Literaryfiction Stories

She sits at crowded tables, drinks countless glasses of wine, and convinces herself that he loves her. That's what this city is for, isn't it? Reinvention? ***** Sixteenth Street is only supposed to be a job for her to afford the bills in the new city she now calls home. What she doesn't expect is to fall head over heels for a man with enough experience - both in the restaurant and in life - to make her forget the real reason she moved to this new city in the first place. Intoxicated by the world of fine dining and men who taste like her new favorite poison, she finds herself lost and in waiting - for him, for the guests, and, most importantly, for herself. ***** OPEN NOVELLA CONTEST 2026 -- prompts 28 & 29

In the warm water, everything drifted away for a moment: the past, the silence, the doubt. Until Kit said something that changed us both. He had always been my safe haven. Until he asked if I would be his first kiss. And I didn't say no right away. A story about friendship, trust, and the space where even a gay boy and his best friend can share a kiss - without it having to change who he is.

Hanggang saan ang kaya mong isakripisyo para mailigtas ang taong mahal mo? Nang mangailangan si Elena ng labinlimang milyong piso upang mailigtas ang buhay ng kanyang ama, isang alok ang dumating na hindi kayang tanggihan - at hindi rin kayang kalimutan. Isang gabi. Isang desisyon. Isang kapalit na hindi niya inakalang babayaran habang buhay. Isang maikling kwento tungkol sa pag-ibig, sakripisyo, at ang presyo ng kaligtasan.

Elias Thorne does not cry. He wakes up at 6:14 AM. He measures his coffee grounds with the back of a knife. He walks the same route to his archival job, counting the cracks in the pavement to keep the world from falling apart. At 38, Elias has turned his life into a museum of habits. His apartment is perfectly quiet, a sanctuary maintained for a ghost: the fading water ring on the dining table, the empty side of the bed, the coat in the closet that smells like cedar and memory. He believes that if he controls the small things-the temperature of the water, the lock on the door-he can survive the absence of the one person who made the silence bearable. But structure is fragile. When a lightbulb burns out and the seasons begin to change, Elias is forced to confront the dust settling in the corners of his life. This is not a story about moving on. It is a story about the friction of survival, the weight of a teaspoon, and the quiet geometry of a life lived in the aftermath.

They called him a wolf because he walk alone but wolves walk as a park but he's afraid he's not good enough for everyone or can't fit in

She writes herself through places, seasons, and fractures. Fragments of becoming - rage and composure, love and absence - blunt lines blurring together, cities too loud and rooms too honest. Not diaries. Not confessions. Just moments that couldn't bear silence.

Eleanor has spent her life in the shadows of Everridge Hall, a quiet maid with a heart full of unspoken dreams. When William, the young heir of the estate, begins to see her in ways no one else ever has, their secret bond becomes a fragile rebellion against the world that keeps them apart. But war steals William away, and a long‑buried truth about Eleanor's past threatens to upend everything she thought she knew about herself. As letters go missing, loyalties shift, and grief reshapes her future, Eleanor must choose between the life she was born into and the love she cannot forget.

After Violette's mother loses her parental rights, the court sends her to live with her biological father, a distant man she only knows through child support checks. He lives alone, studying coastal erosion in a house on stilts surrounded by rising tides. Violet is an Olympic hopeful who runs a free-diving school where the ocean's blue shapes her world. In hope to through their silence, her father begins teaching her how to read the dangerous currents of the water. As Violet turns seventeen, these lessons lead to a transformation, bound by a secret as deep and hidden as the drowned forests beneath the bay.

Hari's dreams were dying, from continuous failed government-job exam attempts and the weight of his family's disappointment, he flees to the concrete heart of Mumbai. He isn't looking for greatness anymore-just survival. In the grueling heat of a suburban factory, he meets Babban. A man who has spent twenty years inhaling smoke so his son can breathe clean air. Babban becomes more than a mentor, he becomes the mirror Hari afraid to look into. While Hari has given up on his fate, Babban refuses to let him compromise with fate, pushing him toward one final, desperate attempt at the SSC exams. But Mumbai is a city of sharp edges. When a spark of local unrest ignites into a violent riot, the dream Hari worked for suddenly carries a devastating price. They say many people will come and go in your life, but some leave footprints on your heart. For Hari, Babban's footprints lead all the way back to the village he tried to escape-carrying a debt that success can never truly repay. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ -•-•-•-•-•-•-•-• -•-•-•-• Written for ONC 2026 Prompt No. 29 :-- You'll meet many people in your life. Many will come and go, but some leave footprints on your heart.

I died at twenty. Ten years later, someone said my name like it hurt. This is not a love story. It's a story about memory, guilt, and what happens when the dead are not ready to let go.

A promised "high-paying IT job" lures thousands across borders. For Zhou Musheng, it becomes a descent into scams, captivity, and crimes beyond imagination. In the shadows of the Golden Triangle, he holds the one truth powerful enough to bring an empire down. [TRIGGER WARNINGS: human trafficking, forced labor, organ trade, violence, psychological trauma. 18+ only. Reader discretion advised.]

