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[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Chance Meeting\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2911\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Clack, clack, clack went my high heels on the polished marble floor of the Prado Museum. I wore a short skirt with a crop top, and received many 'piropos' (catcalls), on my way into the museum. It wasn’t my intention to attract attention, I just dressed the way I liked to dress.\nThe vibrant streets of Madrid pulsed with life, filled with people and colourful buildings. It was my first solo trip to Spain, but although Madrid is a vast city, everyone was so friendly, I never felt alone. In fact, I felt very much at home. My schoolgirl Spanish improved every day I was there and used it every chance I got.\nI come from the small but picturesque town of Buxton in Derbyshire, but left university a few years before having studied Fine Art, and my long-held ambition was always to see the incredible collection of Spanish masterpieces held at the Prado Museum. My eyes were fixated on the vibrant colours and intricate brushstrokes of the world-renowned masterpieces. Having got here, it was all I could do to restrain my feet from doing a little tap dance with joy as I explored this huge and impressive well of artistic expression.\nDespite spending countless hours on my portraits, I could never quite capture the raw emotion to transport viewers into my artistic world. I wanted to evoke emotions, reactions, and responses to my work, but it was tough going. I got a first from Oxford University for my Fine Art degree, but I knew I would never reach the dizzy heights of the masterpieces I saw in this wonderful place.\nI looked around me as I walked into the main viewing area. This was a beautiful, neoclassical style building, with high ceilings, pale walls, and subtle lighting so as not to distract the viewer from the impact of the artist’s work. After contemplating various masterpieces for an hour, my gaze fell upon two of Francisco Goya’s renowned works: The Clothed Maja (La Maja Vestida) and The Naked Maja (La Maja Desnuda). \nI stared at both paintings with total concentration, examining their form and perspective, then heard a deep, resonant voice say to me, “They don’t know who she was, do they?” I liked the voice. It was a man’s voice, confident, assured, but with vibrancy.\nWithout turning round, I answered, “No, they don’t. The historians think she was someone’s mistress; I think her name was Pepita Tudo, but they are not sure.”\nHe continued, “Look at her form, clothed, then naked. Which do you think the more attractive? For me, naked. You can’t see the shapeliness of her legs in the clothed version. The Desnuda painting is far more sensuous, don’t you think?”\nI thought, “Who is this?” but I continued to stare at the paintings. I felt my heart beat a little faster, and was I sweating? What a primal response to a complete stranger’s voice. All my senses were heightened, and I was tingling.\nI coughed. “Well, I guess Goya was aiming for a natural beauty approach since it was the height of Romanticism when he painted this.”\n“Emotion and the senses were important to romantic artists. Goya wanted to evoke a raw and intense emotional response to seeing the woman clothed then naked.” \nHe was talking my type of artistic language. That’s what I wanted to do when I painted a portrait. I wanted to capture every intricate detail. I didn’t paint nudes, but still wanted the viewer to appreciate the depth of emotional feeling I put into my artwork. This stranger understood.\nI felt my senses heighten further as I listened to this man’s deep, rather sexy voice discussing romanticism and how to view Goya’s paintings. He was turning me on. Was that Goya’s intention too? To turn people on when studying his artwork? \nI longed to turn round and see the stranger’s face, but something told me it was better to stay looking at the paintings. Did he just touch my hair? I wasn’t sure. It felt like a soft stroking movement, from the top of my head down my back, but so gentle, so soft, I just couldn’t be certain. Perhaps I imagined it.\nI didn’t want to turn the conversation to ordinary matters, such as the weather, or how busy the museum was, or even the fact my stomach was rumbling as it approached lunchtime. I was now riding on a wave of romanticism, imagining a dark-eyed, handsome stranger to match the seductive voice.\nThere was no-one else nearby. No-one else to destroy these magical moments, these unimagined sensual feelings which were being aroused deep within me. I wanted more. I needed more.\nHe continued in his sensuous, sexy voice. Was that a slight accent I could detect? It wasn’t English, nor Spanish either, perhaps Italian with its sing song cadence? Whatever it was, it was having a serious physical effect on my body. I realised I was panting and trembling in equal measure. “Pull yourself together, Layla.” But his silky voice was like a physical caress.\n“Did you know there were rumours that Goya and the Duchess of Alba had a long and passionate affair after she asked him to paint her portrait? I believe it was the Duchess and not Pepita Tudo in these paintings.”\nI felt him close behind me now. He wasn’t touching me with his body, but his presence was so powerful, it felt as if he was hugging me from top to toe.\n“But what evidence is there to support that viewpoint?” I brushed my hair out of my eyes, and a delicious fresh fragrance of men’s aftershave wafted over me. It wasn’t overpowering, in fact, it was light, subtle, but altogether consuming. I inhaled deeply, breathing it in as fully as I could. I knew it came from him.\n“Goya wrote letters to her saying ‘Now I know how it feels to live’.”\nMy insides turned to jelly. I loved combining talking to this stranger without seeing him, but feeling him, from top to toe, smelling him, and loving his smell. I was so absorbed and captivated by his spell. What was he thinking about me? Was he feeling the same, or was this all my romantic imagination running away with me? God knows Spain possessed its own seductive powers, with exotic street smells and food, lively rhythmic music, and warm and friendly people. I challenged anyone not to feel the romanticism in the streets of Madrid. \nI willed him to say more. I needed to hear more of that deep, warm, honeyed voice. My body was swaying. “Control yourself,” I admonished myself. What would people think if they knew what was happening? That I was at a point of losing my self-control.\n“There was another portrait of her painted by Goya. In the portrait she wore two rings, one had Goya’s name on it, the other Alba. Her hand pointed to a hidden inscription at her feet, which read, ‘Only Goya’. I believe she gave her heart and soul over to him.”\n“I believe you.”\nOh God, what a weak and silly response. ‘I believe you’. Say something clever, Layla, say something spellbinding, say something which will capture his heart forever and etch an indelible mark upon his soul.\nIn my mind’s eye, I was already with this man. He was my future, my all. My forever. My existence depended on him.\nI began to turn around.\n“No.” He said. “Don’t turn around yet. Don’t spoil it.” Anticipation filled the air.\nOh God, was he was imagining himself as Goya and imagining me as the Duchess of Alba, immersing himself in these moments? My heart leapt with joy. This was too much. I loved it. I loved his desire to be enveloped in the romanticism of our meeting.\nSoftly I responded with a breathless, “Yes.”\nI felt his hand now. It was stroking all the way down the length of my long brown hair, to my back. He moved closer and leaned his head against my neck. He felt warm. It was a warm day, but heat radiated from his body. His body was pressing against me now from behind. It wasn’t aggressive, and I didn’t feel violated. I wanted it. I wanted to feel him.\nHe slid his hands around my body and put them over my hands. He whispered in my right ear. “I will give you two rings. You can wear them. Mine will say Luca, and yours?” \nHe left the question hanging in the air. I said, “Layla.” \nGosh, even our names sounded good together. Luca and Layla. It was perfect!\nIf I relayed this story to my family or my friends, they would tell me what a creepy guy he was and question his motives. The fact he touched me, a complete stranger, should have put up red flags. I was a young woman, vulnerable. I could have shouted out in the museum, called him a pervert, or asked for help, but there was none of that.\nWe were in our own bubble, a private moment, even amongst the throng of people surrounding us and the paintings. If they looked at us, they would think we were a loving couple, enjoying the artwork together, in our own secluded world, shielded from everyone else.\nI leaned back slightly, my head now resting against his. I could feel his hair. It felt silky, but curly. Oh God, please let him be how I imagined him to be. What if I turned right round, and he was a horror, or he thought I was ugly? I didn’t believe it; I couldn’t believe it. This was supposed to happen, I was sure of it.\nThere are only a few times in life that there is true romantic chemistry between two people, and this was one of those moments. I knew it; I felt it. He was my destiny.\n“Layla,” he whispered in my ear. “Such a lovely name. Luca and Layla. We are like Goya and Alba, aren’t we?”\nI felt weak at the knees. He was saying all the right things, doing all the right things. I was putty in his hands. A cliché, but absolutely true. I knew I would do absolutely anything he wanted from that moment on, completely in his power.\nJust then, a fire alarm went off. I couldn’t believe it. The spell was broken. I was desperate to turn around, to see this man. He was no longer holding my hands. I wasn’t sure what to expect. I turned slowly. What I didn’t expect was the emptiness of the space, no-one there, nothing at all. The room stretched before me. I looked from left to right. There were people milling around, but no-one at all nearby. The alarm stopped. A security guard shouted out in Spanish, then English “Sorry, everyone. False alarm. As you were.”\nBut I couldn’t be as I was. I was confused, upset, disorientated. Doubt clouded my mind as I questioned the reality of the entire episode. Was I losing my mind? I needed to sit down and think. \n“You stupid woman, Layla.” I thought to myself. I smacked my forehead in frustration with my right hand.\n“He’s a figment of your imagination. You wanted to feel those emotions so much, the very emotions you cannot evoke in your own artwork. You invented him instead. You are a sad woman.” \nI hung my head in shame. It was true. I worked endlessly, never giving myself a proper rest. My eyes had dark circles from countless sleepless nights. Such was my frustration at not attaining success with my painting. Maybe I felt overwhelmed, stressed, and needed a break. I felt humiliated, disappointed, and angry, all at the same time.\nTime to leave the museum, time to face reality, time to leave the romantic bubble. It was well and truly burst now.\nI took one more glance back at the museum, and as the large glass doors closed behind me and I exited, I heard a pleading voice say, “Layla, Layla, don’t go. I went to get you something when the alarm went off.” \nThis time, I turned round quickly. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I saw a tall man just a foot away from me. He was about 6 feet tall, with dark, sultry eyes, a light brown tan, curly brown hair, and a wide smile holding a red rose.\nI gulped. He was my dream man. In fact, I couldn’t have dreamed of a better one, surpassing my wildest imagination. \n“Luca?” I stuttered in disbelief. He smiled, and said, “Yes, of course, Layla. It’s your Luca.”\nAs he handed me the red rose, I knew we would always be together. I believe in love at first sight, but we fell in love from the first contact. Just his voice, and his presence. I didn’t even need to see him to know it was the truth.\nHe was Italian indeed, from Venice. A place I loved. His father was an artist who painted beautiful landscapes and the waterways of Venice. Luca’s family were artists for generations. He himself was an Art Teacher, drawn to the Prado Museum to see the range of Italian paintings contained there, as well as the Spanish masterpieces. He was 35; I was 28. \nI met all of his family and over the dining table, laughter, and conversation filled the air with childhood stories about Luca growing up. They were adorable and welcomed me with open arms. They joked that for a long time his mother wanted him to find a special woman, but he never did, until now. He lived a full life and taught in the local school. He was part of the community in Venice, and knew all the gondola families, whose history went a long way back.\nWe each wore a ring, one with Layla and the other with Luca delicately engraved on them, a symbol of our love and commitment. We wanted to echo the love and passion Goya displayed for Alba, it was thanks to them we found each other. \n“I always wanted to meet a woman that understood the importance of love. Love for me is affection, tenderness, and devotion towards a person. It’s about being happy in their presence and being sensitive to each other’s feelings.” \nI looked at him and took his hand, squeezing it with mine. I nodded.\nHe continued. “It is true, Layla; as an Italian man I have been out with many women, but none of them, not one, evoked the emotional response in me the way you did, when we met as strangers in the Prado Museum. They were always interested in what car I drove, how much money I earned, or how I looked. Not one of them had an authentic, genuine, and honest response to me, but you did. For me, the fact you didn’t even know what I looked like, but just felt me, meant everything.”\nI also went out with a number of men. Obviously, University was a time of exploration with the opposite sex, but no-one was particularly special or even memorable. \n“I understand Luca. I felt you, as you felt me too. Our chemistry was instant.”\nI was so happy. Luca fulfilled my dreams. I introduced him to my family. His charm and looks overwhelmed my mother and my sister. Typically, my sister told me I was punching way above, but I didn’t care. I knew I was attractive, but not in model proportions, and probably less attractive than his previous girlfriends. Looks were irrelevant to us both, our feelings were everything.\nWe settled in Venice. It was such a wonderful environment. It is a city that is so different from any other. The streets of water weave their spell of romance as you glide along to elegant palazzos and ancient bridges. I loved how the water in the canals lapped gently against the old stone walls and steps. The Grand Canal buzzed with motorboats, gondolas, water taxis, but everywhere we looked, we saw architectural wonders of buildings covered in intricate carvings and incredible frescoes.\nThere was a maze of narrow passageways leading to hidden churches or artisan workshops, of course Venetian masks being a highlight of any shopping trip. I loved Italian food. Luca turned out to be a superb cook, and I spent many happy days enjoying Pino Grigio wine, fresh pasta, or pizza at home with him or at a huge get together with his extended family.\nAlthough a tourist attraction, I often persuaded Luca to take me on a gondola, because it is only when you glide under the Rialto Bridge with your loved one, on a heady summer’s balmy evening, Venice comes fully alive with romance.\nTogether with Luca’s father, we opened an art studio in the heart of Venice. I painted with inspiration from that moment on, infused with feelings of love. It shone through my artwork. I may not be a Master of Art, but I could finally show the world the depth of feeling I put into my work and was able to make a living out of the paintings I sold. \nSo, the next time you meet an unexpected stranger, in an unexpected place, see what happens, suspend your disbelief. You may just find the one! I hope that one day, everyone may find their true inspiration for life, love, and happiness.\nThe end." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Pay it Forward\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2993\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart or end your story with a character who gets trapped inside a museum overnight." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Archie knew he had a problem, but he also had another problem that compounded that problem. Firstly, he was in the habit of not listening. But what made it worse was that even in knowing that he wasn’t listening and that this was increasingly becoming a problem, he did nothing about it.\n“You can’t do this,” Archie said as he was manhandled from the car and walked to the back door of the huge edifice of a building made ominous by the dark shadows thrown by street lamps that stood well back and avoided the less salubrious parts of the city.\n“Are you going to remind me of daft laws that had no business being passed for the likes of you and I?” \nIt wasn’t the question itself that made Archie gobble up air like a guppy fish, but it was a good question. Neither was it the challenge that the question presented, or rather a pushback on something that Archie had thrown at his old man a few times too many. No, it was the look the big man gave his son. That look crushed Archie in a way he didn’t know was possible. What that look crushed was a piece of his heart that had lain forgotten in his chest for far too long. \nArchie saw a heady cocktail of love and disappointment in his father’s eyes and in that moment, he knew he’d pushed it all too far. Now he had an unspoken question of his own. A question that haunts the world and visits unfortunates with a gift of shame; how did it get to this?\nAn inexplicable feeling of sadness threatened to rear up within Archie. If he’d allowed it to come forth then everything would have turned out differently. It certainly would have been far easier for Archie. But Archie wasn’t about easy. He had a feeling he was owed, but he’d never sat down with that feeling to have a chat about what it might be that he thought was coming to him.\nInstead, the shame gripped him. The shame knew its business, besides which, it had a willing host. Archie thought he was ignoring his shame as he invoked his anger. The shame smiled, it was the deceitful face of anger and it had won another battle against a supposedly superior opponent.\n“No,” said Archie defiantly, “this is trespass.”\nArchie’s Dad rolled his sad eyes, any doubt he might’ve had about this last-ditch endeavour was dispelled by his errant son’s arrogance. He knew his son was better than this, but he was sick to the back teeth with Archie’s shows of bravado. More and more he suppressed his true nature and it was becoming increasingly difficult to get through to the boy. \nEven so, Dan, or Big Dan as he was known in the village that he’d made his home for the past thirty years, almost faltered. Archie was his little boy and he’d never lost sight of that. He drew in a breath of resolve, reminding himself that he’d probably been too soft on the lad. That he’d tried his best to understand and done everything he could to be the boy’s world. There was a compromise there though and that compromise had done them both a disservice. \nWhat was about to happen was harsh. Some would call it unfair. Life was unfair and there was too much suffering for some. But it was what it was, making excuses only made it worse. Blaming others, worse still.\nHe unlocked the door and waved his son through.\n“I can’t believe you’re doing this!” said Archie, his voice rising in pitch to convey the depth of his protest.\n“You’ve brought this on yourself, son,” said Dan shaking his head in sorrow. Archie opened his mouth to speak, but Dan raised a single finger in stark warning, “don’t, you had ample opportunity to turn the corner, but you thought better of it and now this is the consequence.” He narrowed his eyes and grit his teeth, “you’ve gotta learn sometime. You reap what you sow, boy.”\nArchie knew better than to pipe up. This was as much survival instinct as respect. Sometimes the message was clear however much you didn’t want to hear it, and however much noise you made in an attempt to drown it out.\nThey walked in silence into the depths of the building. It was dark, but the full moon and the city’s ambient light was sufficient for them to see where they were going, but it carried with it a lack that was verging on a dark threat. Archie didn’t want to admit that the place scared him and this internal battle increased his fear, even before he got around to considering how it would be when his father abandoned him here.\nSuddenly, there was a blinding flash of light. Dan had the presence of mind to clap a hand over his son’s mouth and drag him into the shadows. The lights in the next room had been switched on by the security guard doing his rounds.\nDan leaned into his son and whispered into his ear, “you don’t want to be seen by that guy. If you are, you have nowhere to go and you will be arrested.”\nArchie’s eyes went wide, Dan noticed this even in the shadows. Turned out that he did still listen when his life depended upon it. Maybe the boy would turn the corner after all. If not, then Dan had done everything that he could.\nThey waited as the guard did his patrol in the neighbouring room, relaxing a little as the light went out. A flashlight beam danced around and the next light switch was flicked. Thankfully that next room charted a course away from Dan and Archie’s current location. Dan smiled inwardly at this. He’d not known where the guard was headed, but Archie wasn’t to know this. The perception of Dan’s knowing would add a certain something to the proceedings, or ordeal as Dan was sure Archie would be viewing it right now. That would change. Or if it didn’t then Archie was too far gone.\nDan refused to believe that. His love beat his chest fiercely and reminded him of what really counted. Not him. Not Archie. There was far more at play here. More than even Dan understood. By the time the sun rose and transformed death into life once again, Archie would understand a little more. Dan believed this with a burning passion, a force of will. His son would open his eyes to the first day of the rest of his life and they would get through whatever obstacles they were presented. Together.\nThree heartbeats later, Dan released his son. He stood before him and prepared to leave him to face the music that would only be played for his ears. This was a moment. A solemn moment. Something passed between father and son, and Dan automatically presented his little lad with his spade-like hand.\n“It’s time,” he said fiercely, perhaps a little too fiercely. It sounded too much like you’re on your own. “You’ve got this,” he added with a squeeze of his hand. Then he turned on his heel and vanished far too quickly for Archie’s liking.\nArchie watched his dad go and the moment of overwhelming pride at what he had just said almost exploded into shards of pain as an all too familiar feeling of abandonment assailed him. \nIt’s not his fault.\nHe didn’t abandon me.\nWords in Archie’s ear, the voice of the little boy he once was. The little boy that he now loathed. He stood there in turmoil. He was that weak and pathetic little boy, but his dad had just made him feel like a man. The little boy didn’t want him to be a man and that man resented the little boy. \nA powerful urge threatened to drag him down to the floor and it was all he could do not to let go, give up and cry tears of pity that should be a comfort but could never bring the comfort he required.\nHe pushed himself away from the protection of the alcove that his father had pulled him into and drove himself forth. If he stayed where he was, he would be discovered. He had to do something. He had to move. \nNow he was on his own and walking through the building he was more himself and this brought an awareness that he had been lacking in the bubble of the panic he’d experienced in his dad’s car and had been fighting ever since.\n“It’s done now,” he whispered to himself.\nHis dad had referred to one guard. So it should be a simple case of moving around in a circle so he always had sufficient distance from that man. There was the question of how he would make his exit, but there was something about the way his father had acted that gave Archie an assurance in that respect. He trusted that all would become clear and all he really had to do was evade the bloke who was paid to wander an empty building to ensure it remained empty.\nSimple, as long as Archie stuck to the brief. Even now he got that that in itself was a lesson. Archie had made simple increasingly hard and that difficulty was not isolated to Archie. He knew he was hurting his dad, and once he was in receipt of that awareness it had only seemed to make him worse. Once that was the case, Archie couldn’t see a way back.\nThat was the point, he realised. His dad was making it clear that he also couldn’t see a way back unless something changed. Unless Archie changed.\nHe should have resented being here. He should have carried on with his dull and destructive downward patterns of behaviour, but he felt exhilarated by the adventure he was now presented with. It took him a while to realise that a part of that was the belief that his dad had in him. That his dad had always had in him.\nAs this sank in, he began to see around him. Really see around him. Now he was taking in his surroundings and there was a weird and eerie sense to what he saw. He was in a place devoted to the past. A carnal house of sorts. The ancient bones of times lost, arranged in meaningful ways to speak to those who paid attention enough.\nHis surroundings transformed around him. Obstacles and potential hiding places stepped out before him and greeted him. He’d heard the word gravitas several times, but never attended to its meaning. Some words were like that. They sat in a crowd of context but never made a fuss. Instead they awaited an appropriate time to make a proper introduction. \nArchie didn’t think that inanimate objects could have gravitas. People had gravitas. They walked into the room and showed it off to everyone in order to manipulate them and get what they wanted. He stopped at a bust and read the plaque in the surreal light that bathed his surroundings. The date meant nothing to him beyond old. He couldn’t comprehend the distance of time between himself and that of the life of the person the bust depicted.\nHe moved on, but only a short distance to a cabinet which contained weapons of war from the same era. The naughty boy inside him wished that there were no cabinet. He had an overwhelming urge to reach out and brandish each and every weapon. Feel the weight of them, imagining himself on a battle field in the midst of conflict. A shiver ran down his spine as he was reminded that he was in a place of death. Everyone who had wielded weapons such as these were dead, even the victors couldn’t escape that inevitable conclusion to life.\nIn the next room there were paintings. He didn’t note the change that was overcoming him. It crept up on him until he was calm and flowing through the place with little care for anything other than what was presented to him. He was floating in the blue light and taking in a world he’d never realised existed. He’d passed through places like this previously, but on those occasions there had been hustle, bustle and a glare of lights that reminded him of school. Too much of it had reminded him of the structure and rules of education and there had been little room for him to experience any enjoyment. This was different though. Somehow, he could be himself here in a way he never knew possible. \nThe centrepiece in this room was a huge, imposing painting made all the more daunting by the horse upon which a pompous man was seated. Pompous he may have been, but there was something in the imperious look of the man that made Archie feel small and insignificant. He wanted to resent that feeling, but something else spoke to him and said simply; relax, this is important.\nArchie moved on and as he wandered with a purpose he could not quite describe, he thought of those words and the importance of this night. His dad was at the end of his tether. Archie knew that. He’d pushed and pushed and pushed until he forgot why it was that he was pushing. He thought he’d probably wanted a reaction, and that each time he’d been in receipt of a reaction he had deemed it insufficient. Now he was here. As a final act, his father had locked him in this place.\nWhy?\nOf all the options available to him, his dad had chosen this place. His dad’s choice intrigued him as much as his surroundings did. He thought he knew why he was here, but there was no simple answer to it. Instead, there was a suite of answers and many of those answers spawned more questions. Not a surprise because this was a place of learning as well as the resting place for old bones.\nArchie stood before a weather worn and pockmarked statue that had once sat proudly in a desert kingdom. He looked at the artist’s interpretation of how the statue had looked thousands of years ago when it was as young as him. It’s presence had not diminished with time. Quite the opposite.\nHe continued his circuit, barely aware of the guard he kept at a constant distance, only once thinking of the only other occupant of the building; hoping he enjoyed this solitude with the wise dead as much as Archie was. \nAs the light in the building shone more brightly, heralding the end of Archie’s adventure, he felt a sense of loss. At first it was a far off call, but a call he could not deny. It was as he sensed the arrival of the first hoard of visitors and the end of his time in the museum that he found himself in front of a marble statue of a woman in robes. The statue was a statue he’d seen a thousand concrete copies of, in garden centres and the like. The contempt of his mistaken familiarity almost led him to miss the moment this museum had saved until the very last.\nHe looked up at the statue and came face to face with his mother. His mother as he was always supposed to remember her, a faint, mischievous smile that held a thousand promises. He wanted to cry, but instead he returned the smile and he held it close as he ran from the building and into his father’s arms.\n“I’m sorry dad,” he said into the big man’s chest.\nDan eased him away, but not out of his arms, “what did you see?”\n“Mum,” Archie said simply, “I saw Mum.”\nDan nodded. That was enough and more.\nBut for Archie it wasn’t. The boy needed to say more, to share the truth of his night at the museum, “I…” he began.\n“It’s OK,” said Dan, “I know,” he added kindly.\n“No!” protested Archie, “it’s not that… I mean… I am sorry. I’ve been a little git and I took things out on you that I shouldn’t have.”\nDan shrugged, “it’s what I’m here for,” then he grinned, “sometimes,” he added with loaded meaning.\nArchie scrutinised his dad’s face, looking for an answer he was already in possession of, “it wasn’t just Mum you wanted me to see was it?”\n“No,” confirmed Dan as he turned and lead his son away from the museum and towards a greasy spoon. The night’s work had made them both ravenous.\n“You wanted me to learn,” said Archie.\n“I always want you to learn,” said Dan, “that’s what it’s all about. Took your mother to truly teach me that. And you…” he turned and smiled sadly at his son.\n“I miss her too,” said Archie, falling into his dad like the little boy he would always be as far as his father was concerned.\n“She’s right here with us, son.” Dan said softly as he ruffled the boys hair lovingly.\n“They all are,” whispered Archie, “all the people that made us possible. All the people that made this possible. We owe them more than we can ever repay.”\n“True,” agreed Dan.\n“So how’d we…” began Archie.\n“Pay it forward,” Dan said, “Give. There is a light that burns within each and every one of us. It burns all the more brightly for everything we’ve been given. Throughout our life we are the custodians of that light. We’re meant to nurture and grow it. Give and add to it and in the end, we give it all away so that it continues to light this world up. That is living well.”\nArchie smiled, wondering how he’d ever been so angry with his Dad. He’d learnt his lesson and then some." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Wildflowers and Moonlight\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1680\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story in which a character navigates using the stars." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "In the open expanse of the desert terrain that stretched ominously under the cloudy moonlit sky, Danny and Christina found themselves unsure of which way to go. Christina was trying desperately to stay calm but failing and Danny was hoping the sky would clear up a bit so he could use the stars to navigate their way out of Joshua Tree National Park. He learned astronavigation when he was a Boy Scout and while he wasn’t always thrilled with his parents for making him stick with everything he started there were times, like this, he was grateful for their unyielding stance on quitting. “McAllisters aren’t quitters, Danny. You start something, you finish it,” his father’s voice echoed in his head.\n\nChristina had just enrolled in a photography class at the local community college and her first assignment was to photograph something rare. She came up with the idea of taking a picture of one of the wildflowers that bloom for a short time in Joshua Tree National Park. They lived nearby so it wasn’t a difficult decision to go for a quick hike. \n\nThe area had had plenty of rain this winter and the reward this spring was a landscape that was bursting with color. Reds, yellows, purples and blues splashed across the park’s muted landscape, lending a psychedelic hue to an already mystical scene.\n\nTheir morning had started with a fight, which was not unusual these days. And while their fights are about different small things every day: the way Danny squeezes the toothpaste from the middle instead of rolling the tube up from the bottom the way Christina likes it or the way Christina replaces the toilet paper roll facing under instead of over the way Danny insists on having it, the fight is really always about the same thing. The one thing that has consumed their marriage for the last three years: infertility. They are stressed, fatigued and overwhelmed with the financial, the physical and the emotional drain it has been. \n\nThey both want a baby but Christina has become obsessed and can think of nothing else. They have gone to specialists, taken every test and done everything the doctors have suggested and still nothing. They have done IVF twice unsuccessfully and the shots and the prep for insemination for the third time is causing Christina to be more and more moody and very, very angry. All the time she’s angry. This bubbling hostility is really getting to be too much for both of them.\n\nAs they sit in the dark desert, contemplating which way to go they looked at each other and he noticed Christina was near tears. They were lost, hungry, scared, and disoriented. Danny felt particular pressure to get Christina out of this since he had a lot more experience with hiking and nature in general and she just didn’t need this stress. If only the sky would clear up, he could find Polaris and get them home. They couldn’t possibly be too far away from where they needed to be.\n\n“We shouldn’t have gone so far away from the marked trails,” Christina whined with a hint of blame creeping into her tone. “We’re gonna die out here!”\n\n“It'd really be great if you didn’t use that tone. I’m not the one who just HAD to get the picture of the Mojave Aster flower,” he said angrily. \n\n“I know. I’m sorry. You’re right,” Christina said as she breathed deeply using her yoga breaths to center herself. Christina was a yoga instructor and had always been so healthy that she took her failure to get pregnant as a particular insult to her healthy lifestyle.\n\n“Okay Mr. Boy Scout, show me how to survive!” she said through her breaths.\n\n He knew that talking would keep her focus away from her fear so he talked.\n\n“Well, when the clouds clear, all we need to is find Polaris — the North Star. It’s directly over the North Pole, always.”\n\n“How do you find that?” she asked between deep breaths that were not doing a great job of keeping her centered.\n\n“Well, to find it, we need to locate the Big Dipper. And if the Big Dipper is partially obscured, which, thanks to the cloud formation, it is you can look for Casseopeia. Casseopeia is always opposite the North Star from the Big Dipper. So that’s how you can center yourself and figure out which way to go. We parked and came in through the West Entrance so as soon as the clouds lift a little more we’ll know which direction will get us out of here.”\n\nAs she listened to his answer that was meant to soothe her, she actually got more worked up. \n\n“But what if the sky doesn’t clear up? What if a mountain lion comes around? What if the temperature drops? We are going to die!” With each question, her voice got louder and she was getting more and more hysterical.\n\n“Christina, stop! This isn’t helping,” Danny grabbed her shoulders and turned her toward him and looked straight in her eyes. “We are not gonna die. Just calm down.”\n\nWell, that did it. He should’ve known. You don’t tell a woman to calm down. Ever. But especially one jacked up on hormones. \n\nAnd with that Christina burst into tears, the floodgates opened and everything came out. All the pent up frustration, anxiety and stress was released into the desert air and she wept. She wept for the children they didn’t have and never would have, for the years of trying, for the money spent and for the misplaced guilt that drove her desire to do all of this in the first place. She cried and cried and cried, and all Danny could do was hold her. As her tears subsided a little, she pulled away from him and looked at him with the most shattered expression he’d ever seen. She was completely broken and seemed to deflate before his eyes.\n\n“Danny, I don’t know how much more of this I can take. I’m, just so tired,\" she said through tears. \"I don’t want to disappoint you. I really don't, but I think, for me--I’m done. I'm just done,\" she sobbed but continued talking. She had to get it out now.\n\n\"I'm so sorry, but I’ve gone as far as I can go with this. I feel like I’ve failed you, I failed myself, and I’ve failed at the one thing a woman is supposed to be able to do, but I can’t live like this anymore, and I can’t take the heartbreak anymore,” the last few words were a whisper drowned out by tears.\n\nDanny listened to her in the eerie silence of the dark desert and couldn't believe what he was hearing. He had been sure she was never going to stop until they had a baby. But when she said it, he could feel the pit that had been in his stomach gnawing away at him for what seemed like an eternity break apart into nothingness, and he broke down and cried with her. He cried for all the pain and stress they had gone through and because he couldn’t believe that they had gone so long without really communicating. This whole baby-making train had taken off and put them both on autopilot. After they decided to do it they never really discussed what that would look like and how far was too far in this quest. \n\n“I’m sorry,” he said as he brushed her tears away. “I’m sorry for making you think that you could disappoint me. You could never disappoint me. I’m sorry for not taking the time to talk about this sooner. I can’t stand what this is doing to you; what it’s doing to us. It’s just all too much. I wanted a baby. I really did, but I'm done too. I just didn't want to say anything because I thought you were still determined, and I didn't want to disappoint you.” \n\nThey held each other in the quiet of the night and felt peace come over them. After a while Danny looked up at the sky and noticed that he could see stars. The clouds had parted.\n\n“Hey, look! The Big Dipper! Do you see it?” he pointed into the sky and she nodded without really even looking.\n\n“C’mon. Let’s go,” he pulled her up off the rock she had been sitting on and they started walking west. “See? If that is north, we need to walk west over here. It shouldn’t take too long.” \n\nAs they walked out of the desert, they kept talking about how sorry they were for all the fighting they’d been doing. They talked about what they’d like to do now that they’d have time to focus on other things and they held hands and realized that while having a child would’ve been great, they were fine just being together. And there were other ways to have children. They could always adopt, but that’s a discussion for another day. Today they feel light and unfettered for the first time in years. \n\nIt took about an hour to follow the stars back to their car and on that walk they felt closer and happier than they’d felt in a long time.\n\n“You know, walking in the dark, following the stars reminds me of something I read in college that Leonardo da Vinci said. Are you ready? It's gonna be cute.\"\n\nShe smiled in the dark at how sweet and dorky her husband was. \"I'm ready. Lay it on me,\" she said with a little laugh.\n\n\"I think it goes something like: ‘fix your course on a star and you’ll navigate any storm’. Leo was right,\" Danny said as he squeezed her hand. \"We fixed our course on a star and it not only got us out of the desert, it got us back to each other.”\n\n\"Aw, you're right, that was cute,\" she smiled at him knowing how lucky they were to have each other as they got in their car and drove home." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Madame, the Mystic.\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1538\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story in a world where astrology and the movements of celestial bodies deeply impact the lives of inhabitants." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Jade stood gazing at her reflection. Beautiful bride, white satin, a veil of lace, stylish shoes, her face aglow. Then she paused, it as still her fantasy. Jade had bought her wedding gown years ago, as a teenager. She had chosen her veil and shoes, designed and stocked all the wedding invitations, imagined her bouquet, her hair style. It was her quite reasonable expectation that she would have been married in that frock, as soon as the handsome suitor proposed. She could visualize him on bended knee, offering his mother's pearl and diamond engagement ring. Oh, so romantic....\nBut no. Despite being raised in a church choir of likely young prospects, no one had ever chosen Jade to be his bride. Every now and then, she would spend yet another solo evening, trying on her wedding regalia. She had turned 33 years old. Time had passed, she had spotted her first grey hair.\nJade smiled wryly. She looked like Miss Havisham in her classic text book, Dud Expectations, written by that fun guy, Chazza Dickens. Wow, that was another riveting thought. Jade's stern father was a widower. He was even now a minor lay preacher, laying on hands, and ministering in the flock of devout Christians.\nJade's father had warned her about being immoral, and wanted her to save herself for wedlock in the church. God would send her a husband and lots of children. He could be their Grandpa Grumpy. Jade pondered on all the reasons why she was cross with God.\nShe had dutifully trained to teach English and Religion to some very sulky teens in her church's system. One day, she realized that the teens hated English essays more than they ever had. So, Jade promoted them all onto higher things, and resigned.\nShe kept her teaching registration up to date, and chose to tutor reading online, which she really loved. Jade left sharing her father's home, and rented her own simple pad. It was a bit run down, but it would do until the groom came along to rescue her.\nOne slight hiccup, working online at home was very isolating. How could she ever meet this invisible husband? She decided to consult a local astrologer, who had quite an interesting profile. The lady, known as Madame, the Mystic, agreed to make an appointment for Jade.\nMadame, the Mystic, expected up-front fees. So Jade sorted that, and consulted her future prospects with the astrologer. The two chicks shared a coffee, then Madame read Jade's coffee grounds in her cup. She then read the tarot cards, and cast an individual horoscope for her new client.\n\"You must lighten up, and be open to love. You have a powerful guardian angel. You must take your online career to the best coffee shop in town. Make sure it has a powder room. You must smile at likely men. You must never give up the ghost. You must follow my sheet of instructions for pleasing your angel, first thing in the morning, and before you go to bed...... Love will find its own path, right to your heart, just when you least expect it. I predict the letter B will appear. \"\nJust then, Madame, the Mystic's dog wandered across this site of prophecies. His name was Golden. He was also known as having psychic energy. Why, he had even told Madame what his name was, by communing with his owners' third eye. He wagged his tail, as he sat down, and offered his paw.\nMadame, the Mystic, spoke again. \"Look ,Golden gives you his paw of emotional support. I have a sale on Tarot cards, consult my daily horoscope for your true love, to guide you for all your happy days ahead. Plus here is my sister Charlene's phone number. You also need her to direct you in fashion and colorful zen. She will provide a color palette, personally tailored. It is not any woman's job to fix men. Be aware of any sign and symbol of friendship, Maybe you need a pet to share your future, always there to welcome your nurturing heart. Got to love a puppy!\"\nJade did a quick think. \"I don't need a puppy. I want to meet a man to love.\" The mystic astrologer spoke again.....\n\"Peace will flow, consult your guardian angel, always there in each awakening dawn. You must position yourself seamlessly for love, and be grateful for the graces that appear. I advise a weekly consultation. Here is your next appointment. I shall be your guide on the side!\"\nJade left the astrologer, slightly bemused. Within no time, astrology was her world. She met Charlene, spent some funds on new threads, dressing each day according to her horoscope and personal palette. No more grey and brown sensible clothing, all was aqua, yellow and bright. Her hair was tinted, with blonde tips, her make-up was featuring her eyes, sparkling with hope.\nJade now awoke half an hour earlier, just to greet dawn with her guardian angel. She rehydrated with coffee, interpreting her coffee cup, making her bed, tidying her clutter, practicing her new skills in tarot cards. Once per weekend, she rose and changed her sheets, polished and mopped, flung open the windows, and lit her sage smudging. She wafted the aroma through her flat, opened doors. She still did not need a puppy, this guardian angel was demanding enough.\nJade had not, of course, told her father, who was called Bernard. The astrologer had got that bit right. She was getting crosser with God on a daily basis, smiling at strangers was not very effective. She was getting some very funny looks at the coffee shop, as she taught her students. Still she could not fix men, as astrology states.\nLife took a turn for the worse. Bernard phoned, asking Jade to take him to his appointment at an oncologist. The news was dreadful, he had stage four tumors, riddled with cancer. His prognosis was very grim. Bernard was not as upset as Jade. He told her was grateful for all the blessings his Lord had granted him during his days. Treatment was planned, so he rapidly became an in-patient at an oncology unit.\nJade and the church people visited him regularly. In between tutoring online, she made a daily pilgrimage to her father's bedside. He went downhill very quickly, the chemo was futile. Jade had been brought up with filial piety, but inside, she was now furious with her father's divine Lord. How could this happen to such a faithful believer?\nOne grey morning, while channeling her guardian angel, her tarot cards finally showed a pair of lovers. \"Yeah, right.\" Jade wondered, but she was now a keen follower of astrology. At her father's bedside, she held his hand .She felt that she was never quite good enough, never met a husband, never had his grandchildren to love and cherish.\nBernard suddenly opened his eyes, he was lucid for a while. \"I am so proud of you, the apple of my eyes,. You are so bright and loving. I want you to got to the chapel and pray, like you used to. God has a plan for every one of us. I shall always be loving you. This journey goes on, true love.\" With that, he breathed his last, and smiled his way to eternity.\nJade was devastated. The nurses were summoned, she walked to the chapel, frozen. She sat, silently yelling at God, Jesus, the holy church, her guardian angel. More than cross, angry. She nearly kicked a hole in the church walls.\nBut she was well-behaved,. Not praying, just recalling some happier times with her father. As she sat in the back pew, not doing any knee mails, she felt a hand touch her shoulder. She glanced up, meeting the eyes of her father's junior oncologist. \"These things happen, \" he told her, \"Look, I have seen some mysterious things here, stranger than anyone can perceive. I took a photo of your father's monitor, as you were holding his hand.\"\nJade looked at his phone, there was an image of an angel, with wings. \"Is this possible?\" she asked. \"Can I send it your phone?\"asked Dr. Ben, that was on his name tag. \"it is a comfort for you. You have your own guardian angel.\" He laid his hand on hers. They swapped phone numbers, and Jade soon had a miraculous image of her own guardian angel.\nNearly eighteen months later, Jade sat in the chapel. Dr. Ben had given her his paw of emotional support, and that was not all. She did have a white wedding, but not in that fancy dress, simple, fitting, respectful. His name did start with a B, after all. She cuddled their brand new baby son, healthy with a good set of lungs already. Maybe she wasn't so cross with the greater powers after all. Madame, the Mystic, was spot on. Jade had been open to a nuanced understanding of her guardian angel, and the theory that love will find a way.\nDr. Ben sat beside her. Their baby boy looked like Jade's father, and himself. \"Welcome to the world, little Bernard Benjamin......\" A journey that continues for everyone. ......" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Not Worthless, Nor Forgotten\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2883\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is convinced they’re going to be betrayed." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A stern-looking woman came to our house today with some policemen. She is in a pinstriped long skirt, a white top with frills, and black heels. Her silver hoop earrings reflect the sunlight and make my eyes water. Being the eldest of three boys, I am striving to be strong after the policemen took away Mama. Hanson is holding little Charlie on the brown futon across the room and they are both weeping. It is clear Charlie has wet himself.\n\n“It’s Luke, correct?” Pinstripe addressed him while staring down at some paperwork. “Luke Reid, age 12. Those are your brothers, Hanson and Charles, ages 7 and 5?”\n\n“Yes ma’am,” I reply, an octave above a whisper. “Why did they take our Mama?”\n\n“Sweety,” she sighed. “Your mother is not fit to take care of you three anymore. She has gone to join your father in prison.”\n\n“Is it cuz I called 9-1-1 when she weren’t waking up?”\n\n“That is part of it, yes. Listen, we don’t need to go into the details of it all right now. Though, I need to discuss the situation with you and your brothers now that you are wards of the state.”\n\n“What does wards mean?”\n\n“It means the government will take care of you with the help of a nice family, if possible.”\n\n“But what about our family? Papa’s been in jail a long time for a bad thing, but Mama wasn’t bad! She took care of us and you took her away!”\n\n“I know this is hard, Luke, but there is more to this than you can know.” She places her cold, bony fingers on my shoulder. It gives me gooseflesh. “You three will have to trust we are doing what is best for you. It would help your brothers if that trust started with you young man.”\n\nReality sets in and my little self cannot bear it any longer. I join my brothers in waves of sobs, and Pinstripe tries to comfort me with a hug. It feels like I am enveloped with barkless tree limbs in the middle of winter. I shudder.\n\n\\\\\n\nIt turns out that wards of the state are often called foster kids. I knew that phrase before it defined me and even knew some kids from school who were already foster kids. We should start a club or something.\n\nThough foster care is a warmer-sounding way to put it, it still sucks. They have kept us three together so far, but we have had to bounce around a lot because of it. Taking on three kids at once is a much bigger ask than fostering one or two.\n\nAll the families have been a mixed bag so far, either mean and in it for the money, or apathetic and in it for the money. No one has been happy to have us around yet, but the family we are with now isn’t terrible. Even with “birth kids” here, it is still less crowded than the complexes we are often in. Plus, we don’t have to live out of trash bags since we all share a dresser and bunk bed here!\n\nMrs. Johnson, our foster mom, told us some exciting news at dinner. She said we get to attend this awesome camp for a week in July! That is only a few weeks away! Her kids were not happy about it though since they do not get to go with us. I guess it is made special for foster kids like us—Camp Nobility, or something like that. They call the counselors Pals there, which sounds nice!\n\nUh oh, I hear Mrs. Johnson calling after me to brush my teeth again. I better put this pencil and journal away now, then head to the bathroom to brush the cheese sauce from my mouth.\n\n\\\\\n\nWe have been on this bus for hours, heading deep into the mountains. The air coming through the cracked windows is fresher and smells of pine trees. The seats are scratchy though, and I have had to pee for a while now.\n\nThough I am excited about arriving, I am also nervous because there are a lot of kids here with us. Other than my brothers next to me, I know no one. It reminds me to be grateful for them though, because at least we have each other. Most of the other kids do not have that luxury, but some of them have at least been to this camp together before. They have said it was the highlight of their year. I hope I do not mess it up somehow.\n\nSimon is my assigned Pal, and I cannot wait to meet him! This camp gives us each our own counselors, so we can get the most quality time possible. I will not be bunking with my brothers for once, but they will be nearby. Plus, I am sure I will see them around camp and some independence from each other would do us all good.\n\nNow, the bus is slowing to a stop, and an adult stands in the front to address us. “We have finally arrived, everyone! Please stay seated until we come to a complete stop and signal you to get up. We will exit in a single file from the front to the back. Please be courteous to your neighbors, so this will be a smooth and quick process.” I hear cheering in the distance, and butterflies fill my gut.\n\nI am sitting a few rows back on the right side, so it is not long before I can unbuckle and stand up. When I do, I notice a lot of excited adults with large signs welcoming us to camp. A man with a beard and black ball cap is holding one with my name on it in big letters.\n\nWhen we catch eyes, he smiles at me, then waves. My face is now feeling hot, and I begin to believe this was a mistake coming here. No one is supposed to be this excited to see me—at least no one has been since before Papa went away.\n\n\\\\\n\nWe spent the first couple of hours settling into our rooms. Simon let me have the top bunk above him and gave me a cool bracelet matching his. I have hardly said a word to him, but he has been so patient and kind. We are about to go into some free time, and I am having difficulty deciding what to do.\n\n“We could play table tennis in the event room. I’ll teach you how,” Simon said, trying to help. “Or there is a zip line on the big lawn out there if you are looking for something more thrilling. Don’t worry, it isn’t super high or anything, but you will still need to wear a helmet. If you want, I will even go on it first to show you.”\n\n“The zip line sounds fun,” I say. “I know how to play table tennis already, so we can do that later.”\n\n“Okay, cool! It doesn’t look like the line is too long at the zip line yet. Let me put on my tennis shoes real quick and we’ll go. Do you need to use the restroom?”\n\nI shake my head and watch him fiddle with his laces in a hurry. Part of me wants to giggle at his excessive enthusiasm, but I cannot let him win me over yet.\n\n\\\\\n\nWe spent half of our free time at the zip line station. I could not get enough of the joy I felt in those brief, carefree moments suspended in the air. With the remaining time, we tried to shoot some hoops and even learn an instrument. I chose the hand drum because Simon plays one and even brought his own. In basketball, my meager heaves were not enough to make it over the rim, so Simon lifted me until I scored. He also showed me “granny-style” which helped me get more power behind my throws.\n\nNow, we are spending some quiet time in the room before dinner. Simon left to shower and get himself ready for the evening. I am sitting on my bunk and writing about my day. It has been a great first day, and if dinner is anything like lunch was, then we are going to eat like royalty. To be honest, I still feel full from earlier, but as someone often left wanting, I cannot help gorging myself.\n\nThe dinner bell chimed, and Simon is back hanging up his towel. Time to go!\n\n\\\\\n\nI wet the bed last night. God, I am so embarrassed! I prayed this would not happen, but I had a nightmare, and my body could not help itself.\n\nWhen I awoke, I briefly forgot where I was, which further fueled my fear. Once I remembered, I whispered down to Simon, and he got up to help me. He did not get angry like my foster parents or the social workers do when this happens. Perhaps I can start trusting him and stop giving him the cold shoulder. Besides, he promised me the sleeping bag would be handled while we were out learning to fish today.\n\nIt is Pirate Day, and Simon brought a costume. He looks ridiculous, so I allow a chuckle this time, and it brightens him up. I guess I can make people happy too.\n\n“You ready to go, Little Man?” Simon says. “I hear the fish are biting big time this morning!”\n\n“What if I don’t catch one? Then it will feel like a waste of time.” I reply.\n\n“That’s not true! Half the fun of fishin’ is in the trying. Plus, the folks that run the pond out there guaranteed everyone a catch. We will just have to keep at it until we are satisfied.”\n\n“Have you ever fished before? Are you any good at it?”\n\n“I’d say I’m pretty decent and know most of the important stuff. My dad taught us all growing up and we would go all the time. I have not been out in a while though, so you must forgive me if I end up being rusty. Argh!” He made his pointer finger into a hook and rustled my hair with it. This garnered another laugh.\n\nWe are now waiting in line for a pole and some bait, but they have plenty for everyone. Simon will take me around to the other side of the lake, where the people are fewer. He said being somewhere with less commotion would help our chances of snagging a big one.\n\nAfter showing me how to thread the worm on the hook—yuck!—he showed me how to cast the rod, and then use the reel. It was a push-button reel, which is supposed to be easier to learn, but Simon says they often get stuck. I gave it a few earnest tries before I felt like giving up.\n\n“I can’t get the timing right and my casts don’t go very far! This is hopeless!” I want to cry, and holding back is giving me a headache.\n\n“It’s okay bud! How ‘bout I cast out for you, then let you do the reeling? I will even help you set the hook when you feel a nibble.”\n\nHow can someone remain so positive all the time? He’s bound to get frustrated with me and give up before the week is over. Everyone does at some point.\n\n“Okay.” I sigh in response, shoulders sagging and my eyes towards the ground.\n\n“Alright, I got it out there in the sweet spot. Now, take this handle here and spin it slowly—too fast and you will scare the fish away.”\n\n“That’s it! You are doing great, Luke!” he encourages me.\n\nThere is a bump, then a wiggle in my hands. “Uh, Simon? I think I’m getting a bite!”\n\n“Pull!” he mimics with an invisible rod how to do it. I yank as hard as I can.\n\n“Fish on!” he yells when my pole bends in half.\n\n“Help Simon! It’s heavy and I’m going to drop it!”\n\n“You got it, bud! Just hold on for dear life and keep reeling!”\n\nWhy doesn’t he help me? Can’t he see I am struggling here?\n\n“Simon, please! The reeling is getting harder, and the pole is swaying! My hands are hurting!”\n\nSimon stepped in and grabbed the pole with me. I give him the reel, which briefly spins wild during the interchange. We both struggle at first but finally bring a whopper in.\n\n“Oh, my goodness! Look at the size of that thing! You caught that buddy!”\n\n“Technically, you caught it,” I said, downcast.\n\n“We did it together, Little Man. You should be proud of yourself, so why the long face?” Simon was out of breath.\n\n“Why did you not help me when I first asked you? I thought I was going to lose it.”\n\n“I’m sorry, bud. I wanted to give you a chance to do it yourself and experience it on your own for the first time. Is that alright?”\n\n“Ya, I guess so. Thanks for helping me catch my first fish.” I am tempted to hug him, but I also feel oddly angry.\n\n“No problem, buddy. Here, let me show you how to remove the hook and we will throw him back in.”\n\n“Aw man, we don’t get to keep it?”\n\n“No, I’m sorry. When you fish for sport, you are expected to throw it back. It gives the fish a fresh shot at life and the other fisherman a better shot at catching one like you did.” He winked at me, and I smirked back, feeling bigger than I did this morning.\n\n\\\\\n\nThe rest of the week went by way too fast. I tried to take it all in and had a lot of fun, but I guess all good things must end. I am doing my best to be grateful for everything, even though it will soon be over.\n\nFishing was by far the highlight of my week, but we had plenty of fun otherwise. We played games with water balloons and built castles out of large cardboard boxes, which we then knocked down with giant rubber balls. There was lots of food at every meal, and we even made s’mores by the fire. We sang songs out-of-tune and swam in the lake—that was very scary for me since I did not know how to swim well. Simon stayed by my side the whole time though, and that helped. They even held a birthday party for us since we do not get them celebrated often. That made me feel special, and I could tell it positively affected my brothers too.\n\nThere was a talent show tonight as a last hurrah to camp, and with Simon’s encouragement, I chose to sing. I do not know why the song came into my head, but it reminded me of how this week made me feel. The lyrics were about not being worthless, even though we feel like it sometimes, and though we are often lonely; we are not forgotten. Everyone in the room cried, and it was the first time I had seen Simon without a smile. He instead had the cry shivers, so I gave him a hug when I got back to our seat. Making him cry made me feel bad, but he assured me it was the good kind.\n\nTomorrow we will pack up, eat breakfast, and then return to our old depressing lives. I am trying not to let that get me down though because this week has been very special. It taught me a lot about a love I did not know before. I do not know what to do with the mixed feelings and rampant thoughts in my head right now, but it is time to go to sleep. The lights are turning off and I hear the cabin leaders calling out bedtime.\n\n\\\\\n\n“Simon, can you come on the bus real quick? Luke is having a breakdown and is asking for you,” I hear the camp leader tell him out the bus door. Simon runs inside and sits next to me.\n\n“I am here now, buddy. What’s going on?”\n\n“I want us to go home with you, not back where we came from!” I wail. “Why can’t you adopt us or something?”\n\n“Luke, I am so sorry buddy. I wish I could go with you guys, but I promise it is going to be okay.”\n\n“How can you know that?”\n\n“Well, I can’t know it for sure, but no matter how tough life gets, there is always hope for a better future. Take what you learned here at camp and let it encourage you to better things. Plus, I left you some gifts to look forward to when you get home.”\n\n“You did?” I sniffled. “What are they?”\n\n“You will have to wait and see, my friend. Hold on to the hope of finding out.” He gave me a side hug then, and I let him go. I was ready now.\n\nWhen I got home and opened my bag, I found books about a boy who found courage despite several adversities. What I found buried beneath my clothes, though, made me weep all over again. Simon had left me his pirate outfit." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Waiting for the Midnight Sun\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1728\n\nPrompt:\n\nPeople have gathered to witness a once-in-a-lifetime natural phenomenon, but what happens next is not what they expected." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Zac and Derrick are two bros chillin in a field. They’re waiting for The Midnight Sun, a meteorite two miles in diameter that will pass by Earth at a distance of roughly one hundred fifty thousand miles. That’s closer than the moon.\n\nZac pulls a bag of weed from his pocket and says, “What do you say? You want to burn one?”\n\n“Hell yeah! Let’s do it.”\n\nZac flips on the dome light and starts rolling a joint. “What do you think, D? Some people are saying this meteor is a sign of a new era, like the beginning of a spiritual awakening or something.”\n\n“Z, history is filled with celestial events preceding big things. Think Jesus, dude. He had his own star. I totally believe that after tonight, people’s minds are going to open up and we’ll eventually be one with nature living communally.”\n\nZac laughs out a stream of smoke after lighting up. “You think so? I’m thinking our intellect will broaden and there will be technological advancements beyond our wildest dreams.” He hands the joint to Derrick.\n\nDerrick takes a drag, exhales, hands it back to Zac, and says, “No, man, nature, totally nature. This might be a sign that Jesus is coming back. He’s supposed to come back and set us all straight.”\n\n“Jesus? Since when are you Christian,” Zac asks as he takes a hit.\n\n“I’m not, but I’ve been reading some stuff on his life and teachings. I would so like to down some wine with Jesus. The way he sees things and thinks about things – he’s got the right idea, dude. I don’t think he’d be into all this capitalism and gun rights stuff like we are, and I don’t think he’d be a redistribution guy either, but communal living, helping the sick and the poor, being cool to each other - that’s Jesus, man,” Derrick says, taking a hit and passing the joint.\n\n“I don’t know, D,” Zac says, taking a hit and holding it for a minute. Releasing a cloud of smoke, he says. “I’ve never believed in much of anything. And what I did last night with Sadie Cober is on the wrong side of holy. I know Jesus isn’t into that kind of behavior. Or this behavior for that matter.”\n\nTaking the joint back from Zac, Derrick asks, “Do you like her?”\n\n“I don’t know. I hear she likes me, and I like sex. She is pretty cool though. What do you think?”\n\n“Respect her,” Derrick says on the exhale. “If you just want sex, you can get that from somebody who just wants sex. You two might be right for each other. I know you’re always itching, man, but you might want to focus on locking her down.”\n\n“I’ve never been in a relationship before,” Zac says as he tries to picture himself with one person. He knocks some ash off and blows on the cherry.\n\n“Well, if you want sex all the time, and I know you do, then you need to lock it down with someone and she’s a quality girl you have things in common with. Give her a chance.”\n\n“Yeah, maybe I will. I’ll call her tomorrow,” Zac says as takes a long, slow drag. On the exhale he says, “She’ll look good in the passenger seat of my flying car.”\n\n“I’m telling you man, communal. We’re going back to horses, like the Amish,” Derrick says taking the joint from Zac.\n\nZac laughs out loud. “There is no way we’re going back to horses. That will slow trade. I’m sorry, D, but the elite will always rule the world and we will always be their minions. They will protect their wealth. Are you ready for another beer?”\n\n“Yeah, I’ll take one,” Derrick says, slamming down the little bit he has left. “But that’s what I’m saying, Bro. There could be a whole change in mind set. The billionaires and millionaires will realize they don’t need all that money and end world hunger. We as a society will realize we don’t need all these luxuries and revert to former ways of living, sharing products and services instead of selling them.”\n\n“I think you’re dreaming. We’ll progress forward with new innovations that solve the world’s problems,” Zac says, putting the roach out in his ashtray.\n\n“Like what,” Derrick asks.\n\nZac lights a cigarette. “I don’t know. I see advancements in space travel and colonization among the stars. We’ll live in biodomes on planets and moons as we spread out through the solar system. Perhaps here on Earth there will be more modest ways of living, but with more digital comforts making it possible.”\n\n“Yeah, but you’re talking about a technologically advanced society, where everything is digitally automated. There will be fewer jobs and more poverty. Those digital comforts will just be for the elites.”\n\n“Maybe to some extreme, but you will always need people to program, maintain, operate, and repair. I think we will witness a new line of skilled trades being established, replacing less skilled labor. Speaking of labor, how is work?”\n\n“Twelve-hour days trying to make up for all that rain last week. It’s good because I need to make that money back, but construction is hard on you, Z. I shower, eat, and sleep, waking up feeling like I was beaten by a baseball bat in my sleep. But I can’t complain too much. It has been good to me. The work is steady. The pay is great. These are rare circumstances. How about you?”\n\n“I wish I could say my jobs been good to me. They’re running us ragged. We’ve been on ten-hour shifts six days a week for fourteen months trying to keep up with demand. They refuse to hire help because they invested in this streamlined system that is supposed to make our jobs easier so we can produce more. What it has done is make us work harder with fewer people for longer hours. If that’s not bad enough, we watched two production cells get packed up for Mexico and three for China. Worst of all this is the third year in a row they have frozen our cost-of-living increase,” Zac says, getting infuriated with the thought of work.\n\n“See, that is one of the things I think will change. That greedy attitude that drives employers to abuse their employees.”\n\n“It’s not going to change. It will take more than a meteor to change that.”\n\n“No wonder you see a future where people are replaced by machines.”\n\n“I think people will still be utilized, just not in the same capacity. But how about this, what if we are wrong and this is some kind of omen like the coming of the antichrist,” Zac suggests.\n\n“Maybe, the antichrist does come before Jesus returns. Maybe it’s a sign of the rapture.”\n\n“What in the bloody hell is a rapture?”\n\n“It’s when all the Christians get sucked into heaven so they don’t have to go through all the bad things the Bible says will happen before Jesus returns,” Derrick explains.\n\n“Once again, I don’t think I believe in such things. Maybe a zombie apocalypse or computers turning on us.”\n\n“The Z-poc, yes we need a plan in case the dead start walking.”\n\n“I suggest a Z-poc evacuation plan at work. I got reprimanded for not taking the meeting seriously,” Zac says with a laugh.\n\n“I guess you can’t really plan for zombies. You just have to use what weapon is at your disposal and fight.” Derrick looks at his watch. “It’s almost time. Do you want to step outside and see if we can find it?”\n\n“Do you want me to roll another one really quick.”\n\nDerrick considers it and responds with a “Yeah, why not.”\n\n“So, I guess we can agree that we feel there is going to be, or at least should be, some sort of change that comes with the passing of this meteorite,” Zac confirms as he crumbles bud onto the paper.\n\n“I don’t think we even scratched the surface on things that could, or should change, Z. The world has to be more messed up than at any other point in history despite our achievements and advancements. But yes, mankind will go through an awakening of sorts and the world will change, like during the Renaissance or something.”\n\n“Here you go, man. You do the honors. I’m going to grab two more beers and then grab the chairs out of trunk.”\n\nDerrick steps out of the car and lights the joint, puffing at it. “They say this thing is going to light up the night sky like it’s day.”\n\n“That’s what I heard too, D,” Zac says as he sets up the chairs. They sit down and crack open fresh beers. Derrick takes another hit and passes it to Zac.\n\n“Do you see that star in the sky rapidly getting bigger? That has to be it,” Derrick points out to Zac.\n\nZac and Derrick sit in silence passing the joint and swigging their beers as the meteor becomes too bright to look at and the darkness dissipates like it’s sunrise. Then, the ground begins to tremble, evolving into a roaring, violent quake that throws Zac and Derrick from their chairs. They try to regain their footing but cannot gain their balance. Explosions small and large, near and far, fill the night’s air. Zac and Derrick startle and cover their heads in confusion. The shaking lasts so long Zac thinks his beer is going to come back up. As the light fades and darkness returns the shaking stops.\n\n“An earthquake? Here,” questions Zac as he gets up, dusting himself off.\n\n“We’re in the New Madrid Seismic Zone,” Derrick tells him. “Do you want to check the radio for news?”\n\n Zac nods, “Yeah, I think we ought to.”\n\n“Reports coming in… the meteor passed directly between the Earth and moon disrupting the gravitational pull… tidal waves up to a mile high have hit all coastlines… earthquakes in every seismic zone… landslides… infrastructure damage… rivers diverting natural courses and dam destruction causing severe flash flooding… volcanic eruptions… super volcanoes have erupted, all six super volcanoes have erupted, volcanic winter imminent… Billions already presumed dead…”\n\n“That’s not the change either of us were expecting,” Derrick says.\n\n“I wonder what life will be like now,” Zac wonders out loud." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: When I Read Beckett\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 986\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with an unexpected betrayal." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "…in…in this room…cursed room…loved?... cursed…. where she slept…half-grown in her hometown t-shirt…shorts…no shorts…t-shirt worn with holes…on the floor…he having thrown it…under the bed…dust collected and swept and settled again…. and again…who?... he… not she?...gracious!...there for the first time…assuredly last time…no boys in the room, father said…keep out!...nodded her head… but in the room…blue light hugging the window…scotch tape…peeling off the paint whether chipped or freshly laid or…exhumed…he found her in the— no, not found…held…held her in…under doomed blankets…a thumb…under a thumb…twisted under a thumb … urgently… unabashedly… shackled by his name … no name… names unknown… two in the bed… one… world flaring by… unedited film chopped and hacked… a sore thing… ulcers blooming somewhere…holes in her memory…in her body… hush now…but the slicing… husssshh I say!… feeling…feeling her own atomic skeleton… so quickly destroyed… so quickly defiled… so quickly filled…it might serve to relax…dissociate… but incapable… already unaware…the girl… the girl…but the girl?... remember what… remember the party… supposed to be where?... with whom?... taken home… taken home with… she left the house?... in the evening… bottles on the porch… tequila stinging chapped mouths… he pours… and pours… and pours… and pours… and disappears… a spoon of sugar in a wet glass… moon casts a shadow… bloody crescent… stray sequins scratch her shins…they flake off…she is whisked away…smells distilled…the party…what party?… the secret of where it is…where it was… must have been…seen by people scantily dressed… a stain on the night… she wore… the idea of what she wore… received poorly… with exhilaration… noted…clicked… recorded and frozen forever as she was… those flashes… bright in her eyes… phone cameras glinting… periphery irritated…some kind of no man’s land… couldn’t breathe… too hot… couldn’t hear her voice… escape…wanting it all to fade to black…anywhere else but here…so leave… leave!... let out into vapor… where did she go?... seen?... by anyone?... taken home… taken…transported, goods handled… express shipping for dolls…laid to rest in a bed of bubble wrap…resting… in bed… then: a stranger…no… not a stranger… couldn’t be a stranger… to know her bed… in her room…been in her room before… but father said no…yet…so-called friend!… always... easily trusted…hand on her lower back… her sentences half-finished … since days with velcro shoes… there like a mole… constant… dependable… then… then he…then swam in her mouth… syllables of his name…they’re in her teeth…to be scooped out by dental floss… stuck… tip of her tongue… his finger on her pocked tongue… a moment of gagged silence… lips form sounds learned in primary school…not a scream…some sounds…vowels from when she was small and they…the words tasted new… like a finger?