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Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of teens & young adult short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

5300+ Teens & young adult Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. Looking for the best short stories for teens? Our collection of funny, suspenseful, and relatable young adult short stories will meet your needs.

Teens & young adult Short Stories – Page 3 of 354

Blue Thursdays

Submitted to Contest #292

She pressed a hand to her mouth as a particularly loud sob escaped. The walls in her college house were thin and she preferred her three friends she shared it with didn't hear her breakdowns. Her back thumped lightly against the wall as she let her legs go limp, sliding down the solid surface. With every gasping breath, every tear that slipped down her face, her body shuddered. The hour always seemed to go by too fast, time lost to the tightness in her chest, the foggy panic in her mind.Marley scheduled an hour in her week to cry. Thursdays ...

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Cured Blessing

Submitted to Contest #292

Sound-color synesthesia invaded the minds of many artists as a cursed blessing. Caius loved his perceptual phenomenon, but that was before the overwhelming nonsense corrupted his entire identity. Caius’ strokes of the hog bristles left streaks of densely hued oils across the cotton canvas, but his ears found more. The blues’ serene chords blended into black’s rambunctious pounding. The red’s deep thumps bled to become orange’s lively plucking. He played rather than painted the face he’d done so many times before. Caius knew where the outline...

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my name means gold in hebrew

Submitted to Contest #292

Stepping out onto the porch to light your third cigarette of the night, you notice the sky is the same color of their eyes the day they died. Your hands tremble cupping the lighter found in the car and your lip does that thing again.One.Two.Smoke blows out into the cold wind. You were really supposed to quit since your lungs never fully recovered from last year. Now you buy a pack on the way home.So you think: What now? Will I be able to buy cigarettes one day without weeping? How are we supposed to continue? How does anyone? I don’t know…I ...

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Blood Orange

Submitted to Contest #292

I stare at myself in the mirror. The faint music is dooming through the room as I grip the sink so hard my knuckles turn white. What am I doing? Why can’t I just be happy and enjoy this? I hate this so much. Why did they throw this stupid party? I mean, I know why, but why? I hate parties; I thought I made that clear.No, no, it’s okay. They’re your friends, Xander. They could have ignored your accomplishment altogether. I screw my eyes shut, letting out a groan. I need to be grateful for this, my new position as team captain, for this party,...

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Blues

Submitted to Contest #292

My death, as I assume is the same for many other ghosts, is not a pleasant subject. Yet, I will still tell you, since you seem so curious. For the 14 years being the prologue to my death, I served as a marine–as you probably guessed it, yes, that is how I died. Though I have no doubt numberless years have passed since then, my memory still bedevils me as a poltergeist does with that day as if it remained the present. Also, and excuse me for being selfish, but I find it hard to express my thoughts and situation in the presence of nobody but ...

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Midnight on Black Mountain

Submitted to Contest #292

I’ve always loved horses, ever since I was a little girl. I am lucky enough now, at the age of eighteen, to have my own horse. Yes, I have the finest horse imaginable. Black as night, majestic, sure footed, strong. Able to speed like the wind, but dependable and gentle. Dark as night, coal black, he is. I call him Midnight.He’s a very tall horse. I don’t know exactly how many hands he stands, but most people around here say he’s too much horse for a wee girl like me to handle. When they say that, I tell them, inside my own mind of course bec...

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The colour of darkness.

Submitted to Contest #292

As I walk across the sand I get nostalgia from memories a long time ago. The sand was burning my feet. It was hot but the clouds kept coming closer. When I looked out at the horizon. So flat. The sun wasn't up yet but the moon was fading away slowly in its phases. The sand was blowing with the wind in my face which made it hard to walk. As I had to shield my eyes. I put my colour blind glasses on. So that I could see clearly. I collected some rocks and shells and put them into my pocket.  I just escaped the mental facility. I don't kno...

