Write a story about someone who feels increasingly irrelevant.

Posted in Sad on Nov 1, 2022

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✍️ 57 stories

“Time matters.” by K.J. Dyer

Submitted to Contest #154

Time truly only matters twice in one’s life. When you are born and when you die. For me, the former matters the most. I’m 1 minute and 39 seconds younger than my sister Mary and those two minutes condemned me to always being her younger sister.However, I’m not the baby of the family. That honor was bestowed on our brother Luke, by exactly 3 minutes and 14 seconds. Yes, my family boasts not one, but two sets of identical twins. The pecking goes; Mary then me, my brother Landon and then our baby brother Luke. Because of the time difference bet...

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“Evergreen” by Josie Lafontant

Submitted to Contest #154

I’ve always liked funerals. There is something strikingly beautiful about gathering to celebrate someone after they’re gone. Bonding with friends and strangers over shared absence. Reminiscing through tears, realizing the happiness that once was. It sounds morbid, but I don’t mean it to be. Grief is a powerful unifier, and I’ve seen the resilience it gives communities, pulling families closer with its worn hands and warm heart. Today is Chelsea’s funeral. It is also my birthday. I am curving through Pine Street for th...

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“Potential ” by Stevie Hugo

Submitted to Contest #154

Mandy told herself twenty seven was still young, as much as she told herself she should just forget about the application. The application that hadn’t moved from her computer screen in five days. The application that waited for her when she woke up, got home, and ate dinner. When she had first begun to fill it out, it all looked so wrong. Her name. Her age. A year older than last year when she had opened the college website. “Like literally there’s five people who are Dad’s age in my class.” Devin had told her, “It’s not like the 80s ...

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“Garden of Agony” by Howard Seeley

Submitted to Contest #154

Soon after the ritual dinner had finished, Yeshua retreated to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray and wait for the inevitable. As the apostles waited by the gate to the garden, Yeshua went deeper inside. Enveloped in silence, and overwhelmed in despair, Yeshua wept. “Why me, Father, and why now? Since the day I was baptized by John and walked in the desert, I knew this day would come. Not for one moment has this thought ever been in my mind. But did I ever hesitate, knowing my final destiny? No! Since I became aware of who I was, have I ever ...

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“Anxiety of the Middle Years” by Jewel May

Submitted to Contest #154

Skirttttttttt the bus's brakes squeaked as they were slammed by the driver. All the kids rocked forward but remained fairly calm. The driver apologized and everyone got off at the last stop. Lizzet walked home that cool, fall afternoon with her best friend Harriet, as she had every other school day for the last 7 years. They had met in first grade and hit it off right away. They spent every summer and every school year, since then, together. 7th grade had just started today and they both were nervous but together they got through it and now ...

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“Figure In the Field” by Fernando Sosa

Submitted to Contest #154

She called to me through my window. It seemed nice outside, peaceful. The rain came down softly and quietly, her voice cut easily through the sounds of droplets on puddles. I met her gaze and she called to me again. Though I didn't see her mouth move, I heard her voice. On nights like these, I sometimes wonder if she will show up. The first time I heard her call was some time ago, and I ignored it. I allowed the static in my head and the beating of my heart to drown her out, and slithered into bed to enjoy another sleepless night. On ...

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“Blue” by Kate Kilbee

Submitted to Contest #154

My dad had beautiful blue eyes. He was also my hero, very sensitive, so funny and he loved to cuddle me to sleep, but none of that stopped him leaving me when I was six. Even so in my teens, twenties and beyond I was only attracted to men with blue eyes, but just the ones who were sensitive, funny and liked to cuddle. Also like my dad they soon showed their true colours. I learned that sensitive meant weak, funny meant they had baggage but I kept searching for the right man. I was convinced he was out there but time after time it was...

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“Tea and Me” by Karen C

Submitted to Contest #154

Anachronism. I repeated it. Jessie’s blank face stared back at me, and I couldn’t help but smile. “Look it up on your fancy phone there,” I said as we both sat on the edge of my small bed. In the next 15 seconds she had tapped at least 40 characters on the screen. She read aloud, “Anachronism: An error in chronology.” “Or?” I prompted. She looked at the second definition. “A person or a thing that is chronologically out of place.” She looked up at me and I could tell she was a little sad. “You feel like that, Nana?” “Sometimes,” I ...

