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Write about an apartment building being demolished.

Posted in Sad on Nov 1, 2022

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✍️ 42 stories

Releasing the Spirits of The Webster

Submitted to Contest #148

WARNING: this one was inspired by a true crime/serial killer story you may recognize. Although the events of the story are fictional, they are graphic and might be disturbing.    Before this happened, if someone had asked me to quit my job as a wrecking ball operator, I would have told them to jump in a lake. I loved my job, who wouldn’t? Watching that giant ball smash into the sturdiest walls like they were made of straw was a rush like none other, let me tell you. The sound of crumpling destructiveness, the debris explosi...

38 likes 17 comments 17
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Dust in the Air

Shortlisted for Contest #148 ⭐️

I can breathe.They say that it takes approximately seven years for every cell in one’s body to replace itself. This is a wildly inaccurate myth, but it’s nice to think about. It’s nice to feel like that could be the truth - that after seven years, there is no part of you that has ever been touched by the trauma you want so desperately to outlive.It isn’t, though. Many of our cells live from their initial development in the womb to the moment respiration stops, whether death comes at 100 days or 100 months or 100 years. Your permanent teeth -...

28 likes 4 comments 4
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One way down

Submitted to Contest #148

               It was a fitting end to a hostile night.         Clear skies accompanied by a moderate wind blowing mildly across the rooftops of the old Douglas building in Manhattan, brought a sense of relief to the lone denizen of this night, unemotionally looking straight down the side of the building at the rapidly disappearing human silhouette. With an air of witticism summing up the moment… it was… a view to die for…&...

22 likes 12 comments 12
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The Final Thoughts of the Building at the Corner of 2nd and D

Submitted to Contest #148

I knew my demolition would be inevitable. My halls have been left empty for so long now. My pipes are a wet mess of rust and mold. My electrical wiring and conduit have been reclaimed by nature. My insides are nothing more than chewed wires and bird’s nests these days. The carpet on most of my floors has a festering slime in the fibers. Multiple inspectors said they’d never seen anything comparable, and warned against anyone entering. That’s likely why they’re tearing me down. I suppose by this point I’m comparable to a rabid animal, a dange...

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The Caterpillar Gang

Submitted to Contest #148

'She's got it all going on again,' says John, turns the wheel of the Caterpillar and drives off into the yard. Charles takes a Mentos from the XXL jar in the dashboard, offers John a gum, who waves the gesture away. John hates the false minty taste. 'Samantha wants a breast augmentation.'John stares at the little apartment building. The façade is snow-white and black aluminium windows adorn the three floors in symmetrical rows in pairs. 'It still looks perfect,' he says and checks the location on his mobile phone; the address is correct. The...

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Amistad

Submitted to Contest #148

Day 1We just got a letter in the mail. “The Amistad Building, scheduled for demolition on July 1st, 2020. Please, deliver up vacant possession of your apartment on or before July 31st, 2020. We reserve the right to demolish the premises without delay. We cannot be held responsible for any property or persons remaining inside. Sincerely, The Landlord. ” I have been here 60 years; and know all the tenants. It is such a great community, Amistad - Spanish for friendship, we call it. The demolition is set to happen in 30 days. What am I...

13 likes 4 comments 4
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Johnny

Submitted to Contest #148

    “Someone get my boy!” John shouted, amongst the smoke, “don’t worry about me I’ll be fine. Get him! Hes downstairs and he’s paraplelegic. Get him out if you have to drag him!”       John noticed it wasn’t fire fighters helping him, it was community members, and was confused but all he could focus on was Johnny.       Downstairs the flames were quickly moving toward Johnny, who had just been put in his bed for the night by his nurse, Brenda. She started scream...