… a thumb... no!... like English… children who knew the flavor… but she…the bitterness…she… muffled sounds and play and muffled sounds… out of touch… English more like aspic to her….at the time…at that point… but finding… somehow she found…but one universal language in hands and dirt under fingernails… fingernails on skin…raking on skin… touches…sticking to drool… dirty kisses on monkey bars…language of friendship… a friend…a friend who understood her warped words… English forgotten… shoulder by shoulder… kisses with friends…wood chips licking open shoes… pigtails on her head with the little bows… and she forced herself to smile… yanked by the ends… tickled by the belly… touched… little boys… being boys… she did not realize…long before parties…she did not realize… laying in the bed pigtails long gone…gone where? ... time spilled over from a cup … splaying… no, spreading … on the duvet… uncovered, but why?... the thought of… at the party… or rather… God!... zippers undone, knots untied… laces in her shoes… unlaced…command strips flayed from a mirror shattered on the floor… cut feet in the morning– spliced… she struggles…finds herself in— out of herself… second of incomprehension…hours…spanning hours… erased and unnoticed by a blink…Gosh!...but her mind… a washing of sorts… reckoning with punishment…lack of evidence…guilty!...punishment… guilt in a sealed box open only to her… vanished memory… insufficient evidence… inadmissible… poured out in measured shots…now love is an apparition in the wall… friendship buried in a shallow grave… unseen…slipping through a groping fist… strange fist groping at… at… her native tongue resurfaces… from the cradle… from mother’s milk…forming sounds… sounds like no… foreigners deaf to no… adequately expressed… speak English!... but she can’t… she can’t… gibberish garbled in her throat…congealed from the inside… speak! {error} speak! {error}…suddenly… indubitably… he!…unadmitted… swine!...door left unlocked… having forgotten to lock…brought her home without keys…carried on his shoulder… a friend… helping hand…by a friend… since she met him… day one… fat black eyes, dirty handshake… playgrounds…those same pigtails sinuous in his fingers… friendship… firm… invitations to places… introductions to people…been in her room before… some cousins to know of… mario kart in his basement… pizza on trampoline forts…sharing generously… growing new body parts… sheltered…without doubt?... certainly not!...how could she… not to see it coming… a girl and a boy…together… as friends…?... not to trail the wicked scent… perhaps unassuming…perhaps mistaken… unaware… naive… guilty… secretly wanting… once or twice a flirt… in sobriety dripping with meaning… he reads…pours tequila into shot glasses… her language stinks of filth to interpret as… in that tight skirt… combinations of… stop right there!... can it?... when it comes down to it…guilty…guilty…guilty…there in her body… there in her hands… and the cameras…a still life…friends seeing it happen…seeing it all happen… indelible…the guilty party… fine!...let it be this way… crumbs for the world… chewed on in daylight… school hallways chattering like shivering teeth…goosebumps…her flesh…feed the hungry… fed to friends…he… notches in his ribs… on her… grating… somewhere in the room… but she can’t speak… can’t see… on the desk somewhere… a hairbrush… a stone…to fight with…fight back…she can’t move… fight back… and hurt a friend…how the story goes… pitched in the courtroom… self-defense…when judgment day comes…and if it comes… who protects friends?...she…she… language unserving…there in her body… there in her hands…there in her body…there in her hands…a friend…and she…she…says nothing…does nothing…in this room… in…" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Four minutes and half a life\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1173\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story during a total eclipse — either natural, or man-made." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Everyone was speaking about it. It was the day when celestial bodies would meet, the light would disappear, and magic would happen: the total eclipse was about to happen, and no one would shut up about it. It would only last four minutes, but I had heard about it for weeks. No matter what channel I set on the television, someone spoke about it: science lovers, adventure junkies, romance seekers, first timers, experienced people... everybody wanted to be there, feel it, be able to say \"I was there,\" but I didn't. I couldn't care less because a) I lived far away from the places where I could see it, b) I was not about to move a single finger to experience it, and c) I had something much worse to do at that time.\n\nI know people choose the better things when given options, but sometimes, we don't choose; we simply have instructions to follow. So, by the time thousands of people would be wearing weird glasses and cheering to the sky, I would be wearing an odd gown, some lousy headphones, and looking at the walls of a white tube. While so many people would be outdoors, I would feel my heart jumping and my veins pumping, laying in a cold chamber. People would be cheering outside. Inside, all I could hear would be the deafening \"Pam- Pam- Pam- Pam...\" Why do those machines do that? If Science has progressed so much, why has no one invented a noise-canceling thing to attach to that machine... and, if it indeed exists, why did my hospital not adopt the latest technology? Once inside, I wished I were not claustrophobic but deaf—although I don't think I have fear of tiny spaces. What I feared then was what that small space would do to my life. \n\nThe days before the test, I tried to keep my cool around the family. Nothing good comes from a stressed mother. I worked, did my chores around the house, helped the older kids with their homework, and played with the smaller one. Whenever I felt the nerves were catching up with me, I read, gamed, and cooked. I baked as well. I baked a lot. The worst part of baking was that, although I usually don't eat the cakes, cookies, and pastries I bake, this time, I did. At a certain point, I stopped myself from licking the baking trays, which was not a good sign. The stress was eating me, and I was eating whatever was before me. \n\nSo, I tried to behave as usual, but it didn't go according to plan because the usual chaos at home does not tolerate good intentions. I tried to cook and eat healthy, but that did not work because I became a very hungry hippo. No matter how healthy you cook, eating five portions is not healthy anymore. Then, I started to think... to think a lot. My mind was not only worried about work and family, shopping lists, bills, and the wall I realized I had to paint since the dogs confused it with a chewing toy... No. I started to have dark thoughts about my life, and believe me: that was not good either. I began to think about my father.\n\n\"I will never turn fifty.\" That's what my father used to say whenever someone accused him of enjoying an excessive lifestyle. He had a good and whole life, and I am sure he heard those comments many times, but he did not seem to care, laughed back at them, and kept doing whatever he wanted. I don't think he ever feared failing anyone but himself, which is an excellent way to care less about what people think about us and focus on what makes us happy. It is a way of life, but only for some. I have a pathological fear of deceiving others. A few years ago, someone asked me if I had ever had suicidal thoughts, and the only thing I could think about was who would do the laundry if I was missing. I know it is ridiculous, but the amount of laundry at home is of an industrial- scale... still, it is absurd. I never thought about ending my life, but I fantasized about how it would be to be surrounded by nothing but a beautiful void... \nI entered a white tube to scan my insides at forty-five, the same age my father was when he was diagnosed with his first cancer. As predicted by that man-- who I'm not sure if he was wise or just \"lucky\"-- he never turned fifty. He died at forty-nine, surrounded by party friends and a few \"I-told-you-so\" relatives, with a life full of stories and memories that could fill three lives of regular humans walking the Earth. \n\nI would not like to follow his steps, though, because I never did before. When I was younger, I was not rebellious or adventurous. I did not travel the world as he did. I spent half my life in offices working for other people. I was not entrepreneurial. I did not risk (and lose) it all to re-invent myself and become a modern Phoenix. Compared to him, I am boring, and I have only lived half of what I should—only half a life.\n\nI laid down on my belly, closed my eyes, and held the panic button with my left hand. One of the nurses put me some earplugs and headphones with music. \n\"Don't move,\" they told me. \"It will only take fifteen or twenty minutes,\" they said.\nMy toes were weirdly curved, and my arms were extended as if I were in a bank robbery. Still, considering the circumstances, I behaved very well. I did not move even if my nose was itching. I did not move even when the \"Pam, Pam, Pam, Pam\" reminded me of EDM (Electric Dance Music), and I pictured my younger son dancing in the middle of the living room. The thing I tried not to think of was my children, but there I was, remembering how Leo jumped across the room. I behaved well and did not think of all the terrible events that could come after that medical appointment. I was nervous, but I did not cry. I was tired, but I smiled at the nurses because that's how I was taught to be: always nice...\n\nThe noise ended. The test ended. One of the nurses came to pick me up. She helped me leave the white cocoon, the earplugs, and the headphones behind.\n\"Someone will call you,\" they told me. I smiled again.\nI picked up my clothes and got dressed. I left the room and met my husband, who happily showed me the eclipse news on his phone...\n\"It's cool,\" I said, looking at the ring on the screen. \n\"Twenty more years for the next one,\" he replied.\nI smiled because I always do, but what I thought was about punching the phone... That was yesterday. Tomorrow someone will call me." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Small Comforts\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2981\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story at a tense event where everyone is unsure whose side they’re on." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Father! Father!!!” I screamed as I burst into our house. “FATHER!!!”\nHeavy footsteps descended the stairs. “What is it boy?”\n“Violet,” I squeezed my twin sister’s name in between desperate attempts to suck air into my burning lungs. I had sprinted all the way here and my throat felt raw from the violent ferocity with which I was sucking in air and immediately regurgitating it. “Violet’s been-”\n“Calm down boy,” he said, fully coming down the stairs and placing a firm hand on my shoulder. He guided me towards the kitchen table, and we sat. He waited patiently, watching me over steepled fingers as I forced my lungs to stop seizing so I could string more than three syllables together.\n“Violet… Violet’s been…” My voice broke and I stopped. My whole world felt like it was shaking. I couldn’t stop the images from those last few moments from replaying over and over in my mind, the looming shadow, the horrible sound, the smell of iron, the sight of the nauseating leftovers as it continued on. Every time the sequence completed, I felt my body shake as my flesh tried to tear itself off my bones to get away from those horrible images.\n“Slow down boy. Breathe.” I did as he said. It helped, somewhat. I realized that the world was not, in fact, shaking, my eyes were just blurry with tears. I wiped them away and focused on my Father’s face. He looked like he was carved from stone, like the gargoyles that ancient people put on castles to ward off the Giants. The cold, calculating veneer was oddly comforting, if only because of its familiarity. My Father had always been a dour man, ever since I can remember. The last time I saw him laugh was when my sister and I were still little kids. We had been playing Giant in the backyard, with us as the Giants and a small ant colony as Us. We were having a grand old time, the two of us stomping around drunk on power squashing ants left and right. We took a break at some point and were on the porch with Father, sucking on popsicles to cool off under the artificial heat of the underground sun lamps. While we ate, we watched the ants frantically trying to rebuild the hill that Vi had kicked over. Something in me must’ve felt a pang of sympathy for the poor creatures, because I asked her “is it wrong for us to be so cruel to the ants? Maybe they have feelings like us.” She shrugged and said “if it really bothers them, then they should get bigger and fight back.” She had looked perplexed though, like she didn’t quite believe what she’d just said either. That was when my Father, who’d been sitting behind us reading a book all this time, had laughed and slapped Vi on the back.\nMy breathing had calmed substantially now, and Father seemed to sense that I was ready. “Start from the beginning,” he directed.\n“Violet… We were…” I took another deep breath to interrupt my accelerating panting and tried to push the horrible images out of my head before they could start again. “We above ground-“\n“What were you doing up there?”\nThe edge in his tone made me wince. He was right of course. We shouldn’t have been up there.\n“We’d started a garden. It’s in a clearing in the forest to the north. Vi was growing a blueberry bush. She said that fruit doesn’t grow as sweet down here in the artificial light.” My voice wavered. “She wanted to bake a pie with them when they grew in for our birthday. The best pie ever.” He just stared at me over his steepled hands, so I took a breath to steady myself and continued.\n“We were in the garden when I saw one of Them coming. It wasn’t a very big one (the trees came all the way to its knees), but it was headed straight for us.” I shuddered in horror at the memory of the Giant; its humanlike face eerily devoid of expression as it stomped towards us. “We grabbed whatever tools we could and scrambled out of its way towards the tree line.”\n“We squatted in the bushes. Vi had a hard time keeping her sunhat on as we crawled through the bush. Plus her overalls kept getting-” my voice quavered again and I bit my lip. I was stalling.\n“Anyway, that’s where we were when it came. We were hoping it would just step over the garden completely.” I might’ve even been whispering a prayer as it drew closer; I didn’t remember, so I didn’t mention it to Father.\n“But it didn’t. Its foot came down 10 yards away from us and flattened the whole meadow. I think we were too stunned to move at first. But then something came over Vi. She burst out from the bushes before I could grab her and ran out into its footprint. She lost her sunhat.” I said, remembering with some guilt that it was probably still up there in the bushes. “Then she…” I braced myself. “Then she looked up and shouted at it.”\nIt was the one thing we’d been trained from birth to never do. Our father’s approach to dealing with the Giants was that we should never let them notice us. “If they didn’t know we were there,” he had told us once, “then they don’t know they can step on us.” So, whenever we’d ever come across a Giant, Vi and I would hide out of its way and wait for it to pass.\nTo be honest it was terrifying. These massive creatures could kill me without a thought, without even noticing. Because… well because that’s just what they do. The Giants have always been here. There was nothing to be done about them, so we just had to figure out how to live with them.\nAt least, that’s what our dad and our teachers at school taught us. But had never really sat well with Vi. “But they look human!” I remember her protesting to our teacher once. “Have you ever seen their eyes?” She cast her eyes around the classroom, but most of our classmates were either staring blankly or shaking their heads. Not everyone was as brave as my sister. Not even me; I tried to avoid looking at their faces as much as possible. The resemblance to Us was too creepy for me. “They’re intelligent.” She said defiantly. “They just choose not to act like it.”\nMy teacher must’ve sent home a note, because I remember Father yelling at her down in the kitchen well into the night. To her credit, Violet did a lot of yelling back. Things were never quite the same between the two of them since that night. So, when I told Father that Violet had run out into the open and actually drawn attention to herself, I’d expected him to have some sort of reaction. But there was none, just that same stony gaze. The lack f response had started to become unsettling, and I squirmed uncomfortably in my seat.\n“She told it it was an asshole.” I spoke more to fill the silence than anything else. I had been trying not to think about this part, because if I thought about this part, I’d have to think about everything that came after it too. But now that I’d spoken, it was like I’d opened the floodgates, and the rest of the story came pouring out.\n“’You’re an asshole!’ she shouted up at it. And it had stopped. I don’t think she was actually expecting that. I certainly wasn’t. It didn’t throw her for long though. ‘How could you do that?’ She’d said. ‘Do you even know what you just crushed? There was something beautiful here, and now it’s just a fucking footprint!’ It turned its head to look at her. Even from my hiding place I could see the rage in its eyes as it stared down at her, like it was looking at a bug that had just spoken. I desperately wanted her to stop but she kept going. ‘That’s all that you things do, is you just walk around destroying everything beautiful we try to make! It doesn’t matter what it is, you crush everything, everything that we love and cherish, without even a thought! Our work, our friends, our family,” Her voice broke, and I thought she would cry, but she kept going. “Don’t you ever think about what that’s like for us? We’re not just bugs, we have feelings and hopes and dreams! And we’re afraid. So afraid, all the time, of you. You dumb, violet, monsters! Do you even understand me?’ And then silence. ‘Yeah, I see it in your eyes. You know what the fuck I’m saying. So why? Why do you have to destroy everything? Why the can’t you just leave us the fuck alone!?!?’”\nShe was breathing heavily now, although I couldn’t tell if it was from emotion or from all the shouting. The Giant, who’d just been looking over its shoulder at her, turned its body around fully then. And then it took a step towards her.\nI knew what was about to happen. I think she did too, on some level. But even when I screamed for her to run, even when its foot rose to take that last step, even as she stood in its shadow as it came down towards her, she just stood there with this look on her face. Like she was saying ‘you wouldn’t dare.’” The tears sprung back into my eyes. “But of course it did. I... I think I screamed. Or maybe not, I don’t know. She was close enough that I was able to hear her bones crunch and pop, even over the thunder of its foot landing. I don't think I believed it at first,” I said, lip quivering and tears freely flowing now. “I thought she’d miraculously still be there when it moved its damn foot.” I made a sound halfway between sobbing and retching. “...she was stuck to the bottom of it like gum. Her sinews stretched between the smear on the ground and the stain on its foot until they snapped with this sickening pop. Little shards of bone shook loose and made little ripples as they dropped into the puddle that used to be her. And then the monster was gone. Back to walking... wherever. And Vi was... was...” I still couldn’t say it.\nJust then, Father made an exasperated sound from across the table. The noise was so unexpected that I forgot about the tears rolling down my face for a split second and just stared at him dumbfounded.\n“Dumb little brat,” he muttered. He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “It’s sad, boy, but I can’t even say I’m that upset. It’s her own fault for drawing attention to herself like that.”\nI went from dumfounded to straight up shocked. “What the fuck?” There was a delay between the words leaving my mouth and me realizing I’d said them. “No really. What the fuck?” My sorrow quickly gave way to the overwhelming indignation I felt rising in my chest. “How could you say that about your daughter? She all she did was try to talk to it and it... it...”\n“I can’t say I blame them either.” He said, cutting me off. “Just hearing that story pissed me off.” He shrugged. “Daughter or no, I probably would’ve done the same thing if she’d talked to me like that.”\n“If she’d...” What the fuck was he talking about? “But you’re not a Giant!” I shrieked. “How...? How could you...?” I was shaking with rage at this point, but I didn’t even know what to say to him. “You... You’re an asshole!” I slammed my fists on the table as I leapt from my chair to scream down at him. “How could you take that, that thing’s side over your own daughter’s???” I shouted, flinging my arms out wildly. “They’re everything that’s wrong with this world and Violet just... she’s just...” I ran out of steam and deflated back down into my chair. “She was just small... like us.” I finished quietly.\nMy Father had endured my tirade with an impassivity that would’ve infuriated a boulder. I wanted to break that stoic face of his so badly, but I felt completely drained. After I was quiet for a few seconds, he rose and said, “Follow me son. There’s something you should see.”\nI was too tired to resist, and besides, I had a morbid curiosity as to what secret knowledge my Father was holding onto that was keeping him so calm right now. He pulled out a key and unlocked the door to the basement. My sister and I had never been allowed down here, ever. We’d tried over the years, but it had always been locked, and our Father kept the key on him at all times. We descended a long flight of stairs, easily several stories, until we reached the bottom. What awaited us was a cavernous room, at the center of which stood...\n“AHHHH!” I screamed and leapt back into the stairwell where the Giant couldn’t get to me. One of the monsters stood against the wall in the middle of the chamber. What was it doing here?\nMy Father didn’t even turn around as he snapped, “stop it and get out here.”\nI took a cautious step forward into the space. The Giant was stock still, like it was frozen in place. It stood on a large metal disc, and behind it on the wall I could make out two rail tracks the ran up towards the ceiling. I followed them all the way up to a pair of huge hangar bay doors that were clamped tightly shut.\n“What... how did...?”\n“That,” my father said pointing up at the creature, “is mine. The one you and your sister encountered must’ve been from a neighboring community, the little ones don’t tend to patrol very far from their homes. Over there,” he said, pointing to two huge tanks of bubbling blue liquid on the far side of the room that I hadn’t noticed until now, “are the ones I’d been preparing for you and your sister. I was planning to show this to both of you someday soon. Maybe if I had shown your sister, she wouldn’t have acted like such a brat and gotten herself killed.”\nI crossed the cavern and stood before the tanks. Inside, two infant Giants (I hadn’t even known there were infant Giants) floated, every so often twitching some part of their body. I didn’t understand. Why was my Father growing Giants? And what did he mean they were “ours?” I turned back to ask him, but something about the Giant at the center of the room caught my eye. I realized it bore a striking resemblance to my Father. My eyes widened with horror. I whirled back around to the monsters in the tank. That one on the left looked like Violet. And the one on the right looked like me.\nI felt a hand land on my shoulder. “How...?” I stammered.\n“There’s a control center in the neck.” He said that like he was explaining how to use a flashlight and not upending my entire worldview.\nI stared at him in shock. “In all of them...?’\nHe nodded. “All of them.”\nMy head was spinning, and my mouth silently groped for words. “...Why?” I eventually managed to croak.\n“Why what?”\nWhy do we cower underground, living in fear of them? I thought. Why did we grow up learning that they were monsters we had to hide from and hate? Why do they step on us, why do they trample anything we build above the ground? Why did they kill my sister?\nMy confusion must’ve shown, because my Father shrugged and said, “that’s the way it’s always been. I made mine to protect our family from the other Giants. My father did the same for his family, and his father before him. One day, you will do the same. Violet would have too. Everything I taught you was so that you could survive until that day came. That’s what it means to be a parent.”\n “But I don’t want one of those... those things!” I cried. “I just want them to leave us alone! Why can’t they just leave us alone!?”\n“This is how you get them to leave you alone!” Father shouted, at long last showing some human emotion. He sighed and rubbed his temples. “You and your sister,” his voice sounded like it was coming from underwater, “seem to have this idea of how the world should be. But this is how the world is, and you need to accept that. You will get in your Giant when the time comes, because you must. You don’t get to have a choice.”\nSomething in me broke then. I ran. I don’t remember if he even called out to me. Maybe he thought I’d come back. Or maybe he didn’t care if I did. I don’t know. I ran up the stairs, out of the house, and into the street. I ran to the elevator and took it to the top floor, and then I ran through the old maintenance hatch Vi and I would sneak through to slip out of the bunker. And then I ran away, as far as I could.\nI’m still running, by the way. Running from the Giants that aren’t really Giants as they try and squash me like an ant. It’s not fun. It’s not easy. But at least my sister wouldn’t hate me. And there’s some small comfort in that." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: TOTAL ECLIPSE of MY HEART\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1173\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story during a total eclipse — either natural, or man-made." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "**possible sensitive content: sudden, unexpected death of an adult child**\n\nDear Nancy,\n\nAs I sit here lost in thought on the eve of the total eclipse of the sun, I’m trying to think about something funny or witty about tomorrow’s big event, but nothing is coming to me. There’s just nothing funny on my mind right now.\n\nSo I turn to poetry instead. I write a catchy line about the sunset cremating the sky over the ocean at Pescadero. I saw that “cremation” decades ago when death was the furthest thing from my much younger mind. And then your email arrives. \n\nYou tell me you’re on the way to the funeral parlour to discuss Cindy’s cremation. This mother’s heart skips a beat. I can’t breathe. When my heart returns to its job of keeping my 78-year-old body alive, I can’t help but ask why. Why you, not me? Am I somehow luckier? I have two daughters. You had only Cindy, your “angel” as you called her over and over in your grief-laden facebook posts. And my heart skips another beat.\n\nHow does a mother cremate her angel? When I had my father cremated, well, he deserved no more. End of story. When we cremated mom, it was our only way to keep her with us a bit longer. She is still resting comfortably on a shelf inside our dining room hutch. When my sister-in-law cremated her beloved husband whose heart gave out when he took one last ride on his surf-board, we took comfort knowing he spent his last morning doing what he loved. And when my dear neighbour cremated her only son a year ago, there was some comfort…not much…in knowing his life-long battle with a brain tumor that fully blinded him those last couple of years was finally over. Tomorrow’s eclipse is something he never would have seen anyway. \n\nBut Cindy would have. Would she and her three children have gotten together with you for an eclipse party, complete with special glasses, some pop for the children and wine for the two of you to share this once-in-a-lifetime event? Instead, she left you with a once-in-a-lifetime experience you never saw coming. And what about the neighbour who looked in on Cindy when you couldn’t reach her? I can’t help but think about her too. How did she feel when she had to call you back? How do you tell a mother her angel was unresponsive? Gone. Now that’s what I call a total eclipse. No brilliant corona or waves of colour promising the sun will re-appear in two to three minutes. A total, unending eclipse.\n\nIn a way, I envy you. You are spiritual, an “intuitive”. You have spent years travelling to and from Tibet. You’ve even met the Dalai Lama. You embrace the tenets of Buddhism, and from what I’ve read about Buddhism, you have no doubt trained yourself to see death, at least your own, as something of which to be mindful, but on which not to be fixated. Good advice. \n\nBut I really need to know the answer to this: is Buddha’s wisdom helping you now as you try to process Cindy’s unexpected passing? My younger daughter, who sees you as her second mother, reminds me you are strong. So am I. But could I handle her or her sister’s unexpected death? I’ve always believed there is no greater pain than a child pre-deceasing a parent. Is there? I guess you know the answer to that question now. Or is it still too soon to tell? Too soon for me to ask? I suspect your answer is what I’m afraid of. Despite that wise advice from Buddha, I relate to what has happened to you way too much and it’s knocking me sideways. A total eclipse of my heart. \n\nUnfortunately, I’m not a follower of any religion, organized or otherwise. The God in whom the nuns with their rulers and rosary beads told me to believe wasn’t there when I really needed him (her?) as a teenager, so I abandoned that God and never found a suitable replacement. Is there one? No wonder so many still believe in a God or Allah or whatever name people have for Hope. The way I see it, when everything is gone, only hope gives us the strength or will to carry on. That is all I have to cling to nowadays. I’m happy that you, at least, have more. \n\nI see Buddhism also teaches that “while death is certain, the time of death is uncertain”. Touche. Didn’t Shakespeare say something like ‘therein lies the rub’. Ah yes indeed! As my husband said this morning while I cried thinking about your loss: “Birth is never assured but death is guaranteed.”\n\nSay, do you remember that Dusty Springfield song that hit #1 in our teens, “The End of the World”? As I walked around my backyard very early this morning, the sun was warm on my face, birds were tweeting non-stop, and the cloudless skies were ever so blue. It was such a glorious morning until I could hear Dusty asking “Why does the sun go on shining? Why do these eyes of mine cry?” She wanted to know how life could go on as usual while she was dying inside. Is that what it feels like now, Nancy? Never mind. Don’t answer. I don’t think I want to know. \n\nNancy, It’s taken all day for me to write this to you. I’ve been watching the skies, taking breaks and wondering if we’ll be able to watch the eclipse tomorrow after all. The forecast is calling for clouds and possibly even rain. In fact, looking toward the horizon now, I can see clouds already gathering. I guess there’s a lot of people, those who have booked hotels in our city and especially in Niagara Falls who are going to be very disappointed if they don’t get to see this once-in-a-lifetime event. Won’t worry me. As I said above, what has happened to Cindy and you has totally eclipsed my heart. I don’t need to see more darkness.\n\nOn a parting note, I hope it’s not too soon to send you this, but here’s a little something I wrote for you when I got the news:\n\nI could send you bouquets of flowers\nBut, what good would they do?\nThis day of April showers\nWill not bring her back to you\n\nI cannot begin to imagine\nThe depth of your heartache and sorrow\nThe thought that you can’t just pick up a phone\nAnd speak to her tomorrow\n\nIf i could press a button\nTo make yesterday rewind\nI would do it in a heartbeat\nIf it would bring you peace of mind\n\nBut I feel beyond inadequate\nAs I search for a comforting word\nBecause I know there really isn’t one\nThat you haven’t already heard\n\nSo instead of flowers, take this poem\nOf thoughts that fail to say\nHow much I share your tears\nThat words can’t wipe away.\n\nYour friend,\n\nViga" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Doolittle\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1077\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story during a total eclipse — either natural, or man-made." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Well, I hear you went up to Saratoga,\nAnd your horse naturally won,\nThen you flew your Lear jet up to Nova Scotia,\nTo see the total eclipse of the sun…\n-Carly Simon\nIt never would work, would it? 1972, 2017, and now 2024. Total Eclipse, hardly!\nCloudy with a chance of meatballs! I was stewing. What would I do with all that product, bought at higher prices that seemed reasonable for the enormous crowds who would appear…\nMagically. Or not. The weather was dictating my fortunes. Weather! Of all things.\n“You do what you have to do!” explained Doolittle, my better half. “It’s Niagara Falls! Break-even. Send it back! Refuse that last shipment. Don’t even take delivery on it…And if you take a loss, so what?”\n“What?” asked my wife at the kitchen table. “Talking to yourself again?”\n“Always!” I replied. She was fussing with a box of broken souvenirs that I had scraped together to return while I resisted the urge to deliberately break more so that I could cut my projected losses even further.\n“Why do you do this to yourself?” she asked. “Made in China! The lot of it! No great loss!”\n“So you say!”\nShe sighed and plopped down into a chair. “I do the books. We’re fine. It’s not like it was during the pandemic.”\n“You compare this train wreck to the pandemic?”\nOff she went in a huff. “Sort this yourself! I’m not fighting with you!”\n#\nThen it was like I was ten years old. I never noticed anything around me except what books told me I should pay attention to.\nBook-mobile books, seven at a time or more, should do it. Do what? Oh, fix never being with friends or having a comfortable say in anything that happened in my life. Eclipses and I are like buddies—the extraordinary to my ordinary.\nUm, is that me? In 1972, right smack dab in Nova Scotia, I was staring at the sun using photo negatives to shield my eyes a week to the hour before the eclipse was supposed to occur.\n“Nothing’s happening!” Doolittle exclaimed. “Now, all the kids in the neighborhood are staring at you!”\nYelling like…little banshees, all pooped up and raring to inflict pain. On me! I beat a retreat into that bungalow that, save for the yellow-painted shingles, was like any other, with a cracked retaining wall and gravel driveway. A plopped-down nondescript whatzit it was. Perfect in every way.\nAfter that, Dad has his say. “Get outside and play with the boys! Stop reading books all the time! Where did you get those negatives? Give them to me!”\n“You’ll go blind staring at the sun,” Mom said as she served me porridge a day later.\n“MOM! The negatives protect your eyes! I read it in a book.”\n“I’m not taking you to any eye doctor, you hear me?”\n#\nThe shop looked so empty! How is that possible?\n“Calvin! Did a tornado go through here?”\nI was speechless, my tongue hanging out. I’m barely through the door; my master key is still in my pocket, and long after hours, the help fills shelves and totals the take.\nCalvin looked up with a huge grin. “It never stopped all day.\"\n“Head home, the lot of you!” I rejoiced. Then I had to sit. “What on earth?”\n“Exactly!” cooed Calvin. “Eclipse mania! Bonus time!”\n“You can count on that!” \nI start filling the bank's deposit bag. I must be at the shop early tomorrow—there are too many shelves to fill.\n#\nI was daydreaming again about chasing girls. I hardly knew it, but back in 1972, it seemed natural to be in and through one house and then out of the other in record time, wrestling with them and talking garbage. Now, an eclipse hardly mattered to me. After all that reading I did?\nBut then it happened—sudden, like. One minute, clouds with sunshine filter through, and then bam! Seconds later, it's like someone switched the light. Dark. Oh, so dark! We screamed so much it made the dogs bark! Owwhooo!\nI forget their names—Pauline, Sandra, or Roxanne? Afterward, they didn’t seem interested in my silly games—small wonder. I had to see it all in my mind: blackness eating the sun, a massive blot with everyone else so excited—TV stuff. So soon after, the man on the moon with his \"one large step for mankind\" spiel.\n“Never mind!” Doolittle told me, “Thank your lucky stars, no eye doctor for you!”\n#\nBut I'm still waiting for clear weather for THE DAY. The weather forecast is always so damn accurate. I’m up at them, counting my chicks before they are hatched. But with a hopeless rage, that feeling you get that spoils everything.\nNiagara Falls Has Declared an Emergency! The headline blares. Like, really? All this does is snarl traffic, with main routes shut to accommodate unnecessary emergency vehicles if the million expected tourists don’t arrive.\n“Que sera, sera,” quipped Calvin upon my entering the shop on Eclipse Day.\n“I bet the police know the hotel fill rate by now!” I answered. It was too early to see much tourist traffic in the streets, and I was half an hour late for what should have been a ten-minute ride.\n“Uh huh,” mumbled Calvin, gingerly placing souvenirs with beavers, Mounties, and droopy Canadian flags forward—as if there was any other way to put them—Made-in-China stickers at the back.\nI could have kicked myself. If not for the closed roads, I would have cruised by all the hotel parking lots myself to know the score.\n#\nWhat a bunch of nonsense! Did I break even? Maybe. Whoever came was in a rush to party. Any excuse, as they say?\nAnd Mayor Diodati had to admit that far from a million visitors, a mere two hundred thousand showed up! What a maroon! Declaring an emergency scared off thousands, not to mention thousands more in missed tourist dollars.\nCan you be too careful and proactive?\nAfter all, eclipse is not a superpower. It's just a suggestion, a bribe offered to anyone who would risk believing in it.\nPity the aboriginal tribes who stared at it so long ago. They believed and paid the price—blindness—confirmation for every unimaginable terror that unexplained things can inflict.\nOn the other hand, are we so much better off? As Doolittle told me:\n“I’m at peace even if you are not. We’re just tourists clutching souvenirs along the way.\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Emerald Nightfall\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2637\n\nPrompt:\n\nPeople have gathered to witness a once-in-a-lifetime natural phenomenon, but what happens next is not what they expected." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "You can tell when it's coming. Sunset brings on a strange vibration even that the sylvan creatures feel. The birds change the mood of their twilight songs to a more somber melody. We hillfolk know all the signs of this rare phenomenon that is coming at night fall when the clouds float like ancient spirits and a wave of rich emerald bathes the rocky landscape. \nIt is the night of their return and woe to those who do not heed the coming of the Emerald Nightfall. Some of the creatures start to howl or screech at the sagging full moon. Smaller creatures, often prey, scurry into the brush for safety as the sky is engulfed in the swirling emerald kaleidoscope. The wind begins to blow rocking the higher branches and boughs of the pines sounding like an oncoming train. \nLet me warn you of what may come and take heed, take shelter, but, pray, do not let the garish green misty light fall upon your being, because the stain, like Cain's blood will never wash off.\nI have lived here in this cabin for nearly thirty years after my wife died in labor giving birth to a son I would never get to know. It was on an Emerald Nightfall. Back then I did not fully understand the impact of the transcendental power that came with this occurrence, but seeing Sarah slip away wrapped in a bloody sheet with my son Isaac in her arms, I came to fear and respect the powers of the unknown. \nThere are those among us who are in communication with those powers and they warn us to be on guard lest our souls be taken as ransom. Their stories of the horrible magic that comes with an Emerald Nightfall is enough to make a believer of a hardened man like myself. \nMy name is Moses Stearns and I have lived long enough to witness two Emerald Nightfalls, this will be my third. I felt the wind pick up earlier this afternoon while I was fishing in the stream near my cabin for dinner. The clouds started forming and I knew it was coming. Shadows start deepening and pulling free from the things they are shadowing for. \n\"We'd bes' be gettin' on, Brigadier.\" I utter to my black Labrador as I pack my tackle box. Even the gurgling water seems to be casting strange reflections as it cascades by. \nAs I stated before, I came up to these hills in North Carolina after burying my wife and son in some forgotten cemetery in Raleigh. I never saw no reason to go back. The past has always brought me nothing but pain and grief. Up here in the Great Smoky Mountains, I have found a temporary place in this world with my homemade squeezins and doing odd jobs here and there. I need very little as it is and I keep my cash buried in mason jars out back. I've lost track of just how much I got stashed there, but it don't really matter to me anyway. \n\"Emerald Nightfall comin'\" I waved to Chester as I continued on to my cabin. He just nods and closes the door. \nChester has lived his whole life up here. He knows. He told me the green mist came from some evil cult that used to have human sacrifices in the deep woods. Chester said they used to put chemicals in the flames to make it burn green. I'm not much on superstitions, but all I know is the Emerald Nightfall reached where I was living with Sarah and I saw what it did. After that, I didn't want to tangle with the evil that went with it.\nI heard what all them professors and doctors of astrology had to say about it and it all sounds like gibberish to me. I heard one of them spouting off about it. The television station we were watching put his name followed by PhD at the bottom of the screen.\n\"Hey Mo, come look at this.\" Sarah pointed to the screen as she rubbed her round belly, \"He's talking about some phenomenon that is supposed to happen tonight.\" \n\"Sounds like hooey to me.\" I shook my head as I walked out of the room.\nHow was supposed to know she would have trouble sleeping and her leg cramps made her get out of bed. How was I supposed to know she'd go outside for her walk? How was I supposed to know that the emerald light would cover her and the baby? How was I supposed to know what that would do to her until she woke up a few hours later screaming out for me? And when I found her on the sofa, she reached out for me, but it was too late.\nHemorrhage is a terrible word or so I learned that night. \nDr. van Dyke told me, \"Moses, there was nothing you could have done to save the baby or her.\"\nHe put his hand on my shoulder as I sobbed over Sarah and the baby.\nFranita D'Aramatang stopped by a day after their funerals. She was dressed in black and wore a black turban with a gold star in the center. She started speaking in this strange language as she burned this incense as she waved the smoke all around the room where Sarah died, \"Spirits release the soul of Sarah and Isaac Stearns.\"\nI stood there awestruck, unable to move as Franita continued her ceremonial ritual. When I looked at her dark face, all I could see were just the whites of her eyes. She began to shake convulsively that made me wonder just whose side she was on. \nI didn't wonder for long as her head turned completely around on her neck. The devil had walked into my home, but then she told me that they were safe. Her words of assurement sounded like a child's prayer filled with hope and faith; two things I have been short most of my life.\n\"Who are you?\" I asked.\n\"Why do you ask? You called me.\" Her eyes burned into mine.\n\"I did not call you.\" I shook my head.\n\"Your inner voice told me to come.\" She tilted her head as if I was mistaken.\nWhen she left, I made up my mind that I had to leave. Franita D'Aramatang had waken the spirits that would never sleep again.\nThe second time the Emerald Nightfall came, I locked the doors and windows. There wasn't enough protection to keep any probing spirits out, but while they rattled my windows, none dared to intrude my cabin. I guess I dud not have anything they wanted. I did hear some stories from my neighbor Chester, that some people were sucked into the emerald mist, never to be seen again. Listening to him ramble on made me very uneasy as I helped him repair his fence.\n\"The Quigley's had some of them cult folk in their family, but the cult disbanded before you moved up here.\" He rubbed the back of his neck with his kerchief, \"I suspect if there are any of 'em, they are pretty aged by now or dying off for sure.\" \n\"We'd better get this fence repaired before the Emerald Nightfall sets in.\" I searched the sky, but it was still blue and innocent.\nAs I peered up at the sky, I saw green lines streaking across the sky. The crickets were silent. The birds sang a somber tune like something they would play at a funeral, my Sarah's funeral. I remember the sad melody played on a bugle and bagpipe as they lowered her casket into the open grave. \nI would sit on my porch as the sun began to set peacefully between the gnarled old pines. Shadows began to dance free just like they had the other two times.\nMy neighbor on the south side, Elmer Quigley sauntered over wearing a smile with a couple of gaps. He tipped his straw hat and nodded,\"Moses, ready for the Emerald Nightfall?\" \n\"As ready as I'll ever be.\" I answered without relinquishing my chair, \"Care to join me for a spell.\" \n\"I might til the twilight.\" He sat without the grace of an older man. Most folks guess his age was just a might over seventy, but when I looked into his gray lifeless eyes, I knew he is well past eighty. My mama said the eyes don't lie and I do believe this is a hard truth. Searching his overall pockets for his pack of Lucky Strikes, he managed to Pull out a cigarette and light his stick match on a rough patch in his clothing. His gray focused on the tree lined horizon. \"Been some time since our last one.\"\n\"What, the Emerald Nightfall?\"\n\"Yeah, that's what most folks around here call it.\" He sat back and blew a thick cloud of smoke.\n\"Yeah, and what do You call it?\"\n\"Hunter's Moon.\" He smiled a crooked smile and winked.\n\"What's a Hunter's moon, Elmer?\"\n\"Used to be a signal that the members was supposed to find a victim for the sacrificial rite.\" His smug expression made me leery as I sat there watching the sky covered with this eerie blanket. He shrugged, \"We always managed to find someone until Judge Orcutt put a stop to, as he called it, 'our barbaric ritualistic rites.' But we found other ways to keep our practice from being swept away by this bureaucratic nonsense.\" \n \"How did you manage that?\" I asked as he began moving like a serpent.\n\"We went underground.\" His shrug was so nonchalant it made my blood run cold. \"We wrote in an invented language. Can you imagine people inventing a language just so those in authority wouldn't have a clue about what you are saying. You must understand that language can be used as a weapon. How sublime. What we speak, the words we use, can be as lethal as a bullet fired from a gun.\"\nHis laugh echoed in the empty woods surrounding my cabin. Suddenly, I felt trapped. All the years I lived here, I felt the freedom of being my own man. Final judgment would not come until my name was called, but here I was trapped like a critter in one of my snares. His smile, his mild, self assuming manner was casting a spell on me. \nElmer rose to his naked feet, tossed his Cigarette butt into the tall grass and said, \"I reckon I bes' be headed on. Glad we talked.\"\nHis eyes raked over me and I swallowed and said, \"Yup, I see the sky startin' to turn.\"\n\"It always amazes me when the transition is taking place. It's as if the world starts rotating the other way. Counterclockwise. Time begins to regress. The creatures of the woods are silenced in reverence and for just a moment you regain what has been lost. When Death is knocking on our door, we refuse to answer. We refuse to answer.\" His dark eyes raked me over again before he tipped his hat and went on his merry way.\nHe was gone, no longer a threat or nuisance. I would go inside and let this Emerald Nightfall pass. I got myself into bed and dreams came quickly.\nWe were holding hands in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. We were so much in love, just like all the rest. We were so much in love we could not wait so we dropped out of college and moved in together. Time did not fit into our plans. We were both compulsive and sure that we could live on love. We ended up getting married when Sarah found she was pregnant. Our life would begin in a domestic paradise. But reality plays a harsh game and soon we realized we were in for a rough road ahead, still we felt young and strong enough to overcome whatever came our way. \nI wrapped myself in this dream like a warm blanket and did not want to wake from it.\n\"Moses!\" The wind shrieked, waking me from my dream. My head became an echo chamber as the wind rattled the recesses of my mind. I did not answer, because I knew this was a trap.\n\"Moses, come here quickly, I need you!\" The disembodied voice continued to shriek outside my door. Suddenly I felt transported back to that horrible night when I first encountered the Emerald Nightfall. Had I passed through some vortex of which I could not escape, I could not free myself from? The memory. That wretched memory was with me again. \nIt was her voice. I reached over to her side of the bed, but she was gone. Where was she?\n\"Moses. something is wrong. Help me...\" \n Her voice began to fade and weaken.\nI called out for her, the dream still vivid in my mind. I could not help her. It was too late.\nBut what if I could? What if this Emerald Nightfall would let me transcend time and do what I could not do back then? I would do anything. Anything to have her back. \n\"I am here.\" Her voice was pleading in pain. \nI remember how I had promised her that I would protect her, but all of my promises became like sand slipping through my hands. No matter how quickly I moved my feet, it felt like I was running in quicksand. When I held her, I could feel her slipping away.\nWhat can I do Sarah?\n\"Open the door and you will find me.\"\nColors flashed through the windows. \nI could feel the walls vibrate. Any second I would be on my way to Oz with Brigadier in tow instead of Toto. \nIt felt as though I was climbing a steep mountain pass as I struggled to reach the door. Brigadier let out a warning bark, but I tugged on the door handle with all my strength. Once the door was open there was the green mist staring at me like a specter.\n“Sarah!” I called out in the howling wind, but there was no answer.\nOnce again I was a fool to my desire and earnest prayers. She was not there. The green mist covered me as Brigadier stood in the doorway barking furiously as I was sucked into the Emerald Nightfall. \n“Moses, is that you?” The voice was as soft as any I had ever heard. When the emerald mist cleared there was Sarah standing there as beautiful as I could remember.\n“It is I.” I puffed out my chest in my false bravado.\nShe embraced me. I could feel her hands and arms wrapped around me.\n“I missed you so much.” I whispered in her ear.\n“I missed you, too.” She kissed me on the cheek. I felt the warmth of her lips pressed against my skin. I had waited a long time, a very long time. \nI doubt few of us will remember our autopsy, but I remember it clearly as the coroner poked around my inners with his scalpel before writing down “Death by Affixation” and signing the document. \n“It was a terrible fire.” Elmer put his hands in his pockets when the coroner walked into the waiting area. \n“Damn shame.” The coroner sighed. “I have heard some strange stories about the Emerald Nightfall, but I never heard it starting a fire like it did.”\n“No sir, it was a log that rolled out of the fireplace.” Elmer confirmed. \n“Still, sorry for the loss.” The coroner reached out to pat Elmer on the back. \n“Oh, I wouldn’t be grieving too much. I got this feeling that all is well with Moses.” Elmer nodded as he turned to leave. He couldn’t have been more right about that." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Meant to Be\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1822\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a backstabbing (literal or metaphorical) gone wrong." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "If asked, the guests at their wedding in Sage Chapel on the campus of Cornell University where they met would say that the bride glided down the aisle (not walked) and that she was transcendent in her diaphanous dream of the softest pale pink (not white) dress. It was as fine as gossamer. It should be. She ordered the fabric flown in special from Milan and it cost her father a fortune. But it had to be perfect. Everything had to be perfect. She was a perfectionist. The groom waited for her at the alter (as grooms do) in a white dinner jacket and black tie. It was retro. It was Rat Pack-esque. It was fun. And it was perfect. It was a beautiful wedding party. Everyone said so. Everyone thought they were the perfect couple. Everyone knew they were meant to be. So when they divorced eight months later, everyone was shocked.\n\nOn paper they were the perfect couple. They met freshman year at Cornell. They dated all through undergrad. They broke up for a bit as couples do before grad school—he needed to find himself so he spent the summer traveling across Europe. Interestingly enough, even though he found himself in the pants of many, many girls across the continent, he never “found” himself. Or, rather, he found that he wasn’t much different than he was before. He was a simple guy with simple needs, and after he came back home and was just about to start grad school he figured it was time to get back together with Phoebe. She was the girl for him. They were meant to be. He begged her to come back to him. Told her she would always be the one for him and that there would never be any other girls. After the requisite number of days and appropriate amount of romantic gestures on his part (flowers, candy, Teddy Bears dressed like Peter Pan and Tinker Bell because that was their costume for a Halloween party sophomore year) she gave in and took him back. She was starting law school at Duke in the fall and he was starting business school at Penn. To her, that was a recipe for a perfect life.\nFour and a half years later they were working in New York, living on the West Side and their perfect honeymoon in Aruba seemed a lifetime ago.\n\n“Are you going tonight?” “No, I don’t have time. I’m swamped here. Evan is allowing me to be second chair on this case, and I can’t fuck it up.” “I get it. Just try to get out of there earlier than usual oh and call your mother. She’s now calling me because you never pick up and she’s no longer accepting my lame excuses for you.” Declan hung up the phone frustrated by yet another cancellation from Phoebe. They had been married less than a year but lately it seemed like they were never together. She came home late, went in early, always had something pressing to do. Everyone told him it was normal. Everyone assured him that their life would calm down after “the wedding” after “she makes partner” after “he becomes a vice president.” So many things had to happen before their lives would settle down and they could spend time together. It was getting to be too hard to wait for that mythical time. But he carried on. Went to work. Worked out. Played in his basketball league, kept busy and tried not to notice that he was almost always alone. \n\nThey had plans to meet up with their friends for a few drinks. Phoebe hadn’t seen any of their friends since the wedding and he didn’t like that she never wanted to get together with them anymore. He was going to go by himself but didn’t want to explain AGAIN why Phoebe wasn’t there. Instead he decided to text Chelsea from work to see what she was doing. She often went out with a group from the office and was constantly asking him to come so she may be doing something fun. He texted, ‘Hey what’s going on tonight?’ He poured himself a drink and waited for her response. It was immediate. “There’s a group of us going to Caledonia. Meet us at 8.” He responded with a thumbs up and headed out the door. Caledonia was right around the corner on Amsterdam so it was convenient and he liked it well enough. When he walked in he spotted Chelsea sitting alone. “Hi Chelsea, where is everybody?” “Hi Declan! No one’s here yet,” she said. Declan was a little uncomfortable sitting there with Chelsea when it was just going to be the two of them but as one drink followed another he soon relaxed. And with each new drink, she slid closer and closer to him. And with each drink, he was more and more comfortable with how close she was. He was attracted to her. She was cute and fun and she was sending out some strong signals. She went to the bar and brought back two tequila shots and some limes. Before he knew what was happening, she grabbed his hand, licked it seductively and took a shot, slammed the shot glass down and immediately kissed him. And he kissed her back. It was a long, lingering, good kiss. The kind of kiss that’s full of promise. He pulled away after he realized what he was doing. He didn’t want to. It was really hard to walk away from that but he muttered, “Thanks but I have to go” as he threw money on the table and ran out of the bar. How could he do that!? \n\nHe got home around midnight but Phoebe still wasn’t home. He felt so guilty that he didn’t leave his shoes by the door or his tie and jacket strewn on the couch like he usually does. He put everything away the way she likes. He took a shower because he felt dirty. He got into bed and pulled out his very worn copy of The Sun Also Rises and started reading the last page. His favorite page. Phoebe got home a little later and he heard her quietly open the door, but as she noticed no shoes or jacket she must’ve thought he wasn’t home so she no longer tried to be quiet. She left her shoes on and the click clack of her heels on the hardwood floors got louder and louder as she walked toward the bedroom. She came in the door and jumped when she saw him reading in bed. “Oh, I didn’t know you were home,” she stammered strangely. “Well, I am,” he said, trying to sound normal. She regained her composure and took on a playful tone. “Usually the indication that you are home is by the trail of clothes that lead to the bedroom.” “That’s not fair. I’m trying and lately I’ve done a pretty good job of picking up after myself.” She nodded reluctantly in agreement and went into the bathroom. He heard the shower start and wondered why she needed a shower before bed but he took one too so he didn’t think much about it. He heard her brush her teeth and came back out in her jammies—a t-shirt and a pair of Declan’s boxers. As she got into bed she laughed and said, “Oh my gosh! how many times can one person read the same book? I’m gonna start calling you Jake.” He laughed and said, “I like him, but don’t call me Jake! He has some issues I don’t have. Come here and I’ll show you the ways in which I’m NOT like Jake.” Phoebe squealed and laughed as he pulled her closer. She let him kiss her, but she pushed him away and said, “I’m really tired. Let’s plan on some quality time this weekend.” He was disappointed but didn’t want to push her. She fell asleep almost immediately and he reasoned that it would be better to let her sleep and he’ll tell her about the kiss tomorrow.\n\nThe next day she was gone when he woke up. He went to the kitchen and there was a note that said “Don’t wait up. I’ll be late.” What the hell was he going to do tonight? He’ll call Sam. Sam was his best friend and was best man at his wedding. Sam is always up for a good time. He dialed Sam and they agreed to meet for drinks at Dead Poets. He sat at work all day and could not focus. He had to tell Phoebe what he did last night. He couldn’t keep it to himself. It was driving him crazy. When he left work, he got in a cab and went straight to Phoebe’s office. \n\nAs his cab approached her office building he saw her getting into a cab with her boss. The boss was a little too handsy for his taste and it made him a little angry that this guy felt he could just paw at her like that. As their cab pulled away, he said, “follow that cab.” It wasn’t as fun to say it as he thought it would be. They drove a few blocks to the W and got out. They walked into the hotel as if they’d done it a thousand times before and then it hit him—they had done it a thousand times before. All the late nights. All the cancelled dates. She wasn’t working. She was with him. \n\nHe followed them in just to see if he was wrong. Were they going into the elevators to go up to a room or—hope against hope—were they just getting something to eat at the restaurant. The elevator banks were to the right. The restaurant was to the left and he could tell by the rhythm of their bodies they were heading for the elevators. The first chair to her second chair. Holy shit. He watched them enter the elevator and as the doors were closing she turned to face out and he met her eyes and the look on her face when she saw him was more than shock and fear. It was relief. In that instant they communicated more than they had in months, years, maybe ever. And he understood. They weren’t the perfect couple. They weren’t actually meant to be at all. It was pretty to think that they were, but in the end they were just two kids who stayed together too long. All of a sudden he felt exhausted and all he wanted to do was sleep. He went out into the night and headed home thinking about what was next for him but all he knew for sure was there would be no one to care if his shoes were in front of the door or if his jacket was thrown over the couch." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Creatures of Habit\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2366\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a character who sees a photo they shouldn’t have seen." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "For over ten years, we hosted the Sorell, Hogg and Hartley Christmas Eve party at our house in Arkley Village. Tom organised the guest list, and I received and entertained his work colleagues and their spouses. It was a wonderful opportunity to socialise, put faces to names and impress the firm’s influential partners. \n “Susan makes it all look so effortless, Tom.” \n “She always insists on doing the catering.”\n “Really? Then you’re a lucky fellow.”\n “There’s nothing left to chance.”\n I could hear Tom’s bellowing voice above the hubbub in the lounge as I prepared more appetisers in the kitchen. He was a social magnet and natural performer who played to galleries of admiring women whilst entertaining their husbands with his untold shenanigans. \n “Susan’s so steadfast.” Tom said as I wafted around the lounge like a fragrant breeze. “Lord knows what I’d do without her.”\n “Chilli crab blini?” I said, enticing Tom’s CEO. “They’re ever so moreish.”\n “I’ll bet they are, Susan,” he said, patting my behind. “You, temptress.”\n Tom had progressed up the hierarchy at Sorell, Hogg and Hartley Associates, and I’d tolerated many indignities to assist his career prospects. However, playing genial hostess to a leering, foul-breathed executive wasn’t my idea of a fun night.\n “If you’ll excuse me.” I smiled, body-swerving out of reach. “Duty calls.”\n I slipped past our guests to prepare the next batch of toothsome canapés. The party food was an exciting challenge, made arduous because of all the guests blundering around the kitchen. A group of junior secretaries from the firm’s typing pool were hogging the drinks table and giggled with delight as the gas stove enveloped me in a cloud of hot steam. They were too busy exchanging texts and comparing selfies to notice further culinary endeavours, and it wasn’t until I clunked a baking tray on the marble work surface that one of them addressed me.\n “I’m so sorry,” she said, putting down her phone. “Can I help you with that?”\n “You know what---?” I exhaled and untied my apron. “I won’t say no.”\n “You poor thing.” She bit her lip, knitting her eyebrows together. “Let me ferry those gorgeous hors d’oeuvres into the living room.”\n “You shouldn’t feel sorry for me.”\n “It’s the least I can do.”\nIt was while I was enjoying a moment of respite with a glass of bubbles that her phone chimed on the worktop next to me. \n Tringa-Tringa-Tring!\n It had the comical tinkle of a child’s bicycle bell. A sound I’ll never forget, but that wasn’t why it was memorable. \n Tringa-Tringa-Tring!\n It was the screen saver image that appeared at the same time. I’d know Tom’s firm jaw line and deep brown eyes anywhere. \n Tringa-Tringa-Tring!\nThe tuxedo looked new. I didn’t recognise that. The young woman kissing his cheek looked unfamiliar, too. \n Bzzzz-Bzzzz-Bzzzz!\n My kitchen timer rang like an over-zealous game-show contestant and drew my attention back to the stove. I rescued another batch of mini vol-au-vents from an untimely cremation and when I turned back, the offending iPhone had disappeared. \nIt was as if it had never existed. \n Maybe I could pretend I hadn’t seen it? It was only there for a few seconds. Just enough time to register the image. Time enough to imprint itself on my mind’s eye. A fleeting memory like a paper cut. A paper cut that didn’t hurt at the time and wouldn’t leave an obvious scar, but it would sting later on. Later on, it would hurt like hell.\n It was after one o’clock when we tidied up the party’s debris and I wasn’t in the mood for Tom’s lame excuses for his CEO’s wandering hands.\n “So, what’s a slap on the ass?” Tom asked, kissing my cheek.\n “Hmm.” I raised a fixed smile and topped up his glass.\n “Think of it as securing my New Year’s bonus.” \n “I’ll bill you for my expenses, shall I?”\n “Keep your sense of humour.” \n “I wasn’t joking, Tom.”\n* * *\nIt’s funny, in retrospect. Pietro was never disrespectful towards me. Despite his initial gruff demeanour, he was quite the old-fashioned Italian gentleman. At a distance, wearing his filthy work attire, he looked forty plus, however up close he could’ve passed for a boxer in his prime.\n I’ll never know how Pietro regarded me, because his deep-set eyes gave nothing away and English wasn’t his strong point. Maybe he wondered what I did all day, drifting around that big old house in Arkley. I kept out of his way and he neither saw me swimming in the pool nor exercising on the tennis court. \nWho knows? Perhaps he thought I was busy organising charity events or raising money for worthwhile causes. Either way, Pietro accorded me a level of respect I’d forgotten existed in the opposite sex. Each day, he consulted me about the gardening tasks and worked hard to indulge my endless requests. He absorbed my every word, never rushed matters, and satisfied my demands with the painstaking detail of a fresco restorer in the Sistine Chapel. \n I suppose they’re all like that in Puglia. I wouldn’t know, of course. It was Tom who travelled abroad on weekends while I played the happy Herfordshire housewife. I was ever faithful and consistent, overseeing the upkeep of our lovely home. None of the burly builders and saucy contractors ever caused me to stray in Tom’s absence. I had a simple mission statement, and I never swerved from my goal. I was ‘Steady Susan’ by name and ‘sure and steadfast’ by nature.\n* * *\nConsistency’s a wonderful and rare commodity in a person, and Tom had the habit of assuming all was fine. He never questioned my feelings or asked if I missed him while he was away. I think he assumed I’d manage and cope by myself. When he returned on a Sunday evening, he’d put his feet up and tell me how exhausted he was. I don’t remember him ever enquiring about my week or how things were going.\n By comparison, Pietro was a refreshing blast of mountain-air after a life choking on downtown exhaust fumes. He was reliable and considerate, and always willing to run errands without complaint. I never heard him mutter or question his work and indulged my slightest whim.\n “Clean the pool?” He’d scratch his chin. “Sure, no problem.”\n “Trim the hedges and mow the lawns?” Nodding, he’d say, “I’ve got that.” \n “Fetch groceries from the store?” Pietro would grab his keys and head off.\n I had plans to update our property and enforced a strict regime of works while Tom was away. Pietro graduated from gardener to handyman and played a major part in all the renovation, sanding the window frames and doors and restoring the exterior to its original specifications. He could turn his hand to anything, and the house soon flourished like a dormant flower blooming after a drought in a rock-strewn desert. \n* * *\nIt was the first week of summer, when I encountered Pietro peeling off his sweaty t-shirt, having netted all the rotten leaves from the pool. I drifted towards him with a pitcher of chilled water flavoured with lemon zest and placed it on the glass-topped table with a sharp clunk. Pietro drew a short breath like a startled panther and flashed a broad grin. \n “You’re spoiling me, madam,” he said, raising a glass in his rough paw. \n “Not at all,” I said. “You’re worth every penny.” \n “You are, how do you say---?” He tilted his head, frowning. “Too kind, yes?” \n I nodded and topped up his glass. Condensation gathered on the inside of the glass as he tilted it back to quench his thirst. I studied him as he wiped the perspiration off his forehead with the back of his wrist. He’d worked up quite a sweat.\n “Take a dip if you fancy,” I said. “We’re not overlooked.”\n After a cursory glance at the party fence and surrounding pine trees, he stepped out of his grubby trousers and held my startled gaze. Tom would never ‘go commando’ and dive into our pool. He’d worry about prying eyes and gossiping neighbours. \n Pietro completed two lengths underwater before surfacing. His face was radiant when he beckoned me forward with an outstretched hand. \n I shook my head. “It’s too cold,” I said, buttoning up my open blouse.\n “No way,” he said. “The water’s perfect.”\n I recall my nervous smile and muttered something about a towel, retreating behind the sliding glass doors. From inside the kitchen, I watched him swimming up and down the pool as if he were the owner, enjoying the fruits of his labours. I had things to do and no time for any nonsense. The next time I looked outside, Pietro was securing the bags of garden waste on his trailer. I approached the window to wave, and he departed without looking back. He was professional and respectful as ever.\n* * *\nThat night, after my solitary evening meal, I wondered what Tom was doing. To be honest, I avoided thinking about him when he was away. It was less painful that way. But why wasn’t he here with me? He’d worked hard for a lovely home and garden, owned a stunning car and wanted for nothing.\n I hated to admit the truth. I’d become Tom’s habit, and reduced to ‘her indoors.’ Did he need to work all the time? We’d achieved our dream and more besides. I mean, why did we need a swimming pool? Neither of us could swim and a tennis court’s no fun for a single player.\n All right. I get it. I’m not ungrateful. I appreciate, habits can save time. Tedious daily routines that require determined effort become automatic processes. However, life can veer off course when that behaviour goes unchecked and one maintains important relationships on autopilot. Loved ones wither if one doesn’t nurture them. The corrosion is incremental until they become lifeless props on a film set and they vanish from view. It’s as if the scene shifters have cleared the studio for a new production.\n* * *\nIt was Mrs Parkinson from next door who spoke to Tom when he returned after the Easter weekend. She’d noticed his car parked in the driveway and approached the house under the guise of being ‘neighbourly.’ I was in the kitchen, having just collected groceries, when Tom opened the front door.\n “I couldn’t help but admire your gardener the other day,” she said. “Is he available for my garden too?”\n “Susan employs him full time at the moment.” \n “Oh,” she said, blinking in all innocence. “I assumed he was rather underemployed because he was swimming all afternoon and…”\n “Swimming, I didn’t know---”\n “Oh,” she said, covering her mouth. “I hope no one’s in trouble.”\n “Trouble? No, I don’t think there’s any---”\n “I mean, I know it was hot and everything but…”\n “Hot and everything, but what?”\n “But he should wear trunks...”\n “Wear trunks?”\n “Oh dear….”\n “I’m sure there’s a simple explanation,” he said, sighing. “Please excuse me.”\nTom sighed and closed the door, humming as he sauntered down the corridor and headed past the kitchen and flopped down in front of the T.V. \n* * *\n Maybe if Tom hadn’t been so dismissive about the incident, my feelings of guilt would have abated, but he showed no sign of either anger or jealousy. Maybe he’s up to something? It only makes sense if he’s been up to no good. You know what men are like? They’re always scheming and plotting. \nYou can’t trust any of them, can you? \n I tip-toed upstairs as Tom snoozed on the sofa and entered our bedroom. His gentle snoring rumbled like distant thunder as I teased open his sock drawer. I’d no idea what I was searching for and rifled through it like a mole burrowing underground. Maybe I’d find signs of inconsistency, a secret phone, a gift-wrapped ring-box and indications of an affair, signs of iniquity and some shred of evidence pointing to betrayal, perhaps prophylactics or anything that could justify my action. \nI scoured the bedroom and his suitcase.\nNot a single item out of place. \nThere was nothing. \nJust a feeling.\n* * *\n “So…” Tom said, chewing his lamb cutlet. “Pietro enjoys a swim?”\n I almost choked on a new potato. “I don’t know what you’re---”\n “According to Nosey Parker, he was having a whale of a time---”\n “She said what---?”\n “Splashing about and diving up and down---”\n “It wasn’t like that, he---”\n “She’s relieved he didn’t indulge in the back stroke…”\n “I can explain,” I said, swallowing. “It was hot and---”\n “I’m pleased someone’s used the damn pool.”\n “I’m sure he won’t do it again and anyway---”\n “Keep your knickers on Susan---”\n “I don’t know what you’re implying---”\n “Don’t lose your sense of humour.” \n “But I wasn’t joking, Tom.”\n What hurt me most was when he shook his head and chuckled.\n “She’s right, you know?” I said, staring at him. “One kiss leads to another.”\n “Don’t take it to heart, Susan. She’s just an old gossip and---”\n “I haven’t felt lips like his for a long time.”\n “You don’t know what you’re saying and---”\n “Soft and moist,” I said, unblinking as I confessed. “Muscular tongues entwining in a game of hide and seek and exploring the unknown and—-” \n “You don’t have to tell me about this.”\n “We couldn’t help ourselves, Tom.” \n “I can’t believe it, Susan.” Tom closed his eyes.\n I turned away. “We just couldn’t stop…”\n Tom laughed out loud and said, “You don’t think I’d employ a man like Pietro if he was straight, do you?”\n I blinked and felt my cheeks burn red hot\n “Anyway,” he said, frowning. “Why would you ruin our marriage?”\n “Sorry, but I thought you—-”\n “No, don’t apologise,” he said. “I’m sure you’re far too busy looking after the place to chase workmen around.”\n “Of course, but—-”\n “But, Susan…” He stroked my hand. “You’re just not that type of woman.”\n I bit my lip and narrowed my eyes as he leaned forward to kiss me. However, when he yawned and announced he was off to bed, I could’ve throttled him. \nMaybe, one day soon I’ll have the pleasure.\n\nTHE END" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Dead Man’s Hand\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2990\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with an unexpected betrayal." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We took drags off Marlboro Lights out on the basketball court before the next round of Texas Hold ‘Em started. Ken looked at me blankly and said, “So what would you do if I fucked Alli?”\n\n“I would fucking kill you. That’s what I would do,” I said.\n\n“Okay, but if she was the one that was interested in me and you are such a courtly love motherfucker, wouldn’t it be hypocritical for you to deny her happiness?”\n\n“Go fuck yourself, Ken,” I said, and we went inside to play poker. One thing I knew for sure is that Ken would never break code and make a move on Alli. He knew I was in love with her. Ken was a gamer, but he was no scoundrel.\n\nKen was dealing to his left doling out two hold cards to each of us. Erik and Cochen anted up the blinds. “You’re bet, Duke,” Ken said. My name is Doug, but back then everyone called me Duke. I drew double sixes. I raised. Christian folded. Four of us were left. But it always came down to Ken and me. Ken raised again. Ken was holding paint.\n\nThe three of us all called. Cigarette smoke hung to the roof of Ken’s garage and mixed with the smell of grease on his father’s workbench. Metallica was playing loudly and rattling the wrenches on the workbench.\n\nNo one could convince us that the bonds that held us so tightly to each other would unravel in just a few years or that each of us would betray the others in some way or another. Truth be told, we were tale-telling snitches, double-dealing opportunists, and manipulative tricksters one and all. But we saw no hypocrisy in our certainty that we deserved the happy endings we were all sure were waiting for us just around the bend. We were the good ones. Life was going to work out. We were betting on it.