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Write a story about someone who must fit their entire life in a single suitcase.

Posted in Short Story on Jan 17, 2025

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✍️ 113 stories

A Suitcase Full of Davids

Winner of Contest #286 🏆

Maude dragged her suitcase down from a high shelf in the bedroom closet and opened it on her bed. She was staying with her friend Lindsay, who had graciously offered the use of her guest room when she heard about the break-up."You can have the room for as long as it takes," Lindsay told her. She didn’t know if her friend meant until David came to his senses, or she came to hers. Days after the sudden dissolution of her seven-year relationship, Maude had returned to the apartment she shared with David to collect her things, still grappling wi...

136 likes 93 comments 93
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Through the Peaks

Submitted to Contest #286

My Dearest Darling Theodor,If there’s any taint in the snow-white assurance in your mind that I’m coming to you, let this letter quell that fear. Yes, my love, as I’m penning you this little message, I am attempting to stuff my beat-up mauve suitcase with a fraction of the rainbow of clothes that always made you shake your head and elicit that low, velvety chuckle that cocoons me with warmth instantly. I leaf through the soft, watercolour renditions of the dew-kissed, blush roses at the Schloss Mirabell that have, a myriad of times, pai...

60 likes 63 comments 63
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Life in a Suitcase

Submitted to Contest #286

Life in a Suitcase“You're here to help, you say?” Lefty Long grins his widest Texan smile at the disheveled traveler, Claire Calhoun. “Looks like you need a little help yourself, first.”Claire's unruly curly hair falls in front of her face as she looks down at her rumpled traveling hoodie, black smudged tight faded jeans adorned with unraveling fashion rips spaced strategically down her shapely bike-toned legs and sensible running shoes. The unmistakable charred smell assaults her nostrils once again reminding her how much she craves a nice ...

47 likes 40 comments 40
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Going Blind

Submitted to Contest #286

There wasn’t much time to pack. She remembered her mother saying to throw the hamper into a suitcase and that would do. You can wash it when you get there. For the first time in my life, however, she was looking at an empty hamper. She had just done laundry the day before the sirens went off. They would sometimes get a day’s warning before the hurricanes arrive, but not always. This time it was only two hours, and then mandatory evacuation. Standard procedure was to go to the community center up in the hills near the new Price Condominiums, ...

34 likes 20 comments 20
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A crate too big, too heavy, too far!

Submitted to Contest #286

It wasn’t a single suitcase containing my family’s worldly possessions that created the epiphanic moment in my life. It was a wooden crate, a homemade crate, made with love and consideration to handle with care, a miniature pedal car. A birthday present. It was symbolic of so many changes at that time in my life, changes in many lives. A time of upheaval, which would never ever return to the previous pattern of life for so many; ever again.The surrounding support, comfort and security of a close family would be sacrificed, for higher ideals ...

33 likes 16 comments 16
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FRAYED CORNERS, UNBROKEN SPIRIT

Submitted to Contest #286

The suitcase was old; the black fabric faded to a charcoal grey and worn thin at the edges after years of scuffs and scrapes. The corners were frayed, the stitching was loose, and the once-smooth handle now squeaked in protest every time I tugged at it. It leaned precariously against the edge of the weathered park bench where I spent most nights, as though it were on the verge of collapse. Under the dim, flickering streetlight, its surface seemed to drink in the light, offering no reflection - just a dull, silent acceptance of its condition....

30 likes 32 comments 32
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A Journey and a Packing Case

Shortlisted for Contest #286 ⭐️

Journeys and a Packing CaseMy mom left England when she was four on a great big passenger ship, Avila Star. German submarines sunk her on her return voyage only months later. But the Avila and her crew would give safe passage this one last time, escape from war for this family of five. My mom, at four years old, already had two younger siblings. It wouldn’t be a pleasure cruise, but the Germans were dropping bombs within ear shot of their home, shaking the timber and ravaging their farm fields. The shrieking sirens, wailing the children awak...

26 likes 14 comments 14
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BOB

Submitted to Contest #286

The Camp is an ideal place for secrets but no place for privacy or security. I stow it somewhere safe I can remember. That makes things both simpler and more complex.But they were coming, and I had no other options. The Nine had taken all that away.This world has never welcomed my kind, but although its purpose is to protect the Dwellers from us, the Camps offer us a refuge from their contempt and cruelty.I ask the one the Dwellers call “Cyclops” after some historical figure or mythical being. This is their way of putting us into a context t...

