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Write about someone making a seemingly inconsequential decision, which goes on to have important consequences.

Posted in Narrative on Oct 26, 2022

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✍️ 152 stories

Honeylove

Submitted to Contest #95

Trigger Warning: LanguageDavid slipped on the latex gloves as he surveyed the stairs going down into the darkness of the basement. Although it was too early for the body to start smelling, he secured his double-layered mask before cautiously starting the descent. With each step forward, the stairs creaked eerily, filling him with dread. Usually, David loved going down the basement staircase for his daily rendezvous with his victims, who lay on the dusty wooden floor, bound and gagged and terrified, completely at his disposal to do as he plea...

145 likes 99 comments 99
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Takeout & Delivery

Submitted to Contest #95

Is that it? Silver Toyota Land Cruiser. Ubers are almost impossible to spot until they nearly drive up on you.Virginia grabs her luggage and double checks the Uber app on her iPhone for the driver’s name. Lee. She dutifully takes note of the license plate to compare before entering the vehicle. She isn't going to make that mistake again.“Who are you here to pick up?” she asks the middle aged driver wearing an Orioles shirt, who neither turns around to greet her nor asks to help with her luggage. Does he want a two-star rating? “Ginny,” ...

120 likes 103 comments 103
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Paola get's her life now

Submitted to Contest #95

She was in a passenger car on the capital world of Cressida, it had been almost five years since she’d last taken a passenger train, and she could say now that it was overrated. Paola was happy to have bought tickets for the first time with her own notes, but having been in the overcrowded train car for the hour it took between Luke and Hryhoriy, she could only feel the waste of five Nicks. The only thing that could’ve made it worse was bad company on the other end, she knew a good bit about the good folks in Hryhoriy, the kinds that worked ...

50 likes 1 comment 1
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THE PERFECT HAUNTING

Submitted to Contest #95

 THE PERFECT HAUNTING              By Prapti Gupta "Rose, are you ready? We are getting late for office." "Yeah, just 2 minutes" I answered my boyfriend Chris. I was about to leave when suddenly the telephone started ringing. Nowadays who uses telephone? everyone uses smartphone. But still I picked up the phone. "Hello? Who's this?" I could only hear some hush sounds coming from the other side and a woman mumbling something. I again asked who was that and I could barely he...

48 likes 11 comments 11
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The Girl With Fire In Her Eyes

Submitted to Contest #95

CW: Mentions of murder and crime (but not much)You hold the hilt of the dagger in your hands, its metal pressing against your frostbitten arm. You've never held a weapon before, and wielding one makes you feel strong. Powerful. You take a deep breath and run the blade through the rope, slitting it into two with a snap that makes your blood run cold."Go," you say in a voice so hoarse you can't believe it's yours.The ten-year-old girl, the one you've just freed, looks up at you with large eyes, as if she can't believe you're letting her go. Sh...

47 likes 19 comments 19
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The Consequences

Submitted to Contest #95

TRIGGER WARNING: Teenage pregnancy.Mom often preached about how I needed to take into consideration the consequences of each decision I made. She said each choice presented to me needed a decision that required action. She warned me that those actions would impact my entire future—no matter how insignificant the decision seemed. I never understood what she meant until I became a mother myself. My son came into this world because of a series of minor decisions I made one year that melded together and snowballed into the size of Mount Eve...

30 likes 25 comments 25
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The Great Wall

Submitted to Contest #95

The house we owned in France was edged, land wise by our nearest neighbour, Christian, whose farmhouse was some 3 km’s away. Christian would wave at me and my wife as he passed along the public lane in his trusty old Ford tractor leaving a cloud of black diesel smoke behind him. One Sunday, we were having lunch alfresco with a couple of French friends Patrick and his wife Blandine. We were about to sample our third bottle of wine each, when Patrick asked if we had heard of the French pass time of cloud spotting, which for those uninit...