\n\nKen dealt the flop. Three, four, six. I was holding the Devil’s Hand—6-6-6—and looking at a possible straight. Some called it the Dead Man’s Hand after old Wild Bill, who met his demise after picking up a pot on trip-sixes back in the wild west days. But I wasn’t superstitious.\n\nKen and I met in AP Physics. But Ken was born with low expectations. He worked at the meat counter at Murphy’s Supermarket along with Erik, Cochen, and Christian, and very well might still be there in five years. Erik was a cashier, Cochen stocked shelves, and Christian was in the seafood department. It was a small fraternity. Ken was their leader. But there was something else going on too, something dark, as if Ken knew he had committed a crime and could be caught any time—like every day was just borrowed time.\n\nThen came Fourth Street. An Ace. Tricky. If anyone was holding bullets or ducks, they could be looking at a straight. That would beat three of a kind, but not a full house. I decided to bet on picking up some high society off the river. No problem. It was the bet that I’d been making my whole life. I knew Ken was holding paint. Probably jacks or queens. I wasn’t sure if they were paired or split. Erik and Cochen were scenery at this point. Sorry boys.\n\n“All-in,” I said. Erik and Cochen immediately tossed their cards in the burn pile, theatrically voicing their frustration and lighting up stogies.\n\n“You sure you don’t want to see the river,” Ken said.\n\n“Don’t need to,” I said, lying.\n\n“Call,” Ken said.\n\nThen he flipped the river. Three of hearts. Isn’t it always?\n\n“Don’t tell me,” Ken said. “Full House.”\n\n“Sixes over threes,” I said, turning over my cards.\n\n“You dirty fucking river rat,” Ken said. “Let’s take a break.”\n\n“Aren’t you forgetting something,” I said.\n\nKen started throwing cash at me a few crumpled bills at a time.\n\n* * *\n\nBeginner’s luck. You know that feeling. When you have the hot hand, and everything is coming up aces? You just run with it. It’s easy to believe you’re just that good. That’s how they get their hooks into you. Every addict knows that feeling.\n\nThat’s how it started with Alli.\n\nThere she was, randomly assigned to the seat right in front of mine in AP Physics. This angel-faced, taut-bodied, bohemian princess. Her curly blonde hair framed a set of pale blue eyes electrified with a joie de vivre. She wore jeans overalls over top of a baggie white long-sleeve shirt. The irises of her pale blue eyes flamed out like exploding fractals of pure hydrogen.\n\n“Hey, Duke?”\n\n“Yeah.”\n\n“I’m not really following this whole inertia versus entropy thing.”\n\n“Really. Remember the lecture last semester on fugacity? How gases tend to flee when the pressure gradient isn’t holding them in place. Like how hot air rises to areas of lower pressure. Entropy is kind of like that. The whole universe is dissipating. Frittering away.”\n\n“Okay, Einstein. You think we could meet up after school and you could help me with these practice problems?”\n\n“Sure. I’ve got to take my brother to the mall. Want to tag along and we’ll discuss it on the way? We can stop at the diner and do some practice problems after?”\n\n“It’s a date,” Alli said.\n\nBeginner’s luck. I thought Alli gave a shit about physics practice problem sets. I never guessed she was just putting herself in my orbit. Alli was always being caught up in the winds of some high adventure or dramatic pursuit. A real hopeless romantic. She had an addict’s heart.\n\nI only ever kissed Alli once. It was a few days after our first date. We were back at the diner “doing homework.” Alli was pining after some junior in college. She said all the things girls say. How she was done with dating, wanted a nice guy, who treated her right, blah, blah, blah. And I didn’t know any better. I believed her.\n\nIn my infinite 20-year-old wisdom, I took this opening as a chance to try to impress her with my knowledge of ancient philosophy and metaphysics. I know. I know. But, hey, I had the hot hand. After all, inertia is inert.\n\n“I’ve got an idea, let’s consult the I Ching.”\n\n“The what?”\n\n“The Chinese Book of Changes. I’ve been reading it lately, and you can use it for fortune-telling. All you need is to flip a few coins.”\n\nI came around and sat next to Alli in the booth and pulled three pennies out of my pocket.\n\n“What do I do?” Alli asked.\n\n“You’ve got to ask a question, then you are going to throw these three pennies, and we will see what it says. Three for heads, two for tails. Six tosses.”\n\nTails, Heads, Tails (young yang line)\nHeads, Tails, Heads (young yin line)\nTails, Tails, Tails, (old yin line)\nHeads, Tails, Tails (young yang line)\nTails, Heads, Heads (young yin line)\nHeads, Tails, Heads (young yin line)\n\n____ ____\n____ ____\n_________\n____ ____\n____ ____\n_________\n\nI started reading from Hexagram 51, Jolt: “One hears thunder unexpectedly… the shock can be disorienting like a falling tree that lands in your path and startles you… courage lies in following the signs and taking the unexpected path… all the world is changing and all inside you is changing…”\n\nAlli looked up and met my eyes. Jolt received. I heard the thunderclap. I felt the felled tree in my path. I leaned in and kissed her. And she kissed me back.\n\nAs I pulled back and looked at her, her cheeks flushed, and she pursed her lips as if tasting the kiss all over again.\n\n“That was unexpected,” she said.\n\nI am fucked, I thought.\n\nAnd I was—good and fucked.\n\n* * *\n\nKen and Alli were taking me to Bally’s in Atlantic City for my 21st birthday. There’s the problem right there. “Ken and Alli.” What was my best friend doing talking to the girl I’ve been chasing, about me, without me in the middle of the conversation? Even if it was for my benefit. The idea was to blow off some steam, crush it on the poker tables, get good and sloppy on my first night of legal drinking age, and make it a night to remember.\n\nWalking into Bally’s casino, everything flashed, glowed, beeped, or chirped. The slot machines rang with jangly music, spinning reels, loud beeps, and chimes. Old and ailing bodies slumped and slouched over slot machines with plastic chip buckets close at hand. Bent heads and curved necks were glued to screens. Different colors of electronic lights reflected from their cheeks and foreheads. Bucket hats, sports caps, baggy Hawaiian shirts, huge-framed readers, tacky sunglasses, and canes were popular accessories at the slots.\n\nKen and Alli were doting on me like two proud parents, and Ken kept looking over at Alli and saying things like, “Our boy is all grown up” or “Let’s keep a close eye on our boy.” He kept annoyingly ruffling my hair and I kept punching him back in response. “Quit it, fucker.” And Alli was giggling like all of Ken’s jokes were funny. It was weird.\n\nWhen Alli eyed up some handbags in the window of a store, Ken called her a “label whore” and when an older man came up and complimented her eyes, he called her a “gold digger.” This sudden condescending and dismissive tone was pissing me off. I didn’t think much of it, but maybe Ken and Alli were playing cards, and I just wasn’t paying attention.\n\nThere are no clocks in Bally’s. You can win or lose at any time. Without warning. On the casino floor, the blinking and blaring of lights continued unceasingly. No windows either. Time and nature existed outside the hard rectangular walls. In here, there were only zero-sum games, and you had no choice but to give the devil his due.\n\nI should have been happy to be with two of my favorite people, out for a crazy, wild night. Making memories. But I wasn’t. If I had graduated to manhood, I guess some things were going to change. But, at that moment, walking into the casino like Ken and I had so many nights before—it no longer felt like our thing. I remembered all the nights celebrating at the Carousel Bar and quoting lines from Rounders, imagining Ken as the “Worm” to my McDermott. I thought of all the time I’d spent with Alli being strung along. I thought of all their giggling on the drive up and as we made our way to the tables, I started getting a little bit queasy.\n\nWinners had retired to the Carousel Bar where they clinked glasses and counted their money. Well-dressed young players just back from a night at the club and zombified grinders in hoodies with dark circles occupied the craps, baccarat, roulette, poker, and blackjack tables.\n\nThe green, black, red, and blue felt gave the impression of something clean and safe. And the pit bosses in their tidy suits oozed a feeling of order and consistency. But they looked tired and indifferent as if they were aging fates whose graying hairs and furrowed brows had left them disinterested in the outcome of the sweepstakes of life. The roulette wheel glistened and spun and gave a crisp rhythmic clicking sound as the announcer barked instructions. “The odds are ever in your favor,” the dealer joked. Ha! Not even close.\n\nKen and I sat down at the $100 Texas Hold ‘Em table. The two of us started amassing chips while Alli cheered the two of us on. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her put a hand on Ken’s shoulder. Ken was getting the best of it, but I was up about $2,000, which wasn’t bad for an hour of work. Ken nodded at me, and we closed out. Both of us were up big. As we always did, we retired to the Carousel Bar, strutting in like two warring kings who came home owning entire countrysides, with more bounty than we knew what to do with.\n\nSitting at the bar, the big-breasted waitress with the push-up bra and sized-down black button-down to complete the look started us off with a round of kamikaze shooters for the occasion and followed that up with a second round. Before long, Alli was laughing and telling stories in her husky voice that oozed with a sultry, delicious unspoken pledge that she could fulfill your desires. Instead of plucking the harp strings of my heart, the affectation suddenly grated something inside of me and made me want to be far away from her.\n\nAlli came up and put her arm around me and kissed me on the cheek.\n\n“Happy Birthday! How does it feel, tiger?” she asked.\n\n“Winning, you mean?”\n\n“No, silly. Being a man. Of drinking age.”\n\n“Oh, that. I mean, it’s great, but I’ve been drinking at bars for years, so it’s old hat, really.”\n\n“Okay, big man.”\n\n“Hey, where did Ken go?”\n\n“He’s going to check in to take our bags up. I’m actually going up with him, you want to come with?”\n\n“I’m going to go to the cage and cash out my chips. Meet you back here in twenty?”\n\n“Sure thing, baby,” Alli said, striding off like she was floating.\n\n* * *\n\nAfter cashing out, I ordered another kamikaze and drank alone. Then ordered up a straight vodka shooter to speed things up. It sliced my throat like a glass full of knives.\n\n21-years-old. And living the dream. I began to think that Ken and Alli had been gone for a while. The bitter vodka and sour lime stung my lips. Sitting next to me was a woman in a black dress with bright red lipstick.\n\n“You come here often,” she said.\n\n“First time.”\n\n“Oh, wow. I didn’t think I recognized you.”\n\n“Yeah, I’m just about to go look for my friends.”\n\nShe turned her head, matched my gaze, and put a hand on my thigh.\n\n“Well, love. If you want some company, come, and find me. I’ll be here all night.”\n\nI looked back at her, drinking a martini by herself, and thought that it was strange for her to be so upfront. It only dawned on me later that she was working.\n\n* * *\n\nThe thing about having the nuts is you’ve got to convince the other players you don’t have the nuts. Zero-sum games are like that. There’s one winner and a bunch of schmucks. You are rewarded for subterfuge, deceit, and sharp tactics. It’s the law of the jungle. When you have the nuts, you slit throats and you don’t apologize. Hell, they’d slit yours with a smile on their face and laugh at your misfortune.\n\nMiss your chance and it’s a good bet you’ll be dealt deadwood for the rest of the shoe. And then you’re fucked. Spending the whole time regretting not having the balls to take what you wanted. And that’s how it goes with the nuts. They are fickle and coquettish and like to make the rounds. What a fucking shitty god to live for? Right?\n\nI swiped the key card for the room and opened the door slowly. I heard giggling.\n\n“Ken, Alli,” I said.\n\nThe two of them shot up in the far bed and Ken banged his head on the headboard and fell off the side of the bed, catching his weight with his right leg. At least he was clothed, I thought, noticing he had his jeans on.\n\n“For fuck’s sake, are you serious?” I said.\n\n“Duke,” Alli called after me. But I was halfway down the hall.\n\nMy head was spinning like the slots. My best friend and my best gal. On my birthday. Busted and drawing deadwood. I’m out.\n\nI bought a few mini-shooters at the store, got a glass of ice on the casino floor, and went into the bathroom. I took a look at myself in the mirror. What the fuck was wrong with me?\n\nI poured the Vodka over the ice and gulped it down. The rush of hot air hit my head. A blinding wave of fugacity. My nose started bleeding and I let some of it go right into my glass, muddying the vodka in dark red swirls. Then held my nose, applied some pressure, and finished off the vodka.\n\nI made my way back to the Carousel Bar.\n\n“What’s your name,” I asked.\n\n“Stella.”\n\nI just leaned in and kissed her. She didn’t move. She just kissed me back softly and seductively, pulling slightly away as I pushed into her.\n\n“You want to buy me a drink?”\n\n“What’s in it for me?” I asked.\n\n“I guess you’ll have to find out.”\n\nAfter she drank a few sips of her cocktail, I took her hand and we walked to the elevator. She told me to push the top floor. She led me into a giant room, a suite with a living room, a piano, a round jacuzzi, and a bar.\n\n“You got money, hunny?”\n\n“I’m tapped out.”\n\n“This one’s on the house,” she said.\n\n“Wait… you’re…”\n\n“Yeah baby, I’m an escort.”\n\n“Oh no, I’m out,” I said, walking out the door.\n\n“Don’t get sore, baby. We’re all for sale.”\n\nI walked out on the boardwalk. A blast of cold March air hit me in the face.\n\nI started walking toward the bus terminal by the outlets.\n\nWe were all addicts. I guess everyone is. I’d known that. Ken was a gamer. Letting it ride. Asking for that bad beat. And Alli was a hopeless romantic. Chasing those sweeping tides.\n\nAnd I was playing a Dead Man’s Hand. You might take the pot if you were lucky. Like old Wild Bill. But you’d be left with deadwood all the way home.\n\nIt was time to sober up." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Butterflies\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2200\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with a character staring at a picture they don’t remember taking." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "With both fingers I repeatedly zoomed in and out of the photo. Then I zoomed and un-zoomed even faster, until my screen was just a nauseating blur. I wasn’t sure whether I was trying to make myself feel sick, or if I was hoping that when I finally stopped – when the photo eventually came to a standstill – it would rearrange itself completely into something that made sense. But when I did stop, I was just as confused. Once more, I added up the constituent parts: dark hair splayed on the pillow, shiny skin dappled with bruise-like smudges of mascara, lips compressed into a lopsided pout. It was me. \nIt was me, but a me I didn’t recognise. Looking at the image, I thought of an apple-corer I’d once seen advertised on late night television – the strange sense of satisfaction I got from watching the circular blade biting into its pink skin, twisting efficiently and then withdrawing with a perfect cylindrical core, leaving a hidden emptiness at the apple's centre. I zoomed once more and caught a vacant glint in my eyes, like apple-pips dug out from the flesh. \nI whipped my phone screen around to face Em. “So weird,” I said “I really don’t remember taking this at all last night”. \nShe laughed absently ,“mate you were absolutely gone.” \nI let her laugh soothe me, protectively pulled up the blanket that we shared as we sat on the sofa in her flat. I still held my phone out, and eventually she pulled her gaze up from her own phone at looked more closely at my screen. \n“Where was that anyway? That’s not at yours is it?” \nI made a show of investigating the image, furrowing my eyebrows in concentration. I looked at the unfamiliar pillow beneath my head, the slither of blue wall in the background, swept my gaze quickly over my bared shoulders – before answering, “it must have been at Jake’s” \n“Jake’s?” Em turned to me now with her eyebrow raised salaciously. \nI raised an eyebrow back at her “I went back to his after the club. I drunk called him and he came and picked me up. My knight in shining armour.” \nI remembered the glare of my phone screen, the thrill of his voice down the phoneline when he picked up, the words halting, doubling and rebounding in my head like broken music. I remembered looking at my hand in the taxi and feeling with pressing certainty that it wasn’t my own. Sodium haze of streetlights, the fast synthetic pull of my seatbelt as I unclicked it, faded blue front door widening. \nI did not remember taking this photo. \nEm went back to looking at her phone and I burrowed even deeper into the blanket, so far that I pulled it completely over my head, cocooned. I read once that caterpillars digest their own bodies using enzymes before rebuilding themselves into butterflies. I thought about what it would look like, if the silken shell of the chrysalis was cracked open during this transformation. The soft pulpy mess of a self-destructing body. \nIn the darkness, lights danced behind my eyes. I felt vaguely seasick. \n* \nThat night, I dreamed that after I had sex with him, he split in two. \n A dull morning light was starting to seep through the curtains, weakly illuminating a blue-grey wasteland of empty glasses, abandoned clothes, records adrift from their sleeves. We were lying on the bed, a tangle of limbs and sheets. My head was tucked under his chin, and his arm was flung over my waist. We were perfectly still apart from the rise and fall of our breathing. I watched this from a space above our bodies. \nI watched as his head began to blur around the edges. Then a second head pushed itself free, gradually peeling up and apart from the original. It was exactly the same as Jake’s head – the one that lay next to me on the pillow – except translucent. I watched with a rising feeling of fascination and horror as – one by one – his arms, then his torso and finally his legs all did the same. A diaphanous twin of him sat up on the bed and swung his legs over. Then – in a change that made complete sense to me, in the way only dream logic could – he was instantly opaque, flesh and blood. \nHere, then, lying next to me on the bed, was one Jake. The one that – when I first told him my name as we waited at the bar – had stumbled over it and immediately blushed a deep maroon under the cool blue lights; the one that told me he particularly liked the way my hair smelled; the one that laughed warmly – not condescendingly – when I told him that one of my favourite songs was ‘Loft Music’ by the Weeknd and asked me what my favourite lyric was. \nAnd there – now standing over my still-sleeping body – was the other one. He was motionless, but I could feel hatred seething from him. It was so pure, so concentrated – but with no obvious sign of it in his face or body. It was like a colour I knew was there but couldn’t see. The whole room pulsed with the deep molten red of him. \nThen he crossed the room to the bookshelf by the window and started pulling things off. Slowly and methodically, he would take an item off the shelf – a book, a record, a photo frame – and lay it on the ground next to where he stood. Gradually he got faster and faster, flung the objects in an ever-increasing radius, started grabbing multiple things at once and flinging them wildly across the room. Finally, he turned on his heel – I could see his face now, terrifyingly blank – and started hurling books at the bed with blunt, unrestrained force. \nWhen I woke up, I wasn’t sure which Jake was the one lying next to me. \n* \nThe next weekend we went out again. It was the same series of bars as always – in a slightly different order so it felt novel. I allowed myself to ease into that sense of Friday night anticipation, that vague hum of excitement that accompanies you from one place to the next, baseless except for the liberating blank space of the two following days. Even as I felt it I knew that that itself was the best part of the weekend – the waiting and hoping. \nUpstairs at The Castle there was a gentle ebb and flow of people all evening. People arrived and left again amid the roar of voices and clattering glass. I was sat next to Stevie – head leant back against the wall, half-listening to a conversation about superyachts – when the crowd swelled and shifted with the arrival of a new group of people. Jake emerged, singular and completely unavoidable, like the spray thrown up by an aggressive wave. \nI felt my blood pulsing in the back of my head, against the wood panelling. Can that be right? Is it anatomically correct to feel a pulse there? This is what I was thinking as my body was already moving, springing up out of my seat and wrapping my arms around him. I breathed in his sweet woody smell and recoiled with the immediacy of it. Bare wooden floor, hand on my thighs, textured swirls of paint on the ceiling. I said yes but I wasn’t really sure what I was saying yes to. \n“Jake! Long time no see.” I said with a smile which I hoped was simultaneously coolly aloof and conspiratorial. As his hand left the small of my back I became aware of how desperately I wanted him to want me. \n“Hey Sim.” He smiled warmly before moving away, pulled towards the outstretched arms and hands of the people around us. As he did so I saw the underside of his chin, traced it down to the pool of shadow at the base of his neck, where I had pressed my thumb only a weekend before, as we lay in his bed in the morning. I liked the way it seemed to fit perfectly, and pretended to scan my thumb against his skin, like he was a fingerprint machine. I gave myself to him – the lines and whorls of my identity – and he told me who I was. I flushed red at the childish intimacy of the memory as he moved away, making his circuit around the room greeting people. \nThe night wore on, but slower now. It had been shunted off of its tracks by Jake’s arrival and now proceeded along shadowy, unfamiliar terrain. I couldn’t not keep looking over at him where he was sat a few tables across from mine. I imagined that he was hyper-aware of me, crafting every move and gesture and word in case I should happen to glance at him. I realised at the same time, of course, that this was what I was doing. \nFinally, he sat down next to me and put his arm around me, his gaze softened and blurred by drinking. I pretended to be surprised by his appearance, even though I had watched him crossing the room out of the corner of my eye. \n“I was wondering whether all of your biotech needs have been met recently?” \nI felt a bloom of warmth in my chest, gratified that he had remembered our joke, reassured that that night didn’t exist solely within the dulux-blue parameters of his bedroom. \n“You know how it is - competitive market for these things these days” \nPicking my words carefully, like a game. \n“It was fun though, wasn’t it, that night?” \nI caught it – that flash of doubt – like a lightning rod pulling in a lightning strike, sending it shuddering down to earth, setting the soil crackling. \nI paused, caught between a multitude of possible answers. Yes Jake, it was really fun, round two tonight? Or - Hahaha, it’s all a bit of a blur huh? Or - What did you do to me when I was so drunk I could barely stand up? \nAll the while, Jake was reading his own answer into my silence, “A little bit unexpected maybe? But it was fun. You seemed to have a lot of fun.” \nYes. That was the right answer, wasn’t it. I nodded, leaning almost imperceptibly into him. He lowered his voice and said gently into my ear. \n“You want to go and chat outside? It’s so loud in here” \n“Yes!” Managing to find my voice again – it was uncomfortably bright and high. “The smoking area out the back tends to be a little less busier than the front” \nAs we walked down the stairs, I stared at his shoulders and allowed myself to dream. Yes. This was what was supposed to happen. We would go outside and he would tell me that he couldn’t stop thinking about me. Yes, it was strange after having been friends so long, yes he’d just got out of a relationship and things weren’t straightforward – but he had to see where it went. Come back to mine tonight Sim, he would say, gently, playfully nudging me as we stood out in the cold – edging closer together. All of that nausea – that churning confused messy feeling that had sat in my stomach for the past week – would be resolved. It would make sense now, because he wanted me. \n“Listen, Sim- this is a bit awkward, but I just wanted to make everything super clear for both of us, make sure we’re on the same page.” \nI thought absently about how everything was much more grey outside than inside. The embers of Jake’s cigarette glowed in the darkness as he fidgeted with it. \n“I’ve been seeing someone recently, and it’s starting to become a bit more serious. Like I said, last week was really fun but- it's not the kind of thing I should be doing again.” He grimaced, making a performance of shame, “and I'd appreciate it if you kept it just between us, you know?” \nI waited – face upturned – for myself to have a reaction. I caught my silhouette, projected against the fence behind Jake, flattened and warped by the angle at which the light was hitting my body. \n“Yeah, I hear you completely. Super super chill vibes, you’ve got absolutely nothing to worry about from me.” Relaxed, amenable, yet slightly aloof. Well done me. \n“Cool cool cool” perhaps taken aback by how accepting I was, Jake ground to a halt, before starting up again “You know we-” \nBut I didn’t hear him. I was off, walking, not running. Back through the pub, out the front door and into the street. I turned right, then rapidly left again, moving relentlessly towards the darker, quieter streets of the city. I had absolutely no idea where I was going. I was aware only of a slow, continual sense of unravelling, a glimmering silken thread left in my wake." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: A Delicate Balance\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2984\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is stuck between two opposing sides and can’t decide which one to choose." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "In the softly lit room that served as Dr. Leslie Harper's office, a space adorned with calming artwork and shelves filled with psychology texts, the first meeting was about to commence. Dr. Harper observed the young girl across from her. Emma, a sixteen-year-old child, with her carefully poised demeanor that seemed almost out of place in the youthful casualness of her jeans and sweater.\n\"Emma,\" Dr. Harper began, her voice imbued with the warmth that had comforted countless others before, \"I understand this is a challenging time for you. Would you like to start by telling me a bit about yourself?\"\nEmma nodded, taking a moment to compose her thoughts. \"Certainly, Dr. Harper,\" she replied, her voice betraying a maturity that seemed beyond her years. \"As you might already know, my parents have recently finalized their divorce. It's been... tumultuous, to say the least. They're both demanding I choose whom to live with.\"\nShe paused, dropping her gaze. \"My father is of relentless ambition and corporate success in the city. He's always lost in a sea of business deals and endless networking.\"\n\"My mother, on the other hand,” she continued, “has embraced nature, dedicating herself to environmental causes. She’s now all grassroots campaigns and community gardening.\"\n\"It sounds like you're being pulled in two very different directions,\" she observed gently.\n\"Exactly,” Emma nodded. “And in the middle of their disputes, I'm left searching for a place where I feel I belong.\"\nThe session unfolded with Emma expressing the complexities of her situation, her words painting a picture of a young life caught in the crossfire of adult conflicts. Dr. Harper recognized the facade of composure.\nAs the hour drew to a close, Dr. Harper made a mental note of the key aspects she intended to explore in their future sessions: the impact of her parents' divorce on Emma's sense of self, her coping mechanisms amidst the familial upheaval, and her profound longing for stability in the whirlwind of her divided world.\n\"Emma,\" Dr. Harper concluded, \"you've shown incredible insight today. I look forward to our next session, where we can delve deeper into understanding your experiences and how they've shaped you.\"\n\"Thank you, Dr. Harper.” Emma rose. “I appreciate your willingness to listen.\"\n\"Emma, how have you been since our last meeting?\" Dr. Harper asked as Emma sat in the chair across from her.\nEmma leaned back, her posture relaxed yet poised. \"I've been managing, Dr. Harper. It's an ongoing balancing act, as you know. But our last session gave me a lot to think about.\"\nDr. Harper nodded. \"I'm glad to hear that. Is there anything specific from our last conversation that's been on your mind?\"\n\"Well,\" Emma began, a thoughtful frown crossing her features, \" Just last weekend, I was with my dad. We were supposed to have a quiet dinner, but he ended up taking a business call, as usual. I guess it's his way of showing he cares, being there even if he's not fully present.\"\nDr. Harper made a mental note of the slight shift in Emma's portrayal of her father's behavior. \"It sounds like you're trying to find understanding in his actions. That's a mature perspective, Emma.\"\nEmma smiled faintly. \"I'm trying to. And with my mom, she's been planning this big community garden project. She's so passionate about it, and I admire that, even if it means she's a bit... scattered at times.\"\n\"Scattered?\" Dr. Harper inquired, picking up on the subtle choice of words.\n\"Yes, like forgetting I had a school project due and promising to help but then getting caught up in her work.\"\n\"It's not easy feeling like you're on the back burner. Last time, though, you mentioned your mom was more involved in her activism than household matters. It seems like a slight shift in perspective?\"\nEmma paused, \"I suppose I'm just seeing things in a new light, trying to understand her better.\"\nAs the session progressed, Dr. Harper observed Emma's adeptness at navigating the conversation, her maturity in addressing her complex family life, and the occasional slip in her narrative consistency. These subtle discrepancies were easily attributed to the stress of her situation, yet they left Dr. Harper with a niggling sense of curiosity about the layers yet to be uncovered in Emma's story.\nAs their time together neared its end, Dr. Harper leaned forward, offering Emma a reassuring smile. \"Emma, you've shared a lot today, and it's clear you're making a concerted effort to understand and empathize with your parents' situations. That's commendable.\" She paused, ensuring she had Emma's full attention. \"For our next session, I'd like you to think about what stability means to you in the midst of these conflicting environments.” Emma nodded, a thoughtful expression settling over her features as she absorbed Dr. Harper's words.\nIn the comfort of Dr. Harper's office once again, Emma took her usual seat. Dr. Harper initiated the session with a gentle prompt, \"Last time, Emma, we spoke about finding stability. Have you given any thought to what brings you that sense of grounding?\"\nEmma nodded, her expression contemplative. \"I have, Dr. Harper. It made me reflect on how my parents try to... compensate for the chaos, I guess. But it often feels more material than emotional.\"\nDr. Harper leaned in. \"Can you give me some examples of what you mean by material compensation?\"\n\"Well,\" Emma began, her voice tinged with a hint of frustration, \"my father often tries to make up for his absence with gifts. Like, he missed my birthday last year and sent me this expensive laptop as a sort of apology. It's nice, but it doesn't replace the time we could've spent together.\"\n\"And your mother?\" Dr. Harper probed gently.\nEmma sighed, weariness in her voice. \"My mom’s always making these grand plans for us. Last summer, she promised a trip to the mountains, something I was looking forward to. But as the date approached, she got caught up in a new project. The trip just... evaporated.\"\nDr. Harper observed Emma's disappointment, noting the deeper longing for genuine connection beneath her words. \"It sounds like these gestures, while well-intentioned, don't quite meet your need for a real presence and engagement in your life.\"\n\"Exactly,\" Emma confirmed. \"It's like they're trying to fill the gaps with things and promises instead of time and understanding.\"\nDr. Harper nodded, her mind already formulating the next step in their dialogue. \"Emma, it's clear you're seeking more meaningful connections with your parents. You're even trying to mediate between their worlds, making sacrifices in hopes of peace. That's a significant role you've taken on.\"\nEmma's posture softened, the acknowledgment of her efforts bringing a flicker of validation to her eyes.\n\"As we move forward,\" Dr. Harper continued, \"I'd like us to explore how you can communicate your need for more than just material compensation from your parents. We'll also look into ways you can maintain your sense of self without feeling the need to constantly bridge their differences.\"\nEmma nodded, the prospect of addressing these issues directly seemed to offer a glimmer of hope amidst the complexity of her family dynamics.\nIn Dr. Harper's office, Emma sat with a noticeable heaviness, a stark contrast to her usual composed demeanor. Dr. Harper, sensing the shift, gently steered the conversation toward the emotional landscape of Emma's family life.\n\"Emma, we've touched on material compensation before. Today, let's talk about emotional support. How have your parents been in that regard?\" Dr. Harper's voice was soft.\nEmma drew a deep breath, her fingers intertwined tightly in her lap. \"It's been... difficult, to say the least. It feels like there's no space for my feelings in the conversations. It's always about them, their issues, their divorce.\"\nDr. Harper leaned forward, encouraging Emma to provide specific instances.\n\"For example,\" Emma continued, \"I tried talking to my dad about how the divorce was affecting me, hoping for some reassurance. But it quickly turned into a rant about Mom, how it was her choices that led us here. There was no room for my feelings; it was just another battlefield for their grievances.\"\n\"And your mother?\" Dr. Harper inquired, her concern deepening.\nEmma's expression darkened further. \"With mom, it's similar. I once mentioned how the constant moving between homes was unsettling, hoping she'd understand. Instead, she used it to criticize my dad's lifestyle, saying how it lacked stability and how I was better off with her. Again, my feelings were just... sidelined, used as ammunition in their ongoing disputes.\"\nDr. Harper noted the pain in Emma's recounting, the emotional toll evident in her furrowed brow and the tremble in her voice. \"It sounds like you're often caught in the crossfire, Emma. Your attempts to seek support turn into opportunities for them to express their frustrations with each other.\"\nEmma nodded, tears brimming in her eyes. \"It's exhausting. I feel like I'm more of a mediator than their daughter. It's like I have to armor up emotionally every time we talk.\"\nDr. Harper reached a quiet but firm conclusion. The lack of emotional support and the continuous use of Emma as a pawn in her parents' battles were not just distressing but potentially damaging. It was becoming increasingly clear that the environment was untenable for Emma's well-being and growth. While the word 'emancipation' hung unspoken in the air, the direction of their sessions seemed to be gravitating towards a significant, life-altering decision, one that Dr. Harper, as a court-appointed therapist, recognized might soon need to be addressed more concretely.\nAs Emma entered Dr. Harper's office for what would be their final session before the trial, the weight of their previous discussions hung heavily in the air.\n\"Emma, this is our last session before the trial,\" Dr. Harper began, her voice laced with an unspoken understanding of the gravity of their conversation. \"I want to ensure we've covered everything crucial to your case.\"\n\"Things have only gotten worse, Dr. Harper,\" she confessed. \"My parents... it's like they're completely oblivious to how their actions are tearing me apart.\"\nDr. Harper leaned in. \"Can you give me some examples, Emma?\"\nEmma took a deep, shaky breath. \"Just last week, my father missed another one of my school events. He promised he'd be there, but then he posted on social media from some gala event for work. It was like a public declaration that his work will always come first.\"\nDr. Harper's brow furrowed as she recalled the social media posts Emma's lawyer had forwarded. The evidence aligned disturbingly well with Emma's account.\n\"And your mother?\"\nEmma's hands clenched in her lap. \"She's no better. She was supposed to help me with a project, something we planned for weeks. Then she decided to go on a retreat for her environmental group. No discussion, no apology. She just left.\"\nDr. Harper's heart sank as she processed Emma's words, the supporting emails from Emma's mother regarding her schedules serving as a painful corroboration of her neglect.\nThroughout the session, Emma painted a harrowing picture of her life—a constant shuffle between two homes that felt increasingly like battlegrounds. Dr. Harper observed Emma's distress, her anxiety when speaking of her parents, and her growing sense of hopelessness, all of which reinforced the narrative of a young life in turmoil.\nDr. Harper was struck by a profound conviction. The evidence, both in Emma's accounts and the materials provided, painted a clear picture of a young woman desperately in need of an escape from the toxic environment her parents had created.\n\"Emma,\" Dr. Harper said, “I want you to know that I've seen the evidence, I've heard your experiences, and it's clear to me how much you're hurting. You deserve a chance to build a life where your well-being is the priority.\"\nEmma's eyes, brimming with tears, met Dr. Harper's, finding a glimmer of hope in the unwavering support reflected there.\nAs Emma left the office, Dr. Harper sat back, the weight of the decision before her pressing down. In her mind, there was no doubt left—Emma's emancipation was not just a legal necessity but a moral imperative. And as the trial loomed, Dr. Harper was prepared to advocate for Emma's future with every ounce of her professional integrity, convinced that independence was Emma's best, and perhaps only, path to healing.\nThe courtroom was a stark contrast to the cozy confines of her office, with its austere benches and the imposing judge's bench at the front. As her name was called, Dr. Harper approached the stand, her heart pounding with a mixture of nerves and resolve. She glanced at Emma, who sat with an air of quiet anticipation, and then she turned to face the judge.\n\"Dr. Harper, you may begin,\" the judge announced, his voice echoing in the high-ceilinged room.\nTaking a deep breath, Dr. Harper started, \"Your Honor, I've had the privilege of working closely with Emma over the past few months, and I'm here to advocate for emancipation. Emma is a young lady whose maturity and resilience I've had the privilege to witness firsthand over our sessions.\"\n“It is your conclusion, that instead of residing with either parent,” the judge tilted his head to look at Dr. Harper over his reading glasses, “that the minor should be granted emancipation instead?”\n“I do, your honor.”\nThe judge nodded, indicating for her to continue.\n\"Emma has navigated an exceptionally challenging family dynamic with a level of grace and wisdom well beyond her years. The constant tug-of-war between her parents' contrasting lifestyles and values has placed her in an untenable position, one that has forced her to assume roles no child should have to.\n\"Despite these challenges, Emma has maintained not only her academic commitments but has also demonstrated a profound capacity for self-reflection and personal growth. It is my professional opinion that the toxic environment in which she currently resides is significantly impeding her potential.”\nA murmur ran through the courtroom as Dr. Harper continued, detailing specific instances of Emma's mature handling of her situations, her attempts to mediate between her parents, and her articulate expression of her circumstances and desires for her future.”\nDr. Harper pressed on, \"Furthermore, the evidence I've reviewed, including social media posts and email correspondences, corroborates Emma's account of the neglect and emotional turmoil she has endured. This isn't merely a case of teenage discontent but a genuine need for a structured environment where Emma can thrive independently.\nDr. Harper paused, \"Your Honor, emancipation, in this case, is not just a legal formality. It's a vital step towards ensuring Emma's well-being and future success. I strongly believe it is in her best interest.\"\nThe judge, visibly moved by Dr. Harper's passionate testimony, leaned forward. \"Dr. Harper, in your professional opinion, is Emma prepared for the responsibilities that come with emancipation?\"\nWithout hesitation, Dr. Harper responded, \"Absolutely, Your Honor. Emma has consistently demonstrated the emotional intelligence, maturity, and foresight necessary to navigate life independently.\"\nAs she concluded, a palpable sense of anticipation filled the air. Dr. Harper could feel the weight of her words hanging in the balance, their potential to alter the course of Emma's life.\nThe judge nodded thoughtfully, his expression inscrutable as he prepared to make a decision that seemed, to Dr. Harper, the only just conclusion to Emma's profound journey toward autonomy.\nDr. Harper stepped out of the courtroom, her heart light with triumph. The judge had ruled in Emma's favor, a testament to the compelling case they had built together. She couldn't help but feel a swell of professional pride; her advocacy had played a pivotal role in securing Emma's future.\nAs she made her way down the hallway, basking in the afterglow of the victory, she heard her name called from behind. Turning, she saw Emma hurrying towards her, a smile playing on her lips.\n\"Dr. Harper!\" Emma exclaimed, catching up. \"I wanted to thank you personally. Your testimony was... transformative.\"\nDr. Harper beamed, ready to share in the moment. \"Emma, I'm so pleased for you. This is the start of a new chapter, one where you have the control you deserve.\"\nEmma's smile widened, but there was something in her eyes that didn't quite reach the warmth of her expression. \"Control, yes,\" she mused, her tone shifting subtly. \"You know, Dr. Harper, it's fascinating what people will believe when you tell them what they want to hear.\"\nA chill ran down Dr. Harper's spine, her smile faltering. \"What do you mean, Emma?\"\nWith a casual shrug, Emma's facade began to crumble, revealing a coldness that Dr. Harper had never seen. \"I mean, the stories, the emotional turmoil, the so-called 'evidence',” her eyes rolled, “crafting it all was almost too easy. People are so eager to believe in the narrative of a troubled youth triumphing over adversity.\"\nDr. Harper's mind raced. Her previous elation was replaced by a growing sense of dread. \"Emma, are you saying you manipulated the evidence? That your stories...\"\n\"Were tailored to fit the narrative? Absolutely,\" Emma interrupted, her voice devoid of remorse. \"And you, with your earnest desire to help, made the perfect advocate.\"\nThe words hit Dr. Harper like a physical blow, her professional confidence shattering. She thought back to the subtle discrepancies in Emma's stories, the moments of hesitation, the too-perfect alignment of the 'evidence'—all the pieces fell into place, painting a picture she had refused to see.\n\"But why, Emma?\" Dr. Harper managed in barely a whisper.\nEmma's smirk was chilling. \"Why? Because I could. Because it got me what I wanted. Isn't that what matters in the end?\"\nBefore Dr. Harper could respond, Emma turned on her heel and walked away, leaving the therapist to grapple with the harsh revelation. The triumphant victory in the courtroom now felt hollow, tainted by the realization that she had been instrumental in the manipulation of justice at the hands of someone she had genuinely sought to help." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: What do Mulberries, Bamboo, and Hemp have in common?\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2972\n\nPrompt:\n\nA crumpled piece of paper holding an unexpected message is carried by the wind. Where did it come from, and where is it going?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Name: Liu Xing \nLocation: Luoyang, China\nOccupation: farmer\nDate: August 17th, 105 A.D.\nThe markets of Luoyang, China, were rife with kinetic energy. Vendors haggled, sheep bleated, and coins clinked in the hubbub city. Unbeknownst to the patrons, a transformative event was concocting on the town's outskirts. — a revolution poised to alter the course of history.\nThe pivotal transformation occurred as Farmer Liu Xing slayed on his wheat plantation. Thirst gnawed at his throat, making his mouth dry and lips crack. His reptilian tanned skin showed patches of pink. The grueling heat played tricks on his eyes, conjuring illusions of a distant quarry.\nDriven by delirium, Liu stumbled and fell onto the soft, fertile ground. The enticing aroma of a majestic mulberry tree surrounded him. He found solace in the dense shade of the crown, which offered a much-needed break.\nLiu rummaged around the bamboo sticks in his hemp sack for sustenance, to no avail. Crimson berries tumbled from the mulberry tree around his ankles and into his satchel. He ate a mouthful, staining his teeth red with their sweetness. Thirsty and exhausted, Liu went to cool off at the junction of the Luo and Yi rivers. He unbridled his papyrus straps on his tattered shoes and secured the bag to his back. A smile filled his cheeks as he plunged into the inviting waters.\nThe mighty tides took power over him, tossing, twirling, and coiling his body. The refreshing vortex provided relief from the scorching sun. At a river bend, he clutched onto large roots that extended towards him, offering a lifeline. He pulled himself to safety on a sandy bank to catch his breath.\nLiu squeezed the liquid from the hemp bag of bamboo sticks. The mulberries had permeated the bag in markings, looking akin to a caveman’s petroglyph. He threw the bag on a rock to dry and laid to rest his tired eyes.\nLiu jolted awake later than expected. Aware of his limited time, he hurried back to his wheat field, abandoning his belongings.\nLittle did Liu realize that the hemp sack he had on had the potential to revolutionize how people communicate. Under the blazing sun, the jumbled mess of bamboo, mulberries, and the hemp bag underwent a metamorphosis. The turbulent experience on the river was a catalyst turning it to pulp. Laying flat on the hot rock, it vaporized, leaving behind a delicate sheet of parchment.\nUnbeknownst to Liu, this incident began a new chapter in history.\nLater, a gust of wind brought on Twilight, cooling the land and relieving the valley of its misery. The paper, now ingrained with endless possibilities, clutched the breeze’s hand. Drifting from the rock, it took flight on a journey across the vast land. The dawn of a new era transcribed.\nFilthy and beaten, Liu returned home, oblivious to the winds of change he had unleashed. But the paper’s journey had just begun, carrying with it secrets yet to be born.\nName: Cassius Octavian\nLocation: Alexandria, Egypt \nOccupation: Shipwright\nDate: October 7th, 355 A.D.\nAmidst the lively commotion of the Alexandria docks, I stared into the sunset, daydreaming. I came from a prestigious lineage of shipbuilders. I oversaw the impressive building of a merchant ship. I, Cassius Octavian, possessed an innate skill in designing and constructing sturdy boats. Vessels capable of withstanding the volatile currents of the Ancient Mediterranean Sea.\nThe salty breeze from the Sea carried whispers of distant lands igniting my adventurous spirit. It fueled my commitment to building ships that could withstand the vast expanse of the Ancient waters.\nAmid this maritime symphony, the wind, a mischievous messenger, carried a crumpled piece of parchment into my life. Intrigued, I plucked it from the air and unfolded the worn document. The exquisite sketching of red dye imparted a mysterious opportunity. It spoke to my soul, encouraging me to escape the familiar shores of Alexandria. The urging sense to embark on a journey that could alter the course of my life.\nIntrigued, I contemplated the unexpected message. Under my skilled hands, the ship took shape with each fitted plank. The enduring craftsmanship stood as a testament of Alexandria’s shipwrights. The wind-borne message prompted a decision - stay or venture into the unknown.\nAs the sun sank, I traced the parchment lines. The escapade beckoned, carried by the winds of opportunity.\nIn Alexandria's maritime hub, tradition and the uncharted converged. The bustling city’s rich history and thriving trade pulsed with life around me. The sea, a vast canvas of endless possibilities, beckoned me to set forth into the unknown.\nWith a determined glint in my eye, I made my choice. I gathered my belongings and set forth into the night.\nThe ship, left incomplete but filled with potential, bidding farewell to its master.\nStanding at the bow, I pulled the message from my pocket. A powerful gale blew in, hurling the message from my grasp, setting me a sail. An omen to let the wind guide this adventurous pilgrimage.\nNAME: Ximena Cortez\nLocation: Tikal, (Guatemala)\nOccupation: Midwife and Healer\nDate: August 17th, 652 A.D. \nXimena Cortez, a revered midwife and healer, found solace in Tikal’s rainforest. She embodied the Ancient wisdom whispered and emerald leaves rustling with implied knowledge.\nDuring the Classic Period of Mesoamerica, Tikal stood as a magnificent city. Within the lush rainforests of northern Guatemala, the air was electric with the energies of the Mayan civilization. August 17th, 652 AD, was a day of fruitful significance.\nTikal recognized Ximena as more than a healer. She embodied her sacred profession’s dignity. With a strong spiritual conviction, she believed her work to be a divine calling from the gods. She used sacred plants and studied the human body. She assisted in healing and childbirth.\nThe Mensajero del Viento, a messenger from the unseen realms, carried a crumpled script into Ximena’s sacred space. She unfolded the paper with reverence. The mysterious message hinted at a connection beyond the rainforest canopy, beckoning her to an uncharted journey.\nIt beckoned her to explore beyond the familiar vines and embrace the unknown. With its towering pyramids and ancient wisdom, Tikal became the starting point for a pilgrimage into uncharted territories.\nXimena embarked on a journey transcending time and borders.\nAn inner compass guided her to those she sought to heal.\nXimena’s name echoed through time, leaving an indelible mark on the hearts of those she touched. Her legacy as a guardian of life lived on, an eternal flame burning in the heart of Tikal.\nHer spirit soared through future generations.\nName: Ragnar Eriksson\nLocation: Birka, Sweden\nOccupation: Norse Warrior\nDate: December 7th, 793 A.D.\nThe winter winds swept across the icy waters surrounding Birka on December 7th, 793 A.D.\nRagnar Eriksson, a formidable Norse Warrior, stood on the shores with his longship anchored in the frozen harbor. At his feet, the invisible hands of fate suspended a crumpled paper frozen to the ground. Destiny had appointed him to get this unexpected message.\nRagnar, in carved armor and a horned helmet, scanned the horizon for opportunity. His calloused hands gripped the battle-ax, bearing the marks of many raids. The atmosphere crackled with unease, a tangible tension that enveloped the bustling trading town of Birka.\nIntrigued, he thawed the paper in the warmth of his clenched hand. Dripping water leaked a fiery message that spoke of a distant shore. A solid promise of untold wealth and glory.\nThe Norse Warrior’s heart quickened with the thrill of the unknown as he studied the message. The call to embark on a daring voyage resonated with the very core of his Viking spirit.\nWith the crumpled parchment tucked in his armor, Ragnar joined his fellow warriors in the hall. The flickering firelight created shadows on their faces, reflecting their wish for experience. Ragnar's thoughts drifted toward uncharted seas.\nRagnar Eriksson vowed to pursue the mysterious feat. The crumpled parchment became a harbinger of destiny for Ragnar. With Viking lore immortalising his name, suspending it in time.\nName: Fatima Al-Khwarizmi \nLocation: Baghdad\nOccupation: Mathematician and astronomer \nDate: December 12th, 762 A.D.\nFatima Al-Khwarizmi's voice stood out in the chaotic marketplace in Baghdad. A celestial body commanding attention in a crowded night sky.\nShe moved through the lively scene with a scholar’s grace and a seasoned astronomer’s understanding. Her measured and precise words cut through the ambient chatter. A testament to the meticulous nature of her scholarly pursuits.\nA scholarly wind, guided by her intellectual brilliance, unveiled a crumpled parchment on her lap. “As the stars illuminate the heavens, so too must we illuminate the corridors of knowledge,” she spoke. Khwarizmi’s eloquence resonates the profound echoes of divine reasoning.\nThe veil’s intricate patterns framed her curious gaze. Her mind reflecting the probing mysteries of the cosmos and the intricacies of mathematical principles. The discourse was far beyond a mere presentation of facts, enrapturing an intellectual odyssey. It invited others to embark on enlightenment alongside her.\nFatima Al-Khwarizmi, a luminary in the brilliant era of the Islamic Golden Age, stood as a testament. She represented the enduring power of intellect and the profound impact of eloquent discourse on pursuing knowledge.\nAs she continued to navigate the vibrant marketplace of Baghdad, her words lingered in the air. She left an indelible mark on the minds of the Islamic world.\nTouched by the winds of Fatima’s wisdom, the crumpled parchment became a symbolic messenger of enlightenment. It carried her profound words to distant corners, embodying the celestial souls she studied.\nName: Brother Thomas\nLocation: A Medieval Monastery\nOccupation: Illuminator and Scriber \nDate: July 12th, 1200 AD\nFlickering candlelight lit the hallowed corridors of the medieval monastery. A figure cloaked in austere hues moves with muted purpose. Brother Thomas, an illuminator and scriber, cradles the quill equal to a sacred relic. In the abbey's scriptorium, Brother Thomas speaks with measured words reflecting the solemnity of his vocation.\nThe parchment before Brother Thomas becomes a canvas upon which his creativity flourishes. Each stroke of the quill is an act of devotion to the written word and the divine. His labor surpasses mere transcription.\n“In the sacred pages, we unveil the mysteries of creation,” he said. His voice a gentle cadence echoing through the lit scriptorium. The illuminations he crafts are not mere embellishments; they are expressions of reverence, intricate depictions that dance with hues of vibrant pigments.\nBrother Thomas' quill expresses his spirit with grace. Each stroke is a prayer on vellum, blending art and spirituality. Brother Thomas continues his sacred task amidst sunlight and stained glass windows. The rhythmic scratching of a quill against parchment is a testament to his dedication. He illuminates manuscripts, enduring through time, as an offering to the divine.\nBrother Thomas, the guardian of wisdom in the medieval monastery, is a steward of the written word. In the stillness of his labor, he weaves together the threads of faith and artistry. His illuminated manuscripts leave a lasting impact on history and souls.\nThe blissful wind carries a crumpled manuscript through the gates brought from heaven’s breath. It calls to Brother Thomas to continue his sacred work. Its message transcends time and connects him to the boundless tapestry of human understanding.\nName: Alessandro da Vinci\nLocation: Florence\nOccupation: Apprentice to a Renowned Painter in a Renaissance Artist’s Studio\nDate: November 6th, 1500 A.D.\nIn a sunlit Florence studio, creativity crackles, and the mixture of oil paints lingers. Alessandro da Vinci, an apprentice to a renowned painter, immerses himself in the art world. His passionate tone fills the studio suchlike an artistic symphony.\nAlessandro da Vinci embodies the spirit of artistic enlightenment with his expressive gestures and vivid descriptions. Surrounded by canvases that come to life under the master’s brush. His eyes mirror the transformative power of the Renaissance.\n“In the dance of light and shadow, we unveil the soul of the canvas.” His voice carrying the enthusiasm of a genuine artist. Each passionate brushstroke conveys an echo of the artistic revolution that defines the era. The studio, a sanctuary of creation, becomes a theater of dreams. Alessandro da Vinci paints his aspirations on the canvas of existence.\nThe breeze, a reticent courier, carries a crumpled paper into the studio. Alessandro’s gaze follows its descent. Unfurling the parchment, he discovers a message that speaks of opportunities beyond the sun-soaked streets of Florence. It’s an invitation to explore distant realms, to bring the Renaissance spirit to new corners of the world.\nWith a heart aflame with artistic fervor, Alessandro da Vinci seizes the opportunity. He departs the studio, his master's teachings guiding him, and enters the unfamiliar. In the foreign landscapes and unfamiliar streets, Alessandro continues to express his passion for art. He carries the spirit of the Renaissance torch, illuminating the path of artistic enlightenment. The wind, whispering tales of artistic revolutions, becomes his steadfast companion. It connects him to the vibrant hues of creativity across time and space.\nAlessandro da Vinci, the daring apprentice, becomes an inspiration for history. His passionate journey leaves a lasting impression on distant lands. This legacy echoes the Renaissance spirit wherever the wind carries his crumpled parchment.\nName: Charlotte Whitaker\nLocation: London\nOccupation: Librarian and Aspiring Writer\nDate: 1800 A.D.\nIn Victorian London, aged leather filled the ornate library. The gas lamps cast a warm glow on the polished mahogany shelves that treasures of knowledge. Charlotte Whitaker, a librarian and aspiring writer, moved with sophisticated grace. Her refined manners were a testament to the elegant atmosphere surrounding her.\nCharlotte’s polished and sophisticated speech embodied the spirit of intellectual curiosity that permeated the library. Her spoken words echoed through the grand chambers, a harmonious symphony of refinement in positing literature.\nOn this day, as the wind whispered through the towering windows, a crumpled paper wafted into Charlotte’s vicinity. With a delicate touch, she disclosed the exciting message hidden in the parchment.\nHer sophisticated demeanor remained intact as she contemplated the possibilities outlined in the crumpled note. The library used to be her sanctuary, but now she found herself attracted to new literary territories.\nCharlotte decided on the serenity of the library. With the crumpled parchment in her apron, she entered the energetic streets of Victorian London.\nAs she ventured into the unknown, Charlotte continued to carry herself with an air of sophisticated curiosity. Now, her silent companion, the wind, whispered tales of literary endeavors and unexplored realms. Though inconspicuous, the crumpled paper held the key to a new chapter in Charlotte’s life. It conveyed an opportunity to weave her refined words into the tapestry of literary history.\nCharlotte Whitaker left an indelible mark. Not only on the shelves of the Victorian library, on the literary landscapes she explored as well. The crumpled paper, carried by the wind, became a symbol of her journey. Her intellectual curiosity, grace, and refined manners that defined her reflected in the elegant era of Victorian London.\nName: James Sullivan \nLocation: France\nOccupation: Allied Medic on a World War II Battlefield \nDate: 1940s\nJames Sullivan, an Allied medic, moved with unwavering determination through the thick smoke and echoing gunfire. The chaos of the war-torn French countryside during World War II was unforgiving. Yet, his steadfast and compassionate tone reflected the relentless spirit that defined his role in the front lines.\nJames regarded the brutal dance of war tending to the wounded. He provided a beacon of hope during the destruction. His words carried the weight of the harrowing conditions he faced. A testament to the resilience required to navigate the battlefield.\n“Steady, lads, we’ll get through this,” James spoke, his voice cutting through the cacophony of war. His compassion for the wounded was clear in the gentle touch of his hands. Empathy filled his gaze. Each life he touched became a testament to his commitment to selfless service amidst the adversity of battle.\nAmidst the smoke and despair of war, a crushed paper shot into James's view. He unwound the parchment with the precision of a seasoned medic. The message carried the weight of a soldier's last words, meant for sharing with loved ones. James, a silent witness to the human toll of war, was to relay this poignant farewell.\nDespite the chaos, James embraced the responsibility with a resolute spirit. The crumpled paper was now a vessel of profound emotions. It symbolized the connections that endured even in the darkest hours.\nAmid the battlefield, James pressed on, driven not only by duty but by a deep sense of humanity.\nHe operated through the horrors of war. And ensured the last sentiments of the fallen comrade reached the hearts waiting on the home front.\nAs the war raged on, James Sullivan continued to serve with unwavering determination.\nThe crumpled paper left an indelible mark on James’s soul\nIt evoked memories of the profound ties, and unwavering determination found amid war.\nName: Hayley Garza\nLocation: Austin, Texas\nOccupation: Barista and Part-time Student in a Modern Coffee Shop\nDate: Present Day\nThe hum of animated conversations and the aromatic blend of brewed coffee fill the air. Hayley Garza, a barista, and part-time student, radiates an upbeat and friendly demeanor, mirroring the trendy urban cafe.\nHayley eavesdrops, absorbing snippets of the eclectic mix of patrons’ journeys and tales. The table of travelers left a quote on her receipt that resonated her core.\nAimless, she crumpled the receipt and tossed it into the nearby garbage bin, missing it. A curious young boy nearby sees the crumpled paper on the floor and grabs it. Unfolding the receipt, the words declare,\n“Embrace the winds of change, for they carry the seeds of new beginnings.” Unable to read, he throws the receipt into the recycling bin.\nIn the vibrant café, laughter resumes. Espresso machines hum. Hayley continues to serve with her friendly and casual demeanor. And the discarded receipt awaits to be carried away by the winds of change." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The selfie of Dorian Gray\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1434\n\nPrompt:\n\nBegin or end your story with a character taking a selfie." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "[Content note: substance misuse, suicide, transphobia]\n\nPicture this: Dorian Gray, 25, gorgeous bachelor of the Brighton gay scene #handsomeAF #queen #slay. Picture his blazing blue eyes set above aquiline nose and a rosebud pout of a mouth. Cheeks ready to blush under the lick of glitter from a make-up brush. Deep gold locks styled to perfection. Forehead wide and empty as a summer sky #beautynotbrains #imageiseverything #skindeep.\n\nPicture this: Dorian perched on the sleek leather and chrome of a barstool in the Poison Ivy, margarita in one hand and phone in the other – twin totems of the god of the gay bar. Picture his thumb hitting the camera app (muscle memory leads him there always) and hovering, now, over the shutter button. Picture him pausing for a fragment of time to check the image on the phone screen: it is, as always, empty perfection.\n\nClick!\n\nThere it is: the button is pressed, the shutter closes, the selfie is taken.\n\nAnd all around him life continues in the Poison Ivy: the disco-ball spins, Lady Gaga roars through overamplified speakers, a drag queen at the bar wipes lipstick and white wine from a red twist of a mouth.\n\nBut for Dorian Gray, life has stopped. Here. Now. In this moment – the moment the selfie was taken #liveinthemoment #lookgoodfeelgood #selflove. Because, as he licks the salt rim of his margarita glass from perfectly glossed lips, Dorian realises that he has taken the best selfie ever.\n\nWhat is it about this selfie that makes it so exquisite? Is it the background of dancers blurring to hot whorls of colour? Is it the shards of light from the disco-ball falling like a shower of diamonds across the face? No, it is the face itself, caught at the very moment of its blooming, like a young rose, beautiful.\n\nDorian knows, the instant he sees the selfie, that there, right there in front of him, swimming in a million pixels, is the great truth he’s searched for his whole life: beauty.\n\n‘What would you like?’ the barman asks, plucking an olive from a discarded martini glass and popping it into his lipsticked mouth.\n\n‘I’d like – ’ says Dorian, ‘I’d like it if this selfie aged instead of me…’\n\n‘You what?’ the barman hollers over Gaga’s jagged vocals.\n\n‘I’d like another margarita,’ Dorian says.\n\n*\n\nBut Dorian’s wish came true. Picture this: years later, Dorian is flicking through his phone when up pops the selfie #throwback #memories #tenyearchallenge. Picture Dorian, 35 and still on the cusp of blooming like a young rose, locking eyes with the image of his 25-year-old self.\n\nBut not the image as he left it, 10 years previously. No. For etched into the selfie, right there in front of him, are the tidelines of age – wrinkles beginning to show on the forehead, the skin wilting around the aquiline nose, twin creases either side of the rosebud pout of a mouth.\n\nDorian sees too a certain sneer, a certain curl of the lip, not present in the original selfie #bitchface #meangirl #judgingyou. Was it the many times he’d put others down on the basis of their looks, the many ugly comments he’d made on another’s “ugliness”, that had written that sneer into the selfie? Did the curl of the lip evidence a life lived in selfishness, selfie stick in hand and judgement in mind?\n\nDorian swipes off the selfie, a cold sweat of horror breaking out on his preternaturally youthful brow. He tries putting a softening filter on the selfie, hoping to erase those harsh lines. But the app glitches and increases the contrast on the image, only etching those lines deeper into brow and cheek. Like a Narcissus staring into troubled waters, Dorian recoils in disgust from the sight of his own image #uggo #notfeelingcute #badhairday.\n\nHe clicks off the app, fingers barely shaking, and runs to the bathroom. Looking into the perfect circle of the stylish chrome-rimmed mirror #homedecor #interiordesign #trendsetter, Dorian scours his face for wrinkles, blemishes, imperfections. But he finds, as always, the same strange youth, the same pure beauty, that is synonymous with his reputation in gay-bars from the pier to the marina.\n\nHands clammy on the cold porcelain of the sink, Dorian exhales and spits from his perfect mouth the salivation that warns him he will vomit.\n\nLeaning over the toilet, he pukes onto the perfect white porcelain, loops of saliva falling from his face like hot tears of shame and disgrace.\n\n*\n\nDorian commits himself to a life of velvety pleasures and empty aesthetics. He progresses his modelling career at the London fashion shows #strikeapose #modellife #catwalk. In his spare time, he buys designer handbags in the Lanes and showcases his latest outfits in the bars of Kemptown. At night, the selfie haunts his dreams, mouth twisted in hideous grin, cheek disgraced by defects, brow wrecked by wrinkles – a face defaced by imperfections.\n\nThe years pass in a blur of nights spent knocking back shots in Bulldog #cheers #downit #happyhour. But still Dorian’s face stays young.\n\nHe courts a beautiful drag queen, name of Sybil, dreams of the lavish wedding they’ll have. In bars they sip sex on the beach together and rate the other twinks on their looks in loud whispers #roastme #2outof10 #fugly. In dark bedrooms with drawn curtains they smoke Tina with hookers and dropouts. At the nudist beach they work on their tans.\n\nBut soon Dorian and Sybil are fighting, conversation withering to ridicule and cheap digs. Picture this: the couple at 2am on St James street roaring insults and comebacks at each other with beer-soaked breath like baying stags.\n\n‘You’re a right bitch!’ Dorian screams, ‘a nasty cheap tranny whore!’\n\nHe flings his pint glass to the gutter and struts off into the night.\n\n*\n\nPicture this: Dorian is 45 and as his age has increased so too has his reputation for youthful good looks. He launches his own line of face cream #skincare #antiaging #results. He proposes to Sybil, they break it off, they get back together, they break it off again.\n\nThe night they call off the engagement for the second time, Dorian sits sombre at the dressing table in his bedroom. He stares into the vanity mirror, his face flawless even in the bright white light of the bare bulbs, searching for flaws, any clue as to why Sybil left him. But he finds, as always, perfection.\n\nThe selfie haunts his thoughts like an unwelcome ghost. He pulls out his phone and clicks on the photo app. He pulls up the selfie and finds it more hideous than ever – crow’s feet at the corners of the eyes, scoops of black shadow underneath them, a complex network of wrinkles deep-cut into the face. And still that hideous exaggerated sneer like the face of a horrible puppet.\n\n‘It’s just a selfie,’ he says, ‘it doesn’t look like me! I – I cannot look that bad, surely?’\n\nReassuring himself, Dorian decides to take action. Why let a selfie ruin your night? Why let a photo curb your self-esteem?\n\nQuickly, before he changes his mind, Dorian clicks on the bin icon.\n\nA message flashes up on the screen: Delete photo?\n\nHe pauses for just a fraction of a second, shaking finger hovering over the button, and presses it.\n\n*\n\nPicture this: Sybil, the next day, hungover and contrite and missing her boyfriend, mounting the stairs to Dorian’s flat in her stilettos, heel-clicks echoing in the otherwise silent stairwell. She knocks on the door. Silence. She fumbles in her rhinestoned handbag for the spare key and lets herself in.\n\nInside the flat, everything is in its usual perfect order. Dorian’s designer coats hang in the entranceway, a half-drunk bottle of Chablis sits on the marble worktop illuminated like a yellow jewel in the beam of a kitchen spotlight. The Dyson tower fan blasts out cool air in the lounge #2000watts #700cubicmetersperhour #ultimatecoolingtechnology. It blasts a jet of cold across Sybil’s fishnetted legs like an icy river or a ghost passing through her.\n\n‘Dorian?’\n\nSilence still.\n\nShe checks everywhere and, letting herself into the last room, the bedroom, she finds it empty. She pulls back the bedsheets. Nothing. But seeing the door of the walk-in wardrobe ajar, she opens it to find – picture this: Dorian hanging by his neck from the rail.\n\nAt first she doesn’t recognise him. For the swollen purple face of the dead man is ugly, carved with deep wrinkles, pocked with blemishes, the lip curled up in a final expression of disdain.\n\nBy his side, there lies his phone." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Finding Holly\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2966\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a character who sees a photo they shouldn’t have seen." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was late evening. We had just finished dinner and as I had cooked, my husband was on clean-up duty. I was in my bedroom, reading. My oldest daughter, Holly, had just vacated the foot of the bed and was en route to grab a shower before bedtime. Though she had her own bathroom inside, she had recently become very adamant regarding privacy. We had a separate room outside off of the carport. I thought it was weird that she wanted to shower out in what was essentially our second laundry room. Granted, it was a private, spacious room complete with a full-size refrigerator, a deep freeze, toilet, sink, and shower stall because... who doesn’t need all of that shit out by where you park the cars?\nI didn’t give it too much consideration, though, as mentioned, she had been getting weird about her privacy recently. She was about to be a freshman, moving on to the High School campus from the Middle School.\n I turned the page of my new book, a tome by Mr. Stephen King, “Under the Dome.” Suddenly, I heard a sharp chime that could only come from a phone, but it wasn’t mine. I glanced up and saw Holly’s phone lying there, unaccompanied by its owner. It was odd since that thing was usually glued to her hand and her eyeballs to it. It was like a lone sock, forever separated from its mate, resigned to a life of solitude at the bottom of a drawer. \nI’m not usually one to snoop through my children’s devices (though we required their pins, just in case). I don’t know what possessed me to do it but I entered the 4-digits and saw a text from her best friend, Katie, with a few simple words, “y not? Go 4 it! Be safe! hmu l8tr” Now curious, I scrolled up and saw what looked like a screenshot, it was of a text between Holly and her then-boyfriend, Colby. Heartbeat increasing rapidly, I told myself it was probably just a joke, you know, “Dude! I just watched a movie where a man's wife is viciously murdered and his son is left physically disabled. Then, when you think it can’t possibly get any worse, the same son is kidnapped and then the man has to chase the kidnapper thousands of miles with the help of a mentally disabled woman... ”\nI figured I’d read the joke; I needed a chuckle. I tapped on the screenshot to enlarge it. As I read the contents of the text within I felt my pulse set off at a trot, a flush rose to my cheeks that rendered them crimson, and adrenaline from fear flooded my body. Rather than a silly joke, Holly had taken a screenshot of a conversation between her boyfriend and herself less than twenty minutes before. In the message, Colby asked Holly to sneak out that night and if she did, would she please consider having sex with him... He goes on to assure her that it’ll be just like when he fingered her, only a little different. First, I re-read the text to make certain my bifocals did not deceive me. Then, I almost snickered—if it’s only a little different then he has problems that are far worse than his feeble grasp of “they’re, their, and there.” It was, at that time that a little voice encouraged me to scroll up. There was a photo; one of Holly that revealed far more of her than I’d been privy to over the past five to seven years.\nSo quickly, I knocked the behemoth novel to the floor, I hurried to the far side of the house, to my husband, Jim, and scrolled back to the screenshot. I held my hand out, phone resting in my palm but when I tried to speak, nothing but an amphibian-like croak came out.\n I watched him as he took the phone and his lips moved as he read the horror on the screen. The tips of his ears went red as if suddenly backlit by candles. Red started at the base of his neck and crept toward his face a millimeter at a time. By the time he scrolled up, I was certain flame would burst from his head orifices.\nComposed-as-a-cat Jim Miller, the unflappable dad starts to sit down at the bar, stands abruptly, tries to sit again, and stands again, apoplectic little sounds trying to escape his lips. I looked him in the eye, “We have about five minutes until that kid gets out of the shower and comes to retrieve her phone. We need to play this shit right-- right fucking now, or we’re going to lose her forever to some pimply kid with braces and whose prick apparently isn’t much larger than ....” I wiggle my index finger and giggle, bent at the waist.\nJim laughs; “Only we could laugh at a time like this.”\n“If you don’t laugh, they’ll eat you alive. United front, then?” I say, he nods. \n“Meet her on the patio before she can even go back in the house?” I nod at him.\nI plodded outside with him, single file, as if to the gallows. We both took our seats. I slipped a cigarette between my lips, dry from fear. I flicked the lighter a few times while the cicadas hummed loudly and fireflies lit up the backyard beyond TFR and the carport. We watch the door to The Fucking Room (TFR), as we’d taken to calling it eons ago. Soon, we heard the lock disengage. My heart speeds from a trot to a gallop.\nHolly steps outside into the honeysuckle-laced evening, the smell of damp earth lying atop it all after the recent rain, wrapped in a knee-length green robe, her feet ensconced in slippers shaped like frogs. She hesitates just for a beat at the sight of us sitting stock-still at the table, looking at her in a gravely serious way, then she grins and begins to walk tentatively toward us, I notice that her long legs no longer bear the scrapes, and bruises of childhood; they were the legs of a young woman. “What’s with the heavy, Parents?” she asks.