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Bringing The Colors Back

Submitted to Contest #292

My world is only black and white. Also, a couple greys. And I don’t mean that figuratively. I mean literally. Everything always seems so dull and dim. It’s actually overwhelming. Not too many people are happy like they used to be, before I was born. My grammy used to tell me all about the rainbow. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Even the neutral colors like brown or tan. How everyone used to be joyful. But then the storm hit. It was so big and harsh that, when everyone opened their doors once it had passed, the colors were ...

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Cobalt Heart

Submitted to Contest #292

Love. That word never felt real to me growing up—not in the way movies made it look, not in the way the women in my family whispered about it while lighting candles and praying over the Bible. Love was something I chased, something I begged for, always feeling like I was either too much or not enough. I was born to a woman who never really wanted to be a mother. I think she wanted to love me, but she also wanted her freedom, the youth she lost when she got pregnant at nineteen. She carried me into the world alone. My grandmother shut the doo...

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Drunk Tank Pink

Submitted to Contest #292

“He’s getting aggressive again.” “Seriously? My God, what seems to be the issue now?”He shrugged. He looked at the man, stout, tall, square – browed, chestnut eyes and hair, intently, examining each and every rugged and dismantled object thrown recklessly on his desk. Poor guy. He must have got his degree a couple of months ago, judging from the lopsided Certificate hanging on the wall. “You’ve got a lot of getting used to around here, kid.” Maybe encouraging words will ease him, somehow. The guy (named James, printed in gold bold letters on...

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A Life in Gray

Submitted to Contest #292

It was raining the day the color left.  Overcast with hues of blue, the sky cried until the streets were swimming with tears.  Puddles reflected neon orange and bright yellow starbursts and smeared a vibrant crimson against the speckled concrete canvas.  Another colorful disaster, an unavoidable tragedy of which I was the unwilling witness. I think, perhaps, my eyes had seen too much color.  Unable to comprehend the constant variations, my mind relented.  The muddled amalgamation of pigment faded into dull gray which...

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Whispers in the brushstrokes

Submitted to Contest #292

Whispers in the Brushstrokes  Today is one of my best days of my life. I got to move into my first home with my husband. We gathered our things from the apartment to begin our new adventure. When we arrived my mom and grandma was cleaning the home so was it nice and shiny when we entered.   My husband picks me up and carries me through the door like a princess. Though as my feet touched the ground, I noticed the creepy painting from Grandma's house. I stare at it; the thing always gave me the heebie-jeebies.  “Do yo...

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Gray is the Color of a Runner's Ghost

Submitted to Contest #292

In the end, I trace it all back to my cousin's obsession with the history of literature. My cousin Daisy and I were born one day apart, and a few hours later, her mom died. Daisy and I grew up eating Lucky Charms together on Saturday mornings in front of a repeating cycle of our favorite Scooby Doo episodes. She was the first person I told when I realized that my crush on Fred from the movie meant something more than I was brave enough to admit. So when the casting call was put up for our school's musical production of Romeo and Juliet, I le...

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Inflatable Green Pools, Scotch, and the Summer of 1985

Submitted to Contest #292

Georgia told me that the humid air in our small Arkansas cabin made her have nightmares for that entire summer. She said the emerald green leaves that cushioned the tree branches outside were trapping the heat in, suffocating her. She acted like I didn’t know that what she really hated the most was the fact that the air conditioner had broken a couple of months back and our dad had never bothered to get it fixed. We’d wake up every morning with droplets of sweat glistening on our skinny backs, doing its best to dry while it was confined to o...

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New Comforter

Submitted to Contest #292

You scan the aisle of comforter selections hoping you won’t find one that you wouldn’t mind taking home. Your feet judgingly shuffle by clear plastic casings stuffed with navy blue striped cotton, mustard and burgundy velvet, woven quilts in solid plum, and flower-patterned linen duvets. You take note of the selection of colors, which all seem to have lost their saturation over the last few years in your shopping experience. After some brief reflection, you settle that this is the way you like your color palette anyway, and that you can just...

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RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

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