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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 Awaited Waiting Room” by Lavanya Saxena

Submitted to Contest #49

It’s a waiting room like any other, that standard doctor’s surgery set up with the mismatching furniture and a pithy offering of well-thumbed women’s magazines. It greets you with an encompassing, inexplicable hush, perhaps the result of those awful hard-backed chairs that make everyone sit up so straight and formal, and the guests mutter to their companions in whispers and haste to mute their squabbling children or stab at their bleating mobile phones. Except it’s not an ordinary doctor’s surgery and today’s visitors know that. Their head...

7 comments 7
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“Full Circle” by Ben K

Submitted to Contest #49

Opening his eyes, Charlie feels alert and awake as he steps through the entrance of an all white tile room. Stumbling through past the threshold the door slams shut behind him. Wiping around he pulls at the door handle. Standing on the door ripping at the handle, Charlie grunts and yells. “Ah. Come on. Just budge a little...bit. Fuck” “It won't open.” Says a sweet voice from behind. Letting go of the door handle, Charlie falls to the floor landing hard on his shoulder. Startled he screams and scoots himself up against the door. “Where the fu...

2 comments 2
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“Doctor's Office Zone” by Gary Crawford

Submitted to Contest #49

Consider, if you will, a study of human nature. A study of a group of older women, together in a physician’s waiting room, with little to do while awaiting their turn to see the doctor. Interesting turns of events happen as they each consider the complaints and ailments of the others, all the while, patiently, if that’s the word, waiting for their turn, in the Doctor’s Office Zone. * Oh, I’m so glad the doctor can see me today. My hands hurt. They ache so much from my arthritis. Ache? At least you can use your hands. I’m almost cr...

3 comments 3
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“Change in Plans” by Saranglogy R

Submitted to Contest #49

Sandra was nervously fidgeting her fingers in her sweater. The sweat was forming on her forehead though the air con was on. It was her first time to be here, and the smell around the room didn't help her either. She was feeling nauseous but controlled it. Her feet were tapping on the white marble floor, and that sound echoed throughout the room. She was the only person sitting there, waiting for her turn to come. She suddenly jerked up a little when the sound of the opening door. She saw a beautiful woman in her twenties, with blonde wavy ha...

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“When waiting turns enjoyable” by Faleha Hakim

Submitted to Contest #49

The chilling breeze of December had struck the city. The vision was pale and smoke rose from every building. Even the fingers could not seek shelter inside the gloves as the frost easily penetrated. “When will our turn come, Mother?” Karen lifted up her head and faced a woman with red cheeks and shining eyes. She was equal of height when compared to her daughter, Karen and she reflected gentleness and sweetness. As she answered, mist blew out from her mouth, “Don’t know” and rubbed her hand across her daughter’s head. They both sat, quiverin...

4 comments 4
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“A Rabbit” by Jade Speller

Submitted to Contest #49

      It was a dark cold night. At least it was dark by the time we arrived. The building was tall and white. It was very frightening. There were people everywhere and so many white coats I could not count them all. There were even kids a few years older than me wearing candy cane striped clothes. I would like to wear one of those dresses but not here. This is the place where the sirens and the sick people go. Why were we here? I wasn’t quite sure. My aunt and grandmother said my mother was here.   &n...

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“The Waiting Room Saga” by Sue Marsh

Submitted to Contest #49

The Waiting Room Saga Suzanne Marsh I hate waiting rooms especially in doctors offices. There is something about being there during the flu season, with folks coughing and sneezing. I hate waiting for the nurse, who comes out, calls my name. I rise and follow her; sort of like the lamb to the slaughter. I think back to my last visit. Hmmm, the doctor ordered blood work. That means needles...I hate needles for any reason. The same humdrum pale green waiting room, there has to be some other color other than pale green. Pukey yellow, no that wo...

