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Discover weekly, the best short stories

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

150+ Fiction Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. If you’re looking for the best fiction short stories to read online, we’ve got you covered. Wide-ranging and ever-curious, these free short stories will meet your reading needs.

Fiction Short Stories – Page 3 of 10

The Influencer

Submitted to Contest #323

Halfway up Route 18, near the edge of the Mojave Desert, a redrock canyon cuts across ancient lava flows and scrubby foothills before fading, without fanfare, into the western horizon. The canyon is walled by high cliffs, perfect for wandering sightseers and swarms of rock climbers, happily risking their lives for the view. Far below the cliffs, in the canyon bottom, a web of hiking trails, adorned with manzanita and yucca and creosote, leads to great domed rock formations, big enough for crowds of weekend visitors on Saturday afternoons.But...

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Caring for Your Monster

Submitted to Contest #323

WAKING UP When you open your eyes, check to see if the monster is creeping around. If he is, don’t move. Don’t even breathe. The monster doesn’t like being disturbed during his nightly wanderings. Close your eyes and go back to sleep—or at least pretend to. You’ve woken up too soon. If you wake up and the room is clear, knock three times on the post of your bed frame. Whistle high, then whistle low. This will alert the monster: you are getting out of bed. You don’t want to startle him under there. He lashes out when he’s startled, and it wo...

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Only for Today

Submitted to Contest #323

I will not wash my hands today. Not at all. Not even thrice. Today is perfect for it- today is THE day for it. The weather is poor and only getting worse. I've no work and no plans and plenty of food that won't dirty my fingers. I can sleep and read and watch movies and not see another soul who might notice how dirty my hands have gotten. Today is perfect for it. I've written out my plan three times and know it by heart. If I don't take the step I never will. Today is the day for it. I will not wash my hands. I don't need to. My hands are ...

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Clean Enough

Submitted to Contest #323

Step on a crack…break your mother’s back. That is how we got here-the idea that tiny things could destroy the people I love. I look down at my hands, violently scrubbing each other, for the fourth time. I wonder if she hears me. I scrub faster. Germs. I don’t want to contaminate my home, my baby, or my family. I scrub. Again. Hot water burns, but not enough. Five. Six. Seven. I count how many times I scour both sides. Ten. I look down at my hands, now turned bright red from the continuous scrubbing under scalding hot water. The sting feels l...

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The Youth - Samiya Usmonkhonova

Submitted to Contest #323

“Nope, not happening.” Dahlia blurts out with no proper explanation to back up her refusal. I can’t mask my disappointment quick enough and she sees my disappointed expression and pursed lips. Danté, who was standing next to me, developed a similar expression. “We’ve never been out past 9 before! You know how important this is, so why won’t you help us?” I whisper, cautiously looking over my shoulder like an old-timely detective in this dim lit, windowless bedroom. “I want answers too, but I’m not stupid enough to get myself in trouble to in...

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A Tent on the Border of an Unnamed Kingdom

Submitted to Contest #323

Another step and she will no longer be home. It is tempting to freeze, but her fears would not be honored in any case. It is better to choose than be chosen for. At least that is what she tells herself. The tent is lavish. Unsurprisingly. Tub, dresses, furniture, rugs. The finest there is to offer. Ornate and frilled, a show of power and wealth that is out of place in the desolation surrounding them. Outside, snow drifts to the branches of barren trees, the sky beyond them a bleak shade of grey. Inside the tent, erected for the sole purpose ...

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Along Comes Avery

Submitted to Contest #323

I had been retired from the Air Force going on four years now and did not expect to find my life where it was currently at – still unemployed. On the other hand, since I retired, and had lot of free time, I ramped up my physical fitness. It became a religion to me. A ritual that I rarely broke. Monday through Friday, I was in the gym clanging and banging iron, then on the weekends, on the treadmill. I thought about the gym even when I wasn’t there. I rehearsed sets, lifting techniques, contemplated new exercises; I was a man obsessed with fi...