12 likes 1 comment 1
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The Eleventh Floor

Submitted to Contest #148

I got up at five and drank a hot cup of instant coffee as quickly as I could. The coffee was strong and chased away the half a night's sleep fogging my mind.I thought it was important to really see the place one last time. Jay, my only friend left in Taiwan who can remember what happened told me the old place was coming down. I had chased away the memories for several nights with tall cans of beer.Then one day I woke up and I thought I should look.Then I thought I shouldn't.The Pong game in my head. The ball, expertly flying across the scree...

12 likes 6 comments 6
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Ghosts and Rubble

Submitted to Contest #148

The scent of dust and old wood still lingers in the air. At the bottom of a winding hill behind a hospital, a pile of rubble sits in the center of a chain link perimeter. That pile of shingles and siding was once an apartment building inhabited by nurses, students, young families, and old retirees. If you listen closely, you’ll hear the ghosts imprinted in the rooms and the memories that yet remain. Do you see the crumpled screen door front and center? That was the door to the manager’s office. Under the debris, you’ll see an oak desk wit...

10 likes 2 comments 2
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Mavvith on Mierdsdale

Submitted to Contest #148

WARNING: Mentions of suicide, sexual violence, and muder. My family’s home was right down the street from Mavvith Apartments. All we had to do was open up our spacious living room window that sat right behind our comfy, olive green couch and there you would get the perfect view of the monumental building.     I always found myself sitting in our living room and looking out at Mavvith Apartments. In awe of it. Me, an eighteen year old Black boy, intrigued by an old apartment building that had been around since befo...

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Did Anybody Really Live Here, by Gary Wells

Submitted to Contest #148

“Okay, Sal – time to earn those big bucks!” Sal looked down from his cab on the demolition crane. His partner, Ernie, was looking up at him with a broad smile and a pair of thumbs up. Sal gave a brief salute, then reached down and began to gently maneuver the lever that would send a 4-ton wrecking ball into the ghostly remains of the Pearlson Apartment building. A ten-story structure which had housed more than 500 people at its peak, the Pearlson was the last of four nearly identical housing units to be torn down. The first swing came aw...

9 likes 1 comment 1
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The Rosewood

Submitted to Contest #148

They came from all over and lived for a time at 214 Olive Street. Some lived there for decades. Others only for a few years. They all called it home. At least for a time. The complex, built in the 1950s, was small by modern standards. Just three buildings, two floors each, one unit on top and one on bottom. Arranged in an odd triangle that created an even odder courtyard in the middle. All angles and straight lines, nooks and crannies, caused by the three buildings. Every unit, the same floor plan. A bedroom, a living area, kitchen...

9 likes 4 comments 4
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Shady Maples

M B

Submitted to Contest #148

I don’t know what urge sent me there that evening, but I’m glad I went. They were tearing down Shady Maple Apartments - my first apartment. I pulled over to the side just to see the old building one more time and reminisce. The property was sealed off by a chain-link fence where construction - or rather demolition - workers, along with their bulldozers and backhoes, were all about the building complex. Already the car port was collapsed and the parking lot was being torn apart. Dust drifted into the air along with sounds of the ongoing d...

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The Last Tenant

Submitted to Contest #148

“Yo Aram!” the foreman yelled, banging a flannelled arm on the door to the basement apartment.  “Open up man, we need to talk.”  The foreman banged again.  Footsteps on the other side of the orange door drew close, and then a series of locks dragged and scraped, before Aram appeared in an undershirt, smiling wide. “Larry, yes?  What it is?” Aram asked in his thick Armenian accent. “Everyone was supposed to be out by Friday, but my guys tell me someone is still in apartment three-oh-six.”  The foreman was peeking pa...

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Jenny on the Run

Submitted to Contest #148

Jenny on the Run It was a bitterly cold night, with biting frost and a mist hovering over Dublin’s Grand Canal. The Garda (police) patrol car cruised slowly up one side of the canal and down the other with two officers inside, one older, one younger. They crossed over the bridge onto Percy Place and as the car drove along the georgian terrace the outline of the car was reflected in the glittering water. A solitary figure stood outlined against the light on the top floor of one of the houses watching the scene. The car stopped at the end...

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