At fifty, life feels fleeting. Years of laughter, loss, and longing have left their mark. Through reflections on joy, heartbreak, and the road not taken, Ariadne journeys back to the moments that defined her, and the one love her heart never let go of.

"In 'When reality bites,' [Penelope Martin] embarks on a journey of self-discovery and heartbreak as she navigates the complexities of real-life love. Having grown up on fairytales and romantic comedies, she's convinced that her own life will unfold like a dream. But when reality fails to meet her expectations, she must confront the harsh truths of love, relationships, and herself. This poignant and relatable tale explores the gap between idealized love and the messy, beautiful reality of human connection."

They thought love was a feeling. They were wrong. It watched. It waited. It learned their silences. And slowly, it claimed space where freedom once lived. Between longing and loss, tenderness and control, this story explores what happens when love stops being human - when it begins to feel like an entity of its own. Love, the Entity is a haunting romance about intimacy, blurred boundaries, and the quiet fear of realizing that being loved can sometimes mean being owned. Possession disguised as affection.

We didn't fall in love loudly. There were no dramatic beginnings, no promises meant to last forever. Just two people meeting at the exact moment they were tired of being alone. What we had was simple. Instinctive. Private. A language made of small words and shared silence. Of affection that didn't need poetry to be profound. But love has a way of teaching lessons before we realize we're students. This book is not about heartbreak in its final form. It's about the quieter damage the waiting, the forgiving, the absences that arrive gently and leave violently. It's about how happiness can train you to endure loss, and how understanding someone does not always mean they will stay. We Practiced Goodbye Without Knowing is a story of love that felt endless only because its ending was rehearsed in silence.

|3X FEATURED · SHORTYS 2025 SHORTLIST · AULD LANG SYNE HONORABLE MENTION · WATTPAD CREATORS PROGRAM| #SupportPacificIslanderVoices Erin, a conflicted Elemental Spirit, embarks on a life-changing journey across the ocean as the first hurricane of the 2025 Atlantic Hurricane Season. *** Erin hasn't been an Elemental Spirit for long, but she has watched the Earth change right before her, becoming more unrecognizable each day because of humans. As her first journey across the Atlantic Ocean approaches, she has one goal and one goal only: to eliminate the humans. Take them out one by one, starting with the Caribbean. As Erin moves her thunderstorms away from Cape Verde and begins organizing into a massive hurricane, she starts seeing the world from different perspectives: between ships, islands, animals, and even the Hurricane Hunters investigating her. When she nears peak intensity in the Caribbean, Erin faces the toughest question of all: "Is this right, or am I just another monster?" That's something the young hurricane must figure out on her own. *** *A short story inspired by Henry Loomis's quote in Jurassic World Rebirth: "When the Earth gets tired of us, believe me, it will shake us off like a summer cold."* *FYI: This is a story, not a science lesson, so don't expect everything to be completely accurate.* *Moral: There is just as much good in the world as there is evil.* *Word Count: 5,000 exactly (500 words per chapter).*

His heart is completed through three lifetimes. He was once a Camel, carrying weight that wasn't his. Then a Lion, powerful yet painfully imperfect. And finally... a Child, learning the courage to soften again. Each life left its own scars- buried anger, unexpected betrayals, quiet forgiveness, and fragile hope. But every path led him toward a single lesson: "We heal when a heart meets another heart." Now, as a dentist in the human world, he meets fear-stricken patients, broken smiles, trembling hands, and eyes that hide stories deeper than pain. And for the first time, he understands what his three lives were teaching him: Compassion is a form of power. Kindness is a kind of wisdom. And healing... is a shared act. This novel reads like a fairy tale in warmth, a poem in clarity, and a philosophy in depth. Once you begin, you'll feel it- this isn't just a story. It's a quiet act of healing.

Why do we keep trying? Yunmi notices a wall most people ignore. It isn't hidden or guarded. It's just a part of the street, part of daily life. People pass it, lean against it, and build around it. No one expects anything from it. Yunmi does. She believes things exist for a reason. That patience, effort, and persistence must eventually lead somewhere. So she returns to the wall again and again, convinced that if nothing happens, she simply hasn't done enough yet. The wall never reacts. It never resists. It never changes. As Yunmi gives more of herself to something that offers nothing back, she begins to face a quieter truth - not about the wall, but about herself. And about why we stay, long after nothing is answering.

This is not a story of victory. It is a story of duty, love, and the price everyone paid. DISCLAIMER This story is a literary retelling inspired by the Ramayan. It is written to explore emotions, relationships, and human experiences, not to challenge or reinterpret religious beliefs. Any resemblance to traditional texts is used with respect.

In Aohane, a village that lives gently on a fragile world, love grows without urgency or promise. Bound by loss, time, and a sky that obeys its own laws, two lives move side by side-until the night when even the stars must choose whether to remain apart.