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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

Write a story that takes place in a waiting room.

Posted in Thriller and Suspense on Oct 26, 2022

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✍️ 256 stories

“The Picture” by Adriana Farias

Submitted to Contest #49

After running up two flights of stairs and down a long hallway, she abruptly opened the light, wooden door into the dull waiting room. She was seven minutes late for her optometry appointment. The force with which she opened the door noticeably startled some of the people inside. She rushed to the receptionist's window in a hurried strut, thankful that nobody else was in line. As someone who meticulously made sure to always arrive either five minutes early or on-time, she was especially annoyed because only she was to blame for her tardiness...

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“Plum Foot” by Rodge Rules

Submitted to Contest #49

A bronzed hulk of a man strode in next, lacking the fanciful clothing and armor adorning many of the room's occupants. He didn't just lack dress that was fanciful, he lacked much clothing, period. Strategic leather straps held a variety of stabbing, slashing, and bludgeoning instruments loosely in place while the voluminous black fur cloak was free to billow. His left shoulder was capped with the upper half of a monstrous panther's maw. The whole ensemble would have been quite impressive if it wasn't matted with grease, grime, and dust from ...

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“The Accident” by Lu Brosamer

Submitted to Contest #49

Anticipation. Suspense. Worry. Distress. Everyone tries to paste a label on a situation. It was scary. It was traumatizing. No one understands that sometimes everything is too confusing to even know how you feel yourself. Everyone asked me if I was ok, and all I said was ‘I’m fine’. I didn’t know how to describe what I went through. And even more so, I didn’t know what would happen to everyone else. After a while, all I felt was guilt. I didn’t understand why I got to be fine, but everyone else suffered. I’m just me. Me who loves singing, an...

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“The Waiting room” by Catherine Howard

Submitted to Contest #49

The dreadfully cheap looking wall clock ticked past another minute. Sarah glanced at her wrist. It didn’t make any difference. The same time as the clock stared back at her. Tick, there went another minute. Why was the time going so fast? She wondered. In places like this, time usually dragged and while it was true that her turn never seemed to come, the actual time available to her, her lunch break, was dwindling fast. At once stage she had even contemplated walking up the hill to do this chore but the worsening weather had convinced her to...

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“Just a room by Chelsie Reid” by Chelsie Reid

Submitted to Contest #49

The room was filled with people going in and out. The white walls had no decorations nothing to separate them from all the other walls in this damn place. I sat in the hard-woodenchair. They did not even have the courtesy to have plastic chairs. The clock on the wall slowly ticked with no regard to how emotionally draining it is to be in one place and not moving. The table next to me on my left was covered with magazines about sewing, about the newest trend, about how to be fit but I&nbs...

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“'Codename' : Adam” by Mangesh Shirke

Submitted to Contest #49

Major David Stevens, Officer of the Secret Intelligence Service, was riding in a cab to the Railway terminus in a Cold winter in 1970s. He then recalled the previous day’s conversation with Col. Arthur O’Connor, Incharge of the National Intelligence. “In the wake of this Cold War, much of our classified information has already got leaked. It means there is an intelligencer between us! We need to find that spy immediately…!” David said as he spoke on telephone. “Operation Red Star Rising has already initiated without our approval. Personally...

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“A train trip to remember” by A S Winter

Submitted to Contest #49

Sitting in his seat and humming on the rhythmic tone of the running train Brian couldn’t have asked for any better feeling. One could probably sleep here for eternity without worrying about a thing, he wondered. Then his thoughts drifted with the moving train. “Tickets are so expensive”, Brian thought as he looked at his tickets. ‘Time is of essence’, ‘Don’t waste your time’ were probably the statements from people who never travelled by train, he thought. He had bought the cheapest ticket to reach Liverpool from Milton Keynes. Although trav...

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“Diagnosis” by Blue Wren

Submitted to Contest #49

She waited, knowing that her daughter was in the specialist room speaking to doctors who did not know her, doctors who had their own agendas, doctors who knew not of what she knew. She railed, she protested, she hurt inside, desperate to go in. If it was me I would have wondered, “Do I just open the door, do I grab my daughter and take her out of there or do I stay pacing the room, crying, praying, hoping against hope that this nightmare I was just starting to be in would finish and I would wake and find out that it was just a bad dream afte...