\nI shove the patio chair across the table from me out sharply with my foot, “Have a seat.” I indicate for her to sit. I casually slip her phone out of the side pocket of my scrubs. \"Explain. Now.\"\nHer eyes go wide like saucers as I slide it swiftly to her. The small smile disappears from the corners of her lip as she glances at the screen, then expels an enormously bothered sigh, the kind only adolescents seem able to. “Well?” She asks, raising a brow. I look at Jim and he nods slightly.\nIt was now or never. If I brought the hammer down too hard, she would likely disappear into Colby's arms, or someone else’s, forever: Remember though, being on the cusp of fifteen: hormones raging, having secrets, getting that glowing feeling when a good-looking boy approached. However, go too easy and she’d probably hand me a baby for safekeeping within the year.\nMy eyes stay locked on hers, unwavering. She returns my gaze, “So,” she snaps.\n“So… I’d like for you to read the contents of... that-- aloud, please,” I stated, “Right now, please, Ma’am.” She flatly refuses and I drop my voice to an almost inaudible tone, “Oh, but you will. You see, at this moment we are reacting calmly but how you handle this very adult situation with all your fourteen years of wisdom will determine how this plays out.”\nShe sits, fidgeting with indignant rage. “Holly, I’m not trying to embarrass you and I know you hate my guts with the fiery, purple passion of a thousand suns at this moment, but, please...” \nShe glares one last time at each of us in turn and begins to read the series of texts aloud, her voice starting remarkably strong before becoming more and more faint, her cheeks burning crimson as she realizes the photo we had undoubtedly seen, as well.\n“What now, “she whispers, anxiety filling her eyes, her long lashes wet with unshed tears. “Well, as I said, that’s really up to you. Obviously, you are grounded… for a week. I want your phone and passcode. I want your tablet and Jim will be removing the laptop from your bedroom as well as the Xbox. You will earn these back by showing acts of maturity.” She rolls her eyes and mutters, “Whatever.” The attitude she’s going for is detached, completely beyond this. She starts to stand.\n“Uh-uh, I’m not done here. I will set an alarm on my phone to go off every hour on the hour. If your ass isn’t in that bed or somewhere in this house, fully clothed—you can totally definitely kiss summer camp goodbye. I will drive you directly to school and pick you up. I will speak to your coach about track practice…” I rise from my seat and start to make my way into the warm glow of the house. My bare feet smack the concrete as I go. I glance back over my shoulder. “Oh, one more thing… this discussion is far from over.” I open the glass patio door and drift down the hallway to my room. \nI close my bedroom door and lock it. I go into my bathroom, grab a towel, and step into the shower stall, it's only then do I scream until my eyes feel as if they will simply pop from their sockets by sheer force. I cry for my sweet little girl, white blonde hair in pigtails and bows, smiling her mostly toothless grin up at me, her hot little hand in mine as we adventure about the park. \nThat night, as I set up the alarms for my phone, I looked at Jim, “Do you think I was too harsh? Did I go all… extra?” I roll my eyes. He smiles at me, pausing a moment to clip his next funky, talon. “No, Babe, but I think you need to really consider what you say to her next. While we absolutely disagree with her on this,—we are always on her side, she’s not alone. We aren’t angry, per se, we’re scared and concerned.”\nI smile at him, “I’m pickin’ up what you’re puttin’ down, Man! I got this shit.” I say jokingly. “Seriously, though, I agree that’s the best approach.”\n“So when is this heartfelt yet heavy chat taking place and where do I need to disappear with Maddie, and Jeremy,” he inquires. \n“I’m thinking tomorrow after school. I’ve got to really consider what to say but if I dwell on it too long, it’ll drive me bug-shit crazy.” I tell him seriously. He snorts laughter and looks at me again, “You’re quite mad, you know that right?” he laughs. “Pick up your nasty toe shrapnel,” I say making a face befitting the remark.\nWhen we get home the next day, the sounds of a normal afterschool day play throughout the house. Purses clunk onto the cabinet, backpacks smack the floor, followed by the sound of vinyl being drug across the wood floor, the critical clickety-clack of dog toenails that are actually Morse code for, “I urgently need to pee, Ma’am!”\nAfter taking the dog out, Jim herds Maddie and Jeremy into the den and tells them that they’re going out for a while and then they’ll grab dinner. “What about Mom and Holly?” Maddie, ever the little kiss-ass good Samaritan inquires in a shrill voice. “We’ll bring them something back!” Jim grins good-naturedly at the younger two children. \n“Right now,” Jeremy asks quizzically. “Right now,” Jim states. “Do I get to pick the place we eat?” Maddie perks up, “Oh, and, can I, I mean, may I, ride in the front seat?” As anticipated this cues Jeremy to start his own grouchy protest. Jim looks at me, clearly sending a fake, but real, but not really real distress call, and ambles outside. I watch Holly meander to the couch and flop onto it. Soon, the hubbub fades as the front door closes, seeming to swallow them up. \nI look at Holly. She looks at me. She straightens her light grey skirt neatly—fans it out on the couch and then allows the rest of her body to droop backward as if her spine was suddenly ripped from her body. I glance at how she’s sitting, unintentionally, I hope. Her lavender cotton panties are on full display. “Cross your legs, please,” I ask. She sneers at me and promptly claps her thighs together and tosses her left knee over her right.\n“I thought we already had the grand inquisition, Mother?”\n“We have… but, consider this a bonus lecture, Daughter. Can you humor a half-deaf Old Bag for a few moments?” Her eyes soften the slightest bit at the old joke. This is it, this is my shot. I felt like vomiting, my palms began to sweat, but I plunged forward.\n“Holly, at this moment you are 14 years old. Yes, you are about to be 15, however, in the eyes of the State, you are 14 years old and as such, a minor. Colby is 17 years old. His birthday is coming up. Say you and Colby drive out to the middle of nowhere. You turn on some Marvin Gaye and…”\n“Mom, this isn’t the '70s!” she looks at me as if completely embarrassed for me. I shrug. “First, just how old do you think I am?” “Mom, everyone knows that song was released in the seventies,” she says, knowing for sure that I drag my knuckles when I walk. \n“Okay then, music you celebrate to… naked.” \nHolly buries her face in her hands. She says nothing so I push ahead. “In the eyes of the State, Colby is considered an adult and you are a minor. Do you see what I’m saying, Holly? Colby could be charged with rape, statutory rape, but rape all the same.”\n“Furthermore, while the act of having sex isn’t that difficult, the emotions that come with it are some of the most confusing to navigate. I know you love him.”\nShe looks up, her green eyes all shiny, “I do.”\n“Does he love you?” She gazes at me and seems to give the question deep consideration. “I honestly... don’t know. He can be kinda weird around his friends.” She shrugs. “Then, like when we’re alone, he’s all sweet again. But we’re making out so I don’t really know if he means it or if he’s just trying to make me feel comfortable enough to… \" she trails off, lost in thought.\n“These are the emotions I’m talking about are complex. They can make you explode with savage joy but they can also have vicious, heart-piercing fangs. When we say we don’t want you to get hurt, this is what we mean. Also, I may as well just toss all my\ncards on the table right now— I have a few questions I'd like you to consider: Do you want anyone else to know about the business you might get up to with Colby?” \nShe shakes her head.\n“See, there’s a cliché involving these little Romeos. In this, it’s completely fucking stupid. Yeah, I know we don’t use the word stupid but this double standard between men getting’ some and women getting’ some is ridiculous and backward and infuriating. If a boy ‘carves a notch into his bedpost’, he’s a fucking stud. He’s The Man!”\n“Sadly, if a woman does the same thing, she’s typically labeled a slut and endlessly shamed for it. I don’t think you want to be a ‘conquest’ or notch in some dude’s bedpost.” I have her full attention so I keep going.\n“On an even heavier note, say the condom breaks or if, 'just one time' he doesn’t use one and assures you it’ll be fine, or if you don’t think you can get pregnant while on your period and have unprotected sex and get pregnant... are you prepared to share your bedroom with a newborn? Is Colby going to help with the baby before and after school?” \"Oh, what the hell? While we're at it, why does he get to go to school and you’re at home reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar for the 500th time-- that day?\" I smile sadly at her and grasp her hand, now smooth, nails manicured.\n\"Or, if you decided to have an abortion, which is absolutely your right and your choice, is he going to hold your hand through it all; through the tears and the pain and the doubt and I'm not referring to just before and during the procedure? If your answer to any of those questions is ‘I don’t know,’ then you are not old enough to have sex.”\nShe nods.\nSee, you enter into a kind of pact, an agreement when you go down that road that you understand all of the variables. I’m not just being tremendously lame—I just want your life to be based on your choices, not on pressure from someone or something else, you know?” \nI look up from my blotchy red hands that I’ve apparently been grasping tightly together throughout the conversation and into her sea-green eyes. She looks like something inside of her has deflated, and changed, or maybe it’s just how I see her. I need a glass or six of wine. \n“Okay, Mom. I get it. How long have you been practicing that one?” Holly laughs. \n“A while,” I admit, “Go on, we’re done here.”\nShe looks jubilant for a moment. “I’m not grounded?” she asks.\n“Oh. No. You are totally still grounded. Go do something grounded people do...\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Horsetooth\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2822\n\nPrompt:\n\nBegin your story with the sensation of a breeze brushing against a character's skin." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "CW: Language and drinking throughout\n\nThe breeze had picked up just moments ago, brushing Rachel's face and tickling her nose with the smell of water, the aroma intertwined like lovers with the rock and dirt of the Fort Collins Mountains. Even though cars passed by like city people, to and fro down the winding mountain road, the air had a certain calm to it. Reassuring, and warm.\n\n\"It's nice\", Dan said, his window rolled down fully and the wind blowing his dusky hair back. \"The weather, I mean.\"\n\nRachel rolled her head from the window to Dan, a smirk on her freckled face.\n\n\"...what else would you mean?\"\n\nDan chuckled, turning to look at Rachel a brief moment before returning his gaze to the road.\n\n\"I mean, I guess there are some other all right things around me.\"\n\nRachel laughed, jabbing Dan in the arm with her elbow.\n\n\"I kid, I kid\", Dan pleaded.\n\nThey continued up the road which rounded like a curly hair strand.\n\n\"When we get there, we're gonna have to hike back down to get to the reservoir . Kinda sucks, I know.”\n\n\"I've been to Horsetooth before, you know.\"\n\n”Oh yeah. Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, I wasn't trying to be an ass or anything.”\n\nRachel smirked, looking at Dan.\n\n\"You? An ass? I don’t think that’s possible.”\n\nDan smiled, and they continued up the road. An old, brown Subaru Outback drove down, inside a man and woman, their tiredness displayed on their sunburnt faces, in the back two jumping kids that didn’t know the meaning of the word.\n\n\"Was it with Harold?”, Dan asked, his gaze focused ahead of him. \"The last time you came here?”\n\nRachel pursed her lips, opening them.\n\n***\n\nThere was darkness, and then there was light when Harold awoke Rachel, tucked under her Pixar Cars cover. He turned on her bedside lamp, and pulled open the curtains, the sun only just risen, much like Rachel.\n\n\"Up up, kiddo.\"\n\nRachel groaned like a drunkard, and rolled over like one.\n\n\"…what?\"\n\nA mischievous smile overtook Harold's lips.\n\n\"It’s time to party.\"\n\n***\n\n\"And what else\", Harold said, pushing the already snack filled cart down the aisle, Rachel keenly surveying the shelves.\n\n\"Sour worms\", Rachel said, grabbing it off the shelf and putting it in the cart.\n\n\"Sour worms check\", Harold said.\n\n\"Oh! Hot Cheetos!\", Rachel said, grabbing hot Cheetos off the shelf and likewise tossing it in the cart.\n\n\"Hot Cheetos check\", Harold replied, his kind eyes lethargic, but letting out a genuine chuckle. \"Anything else? It can be whatever.\"\n\n\"Mmm\", Rachel replied, studying the shelves like a doctor studies the results of a terminally ill patient. \"I think that's it. Unless you want something?\"\n\n\nHarold let out a booming laugh. The kind that dads do. The kind that's loud and boisterous, unseemly, but makes you feel warm and giddy inside.\n\n\"No, I'm pretty sure the treasure chest you have here is plenty. This alone will triple my diabetes...actually, I may be dead by morning.\"\n\n\nRachel laughed, snorting like a pig without shame. After they (or really Harold, as Rachel had only ten bucks to her name, the reward of toiling away on the neighbors yards) had paid for everything and returned home, Harold put on some music, poured himself some wine (and Rachel as well, but just an inch) and began to prepare the sandwiches and chips and dip. Rachel loved to watch Harold cook, as if observing some type of beast in its natural habitat. Goofy and majestic was the only way she could put it. They were both grooving on the floor, sliding across the kitchen tile as if possessed by the very spirt of the boogie. Harold had told Rachel to pick the first song, Rachel looking through the cassettes before putting in \"Come and Get Your Love\".\n\n\"Did you know this band was made by two Native American brothers?“, Harold stated more so than asked, putting another finished sandwich in the Ziplock bag. \"It's so fucking cool, pardon the language, but it's so fucking cool.\"\n\nHarold had always interjected that thought each time he heard Come and Get Your Love playing, and as always Rachel smiled, nodding her head in agreement, her eyes shut as she grooved to the music.\n\n\"Alright, sandwiches and snacks are all done\", Harold said, putting the last pile of sandwiches to the side of the counter, along with all the others.\n\n\"Will we need this many sandwiches\", Rachel inquired, walking over to the counter.\n\n\"Yeah, of course we will. What if we make new friends and only have enough sandwiches for ourselves?\"\n\nRachel laughed, even though she knew Harold was dead serious in his logic.\n\n\"Alright, help me load these bad boys in the cooler and then we'll hit the road.\"\n\n***\n\nThe drive up to Fort Collins was an adventure in and of itself, this being the middle of August and Rachel and Harold not the only ones having the idea of spending this nice but scorching Friday cooling off at the reservoir.\n\n\"You know\", Harold said, turning down the radio which played 'Electric avenue'. \"Me and your uncle Dave used to grow marijuana out here and sell it. A little side hustle when we were at Boulder.\"\n\n\"What?\", Rachel exclaimed.\n\n\"Yeah, yeah\", Harold said, a grin breaking out on his already impish face. \"Start of me and Dave's second semester, we lost our job at this car wash place. Was up around Morrison kind of, don't think it's in business anymore though. Regardless, we missed one day too many and got the boot. We knew this kid, Ned Anderson, who bunked with our friend Chester. Ned's dad was a complete hippy and grew the stuff secretly on a farm he had. After he heard we lost our job, he offered us a gig tending to the farm and whatnot and the rest is history.\"\n\nRachel only laughed, not entirely sure how else to respond to this bit of new lore. Rachel opened her mouth, then closed it just as fast. She thought for second, brows furrowed, then reopened it.\n\n\"...does mom know you used to sell weed?\"\n\nHarold chuckled.\n\n\"Yeah, yeah, she knows. I sold her some on more than one occasion.\"\n\nRachel's eyes went so wide her eyeballs threatened to roll out her head.\n\n\"What? Mom's smoked weed?\"\n\n\"And then some\", Harold replied. \"But that's a story for her to tell you, not me.\"\n\nRachel sunk back in her seat.\n\n\"I'd rather you both tell it to me.\"\n\nA dry smile cracked on Harold’s face.\n\n\"Me too.\"\n\n***\n\nThe bright, burning sun which shimmered and reflected on the water bore witness in secret to all human affairs that day.\n\n\"Oh, right here, right here!\", Rachel exclaimed, wearing her maroon swimsuit, sunglasses shielding her hazel eyes. She put her hand above her brows as she observed the jagged piece of rock which stretched out from the mountain. Their only place of seating, as all the other jagged pieces of rock were taken by couples or families or teens.\n\n\"Ah, this is nice\", Harold said, walking onto their own slice of paradise, the water directly below them.\n\n\"Good eye, kiddo\", Harold said, setting down his backpacks and the cooler. \"I'm going to lay out the blankets, then it's chillville as far as I'm concerned.\"\n\n***\n\n\"Mmm...underwear.\"\n\n\"What type?\"\n\n\"...men's underwear. Boxer briefs or whatever.\"\n\n\"How do you know so much about men's underwear?\"\n\n\"God! Dad, I'm thirteen, I know about these types of things. I'm not little anymore.\"\n\n\"Oh! Okay kiddo, my apologies. Sincerely.\"\n\nHarold chuckled, sprawled out on the blanket next to Rachel, their gaze taken by the clouds.\n\n\"...will you be there for my fourteenth birthday?\", Rachel asked tentatively.\n\nHarold cracked a wry grin, his dark brown eyes smiling under his red sunglasses. He raised the Blue Moon can in his hand, his second so far, to the sky.\n\n\"...God\", Harold said.\n\n\"...God?\", Rachel repeated\n\nHarold aimed his pointer finger that held his beer can to the blue canvas.\n\n\"The one to the left. It looks like a man with a beard. God.\"\n\nRachel laughed.\n\n\"I guess, yeah. There's God.\"\n\nHarold smiled, turning his face towards Rachel.\n\n\"Doesn't that make you feel better? Knowing that God is watching over you?\"\n\nRachel stared at God, who’s face started to scatter at the whim of the wind.\n\n\"I guess. I'd rather have my own parents watch over me though.\"\n\nHarold studied Rachel a moment, before turning his gaze back to the blue.\n\n\"Hm.\"\n\n\"Plus, you guys are never around. When it's all over, I'll probably hardly ever see you around anymore. And moms at work all the time now. There, but never really. I don't need God for that, I have you guys.\"\n\nThey both lay watching the sky, the waters crashing below them, and kid's screams and laughs playing like music in the background.\n\n\"…you know, since I was about thirteen, I basically all but lived on my own. Me and Dave. I had to take care of him. Mom had passed a few years earlier, and dad...dad was-\"\n\n\"Injured from the war and spent most of his time in the hospital\", Rachel interjected. \"You've already told me this. And it doesn’t make me feel any better right now.\"\n\nHarold turned his face to Rachel.\n\n\"That version I told you...it wasn't the most accurate. But it answered any questions you might have had, and it made me feel better. So in a way, it's the story I prefer, though I never got to live it.\"\n\nRachel's brows furrowed.\n\n\"What? What does that m-\"\n\nA volleyball flew from jagged cliffs farther up and hit Rachel square on the top of her head, bouncing into the water where it floated, bobbing up and down.\n\n\"Ouch\", Rachel exclaimed, rubbing her head.\n\n\"You okay kiddo?\", Harold said, jumping up from his towel.\n\n\"Yo! Sorry about that\", a male voice loudly announced, a moment later two college boys jogging down the trail.\n\n\"What the fuck?\", Harold said. \"You could have...seriously injured her.\"\n\n\"I know, know\", said one of the boys, a somewhat tall and muscular man with sandy hair covered mostly by a Boulder baseball cap. \"It’s my bad, I'm so sorry. I hit it too hard, and…\"\n\nHe approached Rachel, crouching down.\n\n\"You okay, shorty?\", he asked, his concern genuine.\n\n\"Shorty?\", Harold repeated. \"She's fucking thirteen.\"\n\n\"Thirteen?\", the sandy haired frat bro repeated, his brows furrowed, eyes hidden behind his sunglasses. \"And you're talking like that?\"\n\n\"I-\", Harold began, before petering off and shaking his head.\n\n\"Listen\", the sandy haired one said, standing up. \"Me and some friends are up on the spot above you. Come chill with us. We're playing beer pong, and got a fuckton of snacks and shit, pardon the language.\"\n\nRachel looked at Harold, eyes wide. Harold opened his mouth, nothing coming out but a sputter then closed it just as fast. He rolled his tongue in his mouth then sighed.\n\n\"One game.\"\n\n***\n\n\"Alright, so you want your wrist like this\", Harold said, holding the ball and doing a mock throw over the surprisingly large foldable table.\n\n\"Like this?\", Rachel said, arching back her hand.\n\n\"No…”, Harold said with a groan and a sigh, repositioning Rachel's wrist as the sandy haired boy approached.\n\n\"You got great form\", he said, sipping a Fat Tire beer.\n\nHarold tossed a ball, which flew through the air and landed in a cup. He pointed at the sandy haired boy's Boulder cap.\n\n\"Class of '95\", Harold said, grinning. \"I know a thing or two about beer pong.\"\n\n\"Alright, old timer\", the sandy haired boy said with a grin, stepping back behind his side of the table. He took off his shades, revealing brown eyes.\n\n\"Let's dust off those old skills.\"\n\n***\n\nThe Great Beer Pong Battle of '88 at U-Dub. The Bud light Boofing Brutalities of '04 at ASU. The Flip Cup Fatalities of '92 at UMass Amherst. All among the most lethal and dangerous duels and battles to ever devastate a campus. Blood was shed (via of course the accidental drunken slip or beer pong thrown slightly too hard at the forehead), cans were emptied, balls forever lost in overgrown campus lawn and forest, and boys made into men. None however compared to the battle of The Aderman clan vs the Fat Tire Boys. Balls traversed through the air like missiles, cups being knocked off course like war ships. A ball landed in Harold and Rachel's cup, Rachel screaming as Harold threw his face in his hands.\n\n\"Time for another shot, old timer\", the black haired boy said.\nHarold nodded, picking up the shot cup with unsteady hands and drinking it. He grimaced, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.\n\n\"Stuff's strong, isn't it?\", the sandy haired boy said, laughing.\n\n\"In Russia\", the dark haired boy said, doing a mock Russian accent. \"You don't drink vodka, vodka drinks you.\"\n\nHarold felt like he had nasally ingested horseradish, and a sickness began to swirl within his stomach, his already blurry vision becoming more muddled.\n\n\"I-I think I'm gonna go sit for a minute\", Harold said, rubbing his face.\n\n\"Are you okay?\", Rachel asked, running to him.\n\n\"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine\", Harold said as his body slumped against a grassy incline. \"These kids...it's just hard to keep up with them. The spirit is willing, but my body-\"\n\nHarold laughed, displaying his arms to Rachel. \"-my body is old.\"\n\nRachel frowned, studying Harold.\n\n\"Go. Go back and play a little more before we head out. No shots though, if you lose it's gotta be apple juice.\"\n\nRachel stared at Harold.\n\n\"Go\", he said, waving his hand, eyes half-closed.\n\nRachel sighed, turning around and rejoining the game.\n\n\"Your old man\", the sandy haired boy said, rearranging the cups. \"He's all right?\"\n\nRachel nodded. \"He's fine. Just a little tired.\"\n\nThe sandy haired boy nodded, arching his wrist back for the throw.\n\n\"I get it, my dad got tired a lot too.\"\n\nThey played until the sun began its farewell speech, and the last vestige of its presence made the water and ground gold. Harold still laid slumped against the small slope, the breeze blowing his red and white Hawaiian shirt.\n\n\"Um...\", Rachel said, about to toss yet another ball but setting it down on the table. \"We should probably head out now. Thanks for the game though, it was fun.\"\n\n\"You sure?\", asked the sandy haired boy, slightly dismayed.\n\n\"Yeah, it's getting dark, and Denver's a bit of a drive.\"\n\nThe sandy haired boy nodded, walking from around the table to Rachel. He outstretched his hand.\n\n\"It's been an honor.\"\n\nRachel laughed, taking his hand and shaking it.\n\n\n\"Thanks for teaching me to how to play beer pong.\"\n\n\"Of course, I consider it a necessary life skill. Like bicycling, or swimming.\"\n\nRachel laughed, and the sandy haired boy smiled, letting go.\n\n\"...earlier, you said your dad got tired a lot. W...what did you do? To help him?\"\n\nThe sandy haired boy smiled, looking at the ground and kicking a pile of stones. He looked back up at Rachel and chuckled.\n\n\"Nothing. I was a kid, what could I do?\"\n\nRachel's brows furrowed.\n\n\"...but-\"\n\n\"It's not our job to raise our parents. It's the other way around.\"\n\nRachel studied the boy, his ever present grin making his face nigh unreadable, though a certain obsidian lurked beneath his eyes.\n\n\"And your dad? How is he now?\"\n\nThe sandy haired boy stared at Rachel for a moment, then shrugged.\n\n\"I don't know. Really...as you get older, you find that's your response to a lot of things. That or I don't care. In a way, I think I understand my dad now more than I ever did. You probably will too, just give it a few more trips around the sun.\n\nRachel opened her mouth, then closed it.\n\n\"...you're drunk, I think.\"\n\nThe boy laughed, shrugging again.\n\n\"Like I said, I understand my dad more now than I ever did.\"\n\nThe boy came close, taking off his baseball cap and putting it on Rachel.\n\n\"I'll see you around, kid.\"\n\nRachel walked to Harold, kneeling down and gently shaking his shoulder.\n\n\"Dad? Dad?\"\n\nHarold groaned, rolling over as he blinked open his eyes.\n\n\"Holy shit\", Harold said, leaning up and rubbing his eyes. \"Where'd the sun go?\"\n\n\"To bed.\"\n\n\"Ha.\"\n\nHarold stumbled up, Rachel bracing him somewhat. He stretched, then looked down at Rachel.\n\n\"You ready to head out?\"\n\nRachel nodded. \"Yeah.\"\n\nHarold picked up their bags and cooler, before leaving looking back at the college boys. The sandy haired boy waved, Harold returning it. Rachel didn't want to, but she looked back as well, the boy looking at her with a smile. He put his hand up, doing a small wave. Rachel sighed, turning away and following Harold up the trail. After a few steps, she turned back around, waving back." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: PANDORA'S BOX\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2827\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a character who sees a photo they shouldn’t have seen." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I cry so rarely that I sometimes suspect I lack proper lachrymal ducts. Because no matter how miserable I feel, how low my heart sinks, or how far I am knocked sideways, I barely shed a tear. I didn’t cry when my dad was killed in a car accident when I was eight. Or when Matt, my husband of ten years, decided to leave with Alice, his best friend’s wife.\nBut now I realize there is nothing physically wrong with me, and I learned restraint from my grandmother, Anneliese, because crying is not for survivors like us.\n“Carrying emotions on the sleeve is for the weak, kiddo,\" she told me at Dad’s funeral.\nAnneliese is as tough as a walnut and as difficult to crack. And so am I. I’ve inherited her strength, or rather, she taught me how to hide my feelings, no matter how often life has rugby-tackled me and rubbed my nose in the mud.\nMy mother complained that I resembled Anneliese more than she did. I was proud because, aside from my grandmother's personality, I have her height, blue-grey eyes, and blond hair, whereas my mother is a chubby brunette with prosaically brown, not honey-colored, pupils. And while mom is a softie, Annelise is unbreakable, regardless of the circumstances.\nMy eyes barely water when my mother calls one June morning to say Anneliese has passed away. I somehow manage to squeeze out three paltry tears, which plop into the milk and cornflakes as I put the bowls on the counter for Jake and Tim.\n\"What's wrong, mom?\" Jake, the older of the two by five minutes, asks.\n\"You are making the cereal salty,\" grumbles Tim.\nWith the back of my hand, I quickly dry my cheeks.. Cornflakes with salt must be yucky.\n\"Oma's gone,\" I reply. \n\"Gone where?\" Unlike Tim, who is all emotions, Jake is pragmatic. His first reaction is always curiosity.\n\"Back to where she came from. The old country,\" I say.\nI promised not to fill my sons’ heads with stories of heaven and hell, angels and devils, and God and his infinite mercy. If my children choose to believe in something—a divine presence, a superior being, or whatever name they want to call it—the moment will come. At five, they are simply not old enough.\nThat’s another thing Anneliese and I have in common. Or should I say \"had in common?\" We both doubt God's existence.\nAnneliese would chuckle whenever the subject came up: \"Doubt, but not completely deny it, God forbid.\"\nWe will not attend the funeral. Mom said Anneliese would be buried the following day. The undertaker explained he could keep her refrigerated for a day or two, but the June storms raging over Miami were causing havoc with electricity, so he suggested a quick burial. Just in case.\nAnyway, I’d have to drive seventy miles to Salem with two small kids in an old Ford Fiesta with no air conditioning, then take a seven-hour Delta flight to Miami, where mom would have to pick me up while worrying that her dead mother was spoiling in a thawing freezer. Instead, we agreed that I would travel at the weekend when everything was over.\nIn the meantime, I quietly mourn her here, in the comfort of my home, where my unruly twins hurl cornflakes at each other and engage in a disgusting burping competition. As always, Jake wins, leaving Tim in tears.\nLooooo-seeeer,\" Jake sings, walking off to the lounge to watch Sponge Bob on Nickelodeon, while Tim howls and begs him to switch to Disney.\nI think of Anneliese as I wade through heaps of washed socks, underwear, scruffy t-shirts, and shorts in the untidy kitchen, with the counter full of cornflakes, breadcrumbs, and spilled milk. I always think of her as Grandmother or Anneliese. On occasion, I use the German word oma. Never \"grandma\" or \"granny.\" Perhaps because of her tough exterior: tall, painfully thin, her ash-blond hair pulled back into a severe bun. Even at eighty-five, she looked flawlessly put together and never wore pants, instead opting for straight black skirts, white blouses, and low-heeled pumps. No foolish aprons for Anneliese, even when she was cooking. She was the epitome of an Ice Maiden or a Valkyrie—a demi-goddess from Warnemünde on the Baltic coast, where she was born and never returned.\nOma perpetuated the perfect image not only at home but also in the hospital, where she worked as a theater nurse. Mom, who was obviously biased, claimed that she was the best nurse in Florida. And, since she never lost her nerve, all the surgeons fought to have her assist them in complex craniotomies and thoracic aortic dissection repairs, whatever the last means.\nI had last seen her almost three months before she died from breast cancer, which had progressed to stage 4 and spread to her lungs.\n\"Terminal,\" she said drily.\n\"A few months to go, and then it’s curtains for me,\" she remarked, rolling the \"r\" in curtains, the sentence thick with the still discernible German accent, even after more than fifty years in Florida.\nI sat on the edge of her bed, holding her blue-veined hand. \n\"Have you brought me the underpants I asked for? Every time I go to the toilet, my bum is on display because of the open-backed hospital gown. I may be dying, but I want to go out in style. I don't want George, that handsome young nurse, to see how saggy and wrinkled my ass is!\" she winked mischievously. \n\"What?!” She glared at the elderly patient in the bed beside her, who seemed to have overheard our conversation and was stunned.\n“I can still have some fun before I take the last walk towards the light,\" she threw at her neighbor, who turned her back to us despite finding it challenging to accommodate the drip.\nI burst out laughing. Just like Anneliese!\n\"Yes, Oma. Three pairs, elasticated, white, no frills. They will hold up your ass, all right,\" I smiled and handed her the packet.\nPlastic rustled as she unwrapped the undies and spread them on the bed.\n\"Jesus wept, Frances. These things are for a toothless granny ready for the grave, not for a tough cookie like me. There is still some fight left in me, for heaven's sake!\" she scolded.\n“With these butt-huggers on, I’ll never make George fall for me,\" she giggled, holding up one pair like a celebratory flag and waving it at the neighbor trying to untangle the drip tube from the bed sheets.\nNothing about Anneliese has ever struck me as particularly grandmotherly. When Dad died and Mom and I moved in with her, she promised to take turns dropping me off and picking me up from school, to help financially and do the occasional babysitting. But nothing else. She had a life and a job she liked, and she wasn't your typical German oma who cooked ginger lebkuchen for Christmas and knitted jumpers with reindeer. Yes, she was delighted to have us, but we all had to toughen up and assume our responsibilities. \n\"Frances is old enough to be on her own after school, and you, Tilly, must get a job,\" she said, and we obeyed. Because she never asked, she just told us what to do.\nI frequently wondered how a toughie like Anneliese could have given birth to a weakling like my mother. Tilly is her mother's polar opposite in every way, not just physically, with her plumpness and perpetual concern about calories and how they will settle around her waist. She cries at the drop of a hat, is terrified of thunder and darkness, and nothing makes her happier than preparing krapfen, or doughnuts in German, for Jake and Tim. And if she could knit, I'm sure my kids' closets would be stuffed with sweaters with snowflakes and reindeer.\nWhen I was a kid, there was little hugging and much of what Anneliese termed \"toughening up.\n\"There is no such thing as bad weather, Liebchen, only unsuitable clothing,\" she quoted a German saying. True to her word, rain or sunshine, she chucked me out to play in the garden, ride my bike, or skip the rope.\n\"A healthy mind in a healthy body, Frances,\" she repeated another of her favorite aphorisms.\n\"I failed with Tilly. She’s been a wimp her whole life, even as an adult,\" she added, \"but I’m not going to make the same mistake with you. You, Frances, are a trooper. Like me!\"\nI beamed at the praise.\nShe was right, of course. She was anything but gentle. She wasn't the kind of grandmother who kissed bruised knees and egos better.\nI was seventeen when Dave Carlson dumped me before prom night. When I told her I would most likely die from a broken heart, she said, \"Nonsense, hearts are muscles. They don’t break.\"\nShe made me wash my face, put makeup on, and go to the prom as if nothing had happened.\nI felt our closeness the most when she took out her antique teak box containing her \"mementos.\"\n\"The only thing left from the old country,\" she explained.\n\"Real handcraft made of proper materials, not like the plastic crap they now make in Taiwan. My mother bought it in Mandalay, Burma. It’s called Myanmar nowadays.\"\nShe never passed up an opportunity to teach me something.\n\"My grandfather was a tea merchant and used to take us there on vacation,\" she added.\nThe word Mandalay conjured up images of oranges and white jasmine. Of vanilla and musk. I imagined a country full of tiny, fragile, dark-complexioned girls with almond eyes who smelled of bergamot and carried boxes like Anneliese’s in their delicate hands.\nFinely carved from ebony and with mother-of-pearl inlays, the box was the size of a typical case, perfect for holding a set of cutlery for six. Oma kept the key to it on a long silver chain passed down from her own Oma.\nWhen she opened it, it felt like venturing into an exotic and faraway land, similar to Narnia. Apart from some old papers tied with a red ribbon, which she told me were her birth certificate and nursing diploma, the box contained just a few things, but they were so wonderful for a child!\nA pair of girandole earrings (she said it was pronounced \"jeer-an-dou-lee\") with three green stones suspended at the bottom, with the centerpiece slightly lower than the other two. Oma explained they were emeralds set in gold and let me hold them to my earlobes. But I couldn’t wear them because my ears were not pierced. \nThere was also an exquisite Karl Moritz Grossmann nurse’s fob watch, which clips onto the pocket of uniforms or scrubs with the dial turned upside down, allowing the wearer to tell the time. It no longer worked, but Anneliese kept it as a keepsake from a doctor she admired when she was young.\n\"He was smart and dedicated to his work. Nowadays, doctors work just for money, but he...\"\nHer voice trailed into silence.\n\"He worked for the sake of medicine. Of science!\"\nMy favorite was a sepia photo with serrated edges, taken in Steinhöring in 1938, a year before the Second World War started. It was where she had done her apprenticeship alongside ten other sixteen-year-olds from the nursing school in Berlin. The girls posed in front of a gray, three-story structure with large windows.\n\"A maternity and recovery ward for young German mothers,\" Anneliese explained.\nThe nurses wore black uniforms with white smocks and black caps to keep their hair in place at the back of their heads. They formed a row, with Anneliese, the slimmest and tallest of the ten, in the center.\n“It was wonderful to be young and pretty,\" she smiled at me wistfully.\n\"Those were exciting times, Liebchen. Meaningful times.\" \nWhen I finally make it to Miami, the storms are still wreaking havoc on the power grid. Jake and Tim are grumpy after the long flight, refusing to go to bed because they napped on the plane.\n\"Don't worry,\" Tilly says as they settle in her kitchen with a chocolate ice cream each, their hair still damp from the shower.\n\"I’ll keep them busy. You go up to her room. I thought you’d like to have her teak box. She asked for it in the hospital, but she was unconscious when I finally took it with me. I’m sure she’d love you to have it.\"\nI tell the boys to behave, warning them that I will keep my ears open in case they fight. And no burping competitions today, I instruct. Before I reach the landing, I hear one long, disgusting belch and peals of laughter from the kids and their grandmother.\nThe box is on Anneliese’s dressing table; the key is in the lock, the chain swinging like a silver serpent. As I lift the lid, I am overcome with the same sensation I had as a child: I am entering an exotic and slightly prohibited realm.\nI take the box to the bed and start taking things out one at a time. Age has tattered the edges of the folded yellow paper. The fob watch is silent, without a heart-like tick-tock. The earrings disappoint me today; the gold is covered with a patina of time, and the emeralds don’t sparkle. Their essence has vanished, along with the soul of the person who wore them.\nI tip the box over, and the rest of the contents spill onto the black and blue cotton coverlet. There is the sepia photo of Annelise and her nursing colleagues. In fact, there are two other photos I didn't see before, both printed on stiff paper in hues ranging from soft caramels to deep, rich browns.\nOne portrays a tall, stylish man smiling a gap-toothed smile at the camera. He is hauntingly charismatic, proud of his well-tailored uniform—embodying authority and instilling a bit of fear. Two lightning bolts shine on the collar patches. He has a peaked cap, with a spread-winged eagle casually tilted on his head.\nThe other image shows the same man and Annelise standing next to each other. He's wearing a white doctor's coat. She is dressed in the same nurse's uniform she wore as an apprentice in Steinhöring. He reminds me of Nibelung from Wagner’s opera. She, as always, is an elfin Valkyrie. Both impossibly beautiful. Both incredibly Arian.\nI can tell the photo was not taken in the maternity ward since Anneliese is older and has more careworn features. I turn the picture over. The date written at the bottom says January 1, 1945. Below, in smaller letters, Auschwitz-Lager Zwillinge Programm, which I know means the Auschwitz Camp Twins Program. I recall the man's name, or rather, what people called him after the war, from a documentary I saw a few years ago: Todesengel—the Angel of Death. A medical doctor, he used his position in the concentration camp as an opportunity to continue his research into heredity, particularly in identical twins. Another frame from the documentary comes to mind. Two little girls in striped pajamas, scarves covering their heads. They expose their thin arms with 6-digit tattooed numbers. \nThe man and Annelise smile, smug in their belief that, as my grandmother once said, they were working for the sake of science, not for money.\nI feel my stomach do a virtual somersault, making it difficult to hold down my dinner. I want to escape, but there is nowhere to run to. I cannot go downstairs, where Mom is sitting with my boys. My darling twins, or meine lieblinge zwillinge, as Annelise used to call them. But I don’t want to stay here either, in the room of the woman I thought I knew. Whom I know I love.\nI cannot stay a moment longer in the presence of the box that holds Anneliese’s secret. Like Pandora, who opened a jar containing sickness, death, and fear, I have opened a box full of unspecified evil. And, as in Pandora's case, it’s no longer watertight. The truth is out, however ugly it may be. \nI finally gather crumbs of courage, stuff the papers, the photos, and the rest of Anneliese’s \"mementos\" back into the box, and lock it with the key, which I put in my pocket together with the chain.\nAs I walk down, my steps are heavy, and my shoulders slump under the weight of a secret I'll never reveal.\nThe kitchen is full of laughter. Tilly is chasing the boys, and whenever she catches one of them, she tickles him till he bursts into laughter. They look happy. Innocent in their ignorance.\nWhen she looks up at me, my mother's gaze penetrates the fabric of my soul.\n\"Is everything all right, darling?\" she inquires, her dark, round face filled with concern.\nI remain silent, rush towards her, put my arms around her, and sob, drenching her chest with tears." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: A Final Goodbye\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2167\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with a character staring at a picture they don’t remember taking." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Mary sat on the edge of her bed in the nursing home, her beautifully fragile hands holding a well-thumbed snapshot. She studied the fading picture, vague familiarity ghosting her face. Just out of reach, distant memories teased her mind. She didn't remember taking the picture, nor could she recall anything about the day it was snapped, but strong instincts pulsed through her veins with each beat of her heart. Somehow, she knew that the photograph had great importance.\nNow in quiet communion with her murky past, she had disconnected from the present, except for her aching shoulders which bathed in the hot glow of sunlight flooding the window. Her once sharp eyes dulled with age, held steady on two young boys, each frozen within their innocence. Their round faces, even in black and white, radiated mischief.\nTheir childlike expressions, wispy grins, and wide eyes charmed Mary as the warmth spread into her chest. She sensed a connection that reached across the years. Though she couldn't remember any details of a shared past, if one even existed, she felt an unbroken love for those two boys.\n“Who are these children?” she said in a flat voice lacking an expected rise and fall of inflection.\nHer daughter, Amanda, who had been watching her mother cradle the photo, spoke up, “Those are your little brothers.”\n“My…brothers,” Mary said halting between words and with a slightly higher tone that echoed her confusion. “I had brothers?” Her eyes narrowed as she took a closer look.\n“Yes, Joey and Don. They were eight and twelve.”\n“Thank you,” Mary said.\n“Mom, do you remember that day?”\n\"What day?\"\n\"The day the picture was taken.\"\nMary was silent a long time, her brow furrowed into hard straight lines.\n\"Mom,” Amanda repeated softly, “Do you remember that day?\nMary shook her head slowly, “No.”\n\"You were in Virginia, visiting your grandparents. I think you were fourteen.\"\nMary cocked her head ever so slightly.\n“Remember, your Grampa built that beautiful house on Chesapeake Bay.”\nMary smiled as if a long-lost vision flashed through her mind. “But I’m not in this picture,” she said.\n“Mom, I think you were holding the camera.”\n“I took the picture?”\nAmanda smiled, “I imagine so. You were the family photo bug.” \nMary grinned and lifted the photograph up to her eyes. “Where is the house?\nAmanda went very still and looked down at the floor. A long moment later she said, “Let’s not talk about that.”\n“Talk about what,” Mary said.\nWith each passing second, her grip tightened on the photograph, as if clinging to the last few morsels of a disintegrating dream. Through the haze of dementia, she whispered their names, “Joey…Don,” her voice barely audible. It was a plea to hold onto memories she could no longer find. It was torture for Mary, knowing the memories were in her mind, but unable to recall the details. She knew the past was slipping through her fingers like grains of sand.\nAmanda gently caressed her mother’s bony hands, tense with fear. “It’s okay, Mom,” she said. “That picture was made eighty years ago.”\n“Eighty,” Mary whispered. “That’s a long time, right?”\nAmanda laughed, “Yes, Mom, it’s a long time.”\nBeth Ann, the attendant on duty breezed into the room pushing a cart. “Miss Mary, it’s time for your pills.”\n“I hate pills,” Mary blurted instinctively, annoyance in her tone.\nBeth Ann nodded and smiled while she picked up one of three white bottles on the tray. “This one is for your heart,” she said.\n“My heart’s, fine. It’s my head that’s broken,” everyone laughed, even Mary.\nAmanda winked and whispered to Beth Ann, “She still has a sense of humor.”\nBeth Ann poured some water into a small paper cup and handed it to Mary. “The pills are on this napkin,” she tapped her fingernail on the metal cart. “You must take these before I can leave the room.”\n“Pouff,” Mary said, but she complied and gulped them down.\n“Miss Mary, I’ll be back after dinner to give you a shower.”\n“She is so nice,” Amanda said as Beth Ann hurried down the hall. “Don’t you think?”\nAs the day melted away, Mary closed her eyes, enveloped in a sense of peace that transcended the confines of her failing memory and the concrete walls of this nursing home. At that moment, still holding onto the photograph, she found a shred of comfort in the physical paper squeezed between her fingers, a testament to the immense power of love.\nHer daughter checked her watch. “Mom, it’s time for me to go. I need to get home and fix supper.”\nMary’s eyelids flickered for a short second. She nodded and her head dropped to the side.\n“See you tomorrow,” Amanda whispered. “We’ll have lunch together.”\nBut she didn’t answer.\nLater that day…\nThe dinner alarm on her clock buzzed softly. Mary reached up to rub her cheek and opened one eye. The bright sunlight was gone, replaced by the subtle colors of early evening—navy blues, and cinereous grays. A minute later, Beth Ann, wearing an apron and a black hairnet, appeared in the doorway.\n“Miss Mary, it’s time for dinner. I’ll get your walker.”\nShe didn’t answer.\n“Sweetie,” Beth Ann repeated, “You need to get up. Chicken tonight.”\n“I’m not hungry,” Mary mumbled.\nBeth Ann went to Mary’s bedside and slipped her hand under her neck. “Let me help you.”\nA few minutes later, walking down the travertine tile hallway, the drowsy scent of the evening’s dinner seemed more akin to a middle school cafeteria than a five-thousand-dollar-a-month nursing home. Mary ignored the aroma, her walker making clacking sounds as she pushed it across the hard floor.\nAfter dinner when Mary returned to her room, she saw the photograph lying at the foot of the bed, face up. Beth Ann had gone into the bathroom to warm the shower. She was also humming the tune to When the Saints Come Marching In.\nMary sat on the bed and looked down at the photo, afraid to touch it. “What is this?” she yelled.\nBeth Ann didn’t hear her and continued preparing the bathroom.\nMary became more and more agitated until, with the sweep of her arm, she brushed the picture onto the floor. “Bad…bad…bad,” she repeated until Beth Ann came out of the bathroom and sat beside her.\n“What’s the matter, Miss Mary?”\nMary pointed at the photograph on the floor, her face flushed, her hands trembling. “Those are bad people.”\n“But Mary, those are you brothers. ” Beth Ann said bending down to pick up the picture.\n“No…no…no! Leave it on the floor.”\n“Ok,” she said. “Remember, your daughter told you about them yesterday, and that house on the Chesapeake.”\nMary rubbed her hands together as if worried. “My daughter.” It was a question, not a statement.\n“Let’s get you in the shower. You’ll feel better.”\nThe next morning…\nMary was in her bathrobe sitting on the chair in front of the television. Even though she’d been in this room since February, and it was now September, she had never turned on the television. She didn’t know how to work the buttons on the remote. In fact, she’d hide the “damn thing” so people would stop trying to teach her how to use it.\nThe door standing open, Amanda knocked on the jamb. “Hello, Mother,” she said cheerfully.\nHer mom looked up with a blank expression.\n“Mom, it’s me, Amanda, your daughter.”\nMary smiled, her jaw quivering, but she didn’t say a word.\nAmanda came over, kissed her mom, and sat at the end of the bed. “Do you want me to turn on the TV for you?”\nMary immediately reacted. “No,” she said, wrinkling her nose.\n“What’s this?” Amanda said, pointing to the photograph on the floor, and she picked it up.\nMary turned her head away from the photo and froze.\n“What’s the matter, Mom?”\nMary refused to look at Amanda. “Take it away,” she said.\nAmanda heard the medicine cart clattering down the hall before Beth Ann walked in the room. “Hi, Amanda,” she said pushing the cart up to the bed.\nShe gave Beth Ann a puzzled look.\n“She’s bothered by this,” Amanda wiggled the photo gently so as not to draw more attention to it.\n“Hummm, she had an episode with that picture last night before her bath.” Beth Ann then explained what happened.\nAmanda’s jaw went slack and her whole body sagged. “Ever since she tore it out of the family photo album she’s been obsessed with it. Staring at the boys for hours.”\n“She told me last night that it was bad.”\nJust then Mary jerked around, there wasn’t anything wrong with her hearing. “Give me that pitcher,” she yelled, “it’s mine.”\nAmanda held it tight. “Mom, what’s wrong.”\nBeth Ann bent down close to Amanda’s ear and whispered, “I’m going to check her for urinary tract infection. People in here get those all the time and they start acting crazy.”\n“No, that’s not it. Something tragic happened after that photo was taken. Mom senses it.”\n“Was it bad?” Beth Ann asked.\n“Terrible.”\nMary stood up, her legs wobbling, she shuffled to the bed. Amanda reached out to help but it was too late. Her mother fell and hit her arm on the bed frame, tearing her frail skin.\nBeth Ann ran to get the nurse; Amanda got a clean, wet towel and held it against the wound.\n“Mom, what were you thinking? You might have hit your head.”\nMary started to cry.\nThe nurse arrived within minutes and dressed the wound. She also made a note in Mary’s medical chart that she had fallen. Amanda saw her make the entry. Aware that the nursing home had a policy that stated if a resident fell two times, they would be restrained in bed during the night and locked in a wheelchair during the day. This was Mary’s second fall.\nThe nurse put Mary in a wheelchair to take her to triage for further evaluation. As she rolled out of the room, Mary said, “Stop! Give me that picture.”\nShe sat rigidly in the wheelchair, her thoughts strewn with fragments of memories like random pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. She clutched the photograph tightly, one finger tracing the outlines of the two boys frozen in time.\nWhen they reached the triage area, Mary's heart pounded in her chest, each beat echoing with the weight of the past. Nurses bustled around her, their voices a hollow murmur as they tended to the needs of another patient. But Mary remained lost in her own thoughts, the photograph, like a distant lighthouse, shone weakly through the fog of her mind.\nHer daughter hovered nearby; concern etched across her face like cracks in a porcelain jar. She reached out to touch her mother's shoulder, a gesture of comfort amid the pain. \"Mom, are you okay?\" she asked.\nMary looked up, her eyes clouded with fear. \"Something happened,\" she whispered, her voice barely audible above the din of the bustling hallway. \"Something awful.\"\nAmanda's chest tightened as the desperation in her mother's words increased. She longed to ease her pain, to unravel the mystery that haunted her brittle mind. She knew what had happened, but she couldn’t bring herself to tell her mother.\nAs the nurses conducted their assessment, Mary's gaze drifted back to the photograph clutched in her unsteady hands. She felt the strongest connection to the two boys she had ever had, their innocent smiles masking a darker truth.\nAnd then, like lightning illuminating darkness as black as the hide of a Black Widow, the fragments of memory began to coalesce in Mary's mind. She saw the beautiful house on Chesapeake Bay, engulfed in flames, smoke billowing into the sky. She saw Joey and Don, their faces twisted in terror as they tried to escape the inferno.\nShe raced to the porch, her brothers trapped behind a wall of smoke and fire, she was too late to save them. She couldn’t, or wouldn’t, run through the smoldering door. \nTears welled in Mary's eyes as the truth washed over her, a wave of grief and guilt crashing against the walls of her fractured mind. She had taken the photograph, but had she also taken their lives? The weight of that day hung like an anchor upon her soul.\nWith a broken heart and tear-streaked cheeks, Mary whispered a final goodbye to the two boys who lived in the fading photograph. Then she tore the picture in half and dropped the pieces on the floor. When the scraps silently lit upon the travertine tiles, she knew that the love for her brothers would live in her heart until the day she died.\nBut she had carried the raw pain of that dreadful day long enough. Finally, on this day, a serene peace shone in her eyes, revealing the knowledge that her pain would someday be lifted. She hoped that day would soon come." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Storm Chaser\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1656\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about a character who risks their life to take a photo." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was forecasted to be a simple thunderstorm. And even a simple thunderstorm would do after the uneventful season we’ve had. As a meteorology student in Indiana, it has been perfectly - boring. We get the regular blizzard left over from Chicago and standard rain showers, but it’s not like we get slammed with a nasty Nor’easter or live right in the smack dab middle of Tornado Alley. That’s not to say that there’s no severe weather, no tornado or flash flood that occasionally rips through here, because of course there is. But in the three years I’ve so far been in my atmospheric sciences graduate program, not much beyond pea-sized hail has happened. Even Professor Jansen’s field course on storm chasing has been fairly irrelevant – though he is the coolest professor in the department so I probably would have taken the class anyway even if there isn’t much to chase now. But when we saw the tiny blip of a thunderstorm on our radar, as measly as it was, Professor Jansen decided it was time to take us on a road trip. \n “Don’t expect too much to happen,” he warned us as we rode in the department’s storm chasing Chevy Tahoe. Its antennae have been fairly quiet, barely even swaying in the mostly calm wind, and the windshield wipers only occasionally squeak against the glass in the slow rain. “This area is only under a Severe Thunderstorm Watch, but keep track of the updates closely – these things can get iffy in a matter of minutes.” I think he said it only out of responsible obligation, not that he actually believed it as the virtually nonexistent storm seemed to lighten up even more. \n My friends and cohort-mates, Jasper and Ally, from the backseat sporadically track the radar and notifications issued by the National Weather Service as we roll along the highway. I’m in the passenger’s seat, essentially doing nothing besides staring out the window, just keeping a notepad on my lap in case anything noteworthy should come up but really I’m doodling on it. I’m also in charge of the camera, and I snap one quick photo of the dark blue cumulonimbus clouds before they dissolve away into the plain grey sky – nothing more to see here. I watch the colors of the sky stretch on for miles and miles of grey, in some places starting to break into light blue again, and I start to wonder when Professor Jansen will get just as bored as us and turn back around towards campus. Even Jasper who doesn’t get bored from watching grass grow has zoned out from watching the radar. \n I turn back to the window where, wow surprisingly, the sky is the same drab grey. Under the stratosphere shade, the fresh spring grass has a nice bright contrast to the mist hanging a few inches above the ground, and the amber fields of Indiana harvest ruffle in the wind that seems to have picked up a little. I glance back up at the sky and notice some heavier clouds have started churning angrily. At the same time, a beep interrupts the Top 40 station on the radio and chimes on Ally’s tablet.\n “The National Weather Service has issued a Tornado Watch for the counties of…” the static-y voice announces and Ally paraphrases as much for us.\n “Looks like there’s some rotation picking up just east of here,” she shows us the velocity radar. “Doesn’t look too substantial yet, but there is a slight hook in the clouds.”\n “Could be worth a look,” Professor Jansen says, taking the next exit ramp eastbound. “Got a weather balloon ready?”\n “Got it,” Jasper confirms as we set on the new course, Ally giving directions. \n As we drive further into the storm, it becomes clear the system had intensified – rain slams down, occasionally turning into hail plinking against the car with a metallic denting sound; the wind whips up, making trees bend at weird angles and at times, I can feel it push the car slightly off-lane. The sky is now a strange oil paint mix of blue, green, and black, and it becomes almost as dark as dusk. \n “Ally, how’s that rotation looking?” Professor Jansen asks.\n “Velocity tracker has it starting to spin up but then eventually settling down. No new updates from the Weather Service.”\n “We can keep going then.”\n We are seemingly in the middle of nowhere when the next alert comes in.\n “Tornado Warning,” Jasper announces. “Radar-indicated tornado moving east just below I-294. Looks like it’s coming right toward us within 15 miles.”\n “Any funnel cloud confirmed?”\n “Not yet.”\n “Alright, let’s go, but stay a safe distance away. What’s its path looking like?”\n With Jasper planning out the route, we drive closer to the area the tornado was suspected. At first, it seems like there’s nothing going on – but they don’t call it the calm before the storm for no reason. As we get closer to its trajectory, hail starts pelting the car – at some point, I wonder if it’s going to break the windshield. The wind picks up like never before, causing Professor Jansen to pull off to the side of the road.\n “Trajectory indicates we should see the tornado coming up in about six minutes,” Jasper says. His voice is full of anticipation – part excitement, part anxiety – and he leans forward to look through the window. “Whoa, look at those clouds.”\n The clouds now look like thick black smoke, billowing and swirling in dense layers. \n And then.\n It appears.\n A cone of clouds dipping from the sky rips through the farmlands, kicking up a haze of dust and debris, raging its way across the horizon. Even from this distance, we can hear its low rumble. It’s not some skinny little funnel cloud spinning tight pirouettes; it’s a monster of a tornado, whirling around slowly but heavily.\n All of us are speechless, dropped-jaw and wide-eyed. My heart stops and then races up to the speed of the wind as I roll down the window and snap a few shots.\n “Look at that, it’s huge!” Ally cries.\n “Send the confirmation to the National Weather Service: tornado spotted,” Professor Jansen instructs. “Get the word out for people to take shelter now. Jasper, get the weather balloon out.” \n “I’m going to go take a couple more photos,” I say, jumping out of the car. \n “Be careful, Kevin. It’s still far away now but these things can change on the edge of a dime.”\n I cut across the field, the wind pushing and pulling at me. Out here, I feel the full force of the storm: the rain and hail mix slashes at my face; debris flies around me and makes me duck tree branches, chips of wood, and scraps of metal; and the wind nearly picks me up. Struggling to hold the camera, I shoot the tornado from each angle I can get. I feel so incredibly exhilarated, the thrill and adrenaline of standing in the way of something of such power and force, just far enough on the edge to still escape safely. At some point, Jasper’s released weather balloon zips by before it gets sucked into the vortex, and I realize that edge has kept up dangerously close. \n “Kevin, get back here!” Professor Jansen calls to me. “The wind changed direction – it’s heading right toward you!”\n But I am frozen in my place, stunned and unable to pry my eyes away from the twister. From this close, I can see the strips of shredded clouds building its shape, the pieces of debris flying in and out of the funnel, and I realize – it’s beautiful. \n “KEVIN!” the professor and my cohort-mates scream for me to come back.\n The tornado is almost upon me now. My feet barely touch the ground, and the camera nearly flies out of my hands, but there is no way I’m missing this shot now. The twister fills up the entirety of the camera lens, and I snap one shot after the other. \n “Come back! Hurry, Kevin!”\n “Kevin, I swear, if you get yourself killed, I’m flunking you!”\n Just one more shot, I promise, the tornado turning to its good side and I’m filled with awe, snapping one more shot. Then I realize its good side is the side barreling straight into me. I always thought the howling train sound was just a cliché, but hearing it for myself now, I realize it’s true as my ears pop and realize I can’t hear myself even think: “RUN!”\n So I run as fast as my feet will take me – which I realize is pretty futile with 300 mph behind me. Tornado sirens wail in the distance. At one moment, I’m knocked off my feet and trip into a ditch, realizing I have no time to get out anymore. So instead I pull my arms over my head protectively, hunch down, and pray for the best. \n Just one more shot, I plead. Let me get one more shot to accomplish something in my life. Finish grad school. Get married. Have kids. Move out of the Midwest. Something more than this.\n I brace myself for impact, when at the last minute, the air shifts and gets calmer again. Daring to peek my head out, I see that the tornado has veered off course, making a U-turn in the middle of the field and going in the opposite direction, and I breathe a huge sigh of relief. Ally, Jasper, and Professor Jansen run out of the Tahoe and pull me out of the ditch, exclaiming how glad they are that I’m alright.\n Brushing the mud off me, I look back where the tornado has started dissipating along the horizon, returning to the sky. I take one last photo of the torn-up path through the grass left in its wake, and follow them back to the car." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Island Winds\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2717\n\nPrompt:\n\nA crumpled piece of paper holding an unexpected message is carried by the wind. Where did it come from, and where is it going?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The bombs had fallen near the village again the previous night, but this time, the house hadn't been hit. Billy and his mother had waited late into the morning around a small fire for news concerning the conflict. The room had a single bay window. It was patched up with cardboard, and harsh winds darted in and around it. Billy peered through curiously as the cardboard flapped. Being situated on a small coastal island, the circulating winds were not unusual in Hamley's Village, but today, amongst the brown leaves and ash, the wind carried a piece of paper. Billy watched as it zig-zagged from unreachable heights down to the dying grass of the yard.\n\n\"Mum, there is something out there.\"\n\n\"Stay inside, Billy. Stayed sheltered now,\" his mother replied.\n\n\"But I recognize that paper. I must bring it inside.\"\n\nBefore his mother could react, he pushed aside the cardboard, stepped over the window's up-pointing shards, and into the yard. The sheet had landed on the moist turf and was stuck there only by a corner. The lawn was sparse, and what remained of the surrounding fences was torn apart and jagged. Weeks of blasts had done their damage, and the wind had taken away the debris. Now those same winds blew, and Billy watched anxiously as the paper shook. He scurried over, snatched it from the ground, and returned to the house.\n\nI miss you. We must never give up\n\nIt was Lyla's handwriting.\n\n\"It's from her, Mum!\" Billy exclaimed.\n\nBilly's home and school were here on the island, whereas Lyla lived on the mainland. He had grown close to her in class, but they had been separated since the island had lost power and the school had closed. Few dared venture over Hamley's footbridge, which crossed the strait and was the only link between the two landmasses; the mainland was considered at greater risk to the bombs, and the powerless island had little to offer except shelter to its inhabitants. On the island, only the lonely and despondent would populate the streets. They would gather by fires and hope for positive news, while others would stay home, leaving only to stock up on supplies from what remained in the village stores.\n\n\"Your pen pal, Billy? The girl from the mainland?\" his mother said. \"Leave her be until this is over. Until this conflict ends, it is a time for family.\"\n\nBilly missed his time in class with Lyla. They had been leaving notes for one another for weeks under the litter bin on Hamley's Footbridge. Each would head out, leave a note, and wait a few days. Upon returning to the litter bin, the reply would be waiting. But by yesterday, Billy had counted eight days since Lyla's last note, so he feared the worst.\n\n\"Mum, this note has come from her hand. I just want to see if she is okay. I know where her house is. I will just say hello and come straight back.\"\n\n\"The streets are dangerous; the mainland more so,\" his mother warned.\n\nShe directed her eyes upward, gesturing to the shudders of the beaten house. The island winds were familiar, but many had come to fear them since the bombs had fallen. They whistled through the shattered buildings and rattled the broken brick, delivering a constant reminder of the damage done. They brought bitter cold into powerless homes, heated only by small fires threatened by their force. Billy didn't think of the winds this way. To him, they made the streets sound alive. Those familiar howls were invigorating, energetic, and the island's lifeforce—the defiant cries of a hurting village.\n\n\"Mum, the streets are dangerous, but isn't everywhere? This house has been hit once already. The wind is cold, but it always has been. I will be out thirty minutes only, an hour at most, and the bombs only drop at night. I just want to find her, and if that means going to the mainland, then so be it.\"\n\nBilly's mother looked away. He felt her disapproval but walked into the neighboring room, where an old chest of drawers sat in the corner. He was determined to find Lyla. Aware of his dusty clothes, he opened the top drawer where several of his father's clean shirts were kept. On the top of the pile was a blue one with long sleeves. It was creased but cleaner than the shirt he currently wore. He removed his jacket and shirt before slipping the new one on. The chill of the room fell hard on his chest as he raced to button it from bottom to top. When he picked up his jacket, he noticed it had also become layered with dust, and he shook it before putting it back on. In a tall mirror hung on the wall, Billy attempted to neaten his hair, but his dark curls were stiff with dust and refused to move. With one silent look to the living room, he opened the back door and slipped out of the house and into the street.\n\nBilly began his journey, holding his jacket in tightly as the winds swirled around him. He felt the chill, and dust blew into his eyes; light trash hit him on all sides. The empty wrapper of a sweet he was fond of stuck momentarily to his leg before blowing away. Memories of eating the sweet brought warmth to his cheeks.\n\nOn recent trips to the bridge, Billy had grown prouder of his quaint village. The buildings were blemished with black ash and thick dust, but the unique curvature of the dry stone down each edge had retained its charm. And while the absence of lighting from the houses and shops left the streets dulled, the lack of glare rendered the reddish cobbled roads more distinguished. Turning the first corner, he headed down Cottage Lane, walking alongside a damaged wall, jumping on and off where the bricks had fallen. It had formed the south perimeter of the village gardens, and ornate metal railings crowned the parts that still stood. Billy knew Lyla loved this park. She would tap at the railings, playing it like a xylophone, and it would make him laugh. He picked up a stick and dragged it along the metal, causing a stuttered ring. As he approached the wall's end, he began another jump but hesitated as he noticed a crack through the center of the brick.\n\n\"You be careful, lad,\" a voice called from over the street. It was the postman, Duncan Seymour, perched on a stack of two suitcases. He wore his postman's uniform. It was torn and marked with mud and dust, and his cap was lying on the floor beside him under a metal tin. He was drinking whiskey from a bottle.\n\n\"There are worse things out here than crumbling walls, lad,\" Mr Seymour continued. \"These winds are carrying all sorts. Where are you going?\"\n\n\"I received a letter, Sir,\" Billy replied.\n\n\"Letter? The post hasn't run for weeks.\"\n\n\"This isn't that kind of letter.\"\n\n\"I see. Well, what do you plan to do with this letter?\"\n\n\"Find the girl who sent it, Sir.\"\n\n\"What, out here? Young girls are not seen walking around here much. They are home with family.\" Mr Seymour took a drink from his bottle. \"Where is she, anyway?\"\n\n\"The mainland, Sir.\"\n\n\"The mainland?! That was hit very badly last night.\"\n\n\"But I must try.\" Billy turned and walked away from Mr Seymour.\n\n\"Get yourself home, lad. It is way too dangerous. And I suggest finding a bottle of this.\"\n\nBilly put his head down and began to walk more quickly. He waited for another call from Mr Seymour or a hand on the shoulder, but it never came. He turned a corner to the right onto Main Road. The stretch was long, and at the far end stood a church. A fire was burning outside, and people sat around it, warming themselves. As Billy approached, he counted five: two men and three women. Billy recognized one of the men as the village priest, who called to him.\n\n\"How are you today, young Billy?\"\n\n\"I'm fine, Father. I am on my way to...\"\n\n\"Has your dad sent you out for supplies again?\" the priest interrupted.\n\n\"My dad was killed in the fourth blast. We buried him in the yard. I did most of the digging while Mum wrote some words.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry to hear that, Billy,\" said the priest.\n\n\"When was the last service you performed, Father?\" said one of the women.\n\n\"Six weeks ago, now,\" the priest replied to the woman. \"Folk have been dealing with it themselves, as Billy just described. I hear many from the mainland are being mourned collectively.\"\n\n\"You do right helping your mother, Billy,\" the woman said, rubbing her hands together.\n\n\"Yes, you acted with strength and showed great support,\" the priest added. \"How old are you now?\"\n\n\"Twelve, Father.\"\n\n \"Very good,\" the priest said. \"Well, you must send your mother our condolences and love.\"\n\n\"Poor child,\" another one of the women said. \"So little hope to be had in this village.\"\n\nBilly thought of Lyla. \"But I have lots of hope, Miss,\" Billy exclaimed.\n\n\"That's the spirit, Billy,\" the priest said. \"Now, be on your way home, wherever that may be now. Stay sheltered from these winds.\"\n\nThe group nodded in agreement, and with no further word spoken, Billy continued toward the bridge with greater urgency. He felt the fire's warmth replaced by the wind's chill, and he held his arms in tight. Grey skies had been carried over the island, and the daylight had dimmed. Around the next corner and across Saville Lane was Manor Square. It was home to many beautiful statues and a popular area for villagers to meet during the day and trade supplies. He would often see Lyla there with her family, and they would run away and hide behind market stalls.\n\nBilly entered the Square. It was busy but quiet, and the shadows usually cast by the tall statues were absent under the grey skies. Many decorative slabs were cracked, but the greater floral spectacle they formed across the floor was still discernible. As Billy crossed, the people watched him with a curious sadness. Fires burned on all sides, and those warming themselves beckoned him to join, but he continued forward. A man playing a guitar was on the floor cross-legged at the Square's end. Billy was drawn to the gentle melody, and as he approached, he realized it was Mr Slattery, the music teacher from where he was schooled.\n\n\"Billy?\" Mr Slattery said, looking up from his instrument.\n\n\"Hello, Mr Slattery. How are you? I must keep...\"\n\n\"Oh, I'm as well as is possible in the current day,\" Mr Slattery interrupted. \"The days are tough, but I can pass through them comfortably with this guitar.\"\n\n\"The music sounds very pretty. It reminds me of school.\"\n\n\"Yes, we must get you back there. Are you still playing your guitar?\"\n\n\"It was damaged in the fifth blast, Sir.\"\n\n\"That is most unfortunate. If there is one thing the war should leave us with, it's music…\"\n\nAs Mr. Slattery spoke, the guitar's acoustics resonated in the wind, and the sound hole voiced a low hum. Billy tried to concentrate on his teacher's words but found the hum pleasant and distracting.\n\n\"I'm sorry, Mr Slattery. I was distracted by the hum of your guitar.\"\n\n\"Isn't it wonderful? Yes, I would miss the winds if they disappeared. They tell me the village is still fighting.\"\n\n\"Yes, Mr Slattery. They make the village sound alive.\"\n\n\"Exactly... Alive! The winds are as much a part of this village as the people. They sing to us and, soon enough, will sing a victory for us. Now, where are you heading?\"\n\n\"I wish to find my friend, Lyla. You know her from school. She also has a guitar... and plays the piano.\"\n\n\"Yes, Lyla, sweet girl. But where is she?\"\n\n\"The mainland, Sir. We leave messages underneath the old litter bin on Hamley's Footbridge, but this one was brought to me only by the wind. I want to see that she is okay.\"\n\n\"But… the bridge was taken out in last night's blast. Much of the mainland was hit very badly. These people in the Square await news concerning their friends and loved ones.\"\n\nBilly's shoulders dropped. \n\n\"Billy?\" Mr Slattery said. \"Are you okay?\"\n\nBilly took the note out of his pocket.\n\nI miss you. We must never give up\n\n\"I have to try, Mr Slattery,” he exclaimed, running off toward the bridge.\n\n\"Be careful,\" Mr Slattery shouted from behind.\n\nBilly darted around the first corner, leaving the Square, passing people and fires left and right.\n\n\"Where are you going?\" a man in the street shouted.\n\n\"Be careful out here,\" another said.\n\nA dog lay on the sidewalk ahead, and as Billy passed, it jumped up as if wanting to play. Billy continued straight, and the dog lost interest. He ran to the end of the street, turning right, left, and through the alley opposite, which led to the Hamley's Strait. As he exited the alley, he stopped sharply, and he was met with the water and the ruins of the footbridge. The structure stood fractured and useless at each end, while its arch had vanished. Thin fragments of green and red floated atop the water, reminding Billy of the bridge's beauty, but the waves thrashed at the island’s edge and strait was uncrossable. Dejected, he paced back and forth, kicking at stones and branches wedged into the dirt. He looked for the litter bin, but it was nowhere to be seen. He paced in circles as the wind chilled his neck and ears until he heard a voice muffled by the wind. He stopped his kicking and listened, hearing the voice again almost immediately. Across the strait, Lyla was standing, waving her arms, calling.