Romance Short Stories

A Walk Through the Margin

The settlement had been called Pelto. Twenty-three cousins, a stone wall, a grain-house, a living-water system. The Hymn came through the wall on a Tuesday and by Thursday there was…[...]

The Tendril Said Hello

The first thing I knew was the nutrient-warmth. The second was Heia’s face through the glass.She was bending over the jar, both hands flat on the bench, her breath fogging…[...]

The Only Place I See

The only place I see is the horizon. What a beautiful and horrific view. When I am completely concentrated I can almost pinpoint the meeting of the sea and the…[...]

The Amber Room

Her daughter had never seen color. She had never been taught what amber was. So someone needed to explain to Nessa Galloway why every crayon in Isla's box was worn…[...]

A New Dawn

Black abyss greeted my eyes as they removed the itchy blindfold. White moonlight bouncing off the waves was the only indication that there was a sea. Stars twinkling above, waves…[...]

The Graveyard Shift

It was Joshua's first Graveyard shift at his local gas station. For some reason people who worked this shift never stayed more than a week. No one would explain why,…[...]

Project Violet

“Violet,” I mutter to myself as I walk through the woods. Violet; a person, dimension, thing, creature? I do not know, but the letter with that word had led me…[...]

Red Shifted

Ezekiel Crowe once drew maps for the living. His clean lines guided lost souls through the untamed wilderness, steering them clear of swamps and bogs and onto solid ground. For…[...]

Smoke and Signals

Experiment complete. Status: Failure.“Wynn. Good morning, Wynn.” A bird three shades darker than that of the light grey sky chirped from a thin branch outside a domed glass window that…[...]

Deserted

Rachel awoke lying on a beach with debris littered around her. She looked around, confused about how she ended up there. Then she remembered the terrible storm the night before.…[...]

Drew

It was the changing light, not his hunger, that first alerted Drew to the lateness of the hour, although with his hyperfocus now broken, he was suddenly acutely aware of…[...]

RED 21

Henry and Mikey stood before the red-brick maw of Harding High. They had been a pair since the fifth grade, a pact made in the dirt of the elementary playground.…[...]

Ships That Don’t Come In

Catherine O’ Brady could sense something was coming, she could smell it, feel it in her very soul. Not wasting time with finding her slippers, she rushed upstairs to the…[...]

The Hole

Tanya had forced herself not to move. She thought playing dead might buy her some time before possibly having to delve into her dark past. Now she realized that it…[...]

Remember Tauberun

Mila Hoffman never believed in ghosts. Not until Tauberun.Rumors said it was a lively place, once. The baker always had fresh bread ready in the mornings. The buttery scent of…[...]

The Carnival Slept

My waterlogged boots made dull thuds against the grounds of the lifeless carnival. The thuds were where idle chatter, victory bells, shaking coaster bars would have been. They buried the…[...]

Reveille – A Cautionary Tale

The light came late. Not by any measure the others would have named, but Bartholomew felt the delay, a subtle slackening of something that had always arrived with certainty. Dawn…[...]

Sienna

“Color” is a weird concept to me.They say that ever since the Calamity seventy years ago the world has turned achromatic. Yet, for me, it’s always been the same–I’ve always…[...]

Green

From the grate, I look out at the jungle below. The fungi are out tonight—blue-green at the top, darker green into the branches, then a colour past violet down where…[...]

Colors of the Sunset

I had always enjoyed watching the sunset, for as long as I can remember. Ever since I was a little girl, my mother would bring me to this beach just…[...]

CROSS SLASH: Heaven and Hell

Dr. Sven Cain is evil.From a time during his innocent youth, Sven was the dominating factor in medical science and robotic engineering. He didn’t just practice medical science and robotic…[...]

Red

Trigger Warning: Violence, gore, and self-harm. London, 1913 The first thing that I want you to know is that I am not mad. The unfortunate circumstances in which you find…[...]

Blue Mouths

The hand came first.I had held it so long I had forgotten it was not mine — five fingers, dark and perfect, the nails still curved like little shells. I…[...]

The Small Ones First

I found them by their heat.From altitude, the planet read mostly in blues and greens, the thermal signature of a world still within habitable range but trending wrong. Pockets of…[...]

Visions In the Night

Harry hadn’t slept in four days. Every night, the banging continued, louder and louder with each passing day. A few times, he would debate going outside and seeing what it…[...]

Song of Shipwrecks

Angelic notes from a hellion, trapped not by choice, but because my voice and what it was born into; it chooses to call to the waves of the sea. I…[...]

