes 23 comments 23
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The Agent, the Detective, and the Split Personality Droid

Submitted to Contest #182

TW: Guns, swearing and misogyny.“The next demonstration is in twenty four hours,” said Agent Belle Nguyen.“Where?” Detective Arthas Jacques asked, looking away from the waves below the train.“It’s from an internal memo. They have my communicator, but they don’t know what the message says. They’re guessing the timing based on previous messages. If I was there I would know what the message says. That’s not in the memo though.” She ground her pearly teeth in frustration, thrusting a rogue hair behind her ear as if shoving a stranger out of the ...

28 likes 18 comments 18
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You're Unforgivable, Daddy

Submitted to Contest #182

There’s a stain on my soul. It’s sticky, viscous, the colour of melting tar. And I can feel it spreading.On the surface, all is as it should be. The truck hums discordantly in my ears; my boots compress the pedals. The world flies past me in a dispassionate blur. Ahead, the skies and freeway are empty grey. The cargo remains silent.There’s no sensation like a stained soul. The closest I can think of is uncleanliness. Once, a woman left me and broke my heart, but even that is not comparable. That pain is dull now, smothered by the years spent...

27 likes 17 comments 17
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The Confessor

Shortlisted for Contest #182 ⭐️

MEDIEVAL MANUSCRIPT DATABASE Manuscripts > Digitised Manuscripts > French > XIV Century > 322-511 —----------------------------------------- ~ Access granted through your institution ~ —---------------------------------------- La Roche-Aiguille Manuscript BNF Ms-412 to 416 Date: 7-10[?] December 1316 Author:  Robert of Lyon Fol. N/A Parchment, 5x pieces 250 x 340 mm. Description: Five pages, bound roughly together in the top left.  Presented in order. ___________________________________________ [1] I fear th...

22 likes 8 comments 8
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Break Those Chains

Submitted to Contest #182

Cut those chains as hurtful as it may be. Killing yourself as the day passes not wanting to talk to anybody. Sorry for what you been through, sorry for the struggle. I get that you don't wanna acknowledge it. Isolating yourself in a bubble. Sorry for not helping you although there is nothing that I can do. Just making the situation worse with any word that comes out although I don't attend to. "Just save it man don't mention it. I've gone through enough yet you're piling shit." I'm just trying to help. "Help? You helping me? Sinc...

21 likes 15 comments 15
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Dodged a Bullet

Submitted to Contest #182

I chirped a whistle. Zed pounced through the clear teal water. “You catching fish girl? Hmm?” I rubbed the long fur at her neck. “You might have earned the Purple Heart, but that dog is the real piece of art,” McCall snorted and slapped Zed on the back. She fell back on her haunches and snarled at him, dashing through the sand, taking nips out of the air. “Yeesh, I don’t remember her being this feisty on duty.” Zed sneezed to let McCall know she was only playing, but he backed away a few steps. Clearly, one of my colleagues was more intell...

15 likes 8 comments 8
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Paranoid???

Submitted to Contest #182

She lived in a state of perpetual paranoia or so it seemed. Mama was always looking over her shoulder, peeking under the bed, locking doors and windows and huddling with us in a tiny room every night. I couldn’t understand it, we had a big house with three bedrooms and yet, every night we all huddled together in mama’s room sharing a single bed. We were six siblings and mama. Dad had left us in search of a better life, a better job, more money and the hope of giving us a better life one day.Every evening at sunset mama would hurry us indoors...

15 likes 7 comments 7
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The Grasp of Darkness

Submitted to Contest #182

“You’re total is 23.46,” she said, bagging the last of the woman’s items. A cheap bottle of perfume, an assortment of candy, and nail polish. The woman lingered just a moment, adjusting her items and purse. Then she was all alone.   Kas leaned back against the cigarette case letting her exhausted mind and body take a break. A peek at her watch and groaned. Her shift had just begun. It would be hours before she could go home. God, how she wished she smoked. Smoking meant 3 full 15 uninterrupted breaks. Her eyes found themselves draw...

15 likes 6 comments 6
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