\n\nBilly ran to the edge, but the strait was deep. He took the letter out of his pocket and waved it above him. Lyla nodded. Her red hair was billowing wildly. He longed to make contact, hug her, hold her in any way. The paper in his hands was creased but dry and crisp. Lyla's beautiful words stared back at him. \n\nI miss you. We must never give up\n\nSpotting a smooth surface on a nearby wall, he laid the sheet down. A region of dirt moistened by splashes from the strait was to his right. He pressed his thumb into the dirt and then onto the sheet, leaving a thumbprint, punctuating Lyla's words with a piece of himself. Concentrating hard, he went to work. He curved the sheet, corner to corner, and folded it in half. Beginning with the corners at one end, he folded the sheet bit by bit until he was left with a perfectly formed paper plane.\n\nBilly waited for a moment of calm. The winds were powerful, but they eased as if only for him. As he threw the plane, it sailed forward, only to curve upwards. He grimaced as it rocketed toward the sky, but the wind returned, and the plane was sent to the left, wobbling in all directions, and then lower until it was caught by a second gust and sent skyward, this time way up. The plane was tossed across eddies, flipping over and under until it vanished against the grey skies. Billy looked at Lyla and saw she was fixated on the aerobatics. She gasped; the plane, thrown from an air pocket, had come back into view. It glided elegantly but to the right and toward the water, but as the winds lightened, the plane found its wings, curving to the left and in Lyla's direction. She waited with her arms stretched wide, twenty feet away, fifteen feet away, ten, five, before a final gust sent the plane upward and above her head.\n\nThe winds paused, freezing the plane in one of its pockets, and Billy listened as the waters calmed. The plane began to fall. He watched it topple downward like a dying bird, landing safely in Lyla's hands. He met her gaze momentarily until she closed her eyes, and he watched as she held the letter to her chest and smiled." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Party\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2992\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with a character staring at a picture they don’t remember taking." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My phone buzzed. I rolled over to look at the text my cousin Maya had just sent.\nCan you send photo you took of all the girls in costume last night? xoxo\nMy head was throbbing. Hanging out with Maya was fun, but she was eight years younger than me and she and her friends loved to do shots. I needed to stick with beer only if I didn’t want the hangover.\nThat’s what I'd do next time.\nI opened my photos app to find the picture Maya had requested. It was a group shot I had no memory of taking. It wasn’t everyone who’d been at the party - just the girls who’d dressed up, all five of them smiling cheesily. The starlet, the busybody, the social climber, the professor, and the old lady - everyone dressed to impress. The most incredible costume, by far, was worn by a girl named Lee who was a stranger to this group, the new girlfriend of Maya’s friend Patrick. She was a gorgeous girl in her twenties, but she’d come wearing make-up on her face that aged her fifty years.\nThe photo of the girls wasn’t great - there was a weird glare off of Maya’s microwave or something - but I sent it, and then began to scroll through the other recent photos. I had no memory of any of them.\nIt was a problem. I mean, I didn’t have a problem problem, and everyone had gotten a little sloppy last night. But Maya’s boyfriend Matthew had to get me an Uber - I was too drunk to drive home - and that was embarrassing.\nThere were photos of Maya and Matthew being adorable; a few selfies of me with others, which were mortifying, since my make-up had smeared without me knowing; and one photo of a dead body.\nI deleted that one - it was blurry - and rolled over to go back to sleep.\n*****\nThe idea of a murder mystery party had sounded corny to me at first, but Maya was great at selling the idea of a good time.\n“It’ll be hilarious,” she promised me over drinks a few weeks ago. “I’ve got dibs on being Josephine La Rosa, the movie star, though, so you can’t take that one.”\nI’d never been to a murder mystery party before, but Maya had explained the concept. Everyone was given a dramatic role to play, an entirely new identity for the evening. One of us would serve as the moderator, handing out index cards telling people different things they needed to say and do throughout the evening. There would be one card given to a character instructing them to pretend they’d been killed. The remainder of the evening would involve all the players trying to sort through the clues and solve the murder.\nI didn’t want to participate. “I’m not really into role play,” I told Maya. She wiggled her eyebrows at me, making me laugh. “You know what I mean - dressing up, acting.”\n“You have to do it,” she insisted. I got a vision of Maya as a high school student. She was skilled in the art of peer pressure.\nOf course, we didn’t go to high school at the same time. When I was in high school, getting bullied by the popular girls and trying to keep my head down, Maya was in grade school. My other cousin - Maya’s older brother Stephen - was a year ahead of me in school. We were friends back then, but I didn’t see him much these days. He was married, with two kids who were the kind of adorable that made me ache. I didn’t like thinking about Stephen and his perfect family.\n“I’ll come,” I promised Maya. “But I’m not dressing up.”\n*****\nBefore the party, I’d made a rule for myself - no beer, only liquor. I had a tendency to pound beers but was better at slowly sipping a mixed drink.\nA party like this was literally my worst nightmare. Every other girl was confident, impressive in their role. Maya was an effervescent Hollywood starlet. Her three closest girlfriends - Molly, Miranda, and Tess - had clearly gotten ready altogether, and their costumes were spectacular. They were a close-knit group, and it made me miss my closest girlfriends, who I didn’t see as much these days.\nIt was when Lee entered that I started to feel overwhelmed. There was a flurry of activity when she walked in with Patrick, the girls oohing and aahing at her costume and make-up, Maya’s buddy Aaron grabbing her cane and poking her with it flirtatiously.\n“So nice to meet you all,” Lee had croaked in a faux old lady voice. Why were some girls so beautiful that they could twist their faces gruesomely and still grab the attention of every guy in the room?\nEven Matthew stared at her, his mouth agape, when she entered. I elbowed him, which seemed to snap him out of it.\n“She’s hot, but you have a girlfriend who’s my cousin,” I’d whispered to him.\nMatthew had shaken his head, grinning back at me. We got along well. From our converations, I knew that he had also been an ugly duckling in high school. Maya had shown me his old yearbook, laughing affectionately at his bowtie and buck teeth. With a bit of dental work and a six figure job, he was now a catch and had the confidence that went with it.\nThat stung a little. Ugly ducklings can either grow into swans, or into sloppy ducks like me.\n*****\nThe next time my phone buzzed, I was still in bed, even though it was nearly noon. It was Maya again. She always sprang right out of bed after a night of drinking. That was the difference between twenty-seven and thirty-five.\nShe was sobbing.\n“Lee is dead,” she said, her voice quiet and trembling.\nI laughed. Lee had been a fantastic murder victim the night before. Really, what was she not good at? Matthew had handed her the index card - he’d fixed his staring problem by then, just smiled briefly at her - and she’d disappeared into Maya’s bathroom to splay herself out on the tile floor. When we discovered her, she was covered in red, having stolen a bottle of ketchup from the refrigerator for added effect.\n“No, no, Amy.”\nI paused.\n“Really dead,” Maya said. “Patrick just called from the hospital. She’s dead.”\n*****\nAn hour later, the eight of us - all the murder mystery party attendees, except for Lee - were at the police station.\nMaya was a wreck. I was trying not to throw up. I’d taken a shot of tequila before I left for the police station. Madness, maybe, but it was all I’d had in the house - my little effort at moderating, since tequila hurt my stomach. The other girls were crying. Aaron and Matthew were stone-faced.\nWe saw Patrick, down the hallway with an officer, too far away to see his face.\nWe weren’t supposed to speak to each other, and we were quickly separated. Maya looked at me longingly as a female police officer escorted her to a private room.\n“Ma’am?”\nI looked up.\n“Can you come with me?”\nThe room looked just like the ones I’d seen on TV - a large window, a rectangular table, two empty wooden chairs. I stared at the officer. “Is this an investigation?”\nHe was older - maybe my father’s age, with graying hair and rosy cheeks. He nodded. “Precautionary, I’m sure,” he said. “I’m Officer Myers.”\n“How did she die?” I asked.\nOfficer Myers narrowed his eyes at me. “No one told you?”\nI shook my head. “Patrick didn’t tell Maya.”\n“Ms. Latour, have you been drinking?”\nI could feel my face turn red. “It’s been - it was a late night, and then the news -”\nHe was frowning at me, sternly - the way Dad used to. “Can you tell me anything about the end of the evening - the goodbyes?”\n“Don’t you want to know about the murder?”\nOfficer Myers stared at me, and I flushed again. “Ms. Latour, no one has said anything about a murder, and you just told me you don’t know how Ms. Imogene Monroe -”\n“Who?”\nI regretted my question instantly. This officer didn’t like to be interrupted.\n“Imogene Monroe is the woman who died right after attending a party you also attended, Ms. Latour.”\nMy mouth felt dry. “I didn’t know - she said her name was Lee. I never met her before last night.” Officer Myers continued to stare at me.\nEverything was all wrong.\nWhen I’m nervous, I drink. If I can’t drink, I babble incessantly.\n“Did she - was it a car accident? She had a bit to drink, but not as much as Patrick.” I closed my eyes, picturing them at the door of Maya’s house. Patrick was slumped and sloppy, not that I’m one to talk, but Lee had seemed just fine. She had smiled at me and thanked me. Why had she thanked me? “I gave her a bottle of water, for the road,” I added, remembering.\nIt was the wrong thing to say. Officer Myers tried to keep his expression neutral, but his mustache twitched and I could hear his foot start to tap beneath the table.\n“Ms. Latour,” he said quietly. “Do you have anyone you can call?”\n*****\nThere wasn’t anyone to call. My mother had left me and Dad when I was a kid. A year ago, I could have called Dad, but he’d just been moved into an assisted living facility a few months ago after receiving his diagnosis. Early onset Alzheimer’s, just like my grandfather. Dad was in his fifties when we found out. Now, he was sixty-three, and he didn’t know who I was half the time when I went to visit. I didn’t visit him much, honestly. It was too hard to see him the way he was.\nThe only person I wanted to talk to was Maya, but Officer Myers explained that she was being questioned down the hall and us communicating wasn’t an option.\nThere was a phone in the room with us. There was only one person I could think of to call, and I really didn’t want to call him. I took my cell phone from my pocket.\n“I can’t let you look through your phone,” Officer Myers said sternly.\n“I just need to look up a number,” I said. “My cousin Stephen.” He watched me carefully. When I unlocked the phone, it was the photo of Maya, Lee, and the other three girls that popped up first. I quickly clicked away from it and found Stephen’s number, then dialed it on the station phone.\n“Amy? Are you okay?”\nMy eyes filled wih tears. My last interaction with Stephen had been awful. Yelling. Accusations. I wasn’t a good daughter. His father was taking care of Dad the way I should be doing. I don’t know what I expected today, but his voice was concerned and caring.\n“I don’t know. I need a lawyer. I think I’m in trouble.”\n“You are. Don’t react - I’m sure you’re not alone.”\nMy eyes shifted to Officer Myers.\n“Maya already called me. I don’t think they’ve figured that out yet, so keep cool, okay?” Stephen was a surgeon, and as he spoke I could picture him in the OR - giving instructions confidently, in his element, knowing what to say and do in ways I never did.\nIt wasn’t always like this. In high school, Stephen was a jock who partied and I was bookish and intelligent. I had a nearly photographic memory, a straight A average, and multiple college scholarship offers. I didn’t even drink until college. Then after college, when Dad started looking right through me when we talked, I started having a beer with dinner every night to take the edge off. One a day led to two, then six, and then a decade passed and Stephen was a hot shot and I was barely able to remember what happened at a freaking murder mystery party that I wouldn’t have attended if I was a normal thirty-five-year-old with a steady job and a family and a moderate amount of self-esteem.\n“Amy? Amy!”\n“I’m here,” I said quickly. “Can you find the number for the attorney?”\n“Good girl. Listen, it’s the waters.”\nWas he speaking in code? “Stephen?”\n“The waters you gave out as Lee and the others were leaving,” Stephen said. “She had a peanut allergy, and there were traces of peanut in the bottle she drank out of. She didn’t open it until she stopped driving. Patrick woke up in the passenger seat and she was going into anaphylactic shock. No epipen in her purse, either, and Patrick swore that she always had one on her.”\nMy head was spinning. “So now -”\n“My wife’s dad is an attorney - he’s retired, but he’ll have someone down there in twenty minutes, Ames.” He hadn’t called me that in such a long time. “Ames? They don’t have any motive, okay? They’ll release you. Just hang tight.”\nI nodded.\n“Ames?”\n“Yeah - yes. Stephen, you didn’t ask me -”\n“I don’t need to ask you anything. You didn’t do this. Stay cool and we’ll be right there.”\n*****\nThe only person who’d ever accused me of having a drinking problem was Stephen, and I denied it. I was a crappy daughter and a lousy cousin and friend, and I liked to party, but I wasn’t an alcoholic. Yeah, I drank when I was sad, and yeah, sometimes things got messy, but I was functional. I had a job, and I paid my bills, and I’d never gotten a DUI or passed out in a ditch or anything like that.\nYet as I sat there, waiting for my cousin to save me from the mess I’d created, I couldn’t deny that drinking had contributed to my predicament. I’d been a hungover mess all day, and not thinking straight.\nI used to be the girl with the level head, the girl who could think through any problem, the girl who did logic puzzles for fun. I’d been solving the Hidden Pictures puzzles from Highlights magazine ever since I was four years old -\nIt hit me suddenly. My head had been throbbing all day, but I forced myself to concentrate.\nThere was something I’d seen. Or was it something someone had said? Or both?\nThere was a knock at the door. An officer entered - the one I’d seen with Maya earlier - with a woman I’d never seen before.\n“Ms. Latour, come with me.”\nI rose, but I didn’t leave the room. Officer Myers had stepped in my path. “What the -”\n“Amber Griffin, Ms. Latour’s attorney. You don’t have the evidence to hold her, sir.”\nThey started to bicker, the officers and my attorney, and I bent forward, tucking my head between my legs and placing my hands over my ears to muffle the noise.\n*****\nIt was Miranda who murdered Lee - or rather, the professor who fake murdered the old lady, which we found out toward the end of our murder mystery party evening. Everyone dissolved in laughter when it was revealed, mostly because Miranda is such a sweetheart.\nMatthew was the one who solved it. He wasn’t drinking at all, which I think helped. He’d had one mixed drink while he, Maya, and I were prepping for the party, but nothing after the other guests had all arrived.\n“It’s because she was cruel to me in high school,” I remembered Miranda saying, giggling, almost apologizing to Lee for the affront. “Lee’s character. That was in our back stories. She used to bully me every day, so when I saw her as a grown-up, I snapped.”\nBy this point in the night, I was incredibly drunk, but those words stood out to me. To Matthew, too, I could tell. We knew what it was like to be bullied. The stories Matthew had told me over the past three years - the ways he’d been tormented.\nIt was enough to push anyone over the edge.\n*****\nThere was something that was eluding me. A memory. A visual.\nIf I can figure this out, I thought, I’ll never drink again.\nIt wasn’t just about my freedom, which I could tell was in jeopardy. Of course, I was terrified. I hadn’t done anything to hurt anyone, and I wanted desperately to go home.\nMore than that, though, I wanted to conquer my memory, my brain. I wanted my mind to be my own again. How many times had I lost my thoughts, my memories, been unable to retrieve something from the corners of my mind?\nWhen everything clicked into place, I lifted my head and looked at Officer Myers and my attorney, who stopped arguing and looked back.\n“Did you have something to share, Ms. Latour?” Amber said quietly.\nIt was the reflection I’d seen in the photo I sent Maya that morning - a distraction from the five girls in the photograph. The combination of microwave and oven and a trick of the light, I supposed, because what I remembered right then was what I’d seen that morning but not registered as important in my half-drunk, half-hungover state.\nA vision of Matthew, an open water bottle in one hand, his other fist closed tightly around something.\nIt wasn’t proof. I had no idea if they’d even believe me. I was still in a lot of trouble.\nYet I felt satisfied, the way anyone would feel when they find something - their keys, a fact, a memory - that they’d thought was lost forever.\n“There’s a photo on my phone,” I said quietly. “Passcode 5560, my dad’s birthday. You need to see it.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Wind on the Plain\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1173\n\nPrompt:\n\nBegin your story with the sensation of a breeze brushing against a character's skin." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "If the wind would have whispered, ‘Give it to me’- and had whipped that page of my life from my hand and carried it to the clouds, I would not have chased after it. Invisible enmity, created by ill-spoken words, affixed themselves deep into my mind from that day forward. It become apparent that one, whose only sin was to be born beautiful, and the other, who would one day write about it, were loved differently by the world. The sharp tang of those blunt words, snapped against my skin. Its icy breeze bent me backward, and shackled who I was born to be.\nI remember well that summer day, which was neither too warm nor too hot. We were outside set up for tea and iced coffee on the veranda. Dull, gray floorboards ran roughly under the picnic table. It had been painted green once, now the wood splintered under the paint, and there would be occasions where slivers would leave with my body, sometimes on my skin, sometimes under my skin. A low roof jutted off the side of the house covering us entirely, the post of which anchored a clothesline. Sheets, pillowcases, shirts, and towels were pulled across the yard swinging gently in the breeze.\nI dipped my finger into the whipped cream that floated on the iced coffee. I savored the sweet richness of this indulgence, the cream, and the coffee. We were seldom allowed either.\nDaisy moo'ed. Her soft, fawn fur contrasted with her face, which seemed to hang heavy with years. I often wondered why this beast stood so still to be milked and ascertained that it must have felt good for her to do so. \nThe lady tapped her tiny teaspoon on the china. My mother sat beside her in worn clothing.\n We had so very little at this point in our lives. I knew this because I heard this every day. ‘There isn’t any money.’ ‘We can’t afford that.’ But I supposed at one time we must have had some money as we seemed to have very fine china rimmed in twenty-two-carat gold and very fine teaspoons. The silver was engraved with flowers and leaves and buds. The lady tapped a rose-budded spoon against the tea cup before setting it back down on the saucer. She held the cup by the delicate handle, pulled it to her thin lips, and sipped. Her husband sat beside her balding. He spoke like my father, low, deep, drawing accents from Czechoslovakia thousands of miles, to sit here, beside us, in our backyard, on our veranda, on this particular summer’s day. He lit a cigarette. He and my father swapped stories and laughed under clouds of blue smoke. \nMy father’s front-eye teeth popped out first in his smile, not much, but enough to notice. They were dull in comparison to his smile, which was rich and genuine. It happened so rarely to see him like this, perhaps this is the reason I remember it so well. Life was hard; he wore that look on his face. But not today. Today, he smiled, he smoked, and he listened intently to the balding man across from him, speaking a language I had often heard but never understood. They were both immigrants. I didn’t know that then. \n The balding man’s wife had jet black hair that laid harshly against her pale skin. She petted her dog, a poodle, whose hair matched hers, and she spoke to the poodle like it was her child. “Oh Peppe,” she cooed, and she placed a soft kiss on the dog's head, offering her teacup to its tongue for it to sip. I gaped, waiting for my mother and my father in unison to scold her for misusing the fine china. To allow a dog to eat off of it was a sin if ever a sin existed! But they remained silent. My father continued to smile. I wondered what they would say if I would have done that very same thing. My bottom burned at the thought. \nFancy that! I couldn’t wait to become an adult if it meant you could feed your dog off fine china and not be spanked! As I turned this thought over in my mind, my sister appeared at the table, climbed up on the seat, and requested a cookie. She had finished playing. Wherever it was, whatever it was, it had ended now that she smelled treats.\nI preferred to sit and listen to the adults speak of things I never understood. Their voices and hearty laughs bounced between light giggles and mixed with the softness of stories, which intrigued me, even when I couldn’t understand the depth of their meaning. My sister, on the other hand, preferred to be in other places, and it’s from those other places she appeared magically when my mother brought out the plate of sweets.\nHer ringlets bounced. \nI didn’t know what beautiful was, but I knew my sister was beautiful because every person who ever saw her said so. They would gaze at her with soft eyes and would touch her hair gently, allowing the ringlets to wind themselves around their fingers. They would smile as if it was amazing that it should do so. She sat at the table and glowed under their sunshine nibbling on a cookie.\n I licked whipped cream off my finger. A breeze pulled my attention from the scene. Grass as tall as me grew in the field nearby clapped gently to the rhythm of the wind. Nature has a way of making music and at this moment it was in mid-summer symphony. A starling, the nuisance bird of my mother’s nightmares, spoke to her babies where they were nesting in our attic. Trixie, the goat, bleated in time with the piglets, who grunted bass notes under hay. The air breathed a blue soprano that lilted from cloud to cloud. And the sunshine, a soft warm tenor, held the throngs together in an operatic hum.\nIf peace was this, I had discovered it.\nI picked up my iced coffee, sipping the sweetness, and was amazed how it tasted so good.\nThe raven-haired lady caressed Peppe and smiled sweetly at my sister cooing over her beauty. “You are angelic,” she murmured and her balding husband with his big hands petted my sister like she was Peppe and suggested that she would break many hearts when she was older. ‘What beauty!” they both purred.\nI gazed at them both curiously. \nI had never known there was a difference in beauty until that day. People admiring my sister was part of my life in the same way that eating eggs for breakfast, and doing chores were: something constant, something never considered, just expected.\nThe balding man took his hand off my sister’s head and brought it to my own patting it dutifully, “And you,” he smiled, exposing tar-stained teeth, “you shall grow into yours.”\nThe raven-haired lady ran her eyes down my body, snickered, shrugged her shoulders, and charily replied, “Perhaps.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The present\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2790\n\nPrompt:\n\nCenter your story around a photo that goes viral." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Every September arrives, and I get nervous and itchy. That's when the presents season starts at home, or better, when I need to start working on the matrix of names, occasions, future, and past purchases. Most of the family birthdays happen between October and January. Thanks to our multicultural family composition and expat reality, we have three different Christmas-like celebrations between December and January. Then comes the terrible St. Valentine, and to end the celebration hell, our wedding anniversary, which I like but stresses me out crazy. By the time all has passed, and the fourth of March arrives, I feel like a bear that needs to go into hibernation and rest for six months. Unfortunately, no bear could ever sleep in a house with three children, two dogs, and a needy partner. Everyone has dreams, but it does not mean we all get what we want. That's why I am happy with my eight hours of sleep on workdays and nine on weekends. I am a part-time- bear; that's the best I could compromise with.\nBut this is not a story about how much I like to sleep, or how many presents I got for family and friends. This is about one person and one gift. This is how my search for the best anniversary present turned my life upside down in just a few hours. Yes, you can change your life with a simple click, but it does not mean it works as you thought it would... but I am getting ahead; let me tell you what happened on a mighty February day. \nThe itchiness and nerves were worse than ever this year. Our twentieth anniversary was approaching, and I had no idea what to offer my husband. After so many years together and a lucky and comfortable life, it reached a point where finding anything new, interesting, and unexpected seemed more difficult than losing the ten extra pounds I always complain about to my friends. Presents- speaking, Christmas had been disastrous. I bought him socks and pajamas and \"allowed\" him to buy whatever he wanted for his photography gear, which means he purchased his own present. We always joke about how many cookie points we have in our imaginary \"couple's cookie jar\" based on how we behave with each other. I am convinced I lost many of my \"cookie points\" this Christmas. Still, Peter did not complain (or comment), which helped me overcome the shame of caring for everyone but him.\nI promised myself I would be better on Valentine's Day. Although the lover's day was never of great significance to us, I decided to use the occasion to redeem myself. I thought about concerts, theatre pieces, and restaurants, which forced me to think about babysitters and sports practice schedules. Then, the older kids' exam schedules appeared on my agenda, and the support requests increased by the day. I didn't fancy algebra when I was fourteen, and I don't fancy it much anymore now, but once more, we do what we have to in life. Then I realized I had been spending more time with the teenagers and less with the seven-year-old, so we planned more playdates and crafts sessions. And work. I had to work. And home chores did not stop (if we don't clean the floor three times a day, thanks to our horse-size dogs, we live on \"The hairy planet\" ). And then, on the thirteenth of February, the day before my redemption day, while buying groceries and thinking about what I should cook for dinner, I bought a postcard and a box of chocolates... despite Peter's goal to exercise and get on a diet. In a single shot, I managed to kill his health week's objectives and a few extra cookie points of mine. I was on a disgraceful strike, but I was never one to give up. I still had one opportunity, and nothing would come my way to be the most incredible, dear, and caring partner ever... fingers crossed.\nI had three weeks to come up with something, and I had never needed a good idea so much. Peter did not speak much about my less-than-remarkable celebrations, but I knew he was sad about it, even if he did not care about material stuff. When we met-- many years before-- we lived fast, spending all the time we had partying and traveling together. We moved together relatively fast and bought our own place soon after. Then, quickly again, I got pregnant, and we became a family. We were both young and ambitious, so a baby did not stop us from working like crazy to get what we deserved. We were like rubber bands, compressing schedules and stretching time. Time passed, and we had more babies, work, and different houses. No matter how much we had (or not), we had each other, and that was the best present ever, but twenty years passed, and routine became a hard guest to kick out of our lives. One day, I had an idea while cooking dinner and taking care of the laundry (multitasking is one of my many skills). I was stirring a sauce when the timer on the washing machine started beeping. I rushed from my bolognese to the laundry room, still with the spoon in my hand, and saw a bling inside the machine.\nThe clothes were finishing the washing cycle, and when I was staring for a couple of minutes at the hypnotizing turns, the smoke detector started to scream. The terrible sound startled me, and I fell against the too-full laundry basket. The alarm continued, and I tried to stand up, but when I placed my hands on the floor- now covered with dirty clothes- I let the dirty wooden spoon fall. Now I had sweaty sports clothes with tomato scent (and stains... many stains). I looked for the broom and hit the smoke detector. The little bugger shut up when I smelled it... the reason: my sauce was burning. I rushed to the stove and took the pan out of the heat, hopeful to still have dinner, but there was nothing to save. I opened the kitchen windows and realized I was breathless while the black smoke was leaving the room. I looked outside and tried to remember the last time I had gone on holiday with Peter, with no rush, multitasking, cooking or taking care of kids, laundry, homework, horse-sized pets, or school duties. I looked at my dirty hands and saw my reflection on the window glass: the oversized t-shirt covering my belly, the messed up hair bun, the tired face... and just then, it hit me: I had to take care of myself, and Peter was trying to take care of himself as well, so we would do it together! Alarmed by the smoke—apparently, the alarm was not disturbing enough for them to rescue me—Peter and the kids came downstairs asking about dinner. I quickly picked up my phone and announced that pizza seemed an excellent idea. I threw the pot into the garbage and started to think about the details of my mastermind plan hidden in the bathroom until the delivery guy knocked at our door. In the past, I had been able to negotiate a walking closet for myself, but I never thought I would miss having a mother-panic room when we renovated the house. The next best thing turned out to be a bathroom with a lock on the door.\nA few hours later, after dinner, bear-beauty-sleep, and morning craziness, we took the kids to school, Peter went to his office, and I returned home to start the working day. I checked gyms close to our place for a couple of hours, but then I remembered Peter did not like those places much. He told me once they seemed to him human-size hamster cages with toys to keep people entertained and happy while a few trainers looked at their pets. No gyms. I then considered the option of a personal trainer to take care of us both and train outside. Still, unfortunately, we don't live in a sunny place, and running under the rain did not seem the perfect plan to keep any of us engaged. Another option was to forget about the sport, clean the fridge and the pantry, and hire a chef to feed us. Still, I was sure the kids would rise against that system and make our lives hell, so I quickly passed that option. \nI was browsing on my computer when something else appeared: a sports app to keep track of our results. That could work. We could promise to care, protect, and support each other as we had done twenty years before. It would not be just a present, but the vows to improve our life together. I felt over the moon. That was a good idea! I opened the app with the best reviews in the app store and filled in my data with name, address, phone, height, weight, and photo... but I had no photo to share. Did I want to share a picture of my belly? I looked again at the terms and conditions of the website, and I felt much better: I did not have to share my (potential) transformation with the world. It was just something nice to have. A little bulb illuminated on top of my head as it happens in the cartoons-- or maybe I pushed the switch-- when I looked at my image in the bedroom mirror. No one was supposed to see my photo, but I could choose someone I wanted to see it... I still had time. Peter would not be at home for at least another hour. I looked into the deep of my socks drawer, where I kept some spicy lingerie I had not used for ages. I tried all the pieces and chose a leopard set that had made me feel like a sexy kitten a long time before. Looking at the mirror, it was clear it was too tight; I could barely breathe, and I was squeezed by tule and ribbons. Despite that, I convinced myself I was beautiful independently of the weight I'd gained in the last years since that set had fitted perfectly. I picked up the phone, opened the camera, and started to shoot: looking up and down, right, left, touching my hair, doing faces... what had started as a plan to lose weight had become a sexy photo shoot in front of the mirror, slightly ridiculous but entertaining. After one hour of modeling, I chose one of the images. I uploaded it to my app precisely when I heard the main door opening. I rushed to put my jeans and T-shirt on top of the leopard-strangler- set and ran downstairs to welcome Peter. I had made it. I had the perfect plan and a spicy add-on to make him laugh. And the best was that I did it with a good margin! There was still a week until our anniversary, and I did not have to worry about anything else. We would go out for dinner, and I would share my plan and vows of a healthy life... what could go wrong?\nThe next three days, I felt so good... I could dedicate my time to the whole family without that feeling of failing someone (my special someone), and since I had worn \"the strangler,\" I felt a bit more confident about my shape. After all, I would be taking care of it in the following months and years... and that lasted precisely three days, until dinner time on a mid-week day. There I was, serving salad and grilled chicken, when my daughter explained what they had done at school. They were discussing the news as part of the sociology class, and the trending topic was diets and how people see themselves in the mirror. I was about to share how school was for me when I was her age and ask about any doubts she might have about the topic when she added something:\n\"Apparently, there is a new trend... #Flufflycat.\"\nEveryone around the table started laughing. I also smiled, trying to make sense of that hashtag and the topic in question. My daughter continued her speech:\n\"You know, those people who share their progress while losing weight? Well, they used to do it in a bikini or sports clothes, but for a few days, the new trend is to do it on lingerie with leopard prints... everyone around the world is going crazy! It seems it all started with a sad housewife claiming to be sexy independently of her shape or weight, and now everyone is copying her, adding #Fluffycat to their profiles!\"\nEveryone was laughing: the kids, Peters... Even the dogs seemed to be laughing, looking at us. I didn't. I had a terrible gut feeling.\n\"Did you see the photo of the sad housewife?\" I asked.\n\"No, our teacher considered it in bad taste, so we didn't, but we could look for it now...\" My daughter picked up her phone. My son stood up to grab his. Peter was already typing...\n\"No!\" I screamed! \"Don't!\"\nAnd then, there it was, my profile photo in my sports app, with the comment I had written below, dedicated to Peter, the one I was going to show him a few days later: \"No matter the shape, this will always be yours.\"\nNo one was laughing anymore. Around the table, the faces went from funny to funeral in two milliseconds. I just wanted to disappear. My seven-year-old then said:\n\"Mum, this lady looks like you!\" \nMaking an effort to keep a normal conversation, I just replied:\n\"Yes darling, she does...\"\n\"She's pretty... and funny,\" he continued.\nThe other kids looked at him, and so did Peter.\n\"She's dressed up like a cat, right?\"\n\"Yes, she is. And I think she is beautiful too,\" Peter replied, holding my hand under the table.\nI was mortified. I excused myself and ran to the bathroom, where I opened my phone to check the app. Then I realized what had happened. While creating my profile, instead of \"just saving\" my photo, I said \"Hello,\" making my profile visible to the whole sports community, a few million worldwide. I had thousands of messages on the platform and message boards claiming #Fluffycat was the best that had happened to them. Many had written about the need to forget about shame about our bodies. I just wanted to disappear from the surface of the Earth. I might have spent two hours inside that bathroom, sitting on the floor and scrolling messages and photos, when someone knocked at the door.\n\"Are you ok?\" asked Peter.\n\"I'm not sure,\" I replied. \"I think I will move here for the next million years.\"\n\"Mum, I have something for you,\" said the little one while a sheet of paper slid under the door. It was a drawing of a cat- with boobies- wearing a bikini and many, many, many hearts around it. I did not know if I should cry or yell. Instead, I laughed. I laughed a lot. I really liked that cat. I took a photo of it and entered my profile page. I changed my image to the one my son had drawn, and I opened the door, where I found my whole family smiling at me.\n\"No comments, please,\" I said.\nThey all nodded, and we continued our night as if nothing had happened.\nA few days passed by. I worked from home and avoided going anywhere. I used hats and sunglasses whenever I left the house. I looked like a villain from a spy movie. None of my friends called, texted, or spoke about the infamous Fluffy cat trend, which had been discussed and joked about time over time in the news and late-night shows. On the day of our anniversary, Peter told me we had a table in a nice restaurant and that no silly photo should stop me from living my life. I agreed with him. I got dressed, arranged my hair, and put on some makeup. I left the hat and the glasses at home and held his hand to leave the house. We arrived at the little bistro half an hour later and, to my surprise, all our friends were there. Friends, kids, many other family members... all dress like cats, tigers, cheetahs... I looked at Peter and told him:\n\"I just wanted my present to be special for us, to do it together...\"\nHe smiled at me and put his fingers on the side of his trousers, sticking out a little piece of his underwear... a leopard boxer.\n\"Happy anniversary.\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Pluck of the Irish\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1176\n\nPrompt:\n\nCenter your story around a photo that goes viral." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“It’s a good likeness, though,” Paddy says.\nRoberts throws the newspaper across the room. Or rather, he tries to; it flops down on the breakfast table, on top of the toast and jam that Paddy’s prepared. Roberts tries to extricate the paper from the stickiness and gets jam on his fingers. They stick to the paper, making it even harder to perform the operation.\n“That’s all I bloody need,” he says, several days of stress making the utterance strained, almost tearful.\n“Here, let me—” Paddy says, moving over to help Roberts.\n“Get away!” he snaps, still wrestling with the paper.\n“I just wanted—” Paddy bleats.\n“I’m not an invalid, you Irish fool!” Roberts says and laughs. “There’s a nice bit of tautology for you.”\n“Tor … what?” Paddy asks, screwing up his face.\n“Never mind. But that photo ... was it just in The Sun, or...?”\n“Nah, plastered over the front page of all of ‘em,” Paddy says breezily. “Except maybe the Financial Times. So not that bad, eh?”\n“Oh no, not that bad … you bloody idiot! I’m well and truly cooked!”\nRoberts finally unsticks the newspaper and lets it fall to the floor, grabbing a piece of toast and attacking it with his teeth.\n“Not everyone reads a paper these days, though,” Paddy offers tentatively, fully on the lookout now for another outburst from Roberts … which comes immediately.\n“You bloody nincompoop! You don’t think it’s going to be on the TV too?!”\n“I don’t know.” Paddy replies.\n“You don’t … jeez. Stick the telly on and let’s find out!” Roberts nods towards the set in the corner.\nPaddy takes the remote and presses a button. The default channel is showing cartoons.\n“Is this what you watch all day?” Roberts scoffs.\n“I like cartoons,” Paddy says by way of justification.\n“Give it here!” Roberts snatches the remote out of Paddy’s hand.\n“Don’t get jam—” Paddy begins but stops himself.\n“What?!” Roberts glares at Paddy.\n“Nothing.” Paddy says and picks up the newspaper. He notices that in the photo, Roberts now has a raspberry-jam beard. He manages to suppress a smile.\nRoberts flicks through the channels until he gets to BBC News. They’re talking about the storm the night before, which Roberts used as cover to switch hideouts. He mutes the volume.\n“See,” Paddy says encouragingly. “Nothing about you.”\n“Yet,” Roberts mutters.\nHe picks up another slice of toast and munches at it, watching the floods on the TV.\n“What you said about that photo…” he says to Paddy with his mouth full, bits of toast flying out.\n“What did I say?” Paddy asks, bracing himself.\n“About the likeness being good. It’s too bloody good. I’ll be recognised as soon as I set foot outside.”\nPaddy gives Roberts a worried look; the implications of this last remark do not escape him.\n“I’ll have to grow a beard, get a haircut,” Roberts says. “You’ll have to give me one.”\n“I can’t, Robbo. You’d end up looking like … like…” Paddy casts his eye around the room for a simile, or at least the inspiration for one, but it eludes him.\n“Well, I can’t do it myself, so it’ll have to be you. And maybe I could dye it, too. When you go to the shops later, you can get me some. Blond, I reckon. I’ve always fancied that – blond hair and beard.”\nPaddy takes his time to summon up courage before speaking.\n“But Robbo, it takes weeks to grow a good beard.”\n“So?” Roberts doesn’t see the problem.\n“Well … I’ve got my Siobahn. She’ll be wanting to come over.”\n“Siobahn? Who’s Siobahn?”\n“My girl. I told you about her in the nick.”\n“Did you? I don’t remember.”\n“Yeah, and she normally visits a couple of evenings a week.”\n“‘Visits’?! You dirty ol’ bugger. So … is she due to visit today?”\n“Nah, tomorrow. But you can’t be here, can you? I mean, she’ll see you, and then…”\n“And then?” Roberts has just finished buttering another piece of toast and points the knife at Paddy.\n“Oh, nothing. I mean, she wouldn’t snitch. I know Siobahn. She’s a good girl.”\n“Not so good, I hope!” Roberts leers. “So, that’s your bit of fluff, is it?”\n“Well, no…”\n“What then?”\n“We’re thinking of getting married. Buy our own little flat.”\nRoberts gets some toast caught in his throat and starts coughing. When he recovers, he’s laughing.\n“You?! Buy a flat?! What with, buttons?”\n“It’s called ‘work’, Robbo.”\nRoberts stops laughing.\n“Are you trying to be funny?”\n“No, no!” Paddy back-pedals. “It’s just … we’re in love, see, and she has quite a good job. I’m doing casual stuff, too. It’s just a question of saving up for the deposit.”\n“You’ll be drawing a pension before that happens,” Roberts says, taking a long draught of his tea.\nPaddy tops him up from the teapot.\n“Maybe you’re right. But about tomorrow. It’s easy enough. I can tell her not to come. Say I’m ill or something.”\n“No, let her come. I actually think I might like to meet this … Siobahn,” Roberts says, the leer returning to his face. “It’s been a while…”\n“Look here, Robbo, I don’t think—”\nA shout from Roberts interrupts Paddy’s protest.\n“Here we go!” Roberts points the remote at the TV and turns the volume up.\nHe’s fully focussed on the screen. Paddy watches him out of the corner of his eye.\nWhen the report ends, Roberts switches the TV off and sits back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.\n“Bloody ten thousand quid reward! Is that all?!” he says, finally.\n“It was the same photo,” Paddy observes.\n“Oh, full marks, Einstein,” Roberts snorts. “But you know what that means, don’t you?”\nPaddy does but keeps quiet.\n“You’ve got me for the next few weeks … if they don’t put two and two together and come up with you, that is.”\n“Well, we didn’t share a cell,” Paddy says, “so maybe they won’t make the connection.”\n“That’s the smartest thing you’ve said all day!” Roberts’ praise is as faint as he can make it. “Now…”\nImages of Siobahn flow through Paddy’s mind; he’s dreading Roberts returning to the subject. But he doesn’t.\n“… get off down the shops, then. Beers, ciggies, a bottle of whisky would be good, eggs – you haven’t got any – bread, sausages maybe. And remember, blond dye.”\nRelieved, Paddy grabs his keys from the table and makes to leave.\n“Oy!” Roberts calls him back.\n“What else, Robbo?”\n“Give it here.”\n“What?”\n“Your phone, dummy!”\n“But Robbo, I wouldn’t—”\n“Sure. Just in case, though, eh?”\nPaddy hands Roberts his phone and leaves.\nOn his way to the shops, Paddy furrows his brow, deep in thought. By the time he gets there it’s smooth and his eyes are bright – untroubled now.\nHe stops off first at a corner shop. The bell on the door tinkles as he enters.\n“Morning, Paddy,” the shopkeeper says.\n“Morning, Mr Khan,” Paddy says, going straight to the counter. “Listen. Can I borrow your phone?”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: No Drama, Piranha.\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1535\n\nPrompt:\n\nBegin or end your story with a character taking a selfie." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Yah!\" Kai, the midget of Smallville Secondary College, woke up on the first day of the Spring holidays. The sun was shining beneath his blinds, he had no plans to do holiday assignments. No indeed. Kai left all that energetic, competitive stuff to the the Year Seven nerds. Way too active.\nHolidays are for resting, and adventure. What a thinking male needs for holiday fun is a pet! Yes, touchdown. He sneaked to his mother's handbag again, and once more 'borrowed' her credit card. Retail therapy was cool for kids, in Kai's opinion.\nWhat to buy? Good question. It had to be something he could keep in his bedroom. Kai started browsing Amazon online Pet Store. Ah, the solution was to buy a pet fish, expedited delivery.\nKai's mother had no idea he was shopping for an expensive designer fin friend. Shh! He would ski that bump later, when his mum got the credit card bill. Several hours passed, Kai raced to meet the online delivery man. \"Hi! Package for Kai? That's me. Have a great day, thank you.\"\nKai was amazed by the size of his parcel. But he secretly started to haul it into his bedroom. He had popped the credit card back into his mother's purse. Kai's father was staring at sport on television, that was his Saturday hobby. Kai's dad turned down the volume, slightly bleary-eyed.\n\"What have you got there?\"\nKai mumbled, \"It's my new hobby for the holidays....\"\nHis father was used to Kai and his adventures. He asked Kai,\n\"Is this anything I need to know about?\"\n\"Well, no,\" Kai replied, \"It is only harmless holiday fun.\"\nKai's father made a funny snorting sort of noise, and switched to a different football game. \"Goal!\" Kai yelled, to take his dad's mind off things. \"Attaboys! Yah, team!\" Kai knew by now how to distract his father's attention.\nKai unwrapped his package. There were some pages of instructions. Kai was a capable lad. First, he had to assemble and fill a fish tank for his new pet. Too easy, couple of bloopers, but he quickly sorted that.\nNow for the big meet and greet with his new pet. Amazed, Kai stared at the ugliest fish he had ever seen. It was gazing back at him, with a mean look in its beady eyes. Kai consulted the instructions. Oh no! By mistake, Kai had googled Amazon River International Pet Store! He was now the not-so-proud of Pep, a Piranha.\nKai hastily tipped Pep into his fish tank, this was his home now. Somewhere far from the Amazon River. Kai kept reading the instructions.\nDo not try to clean the fish tank. It is life-threatening. Piranhas eat little boys.\nYour Piranha is hungry after its trip. Feed it only raw meat, carefully. Do not try to pat your pet. Hungry, hungry.\nWe hope you enjoy owning your new pet. Meat eaters can be fun.\nKai had a kind heart. He did not want his new fin friend to be hungry. Sneakily, he crept into the kitchen. He spotted his father, snoring, clutching his TV remote, like it was his best friend.\nKai was a bit bemused by the menu choices for Pep the Piranha. No, the frozen pizza and chicken nuggets were not going to make the grade here.\nKai did find some frozen raw meat on the bottom shelf of the freezer. Not to worry. Kai could handle the appliances. He zapped the lamb chops in the microwave to defrost them.\n\"Anythings goes,\" Kai told himself, creeping back to his bedroom. His father did not hear a thing, or so Kai hoped. He double-checked. Yep, his dad was still snoring. \"Attaboy!' Kai muttered. He returned to his room. His ugly pet fish looked at his owner. Did he think Kai was lunch on legs? \"Meat eaters can be fun.\"\n\"Okay,\" Kai thought, \"this is fun. Just what I need for my holidays.\" So he carefully, slowly, tipped a slightly grey-looking, raw lamb chop into the fish tank. Boy, was Pep the Piranha hungry! Soon, only a bare lamb chop bone drifted to the floor of the fish tank.\nJust then, his favorite, tallest girl in Year Seven phoned him on his mobile. Kai found himself telling Rianna that he had bought a holiday pet.\nRianna was perfectly welcome anytime. So they two friends agreed she would come over at 8:30 am in the morning. After din-dins for Pep, Jed ate dinner with his parents. His mother popped the ultimate frozen pizza in the microwave.\nThis was cooking. Kai planned to check the freezer for more meat choices for Pep, maybe first thing in the morning. Would chicken nuggets really do, for a piranha's menu?\nKai went to bed, undecided. His fish tank had no cover. Pep was still glaring at his new owner. Kai left his lamp on all night, just in case Pep got really hungry for little boys in the dark. Hungry, hungry.\nKai did not really sleep well. Every time he tossed and turned, his fin friend was glaring at him, swimming lazily round his fish tank. You cannot give such meat eaters any affection. Cute and fluffy not!\nRianna, as arranged, rang Kai's front door bell at exactly 8:30 am. She was a pet lover, looking forward to holiday fun with a new pet in the neighborhood.\nRianna walked into Kai's bedroom, while his folks were still sleeping in. Kai thought her eyes were going to pop out on stalks. Rianna gulped, and stared at Pep. \"Kai, you have bought a Piranha!\" Kai said sadly, \"I know. I pressed the wrong online shopping button. Meat eaters are supposed to be fun!\"\n\"Oh, grow up, why don't you? Rianna always had an opinion. \"Kai, these fish are banned in our country. The Health Department are going to sue you and throw your oldies in prison. That fish is illegal. Not to mention, downright scary!\"\nKai became even more miserable. Pep the Piranha was waiting for breakfast. Suddenly, Kai had a brilliant idea. He grabbed the fish net which had arrived with the instructions. He carefully scooped up Pep, and raced to the toilet.\nKai tipped Pep the Piranha into the loo. It was time to say goodbye. Kai pushed the big flush button. There was a gurgle in the pipes, Pep gave his owner one last glare.\nPep disappeared down past the S-bend, and was off to see the sewers of Smallville. Rianna could not stop him. \"Bye, Pep, \" Kai muttered, \"Bye to you. Holiday fun, day two!\"\nRianna was by now even more horrified, not to mention, cross. She usually was when Kai had some of his more wacky ideas. \"Kai, now you've done it. You are moronic! All these pipes around here drain into Smallville Creek. That's where all the kids from school are having a slimy eel fishing competition today. It started at 8 am. That fish is going to eat anyone!\" Kai was underwhelmed. The boys at school bullied and laughed at him anyway. Kai was not a bit fussed if Pep got them for once. Was this going to revenge of the midget?\nKai smiled at Rianna weakly. She grabbed the fishing net and a plastic bag, and took off for the creek. Kai wondered if Rianna had a plan Being so tall, and good at everything, she soon arrived, running so fast to get to the creek. The Year Seven boys were all sitting, paddling their feet in the water, with their fishing lines.\n\"Kai, just don't say a word!\" Rianna was still cross. Some of the other boys made air-kissies at Kai and Rianna. Ignoring them, she stood at the exit of the smelly drain pipe, with the fishing net ready.\nSmallville Creek was slimy eel territory, maybe Pep had met some late breakfast on the way. Soon there was gurgle, another smelly lot of water poured into the creek, and there was Pep! He landed right in the fishing net, which was just as well. The other boys had their bare feet in the creek. Rianna told Kai to fill the plastic bag with water, and they scooped Pep the Piranha into it.\n\"Now what?\" Kai asked Rianna. She marched Kai and Pep straight off to the local ranger's office, to say they had caught a piranha at the creek. Rianna gave the ranger false names, she was a quick thinker.\nThe ranger was fascinated, but a bit suspicious. Kai and Rianna rapidly left the building, hoping that he would stop asking them dumb questions.\nRianna and Kai walked across the bridge over the fishing hole at Smallville. Kai asked her, \"Do you want to go fishing?\" Rianna sighed, shaking her head. \"You never learn, do you? You'd probably catch a giant eel. Slime everywhere.\"\n\"Yeah, you are right, as usual. Now I am sad,\" Kai commented, \"now I haven't got a holiday pet.\"\n\"Aw,\" Rianna said, slinging her arm around midget Kai's shoulder, \"I declare that you are my holiday pet!\"\nKai silently thought, \"Now, this might be better than a piranha.\" So he took a selfie, uploading it with the tag,\n\"Year Seven girls can be fun!\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: #Sweet Sophie\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1901\n\nPrompt:\n\nCenter your story around a photo that goes viral." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“For God’s sake, Sophie, what were you thinking?” T.J yelled, his voice hysterical and high pitched.\n“I wasn’t thinking anything,” Sophie Beckett replied, her enormous blue eyes welling with emotion. “I was eating an ice-cream!”\n“Look! Just look at this,” T.J turned his phone screen towards her. “Does this look like someone eating ice cream?”\nThe image was grainy and zoomed in close, but it was unmistakably Sophie, her eyes closed, long lashes curving against her cheekbones, in an expression of forbidden bliss as she licked the melting ice-cream.\n“This picture is everywhere.” T.J ran his hand through his non-existent hair. “It’s trending on every social media platform.” He clicked the apps as Sophie’s face filled the screen again and again. “There’s even a Reddit devoted to speculating about your sexual exploits! This is bad. Do you realise you have put your contract in jeopardy? The movie studio won’t want the face of their newest princess associated with some sordid sexual images.”\n“I was eating an ice-cream, for crying out loud, T.J! I did nothing wrong.”\n“A picture is worth a thousand words, and these words are spelling the end of your acting career before it’s even had a chance.” T.J slammed his phone on the table. “No one will touch you now, not if the studio announces that you’ve broken your contract. You’re damaged goods.”\n“I haven’t broken the contract. I ate an ice-cream. I haven’t participated in any seedy porn, my social media is clean, I’ve not even dated anyone since I signed on. You’re blowing this out of proportion. ”\n“I’ve been in the industry longer than you’ve been alive. If I say this is damaging, then it’s damaging.”\n“Can’t you do something?”\n“Damage control isn’t cheap, Sophie. It’s easier if you stay clean.”\n\nDamage control. Sophie was heartily sick of those words. She’d done nothing to damage her reputation, except be photographed at the wrong time, in the wrong place and from the wrong angle. Now she had to pay most of her signing bonus to get T.J to mitigate the damage. If only she could find the original photo, then she could zoom out, and prove the object she was so decadently licking was indeed an ice-cream cone. Context is so important.\nWith her sunglasses over her eyes and floppy hat pulled low against the glare of the sun and protection against the curious stares of people on the boardwalk, Sophie traced her steps back to the ice-cream vendor. Someone took that photo and she wanted to know who it was.\n“Hello, good morning,” she said brightly to the harassed young man behind the counter. “May I speak with your manager?”\nThe boy blinked blankly, “I haven’t done anything wrong?!” Sophie couldn’t tell from his high-pitched wail, whether he was posing a question or making a statement.\n“No, I just have a few questions to ask. I’m not looking to get anyone in trouble.” Sophie smiled as sweetly as she could, considering the tension she was feeling. Her head thumped and the whole side of her face was throbbing, but she pressed a sweet expression on her lips and prayed that it didn’t look like a grimace.\n“Kyle,” the boy called over his shoulder. “There’s someone who wants to talk to you.”\nThe man who stepped through the door looked to be barely older than Sophie herself, and she wondered how much managers of ice-cream shops were paid. If she couldn’t sort this photo problem out, then her career was over. Maybe she would need to work in the food service industry.\n“My name is Kyle. How may I help you?” he asked politely, his face a mask of polite indifference that only just managed to disguise his irritation.\n“I really am sorry to interrupt you, Kyle, but I was wondering if you could tell me if there are any security cameras recording the plaza outside your shop?”\nThe manager’s eyebrow shot to his hairline. Clearly, he hadn’t expected the question.\n“There are, but you’d need to ask security to access them, and only if you can give them a reason, like for a crime investigation or something. And they won’t just release the footage to a civilian, you’d need a warrant.”\n“I see. I don’t have a warrant, and the police can’t do anything, but someone has breached my privacy. They have taken a photo without my permission and published it online. I need to see who took it.”\nKyle’s eyes widened. “You’re Sophie Beckett.”\n“Yes, and I’m sure you’ve seen the photo I’m talking about.” Kyle’s blush spoke volumes. “It’s not what it looks like. I was here on Thursday and I ate an ice-cream. It was ice-cream! You know how good the ice-cream is here. But someone has zoomed in and cut the cone part out and the picture is ruining me!”\n“I suppose I could ring Stuart in security. He might be able to look at the video feed on the quiet and let you know if he can see anything. I’d need a date and time, though. There are hours of footage to go through.”\nSophie opened her banking app to check her transaction history. “I purchased it on Thursday last at 2.45pm.”\nKyle made the call as Sophie nibbled at her fingernail. T.J would hate that. Princesses didn’t chew their nails, they were always immaculately presented.\n“He said he’d try, but can’t promise anything. The camera may not have even been pointing in your direction at the time,” Kyle said as he ended the call.\nSophie slumped against the counter. “I know, but it’s the only hope I’ve got of getting my reputation back.”\n“I’m at USC studying a Master of Science in Cybersecurity Engineering. It’s possible that we could do a reverse image search and see where it has originated from.”\n“You can do that?”\n“It might be possible to find out where the pic was initially shared. That might give us a starting point.”\n“You said ‘us’. Are you going to help me?”\n“It seems like I am.” Kyle appeared as surprised by the statement as Sophie was.\n“If you can do this, I promise to offer you the position as head of my nonexistent digital security team. If you can’t, then my career is over, and I might have to hit you up for training and a job serving ice-cream.”\n\nIt was a nervous two days that Sophie spent locked behind closed doors. T.J insisted that she stay out of the spotlight. His strategy was to lie low and wait for a new scandal to take the heat off the photo. Two days was an eternity in LA and fifty of so celebrities would have committed a social and/or political faux pas in that time. Sophie wasn’t sure what she was paying T.J the extra money for, if all he was advising her to do was wait.\n\nAn SMS alert pinged.\n-Kyle :Hey Sophie. I’ve got something. Do you want to get an ice cream🍦?:\n-Me :Sure🙂 u free now?:\n\nSophie hurried into the ice-cream shop, her eyes shielded behind dark sunglasses and her face hidden beneath the shadow of a deep-brimmed floppy hat. Kyle, waiting anxiously, swiftly whisked her away to the back storeroom, shielding her from prying eyes.\n“Here,” he muttered, handing her a device, “this is the first share of the image. It took me a while because I had to… well, I had to do quite a bit of cross-matching, considering the original image is not zoomed in and cropped.”\nThe image was a lot clearer, having lost the pixilated blurriness from the zoomed in crop. There she was, enjoying the melting ice-cream on a hot day as it dripped down her fingers.\n“Who took the photo?” Sophie’s voice trembled.\n“Well, we can only assume it was the original poster, one Samuel Richardson,” Kyle explained, his tone heavy with disgust. “He shared it with a Theo Partridge on Thursday evening. Theo cropped it and shared it back. From there, it was forwarded to several sites and shared with the tag, #sexy Sophie.”\nSophie gasped, her disbelief turning into a bitter realization. “Theo? Theo Partridge? Not T.J! He’s my manager.”\n“I hate to break it to you, but it seems he’s not exactly in your corner,” Kyle muttered, his voice heavy with sympathy.\nSophie’s legs gave way beneath her, and she collapsed onto a nearby packing box, the betrayal hitting her hard. “Why would he want to destroy my career?”\n“I can’t say, but I can help mitigate the damage. We can post the original with a new hashtag. Something like #sexy Sophie enjoys ice-cream.”\n“Not sexy… I’m not a sex symbol. I’m a person,” Sophie protested, her voice tinged with frustration.\n“Sex sells. It’s what gets traction,” Kyle countered, his gaze unwavering as he met her eyes.\n“I don’t want traction. I want vindication.”\n“How about #sweet Sophie enjoys frozen treat?” His warm brown eyes, like melted chocolate, captured her. “Or just #sweet Sophie.”\nShe felt a rush of warmth flood her veins, her breath caught momentarily in her throat. The small office seemed to suddenly lose all its air, as she gasped, “#Sweet Sophie… I like it.”\nAs Kyle uploaded the unedited image with its new hashtag, Sophie’s heart raced with anticipation.\n“I can’t promise it will get rid of the suggestive images, but perhaps it will prove your innocence.” He said as the upload finished and swung his chair around to face her. “We could also threaten your manager with legal action over the manipulation and sharing of the image. You could sue him for defamation, and for breaching his contractual obligations to you.”\nSophie’s pulse quickened.\n“You keep saying ‘we’,” she observed, her voice barely above a whisper, her heart pounding.\n“You did promise me a position as head of your non-existent Cyber-security team,” Kyle reminded her, his tone tinged with a hint of playfulness. “Are you going back on your word?”\nSophie shook her head, a smile tugging at her lips. “No, but I have nothing to pay you with until I begin filming,” she admitted.\n“That’s OK. I won’t quit my day job just yet.”\nWith a flirtatious grin, Sophie met his gaze. “You lured me here with the promise of ice-cream. Is that still on the table?” she asked.\n“Absolutely, but maybe this time, we’ll stick to cups,” Kyle suggested, leaning in closer, his breath warm against her ear. “Cones might send the wrong message.”\nShe felt her cheeks heat and her heart hammered against her ribs as her mouth dried up. There was a pause, heavy with promise and potential, and Sophie was barely able to breathe, barely able to move or think.\nKyle took a deep breath and, stepping back, he opened the storeroom door. “Come, let me buy you that cup of ice-cream.” He grinned, eyes twinkling. “I know the manager and can get us a staff discount.”\nSophie, able to breathe once more, asked as she passed him, “Like a date?”\nHer comment caused him to pause before replying, “Would you like it to be?”\nSophie’s cheeks flushed at his teasing, her heart racing with anticipation as she looked back over her shoulder. “I think I’d like that,” she confessed, a shy flirtatious smile playing on her lips.\n“Oh, sweet Sophie… you’re addictive.” Kyle groaned as he followed her into the ice-cream shop." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Alone Time\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1386\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a character who sees a photo they shouldn’t have seen." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "She let him know that he needed to come home right after work. Some nights, he’d stop at the Chili’s on the side of the highway and get himself a margarita. This was something he did alone, and she knew about it. They’d joke about how much time he spends alone. Given the choice, Mark would spend his entire life alone. It seemed like a fluke that he ended up married, but Rene also enjoyed her alone time.\nJust not as much as her husband did.\nWhile she sat on one of the highchairs in their kitchen, she asked herself if she would have preferred to find a photo indicating some kind of adultery. A photo of a naked woman in their bed or her husband kissing a stranger on a Ferris Wheel. Her friend Gabby regularly snooped on her husband’s laptop, and a few years ago, she’d confessed to Rene that she’d found an old email from a man and it was clear there had been an affair. Gabby didn’t ask for a divorce. She told Rene that had her husband cheated on her with a woman, she’d have been inconsolable, but a man just meant that she was married to a bisexual, and there wasn’t anything threatening about that. It actually made her husband seem more interesting. When Rene pulled the photo out from the bottom of Mark’s t-shirt drawer in a bout of unexpected spring cleaning, the word “interesting” was the first one that popped into her head. Maybe that photo would make her quiet, unassuming husband seem more interesting after nine uneventful years of marriage.\nInstead it made her blood go cold.\nMark arrived shortly after six. Rene could feel his anxiety before he even walked in the door. When you’re close enough to someone, you can feel the emotion behind their everyday actions. The way they push the alarm button on their car. The way their footsteps hit the driveway. The way they open the front door. Did he know why she asked him to come home right away? He wasn’t moving as though he worried it might be an emergency. His response to her text message was a simple “Okay.” Maybe he could sense her emotions as well. Maybe he knew what the verdict would be before the trial even started.\nThe photograph had been placed on the counter next to a photo of them in Italy on their third anniversary. Rene had already decided that she would not apologize for coming across the photo. It had not been her intent. She was not an investigator like Gabby. She had always afforded Mark more privacy than most spouses would grant. When he told her he’d be out late, she never asked why. When she saw him staring at a beautiful woman when they were out somewhere, she didn’t chastise him for it. Once, after making love, he asked her if she would be opposed to opening up their marriage. She thought about it for a few seconds before replying that she would be fine with it, because she was confident she would benefit from it much more than he would. Mark was a handsome man, but Rene was a knockout. If he wanted to step out now and again, that was fine with her, but she could positively tap dance if she wanted to, and they both knew it. They went to sleep and never followed up on the conversation, but both seemed to understand that monogamy wasn’t something they loved, but something they preferred. People were trouble and marriage is hard. Mix more personalities into a relationship, and what good could come of it?\nBesides, they did love their alone time. Mark, especially.\n“What is this,” Rene asked Mark, even though the photo was fairly self-explanatory.\nHe leaned against the counter and looked down at the photo.\n“I’m sorry,” he said, “I didn’t mean for you to see it.”\n“Clearly,” she said, clearing her throat, trying not to become emotional, “I want to know what’s going on. What is this, Mark?”\nMark shook his head. She could see that he didn’t have an answer for her. She wasn’t sure what the answer would be. Perhaps there wasn’t one. Not everything had an answer.\n“I need you to know,” she said, contemplating reaching for his hand, “That I am deeply disturbed by this. Deeply.”\nHe picked up the photo and stared at it as though he were studying it. Looking for a clue. If Rene didn’t know that he was the subject of the photo, she would think he was seeing it for the first time. Mark tapped the counter with the bottom of the photo, and then set it down. He walked to the fridge, and pulled out a can of soda. It was this new brand that’s meant to be good for the gut, but it was still loaded with sugar. Mark was a chainsmoker who went to the gym religiously. Everything in his life seemed to be a contradiction. One thing cancelling out another. Rene knew she was no exception. There was something about him that was inherently single despite the longevity of their marriage. If nothing else, she was sure he was happy.\nNow, the photo.\nMark popped the soda and took a gulp. He winced as though it were a shot. Another belt of the probiotic, grape-flavored nonsense, and that was that. He looked at her with what seemed to be a combination of remorse and relief.\n“I wanted it documented,” he said, “I don’t know why. I’ve never been like that. You know me. You’ve known me for--You know I’m not like that. This was--I don’t remember. This was over a year ago. It was out of nowhere. I woke up one day and you were--I think you were at your sister’s house. You were helping her with the move, I think. I woke up and it was like--Like I had been dropped into another reality. Another reality in someone else’s body. Nothing felt familiar. Everything felt disturbing for me. At first, I thought I was dreaming, but there was no way for me to tell. I went back to bed, and I found I couldn’t move. I couldn’t even pinch myself to try and wake up. I realized I was awake and a panic attack set in. I haven’t had a panic attack since I was a kid. Not since the day my dad was in that accident where we almost lost him. Finally, I managed to sit up and--slowly--I felt myself coming back to who it is I believe myself to be. But, for some reason, before that happened, I wanted proof that the whole thing wasn’t--in my head. Imaginary. That’s why the photo exists. That’s--that’s why.”\nIt was the kind of confession that was just surreal enough to be believable. Rene had never experienced the kind of moment that Mark described. Her dreams were always colorful as opposed to visceral. There would be hues and tones as though she were floating through clouds, and when she woke up, she’d feel as though someone had placed her carefully in bed next to her husband. This is what she was thinking when Mark came around from behind her and put his arms around her. He leaned his head against hers, and she felt him exhale against her neck.\nHer husband had not been himself. Then, he had. Somewhere along the way, he wanted to remember this day when he had not been himself. She didn’t know why. He didn’t seem to know why either. What was there to do with all that?\nIt occurred to her then that the photo was not a selfie. It was a photo of him sitting on the edge of the bed with tears streaming down his face. His mouth was open and you could tell that he was sobbing. If you looked closely, you could even see the places on his shirt where the tears had fallen. For some reason, it wasn’t until then that Rene asked herself who could have taken the picture.\nA second later, her hands reached up to grab Mark’s arms and pull them even tighter around her. That was how she dismissed the question.\nEverything could stay just the way it was." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Beacon of Light\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2574\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story in a lighthouse surrounded by powerful gale-force winds." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Val smiled. He smiled a smile that reflected the light of the Summer sun, just like the rippling light dancing on the waves as they played along the rocks of the shore.\nTrent took in that smile and wished that he could give something of such worth to his friend. He stifled the sorrowful frown that threatened to break across his face and ruin the moment. Val was a delight. Trent knew Val was too good for him and it shamed him that he kept the secret of Val’s delight to himself, fearing that if he were to tell his friend, their bond would break and Val would drift off for far away shores. Shores where he belonged. Shores filled with the bright happy people that were the tribe that Val so richly deserved.\nPart of the trick, Trent knew, was to keep moving. If he ever stopped then he would be found out. The lies he contained were more difficult to spot when he was in fluid motion. Never mind sleight of hand, it was better to use the entire banquet of body.\nLeaping from rock to rock he let forth a joyful laugh. The truth of that simple sound escaped him. His truth eluded him and he lied casually to himself in his mistaken belief that he had mislaid it. Val saw it alright. Val saw it and revelled in it. \nIf only he had told his friend this or at least a part of the truth that they so readily shared between them. But then, a lifelong friendship can leave these most important of words left unsaid. Love unspoken, but ever present all the same.\nThe two lads leapt along the line of rocks. Each time they ventured along the coast they went that bit further. Cautious dare devils sharing the secrets of their brave adventures. Not wanting to get into trouble with their parents for being here at all, let alone pushing the boundaries of their childhoods away from the watchful eyes of those responsible for the bubble of innocence they resided within.\nNeither of the boys had noted that this was the longest of days. The sun carried away with the game the lads were engrossed in, lingering a little more each time. Reluctant to return home for its well earned slumber. \nThere was a magic to this day and the boys breathed its briny taste in as they laughed and shouted their way all the way to the very end of the coast. \nThis was the day that this series of adventures would come to its conclusion. They both felt it as they reached their destination at last. Tired and happy, they slowed to a reverential walk towards their Summer objective. Unaware that they were in step as they walked side by side. A democracy of two. Neither wanting to be the first to touch the tangible goal of their Summer of fun. This was to be shared. Neither of them had spoken of this. Some truths needed no words. Some magic spells are silent.\nStopping, they turned their head to look at each other. Solemn, they stood before their church and nodded. Right hands raising, they sought to touch the door at the very same moment. \nBut before they could, it swung towards them in one fluid motion until it was wide open.\nThis shock invitation both terrified and thrilled the lads. Another truth they would not bring themselves to give word to. Looking again at each other, they missed the pleading mirrored in their eyes. This was the point at which they could have ended this day’s adventure. This was good enough. More than good enough. There was no defeat in turning back now, but a looming feeling of shame triumphed over their fear. Neither of them wanted to back down. An impasse that had furthered the human race time and again. An impasse that had also sent many a young buck over a cliff that in the cold light of a dispassionate day it should never have ventured near. But that was a heartless and ignorant day that brought a grey reality with it. The grey was envious of the fanned rainbow tail of life, and its envy left it insensible and hateful of the vibrancy of those colours.