Menu

Menu
Prompts
Contests
Stories
Blog
Directory
Contests
Magazine
FAQ

Write a story that spans a month during which everything changes.

Posted in Sad on Oct 31, 2022

Submissions are closed

Make sure you don't miss our next contest by creating your free Reedsy account.

Sign in with Google
Sign in with Facebook

Or use an email address:

Why not check out our active contest?

✍️ 131 stories

Strong Exhale

Winner of Contest #89 🏆

Hugo-Day one, the hottest day in July. The kind of hot that makes the neighbors forgo underwear and plant themselves in front of oscillating fans. Feet planted in small kiddie pools filled with tepid tap water, topped off with bagged ice from the corner market. The breeze from the fan casting across the iced pools does nothing to diminish the warmth from their radiating bodies. Instead it pushes the sweat further across their faces and thighs until they are all shiny with sweat.It’s nearly impossible to forget day one. You try, yet day one i...

309 likes 257 comments 257
Read story

Not Alone

Submitted to Contest #89

March 1st, 2020 Sunday Dear diary, It’s a new month, a new week, a new beginning. Today was the first day of 10th grade. It was as expected, and about as normal as it gets when you are a 10th grader. The lessons get tougher, the teachers get stricter, and the eight-hour school day just results in a headache and a slowly increasing urge to lie down somewhere, anywhere. My friends and I are as nonchalant about this year as we are about every year we have had. We just go with whatever happens next. I have homework to do, so la...

76 likes 47 comments 47
Read story

'The girl in the park'

Submitted to Contest #89

It was a month ago when I saw her for the first time. It was a perfect morning: birds flying in the sky, the trees swaying in the gentle breeze, and the morning sun casting its golden hue everywhere.Like me, she was also walking in the park, a tall pretty young lady.Something about her caught my eye.I knew it was rude to stare, but I still did.After a few rounds of walk around the park, she came and sat on the bench near me. I gave her a smile, and she smiled back,I noticed she had radiant green e...

72 likes 35 comments 35
Read story

Broken

Submitted to Contest #89

My name is Ben Anderson and I’ve always wanted to be a father. My wife’s name is Lisa, and after a few years of trying we finally got lucky. Our soon-to-be-born baby is due this month. Lisa wants the gender to be a secret and that’s fine by me. Just the thought of being a father makes me the happiest sap on God’s green earth.   I work at Wilson’s Lumber Mill, but it’s not my final resting place. Oh no sir...I have big plans to open my own pet shop down the road. I want to give my wife and child a life that they can be proud of. It ...

45 likes 19 comments 19
Read story

Don't Look Back

Submitted to Contest #89

Snow, the coldly white surface, the soft white blanket, which hid the jagged rocks below. Like a deadly beauty, the iron fist in a velvet glove.I shivered involuntarily, as I looked at the seemingly innocent falling snowflakes, covering the vicious terrain like a dense fog, making those jagged rocks look like a plain.I let out a sigh, another lonely Christmas. Why? oh why did it have to snow today?I knew better than to step out, one wrong step and goodbye sweet world.I looked at my empty cup, with a few sugar crystals at the bottom.Sighing, ...

44 likes 23 comments 23
Read story

The Itch

Shortlisted for Contest #89 ⭐️

She couldn’t focus on what her boss was saying because of how much the bug bites on her leg itched. Her dress pants had gently kissed each bite as she walked to his office, waking up those pesky red dots from their hibernation. They screamed to be itched now. Beat on her temple, ‘Scratch me! Scratch me!’ Leaning over, she rubbed one on her knee to calm the chant. Ugh, she knew she should’ve worn bug spray while camping. She gave herself a pass because it was winter and she hadn’t seen a mosquito in months, but a smart person would've ac...

42 likes 15 comments 15
Read story

Nothing last forever

Submitted to Contest #89

*A true story in my life- please read it would mean the world to me*JANUARY: It was a cloudy spring day in Connecticut, but it wasn’t a nice day for everyone. My sister Temi lies in the hospital with stage four cancer. She was only diagnosed today and was struggling for her life at the age of four. I wanted to help her, but I was only ten. I didn’t want this to be one of the days whereI set up a go fund me, or set up a walk-a-thon for her. I wanted her to live. I watched her breathe through a tiny tube, within her li...

41 likes 15 comments 15
Read story

Ritual Burn

Shortlisted for Contest #89 ⭐️

There are some places that just don’t look right when viewed in the light of morning. The main stretch of Angelwood had a washed out white light and sat at a tilt; all the storefronts seemed to lean drunkenly in at you when you looked straight down it. Morning made a deserted fairground out of the streets. It was almost embarrassing.  I was doing what anyone with a a brain would do in Angelwood at ten in the morning. Anyone who wasn’t wisely still asleep under cover of absolute darkness. I was sitting in a bar, leaning against the corne...