30 likes 21 comments 21
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The Little One

Submitted to Contest #95

The girl gasped in fright and turned around; there wasn’t anything to really get scared of. It was just her little cousin, Mila, who suddenly emerged from behind her and tapped her flip-flops on the concrete. Her fear vanished in a second, and she smiled softly. Her little cousin had a special place in her heart; she could never remain sad or angry at her. She was so small and cute it was impossible not to feel warm inside at just the sight of her. She was beatific; her youngness and innocence radiated through everything she does and the ...

28 likes 7 comments 7
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It Gets Better

Submitted to Contest #95

TW: Mental health issuesIt reached a point where it probably wasn’t safe for me to be alone in my home with my often dangerous thoughts. The symptoms were bad, I admit. I couldn’t get out of bed, my focus was terrible, people had to repeat things to me when I bothered to communicate with other humans at all. Everything felt far away from me, like the world around me was in another dimension and I was just holed up in my own little bubble. All sounds would dim, and even my eyes would blur at the edges of my vision. I felt like a zom...

28 likes 40 comments 40
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Blatta

Submitted to Contest #95

When I saw him, I knew I had to kill him.I crept up from the darkness. I stuck to the gloom — so that I didn’t reveal my location with a misplaced shadow. I took my time, moved with grace. No flurry of movement, no loud swishes of cloth. I swam through treacle, breath all but held, chest tight, hands wet with sweat.Not a big deal, most people would have done the same. It wouldn’t register a blip on the radar of the average mind. Wouldn’t weigh on a normal citizen’s conscience. It’s not like I stopped and debated it for a long time, weighed u...

25 likes 6 comments 6
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An Invisible Story

Submitted to Contest #95

A burly looking surly officer lumbered towards the fireplace, and took a seat in its closest vicinity, with the ensuing screeching shriek. He was hardly in par with the yardstick of masculinity, with his behemoth physique and boisterous disposition.       Leaning forward, he presented me with his first question of the interrogation session."For how long have you known the Nelson Publishers?"His close proximity frazzled my nerves, and I staggered back on my seat. Seeing the pallor spread on my face, he mouth...

22 likes 6 comments 6
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The Curcumin Queen

Submitted to Contest #95

Pick turmeric. Pick me.  Pick the curcumin because it's rich in everything and will make you in its own image. Golden and bright and glowing. Pick it and turn your world into an orb for feasting. Dance with me. I will tell you about Marco Polo and how he loved me once, in China. Or how my plant's name is thought to mean 'sacred earth'. Hear me. Pick me. Take me. With you. I heard the words without registering exactly where they were coming from or what they meant, really. It was in the grocery store... No, not in the big grocery sto...

21 likes 2 comments 2
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Cheryl's Funeral

Submitted to Contest #95

Hot, angry, and impatient, I had wandered half-way down the tree-lined block, waiting for my co-worker to finish up. She had a few more photographs to take, and the open road beckoned. We had covered the Memorial Day groundbreaking ceremony for a much-anticipated seventy-million-dollar opera house and performing arts theatre in one of the poorest states in the country. My state of jadedness was at an all-time high. I have no gripe with opera, or the arts in general, but more than three hundred thousand children were living in poverty in thi...

19 likes 0 comments 0
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Apple vs Orange

Submitted to Contest #95

Apple or orange? An apple or an orange? I wake up every morning with the same dilemma. Here I am again, do I eat the apple or do I eat the orange? This is quite a simple decision, it’s not life-changing in any way, shape, or form. In theory, it is supposed to be such an easy choice, but I just cannot decide which one to eat. I am standing here with both fruits in front of me. Apples are good, oranges are also good. I like both of them. I have eaten three oranges this week and only one apple. There is only one orange left so I will save it an...

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The Shot

Submitted to Contest #95

THE SHOT Sarge: Look. There he is. The sentry. He keeps coming in and out, looking around. He doesn’t see us. When he comes out again, we can just pop him and take him out. Private: Easy as shooting fish in a barrel. S: You ever shoot fish in a barrel? P: No, it’s just a dumb old saying that means how easy it is. S: Back home, we’d shoot catfish, right in the lake. They get close to the surface, and pow! Suppertime. P: Where I come from, only the bad guys had guns. I never fired a weapon until boot camp. But I learned pretty quic...

18 likes 0 comments 0
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