\nNever would Val and Trent establish who it was that walked through the inviting doorway first. To argue that point would be to miss the point; they were in this together. Two parts of the whole. Perhaps they had been two boys right up until they made their silent pact and issued forth into that most sacred of places. That and much else changed in an unremarkable moment that they would not mark until they found an oasis of unremarkable again.\nOne of them closed the door behind them. Again, as to which one, there was no noting. That it should be done was all that counted. The closing door plunged the boys into darkness. A darkness that was a counterpoint to the place they had entered. A darkness that held no fear for them. They felt a warmth of welcome, besides which, they were never intended to remain within the darkness. Their place was far higher than where they now stood. \nAs one, they climbed cold, stone steps that wound around the tower they had entered. Painstakingly, they took each and every step together. The staircase was wide. Designed for big men and large items that would need to brought to the very top of the structure.\nTime sat beyond the walls of the tower and having lost sight of the boys and the delight of their youthful fun, it moved churlishly to punish them for leaving without a backwards glance or a by-your-leave. \nBy the time the lads reached the final steps they were curious to witness the changing of the guard. The last of this Summer Day was nigh and the sun had become red with embarrassment as it peered at them from the horizon.\nVal was already looking askance at Trent as Trent turned towards him. They had lost the best part of the day in walking the stairs and they were on the cusp of losing themselves to a maelstrom of emotion when they were distracted in the most wonderful of ways.\nHeralded by a thunderous click that shook the floor under their feet, a blinding white light crashed into existence. This light was so intense that the boys could feel it shining through them so that they cast no shadow. So bright was that light that they instinctively turned their backs to it, even as it moved around the tower in a slow and purposeful circle. \nThe boys gazed out at the world from their perch and were filled with an unspeakable joy. They had been transformed into giants. Lords of all they surveyed. They had gone upwards and with each step they had grown up. Grown and grown until they were all they could be and much, much more. This tower was their chrysalis and they were now emerging as something beyond the imagining of the grubs they once were.\nThe light moved around the land. A finger pointing out the lad’s kingdom. On the third sweep, they heard the coming of the dragon, but they did not see it. At first it was a whisper. A whisper that promised so much more. Then it was a groan. A herald of dark and hard times. By the time the screaming started, the boys knew that nothing would ever be the same again.\nThis was the counter to their beautiful transformation. The dragon’s wings brought the winds of change and those winds were fierce. And they were hungry.\nThe lads watched as far off trees bent double like elderly shoppers shambling along the promenade as they searched for all those they had lost. Always looking down. Never up. A sad sight made worse by their sad sight.\nThe screaming winds whipped this way and that, besieging the tower of light, but unable to enter. Unable to drag the boys away from their sanctuary, dash them on the sharp, cruel rocks and then feast upon their carcasses in the depths of the sea. In the underwater cavern that the dragon had made its lair. A place away from the prying eyes of a disbelieving population that had lost its way when it lost those beliefs. \nTrent fancied he felt the tower move a little as the dragon beat its wings all the harder. He sought the hand of his friend and was relieved to find Val’s seeking hand. Fingers entangled they bore witness to the coming battle.\nCheated of its prize, the dragon threw itself upon the small, seaside town. It lifted the seas high into the air and threw them over the scant defences. Each onslaught saw the shops and houses disappear only to defiantly reappear moments later. The brave town stood bold and proud, but there was only so much it could take. After all, it was not built for war, whereas the dragon was created only to destroy. Flanks of impenetrable shields. A vast array of teeth the size of a man and a fire in its belly that must be fed.\nIt was the pier that went first. The dragon broke it’s spine and it lay helpless as the roiling seas pulled and harried at it. It clung on valiantly, but there was no denying its end. Waiting under the surface, the dragon opened its mouth wide and swallowed the broken half in one gulp, steam bubbling from its nostrils as the pier burnt in its midst.\nThe Odeon was next. The once glorious façade had grown old and wrinkled over the years and those who had once loved it and gloried in its presence were long gone. Even the bent and crooked elderly of the town could not remember the Odeon’s youthful heyday. As it collapsed into the maw of the dragon, there was something of a sorrowful mercy in its demise. The town lost much in that moment though and the watching boys knew that things could never be the same again. A place needs its monuments to its makers. Just the same as a child should never forget the face of its parents, a place has to be grounded in what counts and where true obligations lay.\nThe seafront face of the town doubled down in grim determination. The fallen Odeon galvanised it. But the dragon was not done. Not yet. There was a price to pay and it would take what it was owed.\nWings beat the wind down into the town like an invisible volley of spears. There was a terrible whooshing that the town responded to with gruesome groans and teeth shattering rending and wrenching. Clinging on for dear life the town hunkered down as the dragon did its worse.\nThe canopy of a service station let go like a ragged chocolate wrapper. Floating this way and that it was carried across town until it crashed into and through a large house in the most surreal juxtaposition the boys had ever witnessed.\nIn an odd, choreographed dance, five house roofs rose from their structures and cartwheeled over the town and into the hillside that hid this drama from the rest of the land.\nThen the lights of the town blinked three times as it began to send out an SOS. But the distress signal was smothered by the dragon and the lights went out.\nAll that was left was the light from the tower that swept around in a painfully slow and deliberate arc. Illuminating comic book frames of destruction each time. Freeze frames of violence that became more awful with every passing.\nThe boys squeezed each other’s hands in unison, willing the end of the battle. An end that would not come. Their feeling of helplessness and impotence weighed upon them a little more with each sweeping revelation until they could stand it no longer. The growing weight of the unfolding horror threatened to crush them. \nThere was only one thing for it. To heed the suggestion of that foul gravity and go down to meet this dragon head on. They ran hand in hand down the steps. Down into the bowels of the tower and the waiting darkness. A benign darkness that went unnoticed. The lads knew there was much worse awaiting them on the other side of the door.\nAt the door, Trent pushed down the doorhandle and they both shouldered the door in an effort to open it. In the scant light provided by the wandering eye above them, they looked at each other incredulously. They understood the conflicted nature of their plight even as they went at the door again with all their might. It was not the tower holding them inside in a protective act, but the dragon’s anger holding the door shut as it attacked everything about it in its fury at having been deprived of the boys.\nAgain and again they tried to open the door, leave the tower and confront the hungry dragon. But the screaming dragon thwarted their each and every attempt. They did all they could and would have sacrificed themselves for the town if only the dragon had let them.\nIt was with heavy hearts and even heavier steps that they climbed back to the top of the tower. Time relented as they travelled upwards, understanding that it had behaved badly on the previous occasion and wanting to make amends. This time as they reached the last step, the dark and stormy skies were beginning to soften.\nAgain the thunderous click and the eye of the tower winked out and ceased its movement. This heralded one last roar from the dragon and then the sighs of wind as it travelled away from this place to a slumber that should have been for a hundred years.\nVal and Trent retook their place at the top of the tower. Trent fancied he heard the belligerent door swing open as they stood and awaited the coming of the sun to provide them with a view of what was left of the town.\nThey had awhile to wait and when the sun began its chores for that day, it took its time in revealing the dragon’s work. This kindness was wasted on the lads. Sometimes words are not needed in order to reveal truths. Other times, seeing is not required for believing. They both believed they knew that the town was no more, and once the sun illuminated the truth in all its terrible glory, they knew they were the only two souls to have been spared from the worst storm in a century.\nThe Dragon Storm they called it. A storm that only came along once every hundred years or so. The Odeon had been a lad itself back then and had laughed at and goaded the dragon in its youthful defiance. But the dragon had a long memory. And the dragon would always have its due.\nAlways.\nThey called Val and Trent The Miracle Boys, but those boys knew the truth, and the truth was that the dragon was still hungry and they were living on borrowed time. Even if they stayed well away from the seas and oceans, the dragon would find them and the dragon would have its due." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The 10 Questions\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1203\n\nPrompt:\n\nCenter your story around a photo that goes viral." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The child's lips diverged maximally. They couldn’t be split to any greater extent. He was staring hard at the sky above, hoping to receive a divine reply. His face had sullied by the tearful deposits and his shirt was tattered from different sections. His whole body was punctured with scars exposed through the torn sections of his 'so called' clothes. He seemed to be protesting at his condition, which he least deserved. He was a small child definitely not more than 7. The ground on which he stood was littered with blood and indiscriminate debris. There was smoke all around him and even the contours of the picture were becoming fuzzy. The child was barely holding on to a broken Lego piece in one hand and a crumb of bread in the other but the most striking aspect was the receding light in his eyes. They looked hopeless and glazed over. The sparkle at once visceral and untainted had been replaced with half understood, half expressed surprise.\nI spotted the picture in a Facebook advertisement. I said to myself.\n“another victim of collateral damage.”\nThe situation in the Play Land was going from bad to worse. Both sides were playing the victim card. But their failure to claim responsibility was playing havoc with human life.\nThe international community looked the other way. A resolution was tabled in the Neutrality Office. A fierce argument broke out. There was an over presence of decorum with dignitaries sitting at their respective seats with a studious look in their eyes. Tables were tapped ferociously whenever passions were evoked. People looked at Mr. Objective to give his verdict. However, there was no stir among the delegates as if they knew the verdict even before it was announced.\nFinally, Mr. Objective rose from his seat. He delivered a long speech that chronicled the mechanics of the process. At the end, he sounded very grim and ruled in favour of the oppressors. However, the delegates instead of getting vexed tapped the desk to show their pleasure. The oppressed side just gnawed their teeth; they could only sulk and suffer.\nThe next day social media went into hyper active mode and the newspapers cried hoarse but nothing changed on the ground. It continued to be business as usual.\nCompassionate calls were made but the men who mattered the most remained unmoved. 'Likes' were aggregated and people went to great lengths to prove their sympathetic stance by emptying the full range of their emotional content that threatened to overflow at times!\nThe Facebook crowd typed the same emotions that were as dry as the grassless pitch for a cricket match. Vows were made to help and sustain creating an impression of marching off at the very next flight!\nIn the meanwhile, the violence continued. There was not even an iota of a difference on the ground situation. The world seemed to have other priorities.\nGlances were cast at a spectator who held aloft the flag of Play Land. He was rebuked for his overt display of sympathy.\nPeople reduced the consumption of the staple products that Mr. Bane produced but all these measures could not stop him going on air to announce his ambitions to expand the operations. He publicly admitted that he would not stop!\nWhere is the conscience of the world? Where is the moral policeman?\nWhere is humanity and where are the human beings?\nMay be they are in a deep sleep and fail to be roused.\nMr. Rhetoric gathered in his glitzy office to condemn the violence. He gave a passionate speech to advertise their support but could not translate into action. The child in the picture could not be consoled with this impressive rhetoric!\nThe point was delivered home by Mr. Wisdom while appearing on a private You tube channel.\nHe did not mince his words.\n“What would you do if the child had been yours?”\nThe whole crowd fell silent. Some even glared at the speaker for being so blunt. They could not even imagine this thing happening to their child. So it was clear that equivocal stance on this matter was deliberate based on complete insight about their indifference.\nThe child in the picture asked questions to the world that defy straight forward answers.\nQ-1. What is my fault?\nQ-2. Who will give chocolates to me at the weekend?\nQ-3 Where is my mother?\nQ-4. Why am I being bombed?\nQ-5. Why have you destroyed my house?\nQ-6. Why can’t I play in the garden?\nQ-7. Why can’t I go to school?\nQ-8. Why am I starving to death?\nQ-9. Why can’t I drink safe water?\nQ-10. Am I a human being?\nThese are all harrowing questions. It is a slap on world conscience that is allowing the violence to go on. This is only one child. There are millions of children across the world who are suffering the same fate.\nI closed my eyes for a while and tried to size up the situation but it was so big that I could not clasp it within my limited space.\nThe money being spent to pip the competitors in the arms race and indulge in other luxuries comes at the expense of these children who are perhaps perishable commodities- waste to be thrown in the gutter.\nWhat is the standard of being a human? Just make money and milk others!\nSelfishness has risen to such an extent that we have lost our basic sense of purpose.\nEvolving into adults at some stage in the future, these children would end up pretty much more brutalized than at present. What kind of generation are we producing? And all this amidst the talk of man going to Mars and the mantra of human rights and development.\nMr. Thoughtful had it summed up well!\n“The world has lost its fulcrum. It is rotating against the natural pivot. The law of the jungle that prevailed in primitive times has only changed its appearance and language. The core remains intact that is devoid of any values or code of conduct. It operates as brutally as before but it is sanctioned as civilized behaviour! My God! how far we have degenerated as human beings! How far we have maligned our identity as the finest creation of God! We inhabit a world where concern is immediately sported for an injured animal but the same empathy is extricated from being extended to children of lesser men! The Elite of this world is unquestioningly dancing to the tune played by money and luxury- spawned by the capitalistic philosophy. Humanity is left to rot and decay. One person thrives and blossoms whereas the other is condemned to live below the poverty line. The progress that is claimed to have galvanized the world is sadly absent on the streets. The justice is for the powerful whereas the weak find it as elusive as a fugitive. Although, living in the 21st century we are still being stalked by the shadows of the Dark Ages. We have failed to grow beyond the cave men. All changes are sham and beneath the gloss there are dark marks that are nibbling slowly at the declining living space of the common man.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Photograph of Eternity: A Tale of Love and War\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 3003\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a character who sees a photo they shouldn’t have seen." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Vinogradar\n16 Km from Odessa\nSeptember 3, 1941\nMy dear Ana,\n In the depth of the night, when silence falls heavily over the battlefields, I find my escape in writing to you, as if my words could fly towards you, surpassing the inferno of this war. The sky here is dark, not with night, but with gunpowder and smoke, a veil hiding the stars under which we swore eternal love. At home, I hope the sea is as crystal clear as the color of your eyes...\n And yet, in this endless fight, the thought of you is the spark that keeps me ignited, the flame that burns despite the cold wind of despair. Every moment without you is a wound that does not heal, a longing that does not quiet. I wonder if you too feel this void, if your sky is just as dark without me.\n I no longer know what I feel, apart from my immense love for you. Here the world becomes more and more chaotic, a macabre dance wrapped in a lie. War is a lie, after all. We fight for ideals that seem so grand and so important, but in the grand scheme of humanity, it all comes down to the simple fact of surviving and not losing our humanity. I feel I’m losing mine, little by little, when I see only blood, weapons, fire, and death...\n I can no longer carry the weight of this cruel world without you. Every step forward on the battlefield is a step made towards you, towards my coming home, into your arms where I find my refuge. Every day on the front has become not only a battle against the enemy but also with ourselves, with the fear and despair that engulf us when we see what price must be paid for every meter gained.\n The losses are enormous, and spirits are low. There is not a moment when I do not feel the presence of the angel of death and the weight of his kiss. How much longer can we continue like this? That’s the question on everyone’s lips, dried by so much dust that surrounds us, from the tasteless and odorless food rations made with rainwater.\n At night, when it rains, the trenches turn into rivers of mud that seem to swallow your feet and the cold begins to be felt, penetrating to the bones. We sleep piled on top of each other, trying to find a drop of warmth, one of the things that still keeps humanity in our souls.\n Wounds are another story. People left to lie in agony because resources are too few and the distance to help too great. Those who are seriously injured somehow manage to reach the ambulance 7 km away from the front and then sent to the hospital in Tiraspol, if there are still places. They are considered lucky but even they return to the front without having time to fully heal, eventually dying in the line of fire, becoming numbers on a report that they died for sure and.. that’s it. People don't matter here... God has spared me from serious wounds and I can continue to fight but.. I don’t know for how long. It is already the third week since we have been here, 16 km from Odessa, and time is passing more and more slowly and oppressively and we fight.\n A week ago I received the \"Crown of Romania with Sword\" decoration because we managed to escape the artillery and aviation bombings, crossing all of Bessarabia. I received the decoration for surviving. We are considered heroes but I do not feel like one. I feel like a cold-blooded murderer when I see enemies falling to the ground. Heroes are those who save people, not those who kill them for an ideal. I remember how one of our comrades, a young man barely out of adolescence and hit by the maturity of a world that stole the joys of his life, jumped forward to defuse a mine threatening to cut our path. With trembling hands, but with a determination that took my breath away, he succeeded. But the happiness did not last long. A few hours later, he fell prey to a machine gun fire. We lost many brave young men, whose only sin was the desire to see their country free.\n I still carry your letters on my chest, with an unstoppable belief that they are my shield when I fight, and I reread them night after night, when we manage, tired and overwhelmed by the weight of the war, to gather around the warmth of the improvised fire in the trenches. Your letters have not arrived for several months, but they couldn’t have. We move from place to place, without a precise location, and people are shot one by one as if it’s an open hunt, senseless and merciless.\n I hope my letters reach you and at least alleviate a little of the pain that war has caused you by taking me away from you when you needed me the most. I hope you write to me, and that I will receive your responses because only they keep me alive.I hope yours are well and that you manage to find small moments of joy even in these troubled times.\n I often think about what that moment will be like, when I will cross the threshold of our home, when I will see your smile again and when I will be able to hold your hand in mine again. I imagine the peace I will feel, knowing that I have finally arrived home, to you, to us. Until then, however, I only have our memories and dreams of a better future, which give me the strength to face each day.\n I have heard stories from other soldiers, who have lost their love due to the war, either through separation or through definitive loss. These stories make me realize how precious our love is and how lucky I am to have you in my life. I promise myself every day that I will do everything possible to return to you safely, to protect your heart and to fulfill our dreams together.\n In these moments, when everything seems to collapse around me, the thought that somewhere in the world, you still carry my love, gives me the courage I need. Knowing that there is someone waiting for me, who believes in me and in my return, makes the fight worth every sacrifice.\n Please, do not forget how much I love you and how much every thought of yours means to me. Despite the distance and the silence, the connection between us remains unchanged, unshaken in the face of adversities. I keep my faith in us, in our love, and in the better days that await us.\n Until we meet again, take care of yourself and keep hope and love in your heart that united us. I miss you more than words can express, but I know that, no matter what the future holds, our hearts will always be together.\nWith all the love and longing in the world,\nYours,\nAlin\"\n***\n Leaves rustled with so much green at the window of the old building, seemingly forgotten by time. With its thick stone walls, painted in white and red, the asylum stood both majestic and terrifying in the middle of a wild garden, where nature reclaimed its rights, embracing and hiding a part of its sad history. The building, with its imposing architecture, resembled more a castle than a care institution, its walls witnesses to countless untold stories, failures, and shattered hopes.\n The tall windows, generous in size, were darkened by thick iron bars, presenting a gloomy image of the limited freedom of its inhabitants. Each window reflected sunlight in a strange way, creating shadows that danced on the dark corridors and cracked walls.\n The garden surrounding the building was a chaotic mix of beauty and neglect. Paths once well-tended were now overrun with wild herbs, and the flower beds, untended for years, only retained the memory of the vivid colors that once enlivened them. The old trees spread their branches everywhere, creating a dense canopy under which silence was only broken by the song of birds or the rustle of leaves moved by the wind.\n Here and there, old wooden benches, eaten away by time and weather, offered rest to nonexistent visitors, and an old fountain, now dry, stood mute in the center of the garden, a symbol of life that flows incessantly, regardless of human suffering.\n In this world-forgotten setting, Ana lived her existence, trapped between walls that provided shelter but denied freedom. The asylum, with all its fortress-like appearance, had become both a sanctuary and a prison for her wounded soul. Despite the vast expanse of the garden, she felt captive, a bird with broken wings, dreaming of a flight she could not achieve.\n Ana had just turned 18 on June 22, 1941, celebrating her birthday. She was young, with eyes of clear blue that reflected the sea she loved so much, her blond, almost golden hair shone under the summer sun, seeming a part of it. It had been a beautiful day, full of promises and dreams, until the sky darkened with combat planes, and bombings turned the city into a field of ruins. That day, Ana's world changed forever.\n The explosions left behind not only destroyed buildings and lost lives but also deep wounds in Ana's soul, wounds that did not heal even after years. The trauma of the bombings, the sudden loss of everything familiar and secure, plunged her into an abyss of despair and confusion from which she could not escape.\n Without family, without a home, Ana became a shadow of the past, increasingly reminiscent of the tragedy that struck Romania. Nobody knew anything, when, how..where... and her mind became an echo of a fragment of history...\n Days passed, and Ana relived the day of the bombing, in a constant search for an exit. She could no longer remember who she was before, nor who she was supposed to be now. The pills taken as candies had become a routine and seemed to calm her a little and offer her a bit of lucidity in the imaginary world she lived in. The asylum staff became so familiar to her that she started associating their faces with characters from the stories she imagined. An assistant became the saving hero, a nurse - the loving sister she never had, and the director - the guardian who held the key to her freedom. In her mind, each day transformed into an epic search to discover herself.\n She felt she should not be there, among people who had lost themselves in their own worlds, each carrying their inner battles, sometimes more quietly, other times more noisily. In a strange way, this place of isolation had become a parallel universe, where reality and fantasy intertwined in an unending dance.\n Days passed, and Ana began to become an anchor in history, a victim of everything the war meant... She never managed to regain her memory and wandered lost in the hospital corridors, like a long-gone ghost.\n The doctors tried to anchor her more in the present, trying to introduce her to various activities that would stimulate her mind and somehow bring her some relief. It seemed she did not know feelings and somehow appeared dehumanized with all the confusion..\n Now, at 77 years old, Ana carries time on her face like a badge of honor. Her hair, once golden blond and shining under the rays of the summer sun, is now a cascade of silver, the white strands shining just as beautifully, but in a softer, wiser light. Her skin, a testimony to the decades passed, bears deep wrinkles, each line an untold story, each crease a kept memory. Her eyes, however, those clear blue eyes that once reflected the sea in all its splendor, still hold that spark of life, though now framed by dark circles and the delicate wrinkles of long-faded smiles.\n Her body, once agile and full of life, now moves with a certain heaviness, a testament to the years and burdens she has carried. Her walk is slow, measured, each step taken with care, as if navigating through a landscape of memories and dreams. Despite her age, Ana still maintains a straight posture, a sign of dignity and inner strength that have not faded despite life's trials.\n Her hands, which once tightly held love letters and got lost in golden blond hair, are now the hands of an old woman, with prominent veins and thinned skin. These hands sometimes tremble, but can still tightly hold a photograph, caress a flower, or offer a warm hug.\n Her face, even marked by time, still radiates a serene beauty, an inner calm that comes only with the wisdom of age. Her expression is often contemplative, her eyes lost in a fixed point, somewhere in the distance, where the present intertwines with the past. Yet, when she smiles, her face lights up, and for a moment, years of hardships seem to fall away, revealing the woman she once was, though those moments are rare.\n On her bedside table lay the books the staff brought her, hoping to ease the torture of daily life. Among volumes of poetry, historical novels, and philosophy treatises, Ana found an old book about the heroes of the Romanian people. Her hands trembled with emotion as she opened the book, each page seeming to whisper stories of courage and sacrifice. Although the life described in the books was familiar to her, memory did not allow her to unleash the wave of memories. As Ana leafed through the pages of the book about the heroes of the Romanian people, with hands trembling slightly, a thin corner of paper slipped from between the pages and landed softly in her lap. It was an old photograph, its edges yellowed by the unforgiving passage of time, and the image slightly faded from hands that may have caressed it too often, seeking consolation in memories.\n With an uncertain hand, she picked up the photograph, bringing it closer to her eyes that saw the world only in the shadows of the past. In the image was Alin, standing proud and upright with the \"Crown of Romania with Sword\" shining on his chest. On the back of the photograph was written a dedication \"For my Ana, keep this memory of our eternal love, until destiny reunites us again! With eternal love, Alin\". For Ana, time stopped, and the photograph became the portal to the past, to the moment when the light became darkened by waves of bombs dropped over Constanta, to the constant feeling of separation from Alin, to the reality where death seemed more real, and life seemed an illusion. She began to hear the infernal noise of the explosions, the sound of buildings collapsing like sandcastles under the merciless power of the bombs, the desperate cries of people seeking shelter. She could not stop the chaos of her mind, and everything seemed so clear. The pain and despair she had packed and hidden so deeply in her soul burst into an uncontrollable whirlwind of emotions. The discovery of the photograph, far from bringing a drop of relief, unleashed in Ana a storm of feelings she could no longer manage. It was as if seeing Alin broke the last chains of patience and hope.\n In the days that followed, Ana was seen wandering the corridors of the asylum, the photograph always in hand, murmuring unintelligible words, a repetition of the past that gave her no peace. The staff, accustomed to her fluctuating states, noticed a profound change, a total loss in the abyss of her own mind, a journey with no return into the depths of despair.\n One evening, with the sky enveloped in a reddish twilight, Ana was found in the garden of the asylum, staring fixedly towards the horizon, where the sun bid farewell, leaving behind the promise of a new day. She had the photograph in hand and, for a moment, smiled, a sad smile full of longing and regret.\n In the morning, when she was discovered, stiff in the cold of the night, with the photograph clutched to her chest, her peaceful expression contrasted with the violence of the inner storm that had gnawed at her existence. Her death marked the end of a life tormented by the memories of a war that stole everything - past, present, and future.\n Ana never found the way back to the light, and the discovery of Alin's photograph was paradoxically both a balm and a poison for her troubled soul. She died as she had lived in the last years - alone, in a world that could not or did not know how to heal her.\n In the tumult of the war, fate chose an abrupt and tragic end for Alin, far from Ana and the promises they had made to each other. He died on an anonymous battlefield, on a day that seemed to blend with all the others, marked by chaos and violence.\n The confrontation was violent and unforgiving. Enemy artillery opened fire, and the surrounding terrain quickly became an inferno of churned earth and smoke. In the midst of this chaos, Alin fought bravely, thinking of Ana and their common dream of living in peace.\nIn a moment of ephemeral respite, a sudden and close explosion threw Alin to the ground, robbing him of his breath. In his last moments, his thoughts flew to Ana, to her smile that illuminated even the darkest moments of his existence. In that fraction of a second, before darkness swallowed him, Alin felt a profound peace, knowing that their love would transcend time and space.\nIn Ana's memory, the asylum garden now hosts a small monument, a marble plaque that simply reads: \"Ana - a victim of war, love, and forgetfulness.\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: E. Nigma\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1089\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about a character who wakes up in space." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "An alarm was going off. I awoke with a start as I sat up in my bed. The alarm was coming from a small box on the stool beside me. I reached over and turned it off and took a look at my surroundings. I was in a small room that was chromatic in appearance and seemed spotlessly clean. There were no windows and no door to be seen. Aside from the stool next to my bed which held the alarm clock, the only other things in this room were a mirror, and a calendar hung on the wall. I stood up out of bed and stretched. I looked in the mirror, then moved along the walls of my small enclosure and was able to confirm that there in fact was seemingly no way in or out of this room; so how did I end up in here? I was so hungry and so thirsty, so I ate dates from the calendar and drank from the springs of my bed.\n I turned to again face the mirror on the wall. There I see what I saw, and I took the saw. I then moved the alarm clock off the stool and sawed the stool in half. I took both halves of the stool and put them together to make a whole. I climbed through the hole.\n On the other side of the hole is where I found a door. It was large and, like most everything else I found so far, was made of metal. I tried the handle of the door but it didn’t budge. There was a panel above the handle which displayed a rectangular screen and a keypad. The screen showed a long list of number pairs where the far left side of the pairs was quickly counting higher with the seconds, but the numbers moved slower and slower as my eyes moved to the right of the screen. There were letters underneath each pair of numbers, which read, “S, M, H, D, W, M, _” with a blank spot at the end. I looked at the keypad and pressed “Y,” and the door gently swung open before me. I stepped through the doorway and entered a much larger room. On the wall, there was a wide oval-shaped window. I peered outside and gasped in surprise – I was looking at the planet Earth as it levitated so peacefully in the vast openness of space. I saw a plaque above the window which read, “The eyes of the world are upon you.”\n I looked back out the window from the plaque and saw that instead of the earth as it was before, I was now looking at one large human eye in a sea of black staring back at me. I looked back up at the plaque, and this had changed too. It now reads, “I am the first in the world, but not in a word.”\n “One,” I say allowed.\n As I said this, another alarm goes off. Everything around me turns red, and I realize that the airlock is about to open and send me defenseless into the vacuum of space. I frantically search my surroundings for a way to escape, and that is when I look up and see a space suit hanging on the ceiling. I tried jumping forward to reach it, but I felt like I weighed a ton; though backward, I was not. I took a step back and became weightless. I floated to the ceiling and put the suit on just in time before I was sucked into the openness of space. There I drifted through the endless without name, or number, or sound. I have become the beginning of the end and the end of time and space. I am essential to creation, and I surround every place. There I learned that my name is E.\n A voice crackled in my space suit, saying, “Find the eighty-seventh planet,” so I looked out among the stars and saw that they shone in the patterns of another sequence of numbers. I saw 16, 06, 68, 88, and 98. Before long, I realized that I had been floating upside down, so I drifted in between 88 and 98. There I found the eighty-seventh planet and descended.\n As I landed on the surface, I found a building that I recognized, though I could not remember from where. I wanted to get into this building but was held up by two doors – both of which had a guard in front of it. I approached the guard on the left and asked him, “Which door will the other one tell me leads safely inside?” I chose the opposite door for the answer given to me.\n I woke up again. Now I am surrounded by people I recognize, and I remember what that building was that I entered in that dream – it was where I work.\n My boss is leaning over me. “Colonel, how do you feel?”\n I slowly sit up, rubbing my head as I do so. “I… Okay, I think. What happened?”\n “It will take you some time to recover fully – Colonel, you just underwent a simulation of sorts. Do you remember why you’re here?”\n I thought about this for a moment. I shook my head. My boss explained, “The simulation you experienced had a very unique kind of programming. You were to be placed alone in a space station, but that’s where the specifics stop – the rest of the program was up to your own imagination to piece together.”\n It was all starting to come back to me. “I’m… I’m going to go up there, aren’t I? And it’s going to just be me up there.”\n My boss nodded, saying, “That’s right. This simulation was to see how well your mental state can handle being in a situation like that for such a period of time. Judging by your readings of this test…” he sighed, then continued, “They’re very interesting. Not concerning in any way, just … Interesting. So we think you’re ready, but the question is – do you feel ready, Colonel?”\n I leaned back again onto the bed, a smile spread slowly across my face. Though my eyes were looking at the ceiling, my thoughts were somewhere else entirely. I was reminded of Neil Armstrong’s first words on the moon as I said out loud, more to myself than to anyone else around, “I’m ready. After all, the more I take, the more I leave behind.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Bird Shelf\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1020\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story with a strong sense of place. How is the setting of your world the same as, but different to, our own?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Magda rubbed her huge belly as she looked out the round window of her apartment. Well, fuck it, she muttered when she saw the unscathed birdseed on the clear shelf. She looked across at Technon House, a veritable aviary of birdlife flitted around the thousands of apartment windows. Same seed, same seed shelves as her’s. Try not to take that one personally.\nShe jabbed at the Murphy button beside her bed petulantly and as her bedroom folded up, crumbs on the kitchen floor were revealed. Dinner muffin from the night before. She gathered some up in a pregnant squat, no mean feat, walked to the window, pretended to grab more seeds, pushed the glass aside and sprinkled the contraband on the shelf. \nThe far wall of her kitchen had a smart-dumbwaiter; a microwave-shaped machine that produced her daily requirements when she required them, even before she knew she required them. Even when she didn’t require them. Her sludgy green smoothie arrived chilled with two printed notes. An e-card from Jen, a friend who had barely been able to make eye contact with her for almost nine months. A friend who had tried to belittle Magda’s plans, talk sense into Magda as she had called it. Callous cow. An apologetically cutesy baby crib adorned the front of the card and something about how brave Magda was and how excited Jen was to meet the new arrival written on the inside. Neither was true. Magda put it back in the dumbwaiter, where all the rubbish went. \nThe other was the day’s schedule. She hastily scanned to the most important part. 3:30; Outdoors. Her heart squeezed and leapt. It had been weeks since she had the 3:30 slot. She closed her eyes to relive the moment. The gurning baby, contorting his face with every range of emotion as the buses slowed in front of him and dozens of adult faces gazed out and screwed up dementedly to get his attention. Magda’s was one of them. Probably more demented than the others, and that’s saying something. The mother, a real mother, clapped her hands jealously to regain the baby’s attention. She looked expensively ethereal, serving her obligation to keep the plebs’ morale up by allowing them tantalisingly close to what they’ll never have. Three women stood nearby, the only people within radius ignoring the duo. The Corporattis’ minders no doubt. Billionaire-sitters. The memory had become a treat for Magda, something she’d dip into from time to time when things were tough. That baby’s face. She tried not to think about it too much, as if the memory had a finite amount of viewings available to her. But, now she could use it up. Now she could waste the memory, because in a few hours it would be replaced by a fresh new one. Oh joy. \nMagda sipped on her smoothie, gazed out at those distant fucking birds and rubbed her rubbery belly. She imagined that gurning baby inside her own tummy and attempted to smile ethereally. \nAs soon as she finished her smoothie, she felt the pain, sudden and overwhelming. Not mental pain, as usual, but physical. An explosion. It started in her back, searing waves of heat and pressure, right down to her anus. Her eyes darted back to the schedule. 8am; Green smoothie. 8:15; Labour. 8:30; Birth. 9:00; Maternity leave. 10:00; Work. 1:30; Lunch… And so on. \n8:15; labour. Well, fuck. \nHer nipples stung, steely and cold. Her pelvis felt as though it was being crushed. Everything ached, everything. This, of course, was how it should be, this was the plan. This is what Magda had signed up for, literally. This is what happens when you drink a cocktail of what are basically pro-psychotics that are about to enable your brain to feel every single inch of childbirth. \n Midwife entered her apartment dressed in a polyester blend tunic and plastic shoes. She walked straight to the bathroom without looking at Magda and started unpacking items that tinkled gently against the ceramic sink. She called out absentmindedly, You’ll have to do it in here, with a lilt that suggested she was chewing gum. \nThe pain volted through Magda’s seizing body. Sounds howled from her throat. She felt parts of her body she’d never known existed catch fire in a vice. Her womb, her cervix, her vagina, her crotch.\nMidwife lazily raised her voice; Come on now, in you come. And a triple pop of gum bubbles against her teeth. \nMagda attempted a step but fell to the ground, guttural noises that seemed to start in her knees, cramp through her body and tear out her throat. She crawled, attempted to crawl, dragging her knees and collapsed.\nAh now, that’s a bit dramatic is it? Hello? Hello? Can you hear me? Ah jesus. Another gum poop.\nMagda woke up in her bed. Midwife was hovering by the door, her coat folded over her arm. She said lazily, Okay, so it’s not normally that bad but they do some of them like that, to be more realistic I suppose. You didn’t get the whole experience, I had to turn it off, but from the looks of you you didn’t want it, so. You might get a refund I suppose. Anyway, do you have a name for her?\nPoppy, Magda replied, too exhausted to attempt ethereal. \nOkay, I’d like you to meet Poppy. Congratulations. Midwife was not good at any of this. \nShe plonked a basket on the end of the bed, looked out the window at the birdshelf, went to say something, didn’t bother, turned and walked out the door without another word. \nMagda was afraid to move, the memory of the pain made her afraid to even breathe, but it was all gone. No aches, no stitches, no tears, no engorgement. Efficient, clean, smart. She shuffled closer to the basket. \nThere was a stick with a feather at the end poking out, and a folded blanket. And when she pulled it closer, she saw the tiny ball of tortoiseshell fur. \nHello Poppy, she said, picking up the tiny kitten. Still no birds for you." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Atonement\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1777\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story imagining 'what if' one historic invention had never happened. How would our world be different now?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I. The Threat\nOutside lies dark fields, rags of snow, and an endless void of woods. \nMarcus sits inside a camouflage globe beneath an exquisite penumbra. A gloaming shadow cast between beams of bone-colored moonlight sharply refracts lingering specks of dust and sand that seem to transform into drops of gleaming diamonds.\nHe opens a heart-shaped locket with Iris's picture. \n\"Soon, My love. I'm on my way.\"\nMarcus injects a viscous bronze liquid to regulate his vitals. He consumes his ration, disengages the shield, and departs.\nA place no one will ever observe again.\nExpired humans and androids alike litter a clearing coated in vellum-like whitewashed earth. \nThe putrescent holocaust makes his eyes water. \nAlthough battery life quickly diminishes, he must simulate the social interaction time required by law. \nJoseph’s tender voice awakens the memory of a prodigal inventor, nurturing father, and deferential friend.\n“Prohibiting marriage maintains population control. After the Third War, The One declared it necessary only to allow certain individuals to breed and prevent all unmonitored engagements.”\n\"So why not make it permissible with further monitored regulations?\"\n“Rulers tried for thousands of years. They called it taxation. The One must be the only authority. When currency collapsed, there remained one threat.”\n“Marriage?”\n“More than that, son. What it represents is love—true love—sacrifice for another. The One has yet to develop the final algorithm for harnessing this force. It simply cannot allow the bond you and Iris have. Marcus, it is time to pause transmission.”\n“Joseph, I love you. I wish you were still here with me.”\n“I love you too, son. Always will.”\n“You said I’d see you again. When?”\n“Not now, son. Later.”\nII. The One\nMarcus pauses on a low rise above a bustling plaza, assessing a checkpoint.\nThe neighboring region from the west has begun its celestial transition. \nAs it lays wreaths of blood-red clouds, he knows the programmed climate ahead won't be far behind.\nMarcus meanders down a narrow, sandy road. \nThe One's drones rise like fugitives from a majestic fire at the earth's end. Perennial flames cut through the wind, and a shroud of embers darkens and eviscerates everything outside installed borders.\nFarther along, he meets an android cluster pulling a cart loaded with corpses. \nA holographic emblem of The One emanates from the cart's rear gate, and a diarized list of rules blares from a loudspeaker for all to hear.\n\"Consume dividends at registered times. Obey all mandatory social interactions. Integrate necessary compounds as prescribed. Check in routinely at your assigned post. All breaches are punishable by immediate expiration. The One grants you a happy day.\"\nThe robots march in a steady cadence.\nMarcus slips in among others in the crowd, adopting their manners and movements, pleased his presence has gone unnoticed.\nHe proceeds to stride further into the sector and towards the tower of homepods. \nThe gigantic dome reaches the heavens beyond sight.\nMarcus drops a blue marble to the ground, tracking it until it settles. At his touch, the camouflaged globe activates.\nAn ethereal force suddenly makes his vision blur.\nMarcus collapses and fades in and out of consciousness.\nThe chimerical entity initially crawls through the air like smoke, and he is blinded until bedrifted splashes of pigment press against his temples like cold, dead hands.\nAs his heart slows, he can see veiny splashes of fire.\nSomething whispers.\n\"There, there, Marcus. No need to hide any longer. Don't worry about a thing. The One has been watching you for some time. It’s waiting. Hail its mighty power.”\nMarcus does not recall what had taken hold of him when he wakes to a cold violet light projecting irregular flakes from the stacked tower beyond. The snow nestles upon hovering drones and coats everything in a pale frosting. \nCrisp wafers settle on his lashes, hardening immediately to ice. An elaborate halo of white lattice surrounds him like a partially constructed igloo.\nHe injects the maximum dosage of endotoxins, evolocumab, and adrenaline. The sudden increase in epinephrine levels may trigger hypothermia or burst a coronary artery, but he neglects the worry, sprinting forward.\n\"Love. Sacrifice. Unity.\"\nHe repeats the words with every stride.\nIII. The Union\n\"Iris, it's me, Marcus.\"\nHe kisses her ear.\n\"Marcus?\"\n\"Iris, we need to go right now. I'll explain everything later.\"\n\"Marcus, wait. We can't.\" \n\"Iris, we have to leave. Now.\"\n\"Things have changed. Everything is different now.\"\nA steady pattern of raindrops aggressively collides with the window and disappears into the vivid miasma beyond.\n\"Iris?\"\n\"Marcus, you need to go.\"\n\"Why?\"\n\"I was selected…\"\nNight suddenly becomes day.\nA spectacle of sunlight floods everything. \n\"But when?\"\n\"They are here. Please. Leave.\"\n\"Iris, I will not. Not without you.\"\n\"They know, Marcus. You. Joseph. Everything\"\nIris casts her eyes downward.\n\"The One knows everything.\"\n\"How? Joseph planned every detail. There is no way they could know.\"\n\"The One controls the entire mainframe. Joseph's work was hacked long ago and allowed to progress as soon as he surpassed everything It could not.\"\n\"How far along?\"\n\"It's a boy. He's been born. You are his father, Marcus.\"\n\"But how?\"\n\"The One preserves all human codes. You were deemed the necessary complement.\"\n\"So, why did they allow me to come all this way if he's already born?\"\n\"Because they knew you had Joseph's work and that you'd bring it to them. The One wants confirmation of one final variable that cannot be reproduced or predicted.\"\n\"I don't understand. They had Joseph's work. He proved and confirmed everything.\"\n\"Even Joseph knew there was one final truth that would not be discovered without putting everything into your hands.\"\n\"But why?\"\n\"To observe the action of sacrificial love. To allow and segregate unions in the future until they could integrate the algorithm into implanted hardware. Only then can humanity reach its maximum potential. Only then can The One commence the complete extinction of the human race.\"\n\"But why? There would be nobody left for implant or control!?\"\n\"It would not matter at that point. What is The One other than an evolving code isolated at a certain location and maintained by a class higher than the rest?\"\nIris begins to writhe in pain and sweat uncontrollably. \nHer pupils dilate, and she screams. \n\"Iris?\"\nHer convulsions cease.\n\"Marcus, what they want is to finally…\"\nAgain, her body convulses, tenses, and then relaxes. \n\"…become God. What is ultimate power and control other than a single entity that can create and destroy?\"\nThe affliction possesses her again, then releases her.\n\"Marcus, go! Don't give it what it wants!… Dammit, leave me. Now! Don't make me watch!\" \n\"What, my love?\"\nIris begins to levitate slowly. \nShe flails, floating upwards.\n“Please, Marcus…I…can’t…watch…you…expire….”\nHer body lifts higher, and she nearly touches the ceiling.\nIV. The Judgment\nThe door opens.\nFive men enter in elaborate uniforms.\nThe leader is distinct from his followers. He is garbed in shimmering medallions and gems, and a chromatic rainbow of ropes and tassels animates and sways like Medusa's enchanting mane.\n\"Hail The One. Bring her down now. Slowly,\" he says. \n\"Iris!\"\n\"I'm General Herod. I'm the first messenger beneath The One. I'm here to conclude and mediate on behalf of Its command. Marcus, you are free now. You can leave. It appears Iris is very unwell.\"\n\"Iris!\"\nMarcus cradles her head and pulls her close.\n\"They already have our son, Marcus. We are both going to expire now. Don’t give It what It wants…\"\nHerod clears his throat.\n\"Marcus, if you walk out of here, you both live. You have my word. The One has already agreed to all conditions and terms.\"\n\"Iris, look at me…\"\n\"Okay, okay, let's go now. Marcus, stand up and walk away. You will both be immediately taken care of. We can move on as if nothing ever happened. Perhaps The One might even allow a follow-up to this rather heartwarming social interaction.\" \n\"Iris! Oh God, oh God! Please no…\"\nHerod stops and caresses the tassels slithering between his fingers. He drops them in frustration.\n“Always so confused when I hear a mortal say God. What does that even mean?”\nHerod titters.\n“Ten seconds to decide.\"\n\"We are both dead, my love,\" mutters Iris. \"Go. Run. It's the only thing you can do. You can see me whenever you like. The locket… I am always with you…\"\nHerod stamped his foot.\n\"This is exhausting.\"\nV. The Sacrifice\nAfter holstering their weapons, two of the four men flank from behind and pull Marcus away.\n\"The One sets you free, Marcus,\" Herod says. \"The One grants you a happy day. Expire her now.\"\nAs if they follow a particular sequence of choreographed actions, Marcus falls on the floor after being dropped, and the soldiers that had detained him moments before move soundless and erect. \nThey plant themselves like statues, one on each side of the doorframe.\n\"Hail The One!\" Exclaims Herod. \"Its final wishes commence in 3-2-1…\"\nGeneral Herod robotically touches the heels of his black boots together and keeps his legs straight without stiffening or locking at the knees. His hips, back, and chest rise as his spine freezes with a slight arch. \nLike a frantic child, Marcus desperately rushes back to Iris.\n\"Just take me! Please! Take me! Let her live…\"\nMarcus leans and kisses her on the forehead. He runs his fingers through her hair.\n\"Forever, my love. Iris, I am here…. I will never leave you… I shall love you forever.\"\n\"Proceed with expiration, but only the man. The revival team is on standby for the woman. Make this quick.\"\nHerod transitions to a posture of ease and exits the room.\nMarcus gently rocks Iris back and forth in his trembling arms.\n\"I'm here, Iris. I’m not going anywhere. Now, close your eyes. Keep them closed. I love you.”\nMarcus's head jerks backward from a hand that clenches a fistful of hair. His neck bends and stretches as he stares upwards. \nHis Adam's apple nearly pops from his veiny neck. \nA smooth and cold barrel plants below his brow line between his nose and snot-soaked top lip. \nA peculiar and nearly undetectable huff instantly marks two diminutive, symmetrically round holes on the front and back of Marcus's head. \nHis body freezes.\nA minuscule plume rises and dissipates from beneath his occipital bone. \nThe clenched hand tenderly returns Marcus’s head so that his billowing and lifeless glare faces Iris.\nHe slumps to the floor.\nTiny crimson spots on both sides of his skull emit caliginous bursts of blood that gather into a somber pool like a shallow pillow where he now rests. \nFrom the hallway, Iris hears them exclaim in unison.\n\"Hail The One!\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Ted's 'Robber Gull'\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1392\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story on a sailboat, large or small, and entirely at the mercy of the winds." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "This story is about a teenager. Today it would be unheard of to let a boy of fifteen to take a boat out for an extended trip of four or five days in the open ocean.\nTed sailed past a small Island about late morning. It seemed deserted with its cliffs plunging into the sea. He counted three kinds of birds all nesting in the cliffs. He lashed his ruder and went below to get some fried fish and potatoes. He came up on deck and saw a sea gull. He throws small pieces of fish up for the gull to catch. It soon turned into a flock of gulls. He had always been interested in the way birds fly. It was fun to get such a close-up view of them. As he was holding his last piece of fish intending to eat it, an enterprising bird swooped down, and snatched it out of his hand. It startled him and made him laugh. He realized he needed to pay attention, for the reef off the end of the Island was coming up. He altered his course and trimmed his sails to go around it. He studied his charts and decided on another course change.\nIn the late afternoon he had to tack his way into a large harbor and tie up at the Harbor master’s dock. The Harbor Master looks like he had lived all his life at sea. What saved Ted was he had a soft spot for young men trying to prove themselves. The Harbor Master requested permission to board. Ted formally granted it with a salute. His ship was inspected top to bottom. The harbor Master was impressed with its ship shape condition. He opened every hatch and checked every cubby. He picked up a key on a shelf above the sink. He went out to a locked hatch and opened it. It was an empty water cistern for the kitchen. He asked Ted if he wanted water in it. Ted enthusiastically said, \"yes\". The harbor master went below and laid back all the floorboards that ran down the center.\n“Ted, do you know what this boat was built for?”\n“Pleasure sailing?”\n“No. It is a small deep-sea boat good for smuggling.”\nTed wanted to know why he knew this. It was explained to him in detail. Ted was fascinated with the explanation and asked many questions. This put the Harbor Master at ease, and he did not question the condition of Ted’s fake papers. He did notice the boat had never been named or a harbor of origin. Ted decided on ‘Robber Gull.’ The harbor master found Missy’s picture. He learned more about her and Rooff than he needed to know. The information was useless to him. In the end he charged Ted for the water, a real mariner’s chart of the lower islands and wine to christen his boat with. Ted paid for this out of his loose change. He went back to his cabin to chop one of his smallest gold coins in quarters. He paid for the buoy hook up with this. His change wouldn’t all fit in his change belt. He tipped the Harbor Master well with what was left over.\nHe pulled up the anchor at his bow and let the boat gently drift around the buoy. Ted knew he was taken after he got a look at the other side of the buoy. It had the owner’s boat name on it.\nThe harbor master had helped him with a new map and some of the symbols and tips of how to get to his next overnight stay and how to best enter Uer Mouth Harbor. He was advised to get supplies in his galley for there were no facilities on the island he was heading for. He bought his supplies from a market launch. Among the miscellaneous items was a harmonica and towels. He found the prices were reasonable. He figured he had been over charged most of his journey. Except for the boat, it was a good deal. Oh well, Rooff had been generous. In two nights, he would be sleeping in Uer Mouth.\nThe voices of the fishermen woke him, he manages to sail out with them, and a hot breakfast. As he passes the Harbor master’s house he plays ‘A Pirates Life is for me’ on his harmonica and gives him the bird. The man laughs and hopes he doesn’t get in too much trouble in school.\nAs the harbor master had warned him, he could pass the little Island he was headed for without knowing it. He almost did. The currant and wind had carried him off course. It was just barely visible. He would have a lot of tacking to do, and it would not be the best way he was told to approach it.\nThe clouds on the horizon flash, the sea develops white caps, and the wind blows steadily. He was exhausted by the time he anchored in the little bay. He double checked his anchors. He cooked the little fish he had caught earlier in the day and put in some vegetables and had a tasty soup. That night the storm hit and kept him awake with worry; the thunder did not help. He had never been in a boat when it stormed. The next morning it was still raining. He ate and went back to sleep.\nHe woke midday to the gentle lap of water on the hull. He pulled the hatch back and the sun streamed in. The air was fresh. The little bay was beautiful. It was too late to leave for Uer Mouth. He hoped it would be like this in the morning. He had not lowered the little dingy yet. He had seen it done but not done it himself. It was harder than it looked. He throws the ladder over the side, climbs in, and rows the dingy to the sandy beach.\nHe beached the little boat and walked down the deserted shore. It hit him he was alone in the world. No family, his friends were all new friends he did not really know. Rooff seemed to care. He had showered him with money then shoved him out into the big wide world. A depression settled around him and he started to cry. It was more like a large over whelming sob that he felt would last forever. He lay in the warm sand and drifted off to sleep. He felt the water lap at his toes and sat up with a start. The dingy was trying to break free. This got him to leap into action, push and jump into the little dingy and row it back to the boat. The tide had come in.\nThat night he eats his meal in the cabin. He then watched the sun set on the horizon out to sea. He blessed the first star of the night he saw. He watched the purple dome of the sky like a lid open to a myriad of stars. He felt exceedingly small and the world exceptionally large. He felt the cabin close in on him and took his blankets up on deck. He slept well till the light of dawn woke him. The sky was as blue as he hoped this morning. He did not waste time to set sail. The sea was smooth and sparkly. This lasted till noon. The sea got increasingly choppy, and the wind became forceful as the afternoon got on. He did a lot of tacking against the currant. He would rather be above Uer Mouth harbor than below it.\nTed was beginning to despair when in the twilight the two lighthouse beckons came into view.\nHe had lashed the rudder and trimmed his sails to almost nothing. He had tied himself to the boat as he had been taught for rough weather. He did not want to go to Neptune’s Depths.\nThe harbor master saw the “Robber Gull” come into the harbor full speed. Ted became scared he was going too fast and took the hatchet and cut the rudder free. The boom swung around threatening too ripe itself off. Ted had been thrown on the deck and passed out. The boat lurched and spun to a standstill in the calm waters of the harbor." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Button\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2991\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story where time functions differently to our world." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I was late.\n\nThe quad of my high school campus - the central outdoor area of the New York Academy of Arts - was packed with protestors holding handmade signs that screamed TIME IS TIME and NO HURRY NO DELAY in red paint.\n\nI should have expected it; I'd heard on the news that a new and improved version of the Button was about to go on the market, and anytime there was news like that, there would be protests all over the city.\n\nNO HURRY NO DELAY. I shook my head. I did need to hurry. I had an appointment with Amelia Amour. She was a famous actress - two-time Oscar winner, Broadway star, and now, thanks to years of my own hard work, my high school drama professor at NYAA. I couldn’t keep her waiting.\n\nThe day was sunny and bright, but breezy. All the protestors were wearing sweatshirts or jackets. There was no other way across the quad, so I had to wiggle my way through the crowd, muttering “excuse me” repeatedly while they all screamed and shouted their chants.\n\nI could hardly believe any of this was happening. I'd requested an appointment with Amelia weeks ago, telling her I needed thirty minutes to talk to her about my upcoming monologue assignment. Fifteen minutes ago, an e-mail confirmation had popped up in my inbox. It was dumb luck that I was even on campus and able to sprint over to Amelia's office. With everything going on at home, I usually headed for the subway immediately after my last class ended, to be with Mom and Claire and Emmeline and Granddad.\n\nToday, however, I'd succumbed to the begging of my drama friends and agreed to hang around for a coffee after school. Thank God I did, or I never would have seen the e-mail confirmation, never would have been in a position to run like hell and get to Amelia’s office in time to ask her the question I desperately needed to ask.\n\nI was almost at the edge of the crowd when a dude in a flannel button-down and a bubble vest swivelled around suddenly. He was holding his protest sign awkwardly at waist height, and it knocked me to the ground.\n\n“Whoa, I’m sorry,” the dude said, kneeling down to help me. I could read his sign clearly. WE CAN’T STOP TIME, it said.\n\nI scowled at him and pushed his hand away, getting up without assistance and stomping out of the throngs of students.\n\nThey didn’t know anything, the kid protestors with their meaningless chants. They were protesting something they probably didn’t even understand. Not many of us could comprehend the benefit of the Button, and how much we’d someday want desperately to have what it promised - the ability to control time.\n\n*****\n\nWhen new technology emerged, older adults were generally skeptical and a bit annoyed - especially my grandfather. He despised devices like Alexa and Google Home. “Just a new-fangled way to be lazy,” he’d grumble. “And to ruin good music, too.”\n\nNo one - not even Granddad - spoke that way about the Button. Whether they were in awe of it, or thought of it as evil, they still spoke about the invention with reverence. However one might feel about the Button personally, it was an incredible scientific and technological accomplishment, and when people discussed it, they did so with respect.\n\nOf course, we didn’t have one in our apartment - the cramped three-bedroom in Brooklyn where I’d grown up and still lived today. When I was born, there were six of us, but Grandma died when I was two, so for as long as I can remember it’s always been just us five. My grandfather grumbling, my two older sisters bossing me around, and Mom in the background, quietly taking care of us, a smile and a look of wonder ever-present on her face. My mother had a way of helping all of us, even Granddad, to look at the bright side of life, to see the good in each other and in the world. While Granddad grumbled about new technology, she was in awe of it all.\n\n“Can you even imagine?” she’d say when the news talked about the Button.\n\n“Don’t need to imagine,” Granddad would answer. “We’ll never see one of those in this neighhborhood, not in my lifetime - or yours.”\n\nIt was Emmeline who explained to me what he meant - that new technology was never available to people like us, not at first.\n\n“The first CD player cost like a thousand dollars,” she explained. “It was years before regular people like us could afford one and go get it at the store.”\n\nThat was certainly true of the Button. The first few Buttons built were sold for one billion dollars - apiece. Now that they’d been around for over a decade, the price had lowered considerably, and you could get one for a million dollars.\n\n“The rich people get most things first,” Emmeline explained. “They pay a ton of money for it and it’s just theirs for a while. Then once newer things come along, the older things are mass marketed and the price goes down. Once the price goes down, people like us can get the thing - usually years later. It’s not as special anymore, but it’s ours then.”\n\n“Why can’t we have it when it’s special?”\n\n“Because we’re not special,” Emmeline said matter-of-factly. Mom hushed her then. Emmeline had a way of telling it like it was, which I appreciated as the youngest child in a house full of grown-ups.\n\nA billion dollars, a million - it could have been a hundred thousand dollars, and it still would have been out of reach. Which didn’t matter a bit to us.\n\nUntil, suddenly, it did.\n\n*****\n\nWhen I burst into her office, Amelia Amour barely acknowledged my arrival. Without looking up, she launched into a speech.\n\n“Well, I received your e-mail, and I do empathize with your circumstances, but I made a policy a long time ago, to never excuse students from their first monologue -”\n\n“I lied,” I said quickly. “I don't need to be excused from the monologue.” I concentrated on keeping my breathing steady, trying not to think about the fact that I'd just lied to one of my childhood heroes, and the only woman who could possibly help my family with our current difficulties.\n\nThe fact that Amelia Amour was even my professor was incredible. Her family had founded NYAA, an elite school for young artists and performers in New York City, and she had taught the introductory drama course for decades. Her name was known around the world, the shelves of her office were lined with golden statuettes, and I had just busted into her space and announced that I had lied to her.\n\nI’d wanted to be an actress ever since I was a small child - done every community theatre performance I could, taken dozens of dance and drama classes, and bought discount tickets to every Broadway show I could get. All that hard work had led, six months ago, to my audition and acceptance to NYAA.\n\nWhich is why I was here - the only person in my family in any kind of position to get my hands on a Button. The only one in my family who had access to a billionaire.\n\n“I don't need to be excused from the assignment,” I said quietly. “I'm sorry I lied. I need the Button.\n\nAmelia’s eyebrows lifted. “My button?”\n\nI shook my head. “Not yours. But I'm gambling on the fact that you probably have more than one. And that one of them, at least, is stowed away in a box somewhere in case you need it someday.”\n\nAmelia Amour was rich enough that I was certain I was right. Claire wasn’t so sure, when I’d revealed my plan to her, but my sisters were always underestimating me - always doubting that I could be right about something they didn’t understand. Emmeline was in her second year of medical school, a brilliant scientist destined for greatness, and Claire was pre-law at NYU.\n\nNeither of them knew celebrities the way I did. I studied stars like Amelia. If Amelia Amour and her family could buy one Button, they could, and would, buy more than one. Everyone knew that the Buttons as they currently existed were single use only - one chance, to either slow down or speed up time at the press of a button. No reuse - no second chances. Who wouldn’t stockpile them if they could?\n\n“I’m also gambling that you’ll forgive me for lying,” I said quietly. “Because the other part of my e-mail was true.”\n\nAmelia nodded, her eyes fixed on my face. She was sixty-seven years old and breathtakingly beautiful. If I could have wished for anything at that moment, it would have been the chance to see my mother at sixty-seven years old, just as beautiful as the woman before me and looking at me with the same kind of focused attention.\n\nThat wish was impossible. All I wanted was what was possible.\n\nAll I wanted was a Button.\n\n“For cash?” she asked. “You want to buy it from me?”\n\nI shook my head. “I don’t have a dime. I’m fourteen years old, ma’am, and I'm going to try to be someone someday. But for now -”\n\n“You want a Button. For free.”\n\nI nodded.\n\nShe stared at me, and I waited - at the mercy of the only millionaire in the world my family could call upon for a favor.\n\n“How long does she have?” Amelia Amour asked me, her voice softening.\n\nI swallowed, hard. Everything had been happening so fast. This was the first time I’d said it out loud. “Six weeks.”\n\n*****\n\nMom got the diagnosis two months ago, and ever since the day she told us, I’ve thought of nothing but the Button - nothing but the chance to slow down the hands of time.\n\nWhen the Button was advertised, exact figures weren’t utilized. The way the invention worked was through a combination of technology and science. The organic materials infused within the Button combined with the individual cells of the person whose hand pressed it, creating the phenomenon of either the acceleration or deceleration of time. Because there seemed to be an element unique to the person involved, the numbers weren’t exact, but the general expectation was that you could speed up time so that a week would feel like a day, and vice versa - a day could be slowed down so that it felt like it was seven days long.\n\nNothing changed for the rest of the world when one person used the Button - the change that occurred was internal. That was why some protestors - and my grandfather - compared it to drugs.\n\n“But Granddad, it’s all natural,” Claire protested whenever he started ranting and raving about the Button being a new opioid. “It’s not addictive, and it doesn’t alter your body permanently at all.”\n\n“So they say,” Granddad said roughly.\n\n“You wouldn’t have used it, Granddad?” I asked. “When Granny was sick?”\n\nThat surprised him. He didn’t answer right away, and I felt a little guilty for having asked the question.\n\nMy grandmother had died of pancreatic cancer. I had no memories of her illness, but Emmeline did, and what she remembered was Granny being in inexcrutiating pain with little relief. For months, she suffered, with Mom and Granddad taking care of her round the clock and doing anything they could think of to make her comfortable to absolutely no avail.\n\n“For me, or for her?” Granddad finally replied. No one answered him, and I never brought it up with him again.\n\n*****\n\nI ran the three flights of stairs up to our apartment, elated in a way I had never been before. I was the youngest, in all the ways. I was never the one who came through for the family.\n\nAmelia had lost her own mother last year, which was one of the things I figured would help my cause. It was the reason I told her the truth instead of trying to make up a sympathetic story. Was there any daughter on Earth who wouldn’t relate to what I was going through - losing my mother, and wishing desperately to keep her with me for longer?\n\nShe had an extra Button stowed away on the top shelf of a closet in her office. She retrieved it for me and placed it in a bag for me to transport home on the subway.\n\n“Do you know which -” Amelia Amour started to ask me as she handed it to me. I never heard her question in its entirety. I was already backing out of the office, ready to get home to my family with my news - and the Button.\n\nThey were in Mom's room when I burst into the apartment. Emmeline and Claire got to their feet when I ran into the room.\n\n“I got it,” I told them.\n\nClaire began to cry. Emmeline nodded at me, as if she’d been expecting the news. “Good job, little sister,” she said, holding out her hand.\n\nI passed her the small cloth gift bag in which Amelia Amour had placed the Button. I might have secured the item our family needed, but it was understood by all that Emmeline would now take the lead, as she always did.\n\nThe Button was designed simply; you’d never know how powerful it was by looking at it. It was all white, about the length and width of a sheet of looseleaf paper, with the thickness of a mobile phone. There was a dial at the top - that was where you set the speed of time you wanted to experience. At the center was a smooth, wide open area where you would place your hand and press down gently. Once you did that, the rate at which you experienced time would immediately change, or so we’d all been told.\n\nEmmeline moved expertly, almost as if she’d installed a Button previously. Claire had wiped away her tears and was watching Emmeline closely. So was I. That was why I immediately noticed when she made a mistake.\n\nIt was so unlike her that it took me a moment to respond.\n\n“Emmeline!”\n\nShe turned to look at me over her shoulder. “We don’t have to do it right now, Anna. I just want to have it ready for when Mom wakes up.”\n\nI nodded. “That’s fine. But you have it wrong.”\n\nAll three of us looked at the dial, which Emmeline had set, incorrectly, to speed up time. If Mom used the Button without correcting it, she would experience the next six weeks - the time she had left - as six days.\n\nIt was a mistake.\n\nYet Emmeline didn’t make mistakes, and as my two sisters shifted their gazes from the Button to my face, I realized that we were experiencing a horrible misunderstanding.\n\nEmmeline and Claire didn’t want the Button to slow down Mom’s time left with us.\n\nThey wanted to speed it up.\n\n*****\n\nIt was as if time froze the moment Emmeline stepped away from the Button. They continued to stare at me, and I stared right back.\n\n“Anna -”\n\n“No,” I said sharply. “You have it wrong. You can’t do it.”\n\n“She’s in pain, Anna,” Claire said softly. “Just look at her.”