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“While we're waiting ” by Pearl Mabuela

Submitted to Contest #49

Marlene taps her foot on the floor in agitation and constantly checks the time. Joshua rolls his eyes and gets up; “I’m about to get some coffee, can I get you anything?” he asks. Marlene sighs and reaches for some money in her bag’ “Just get me a matcha latte… and hurry up, she might call us in at any moment” she says as she rolls her eyes and focuses her gaze on the psychologist’s door. Marlene’s phone rings and she grabs it out from her left side jacket pocket, the name “TORI” flashes across the screen and she attempts to answer when the ...

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“Waiting: A chapter of my life.” by Safia Ismail

Submitted to Contest #49

Nobody likes waiting and so do I, but unfortunately I always have to wait, whether i am standing in a line or meeting somebody. I always have to wait, the more I hate waiting the more, I have to face it. I don’t know why people make me wait for them. Sometimes I wonder why am I so unlucky? Whenever I stand in queue in a metro or canteen or anywhere  else , I noticed that whenever its my turn line stops or something happens and i have to wait. Sometimes computer fails or the person at the counter have something urgent to do and then he l...

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“Arrival” by Kristel Marie Aguilar

Submitted to Contest #49

I stood up to check Kyle’s flight status on the small screen for the third time. Ten more minutes. I groaned. I haven’t seen my son in five years. Five fucking years. And suddenly, that felt much shorter than ten minutes. It felt like the universe decided to slow down time as if it wanted to prolong my agony. I kept clenching and unclenching my right hand to keep my cool.  Ten minutes. No big deal.  As I was about to sit back down, the woman sitting beside my seat gave me a cold look. “Can’t you just stay put? You’re makin...

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“A Place like This” by Dan McKeon

Submitted to Contest #49

I try not to tinker with it, but my finger is almost magnetically drawn there. I pull my hand away and just stare. The cumulous puff of white teases me. I can nearly hear it screaming my name. I want to resist, but my index finger reaches beyond my conscious thought and begins to stroke the stray batting poking through the cracked vinyl of the armrest. The chair that supports my slumping weight is a gray, powder-coated aluminum and I can feel its bitter chill press against the calf of my leg through a hole in my jeans. The armrests are cover...

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“Reunion in the Operation Theater” by Sana Shahid

Submitted to Contest #49

Worth the Wait Ellen pursed her lips tightly and wrapped her coat firmly around herself. Her hair was falling loosely around her apparently in a mess as if she had come right off her bed. The hastily tied shoelaces were already coming undone. Her clothes were mismatched; she had put on an orange sweatshirt over her pajamas and wrapped her coat over it in a hurry which looked pretty odd. She brushed a strand of hair aside from on top of her droopy eyelids. She would occasionally reach her hand up to her mouth to muffle a yawn. She rubbed her ...

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“As I Wait...” by Maddy Mendez

Submitted to Contest #49

Tick-Tock-Tick-Tock. As the clock on the wall keeps moving it’s hand second by second I feel the dread set in. The idea of not having her in my life. The idea of never being able to hold her or kiss her. Legs shaking, people rushing in and out of my vision, as I continue to fall further away from the reality I’m living and back into the past. I can remember each of her features as if she was standing in front of me. She had these beautiful eyes, as green as an emerald, that would entrance you once you looked at her. I also remember the feeli...

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“Hidden Stories” by Mai Sumner

Submitted to Contest #49

This truly is a depressing place. Cracked chairs, chipped paint on walls with drab, dull colors, overwhelmingly bright lights. The impeccably clean floor is shiny and reflects light, but at a closer look, there is filth under the metal chairs and stuffed into the crevices between objects on the ground. The sliding doors with black carpets seem to add some comfort compared to the white vinyl floor, but the floormat is stained with the wipe of despair and confusion flowing down sick, skeletal bodies walking in. It is hard to not to look at the...

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