The ghosts left behind

There was a stillness to the air, to an almost impossible degree, as if the air itself had begun to forget how to stir and dance until the stone that…[...]

Thirsty

This story contains reference to sexual violence and physical violence. The blood soaked deep into the dusty ground, turning the pale tan to a dark, rich burnt umber. I left…[...]

Lucid

It only really makes sense if you start with the table, and barely then. But let’s start there. There was a square table with a white linen cloth. Four chairs,…[...]

Long Odds

As the day of reckoning neared, I sat in my palace of safety, contemplating our survival and the best way to prolong it. Lately, my kingdom had fallen under attack,…[...]

Don’t Follow the Song

The light from the laptop strained her eyes more than the late hour itself. Ioana scrolled absently through articles, forums, and videos sent by people convinced they had captured the…[...]

The Last Thing That Still Works

My hand is no longer a hand. It is bone and blood and something that won’t obey me. Daisy didn’t run. She bolted, threw me hard enough that the sky…[...]

The Woman Across the Aisle

The Woman Across the Aisleby Owen Smith I shouldn’t be allowed in here, he thought. His footsteps echoed across the empty pews, bouncing from wall to wall like bullets ricocheting…[...]

With so many questions why would you want answers?

It was dark.There was a slight familiar ring in my ears and I didn’t know how to stop it. I then realize I just had to open my eyes, why…[...]

The Tachyon Fates

Another yawn slips from Kat as she leans back from the wall of data glowing on her monitor. Above her, the fluorescent lights flicker in their usual uneven rhythm, but…[...]

THE RED IN THE RAIN

Deep red puddles collected in the dirt lanes of Masaki, thick as clotting blood. It has rained that day, though it never should have. The leaves hung heavy, each one…[...]

Madman’s Ball

Doctor Lena was escorted into the cavernous citadel of the Hierophant, a madman cloaked in shadow. The doctor used the telescopic functionality of his cybernetic eyes to peer into the…[...]

Silence in the dark

I haven’t been able to sleep since my daughter’s ghost started visiting me at night.I wasn’t sleeping well before, but at least I got an hour or two before daylight…[...]

Aphelion

It was beautiful, and Eric hated himself for thinking so, hated the way the magma flowering across the Pacific looked like the roses he used to steal from gas stations…[...]

Empty Insides

On the fifth of march, as the late snow was crying from the sky into the suburbs of Tulip's Hollow, Michael Phillips woke up to discover that his liver had…[...]

Saltwater Spirits, Sugarcane Shadows

The first thing Marisol felt was the pulse—a thrumming, blood-red heartbeat of a feather resting upon her threshold. It did not merely lie there; it breathed, twitching against the humid…[...]

Five Days in Liminal

Monday, October 9, 2023I buried Eleanor over the summer. I didn’t cry.In fact, I must confess, I carried myself with a composed, almost nonchalant demeanor throughout the service, and mourners…[...]

Life Sentence

Day 1535The cold floor of the cell doesn’t bother me anymore. When I first landed here, I couldn’t sit without flinching at the feeling of the frigid pavement against my…[...]

Suitable Behavior

The years have passed, I kept some of the pictures of mom and dad. Their younger selves still smile at me inside the frame next to the stairs leading to…[...]

File name: Caelum Altera. Case number: 2085 1141513151225

Trigger Warning: Sensitive topics. Mentions of physical violence, gore, or abuse, references substance abuse, and mental health topics. There’s a quiet click, and the quiet hum from the internal mechanism…[...]

Jenny

CW: misogyny, stalking, femicide Up-down. Up-down. The man’s knee was trembling, shivering as if to a high up-beat. With his worn-out sneakers and his green hoodie, the guy in front…[...]

Hoard to Death

“You know, I feel like we have this… incredible connection,” Gary says. He’s leaning across the table to reach for my hand. I settle for the tips of my fingers…[...]

Death Of A Tyrant

The priest conducted his sermon in a monotone voice: “…beloved husband to Annabelle. Cherished father of Nathan and Rebecca …”What a crock of shit.William John Bradshaw was a heartless prick.…[...]

Among The Stars

Every star up there, every sun to a stellium of planets, and some people still believe we are the only life in the universe. I used to hate gardening. One…[...]

Haint Blue Homecoming

By the time I turned off County Road 12, the kudzu had swallowed the mailbox whole. Green vines thick as rope curled around the post like something claiming a body.…[...]