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“Squirrel Blood” by Cajek Veilwinter

Submitted to Contest #154

It has been forty years since our cult has met. I am still here in the woods: carving the visage of our God - missing my friends but missing my God even more. The pine trees outside swayed as the lightning and thunder remarked on the wind. I refresh and refresh on my rectangle... and the trees outside sway. My eyes. I could feel my eyes burn as the blue light filled me with things that I had not felt since the Visiting. I could hear screams deep in the forest. I could see the rectangle’s feed and I feel the harbinger of my god feeding...

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“The Other Side ” by Kevin Alphatooni

Submitted to Contest #154

The day was quiet and the wind blew cold. Sunlight glittered through the frosted window as Kyle and I sat in the middle of hundreds of tiny Legos. Occasionally we reached for a few, instinctively knowing where they lay within the scattered mess, and quickly snap them to our make shift rocket ship. Guided only by our imagination, we laughed while we struggled to give our construct a uniform structure. We kept going back and forth, theorizing where to place blasters and scientific doo-dads. Just about to have a break though, Kyle’s mother crea...

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“The roses in the rows” by MJ Payne

Submitted to Contest #154

Alice gazed absentmindedly out of her kitchen window. Without even looking, she turned off the faucet and wiped off her hand on her apron. She had been looking out the window at this kitchen sink since she needed a step-stool to see out. The aging farmhouse she owned was once owned by her parents and she had inherited it as expected. What wasn’t expected was inheriting it the day after her eighteenth birthday when her parents had perished in a terrible automobile accident when their car plunged off the little bridge that ...

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“Once I was a Warrior” by Ralph Aldrich

Submitted to Contest #154

At one hundred and five, the apache native White Buffalo sits in the reclining chair, looking out the nursing home window. He can’t see much, just the asphalt parking lot and a few blurry trees beyond. His failing eyes see a dot moving about in the sky and assumes it’s an eagle. “Tell me, friend eagle, when will the Great Spirit come and take me to the land of peace and plenty? I have lived too long and serve no purpose. These people here treat me like a living artifact, a credit to the nursing home. Even though I ...

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“The explorer” by Daniel Sentinal

Submitted to Contest #154

His day started the same as each that preceded it. He awoke to the gentle sound of surf breaking over the beach, as early morning sunlight glowed around him. Groaning into a sitting position, he cupped his face in his hands and sighed. His bed was on the sand in the middle of a beach, which stretched out to the left and right, framed by palm trees on the one side and an azure sea on the other. The call of gulls and the smell of brine caressed his senses. After a few minutes he got up, bed and covers sliding down into the ground. As he walked...

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“HOLDING ON” by AR Benjamin

Submitted to Contest #154

“HOLDING ON” I couldn’t see that death had already eloped with my auntie’s body. * When my stepdad would come home at night, I’d usually be worried about him stepping into my room, while my mother slept. This evening, my fears fell like rain over an Indian summer sky. He headed straight for his bed where my mother remained watching the tv. Speaking in a hushed voice that you would only hear offered to babies, he said: “It’s going to be okay…Yes, on a bench, in Pimlico.” “By herself?” my mother asked. “Speaking to herself, alone.”...

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“Therapeutic Youth” by Nolan Pieper

Submitted to Contest #154

Tracy looked over her notes from their prior meetings one last time, “Thank you for coming to see me today Oliver. Your mother said you have been a tad distant lately, do you feel the same way?” “Yeah, I guess you could describe it that way, disconnected, insignificant, irrelevant, it is all the same and none of it really matters anyway but that is okay,” said Oliver. “That seems like quite a negative attitude to have about yourself at your age don’t you think?” “Oh I am sorry ma...

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Write a story about someone who feels increasingly irrelevant.

Submissions are closed

✍️ 57 stories

“Time matters.” by K.J. Dyer

“Evergreen” by Josie Lafontant

“Potential ” by Stevie Hugo

“Garden of Agony” by Howard Seeley

“Anxiety of the Middle Years” by Jewel May

“Figure In the Field” by Fernando Sosa

“Blue” by Kate Kilbee

“Tea and Me” by Karen C

“Squirrel Blood” by Cajek Veilwinter

“The Other Side ” by Kevin Alphatooni

“The roses in the rows” by MJ Payne

“Once I was a Warrior” by Ralph Aldrich

“The explorer” by Daniel Sentinal

“HOLDING ON” by AR Benjamin

“Therapeutic Youth” by Nolan Pieper

🌟 Similar prompts

Start your story with someone saying, “We’re running out of time.”

Write a story — romantic or not — about two characters who can’t find the right timing.

Write a story about an object that has been around for centuries or passed down generations.

Write a story featuring an element of time-travel or anachronism.

Contest #154

Enter our weekly contest!

$250

Prize money

280

Contest entries

112

Stories

Win $250 in our short story competition 🏆

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