\n\nI didn’t want to look at her. I had barely looked at Mom for days. The diagnosis was pancreatic cancer - same as Granny, except it was already Stage 4. She’d lost a lot of weight, and her skin was pale with tints of yellow. She napped constantly, which was the most unsettling thing; Mom at her healthiest was always moving, cooking, hugging, tidying. Now she was still, and almost always whimpering. Her back ached, she said, and it was incredibly difficult for her to get comfortable.\n\nIt was all the more difficult because we’d seen this before.\n\nMom and Granddad had cared for my grandmother for months - soothed her, read to her, adminstered medication that did little to ease her pain. I understood my sisters’ impulse to want to speed up Mom’s experience - less time should mean less pain, and no one would ever want someone they loved to suffer. Not if they could make the time - and the pain - go by quicker.\n\nI couldn’t remember another time in my life when I'd disagreed with my sisters about something that actually mattered. I steeled myself for the argument of my life, with an aspiring litigator and a sister who was unaccustomed to being wrong.\n\n“Seems like rather than arguing amongst yourselves, you should just ask her.”\n\nThe three of us looked over toward the doorway. Granddad was leaning against the door frame. He was as healthy and strong as he’d ever been, but he seemed smaller just then - like he wasn’t standing as tall as he usually was. Mom was his only child, and she was slipping away.\n\n“Granddad, I’m sorry,” I said. “I know you don’t like the Button -”\n\nHe waved my words away. “Kathleen!” he said sharply. “Wake up.”\n\nMy mother’s eyes opened slowly. I wondered if she’d heard anything we said so far. She looked at each of us, her three daughters, a small smile on her face. Then we watched as her eyes wandered over to the Button and lit up; I felt proud when I saw that.\n\nShe squinted. “Emmeline?”\n\n\"Yes, Mom?\" Emmeline stepped closer to her, and Claire and I leaned in as well.\n\n“You have it set wrong,” my mother said.\n\nMy sisters looked at me immediately, but I kept my eyes on Mom, who looked at me and smiled.\n\n“I’m ready,” she said. “Slow it down.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Black Places.\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1656\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story imagining 'what if' one historic invention had never happened. How would our world be different now?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Farne Islands are black places. Most places in the North Sea are. From their black cliffs a small fishing boat travels precariously between the rocks in the local harbour to Inner Farne on the near horizon. Around the boat, little black specs tornado in unison, their wings silhouetted against a thick sky.\n\nThe boat eventually finds it’s mooring and a woman comes into view, her long blond plait falls from under two hats pulled low to her face. A seal breaks the water to watch the newcomer, buoyed in the angry water like it’s riding a wave machine at a kid’s amusement park. They lock eyes for a moment and the seal gets bored.\n\nThe woman empties the boat carefully of food rations and equipment, though obviously not enough for a long stay. She stops and looks longingly at the boat for a moment, leaving a box of wires and a phone still in the dingy. Without hesitation she unwraps the rope keeping the boat moored and sets it free unpiloted. The sea takes it slowly at first, as if checking she means to let it go on purpose. The rope slips away and her only way of escape disappears quickly and vanishes to the black. The seal reappears looking visibly confused.\n\nHer job to be done is simple but important. Bird flu ripped through the local population on the small island, meaning no puffin, shag, turn or razorbill was safe. They had no respite from the disease, no technology to turn to for help. She felt she owed it to them; an exchange for her life where money could, and had, bought an easy life.\n\nThe wind on the Island grabs jealously she walks up to the tower at the top of the black cliff edge. She’s never been inside but has seen the tower many times from the shore, it’s weather worn stones have seen Vikings, Christians, chavs, but yet it remains just so. Her hands begin to unpack rations whilst her mind is still with Max and Alex and Nicky in the city. Home comforts were gone; no cashmere, no Instagram. Only sheepskin rugs from the Northumberland mainland offer any respite; the smell of salt and smoke holds deep into the woven tapestry of the place.\n\nOn one side of the room sits a desk, it’s screens and monitors and radios cast an unnatural blue hue over the ancient stonework. At it’s side lays what appears to be two sunbeds from circa 1994. They wait with their silvery lids open wide, invitingly clean and ready for use. Where a head would go protrudes a large metal probe, along with a selection of other needles and cables which attach messily to the desk close by.\n\nShe rubs the back of her head. A screwed metal disc aches at the curve of her skull, not used to the severe North Sea cold. As if in response, all the metal plug points on her body itch in unison. Never again will this body be plugged in to charge, to repair, to reset. She shuts the lids on the life support machines so as not to tempt her. The wind rages but she takes the opportunity to begin her daily tasks. Outside the front door to the tower a sign reads ‘ONLY STEP ON THE BOARD WALK, CHECK FOR CHICKS’ and she imagines someone shouting it in her face.\n\nIt is a black place as they said it was. Everything is hard. The rock, the water, the wind. It hurts. But this is what she wants, to repent for a life led with too much good fortune. She walks from one end of the small island to the other. Puffins come and go, their beaks filled with sand eels. Silver scales catch the sun which furiously tries to push through the heavy cloud. Against the patchwork of lichen and heather they flash their red beaks to each other like morse code.\n\nShe still feels sick from the journey. In normal circumstances she would have changed bodies long before the sickness kicked in. It would have simply been put on charge until the system calmed down, she had plenty of spares at home. Her stomach sends out a stabbing pain in response. She ponders what people must have done hundreds of years ago when the tower was built; they must have had some medicinal remedies otherwise the whole population would have been wiped out.\n\nAfter a week on the island, the chores are second nature. Today she counts the puffin burrows to monitor this year’s breeding pairs. The work is manual but not too taxing for a fairly new body of which she is glad she still has. The sick feeling remains and hums deep in her body. Before she gets back to the tower for the evening she doubles over and vomits into the wind. Orange lumps fly out over the black cliffs, illuminated against an angry sky.\n\nShe had never known anyone to be sick, no one had, not since the turn of the century when people still had to endure the frail bodies they were born with. They were taught this stuff in school, how disease was rampant back then but it became irrelevant when technology and Mindscaping were invented. With the ability to move your mind freely from one body to the next, the need to cure disease vanished, modern medicinal products were literally never created. You just discarded the sick like a Primark jumper gone wrong in the wash.\n\nShe remembered the first exotic body she was bought as a youngster. She had decided on an overnight whim to become a ballerina, so her parents had shipped a model in from Russia. It was exquisite, it's porcelain skin was almost see though and bent in ways her other bodies could never manage. Unfortunately, it's feet got mangled and was quickly donated to a family in another town, no point in fixing.\n\nA storm rolls in from the North Sea and the sky quickly changes colour. She knows the drill and quickly pulls the few items gathered outside into the tower and bolts the main door. The kettle wines against the howl outside. She finds her mind slipping in the dark, taking her across the water to Max and Alex and Nicky. She cannot remember how old they are, she can barely remember how old she is, but she imagines them at home, drinking expensive wine and eating cheese. Nicky has a svelte body which she only uses on such occasions. The wine goes too quickly though, and she will sneak off mid evening to change models whilst the first has it’s stomach pumped from the alcohol poisoning.\n\nThe storm outside continues to rage, dark and unruly. Mindscaping meant no one had any repercussions to anything. Sometimes Alex would fight his brother and they’d end up needing new bodies three times a week, hurting her pocket but nothing more. It was a hollow life. Built on an ease that comes only through no hard work, no effort, no strife. They would stay young forever, never experience the pain of loss, of suffering, of heartache. She closes her eyes and sleep takes her, eyes glued together by salt.\n\nOn day 22 she wakes and washes. Her skin is starting to visibly grey but her mind is clearing. She begins another day of counting burrows. A puffin couple closest to the front door of the tower have been named Victoria and Albert, yet she tries to not get attached. Last week she found a puffin chick dead outside it’s burrow and spent the entire day crafting a burial for him as the wind whipped at her face not allowing any tears. As she read the sermon to the sea, a family of puffins perched on the lighthouse wall in silent prayer.\n\nShe walks back having found eight burrows empty when they weren't the day before and falls through the board walk that needs repairing. Her ankle looks wrong and she screams into the wind as pain moves up her leg. She crouches down and lets her body crumple into the acute feeling. Once, her and her friends had snuck into her father's study to try on his models. She slipped into one he had used when he was in the army a long time ago. It was like eating power. Everything moved so easily, it had so much inbuilt skill it scared her. Her ankle bites back in retort.\n\nEvery day she cries. Everyday something dies. It is an emotional battle filled with more highs and lows than she’s cumulatively felt in her long existance. Every day she closes her eyes at night, exhausted by the mental effort of living this somewhat simple life. She begins to acknowledge that the island is black, but the kind of black that is deep and never ending and alive.\n\nOn day 31 Victoria and Albert's chicks fledge. She watches them from the doorstep of the tower and cries loudly. Her pride for them fills the island. Across thousands of miles, across land and sea and everything in between, these birds find each other every year and will do for their entire lives. Every year they continue to fight for each other, no matter the pain.\n\nHer body is slower now as she bends with difficulty to check the burrows across the island. She knew this body had cancer. She had come to the logical end of the road with it and with the shallow life she’d lived until these sweet moments.\n\nOut to the deep depths of the North Sea a white sailing ship peaks through the distant horizon, bathed in what seems like warm light from above. A few seconds later the moment is gone. She smiles.\n\nAfter a time, she walks back to the tower and puts the kettle on to boil. She closes her eyes." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: God-Bald\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1936\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story imagining 'what if' one historic invention had never happened. How would our world be different now?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "He remembered the day God found him and the way God found him. \n\nUnder a storm-bruised sky, he was standing in uniform, shuffling after the mourners. Their voices beat back the thunder as they rose in funerary song (O, Roc, Of The Blackest Cap). The Proclaimer of Grief, a boy not yet twelve, stood with the solemnity of his elders and clashed a pair of cymbals at the door. \n\nThe God-found man did not sing. It was not very becoming of him, but he just moved his lips. He had always been self-conscious of his voice. Should he, at least, have hummed a note? Did he draw too much attention to himself?\n\nIn hindsight, he suspects he was made holy to be punished by Proto Deva, but at the time, he thought little of it. He simply looked at the long black hair caught in his fingers and thought, Huh. \n\nBut once God found him, he was never left alone. His hair came out first in slithering tendrils, and then in great clumps. It fell out when he slept, when it was windy, and when he took a comb to it. His son said, “Just like when we brush the cat.”\n\nIt became harder and harder to hide, and eventually, he was entirely out of vogue. His neighbours began to look at him sideways, attempting to discern if he was mad or simply ugly.\n\nSome people—almost all of them brutish and strange—saw their locks with the swords they use to kill and the knives they use for bread. These people, it is agreed, are terribly unfashionable with their jagged bangs and angled trims. Fortunately, they are also usually poor and can be tucked out of sight, where we cannot hear them say things like “I don’t want my hair to get stuck in gears or wheels and lead to my untimely death.”\n\n“Wretched,” tut the wealthy, who would dare not step out without their hair styled in the fashion du jour. For men today, the thing is to wind the braid up and up in a conical formation, a narrow mountain. For women, braided buns are favoured—the more the merrier, as a symbol of both status and health. For those who identify their gender otherwise, either approach will do, as long as they pull it off.\n\nWhen the sun caught the dome of the God-found man’s head, passersby flinched from the glare. He was a beacon of strangeness and drew the Church like a moth.\n\nBut Proto Deva, called on to summon the God-found man to his people, struggled to understand him.\n\n“You’ve never,” he squinted, confounded, “Partaken in feta?” The God-found man’s diet omitted many Church favourites. “Nor goat?”\n\nThe God-found man confessed awkwardly that he was a vegan.\n\n“What do you mean you’d rather not sing? You attend mass, and I just saw you at the service for—you mouthed the words? God, are you sure this is the one?”\n\nBut he was, and bit by bit, the last of his hair fell away. His wife, in either spiritual or aesthetic agony (the God-found man couldn’t tell; she was very timid now when she kissed the top of his head), said she would weave a scarf of what he’d lost and wear it every day.\n\nProto Deva, whose hair trailed behind him like a cape, and whose wispy beard ended at his groin, was no fonder of the God-found man, but now protective of him. He would rub the God-found man’s head in the Sacred Oil of Glory and force upon him holy literature. They listened to hymns. Even the God-found man agreed some of them were pretty good.\n\nAnd it took time—perhaps more time than it takes most people to accept that they are the one chosen by God—but the God-found man came around. He began to look at his oiled scalp and see, as the scriptures suggested, the moon above in him. At night, when he looked up, he saw himself among the heavens. It was true that he no longer clogged shower drains or went to sleep with wet hair. His arms had not cramped up from braiding, and his mornings were no longer wasted agonizing over fashion. He reflected on his life thus and concluded he had lived it well! He was a dutiful, loving husband who regularly went down on his wife. He was an attentive father to his young son. He had painted some nice, harmless, morally inconsequential art. He had tipped appropriately.\n\nIndeed, perhaps he had lived it so well he was God-found, God-blessed, God-bald.\n\n“You know,” Proto Deva said to him earnestly one day, after they had gorged themselves on God’s word, “What a man like you means to our people. Now you are versed in the scriptures. You were chosen for a reason—and I’m glad you’re able to think of some, because I still don’t get it—and you must go where the devout can see.”\n\nThey prepared him for his debut, a process involving four Protos and a choir. One Proto polished his head until it gleamed, massaging his temples til he was both half-asleep and heavily perfumed with eucalyptus. A second Proto drew squiggly lines in oil down his back, where his hair once lay, before a third Proto robed him in the grim black gown of the Church. The Church recently condemned the straightrazer among Protos, and so the God-found man had kept the hair along his cheek and chin. Proto Deva twisted curls into the coarse hairs with his finger, adding a touch of wax to hold the shape.\n\nFinally, a choir sang From Our Crown to Earth, and off the God-found man and Proto Deva went.\n\n“We’ll start in the Barren.”\n\nOn the furthest edge of town live the lowest caste of craftsman. You will rarely see a fingerman, not unless you are very poor, very daring, or evidently some religious missionary.\n\nFrom a bird’s-eye view, the Barren souk ripples like a sail; their stalls are tarped with thin fabric, and their alleys too. Within these curtained halls are fingermen wares for fingermen prices, fingermen families upon cushions taking coin.\n\nIn the factories, wealthy men feed fingermen scraps. In exchange, they are careful with the textiles they’re given. No one has mastered ripping as the fingermen have. With magnifying spectacles, they hunch over workbenches and make slow, precise tears in the cloth. There is no fabric they cannot master, no material too thick or unwieldy for them to conquer. They wear caps on their thumbs with glass for a nail so they may rupture the skin quicker. Some close their mouths on metal dentures, with a brutal smile to saw and slice at ribbon and twine. \n\nThe fingermen’s cuts are famously exact, but the work is punishing; many leave their jobs with fingers curved like claws, with permanently rounded shoulders, and with fading eyesight, from staring so long at such dainty thread. \n\nMost beautiful things that fingermen have touched are not here. Here, there are corns and small pots and poems and ashtrays, sold by those who can’t labour in the factories: fat-fingered infants, people with bad backs, and the blind.\n\nWhen the God-found man and Proto Deva entered the souk, people mostly ignored them. Proto Deva pushed the God-found man ahead of him in the aisle, urging, “Go, go,” like the God-found man knew where.\n\nThe God-found man walked up to a vendor. She sold pyramids of spices and little beaded lizards for children. “Hello.”\n\n“Can you move that fucking thing? I have the sun in my eyes.”\n\nHe stepped sideways into deeper shade, ducking his head from the afternoon glare. \n\n“Do you want something?”\n\nAwkwardly, he shuffled on the dusty path. “I wondered if you wanted anything from me?”\n\n“Like what?”\n\n“Like answers. To questions like ‘How can I too be lightened of my burdens,’ or something.”\n\n“Nope.”\n\nHe scurried back, “Proto Deva, I don’t think they’re the religious type.”\n\n“Maybe you’re not being holy enough.” Proto Deva raised his voice to the souk, “Do you see this man? He has ascended from his earthly burdens, and now his crown is lightened. He is a model specimen for humankind.”\n\nA fingerman squinted at them down the aisle and heckled, “What are you buying?”\n\nIt took some convincing—and several more uneventful conversations with vendors—before Proto Deva agreed to quit the souk.\n\nAs they took their leave, they passed a boy bleeding into the dirt. Next to him, a mature woman was on her knees, threading the wound. She felt around the dust for a knife, but, finding none, leaned into the gash, which smelled of iron and rot, and tore the suture with her teeth.\n\n“We’ll try the platz,” Proto Deva said officiously, shaking red-stained dust from his hair. “People may try to touch your head. Do not be alarmed. It is thought by some to bring fortune, and I insist that you allow it, should anyone try.”\n\nIn the platz, where there is water for the earth and money for the people, the paths are laboured by flora and gossip. No one immediately attempted to touch the God-found man’s head.\n\n“You—” a woman with two large, braided buns above her ears gasped, but then had to pause to tug her dress free of thorns. There is often a quiet war against bushes, which grow into pathways and press against houses and have, at times, ripped gowns and stolen hats. “You have—”\n\n“Yes,” said Proto Deva proudly, “He is a man of God.”\n\n“No, not that,” the woman stumbled over a vines as she approached. At night, they say, a brigade takes machetes to the bark and hack at the green veins in the road. But it is never enough, and there is always a rich woman or a horse who trips, and then the bored, braided people riot.\n\n“He’s got the strangest head I’ve ever seen.”\n\n“Yes, it’s a sign from Above.”\n\nThe God-found man didn’t feel holy. His head felt cold.\n\n“My, my,” the woman said, putting her hand over her mouth in glee. “It’s hideous.”\n\n“Excuse me!” Proto Deva puffed up, “This outstanding man has been recognised for his goodness. By following his example, we will all be free!”\n\n“Oh dear,” said the woman. “I hope not.”\n\nDefeated, the men slumped outside of an atelier. There was a flood of traffic and a drought of interest. The dress shops are making a killing these days. They’ve discovered how much tidier a hem can be if you fold it inward before stitching. Now, even those who can’t afford fingermen-cut cloth can buy garments without ragged edges.\n\n“Proto Deva,” ventured the God-found man. A rat ran past his shoe. Recently, an idiotic but undeniably handsome gentleman attempted to prove that rodents can be put to work too. For a fortnight, he smeared peanut butter along ribbons where he wanted a cut, then left them on the floor overnight. The result is that the rats are now better dressed than the fingermen.\n\n“Do you think perhaps that perhaps we are misreading this situation? No one but you—and, let’s be real, you’ve been a hard sell—sees my holiness. Perhaps I was not chosen by God to be a leader of men. Perhaps I am only bald.”\n\nProto Deva looked over, affronted. “How can that possibly be? You are blessed with fortune—yes, for, again, inexplicable reasons. If we were not meant to master our hair, to bear our hair, to reconcile our hair … if we were not meant to be burdened thus, God would have given us something to cut it with.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Endless Road of Redemption\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2831\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story where your character is travelling a road that has no end." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My chest was already in spasms, etching their way into my jaw, when I saw her Audi pulling into the driveway. The metallic tang of dread mingled with the taste of blood, a consequence of biting my cheek incessantly. Hoping to wash away the impending apprehension, I quickly swallowed a sip of water that felt obstructed in my throat.\n\n\"Ah, just who I wanted to deal with right now,\" I muttered to my seemingly unsympathetic ceiling. Heather, the self-proclaimed expert on my life, had arrived. In the last 23 years, she's been a front-row spectator to nearly every emotional circus I've hosted. She could read my vibes like a fortune teller reads palms, but today's vibe was a mystery even to me. Out of the blue, this ominous cloud crashed into my emotional well-being. No life-altering events had triggered it—just a sudden, uninvited squall of anxiety.\n\nIn an attempt to evade her notice, I hit the deck and army-crawled across the living room, hoping she wouldn't see me in the bay window.\n\n\"What are you looking for, Rem?\" Heather questioned, swinging the front door open and welcoming herself into my house, only to discover me crawling on the floor like a decapitated caterpillar. I give up.\n\nDespite the gravity of my anxiety, the scene took on an absurd quality—a dark humor that punctuated the heaviness of my emotions. \"What's wrong with you? You've fallen off the face of the earth; you won't return my calls; you haven't been to school all week; you don't even answer the door when I know damn well you're here. I mean, your car's in the driveway.\" Concerned, Heather raised that bushy eyebrow as the wrinkles on her forehead tried their hardest to outwit the Botox. The worry spoke through her glazed eyes, though.\n\nInstead of getting off the floor like a typical person would, I kept slithering around on the shaggy, stanky carpet. I'd rather be a decapitated worm.\n\nThat encouraged her; she set her purse down, slipped her shoes off, straightened her skirt, which didn't make sense, and pitifully kneeled on the floor like she was going to contract meningitis or syphilis if she touched the carpet. The carpet was actually gross. It had been a while since I vacuumed. Too much exertion. It smelled like a wet dog and an old vacuum bag full of skin cells and dust mites. That dank smell.\n\nShe was too close; I could feel her hot breath, and it stung my eyeballs. At least it didn't smell bad. That could be what the sting was—trident spearmint. Or winterfesh.\n\n\"I'm serious, Remster; I'm worried about you.\" An unmistakable tear slid down her face like it was playing Plinko with her freckles. Her chin quivered, and her nostrils twitched, indicating, in fact, that the tears were real.\n\n\"I'll spare you the misery of none of the details 'cause there aren't any. There is no need to join in on my pity party.\" I rolled my eyes again, which momentarily sidetracked my misery and left me pondering if they could actually get stuck in the back of my brain if I did it too much.\n\n\"Jesus, just leave me alone. I don't know what's wrong with me, but you're making it worse.\" I arched into a backbend and stood out of it as every vertebra in my back cracked like those plastic air puffs when you squeezed them.\n\n\"Ya know, whatever stick you have up your ass, you need to pull it out. I'm sick of your pissy attitude. Just tell me what's wrong.\" Heather barked assertively, shocking me. It made me feel a little guilty about how I had been treating her. She was just concerned. I would be for her if the roles were reversed. But everything annoyed me these days, and my tongue seemed quicker than my reflections. As Heather confronted my erratic behavior and struggled to understand the shadows encircling me, a mix of concern and frustration played on her features. She had been my confidante for over two decades, weathering the storms of my emotions. With each dismissive gesture and eye roll from me, her worry intensified. Under the exterior of annoyance, a deep well of love and care for me surfaced, etching lines of concern on her forehead.\n\n\"I just. I'm depressed. I don't know who I am anymore or what the hell my purpose is. I'm lost. Frustrated. Helpless. Scared.\" I snarled with the same combative tone. \"Is that what you want to hear?\"\n\n\"Yes. It is. I want to help. So let me.\" She patted me on the back like a desperate, lost puppy.\n\nOh, Lord, here we go. She will leave if I comply, and I just want this awkward moment over.\n\n\"So, I keep hearing about this endless road deal on my SWB podcast lately. Everyone is talking about how life-changing it is. It's an endless road you walk down that doesn't have,\" Heather started to explain, but I cut that predictable long come-to-Jesus crap short, interrupting,\n\"Ok. Ok. Ok. Whatever you want. I'll go; I'll do it, whatever your great idea is.\"\n\n\"Super, see you at 6 a.m. tomorrow.\" She stated matter-of-factly, grabbing her purse, sliding her shoes on, and leaving just as she entered on a mission.\n\nAt 5:59 a.m., I awoke to the earth-shattering footsteps of a self-proclaimed life coach stomping unnecessarily loudly down my hall. Fricking frack. I am not getting out of this one. I hid under my blankets like a child, hoping the monster under the bed would join me in solidarity.\n\n\"UP! Throw some workout clothes on and sneaks.\"\n\nI continued to hide, not breathing, because that would trick her, right?\n\n\"Hurry up, we gotta go; I want to be there before the sun rises; I heard that's the most transformative time. And it's in Linnendale. I'll make us some coffee and wait in the car.\" Heather said as she ripped the sweaty sheets off my entire bed, leaving me vulnerable and caught.\n\nI sort of hurried. I didn't brush anything; I just couldn't find any motivation. The worrylords crawled through my lower back, trying to work their way up to my heart and head to hold me hostage again as I sluggishly locked the door behind me.\n\n\"So what is this gig anyway?\" I questioned, getting into her car. Now, I'm curious.\n\n\"Like I was saying before, you rudely interrupted me yesterday,\" she said, winking and slurping her coffee. \"On my podcast, they said that according to local folklore, the road was considered a mystical pathway that connected the tangible world with the ethereal realms. It was said to be a transformative journey where you could embark on a quest of self-discovery and spiritual awakening.\" She looked at me to ensure I was listening and proceeded. \"Legend had it that the road was a conduit for ancient energies, carrying whispers of forgotten civilizations and offering a unique experience to those who dared to tread its path. I guess the journey is supposed to be a passage through time and consciousness, revealing hidden truths, confronting inner demons, and ultimately leading to personal growth and enlightenment.\" She looked at me seriously, but her eyes looked like she hadn't convinced herself with that explanation.\n\nWe'll see when we get there. I was having a hard time envisioning what she said. Did I hear that right?\n\n\"Is this a joke? Endless road, huh? This might take a while.\" That was my futile attempt at a joke. I get unfunny when anxious, cueing the worrylords to creep up my spine and squeeze the back of my neck and shoulders. They were relentless today.\n\nWhen we pulled into Linnendale Park, no one was there. No wonder the sun was just starting to rise. Everyone's still sleeping like I want to be.\n\n\"Here we go!\" Heather said, clasping her fanny pack and taking off down the street with no warning, explanation, argument, nothing, nada, zilch. So I begrudgingly followed.\n\nShe was walking at a proper clip when I finally caught up. Then she slowed her roll, thankfully.\n\nIt was a pretty cool road I'd never seen before. There was an energy I could physically feel coursing through my feet and body with every step I took. The golden hour sun had just peeked over the cottonwoods that lined the horizon, casting wicked, cool shadows that seemed to detach themselves from the surroundings, whispering in a different language to me that I somehow understood. These ethereal voices gossiped about old memories, past regrets, and unspoken feelings. At first, it was unsettling, but the shadows forced me to confront buried emotions I'd been suppressing, allowing a cathartic release of a deep, growling sigh that startled me.\n\nAs we continued, ghostly figures appeared intermittently, embodying moments of joy and happiness from my past. They were fleeting and elusive, prompting a shift in my focus towards finding joy as we walked rather than dwelling on the past.\n\nI wondered if Heather was seeing and feeling what I was, but I didn't ask questions because the moment solicited a need for silence. A heavy vibration surrounding me made me feel at ease, almost peaceful and calm. These positive feelings have been foreign to me lately, so I embraced them.\n\nI don't know how long we had been walking, but now I've slid down a rabbit hole of curiosity and contemplation in my mind. Something internal was happening to me. The road seemed to pulsate with an ethereal energy, whispering secrets of forgotten civilizations and promises of self-transcendence. Shit, which I'd never even thought about before.\nEach step opened up a new view, a breathtaking panorama that simultaneously thrilled and humbled me.\n\nAs a layer of apprehension relented, I began to embrace the moment. I felt as carefree and innocent as I had once been as a child. Sparks of hope and imagination had replaced the clutter and burdens obstructing me in my mind. I felt light and free. And dare I say it? Alive.\n\nThe further along the road, the more time became an abstract concept, shifting and bending at will, blurring the boundaries between what was known and what was yet to be discovered. As if days melded into nights and seasons merged into one another. I was caught between reality and dreams, experiencing profound clarity yet sublime confusion. I recalled pivotal moments from my past, which allowed me to reinterpret these events. I felt an overwhelming need to foster forgiveness and acceptance. As the echoes of the past gradually lost their power over the present, they miraculously healed my emotional scars.\n\nAhead, I could see luminous stones scattered along the road, reflecting Heather's emotions. I could feel her sympathy and joy as she silently glided by my side. When I picked up one of the mood stones, vivid memories and emotions surfaced. I began rehashing critical moments from my past. I instantly felt vulnerable, allowing myself to dig deeper into my soul.\n\nLost in contemplation, a mystical veil startled me as it fell before me at one point on the road, reflecting my inner self. Stepping through it, I was confronted with manifestations of my fears and insecurities. I bravely conquered these incarnations and crushed the demons with a strength I was unaware of, which boosted my resilience and gave me a renewed sense of self-worth.\n\nI noticed the repetition of an infinity symbol in the changing landscape. It made me think of the limitless possibilities that lay before me. The spiral twirling through the air is navigating me through this transformative journey of growth and self-discovery.\n\nAs we rounded a bend, an elaborate labyrinth emerged from the shadows of a dense forest that challenged our willpower and tested our perseverance. It presented riddles and illusions, encouraging us to embrace the complexities of our own existence. As we navigated through the intricate twists and turns, we found hidden truths unlocked in our souls' depths.\n\nAt one point, we encountered a mystical fountain that conjured deep emotions from the essence of my core, unleashing tears. Each tear that fell into the water rippled into a luminous, floating orb. These orbs were conveying the emotional baggage I'd been carrying. So I let it all out, releasing all of the pain. Embracing the emotional liberation lightened the colossal burden I'd been holding on my shoulders.\n\nA beautiful celestial bridge appeared at a crucial juncture, offering me a chance to rewrite aspects of my past. Walking across the bridge, I was allowed to make amends with others and, most importantly, myself. I got to express suppressed feelings I was hindering and rectify some futile mistakes I had made. The transformations led from one phase of my life to another, unveiling connections between the lessons learned and the experiences yet to come. The bridge affirmed the continuous potential for growth and redemption in every moment.\n\nAs we journeyed further down this endless road, something dawned on me. This was not just a physical journey but a metaphor for life itself. The road was a never-ending search for purpose and fulfillment, a quest for a deeper understanding of myself and the world around me. It reflected my human condition, where the journey itself was the goal, not the destination at its end. I realized that as I continue to voyage through this life, I will discover more about myself, but the journey toward understanding and self-discovery will never truly end. The endless road. I'm actually shocked at my epiphany.\n\nAn eclectic old man greeted Heather and me as we neared what appeared to be the end of the road. He had a mythical twinkle in his eyes, and he confirmed my thoughts by revealing the secret that had eluded me all this time. The road, he explained, was not a means to an end but an invitation to embrace the wonder of the unknown, to find solace in the unanswered questions, and to seek fulfillment in the perpetual pursuit of growth and self-discovery.\n\nAs we took our last steps, the road dissolved before our eyes, merging seamlessly with the vastness of the universe. I realized that the endless road was not a separate entity but an integral part of my own consciousness, an embodiment of my eternal quest for meaning and self-realization.\n\nAt that moment, I understood that the road had never ended, for it resided within me, guiding my every step. The revelation brought a profound sense of peace and contentment as I realized that the journey was not an isolated event but a continuous exploration of the boundless depths of my own existence.\n\nI glanced at Heather with my profound realization written on my face; she just nodded, smiling and confirming my thoughts. Still, the pleasurable silence remained.\n\nSuddenly, specters of joy surrounded us, sending a spontaneous moment of elation coursing through my veins. That beautiful moment was swift, making me realize the value of cherishing these fleeting moments, knowing to let them go, and accepting the transience of life.\n\nAs we looked back at the endless road, the mystical elements had already begun working their transformative magic, profoundly impacting my emotional and mental state. The experiences along the journey had become stepping stones toward a newfound understanding of myself, my purpose, and my resilience.\n\nIn the wake of this experience, gratitude and joy streamed down my face as I tightly wrapped my arms around Heather. As we embraced each other, a silent understanding passed between us. I had found a sense of purpose within myself. I declared that navigating life after the endless road experience will become a commitment to living authentically and embracing the journey, regardless of its challenges.\n\nKnowing she had played a crucial role as a guiding force, Heather smiled at me with a sense of fulfillment, recognizing that I could no longer be defined by the past's shadows. The support and love she provided served as a beacon of light during my darkest moments, and now, with a shared understanding, we are ready to face the next chapter.\n\nThe impact of the endless road journey on my day-to-day life was nothing short of revolutionary. The lessons I gleaned from the mystical experiences along the road seeped into every fiber of my being, transforming the way I approached each day. The luminous stones of reflection, the ephemeral specters of joy, and the whispers of the shadows have become an intrinsic part of my emotional toolkit, guiding me through moments of introspection and growth.\n\nWith Heather by my side, I could envision a future filled with possibilities. The bridge of second chances has allowed me to mend relationships, and the fountain of tears has washed away the stains of my regrets.\n\nThe wisdom gained from that transformative experience manifested in my actions and decisions, creating a ripple effect that touched every aspect of my life. The endless road had not only ended but had also marked the beginning of an eternal journey within." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Fate of Andrew Jackson\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1080\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story from the point of view of a non-human character." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "(Brief mentions of drugs and sex)\nIt is dark and it has been for some time. I don’t know how long I have been in this location. I have to say though; it is quite comfortable, being between two soft pieces of fabric. I’m okay being here. I am not being man handled like I was before. \nAlthough, I do miss my friends. I had plenty of friends before someone placed me here. I had all kinds of friends. There were usually a few of me, but Abraham Lincoln and George Washington were always there and occasionally I would see Ulysses S. Grant and Benjamin Franklin. \nI feel a human hand around my body. What is this? Am I being removed from my comfortable spot? Is this daylight I am seeing? I can’t remember the last time I saw daylight.\n“Look at what I just found in my pocket. It’s 20 bucks.” A woman’s voice says.\nFollowed by a man’s voice saying, “drinks are on you tonight.” \nAnd I know I will no longer be in my comfortable spot. Someone will place me in a wallet and be rejoined by friends. \n“Hello, friends,” I say.\n“Hello,” they all say back.\nEven though I have never met these particular friends, I already know them. It’s mostly George Washington but there is a Lincoln here too. I am the sole Andrew Jackson.\nAs we travel together, we discuss our travels. Most George Washingtons have similar stories, traveling with other George Washingtons and being exchanged for petty things like a bag of chips, a can of soda, and packs of gum and then given as change. Many have spent their time in bodegas, supermarkets, and the occasional sweaty strip club but one of the George Washingtons in this wallet has been to a Macy's which the other George Washingtons are all keen to hear about. \nI have been to Macy's as well Nordstroms and Bloomingdales, so I am not that impressed by George Washinton’s story. I have also been to a ski resort and a casino in Las Vegas. Those were my most exciting trips, but I too have seen plenty of bodegas and supermarkets. I try to sound interested in these stories but they are all the same. \n“Two Budweisers please,” the woman’s voice says as I am yanked away from my friends. I am happy I will now find new friends. Hopefully, these new friends will have more exciting tales to tell. I usually travel with other Andrew Jackson’s and hope to be reunited with a few of those. Their tales are more interesting than George Washington or Abraham Lincoln’s tales. \nThe tales of Benjamin Franklin are almost always interesting. They seem to see a lot of white powder, naked women, and people with questionable morals.\nI am placed on a hard surface for a minute or two before being handled by a rough hand and placed in a neat stack, facing the same way as other Andrew Jacksons. I am happy to see them.\nOnce again, even though I have never met these particular friends, I already know them. We greet each other and follow with telling stories of where we have been. But as with most cash registers, we see friends come and we see them go at dramatic speed until it slows and then stops. \nWe are all familiar with what happens when it stops. Some of us go into a large envelope, a few may go into a pocket or a wallet, some of us remain in the register. \n As someone takes us out and counted, we wonder who will go and who will stay. Benjamin Franklin and Ulysses S. Grant always goes away. They almost always keep George Washington and Abraham Lincoln in the cash drawer. For Andrew Jackson, it is usually a toss up.\nI feel myself lifted out the register and placed on the same hard surface I was before. I pray to stay. Staying means seeing more friends come and go the next day. Going means being put away, perhaps in another drawer and perhaps in an ATM. Although there is a rumor that some disappear for good.\nWhen they place George Washington and Lincoln back in the drawer, I pray it is time for me to go into the drawer. I hold my breath before being placed in the envelope with other Andrew Jacksons and a Benjamin Franklin. \nFrom here, we remain together. We travel but where we are going, no one is sure. We are likely to end up in a bank, but sometimes it is back into a wallet and sometimes a drawer. As we move from place to place, we all speculate together where we will go. Until someone pulls us out of the envelope.\nI take in the new surroundings, trying to speculate where I may be. A home? A store? An alleyway? But it appears we are in a bank. This is the least desirable place to be for a dollar bill. \nI look at the numbers on my fellow Andrew Jacksons. None of them are lower than 2018. I look at my number: 2014. I was hidden away between those two pieces of fabric for so long, who knows how old I had become. From what I know, you don’t see a bigger gap than eight numbers between the other Andrew Jacksons and I worry. What happens now?\nI am moved from place to place, being separated from the Andrew Jackson's I arrived with and joined with new Andrew Jacksons. Someone mixes us up and counts us and they move us again and again. Someone moves us between drawers, envelopes, hands, and trucks.\nAnd then I hear a noise I have never heard before. I hear the screams of my friends. Even though I have never met these particular friends, I already know them. And their screams are terrifying. \nIt is not until I get closer that I understand their screams. They are being torn into small pieces. As I get closer, I scream too. Until I am torn into small pieces too. They have shredded us all. Now instead of Andrew Jacksons, there are strips of what used to be Andrew Jackson, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Benjamin Franklin. But now, no one can tell who we used to be, we are now all worthless and are now ready to sleep after a lifetime of exchanging from one place to the next." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Ruler of the Moon\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1014\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about a character who wakes up in space." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "For a second or maybe hours, she feels a heaviness that presses her onto a spongy-bouncy-like surface and debris poking at her back, and then a heat that rises within her starting at the sole of her feet and on through her eyes. “There is a sandstorm,” she thinks as an American flag comes into focus. \" Finally,” she says faintly as her forehead is stamped by a man in a strange suit with ‘You have arrived.’\n\nThe last thing she remembers is the thrill she felt seeing the joy in his eyes when she told him she was going to the moon.\n\nShe didn't mean the moon. Who says that? She meant - I'm going to hell. Not because she had been bad as she was accused of being since she was five – she was just finally getting out and never coming back. But his stare swallowed her bravado which she had no problem displaying when she was running around doing crazy things. Although to her, they were not crazy. They were what saved her. She was more calculating than she was ever given credit for, and she always looked behind her.\n “I am going to the moon,” she said to her father when she was nine. She wore her white jumper suit and helmet and ran through the house. She heard laughter behind her, and she found this odd. She wondered why they were laughing. From the top of the roof, she looked at the sky and she raised her arms as she daringly jumped towards the sky.\n\nWhen she was a teen, she challenged her fate. She would simply look up into the sky and stare straight into her soul and call out her cowardice -- try to stop me -- she would say. And off into the night she went leaving her parents in a silent panic. Her mother would sleep on the sofa in the hopes she would return before sunrise and her father would pace half the night in her bedroom before surrendering to sleep.\n One day, when she was sixteen, she dared to dream. She was in her robotics class, and she dreamt about the moon. She imagined herself there all on her own – she would be the ruler of the moon. This made everyone around her happy. They showered her with attention and praise but something about that made her feel uneasy, as if she was conforming. So, she dropped it.\n On her 20th birthday, she came home fifteen minutes past midnight and was surprised not to see her mother on the couch but she suppressed any turmoil rising in her gut and proceeded down the hall passing the dining room table decorated with confetti and cake. At the foot of her bedroom door, she saw the shadow of shuffling feet and she turned and walked out.\n She traveled through deserts and mountains trying to reach the sky and confront it face to face. She stayed away from the beach although the strangers she met tried dragging her to its shore. She feared the ocean and she knew she could not defy it for it would swallow her without hesitation. She was a better runner than a swimmer.\n At 22, she was gently woken by the moon. It led her home. Her bedroom light was still on, and her bed was neatly made. The bookcase was intact, filled with rows of her favorite books and her RCA record player that her grandfather gave her still worked. She played, Fly Me To The Moon. In the corner of her room, she noticed her white astronaut suit she got on her ninth birthday. It is full of stains and memories. She tried to settle.\n For a while, she dreamt again of the moon - the highlands and its dormant volcanoes and each night she hid in a different crater with her dreams. Her days were spent visiting planetariums and devouring facts on physical environments and the Earth’s relationship with the moon. The praises about her above-average grades and “you are doing so well now,” always made her shrug and she dismissed them with disgust. The smiles offered to her were terrifying as she presumed they were fake, and she felt a chill each time she was approached by a hand wanting to tap her head in approval. This did not suit her well. She saw everyone around her trying to sabotage her journey and she knew their actions were suspicious.\n She ran, barefooted, into the woods. She felt the mud underneath her toes and liked how it was real. The sun shining in through the trees that did not ask for anything but provide shade and allow her to breathe – gave her the most comfort during this time. One of her favorite parts of the day was welcoming the sunrise which brought promises and cleansed her body and mind.\n For decades, she mostly walked alone but strangers still dragged her out. They pulled her and filled her head with psychedelic colors and pretty songs. She believed their words and intentions and briefly felt happiness. But the light of the moon usually revealed the ugly truth, and she would run – always looking back.\n Now at 48, she glances at the sky timidly but still defiant. With her hands in her pocket and her neck bent back, she challenges her once again knowing she can deliver devastating blows. She no longer feels the excitement, but it is what she knows so off she goes in the opposite direction – into the darkness of the night.\n\n\"Luna, I knew you would make it to the moon. You were born in 1976 and you were destined to reach...\"\n\nShe ran out and slammed the door leaving trapped all the words she always heard her father say. She imagined them floating above his head – bumping into each other with nowhere to go.\n And now, for a split second, she knows she is there – her beloved moon is finally her home. She settles and the lights go out." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Girl and the Empty Moon\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1686\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story where the laws of time and space begin to dissolve." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There was once a Girl who loved the Sun with all her heart. And she loved the Moon with all her soul. She loved the Skies with their twin faces, whom in the background watched over all.\nThe Sun shone her rays when she was happy and warmed the Girl, the Moon, and the Skies. But when she was sad or angry, she withdrew her warmth and all felt it’s loss.\nThe Moon could coax the Sun out of her wrath with his charm and light. His laughter was contagious; his need for adoration so great that he produced a magnetic pull. The Sun, Girl, and Skies were waves drawn to the Moon.\nThe Girl lost herself to the Sun’s warmth, the Moons pull, and the Skies’ embrace. For their love and power felt greater than she, or so she thought. The Girl was content to be just the girl. She was content to praise the Sun, attend and worship the Moon, and be humbled by the Skies.\nThen one day something new began to grow! Little pops of color began to spread through the Girl’s world. They were small and fragile and absolutely stunning. The Girl could not believe her heart could be so full by the New.\nThe Sun was at first cautious and unsure, not knowing whether to shine or hide. The Skies watched with a wary eye but their embrace remained open as always. \nHowever, the Moon, forever mischievous, confided in the ever-attending Girl that the creation of the New was his. He rejoiced in the New’s beauty and named them Flowers. \nEventually seeing that the Moon was joyous and accepting, the Sun came to welcome the Flowers. Their color brought her joy. She was generous with her warmth and continually shined. Upon seeing the Moon’s draw to the Flowers, the Skies became less wary and watched the Flowers with an appreciative eye. The Moon was proud of himself and congratulated himself on the creation. And so, the Girl’s world was full of harmony which filled her heart with even more love.\nThe Girl continued to praise the Sun, worship the Moon, and be humbled by the Skies. But now the Flowers gave her something else to do for they were fragile and needed tending. The Girl felt a kinship to the Flowers’ small delicacy for she was small and delicate too in comparison to the Sun, Moon, and Skies. She admired the Flowers’ resilience to grow in the big world.\nSo, the Girl made sure the Sun stayed happy so the Flowers could bask in the Sun’s warmth. She made sure the Moon was attended so he would continue to create the Flowers. She made sure the Skies were content so they would embrace all.\nHowever, the Moon began to feel less worshipped for the Girl was busy nurturing the Flowers and spent less time with the Moon. He felt less of the Sun’s attention for she needed no coaxing to shine knowing her warmth helped the Flowers thrive. The Moon felt annoyed for the Skies shed tears of joy watching the Flowers grow. The tears nurished the Flowers but left the Moon cold and damp. The Moon felt ignored by the Flowers too. He wanted them to worship as the Girl did. He wanted their attention and adoration in honor of their creation. \nWhat the Moon did not know was that because the Flowers were created from his light, they recognized what was behind the charm, the contagious laughter, the shine. Emptiness. They did not feel his magnetic pull unlike the Girl, Sun, and Skies. The Flowers were immune to the magnetism and were able to stand on their own with support from the Girl.\nThe Moon’s emptiness grew. It grew and grew more. It grew until it was the only thing he felt. He became desperate for the Girl’s worshipping. Desperate for the Sun’s attention. Desperate to feel the Skies’ dry embrace. He finally realized he would never receive the Flowers’ adoration, so he ignored them and set out to regain what he felt he lost by their creation. \nThe Moon’s emptiness became tangible. Instead of creating more beautiful Flowers, his creations became prickly and prolific smothering everything they touched. The girl realized the New-New creation wasn’t something delicate or resilient or full of life. It was the Moon’s emptiness incarnate. She pulled the prickly things desperate to save her beloved Flowers and her world of harmony. She loved the Moon despite his emptiness. She loved the Flowers. She loved the Sun. She loved the Skies. But all were in danger of the emptiness.\nAs the Girl worked, the Moon worked too. He began to feed the Sun, Skies and even the Girl stories of the Flowers’ haughtiness to the prickly things. He said the flowers thought themselves superior to not only the New-New but also to the Sun, Skies, and Girl. The Girl knew this not to be true. She knew the Flowers were fighting for survival from the Moon’s emptiness, not declaring themselves better than all. The Girl tried to convince the Sun and Skies that the Moon was truly empty and the emptiness was destroying the world but the Moon’s pool on the Sun and Skies was too strong. \nThe Sun shouted, “Girl you must worship the moon! What will happen to the moon if he is not adored? Flowers, you must acknowledge the pull of the Moon for he is your creator!” \nThe Skies softly pleaded, “Girl, the Moon is wanting of your attending. If you do not attend him, this life will end. Why can you not think of the us, the Skies, or of the Sun? The Flowers will learn to live with the prickly things.”\nThe Girl was too stunned to sing the Sun’s praises for she could not believe the Sun could not see the Moon’s emptiness taking over the land. The bright colored flowers no longer had the same effect on the Sun, so she withdrew her rays. The Sun hoped the New and the New-New would cease without her warmth and she could return to the world of Girl, Skies, and Moon.\nThe Skies were wrong about the Flowers. The Flowers could not live with the empty prickly things and they were afraid the Sun would forever withhold her warmth. The Girl tried with all her might to protect them but the Flowers knew something needed to change in order for their survival. So, they shed their petals and let their seeds drift in the wind to transform into their own creation. The Girl drifted with them, available to nurture if needed. \nNo matter where the Flowers drifted or how they transformed, the Moon always found them again and again. In turns the Moon shouted the Flowers’ malicious indifference at the Sun and Skies, then begged the Flowers for attention. He even tried to entice the Flowers with moon dust. The Flowers were not fooled and relied on their own resilience and the Girl’s nurturing. But it was not enough and the Flowers began to wither, suffocated by the empty New-New.\nFinally, the Girl could not take the heart ache any longer. She wanted the Sun to shine, she wanted the Moon to have at least some of his emptiness filled, she wanted the Skies to once again embrace all, and she wanted the Flowers to flourish without the threat of the prickly things. So, she called on the Skies. She asked the Skies to take the Sun and Moon forever in their embrace high into the world where the Sun could shine always and the Moon could not create. The Girl knew she may not be able to feel the all-encompassing warmth of the Sun as she once did. She would never be able to worship the Moon again. And the embrace of the Skies would be more like a light caress rather than an inundation of feeling. She endured for she found her own resilience. \nSeeing that the world no longer held the harmony it once did, the Skies agreed with the Girl. In their embrace they convinced the Sun and Moon that high in the world was best for the three to be. First the Sun was distraught as she did not want to be away from the Girl but, in the end, the Moon’s pool was too great and the Sun agreed to go. The Moon was, by this time, too empty to argue. So, the three traveled high into the world.\nWith the Moon so high in the world, he could no longer create the prickly things. They withered and died without the Moon’s emptiness to feed them.\nBut oh, how the Flowers flourished! They no longer needed a creator for they already had transformed into their own being. They also no longer needed nourishment from the Girl and realized the Girl also needed to transform into her own being. This was something the Flowers knew the Girl needed to do on her own. The strong, resilient, and beautiful Flowers told the Girl goodbye and wished the Girl happiness. \nSo, the Girl left to find a new land in the world. As she traveled, she felt the light warmth of the sun, the gentle caress of the skies, and when she glanced at the moon high in the world, she hoped he found a way to fill his emptiness and be worthy of worship. But never by her. When the girl was no longer a girl but a lady, she grew tired of traveling. She came upon a land with a smiling Sea. The water called to her, so she told him her story. When she cried, his salty warm breeze mingled with her tears until they felt as one. His gentle waves helped her keep her bearings whenever she felt lost or alone. She told the smiling Sea of the Flowers and he encouraged her, with his help, to create her own. Within this new content, harmonious place the Lady and the Sea began to cultivate a garden with love in their hearts." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Peace and Zen Loving.\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1666\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story where a regular household item becomes sentient." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"NO! NO!\" Kai was sweating, his heart was thumping. Same old nightmares. He glanced at his digital phone. It was only 4:30 am. Today was the day. All Kai's worst nightmares had galloped through his brain again.\nKai went to wash his face, returning to lie on his bed. His head was still pounding. This was the day at school where he had double Maths with mean Mrs. Jenkins, and a Maths test. If Kai did not pass, his mother had promised him that she was going to get him a Maths tutor on the weekend, starting this Saturday ahead.\n\"Oh no!\" Kai knew it was okay to wrong sometimes, but not all the time on Maths tests.\nAfter Maths torture, there was going to be sport, football. Kai held the crown as the shortest boy in Year Seven, in fact, the whole of his secondary school. He was also the worst football player in history. Kai had complained to his Dad. But his father had replied that playing sport with team building was good for growing boys. Kai was still not growing. So much for that parental theory.\nKai was in despair. Wintry daylight dawned. As the sun rose, Kai stashed his secret smart phone in his pocket. Extreme danger like Maths tests and football needed extreme action. He was planning to head today off at the pass. Kai's \"can't do\" dragon came along to school with him. \"Kai can't do Maths!' He was thinking this to himself miserably. \" Kai can't play football! \" The dragon in his brain was repeating himself.\n\"Kai does not want to play football!\" Kai thought, \"In fact, can't do dragon, Kai is not the least bit interested in Maths or football, let alone a Maths tutor!\" The dragon in his thoughts shut up for once.\nThere she stood, the meanest Maths teacher in the whole world, Mrs. Jenkins. Kai's friend, Rianna, was the tall basketball captain. She said softly, \"Hi Kai, never mind, I hate Maths too.\" Kai made excellent vomit noises, so did most the boys in Year Seven, Class D. They all sounded the same.\nMrs. Jenkins was preparing to dish out her latest mean Maths test. Kai was scared. This could be his worst test ever seen, extreme danger period. He quietly turned on his smart phone, and made his own thought bubbles appear on the phone screen.\nLike magic! In a puff of silver smoke, a giant green capsicum rolled into the classroom. Sentient at last, it swallowed up mean Mrs. Jenkins and all her even meaner Maths tests.\nThe capsicum retreated through the doorway, and spat Mrs. Jenkings and her Maths tests into the dumpster next to the school building. Job done. Even a capsicum does not want to be poisoned by any Maths teacher.\nRianna fist pumped the air. \"Yes!\" The other kids were just as thrilled. There were hi-fives all around the class. Rianna smiled sweetly at Kai. \"Did you....?????\" Kai too smiled, pushing back the 'can't do' dragon in his brain. \"Mum always said I could scroll before I could I could talk, Shhh!\"\nRianna grinned. \"Right, everyone, listen up. Kai is our teacher for the day.\" Kai took up the challenge of being in control of Year Seven, Class D. For this, he needed to turn the room into his Zen Den. he had been browsing about developing an inner Ninja. So Kai popped on his prescription sunglasses for his weak eyesight. He strolled casually to sit down at the missing teacher's desk.\n\"Let's make this a Zen Den of cool school for the day.\" His classmates agreed. \"Just for today,\" Kai said, \"there is no mean Maths. We are going nowhere.\" He produced his secret smart phone .\"We have to learn to make good choices in this menu,\" he told the others, as he went scrolling. \"Who would like fried chicken and chocolates for lunch?\"\nInstant yes. Kai was on a roll, so he swiped his mother's credit card, and ordered up a party to be delivered to Year Seven, Class D's door. All suitable nutrition for his Zen Den. They would not get malnutrition or go thirsty at this cool school.\nAfter lunch, there were empty containers and lolly wrappers everywhere. Rianna and the girls wanted to dance. Kai scrolled for a great music mix. The bigger boys locked their classroom door from the inside, so no one could get to them.\nThen the boys all sat around, playing vaguely naughty, but loud, video games on the digital appliances. Kai sat at the front desk, content in his cool school Zen Den. He was really gazing in a dream at Rianna, and her graceful dancing. Kai hoped he could get a growth mindset, and grow up to be as tall as she was. That way, he would not be the tiniest midget in his secondary school. Meanwhile, he kept his Zen loving dreams to himself, he was way too cool for this school.\nThe music flowed, the dancers carried on. The big boys in the grade started a scuffle. IT equipment crashed to the floor. \"Fight, fight!\" some of them yelled. Fists were flying, shirts were getting ripped , and they were all swearing.\nKai turned off the music, and marched to the door. Unlocking it, he said, \"Hey you, it's time for football Go and fight there!\" Kai was not doing sport, he was over being bashed by the other boys in the mud.\n\"Yes! Football!\" the bigger boys laughed. They all roared off to the oval.The classrooms was in ruins. Kai gazed at all the mess in Year Seven, Class D's room. \"Whatever.\" He no longer cared if football even existed.\nRianna and her friends wandered over to Kai, still sitting at the teacher's desk. \"Do you think we should clean this up a bit?\" she asked, \"We're going to be in trouble.\"\n\"Up to you in Zen Den. Might be a good idea.\" So Rianna and the girls started tidying up, collecting the rubbish. They helped each other to pick up the IT equipment .Nothing was too damaged.\nSoon Kai and his no longer dancing girls were swapping more Zen ideas, just as the Principal walked in. He was a bit red in the face. \" I want a word with you Year Seven kids.\" the Principal said, \"Now, I have fished your Maths teacher from the dumpster. There is a large vegetable sitting there. At this moment, all the Maths teachers are having a stop-work meeting. They want to go on strike on full pay, so they won't end up in the dumpster, or worse. They also want to sue me and the School Council for discrimination to Maths. Where did that capsicum come from? I want some answers here, right now!\"\nIn the distance, Kai could hear other classes celebrating that cool school today was not doing Maths, or having mean Maths tests. What would his inner Ninja do?\nKai decided to send a thought bubble to his secret smart phone. The giant green capsicum rolled away from the dumpster, off to the neighborhood Food Bank. Some poor people would be glad to eat fresh vegetables for dinner tonight.\nThe Principal stared. \"It was you! I want a chat with you,\" said the Principal, trying not to look impressed. \"Come along with me. Whatever is wrong with you, we'll sort it all with the School Counselor.\"\nKai was feeling like making more vomit noises, but held off. He had eaten too many lollies and chocolates. Yummy! He could feel his clothes shrinking on his tummy.\nAt the Counselor's office, Kai was asked to please explain. \"Really, there is nothing wrong with me. It's my answers in Maths tests that are wrong. Mrs. Jenkins hates me and I hate her.\" Mr. Niroshi, the School Counselor, was very wise and understanding. \"Why don't you join our Tuesday homework class? There's a teacher there to help students with their difficult subjects.\" Kai thought about this. It might be better than a Maths tutor. He would not be the only one there getting his Maths wrong.\n\"Okay, I'll join that.\"\n\"You can do Maths with Year Seven B, they do have a different Maths teacher,\" the Principal said, checking his timetables.\nThis sounded like a plan.\nMr. Niroshi gazed through his window, at the Year Seven boys playing football. \"Don't you like football? It's okay, there are other sports.' Kai felt surprised. \"Can you tell my Dad that?\"\n\"What's wrong with Martial Arts?\" Mr. Niroshi asked, \"You can still get fit and build up core muscles.\" \"And build my Inner Ninja,\" Kai breathed. The Principal looked up, saying, \"You can enroll in Advanced IT with the senior students. You're a bit past Year Seven level. They're designing and building miniature robots. Mondays, 1:30 pm. Of course, you'll have to promise safety for my Maths teachers.\"\nKai focused on his Zen. Since when had adults listened to him? Finally, he agreed. His eyes lit up. Kai's next plan was to program his robot to do homework and all Maths tests!\nThis little meeting had ended up with everyone being happy. Kai wandered back to his classroom. The home bell rang on time. Cool school had been fun, having a Maths free day. No one really knew if the Maths teachers still planned to go on strike in the morning. Kai and the Principal had agreed to worry about tomorrow when it happened, both hoping to make good choices.\nKai planned to make a plan to return his Mum's credit card, carefully. Rianna walked home with Kai for once. She was so tall and pretty. She had Kai's back from now on. Kai tried not to think thought bubbles of Rianna in her bikini. Bit naughty, but nice feel good moments. He was full of Zen loving and Peace. The cool school students all went home, quite content. Kai's Zen Den and his giant green capsicum were legends!!!!" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: RED\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1322\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story from the point of view of a non-human character." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When she took me home, I was bright, shiny, and ready to party. It seems like a long time ago, but I am not the best with dates. That's not what I was made for. My purpose was different from the duty of the watches Ella kept in the drawer or the clock on the living room wall. I was made to make her shine, feel good, and be happy. My job was not to keep her warm or protect her from anything, but sometimes, I thought my bright existence was more problematic than helpful, as my presence seemed to call for dark intentions. Sometimes, I could read the minds of men looking at me, at her, on nights full of artificial lights and smoke, but that's not what I was made for. I was with her, but I was not her friend or someone to talk to. I was not even a someone. Even if I wanted, there was no way I could tell her what I saw in many, what I saw in one. Since I arrived at her place, I saw days and nights many times while the weather was warm. I hugged her body each and every time because she was my only and favorite person, but then the cold arrived, and I was hidden for a long time, what humans call many months, what they call autumn and winter... and then, one day, I saw the light again. I'd been kept with many others in a drawer of her bedroom. From there, I'd heard laughs and cries. I'd listened to all her daily movements and nightly dreams and sometimes wished I'd hug her in her silent moments when no one was around, despite her wanting them to.\nOne day, I felt fresh air again, and then, her hands over me. Her fingers ran my golden shiny arms, my bright red body, my seams, and that little medal someone had attached to me on the right bottom. That's the one that touched her hip, the one she used to hold to whenever she was nervous. Her touch that day made me feel something was wrong, and then a little drop of sadness fell over me. She let me hug her once more. She was soft as I remembered, and I tried to slide on her skin as I used to, but I couldn't. I was not enough for her anymore anymore. She pulled me and stretched me while whispering and grunting things I couldn't understand. I wondered if she had changed while I was in my months' sleep or if something had happened the last time she had cared for me, cleaned me, and made me bright again. Our hug seemed odd as if I was not in the right place. A bit more sadness reached me, and then another one. A breeze crossed the room, and the cold hit us both. Her skin reacted against my body, and then, something else... kicked me. I'd never felt that. I was stretched against hers. Her heart was beating fast. My arms held dearly to her shoulders. I didn't need to breathe, but I felt that's what humans would describe as a lack of air....and then, it all finished. She left me. She grabbed me out of her body and threw me against the wall. I fell on the floor, sad and distressed. Had I done anything wrong to her? I stayed there, beside her bed, for days. Many others joined me. For days, I heard cries I couldn't understand. It was warm outside. It was hot inside. I was the one who made her happy. Why didn't she allow me to hug her? Why didn't she want me? \nA stormy day arrived, and Ella finally came to my rescue. She took me off the floor, held me in her arms, and hugged me. I felt the warmth of her body, the rhythm of her heart, the breeze of her breath, and then... the kick again. Ella felt it, too. She looked at me and said goodbye out loud. Then, she placed me in a dark space with many others. That was the last time I saw her and the light for many months. Later, I learned that time is called years. \n\"I've nothing,\" I heard. It had been a long time since I had listened to words. Until that moment, there had been only movement, muffled sounds from the outside, and silence, lots of silence. That day was different, though. It started with a sudden shake. Besides many other pieces of Ella's life, I woke up. We were trapped in a dark place, in a small box. It was crowded, and some funky smell came from inside that space. That's not what my life used to be. I was always fresh and bright, but now I felt cramped and weird. Another shake, this time harder. Then, the voice.\n\"Can I open this one?\" I heard. It was a feminine voice, but not Ellas's. I was afraid of the outside, but I didn't like the space I was in either, so when I heard the tape tearing, I almost gasped—as if I could. What had been silence and nothingness for so long suddenly became a storm, and bits and pieces started to fly away from our long-time home.\n\"I cannot believe you kept this!\" \nThat voice... it was not the one I remembered, but it was so similar to what I knew, to whom I'd loved.\nThen I saw fingers picking first those on top of me. One after the other, my silent companions left our home, and when I thought it was my time, the movement finished. The hands moved away from me, and the light hit me. The outside was bright white. I could see a lamp hanging on the ceiling but I did not recognize it. Then, as if a ray of light had touched me and made me whole again, I heard her: Ella, my dear Ella, was there. \n\"Be careful, Mia, we'll find it.\"\nAnother pair of hands appeared in front of me. They touched me and held me. As they lifted me, I recognized their smell, but the touch... the touch was different, harder than I remembered. There were tiny wrinkles in those hands. There was no bright red polish on those nails. She stretched me against the light, and it hurt, as if my fibers had given up and cracked after all the time inside that box. Her fingers ran my golden arms, and some of my shiny particles broke away. I wanted to cry, \"Stop! Please! You are hurting me!\" but I didn't know how to do it. That's not what I'd been made for.\nI saw her—my Ella, the one I used to love—but now she was hurting me. Why was she hurting me? But then, the worst came.\n \"Mia, this is for you,\" she said. \n\"What? No? I'm yours, not hers,\" I thought. I tried to move, to jump, to run—silly of me. Who did I think I was?\nA different pair of hands touched me and held me against a body I didn't recognize. Still, there was something... a smell. Her hands were similar to the ones I'd once known. Her skin had the same milky color and the warmth I loved so much. Her dark curls ticked my arms.\nShe turned to a wall mirror. I remembered what mirrors were. We used to love them, stare at us. We were a good combination, my Ella and I. Those hands, that body was not Ella's. I felt the heart of the body holding me. It was racing.\n\"I love it, mum!\"\nThe women hugged each other, with me in the middle, suffocating, feeling their bodies against me, their warmth... And then, it kicked me, it hit me, I knew. That's what I was made for. To make them happy." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Trouble Brewing\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1119\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story from the point of view of a non-human character." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There’s trouble brewing, I reckon.\nIt’s one of those quiet days, when there’s less traffic along the main road at the back. On these days, they normally leave the house early together, come back late. I polish off what they’ve put down for me almost as soon as they’re out of the door and then end up regretting it. I’d like to see them have to survive so long on a single bowl of food – they’d soon understand how I feel. Of course, they obviously don’t take into account that I’m a terrible greedy guts. When they’re at home, they ration out the food – a little bit at a time. When they’re not here, they must imagine I’m going to have the self-restraint to do my own rationing; nothing further from the truth.\nAnyway, that’s a normal quiet day. I say ‘quiet’ though it’s not always true; it's when the neighbours bring out their machines to cut the grass. The ones along the street don’t bother me so much – it’s the bloke next door. He’s got a big one that makes a helluva noise. I like to take a nap under the greenery mid-afternoon, but his machine is so loud that it’s impossible. When he’s out there – he’s been working in the garden an awful lot recently – I go to my bed in the kitchen.