Wrong Doers

I shake my head, trying to clear my head a faint smell of smoke fills my lungs as I walk into the diner. I clutch my purse tighter and steal…[...]

Echoes + Tropes

“Cut!” The actors relax and laugh at the director’s announcement, and I frown at them from my chair, annoyed at their contentment. “Hannah?” It’s my co-writer, Neal, who notices my…[...]

Alone

Why is it so dry? My skin feels like it’s going to peel off my body as I open my eyes. Even that takes effort. The town I’ve lived most…[...]

Back for Good

“Tallest man you’ll ever see,” Wally said. “I swear.” “But that was fourteen years ago,” Laura said. “Oh yeah, Mark was already old by then. If Mark’s alive, he’s at…[...]

Mr. & Mrs. Bright

It was a lovely restaurant. The same old stereotypical candlelight dinner with two people who love each other as if it was their life's work. As if holding each other,…[...]

What Did We Bury?

INMATE FOUND DEAD IN CELL: Ellis Rucker, 28, found unresponsive in his cell at Kessler Correctional early Thursday. Prison officials say foul play has not been ruled out. Clara read…[...]

The Carver Twins

The Carver twins had been swapping places since before they had language for deception, and now, at their father's funeral, they would perform their most dangerous switch yet, because one…[...]

Better Late

The day couldn’t make up its mind. Summer had come early, seen that no one was ready for it and so it had eloped with Spring in the dead of…[...]

The Last Night of Iron

Rain hammered the Rusted Saints clubhouse hard enough to shake the windows. Water rolled off the rusted gutters outside while thunder moved across San Perdido like distant artillery. Most of…[...]

The Thing In the Casket

[CW: References to suicide.] The thing in the casket looked nothing like Ryan Cole. Rain poured off the sides of the heavy canvas canopy, turning the graveyard grass to mud.…[...]

Lowered with him

Every eye in the church finds her in the front row. Their attention presses against her skin, hot and inescapable, and all she wants is to disappear into the polished…[...]

9

She came back into her house, the screen door squeaking and sticking a little. She brushed the dirt off her face , looked at the screen door and said "I've…[...]

The Way Out

**SENSITIVE CONTENT: themes of trafficking, incest, drug usage/dealing, and prostitution** She woke to the sound of her boyfriend’s phone going off. Next to her in bed, he’s slumped over the…[...]

Chaltier’s Well

Chaltier's Well had stood for three centuries at the fringe of Western settlement, neither prospering enough to expand beyond its original boundaries nor failing enough to join the ranks of…[...]

To Those We Never Meet

Standing outside in the rain, I looked at the building before me. Its walls hollow and solid at the same time. The door closed against the weather and the coming…[...]

Every fourth word

CW: References to murder. To our patrons: If the morning suits you, early callers now can pause awhile and read what follows in this week’s paper: several free currant buns…[...]

The Last Hit

Some fans sang his songs, others prayed. Most cried as Adi’s casket passed through the villa gates. Police held reporters back while the family crossed the courtyard. They wore the…[...]

The Last Silences

Rain falls over the base as if the night needed to wash the mountain before dawn. The ground absorbs everything. Damp wood groans under the wind. The smell of saturated…[...]

Election Night

‘Twas election night, and the votes were in. All day across the city, people blackened in little ovals and dropped ballots into metal boxes. The residents were picking the future…[...]

Bad Mother Funeral

Chapter 1 “Are you family? I need to know where to seat you.” The man eyes me like he thinks he may have seen me on the wanted posters at…[...]

The Death of Iris Vane

Iris did not know, when she stepped out of her squished little brownstone on Cobble Hill, that she was going to die. Of course, everyone dies eventually, but for Iris…[...]

The Sunflowers

Leanette adjusted the napkins placed on top of the plates so that the embroidered sunflowers sit right at the center. This is the third time in ten minutes. She moved…[...]

The Picture-Perfect Family

We held hands as my father said the prayers."Heavenly Father, we thank you for this food and for the ones who prepared it." He smiled warmly at my mother, who…[...]

Silent Table

During a dinner party in the final days of September, there was a man by the name of Michael Tret who as looking for someone else there named, Eric Wron.…[...]

Hold’em to Headstones

“A flush beats a straight,” Death rasped, waving a celebratory hand toward Juliet. The dark-haired teenager tipped her head in a firm nod, then cast her gaze away from Lucci,…[...]

One to Another

When the doorbell rang the fourth time, the mood had already turned sour. Mrs. Morayo managed a weak smile when she opened the door to see Archbishop Charles Matthews. He…[...]