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Inevitable

Submitted to Contest #323

Fear is such a fickle thing, an emotion that I have become so accustomed to it almost glazes over me like soft sunshine. This isn’t just fear anymore, its guttural terror. All I remember is screaming, the hot searing pain of venom running through my veins. The taste of metallic blood in my mouth from nearly severing my own tongue. Zombies were something I once fantasized about, like a sick alternate reality I could escape into. I should have amputated my arm immediately, I couldn't do it though, I’m a coward at heart. That’s why I’ve survive...

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What Once was Sacred

Submitted to Contest #323

What Once was Sacred The line was long. I hated long lines. My throat would tighten, and I would forget to breathe. I could feel my skin crawling where others neared me. I would withdraw into myself, much like a turtle into its shell. I felt an ache, a longing to time jump to the point where I was home, wrapped in white linen sheets with a vanilla candle filling my bedroom with serenity. I took out my phone and looked into the camera. My luxurious blond hair filled the screen, my rosy apple cheeks, my long lashes. I breathed a sigh of relie...

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The Thing with Cats

Submitted to Contest #323

On the third of May in the year 1979, Gayle Elaine Sanford realized Monkey hadn’t come home for breakfast. It was the first time in twenty years he’d been late. The old cat was an orange tabby, a fat one with four white paws and a stumpy tail he’d lost as a kitten. It’d been caught in a patch of barbed wire that some old man had left along her fence when she’d first bought the trailer at the end of Wayshire Road. She’d been busy cleaning out the trash the previous owner left behind and heard a yowl so sharp she’d thought a banshee’d just be...

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Lake Sweetwater

Submitted to Contest #323

The chanting coming out of the forest was new. At least, Kirsten was pretty sure it was – possibly it was typical for the town of Sweetwater, but having only just moved here, she couldn’t be a hundred percent sure. Maybe this was simply another quirk of living in a small town, another mundanity to the locals. Until recently, Kirsten had always lived in cities. Her parents were originally from Sweetwater, but they had moved to Seattle before she was born. Kirsten’s career as a corporate arbiter had also not been conducive to small town life ...

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Singularity

Submitted to Contest #323

Ok, I’ve got you wondering. Am I writing about the pre-Big-Bang, dimensionless speck of concentrated matter, comprising everything that is now the universe? I know, I know, I go off at tangents. Explore all avenues of meaning instead of just stick to the point and get on with the story. I’m sure it’s my OCD. It runs in the family. OCD, that is, not exploring all avenues. Although that’s what got me into the events I have to write about now. This isn’t about Professor Stephen Hawking’s singularity. It’s about my singularity of habit, which I...

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Hunt the fox!

Submitted to Contest #323

Trigger Warning: This text contains mentions of substance abuse and physical violence.------------------------------Despite holding out their hands over the bonfire, the three first-year students trembled in their places as they waited for Luther's words.Rowe waited distractedly, reconsidering all the decisions he had made that had led him to this absurd initiation ritual.The main reason had been to appease his mother's concerns, as she only wanted him to have the opportunity to meet people his own age and finally make friends. She knew how ...

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Safe and Sound

Submitted to Contest #323

Safe and Sound “Tom, I know you have your daily ritual with your security system but there’s a very fine line between ritual and obsession.”Tom wasn’t surprised at Rick’s comment. Their chance meeting at the mailbox had led to a conversation about Tom’s new, updated security camera system and it had quickly gotten out of hand. Like all the other neighbors, Rick had been watching Tom go about his daily routine of checking his security system and each time he did it Tom noticed Rick watching. It had reached a point where Tom couldn’t check a ...

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Edible Art and Other Disasters

Submitted to Contest #323

“Hey Julie!” I panted, dashing across the parquet shop floor, almost knocking over a mountain of maraschino cherry jars. “Did you hear what happened?” Julie looked up at me from the salami she was meticulously folding, one perfect petal at a time, in that way she tended to do so often these days, as though whatever I was going to say wouldn’t live up to her expectations. Obviously, I was interrupting her at a crucial point of salami rose construction. We had only known each other since we became interns at Peter Smollet, the famed charcuteri...

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RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

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