39 likes 5 comments 5
Read story

Hell Hath No Fury

Shortlisted for Contest #89 ⭐️

Hi, lovelies!   A few content warnings: cursing, suicidal thoughts, death, and a brief mention of substance abuse.   Thanks for reading!   ---------   It started with an envelope - white and innocuous save for the “time sensitive” stamp in the bottom right corner. Whoever it was had spelled my name correctly, which was a rare occurrence among the spam mail I regularly received.    Siobhan O’Rourke.   Yes, my family is Irish, I would deadpan to whoever asked, as if it weren’t the most obvious thing in the wo...

39 likes 14 comments 14
Read story

Just a month for Jenny

Submitted to Contest #89

We should probably start at the beginning, or somewhere close to it. Jenny found a body. Don’t worry, it wasn’t dead. But one doesn’t often find their sister’s boyfriend in their bed. Most people at least. Luckily for Jenny not many people really knew her. At least she felt lucky. One thing for sure, he didn’t know her from Marry, Jona, or the Whale. That she knew when he called her ‘Molly’ upon waking up.  She went about her morning by herself, while he of course ran back to her sister, like a loyal puppy. She’d call her sister lat...

34 likes 4 comments 4
Read story

Cherry on Top

Submitted to Contest #89

February 6, 2020“Every day in this place is like eating a big ol’ bowl of shit.”Jimmy looks at me when he says this, but really he’s talking to the guard who is getting ready to lock the heavy metal door to our two-man cell. It's Officer Beaudoin. Big fat creole guy from way out in the swamps south of New Orleans. I been down there once when I was a teenager. Not much difference between land and water far as I recall. His gut is hanging way out over his belt, Beaudoin's is, but he doesn't care one whit about that.Beaudoin rolls his eyes. He'...

28 likes 10 comments 10
Read story

Supposed to

Submitted to Contest #89

It was Mitty’s birthday, but that didn’t matter; he was shouting again. This time he was in the kitchen. His voice was loud as he yelled, “Benvenuto Cellini said you should be able to see the story of your life by the time you're forty years old!” Pfeiffer was picking up toys in the living room. She liked to keep herself busy when they were fighting.“Sorry, we’re not good enough.” She said.“It has nothing to do with you.” He said.“How can you say that? I’m your wife.”“So what? It’s not that. It’s me. It’s what I’ve done.”“You’re a great...

28 likes 3 comments 3
Read story

Mile Marker 112

Submitted to Contest #89

I became a mother at 15, technically the day I had my daughter, Sarah, I was exactly 15 ½ and should have been getting my drivers permit. We had already had two trips to the hospital for false labor, so that morning when I told my mom that I was having contractions, she figured she had time given that it was my first baby and the labor is typically longer. I didn’t realize that my back hurting and being unable to get comfortable or sleep all night was the first stage of labor.So my mother started getting my brothers ready for school, we all ...

26 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

Love and Truth

Submitted to Contest #89

A rapid noise of clicking feet outside her net-covered window attracted her attention. A domestic pigeon was caressing his purplish-grey wings with its head and simultaneously pecking at the backside of the window AC it stood on with its pink twig-feet. A few weeks ago, a pair of pigeons made their nest beside the AC on the bay below the window. The large Ashoka tree hid the September sun behind it's dense foliage, shading their family.  Sella had gotten a new hobby of looking at them. Fascinated by the Mama pigeon warming up ...

25 likes 7 comments 7
Read story

Fallen Flowers

Submitted to Contest #89

"What's your favourite colour, Amelia?" "Pink!" "Your favourite fruit?" "Strawberry!" "What do you want to be when you grow up?" "A scientist!" They asked the same boring questions, and Amelia would answer them with the same prepared answers along with her naive enthusiasm. The girls would fight her over liking pink more. Her servants would bring her baskets of strawberries, and the grown-ups always praised her for choosing to be a scientist in their abundant gatherings. "What is a scientist?" that was what nobody asked her, a good t...

25 likes 6 comments 6
Read story

🌟 Similar prompts

Start your story with a character taking a leap of faith.

Middle School – 151 stories

Write a story where one person is trying to say goodbye but keeps getting interrupted.

Middle School – 154 stories

Write about someone who is always looking toward the future.

Adventure – 77 stories

Start your story with an ending and work backward toward the beginning.

Fiction – 201 stories

How to Write a Novel

Join Tom Bromley for a writing master class and finish your first draft in 3 months. Learn more →

How to Write a Novel