25 likes 4 comments 4
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It's a Pity

Submitted to Contest #286

It is springtime in this littoral wasteland. Heavy Gulf weather, having relieved itself over the Mesopotamian Marshes, hangs oppressively upon these blown-up shores. The midday atmosphere smothers every cooling breeze whispering off the recumbent sea.As war machines desolate this slip of land, the writer seeks shelter in metaphor. The birds in his rafters shuffle, and sigh. The sun’s first rays have awaked them. Hunting drones predate above his creaking attic. Their sites have discovered his aerie. Like the pity in his rafters, distractedly ...

25 likes 19 comments 19
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Sadie

Submitted to Contest #286

“Can I bring Sadie, Mama?”“No, I’m sorry. Only what fits in your suitcase. Please, Esther, hurry up.”I looked at Papa beseechingly, hoping he would allow me. He was busy packing his own case, tucking the tiny velvet pouch of coins into the lining of the interior.“You heard your mama. Be a good girl.” He smiled at me gently.Mama handed me a loaf of hard bread wrapped in a kitchen towel. “Squeeze this in, please.”“I can bring stale bread but not Sadie?” I was astounded.“You want to go hungry?” She looked...

23 likes 10 comments 10
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Suitcase Traveler

Submitted to Contest #286

It is cold when you are riding the rail, but what choice do I have these days. Got my bed roll unpacked in this Hooverville and we sittin’ around the campfire playin’ my harmonica to sad blues tunes and tellin’ stories of our travels. I tell ‘em I am Amos Wright from Greenville, Mississippi, son of a sharecropper who runned away. Now I was tol’ we’s somewhere north of Wichita. “So, Amos where are ya headed.” Balou, a redheaded Cajun, asks me. “Wherever there is work.” I lean back on my night roll. “Gotta be careful. Lot...

18 likes 3 comments 3
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Fire Escape

Submitted to Contest #286

Geoff’s phone kept ringing. He knew it was Madelaine, his hysterical friend… girlfriend? ‘Mad,’ for short. Who else? He didn’t pick up. He knew what it was about. He didn’t need to hear, again, how foolhardy he was to move into the hills.He was busy. Half an hour ago the evacuation order gave him an hour. Wind buffeted his house. Hundred mile per hour gusts were predicted. A siren wailed by. No rain for months. Fire was racing down the canyon toward him, driven by Santa Ana winds.Everything in his life had gone insane. He had minutes to choo...

17 likes 6 comments 6
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The Tiny Suitcase Project

Submitted to Contest #286

I was slouched on the soft carpeted floor with a small suitcase and a closet bursting with possessions. A closet filled to the brink of exploding, and a tiny suitcase. A minuscule suitcase, and a closet of chaotic festivities. I looked back and forth between the empty compartment lying still on the floor and the wide-open wardrobe doors with robust colours and frivolous items dancing uncomfortably off-beat. As I gazed deep inside, I rendered this task futile. It was impossible to fit all my possessions inside the worn-out bag sitting by my k...

15 likes 8 comments 8
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The Choice

Submitted to Contest #286

(This story is about a fire evacuation.) The air filter machine whirred in competition with the TV anchor's urgent plea for viewers to follow local authorities' edicts. My phone showed "Evacuation Zone Level 2," meaning "Be set to depart on a moment's notice." John and I had been through this before but never had to leave. Usually, I liked the expansive view from the east window, but today, the emerging tsunami of red and brown toxic smoke felt apocalyptic. Deep inhale. Breathing is still okay. Asthma medicine holding up.  Still staring...

15 likes 4 comments 4
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$526.41

Submitted to Contest #286

     “Don’t forget your paycheck!” Will’s manager called from the back room as Will clocked out of the hardware store he worked at. He went behind the desk and picked up the legal envelope that contained his current life savings. As he stepped onto the sidewalk of late-night Rocky Springs, Wyoming- the small city he resided in- he ripped open the envelope and did a double take of the amount.      $526.41?! he thought, sighing slightly.      Will was 18, fres...

14 likes 10 comments 10
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