The same four chairs

Mr and Mrs Briarson sat across from Mr and Mrs Hall in the same four chairs, just as they had for fifteen years. Their regular dinners began when the Halls…[...]

A Rainbow in Kentucky

For Independence Day Emily wanted music. Jen wanted crafts. Olivia said a Rainbow Gathering was the perfect compromise.They found information online. The national gathering was somewhere in the Daniel Boone…[...]

Marrya

When the first flyer fell from the sky, it was as soft as a fluttering bird. It had caught on the broken wooden panel Mother had salvaged from the rubble…[...]

Brought to Heel

Eager to please, the Handler says, passing over the Hound’s proverbial leash with a smirk. Go on, try him out. He does tricks. The Hound simmers silently next to the…[...]

Just Another Dead Girl Underwater

Trigger Warning: implications of death, violence and sexual harassment By the time the fisherman finds me, I will have been dead for thirty-three hours, six minutes, and twenty-nine seconds. Eighteen…[...]

An Ode to the Archduke

June 27th, 1914: Today started out like any other day. I was a bit hungover from grabbing a drink and going to the cinema the night before, and it still…[...]

The Big Deep

I’m a miner. I dig holes for a living. ‘Dig’ is a generous word, really. I blow things up so we can go deeper. Drill, charge, blast then bog it…[...]

OMG Karma’s a… What?

***This story has references about date rape.*** The sudden crack of the dry branch resonated through the deep woods. I froze. The moon hid between the clouds, peaking out to…[...]

The Things I Couldn’t Pack

That morning Mama and Baba were having another one of their secret conversations after breakfast. I heard it, though. I hear almost all of the conversations they hide from us…[...]

Queen of the Flare

It was like any other day—at least, in the beginning.Madison’s arms stretched upwards as she yawned and fumbled for her cell phone on the nightstand. "How many followers do I…[...]

He Wasn’t the Same

He Wasn’t the SameUnion County, IowaFriday, June 8, 19459:21 a.m. Eighteen-year-old Jakub Nowak, the youngest son of Polish immigrant farmers, settled into a thinly padded seat for the longest train-trip…[...]

No Caller ID

This town deserves its picture on the front page of America's Most Miserable Cities. I kick the box of Nancy Drew Files that I've read twice over. Travel activities wear…[...]

Seventeen Steps to Freedom

Voices screaming so loud they could be heard clear at the end of the block. Doors slamming hard enough that the hinges rattle and squeal in protest. Boots stomping against…[...]

And if I’m on fire, you’ll be made of ashes too.

The thing Shane needed most in the world was alone time, and it was so close. After six long hours of hiking narrated by KP’s constant chatter and the world’s…[...]

The Visit

Content warning note: Mental Health and passing of a loved one. Diphtheria, meningitis, RSV, Pertussi-. “Mike, what do you think bud, you want to go?” Pertussis, Measles…. “Uhh um give…[...]

The Text

Reading the text again for the fifth time the detective knew that it had to mean something.This generation puts everything in a text message instead of calling or writing a…[...]

Romance on the High Sea

ROMANCE ON THE HIGH SEA1500 words Bryce looked out over the sea and felt relaxed for the first time in two years. A lot had happened in a short space…[...]

Lion’s Roar

Lion’s Roarby Vivi Anne(First and last words are the same)Annie, I love you,” Ronnie said, gently. She was shocked; she didn't expect to hear that. Fear immediately took hold of…[...]

Alone In The Depression

Sensitive Content: death, loss, poverty, illness, and grief Alone. They called it the Great Depression later on, but back then, we didn’t name it anything. It was just… the way…[...]

The Ink Won’t Listen

The Ink Won’t Listen Rice. Her name is Rice. She is 17. She is always covered in paint or Sharpie. She is never far from a book. The pages display…[...]

Wishful Thinking

Nora Hargraves desired silence. She required it. Demanded it. The potion’s next step was the most fragile. A single misstep, one careless sound, and three months of work would be…[...]

Birthday Wishes

Margot - 31 days agoWelcome to the best team ever!To: JaneHello Jane, I just wanted to reach out and give a warm welcome! I’ve worked at Royal Red Publishing for…[...]

The Lies I Tell Myself

The first person I killed often visits my nightmares, but it’s the second who haunts me while I’m awake. His bruised face appears in the foggy alleys I pass. His…[...]

After

The last time Ava and I walked home together, she was aiming for the cracks instead of avoiding them. She kept tapping a crushed soda can with her shoe until…[...]