Write a story about another day in a heatwave.

Posted in Summer on Oct 26, 2022

Submissions are closed

Sorry, we are not accepting submissions for this prompt as it is not part of an active contest. Make sure you don't miss our next contest by creating your free Reedsy Prompts account.

Or create a new Reedsy account:

Why not check out our active contest?

✍️ 177 stories

“Mermaids and Fan Hogs” by Stacey Fultz

Submitted to Contest #53

“Ahhahhhahhh ahhhahhhahhh ahhhahhhhahhhh…” “Stop making so much noise! You’re bugging me! And you’re hogging all the air!” “I’m singing like the mermaids. Listen, the fan makes it like I’m under the sea. See, ahhahhhahhh ahhahh—!” “Boys can’t be mermaids, stupid!” “They can too be! Momma says I can be whatever I want, and I want to be a mermaid! Ahhhhahhhhhahhhhh ahhhhahhh—Ow!” “I said STOP!” “You didn’t have to hurt me. I’m telling! Moooooooooom! Tay hit me!” “I did not! El’s lying!” “Am not!” “Mooooooooooommmmmm!” They ...

6 comments 6

Read story

“The Water Slide” by Felicity Edwards

Submitted to Contest #53

It was still dark, but a breeze had just sprung up. The sheets lifted off the sleeping couple. She woke with a start. “Ben, there’s a wind coming, do you think it will cool the place a bit?” He rolled over. “It’s the middle of the night, what are you going on about now?” She settled down, reveling in the cooling zephyr. When it was time to rise, that moment of coolth was forgotten The sun shone brightly, and already, the heat was palpable. Before long, the children were complaining about the heat and it was only 7 am. Margaret dreaded t...

6 comments 6

Read story

“Yellow, Red, and Blue” by Hallie Blatz

Submitted to Contest #53

Fifteen minutes until the next rotation. Four rotations until the end of the swim. Three more swims until the end of the day. Shouldn’t be too bad. Except that it is so hot. I can’t swim until the hour is up though. I move the umbrella so it’s covering more of me and scan the water. There’s hardly anyone to watch, I don’t know how more people aren’t coming to the pool. Only twenty people are swimming and the limit is seventy five. I guess people are scared of getting sick. It’s understandable, everything on the news i...

8 comments 8

Read story

“Another day in the camp” by Alexandra Talapan

Submitted to Contest #53

“Welcome to “The Gorcey Camp” dear unruly children!” the voice of Mr. Hathaway resounded in the speakers, followed by a loud false laughter. He was a tall thin man with a flatback posture. The hoary head and wrinkled face highlighted his old age. He was the man that, for 15 years in a row, had been organizing the summer camp for re-education. If you are wandering how I ended up there, I’ll explain to you now. My mother’s fiancé, who is my stepfather, is a supervisor in the camp. In other words, he makes sure that nobody leaves...

8 comments 8

Read story

“The Wax Man Melts” by Ethan Moses Kelly

Submitted to Contest #53

Spencer held a cigarette up to the heat of the sun, his thin fingers glowing semi-translucent orange in the harsh light. Riggs squinted, obscuring his soft eyes with the brim of his helmet, and reached out to gingerly take the cigarette away from Spencer. “You’re wrong, I’m pretty sure it won’t light.”“Course it will,” said Spencer. “It’s been so hot out here; it’s gotta.”“Try another?”“Try yours.” Spencer grabbed the cigarette back, taking it in his teeth and lighting it with one swift motion. The flame of the match was barely percepti...

7 comments 7

Read story

“The last heatwave” by Alexandra Bilanin

Submitted to Contest #53

Rayne is, for the lack of a better word, scared. She is feeling as if a ball of dread has been bouncing around in her stomach for the past few hours or so. It was making her sick.Intuition - as some people called it - was a funny thing, for the line between intuition and imagination was paper-thin. But is her imagination strong enough to make her ill? Perhaps, but what is its reasoning for doing so? Imagination worked just as hard subconciously as it did conciously... maybe even more so, but it's never without rhyme or reason.It's too hot t...

13 comments 13

Read story

“Diary of a Teenager ” by Tanja Cilia

Submitted to Contest #53

I’m frazzled, and my brain’s fried.How do they expect us to study in this abysmal heat? It’s not as if everyone can afford a summer cottage – or even air conditioning.All this fan is doing is regurgitating the heat, and I cannot open the window because the mozzies will attack.I flunked my maths test… again. How am I going to explain this to my mum? She with the doctorate in Applied Mathematics – she who thinks that I should be able to multiply a three-digit number by another three-digit number, in my mind, like my sisters do?Oh, drat, s...

4 comments 4

Read story

“Summer in the Sindh ” by Udita Bhattacharya

Submitted to Contest #53

I Salim woke up to the sun in his face and promptly went to work. He wasn’t late, it was only about seven but it was summer in the Sindh province. Salim was grumpy and already very hot. Yesterday he didn’t sleep well even on his woven charpai which let the air flow beneath the body, as one lay down. The air had carried the fire of the heatwave across the dusty land into the night. Nothing Salim touched was cool – the water he splattered on his face, the towel he used to wipe his body and the road he took to the fields were all heating up. It...

3 comments 3

Read story

“ALL WET” by Andrew Grell

Submitted to Contest #53

ALL WETBy Andrew Paul Grell“We lost another three sheep last night, Jim. Another day, 90s, zero precipitation. Do you have any idea how expensive it is to truck water up this mountain? How’re things going with that divining rod of yours? You made some pretty tall promises to the Town Council.” Ethan Zamisky and James Jarett faced each other off at either end of Dreishpeil, California’s main (and only) drag. Settled in the late 19th Century by Jacob and Fenia Dreishpeil, immigrants from Russia, to compete with La...