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“Waiting family.” by Sam Kirk

Submitted to Contest #49

“The surgical waiting area is located on the 5th floor,” the female nurse with a pixie cut informed Tim after his mother got wheeled away. Tim thanked her and walked out of the pre-operative holding area towards the hospital bookstore on the first floor. The surgical team he met with mentioned the procedure might take a few hours. Apparently, putting screws into bones that are falling apart is not easy. The doctor did not ease Tim’s worries about his mother, but Tim appreciated honesty. There was nothing worse than to expect the best and t...

2 comments 2
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“Welcome to England ” by Phil Manders

Submitted to Contest #49

 The heavy old oak doors swung open violently, crippling the peace, crashing against the four hundred year old walnut panelling. It had been many years since they’d been treated with such disrespect, but they had seen worse in their long life, and they would, no doubt, see worse again. “HEY! Excuse me! Can I get a little service round here?” bellowed Hal, he dragged his suitcase over the highly polished brass threshold and onto the plush carpet. Its tiny wheels sinking into the deep, burgundy shag pile, refusing to budge any furthe...

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“THE NUN'S STORY” by Barbara Burgess

Submitted to Contest #49

Right from the start the room appeared claustrophobic. It made me more nervous than usual.  White ceiling. Green walls. Everything else brown. Bodies everywhere.  I pushed myself into a space on the dark wood bench. Its high back more reminiscent of a church pew than a waiting room. It dug into my shoulder blades and the back of my head annoying the hell out of me. A dentist’s ploy to make you so uncomfortable you do not fill up his waiting room on emergency treatment only mornings. The bench seats took up three of the fou...

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“On the Other Side of the Door” by Lauren Pagano

Submitted to Contest #49

Lily knew she should've been used to waiting rooms at this point. She was fairly certain she'd seen the inside of every single waiting room in Springfield at this point.Big.Small.Themed.Empty.Clinical. Packed.Dreary.Name an office with a waiting room and Lily had probably been there and done that.So, it was with a gloomy resignation over time, that Lily had found herself becoming one with the routine that was the waiting room.She knew the routine like the back of her hand. From the waiting room she had sat in for a half hour last week which ...

3 comments 3
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“The Imps on our Backs” by R. E. Dressler

Submitted to Contest #49

It smelled like a Band-aid. Why is it that all doctors’ offices smell like Band-aids? After handing back the redundant medical form that they painstakingly make you fill out before every visit, I had nothing left to do but nervously rap my fingernails against the uncomfortable plastic seating. Staring into the distance, I began testing my vision, reading different sized lettering. It was my way of psyching myself out before seeing the eye doctor. Every time I went in for a check-up, I had this compulsion of first assessing my own vision. Tho...

2 comments 2
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“The Ten Thousand Doors” by James Alcivar

Submitted to Contest #49

He awoke, as if from a dream. His mind was foggy and lethargic. But like a jolt of electricity, everything came flowing back, and he remembered who he was. “My name is Henry”, he spoke. “And I was born on Earth in 1993” Here, he felt weightless. It was the vast vacuum of space and so, he floated, completely still. Suspended in the dark ether, was the simple wooden door. The door frame glowed a white luminescence. He found himself gravitating, pulled, towards it, reaching out for the handle. Every fiber of his body drawn to the door. He twist...

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“We're All Suspects For a Reason” by Elora Wiesley

Submitted to Contest #49

A woman rushes into the waiting room. She sits down, breathing heavily and taps her foot impatiently. She studies the minimalistic room. Plastic chairs fill the rim of the room. In the center, there is a table stacked with a variety of magazines and cheap plastic water bottles. There were no windows and only two doors in the room. The first door is the one Nicole had just entered through, which is locked from the outside and guarded by two men. The second door has a small window and she can see people arguing inside.  There are five o...

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“THE SCENT OF HUMANITY!” by P. Jean

Submitted to Contest #49

(write-a-story-that-takes-place-in-a-waiting-room) It is early spring, but already hot.   I tend to forget that it is never cold here and warm is normal and for locals today is not an especially hot day.   Back home in the Midwest,  this time of the year can be variable,  warm days of spring thaw followed by cold winds and even snow storms.  This place could use some cold wind blowing through,  it is not the most pleasant place to be.   I’m never sure if I might be labeled practical or if it goes b...

5 comments 5
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