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Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of black short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

780+ Black Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. Discover the best new stories by Black authors, written to themed prompts and curated by our judges.

Black Short Stories – Page 52 of 52

THE WANDERING DOLL

Submitted to Contest #61

+ THE WANDERING DOLL When she was about sixteen, her mother had started to say: “ But what now do you do of all those toys piled up in the cellar ( under the stairs) Now you’re a girl….” Indeed her mother had said: “ Now you’re grown up” And Sara had felt her heart trembling at those words. How? At not yet sixteen, would she already be an adult? “ You should give them to your cousins, who are still children.” And her mother had come back a lot of times to the matter, pressing her to giv...

11 likes

Just Like Mommy

Submitted to Contest #61

It is the eve of day before the long weekend and not a sound can be heard. No cars zoomed by, no birds chirped, and no one walked along the streets. On this silent road sat a middle-aged man on an old wooden bench at a bus stop. Not in the middle of nowhere, but in the outskirts of a big city. Patiently, he sat in the glass shelter, filled with calm anticipation for the beginning of his near-two-hour ride home. His face was long and exhausted, where creases of his wrinkles made home to particles of dirt from the industrial warehouse he labor...

9 likes

A donkey in a horse pen

Binyamin Othman

Submitted to Contest #61

There is a boys secondary school (high school) in Nigeria called city academy, situated in Zaria, Kaduna state. It’s a boarding school for the upper class kids, opened in the year 1998. School fees per term was N45000 (about USD500) then. It got a reputation for academic excellence in a very short time and it became famous, as a result, rich people troop to send their kids there. In the year 2004, the school graduated its first set of students. Politicians, business men, and senior civil servants were invited, that added to the school’s fame...

10 likes

Box of Memories (sequel to "Breaking with Tradition")

Philip Clayberg

Submitted to Contest #61

When the clutter in your basement looks more like rising floodwaters, it's time to go down there and deal with it. Building an ark to escape in would only be a way of avoiding the inevitable. And, besides, God would probably want me to go out into the world and collect all the animals, two by two. No thanks. I'd rather deal with the clutter.I opened the basement door and looked down the stairs. The only clear area was the path from the bottom of the stairs to the washer and dryer. The path was walled-in by piles of clutter almost up to my hi...

26 likes

My Christmas Holiday

Cheeahmahkah Asadu

Submitted to Contest #61

It was my favourite time of the year, everyone's favourite time of the year if we are being honest, Christmas and I was packing my clothes and shoes from school for the long anticipated holiday. I hummed in unison with the old Christmas track album our hostel matron played. It was distant but yet gloriously divine. We had something similar at our family house and we would play all the tracks on repeat for the whole night into Christmas. "Where are you going to spend your holiday?" Victoria, one of my hostel mates had asked me. "I am not ...

11 likes

Orange and spice

Omani Saleem

Submitted to Contest #61

There’s a short sharp pain on my hand as an oil splash lands on my skin. Breaking me out of my thoughts. I look down at the pan of chips I am frying. They are starting to burn, the edges turning brown. This is not good; I'm going to be in so much trouble. I quickly take the pan off the fire and start scooping the chips out of the pan with the spatula in my hand. I put it on a plate, and then I look up at the clock. Its eight o clock, I'm late. I rush around the kitchen setting plates and cups on four different trays, I set the glass cup with...

33 likes

THE GIRL

Submitted to Contest #61

It is three pm and I am already tired of waiting for my flight. Time seems to be very slow today. I could chat or maybe read an ebook but I am not in the mood for any. I got thirsty so I decided to get a bottled water at a shop. I had finished the one I bought earlier. My steps were a little slower than how I normally walked. Probably because I was singing my favourite raggae song; redemption by Bob Marley. As I strolled, I watched an airplane took off. It was a sight I had gotten used to over the years, still, whenever i watched it, I...

9 likes

To Infinity?

Inkstained Introvert

Submitted to Contest #61

It was called Galaxy, and for good reason.It was nothing more than a ripoff of the Milky Way candy bar, only with dark chocolate instead of milk and fancy edible glitter in silvery hues of dark purple and blue. Pippin and I used to skate to the drugstore on the corner and buy a bar, Saturdays, before our parents got off work. We’d pool our jangly collection of nickels and quarters until we had $0.79, and then we’d split one. Pippin would eat hers slowly, and mine fast, in classic girl-boy contrast. We saved the wrappers and stored them in on...

15 likes

Breaking with Tradition

Philip Clayberg

Submitted to Contest #57

I bit my lip and broke my pencil in half.After all, it's one thing to be called dumb by the bullies in school, but it's another to feel dumb around your father. I can speak and write just fine. It's just that Pa doesn't like it when I use “ain't”.“Because it isn't good English,” he said, standing behind me, and looking down at the essay I was writing. He shook his head and sighed. I watched as he knelt and picked up the pencil halves. “And please don't take it out on your pencils. That's the fourth one that you've broken today. I don't have ...

28 likes

Poems and Penitence

Submitted to Contest #54

Juvie wasn’t hell. It was bearable. Barely. Everyone—her momma and her sister and kids from school who’d never given a damn about her before—had approached her with shining eyes and earnest voices, telling her to be careful, keep her head down, don’t get on anyone’s bad side. Like it was a state penitentiary or somethin and not Poskins County Junior Jail. Junior Jail wasn’t the real name. Duh. But juvenile was a juvenile word and detention sounded too much like school. Like they were in time-out. It was time out, all right. Time out from ...

12 likes

Strangers and Roads

Princess Eno

Submitted to Contest #47

The water trickles down the window, and the urge to wipe at it furiously overcomes you. Grandma would call the rain a sign of impending danger. Why else, would the rain be pouring in the middle of harmattan season? You had checked the forecast before. You were sure it was as predicted. Temperature as low as 9 °C , with a promise of harsh sun in the afternoon, and very low humidity. You curl into yourself and into the window as the person beside you sneezes. At least he has the decency to use a handkerchief. You shake your h...

14 likes

No Justice, No Peace

Temnit Meshesha

Submitted to Contest #45

I stood in the middle of the road in disappointment. I surveyed the street in what was left of the destruction. There was a barricade of police at the end of the block, cars with severed parts flipped over, and businesses on the block battered up with wood, leaving the rest without armour, up in flames. The street was a perfect divider of the uproar. With damage on one side and the other yet to be as fermented. I didn't want to choose between either side though. I shouldn't have to. I came here for a peaceful protest and that's what we’...

9 likes

Gordon, Surnamed Parks

Submitted to Contest #14

Long orange shadows flung themselves against the beat-up bricks of Fort Scott. The bloodred sun disappeared slowly from the sky and inky ghosts of night took its place. The stars, mostly blotted out by the street lights, peeped around the lightning bugs that dotted the sky. Two young boys walked, shoulder to shoulder, down Penn Street. One was white, with red hair and red eyes and a hangdog look that marked him as a troublemaker. The other was darker—dark enough to be called black, in this time of segregation—with short-cropped curly hair an...

31 likes

Diamond

Submitted to Contest #4

DiamondBased on theme: To Love SomebodyBy Royce HollandI arrived at the doctor’s office about 15 minutes before my appointment. I walked into the office and checked in with the receptionist behind the counter.Good morning, I have a 10:15 am appointment with Dr. Williams.Good morning, may I have your name please?Charlie Johnson.Okay Charlie, I will let Dr. Williams know you are here. You may have a seat until called.Thank you.You’re welcome.I took a seat near the window and started to stare blankly out of it wondering what was going on for y...

9 likes