2 comments 2

Read story

“Love Is Like A Heat Wave” by Donna Chavez

Submitted to Contest #53

Whenever I'm with him, something inside starts to burning... Martha and the Vandellas sang over the oldies station on their crappy old radio, the volume turned up to try and drown out the rickety sound of the oscillating fan that was the only break from the stifling air in their stuffy little bathroom. It did little to provide much relief from the burning hell outside. It had turned most of the inside of Rob and Sandy's modest little home into a sauna. Their AC window unit in the bedroom had gone on the fritz, clearly overw...

1 comment 1

Read story

“Another day in the heatwave ” by Juhi Garg

Submitted to Contest #53

It was in the middle of a deserted street, in the Hindi heartlands of India, Nandu wiped the sweat off his sunburnt face. The forehead lines deepened, as he pulled the cart full of bricks, across a gentle slope of the road. He had to pause and take a swig from his flask of, now boiling water, to keep himself from fainting. The drops of sweat falling on the street, were immediately evaporated from the scorching sun. He swore he could hear the steam rising off the ground. Nandu, as the only bread winner of the house, had a tough job. He ...

8 comments 8

Read story

“My First Haboob” by George Georgerfrost@gmail.com

Submitted to Contest #53

Few people would go from Alaska to Gilbert, Arizona as the summer was starting to vamp up in the Valley of the Sun. The Valley of the Sun is where average temperatures can get up to 110 degrees by 3 pm, but then, I’m one of the few people who did exactly that. My father-in-law and I left our home in Chugiak, Alaska in the first week in May. I had lived there for ten years, but he had lived there over twenty years and after retiring decided that he did not like being cold anymore. He wanted to go somewhere that was war...

1 comment 1

Read story

“The Eternal Summer of Somner” by Kate Bibb

Submitted to Contest #53

Kids waited in lines for a refreshing ice cream cone from a sweat-drenched vendor, only for their long-awaited treat to melt in the cone. I licked my parched lips, feeling thirst well up in my throat, and I greeted it like an old friend. From my hideout in the crook of the slide at the deserted playground on an near empty avenue, I tried to peel my perspiring skin from the plastic play-set. Halfway through the sticky ordeal, I gave up, slumping back into the sliver of shade. I contemplated trying to find a building whose air conditioning was...

1 comment 1

Read story

“Blocked” by James Ashton

Submitted to Contest #53

Simon had always been drawn to expression through the written word, but at this moment he was plagued by writer’s block. Even as the heat outside crept its way into his dark motel room, Simon sat firmly at his laptop staring at the words that could be; the stories that could be. He had become just another starving writer, lost in a monetized world. The local Nevada news station had said it was going to be the hottest week of the year, and as Simon sat shirtless, drenched in sweat, he felt it. The bridge of his nose was too slick to ...

8 comments 8

Read story

“Dog Days of Summer” by Anna Z

Submitted to Contest #53

Flashback starts - Traveling from New Jersey to Arizona could make the top 3 worst idea’s that I’ve ever had. Just the contrasting weather was enough to make any rational person reconsider. But then again, who said I was rational!? New Jersey is a place that isn’t too hot and isn’t too cold, its right there in the average, the middle of everything. No devastating droughts, large scale hurricanes, and tornados, impending earthquakes, unpredictable floods, and the highest snowfall I’ve ever seen were barley 4 measly inches. It fitted perfectly...

7 comments 7

Read story

Load more stories

🌟 Similar prompts

Write about a few people spending a long-overdue weekend away at a cottage.

Summer – 124 stories

Write a story that begins with someone's popsicle melting.

Summer – 256 stories

Write a story about a teenager spending their final days at home before going away to college.

High School – 118 stories

Write a story about summer love — the quarantine edition.

Romance – 131 stories

Contest #53

Enter our weekly contest!

This week's theme: Dog Days of Summer

$50

Prize money

806

Contest entries

0

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Aug 07, 2020 EST

A winner will be announced soon.

View details

Win $250 in our short story competition 🏆

We'll send you 5 prompts each week. Respond with your short story and you could win $250!

Menu

CONNECT

BLOG

APPS

TOOLS

ABOUT

Write a story about another day in a heatwave.

Submissions are closed

✍️ 177 stories

“Mermaids and Fan Hogs” by Stacey Fultz

“The Water Slide” by Felicity Edwards

“Yellow, Red, and Blue” by Hallie Blatz

“Another day in the camp” by Alexandra Talapan

“The Wax Man Melts” by Ethan Moses Kelly

“The last heatwave” by Alexandra Bilanin

“Diary of a Teenager ” by Tanja Cilia

“Summer in the Sindh ” by Udita Bhattacharya

“ALL WET” by Andrew Grell

“Love Is Like A Heat Wave” by Donna Chavez

“Another day in the heatwave ” by Juhi Garg

“My First Haboob” by George Georgerfrost@gmail.com

“The Eternal Summer of Somner” by Kate Bibb

“Blocked” by James Ashton

“Dog Days of Summer” by Anna Z

🌟 Similar prompts

Write about a few people spending a long-overdue weekend away at a cottage.

Write a story that begins with someone's popsicle melting.

Write a story about a teenager spending their final days at home before going away to college.

Write a story about summer love — the quarantine edition.

Contest #53

Enter our weekly contest!

$50

Prize money

806

Contest entries

0

Stories

Win $250 in our short story competition 🏆

Explore more writing prompt ideas: