Love

Sick and Sweet
There he goes, his sixth cigarette of the afternoon. It's not like when he's on a "power trip" (like last night), but even so, I know some kind of nonsense is about to start, and I'm going to have to play my part, too. It's a routine, it's destructive, and it's damn addictive.
By Maggie Z4 months ago in Fiction
Petrichor Between Us
I ponder if you wait long enough. The universe will intercede, interject a prolonged separation from humanity. If merely sitting, doing little to cause ripples—would that eventually create causation, and would the universe answer?
By Paul Stewart4 months ago in Fiction
ayuda. Top Story - September 2025. Content Warning.
“ayuda?,” a soft voice knocks on the gates of my sanctuary. a modest plea from the other side of my mental fortress; opposite my walls, locks, moats, and more walls of security after security within my thoughts.
By ⸘jason alan‽4 months ago in Fiction
Ditched and Cleaned
In the morning after the botched romantic night, while getting ready to go to work, Brad said to Emily, “Babe, I’m so sorry about yesterday. I should have told you about the allergy. I just thought that since it’s so rare and I never buy anything with rosehip I didn’t really need to.”
By Lana V Lynx4 months ago in Fiction
The Toys
Author’s Note: This dramatic monologue is inspired by Coventry Patmore’s poem “The Toys.” It reimagines a father’s moment of regret and longing as a heartfelt stage piece—one that speaks to the fragile bond between discipline and love.
By Mohsin Shah4 months ago in Fiction
Love in the Shadow of Storms
Chapter One: The Coming Storm The horizon had turned an unsettling shade of gray, like ashes smeared across the sky. In Seabrook, a sleepy coastal town, storms were familiar, yet every storm carried its own mood. Some came swift and wild, others brooded for days before unleashing their wrath. This one was the second kind—slow, heavy, and full of warning.
By Khan584 4 months ago in Fiction
The Cinderella
Cinderella Once upon a time, in a quiet little kingdom, there lived a kind and gentle girl named Cinderella. Her life hadn’t always been hard—she was once surrounded by love. But when her mother passed away and her father remarried, everything changed.
By Khan4 months ago in Fiction
Between Pledges and Heartbeats. AI-Generated.
Aarav’s journey began like so many others — with hope, ambition, and the bright promise of a future he was determined to build. Fresh out of college, his heart brimmed with dreams of success, yet reality was far harsher than he had imagined. Day after day, he scoured job listings and sent out application after application, each one a silent plea for opportunity, a chance to prove himself. But with every passing day, the silence in response grew heavier, wrapping around him like a cold fog.
By Saqib Ahmad Sultan4 months ago in Fiction
A Sailors Anchor
Justus, It has been too long since I last wrote to you, I just miss you so. The last few nights we had spent together were the best in my life, honest. I haven’t been able to laugh that hard in so long, to smile so hard that my cheekbones hurt. Just meeting you like that was just unimaginable, the sheer feeling of fear I felt in the pit of my stomach not because of meeting you but because of the feelings I am having that are so sudden. I can’t even begin to describe what it is that I am feeling, or maybe it is I am afraid to describe those feelings for fear you may not ever want to speak to me again. I’ve never met anyone in my life where I’ve felt a connection so instantaneous that it made me feel overwhelmed with butterflies in my stomach, that I felt like they were trying to fly right up out of my mouth. You have no idea the impact of our meeting has taken upon me, someone who has been going through one of her worst times. I’ve had my heart taken from me, broken and returned with large pieces missing. I had vowed to myself that I wouldn’t invest any of myself in another person, that I wouldn’t let my heart open up to anyone because I didn’t want to lose any more of it.
By Alina Anthony4 months ago in Fiction
Fractured Reflections. Runner-Up in Parallel Lives Challenge. Content Warning.
Bowel movement, shower, dressed for the day ahead. Toast, marmalade, of course. Coffee, black, indubitably. Doom scroll for ten minutes before grabbing my wallet and keys. Out the door to, out the driveway for 9.30. Plenty of time to get across town to my employers.
By Paul Stewart4 months ago in Fiction
Falling for My Best Friend: A Friends-to-Lovers Romance
Chapter One – Just Friends Emma Reed and Noah Parker had been inseparable for nearly fifteen years. They met in college—Emma, a shy journalism major with messy notebooks, and Noah, a computer science student who always carried too much coffee and a grin that could disarm anyone. From day one, he made her laugh when she wanted to cry, and she grounded him when life made no sense.
By Shakespeare Jr4 months ago in Fiction
“She Was My First Love, and My Last Goodbye”
I met her on a rainy Tuesday afternoon — the kind of day where the sky feels heavy, and the world moves a little slower. I was 17, reckless, and didn’t believe in anything permanent. Then she walked into the library wearing a red raincoat and holding a worn-out copy of The Bell Jar. She didn’t even notice me at first, and maybe that’s what caught me off guard. Most people looked, she didn’t.
By fazalhaq4 months ago in Fiction