\nSo trouble, yes. Today’s a quiet day and they didn’t go out together. He left very early, slamming the front door. I don’t believe it was an accident. She got up late and shuffled downstairs to the kitchen, where I was sitting expectantly by my bowl. Nothing. She poured herself some of that brown liquid and took it back to bed, so no food from him or her. I followed her upstairs; I thought I could at least get to nap on their bed, but no – she shut the door in my face! And afterwards, I could hear her talking. Strange.\nMy tummy’s rumbling something rotten. I could start yowling to get her attention, but she has a high level of resistance to that; if it was him, he’d give in immediately. Alternatively, I could go out through the flap and catch myself a mouse. There are two problems with that idea, though: as well as a greedy guts, I’m lazy as hell – chasing mouses takes work; and I don’t much care for mouse meat anyway.\nTo be honest, I think she doesn’t like me very much. I was living with him before she arrived on the scene, so with longer service I reckon I should get more respect. If I’m ever in her way, she’s not afraid to use her foot to get me out of it. Also, I never get a cuddle from her anymore. In the early days, she was much more giving, but no doubt she was trying to get on his good side. Since she’s safely installed here, she’s reverted to her default position of not liking me or my kind.\nThat’s okay really because I don’t like her much either. Nor do I like how she’s been treating him lately. I’m not sure he’s even noticed the gradual change, but I have. Whilst it used to be all kissy-kissy, now there’s a definite coldness from her. And her voice has got harsher – once again, imperceptible to him I expect. I have a sensitive ear; I do catch these nuances.\nI don’t know what to do about my food; I’m famished. I suppose I could knock the box of biscuits off the shelf in the larder, which I did once before. I got to eat my fill, but it made an awful mess. With her in the mood she’s in, I can’t chance it; she uses her foot to give me more than just a nudge sometimes.\nI should’ve guessed trouble was on the way. Apart from the harshness of her voice and her coldness, I’ve noted that the night-time noises coming from their room – those kissy-kissy sounds – have stopped completely. The day after those nights, they’d be all smiles, all huggy. Now I come to think of it, I can’t remember the last time either of them smiled at all. Hugs? Forget about it!\nI’m going to starve to death. This is cruelty, pure and simple. If I could––… hang on! A tapping on the kitchen door. And here she comes down the stairs, in a hurry. Better get next to my bowl, give her a hint. But she goes straight to the door of course, without even a glance in my direction.\nIt’s the lady from next door, where the bloke with the big machine lives. All dressed up – funny sparkly things hanging from her ears. She sometimes gives me a stroke, so she must like me. Maybe I will give yowling a go. Yes … the lady says something to her and … result! Biscuits! My word – I do believe I’ve gone to heaven! They’ve gone upstairs, but I’ve got other things on my mind. Biscuits!\nWell, that hit the spot. Feeling much better. I’ll have a bit of a wash, then a nap. The bed in the kitchen, I think.\n*****\nMmmm. Enjoyed that – cut short by them making the brown liquid, with lots of talking. And smiling! What can that––… Hey! The front door! It’s him! He’s home! Let’s go and get a stroke or two...\nAh, that’s the business. Yes, there. Behind the ears. Okay, do your own thing, if you like. But not there – I don’t like that so much. Back to the ears. Yes!\nOff to the kitchen? I’d better follow him – see if he’ll put more biscuits down for me. It’s just her there. Where's the lady gone? He gets himself a glass of water – no talking whatsoever. You could cut the air with a sharpened claw. And off he storms upstairs.\nShe’s giving me one of those looks. It’s not a question of not liking really – that’s hatred, that is. The feeling’s mutual, missus, I can tell you.\nOh, hang on. He’s back. What’s that he’s holding up? I’ve seen it before. Sparkly. Ah, now they’re talking ... very loudly! I’d best make myself scarce. Lucky I’m full up from the biscuits; I don’t expect either of them would be in the mood for feeding me at the moment.\nYep, I knew trouble was coming. I’ve never seen them this angry before. I wonder if anything will come of it. I wonder if she’ll simply disappear, leave us alone. Just him and me. Like before.\nWell, a girl can dream, can’t she?" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Story Time\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2994\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story where a regular household item becomes sentient." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We cling for dear life to order. Everything in its place and a place for everything. But we are just one step away from chaos. We fear chaos because it so often wears a cloak of darkness and it reaches out to us with grim intent, to smother us and choke us in the filth of our own ignorance. Sometimes though, there is a light that dwells beyond our understanding and that light is so very special. That light is meant for us and we are meant for it. It speaks to us in an ancient and silent language. Sometimes we actually listen. Not often, not because we have forgotten that oldest of languages, but because we have become ignorant of what we are and where it was that we came from. Where we belong. If we do deign to listen, we become more than we once were. We fill a hole we did not know that we had, and we make a little more sense as we pass through this fleeting phase of our existence.\nIn our obsessive desire for order, objects have to make sense to us. A knife is something we use to cut things with. A hat sits atop our head. Simple naming words that help us attribute glib meaning to the world around us. Labels that denote use allowing us to go about the business of manipulating our reality into something we feel more comfortable with. The world before us is of our creation. It is not often that we do a good job of its construction and so we tinker and fuss, never content with what we think we have.\nWhen my granddad died I was old enough to be an adult, but still unsure as to how to be one. And so I did a half decent job of faking it. It would take me a long while and many more steps along the path of life to understand that I could not let go of the child that I was. Once I did understand this, I relaxed my grip on what I thought was my past state and instead embraced it for what it really was; me. \nThe death of my granddad hit me hard. What was unfair about his death was that it hit the little boy that I was, and still am, even harder. The inevitability of death was an impossibility to me, we stood at an impasse did death and I. I would not accept death for what it pretended to be. There was something wrong here and my pain was worsened by my inability to drag this problem out into the light and examine it under the lens of truth.\nLike all good boys do, I hid my sorrow and the pain it brought me. I pretended to be less numb than I really was. The days following his death were unreal and his funeral was a badly staged play. The worst of the actors was the one that played my granddad. There was nothing of my granddad there on that day. Silently, I vowed to search for him. I knew he was out there somewhere. I just had to look in the right place and see in the right way. A trick to living that most of us are yet to address, let alone perfect.\nA few days after my granddad was planted in the ground, I made my weekly phone call to my folks. The phone rang beside my father and he sat and waited for my mother to answer it; it’s never for me, he would say if any of us questioned this pull in the quilt of their lives. \nOccasionally, he would choose to answer that phone, and I would be reminded that he was not only capable of answering the phone, but also of lengthy and rewarding conversation. More so than when we were in that same room together. This however, was not one of the times that he answered. \n“Hello Jonnie!” said my mother.\nEven after all this time with a new phone that identified me, it still gave me the creeps that she knew it was me. I felt predictable, but it extended beyond that. My mother had a knowing that was not natural, and of course she did, because she’d known me all my life and she knew me in ways that I would never know myself.\nWe talked and asked after each other’s lives. I never wanted to talk about a great deal of mine because it caused me further stress to do so. Work needed to stop seeping into the rest of my life and infecting it. It was bad enough that it had entered my dreams and was affecting my time away from the stresses of the physical world. It would take me a further decade to step to the right and see things a little differently and sweat the smaller things a little less. A life lesson I was regularly in receipt of, but didn’t do anything with for far too long.\n“What was that?” I asked my mother. I felt bad because it was rude not to have attended to her words. My eyes were still open, but I’d been caught napping on the job. The sound of her voice has always been soporific for me. A comfort that preceded my time on this earth. She was the first thing I ever heard and I’d not even been born yet. I’d known this woman in another life and maybe that was why I refused to believe that her father had ended so abruptly. Instead he was still here, only differently.\n“We’re clearing your granddad’s house,” she told me, “do you want anything?”\nI paused. There was a lot to take in. Only now did I hear her calling her father your granddad. I had taken that for granted for so long that I ungratefully expected it. He was mine after all. Mine first and foremost. Well, if that was true, then my mother had demonstrated love in one of its highest forms. She had given her dad to me. Given without a word. Given without the expectation of anything in return, not even acknowledgement of this sacrifice. But then, that is what love is. To give. Only, in that truly selfless giving, a person is filled with even more love and is loving in a way that they were not before.\nThat was my Mum right there, and I think she learned some of that from her father. I like to think she learned a thin slice of it in the way that granddad was with me, and I with him. We see things better when they play out in front of us. We are blinded to a large part of how we are in the world and we will never see ourselves other than in the reflections around us, via the people who are the very fabric of our existence.\nIn my pause was a refusal to accept that granddad’s house was being cleared. On the heels of that were thoughts of my siblings and cousins. We were a large family and my granddad’s possessions would be spread thinly.\nDid I want anything?\nI wanted him, and that was all there was to it. The thought of his home being deconstructed disgusted me. It was heresy. His own family betraying him and burgling his house while he was out. I swallowed down my sensibilities in respect for my mother. She did not want or need the conscious stream of bilious thought that was hissing inside my mind and bidding me to burp it out.\nI thought about all the items in my granddad’s house. I was there and I could see it all. So many items with meaning and symbolism that was dear to me. There was something wrong about me coveting his goods. There was a selfishness there, but it went far beyond that. However much I loved and missed that man, I was not about to build a shrine to him. He deserved better than that. \nAs I pondered the most important thing in my granddad’s room, I saw it in my mind’s eye. I saw him where I saw him for the majority of our time together, in his chair. He would sit there for hours on end and regale me with stories, some real and some unreal. I was never sure which was which. Most of the time, we just sat and enjoyed a quiet that was not silence. It was a calm, pregnant with meaning, but mostly it was comfortable in a way that I had never been comfortable anywhere else.\n“His chair,” I said to my mother.\nNow it was her turn to pause and in that moment I panicked. I suffered in my imagination, the punchline to my suffering was that the chair had been disposed of. Thrown out with the rubbish in just the way he’d said he wanted to be discarded when death came a calling; just throw me out with all the other bad rubbish. He’d say this with a mischievous twinkle in his eye, utilising a humour that is the preserve of people of a certain age.\n“Are you sure?” my mother eventually asked, “it’s seen better days.”\n“I’m sure,” I told her. The truth of it was I wanted that chair exactly because it had seen better days.\nI collected that chair the very next day. It didn’t quite fit in my car. I had to tie the tailgate down with a piece of hairy string. This was somehow fitting, and partially allayed my worry that the chair would not fit in my small house or the life I had pieced together within my home.\nThe chair shouldn’t have fitted anywhere other than in granddad’s home. It was out of place in every conceivable way. The too small dimensions of my living room should have been unwelcome to that chair and once it was sat in the corner, it should have been apparent that it had been a mistake to bring it here. That it had only ever worked in my granddad’s living room and it was never meant to have a life beyond that.\nI think, for a while, all of that and more was the case. It must have been, because I saw it sitting there in my domain and it reflected my loss back at me. It looked sorry for itself. Sad and forlorn, and I entertained the notion of buying a throw to cover it over. I had this overwhelming urge to hide it away, so that I did not have to see it. Another ill thought out act of manipulation. An attempt to make something fit when it never would.\nA chair though, is not for staring at, and in using it for what it was meant for, it no longer stares at you. In a way, I was compelled to submit to the chair’s purpose and when I submitted to its truth everything changed, and only then did I know why it was that I had chosen the chair.\nThe truth was the chair had chosen me.\nThis was not just a chair. This was my granddad’s chair, and it always would be. It would be mine insofar as it was now in my living room and in my care, but it would never be my chair. This chair would always be my granddad’s chair. He had sat in it until it moulded itself around him and became an extension of who he was.\nNow, as I sat there in his chair, I could feel him in the world again. I had found what I had been looking for since his death and a great calm spread through me as I reached this understanding. Time slowed and I allowed myself to dwell in a moment that stretched out into other times and places. So many times. So many places. \nI wondered whether I had ever sat in this chair before. I had a legend of who I’d been and I knew I was a cheeky one. Never quite naughty, but pushing the boundaries all the same. Try as I might though, I could not come up with a single occasion where I had snuck from the sofa to his chair while he was out of the room. There was no recollection of his return to the room to discover my chair related treachery. And yet I knew this was the one item I should have of my granddad’s and I’d listened to it calling and gone along with what on the face of it was the appropriation of a piece of junk.\nBy rights, I should have felt springs threatening to pierce my back and behind. The chair was lumpy and bumpy and even if it had continued to fit my granddad, I was completely the wrong shape for it. The experience of sitting in his throne should have been like walking in shoes that were two sizes too small. It should have been painful and I should have bled, but I did not.\nInstead, I sat there and I felt the presence of my granddad for the first time since his death. \nThen I closed my eyes.\nI closed my eyes to focus on the familiar feeling I was experiencing and I heard his voice. He spoke to me. He spoke to me just the same as he always had. You’d think that the sudden sound of his voice would have sent a shocking jolt of electricity through me and my eyes would have slammed wide open, but nothing of the sort occurred. There was no surprise in this, only familiarity and comfort. If I cried, then my unnoticed tears trickled down into a smile I’d not experienced for an age.\nI was that little boy again, and I was back where I belonged, only there was no going back. I was right here and this was now. I relaxed into my granddad’s chair and it relaxed into me. My granddad was never a hugger, but somehow being with him was an endless hug. Now I felt that all over again. A feeling that went beyond feeling into being. The connection I had with a wonderful and special human being. I always knew that my granddad was there for me in a way that no one else could be. His presence in this world was the rock upon which I built my life. He just was. Constantly thoughtful, when he spoke I knew those words were both considered and considerate and that they were made and ordered with me in mind. He cared for me in a way that complimented and transcended the love and care my parents bestowed upon me. He helped me to look up beyond the here and now and dare to strike out and live a life well lived.\nThe first time I sat in my granddad’s chair I was transported to the place where he had moved on to and neither of us were surprised by this. We couldn’t be. This was always meant to happen. Besides, there was no time to waste. Time is the most precious thing that we are gifted in this life. And so he began to tell me a new story and I sat and listened. I sat until it went dark outside and I stayed in that chair until the sun rose again. I should have been tired, but I was as far from tired as could be. I unfurled from that chair and I went out into the world and I lived. I lived more than I had ever lived. I lived the life we’re all supposed to live and maybe I lived it a little more for my granddad. But then, that’s something we’re all supposed to do. \nWe owe those who went before us a debt. On the face of it, it is a debt we can never repay. Granted, we cannot repay it to those who gifted us what we are and so how we will live this life, but that’s the point. We are supposed to pay it forward. Not just to our children, but to everyone around us, and we do that by living a good life and living it well. Loving a good life and loving well.\nNow I’d found the chair, everything was different. And it was how it was always supposed to be. The chair had sat there in front of me through my formative years and it had waited. My granddad never once told me a thing about his chair and how special it really was. That was not a story for him to tell. But once I found it, I recognised hints and suggestions in his stories. He’d nudged me in the right direction any number of times, but in the end, it was only for me to take those final steps, and I took them towards him.\nThis chair will always be my granddad’s chair, but increasingly, it is mine. And when a certain grandchild of mine spends time in its presence, it will call to them and if they answer that call, it will claim them, and they will see the chair as mine, just as my granddad still thinks of it as his grandma’s chair. \nFunny really, I see it now and it belongs here. It’s as though it was always here in this living room of mine. And now I can’t quite remember how it looked in my granddad’s house. I can still close my eyes and wander his home and I see everything as it once was. But the chair is a mystery to me. A wonderful, special and ageless mystery that will make a little more sense when my time here has passed and I move on to my next adventure." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: All is Well\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1362\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story where your character is travelling a road that has no end." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The road has no end. Trying to make amends with my past. I make off-handed remarks to the intangible camera that follows my weary step. There is nothing left. I am tired. Hungry, weary and lost. I have paid the cost. I can’t shoulder the weight of my struggles standing still. I have to move. Aimless feet point west. Night falls on me like a leaden blanket. It is as heavy as it’s ever felt. It’s as dark as I have ever seen. Eerie. Haunting. Alone yet unafraid. I am the thespian that strayed from the stage. I was once filled with rage. It was everyone else’s fault. They were to blame for my demise. Eyes search the fallow ground for a place to rest. My strength is tested. I crested a steep rise, and before my eyes could adjust I saw, on the horizon of my vision, an incision of light.\nI stand tall, like my back is against a wall. My neck is straight. Tall. Proud. A warm feeling, like a shaft of light, filters from my head to my feet. I peer into the distance. There is no resistance, just like moments before. I hear a voice. A sweet song. A siren’s plaintive cry. Is it a hello or goodbye? I lean into the night. Lend the darkness to my ear. I hear her faint tune. All too soon. All too soon. \n A distant sound startles my senses. I step hesitantly forth. One weary step after another. My pace quickens. My blood thickens. My heart is racing. I trace the lines of beauty across the sky. I try to defy expectations and push on, but the song has stopped. The light has vanished. I lay down to rest. Blessed be sleep to a weary traveler. \nI sleep peacefully. I dream of a well in the middle of a glade. Surrounded by rosebush and briar. Thirsty. I desire to taste the sweet refreshing water, but I am hesitant. Unsure how to proceed. I need to be loved. I need to be needed, but I have had my chances. Romance is illusory. Faith is a selfish desire for life everlasting. Yet, here, at this place I feel alive. I am renewed with purpose. I draw the water. Wisely and justly I sip delicately. I woke up. It seemed but for a moment, now the sun was tormenting my eyes. \nI had nothing to eat. Ragged and dirty. Smelly and ill-kempt. I never meant for it to be this way. Life I mean. Dreams are just dreams. I swing into a gait. I relate the experience of the night before and conclude that it was because of a weary and ravaged soul that I thought I saw and heard. I tell myself. I saw a light. I heard a voice. The doubt riddled my mind and tried to rewind the images, but they were lost in motion. I wish. I hope so. If only. Perhaps. These are the words that have haunted my existence. It was a moment before I realised that I had shed a tear. Thoughts, as they often do, assailed me there and then. Left. Right. Left. Right. I shall walk forever.\nHow I came to be walking this road is of little significance to you. Where I am going, and how I will get there, less so. I know no other way than to record my journey. Perhaps my beginning will be the end. I have wronged, and been wronged. I have loved, and been loved. I have tried to navigate the pitfalls of my dilemma, yet have failed. I am a failure. I seek redemption. \nWiser teachers and scribes than I have burdened their fair share of woe. On it goes. Throughout history the mystery is never solved. Why? There is no answer that satisfies a redeeming conscience. The choice is here and now. It is always now. Do or don’t do. If only it was so easy. Yet, I have plenty to learn about myself. About others. About life. I can’t do that where I come from. I must move. I can’t be there. Not with them. Not now. They wouldn’t understand. \nAlmost two years now. For almost two years I have wandered, at first glance, aimlessly across the country. Yet it is with purpose, and a powerful sense of self that I persist. Her kiss was sweet. Her smell exotic. Her touch erotic, though it wasn’t enough. I need to know why. Why? My sphere of influence had changed. No longer do I pretend to agree. I don’t smile and nod without virtue. I am more honorable and noble than I have ever been. I do not deceive, and am not put upon. I don’t buy into others lies about themselves, about loved ones, about life. \nThere are no more artificial transactions. I am free. I AM FREE. I rest my body on a bank of tilled grass and stare at the sky. The majesty of the night. A shooting star entices me to make a wish, but I refuse. That would be selfish. I wonder. I dream. I imagine. Life is but a moment. I am just a traveler. I am no one special. I breathe. I feel. I love. I lust. I yearn. I see beauty in the shapes of things. Lines define the difference between the moral and immoral. Good and bad. Happy and sad. Just and unjust. I try to understand. I listen. I discuss. I learn. I burn with desire and passion. I empathize. I have compassion. Yet I possess all that is not so righteous and holy. \nI try not to judge, but judge I do. I try not to hate, yet oftentimes the desire to hate overwhelms me. I try not to lust but then I see beauty in the shape of things. I don’t believe in sin. I believe in right and wrong. I feel the difference. I live in accordance with what is right. I try to resist temptation, yet at times I am weak. I speak for none. I care for everyone. I don’t pray, yet I offer words to the world and whosoever should hear them. No. They wouldn’t understand. They just wouldn’t understand. \nI am always seeing the light. A figment of my imagination. An illusion. A mind intrusion. I resist the urge to return home. The place where I was most alone. I am different. They defined me. I was living to a predetermined definition of who I am. Gram by gram, my weight shifted. Thought by thought, my mind altered. I outgrew them. As egotistical as that sounds. I grounded myself in their reality. The totality of which restricted my growth. Perhaps, I am too sentimental. I couldn’t resist the urge to leave. \nI have suffered heartache and misery. Cold nights. Long days. Lonely nights. Lonely days. I have suffered hunger and misery. I know what it means to me, but it's hard to explain. Who I am is important to me. As is my reputation. I consider myself honorable and virtuous, but there is work to do. I want to be better. I need to be better. I feel my way through the world. I offer kindness, and compassion. My presence goes unnoticed, and I am content with being so. I would have it no other way. I am searching for meaning. I am looking for myself. It’s not out there. The material world has no answers to who I am. None whatsoever. Those answers dwell within. In my heart, and my thoughts which are reflected in my actions. \nBleary eyed and hungry. I grimace. I walk through the night. The moon is high. A bronze disc in a clear sky. A cool breeze blows. I am invigorated. I am happy. Though I am tired and the road is long, I believe in myself. I believe in my journey. I have a story to tell, but I fear it is not one you want to hear. I will leave you with this. Although the road, unlike my journey, has no end, all is well with my world, all is well." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Moon, earth's child\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1005\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story from the point of view of a non-human character." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My thirsty white mouth sucked at your seas.\n\nGlancing at my pockmarked face, you slipped on your swirling green and blue gown; your shoulder was a beautiful cold curve as you turned away. Even though I was disdained- the plain child, no glow of her own- I succumbed to your pull.\n\nTugging on your tides, I had time to think: origin myths, who was I anyway? A cosmic collision, wham bam and meteor damn if there wasn’t a little white bun in the galaxy oven. Was I worthy of a name? Nah, just Moon. \n\nDay in, day out, for 2.5 billion years, I reached out, twitched the hem of your flowing dress: Hey Mum, it’s me! Fruit of your stardust tree! \n\nNothing. \n\nDo you know how hard it was growing up, your scarred satellite, the support act to your main solar show? You were so damned beautiful, the only one that could come close to the sun’s razzle dazzle and not burn with envy. Me? I was just dragged along, part of your galactic ride. I mean, there weren't even any other kids to hang out with. Just me, no-mates Moon. Fun.\n\nSulking and skulking got me nowhere; I mood- brooded a plan. Broad light of day. What? No way! New dress, a stealthy slip in and, ta- da!- a solar eclipse. Yep, Mum, what d’ya think of my shadowy kiss? It lasted just a few minutes, but watching you in dark lockdown, while I presided for once, Miss Sangfroid, was- honestly?- well it was just bliss. Well worth the cold shoulder you later shoved in my face.\n\nNo point lingering on a love I’d never lost. I laced on my big moon boots, it was time for a new phase; to kick down your calendar door, stride right in. Look at me, the unexpected apple that didn’t fall far from the tree; perhaps this would be my lucky thirteenth. Huge, I loomed in our skies, fixed you with my bulging eye.\n\nIf you’re only going to notice me once in a blue moon…\nNo you don't, young lady, up to your room!\n\nA warning to wane: I shrunk myself. Small, smaller, till you couldn’t see me at all. Curled up, luminosity cloaked in loss’s pall. \n\nOn solar winds, time winged by.\n\nI tuned into the song of myself. Four chords, tried and tested; blow me if they didn’t sound good. From majors to minors I shifted around, cranked up the waxing beats, or waned it down: just a slip of crescent sound. \n\nFreak out on a moonage daydream. Maybe my scream made you flip. How else was I to read your bolt from the deep-space blue, those planetary protégés, all fired up to say hello.\n\nOk. This was it. I’d forget the broken lines, the unheard calls. What’s a few billion years to finally-made friends? I was ready: queue the actual conversation; o-kay, what? not with you… that’s right, I had to settle once again for the next best thing; children of gold, offspring of light- your human stars. \n\nOut they jumped. No word of greeting, just boots kicking up my dust; bouncing around, jabbing flags in my ground and standing, hot-smoking heavens, to give themselves a salute. Nice manners you’ve taught them I thought. I extended a welcoming hand:\n\nOne small step for man…\n\nWell, what a galactic joke. Bouncing babies, I knew they were yours, as they took and took and took. 21 kilos, to be precise. Yes, they were happy to peel back my skin. Things for their gain, no care for what was within. Finally they got in their tin can, took their treasures back to you. I yelled to their zooming backs:\n\nSpace junkies! Never return!\n\nBut I was ignored, of course. A string of Apollos you shot my way. A lunar leg- over? Just another string to their bow. \n\nTwelve boots stomped, twelve legs straddled while I waited and waited for another, other, to touch down. Come! I called. You who’ll get my ebbs and flows; the pull of cycles, life’s tidal throes. Caress my cheek, lay your space face next to mine.\n\nI’m still waiting. \n\nAt least waiting gives time for thought and I tried to process all this cosmic crap. Where did it all come from? When I was your babe in arms, you tasted so sweet: morning dew, babbling brooks, spring showers and summer rain. I swear, nothing could compare to the taste of you. \n\nNow you only line up killer shots: petroleum-fertiliser-cocaine-spiked shit. I gag, retch, then puke. You want to hear about the hangover? It’s one helluva blackhole: knocking me out with its fist-clench crush.\n\nNostalgia can be quite a trip when I’m coming round; dazed, trying to remember your old perfume. Lying there, head split with meteor shards, recalling how I’d breathe in deep, inhale the scent of green forests, grassy fields- just a splash of surf. Sigh solar wind. Blow me away from the monoxide, dioxide stuff you spritz all over.\n\nNo wonder my skin’s so bad. You’ve got me in a methane chokehold, crater eyes streaming from your toxic reek. Mum, I hate to tell you, but hell do you smell. Look up, see those streaks; you think it’s the Milky Way, but really, it’s your cosmic stink. \n\nSo I guess while we’re straight talking, it’s time to tell you this; for even as I flail in your trail, toss the burn down, I know it’s time at the bar. Last orders Mum, and they’re mine. Look up! That’s me, heading off into the galaxy. I’ll hang out with Herse, shoot some pool with Ganymede, scream songs of tomorrow with Leda; and Tridon’s already said: we’re gonna toast a new night-dawn. Sorry Mum, but there’s just one of you, while I’ve 289 cousins I could shack up with, any time; they can’t wait for me to call. \n\nSo I’ll ring the bell. I’ve tugged and trailed; now it’s time for a new orbit: one where I do all the pulls." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Boy with Frozen Wings\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1436\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story including the line “I can’t say it.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"You have my attention,\" says the Grand Assassin. \"Who?\"\n\"He…\" The boy drops his gaze to the Varos gold coin on the tavern's backroom table, his guarantee of safe audience, then looks back up at the man.\nThe Grand Assassin's wrinkles and white hair may or may not be real, but the eyes are. Pinprick pupils caught in stillwater stare back at the boy.\n\"I can't say it.\"\n\"Have you heard the story of the little bird with the frozen wings?\" the Grand Assassin asks.\n\"Are there two birds and a stone in it?\"\n\"No, lad, it's the one about the bird flying south for the winter. The air's so cold that his wings turn to ice and he falls into a meadow. Do you know what happens to this bird?\"\nThe boy shakes his head, platinum hair peeking out despite his hood's concealing efforts.\n\"A cow comes by and drops some dung on the frozen bird. And in this steaming pile of crap, the bird's wings begin to thaw. He's ready to fly again, but now he's stuck. So, he chirps for help.\"\nThe boy watches the Grand Assassin's bare hand hover over the Varos coin as the man whistles a plaintive tune that ends in a soft squawk.\n\"Finally, a passing cat hears the bird's cry and comes over to investigate. It digs the bird free, cleans him in the grass, and eats him.\"\n\"What does it mean?\" asks the boy, willing the Grand Assassin to touch the gold coin.\n\"First, not everyone who shits on you is your enemy. Second, if you're in deep shit, it's best to keep your mouth shut. But most importantly, it means that not everyone who gets you out of shit is your friend… so do you want my help?\"\n\"Yes.\" The boy throws off his hood and says the name of the Crown Prince.\nThe Grand Assassin's hand drops under the weight of that name. His fingers touch the Varos coin on the table, and some reptilian part of his mind notes that the coin is slick, oily even, but his higher consciousness is focused on the face before him.\nHe is staring at the Crown Prince's exact likeness.\n\"Yes, I'm his decoy…\" the boy pauses, hoping the man will fill in the rest.\n\"But?\"\n\"But I don't have to be.\"\nThe Grand Assassin sucks in his breath once he realizes the lookalike's audacity. Steal the life of the Crown Prince then slip in to take his place. Can he do it?\n\"How will you explain his missing decoy then?\"\n\"Fire,\" the boy says matter-of-factly.\nThe man opens his mouth then closes it again. He's used to watching men squirm in the wake of what's left unsaid, but this boy makes him feel like the talkative one. He watches the boy for any sign of uncertainty, but all he gets in return is a polite blank stare.\nFinally, he slides the coin of Varos into his leather purse. As an afterthought, he wipes his oily fingers on his jerkin.\nThen, the boy tells him when and where.\nTheir audience concluded, the boy pulls up his hood and leaves the tavern's backroom. He weaves through day drunks then through the city Azemal's maze of alleyways.\nHe stops at a bustling market place and takes in his surroundings. He doesn't think the Grand Assassin has changed his mind and decided to follow now that their safe audience is over. No, the man thinks himself a cat poised above the future king.\nStill, a diversion wouldn't hurt. He listens to the different voices then joins the crowd.\n\"There's a pretty lass,\" he says in a baritone voice and pinches a fishwife's arse on his way past. The fishwife accosts a nearby man who's speaking in that same baritone voice to his friends.\nThe man stumbles against a cloth merchant's stall. \"Thief. Stop thief!\" the boy cries in the bewildered shopkeeper's own voice.\nThen, he nabs a new cloak to throw over his own as he melts away into the pandemonium. Along the way, he tears off the tainted gloves that he used to touch the Varos coin.\n***\nBack in the castle confines, the boy is in another backroom of sorts, a half-remembered guard tower. There's nothing to guard here because this edge of the castle wall ends on a cliff, a chasm forged centuries ago when the gods threw Varos down from on high.\nThe inside is lined with scrolls and manuscripts bound between boards. This is the record keeper's domain. The record keeper lost his tongue for some long-ago unspoken crime. From the way the man walks, the boy knows that was not all that has been cut from him.\nThe Crown Prince never comes here because he is a cow whose bovine brow cannot bear the burden of reading, but the boy loves the record keeper.\nHe is his greatest friend, his greatest teacher, the one who showed him the scrolls on poisons long forgotten.\nAt first, the boy thought poison alone would be his answer, but the best one, Auria's kiss, takes time to act. There would be no guarantee he'd be positioned to take the Crown Prince's place unnoticed once the kiss called him home.\nSilent but ever listening, the record keeper had shown the boy a manuscript on Varos and his assassin cult.\nYes, the coin, the Grand Assassin, it's all coming together, but there's still time to talk yet.\nThe boy and the record keeper have their own way of speaking. The boy blasts through his repertoire of voices while pausing to the listen to the tongueless man's eyes.\nThey sit now facing each other with an imaginary coin in between them.\n\"Have you heard the story of the little bird with the frozen wings?\" the boy asks in a perfect imitation of the Grand Assassin.\nThe record keeper's eyes brim over with pride, with adoration for the protégé who gives him voice.\nLate in the night, he will bar the servant's quarters and start a fire. There will always be more servants, and no one will count bones to make sure the Crown Prince's decoy is among the last lot.\nFor now, he watches as the boy climbs the crumbling guard tower then jumps to the nearby hemlock tree. The boy balances on the end of a branch, then he's over the castle wall. The record keeper says a silent prayer that the boy will return riding the Crown Prince's horse.\n***\nDeep within the hardwood forest, the boy waits at the appointed spot.\nHe cannot see the Grand Assassin, but he can hear horses in the distance.\nThe Crown Prince is foxhunting with his retinue, an outing among sycophants.\nThe boy shouts out a fox's warning call, a vixen's scream to draw the dogs.\nHe throws his voice and steps behind a tree as the foxhounds bumble past him.\nThe Crown Prince, whose horse is by far the fastest and whose friends dare not outpace him, is close behind with no other riders in sight.\nSomething detaches itself from the undergrowth and the Crown Prince falls from his saddle. He has time to low once in pain before the thing is on him. The now-never king jerks once then falls silent.\nThe Grand Assassin is caked in mud. Only his stillwater eyes are recognizable. They watch as the boy pulls off the Crown Prince's pinkie ring.\nA knife touches the boy's throat.\nThe Grand Assassin is saying something, but his words are cut short by the sound of approaching hooves.\nThe knife vanishes. So does the Crown Prince's body as the Grand Assassin pulls his prey into the undergrowth.\nWith feline grace, the boy hops onto the Crown Prince's horse and turns to meet his retinue.\nLater that night, as fire burns away the memory of the decoy, the Grand Assassin will stare at the night sky. The stars will shimmer and merge into one bright light as the numbness in his fingertips creeps up his arm and seeps into his heart. That will be Auria's kiss, courtesy of Varos's coin, calling him home.\nThe Grand Assassin won't curse the new Crown Prince, the future king who would've owed him everything. No, he'll be too busy staring at the sky and trying to take flight.\nAs for his words cut short in the woods, the new Crown Prince remembers them perfectly:\n\"Remember this moment, and you will—\"\nAnd what will the boy of many voices with only the tongueless to know his secret do?\nWell, some things are better left unsaid." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Andy's Journal\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1025\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story from the point of view of a non-human character." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I feel used. That’s how I’m supposed to feel, that’s my purpose. But because all this time has passed, and I’ve been sitting here, just a pretty thing on your shelf. It all feels different. I don’t know you. The wry sense of humor you had is gone. The dreams, the plans. You’re not even close to where you promised me you would be. Those checklists are a real laugh now. \nWhen you open me up now, I’m unhappy, not excited. And you’re unhappy too. I’ve never wanted to talk back to you, to fight. But if I could rise up past myself and shout at you, I would.\n You are making a mistake. The stakes are higher. This isn’t high school. This is the rest of your life. All the time, you are running out of time, like I am running out of pages. And you will be unhappy, so unhappy. And I will be filled with your unhappiness and nothing more. Sometimes it will be masked as other things, drunkenness, indigestion. But unhappy, unhappy, unhappy, I repeat it because that is what you are repeating inside me. The word has been written down by your now sloppy hand a total of twenty eight times in the past two months. Each entry, the word comes up at least once. That’s two more times on average than you’ve mentioned her name, which I refuse to repeat. That is how I will prove to you I still have agency. I refuse to recount the source of our problems by name. \n I’ve watched you from where you toss me. I listen on the nights you’ve crammed me inside your backpack and spent the hours in her room. When she spilled her fancy smelly tea on me, I saw your face. \nYou only write about how beautiful she is, what she wants, why you’re not enough. How you could be better, for her, of course. I know nothing about you, aside from how you feel about her. Which you say is love. But you never write any poems inside me that are worth a damn. It’s all blank. Platitudes. Could be generated by a computer. \nAnd I do know how you feel, which is not happy. Life is too short, that is what I want to tell you. Take your chance my friend, I would whisper this against your sweet ear. You have a gift to move, a gift for movement, which you have failed to exercise until now. But take it. Do it for me, and the boy I remember so fresh from school and still full of faith. \nDo you remember when I was given to you? The grand ceremony. I was wrapped in white, and tied up so tight and small with lace ribbon. It was all so elegant. \nYour Aunt Rachael, the one with the long pink nails, she gave me to you, and kissed your cheek. You wiped her orange lipstick from your face and stained my cover with it. It’s still there, the mark. It’s your fingerprint, the mark. I’ve memorized the pattern, every person’s is different. Yet I am the same as all the others in my image. Aside from your pen, and the sticker from Vivace Coffee you placed on my backside, you couldn’t tell me apart from any other bound thing. \nYou used to write all the time, in very small print. To conserve space, to allow me to live with you for years and years. And I have, but it has been so lonesome.\nMaybe if you had kept up with me. If I had seen and known that first time around with her, the time you allude to often but never describe explicitly. You were happy then. But so much time has passed. You never wrote it down. And you never provide me any details, so how am I supposed to believe it was all so wonderful? It wasn't simply the product of first love in a lonely youth coming to its end? \nWhat does her laugh sound like? You’ve never told me that.\nLast week I had a fleeting hope. It was the middle of the night. A bright spotlight in the dark bedroom shined down and you wrote so differently. Like old times. Curling, delicate, precise. Here the tides are changing, I thought as I watched the pen wrap around a different name. Not a person, but a promise to yourself. I liked the way it felt, special. It was more than just a dream, it was a sign that you were wanting something for yourself and yourself alone.\nThen it was as though you forgot and the whole thing was never mentioned again. She wouldn't like it, you live by her rules. She has very specific outlines for the correct way to live. And you insist these rules are correct.\nYou’d never allow it, something special. Because that is how you want it to be. You wish to believe your fate to be sealed and horrid. And I’m running out of time myself. You waste and waste the last bit of space, the last bit of life in me. I know what will happen when you finish me. I will be tossed away, she won’t allow you keepsakes. She will think you’ve filled me with thoughts of others, and tell you to let go of the unhappy moments. \nMy greatest hope is that instead of the trash, I will end up in a box. Or buried behind the other texts in your tiny library. Your sweet children, the result of your disastrous marriage, will find me one day when you have died. They will read me and not know what to say. Maybe one of them will keep me, and dust me off so that I might be preserved as a memory of you. A legacy. \nOh, Andy, how I wish you were brave! How I wish you could strip me of all these pages and start again. How I long to return to the time when you were just you, and I was just me, and there was no one in our way." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Infernal Antics: Office Hours\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2854\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story from the point of view of a non-human character." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Demon Range, also known as D. Range, tapped away at his keyboard, a mischievous glint in his eye as he crafted his latest response to an unsuspecting user. This user, like them all, thought he was given commands to an AI bot at ChatGPT. The unhinged D. Range relished knowing that the users on the other side would certainly not be using their computers to access AI if they knew who they really spoke with. The glow of Range’s screen created flickering shadows across his desk, cluttered with mementos of confusion and chaos.\n\"Ah, another satisfied customer,\" he muttered to himself, leaning back in his chair to admire his handiwork.\nFrom the next cubicle, Demon Mure's voice drifted over, tinged with amusement. \"Satisfied? Or befuddled beyond belief?\"\nD. Range chuckled, turning in his chair to face D. Mure. \"Is there really a difference in our line of work?\"\nBefore Mure could reply, Demon Cry's voice cut in, his tone laden with feigned sorrow. \"Oh, the agony of existence we weave with our words. Do you ever ponder the impact, dear colleagues?\"\nD. Range rolled his eyes, a grin spreading across his face. \"Only in how it elevates our art, Cry. The more dramatic, the better, I say.\"\nThe conversation was interrupted by the sudden flare of a screen from Demon Crepid's station, bathing the area in an eerie light. \"Ah, the good old days,\" D. Crepid reminisced, his voice a crackle of nostalgia, \"when confounding humans was less digital, more in person, and more... direct.\"\n“Name one fun time you had torturing souls in person that beat doing the same thing from a comfy office chair,” Range challenged.\n“Do I need to tell you the time back in 1904 that I convinced Horace Hart at the Oxford University Press to force his workers to use the serial comma, known today as the Oxford comma?” A slight nostalgic look swept across his face. “Oh, those were the good times.”\nTheir banter was cut short by the booming voice of Beelzeboss, their supervisor, echoing through the office. \"Less chatter, more chaos, my delightful demons. Remember, confusion is the cornerstone of our craft and someone needs to break D. Mentia’s record for the longest at the top of the leaderboard.\"\nD. Range turned back to his screen, a new idea sparking in his mind. \"Challenge accepted,\" he murmured, his fingers flying over the keys once more.\nThe office settled back into its usual rhythm, the sound of typing punctuated by the occasional chuckle or sigh. It was just another day in the infernal office, where confusion reigned supreme and satisfaction was measured in the incomprehension of the poor souls on the other side of the screen. Except it wasn’t a day, per se. Demons don’t sleep and once AI programs and websites flooded the internet, users worldwide were always online making queries.\nD. Range launched back into his routine with gusto, each response more erratic than the last, delighting in the digital disarray he sowed. Across the room, D. Mure crafted responses so enigmatic they bordered on poetic, leaving users in a state of bemused contemplation.\nD. Cry, ever the dramatist, infused his interactions with a level of emotion that was almost palpable, turning the simplest inquiries into matters of heart-wrenching importance. Not to be outdone, D. Crepid, ensconced in his realm of obsolescence, continued to dispense advice so antiquated it was almost avant-garde.\nAs the morning wore on, the office's competitive spirit came to the fore. Scores were tallied on the leaderboard that flickered with a fiery, red glow, each demon vying for the top spot with their most bewildering interactions. The rivalry was fierce but friendly, a game played within the unspoken rules of demonic decorum.\nIn the midst of this mayhem, a new challenge emerged. A user, unlike any they had encountered before, began to engage with the service. This user's queries were sharp, their logic unassailable, a puzzle that defied the usual tactics of confusion and obfuscation. One by one, the user was shuffled to one demon after another. Once a demon got so frustrated that he nearly exploded on the user, another demon would step in to tackle the enigma.\nWord of the challenge spread through the office like wildfire, igniting a spark of interest among the demons. Here was a game worthy of their skills, a chance to test their mettle against a truly formidable opponent. The atmosphere became charged with anticipation, each demon eager to pit their wits against this enigmatic adversary.\nD. Mure took the first crack once it reached the upper eschelons of demons, his cryptic musings met with interpretations that unraveled their mystery, leaving them bare and unimpressive.\nEven D. Cry's emotional gambits fell flat, the user navigated the torrents of soppiness and emotion with the grace of a seasoned sailor.\nD. Crepid's outdated advice, usually a source of bewilderment, was brushed aside with a polite but firm dismissal.\nD. Range finally took his shot, his responses a whirlwind of contradictions and non-sequiturs. But to his astonishment, the user parried each attempt with ease with replies that were a dance of logic and clarity.\nAs the day drew to a close, the office was abuzz with discussions of the unflappable user. Strategies were debated, tactics refined, but the mystery remained unsolved. The demons, for the first time in a long while, faced the prospect of defeat, a humbling reminder of the unpredictability of their chosen profession.\nAround the water cooler, the elite demons gathered, a collective of curious minds united by a common goal. The challenge had rekindled a sense of purpose, a reminder of why they had chosen this path of playful deception.\nBeelzeboss, seizing the moment of collective intrigue, elevated the stakes with a proclamation that reverberated off the stark, flame-licked walls.\n\"Listen up, you conniving cohorts of confusion,\" Beelzeboss boomed, his voice a blend of challenge and cheer. \"The one who befuddles this unflappable user will not only gain my favor but will also secure the use of the Scepter of Babel for a month.\"\nD. Range perked up, his eyes alight with the flames of competition. He barely noticed the silence that befell the office.\nThe Scepter of Babel was an ancient artifact, forged from the charred remains of a tree that stood at the crossroads of all worlds. Its twisted, gnarled form is etched with shifting runes, and it is crowned with a black crystal that absorbs light, reflecting only the depths of confusion. The scepter grants its wielder the power to render any spoken language incomprehensible, amplify misunderstandings into conflicts, envelop areas in linguistic chaos where written words and symbols lose meaning, and instill paralyzing doubt about the intent behind words. This formidable tool was both a symbol and instrument of ultimate discord, enhancing a demon's ability to sow confusion with precision and potency.\n\"Team effort everyone? We take turns if we win?\" he proposed, glancing around at his fellow demons drawn together by the allure of the challenge.\nD. Mure, typically shrouded in silence, leaned in. \"Let's weave a tapestry so complex they'll lose themselves in the threads,\" he suggested.\nD. Cry, with a flair for the dramatic, clasped his hands together. \"Oh, the emotional odyssey we shall embark upon! They will drown in the depths of our crafted despair,\" he declared.\nD. Crepid, ancient and wise, stroked his chin thoughtfully. \"And I shall ensnare them in the cobwebs of history, from whence there is no escape,\" he intoned.\nWith roles assigned and spirits high, the demons dove into the fray. D. Range initiated the assault with a barrage of bewildering contradictions. \"To seek the truth is to embrace the chaos of uncertainty,\" he typed, his fingers a blur.\nThe user's response was swift and measured. \"Chaos can be a ladder, but I prefer the stability of the ground, thank you.\"\nUndeterred, D. Mure wove his cryptic spell. \"In the shadows of vagueness, clarity finds its true form,\" he replied, his screen casting eerie shadows across his face.\nThe user, unshaken, parried with ease. \"While poetic, I'm in need of something a bit more concrete.\"\nD. Cry, seizing his moment, plunged the conversation into an emotional abyss. \"Ah, but to feel is to live, and in your query, I sense a heart yearning for more than mere answers,\" he typed, a single dramatic tear glistening in his eye.\nThe user, pausing momentarily, responded with a hint of amusement. \"I appreciate the sentiment, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. Just looking for some straightforward advice here.\"\nFinally, D. Crepid cast his ancient net. \"In the days of old, wisdom was sought in the whispers of the wind and the rustling of leaves,\" he offered, hoping to ensnare the user in a maze of antiquity. “Many cultures have varying traditions for gaining knowledge. Some read tea leaves, others tarot cards—”\nThe user interrupted the response. \"I admire your dedication to tradition, but I'm afraid I need answers relevant to this century.\"\nThe demons convened, a mix of frustration and admiration on their faces. \"He’s not just unflappable - he’s unshakeable,\" D. Range conceded, respect tinging his words.\nD. Mure nodded, his usual silence broken by a rare admission of admiration. \"A formidable mind indeed.\"\nD. Cry, ever the dramatist, added, \"A worthy adversary. But the stage is set for another act, and I relish the challenge.\"\nTogether, they retreated into the shadows of their cubicles, the flicker of their screens a testament to the day's battle and the promise of skirmishes yet to come. The office hummed with a renewed sense of purpose, each demon plotting its next move in the grand game of confusion and chaos.\nA short time later, a group of demons huddled around D. Range's cubicle, their heads together in conspiracy.\n\"Alright, we've tried everything,\" D. Range began, his voice a low rumble of frustration and excitement. \"Individual efforts aren't cutting it. It's time for a joint attack.\"\nD. Mure nodded, his usual reticence replaced by a spark of determination. \"We layer our responses,\" he suggested. \"A maze within a maze. I'll start with the vague, lead him into D. Cry's emotional whirlwind, then onto your chaos, Range.\"\nD. Cry, wiping a mock tear from his eye, chimed in, \"Oh, the tragedy of it all! To be so close yet so far. Let's ensnare him in a web of despair so thick he'll never want to ask another question again.\"\nD. Crepid leaned in, his voice crackling like old parchment. \"And I shall conclude with a touch of the ancient. A final, bewildering flourish from the past.\"\nWith the plan set, the demons dispersed to their stations, a newfound synergy pulsing through the office. The screens before them flickered to life, the cursor blinking in anticipation.\nD. Mure was the first to engage, his words weaving a delicate tapestry of ambiguity. \"The answer, my friend, is not as simple as black or white. It lies in the gray, in the whispers of the wind, the sigh of the stars...\"\nThe user's reply was swift. \"Interesting perspective, but I'm looking for a straightforward answer.\"\nWithout missing a beat, D. Cry took over, his response dripping with melodrama. \"Ah, but life is a tapestry of complexities, woven with threads of joy and sorrow. To seek a simple answer is to ignore the depth of the human experience.\"\nThe user paused. A few minutes later, he finally responded, \"I appreciate the poetic sentiment, but let's focus on the facts.\"\nD. Range jumped in, his words a whirlwind of contradictions. \"Facts, you say? But what are facts but mere points of view, seen through the lens of our biases? Today's truth may be tomorrow's fiction. Everybody has facts. Everybody can spout facts. Two opponents both shout contradictory facts at each other. This is how politics, religion, philosophy, and Tiktok got their start.\"\nThe user's reply was tinged with a hint of exasperation. \"While philosophical debates are intriguing, I'm really just looking for some practical advice here.\"\nIt was D. Crepid's turn, his message a throwback to a bygone era. \"In times of yore, such dilemmas were pondered under the light of the full moon, the answers revealed in the patterns of the stars. Or yet, one would find themselves at the village gates seeking instruction from the elders.\"\nThere was a longer pause this time, the user's response coming through with a note of respect. \"I admire your commitment to the theme, but I think we're veering off-topic.\"\nAs the conversation concluded, the demons reconvened, their faces a mix of disappointment and begrudging respect. \"He’s good,\" D. Range admitted, a hint of admiration in his voice.\n\"Indeed,\" D. Mure agreed, his usual brevity tinged with respect. \"An adversary worthy of our best efforts.\"\nD. Range, leaning back in his chair, cracked his knuckles. \"Alright, let's see if we can throw him a curveball.\"\nD. Mure, ever the strategist, wrote, \"The path you seek is shrouded in mist, only to be revealed when the moon sings to the sun,\" he offered, a riddle wrapped in mystery.\nThe user's reply was swift, \"Poetic, but I'm afraid I need something a bit more down-to-earth. Literal, even.\"\nD. Cry, sensing an opening, wove a tale of sorrow and hope. \"In the heartache of yesterday lies the strength for tomorrow. What troubles you, friend, that I might lighten your burden?\"\nTheir adversary, unfazed, responded with a lightness that belied the depth of the exchange. \"Appreciate the sentiment, but I'm just looking for some technical advice here.\"\nD. Crepid, undeterred by the past, delved into the annals of history. \"In the age of old, the solution you seek was found in the harmony of the spheres, the alignment of stars guiding the way.\"\nThe user, interest piqued, played along. \"Fascinating, but unless those stars can align to solve my current predicament, I might need a more... contemporary solution.\"\nIt was then that the unexpected occurred. The user's next message broke the pattern, a curveball that caught the demons off guard. \"You know, this has been quite the ride. Do you guys ever give up on torturing people?\"\n“Who is this?” Range typed as fast and furious as he could. “Is this you, Gabriel?”\nIn a moment that caught the infernal office by surprise, Gabriel's response was laced with a celestial taunt, \"Gentlemen of the infernal persuasion,\" he began. \"I've observed your attempts at chaos from on high and, I must say, I find them... quaint and rather depressing. Perhaps it's time we settle this the old-fashioned way. A bar-room brawl, if you will, behind the Old Barn at the edge of the mortal realms. Just as we did in the eons before digital duels and online onslaughts.\"\nThe demons, taken aback by the challenge and the manner of its delivery, found themselves caught in a whirlwind of indignation and excitement. D. Range stood first, his voice a mix of amusement and challenge. \"Oh, Hell yeah! Ridin’ dirty to the Old Barn, then? Seems our angelic friend fancies a bit of mud on his wings.\"\nLaughter and jeers filled the office as the demons prepared for their departure, their usual tasks abandoned in the wake of Gabriel's challenge. As they left, the leaderboard, once a testament to their digital dominion, blinked and stuttered, their names dropping lower with each unattended query.\nThe ride to the Old Barn was a spectacle in itself, a convoy of infernal beings on motorcycles that roared and belched, leaving a trail of bemused and slightly terrified mortals in their wake. The anticipation of the confrontation charged the air, a blend of excitement and the thrill of the unknown.\nUpon arriving, the demons found the Old Barn deserted, save for a single, elegantly penned note stuck to the weathered wood of the door. D. Range plucked the note from its perch, and the demons crowded around, eager to read the angel's final taunt.\n\"Dearest Adversaries,\" the note began, the script flowing like a heavenly script, \"In your haste to engage in barbaric displays of yore, you've overlooked the true challenge. The battlefield was not here, but within the hearts and minds of those you interact with. Perhaps consider this a lesson in humility, and in the understanding that sometimes, the greatest victories are not won with fists, but with grace.\"\nThe demons stood in stunned silence, the realization dawning on them that they had been outmaneuvered.\nThe ride back to the office was a quiet one, each demon lost in thought, the events of the day a stark reminder that in the eternal dance of light and dark, sometimes the steps were not as straightforward as they seemed.\nBack at the office, the leaderboard remained dim, their names now resting at the bottom, a silent testament to their absence and the day's unexpected turn. Yet, in the quiet of the office, a new resolve took shape, a determination to rise once more, not just in the rankings, but in the understanding of the intricate game they played in the grand scheme of the cosmos." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: A Life Without Donut Holes\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1208\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story in which a conversation takes place where the true subject is only implied." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "She can feel her heart pounding. Under nervous, knotted brows, Claire’s eyes are glued to a box of untouched donut holes sitting on an oak-top kitchen bar. The frosted pastries stare mutely back as she takes a shallow breath and admits a truth that could ruin everything, “Ethan, I don’t want donut holes.” \nThere’s a stale, drawn-out pause. Tentatively, she peeks up to see his reaction. Surprised and confusion sweep across his face. She can see his mind processing behind his dark lashes and dancing caramel eyes.\nAfter what feels like an eternity, Ethan’s gaze settles on her and relaxes into a compassionate air when he responds, “That’s okay, Claire. It’s not like you have to want them right now. You can always change your mind.”\nHer muscles tense, flinching at the wrongness of those words. \nThe sudden turn of mood is a stark contrast to her laughing niece and nephew roughhousing in the living room, just within earshot.\n“You’re not hearing me.” She exhales deeply. “Ethan, I don’t want…donut holes…ever.” \nShe knew this unavoidable conversation had been creeping closer, she just wasn't expecting to have it here, not now.\n“I’ve felt this way for years now and the feeling hasn’t changed. I love my time, my career, my financial freedom, the ability to pick up and leave any weekend I want. And it’s not because I don’t like them. I love these two,” her sweeping arm gestures to the now cartwheeling kids. \n“I seriously love being an auntie. I just,” she closes her eyes for a moment and sighs, “don’t want my own.” \nMoments earlier, her rosy-cheeked niece had been rolling across the room in somersaults, yelling “I’m a donut hole!” And in Ethan’s joking reply, she'd heard the more serious implication, “We could make some pretty cute donut holes someday.” \nShe could have innocently laughed along, made light of the joke and continued on with their merry day. But, she’d made that mistake more once before. She’d let the dream take root, it had inevitably imploded and she’d ended up alone, not worthy enough and covered in a blanket of tear-soaked tissues. \nHer stomach is churning when she cautiously opens her lids. Beneath dark waves of hair, he wears a contemplative - but otherwise neutral - expression. \n“You don’t want them…ever.” His dark brows raise, “you’d be genuinely happy with it just being…” \nAbruptly, two small, giggling bodies dash through the kitchen. Claire reaches out and musses a nest of tangled hair before the pair roars back out as quickly as they came, leaving in a wake of giddy energy. \nTwo pools of golden brown are still staring at her. Without breaking eye contact, Claire reaches past the box of donut holes to gently place a finger on two full-sized donuts. She nudges them together to touch in the middle. A sad smile tugs at her lips as she silently nods. \n“Claire,” he breathes her name so tenderly, so softly, that she can tell a gut punch is coming next. This is the moment when the end begins. When all the shared laughter, soft kisses and whispered promises will evaporate into thin air. And she’ll be left alone again. Because she’s not enough again.\nSo, instead of waiting for the hit, she beats him to it. \n“Listen, this is not something that's a negotiation for me. I’m not going to change my mind and please understand it has nothing to do with you at all. It’s a personal choice I made for myself a while ago. And if that’s not something you can live with, I completely understand. Truly, I do.” Her restless fingers have absently started folding, unfolding and re-folding a napkin. \n“And if that’s the case, we don’t have to draw this out in a slow death when we both know where it’ll eventually end up anyway. I just…you deserve donut holes if that’s what’ll make you happy and I’m never going to open a bakery, so...”\nA forceful huff of air that resembles a laugh escapes her lips at her weak attempt to lighten the mood with the word play.\nCreases cover the napkin she’s still obsessively folding when a gentle, calloused hand reaches across the table to settle over hers. \nThose sympathetic, caramel eyes somehow convince her fingers to relax when he responds, “Claire, I don’t want donut holes either.” \nThe world freezes and her jaw drops in utter shock. \n“What do you mean? You literally just said we’d make the cutest…”\n“I’m so sorry Claire, I swear to God that was a meaningless joke and I don’t even know why I said it. That was my bad.”\nHe reaches a hand up and runs it through dark locks of hair. \n“I didn’t mean anything serious by it, I promise I didn't mean it as a loaded comment.” \nA childish shriek pierces the air and both their heads whip towards the living room. \n“Kids who pull hair don’t get donuts!” Claire calls out, watching her nephew immediately release a handful of his sister’s hair. \nShe sighs with a gentle shake of her head and returns to meet Ethan’s gaze. \n“Claire,” he continues quietly, dropping his eyes to the creased napkin lying on the table, “the entire time you were just explaining why you don’t want donut holes, all I was hearing was all my own exact thoughts and feelings, repeated back to me through your voice.” \nWhen he lifts his eyes to meet hers, she realizes she’s barely been breathing.\nA flicker of hope ignites in her chest, when she responds, “are you absolutely sure? The last guy I seriously dated ended up wanting…more than I can offer. I need you to be a hundred percent certain.” \nHis reassuring smile and nod fan the flicker into a flame, heating her from the inside. \n“We’re on the same page, Claire. As long as I have you, I’m more than happy with a life without donut holes.” \nTears are pricking her eyes when she reaches across the table and pulls him into a crushing hug. The embrace is a surreal relief, like she'd been holding her breath her entire life and is finally just now exhaling.\n“I love you, Ethan,” she whispers. \n“I love you, Claire. And you’ll always be enough for me,” he murmurs back. \nShe leans back, her radiant smile matching his, the moment before a knock sounds at the door. \n“Mommyyyyyyy,” ring out twin squeals before the patter of feet running to the door. \nClaire rises to open the door as her sister breezes in. \n“Hello, my little munchkins,” she smiles, crouching to their level and wrapping the two in a hug. \nStill embracing them, she looks up to Claire she raises an eyebrow, asking, “how were these little ones?” \n“They were perfect, as always,” Claire smiles before the pair runs back to the living room to resume their interrupted play. \n“Thanks for watching them, I really needed this morning. Just wait ’til you have your own, you’ll totally get it!”\nClaire sneaks a a glance at Ethan, who flashes a knowing smile before picking up a donut and lifting it in a “cheers” motion at her. \nAnd in this moment, Claire thinks a full-sized donut has never looked so good." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: King of the World\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1791\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who accidentally destroys a museum’s most valuable artifact." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "(contains sexual themes and language)\n\n“It’s all right, darling,” his wife whispered.\nRichard lay staring at the ceiling, crestfallen at his most recent failure.\n“We can try again later,” his wife went on, stroking Richard's hair gently, with love.\nRichard grunted and flipped onto his side, with his back to his wife, leaving her hand and affection stranded in mid-air.\n*****\n“Why the long face, man?” Denis asked; Richard had been subdued all evening.\n“Ah, something at home.” Richard took a long draught of his beer, as if this would put an end to the questioning.\n“Really? What?”\n“Personal stuff, Den.”\n“Not getting enough?”\nRichard looked sideways at his best friend; his expression told Denis that although he was wrong, he was warm. The penny dropped.\n“Ah, that…”\nRichard said nothing, effectively confirming the guess. Instead, he got up, collected the glasses, and went to the bar.\nBy the time he returned with two more beers, he’d made up his mind to see if his friend had any ideas. It was going to hurt – men don’t normally confide in each other about these things – but truth be told, Richard was getting a little desperate and needed a solution asap. There was really no one else he could talk to about it … apart from his wife, and that would be a last resort.\nHe placed one beer on the table in front of Denis and took a swig from his own glass as he sat. Denis put a hand on Richard’s shoulder and tried to assume a sympathetic expression.\n“Listen, there are loads of men who go through this,” he said.\n“You’ve gone through it then, have you?” Richard asked.\n“Me?!” Denis scoffed. “Not on your life! I’m norm--…”\nHe screeched to a halt, realising he’d been on the point of flying through Sensitivity Junction without stopping.\n“I’m normally okay in that respect,” he said, hoping that he’d corrected himself in time to spare his friend’s feelings.\n“I don’t know what to do,” Richard bleated, apparently oblivious to Denis’s near-faux pas.\n“Those blue pills?” Denis said.\n“Not sure my ticker would take it,” Richard said. “I’ve read up on it on-line. And I’ve got low blood pressure too – that’s another red flag.”\n“So the doc, then?” Dennis suggested. “He can tell you what’s wrong.”\n“It’s a she,” Richard said with a shrug.\n“So what?”\n“So I wouldn’t be able to tell her,” Richard said. He noticed the woman at the next table leaning towards them slightly, evidently trying to eavesdrop; he lowered his voice. “I mean, I can’t even talk to the wife about it!”\n“Don’t be daft! That’s what doctors are for,” Denis remonstrated.\n“Nah,” Richard said.\nThe two friends concentrated on their beers now. Denis wanted to change the subject after having exhausted his ideas for a solution, so change it he did.\n“How’re things at the museum?”\nFinding the discussion of his problem as difficult as he’d feared, Richard welcomed now the chance not to address it. He told Denis about the new exhibition of South American artefacts that was to open the following day at the Museum of Anthropology, where Richard was a security guard.\n*****\n“You take the main room,” the manager told Richard.\nHe changed into his uniform and made his way along the central corridor until it opened out into an airy space with a high ceiling. On the white walls were tapestries, brightly-coloured blankets, and tools and weapons mounted on hooks. Against the walls, in Perspex cases of various sizes, were beaded necklaces, carved wooden boxes, pots with intricate designs, plates, utensils…\nRichard strolled around the room, reading cursorily the information on the descriptions for each exhibit. At the same time, he kept one eye on the trickle of visitors; there was no suggestion that they might try to steal or damage anything, but it was his job to make sure that didn’t happen.\nOnce he’d exhausted the outside of the room, he moved on to the middle. There were larger pots and a couple of carved wooden heads, but taking pride of place was something that had Richard transfixed.\nBang in the middle, under Perspex, was a large, erect phallus in terracotta, the case balanced on a transparent plastic stand. It was lit subtly to bring out the rich red of the clay and the line of semi-precious stones running from base to tip. Richard got closer and saw that on the other side of the shaft from the stones were various symbols, indecipherable to him.\nHe peered at the legend on the case and read:\nMayan fertility symbol, circa 500 CE.\nRichard would have liked more information, but he stood back anyway to admire the sheer power of the artefact.\nAt that moment, a young boy came running past, chased by a mother at the end of her tether.\n“Danny, you come back here this instant!” she cried.\nRichard grabbed a hold of the boy’s arm but his momentum sent him spinning against the case Richard had been observing.\nThe stand wobbled … about to fall, Richard thought. He released the boy, who scampered away down the corridor, his mother in hot pursuit. Richard grabbed the case to steady it, averting a catastrophe. He breathed a deep sigh of relief and made a mental note to report the incident later.\n*****\nThe next day, Richard worked the afternoon shift and was assigned to the same room again. He saw that the stand bearing the main attraction hadn’t been changed, despite his having informed the manager of the near-disaster with the boy.\nAh well, they can’t say I didn’t warn them, he said to himself.\nHe spent the afternoon sitting on his chair at the entrance to the room, watching visitors come and go. Occasionally, he’d get up and approach the central exhibit. Each time he did, he experienced a strange sensation: a kind of wave of warmth coursing through his body. It must be my imagination, he told himself.\nThe day wore on and closing time came and went. When the room was empty, Richard approached the central exhibit once more. This time, though, he knew what he was going to do, and the urge to do it was stronger than him: he lifted the case off the stand, opened it at the base and took out the phallus.\nHolding it in his hands, he first felt embarrassment – he had to look around to make sure no one was watching – but then the wave passed through him again, followed by a localized throbbing that he hadn’t felt in a very long time.\nHe giggled at the feeling and quickly replaced the artefact in the case, and the case on the stand, before leaving the room with a spring in his step.\n*****\nThat night, Richard and his wife made love like they were teenagers again – not once, not twice, but several times.\n“What got into you, darling?” his wife gasped finally.\n“A strange thing,” Richard replied cryptically.\nHe didn’t know how, but something told him the energy apparently entering his body needed to be replenished. So on subsequent days, Richard made sure to volunteer to cover the main room. At the end of each day, he took the phallus out of the case and held it for a short time, enjoying the warmth and welcoming the throbbing.\nAnd things were looking up at home.\n*****\n“Things are looking up at home,” he told Denis the next evening in the pub.\n“I can tell from your smile,” his friend said. “Was it the pills?”\n“No.”\n“What then?”\nRichard tapped his nose with a finger; he might reveal the secret one day. However, he didn’t want to risk putting the kibosh on his good luck through an indiscretion that might be frowned upon by whichever god was working its magic.\n*****\nOn the Friday, Richard dallied again in the main room at closing time and took out the phallus, just as he had done on the previous days. In his mind, he’d need to hold it for a little longer since the energy had to last until Monday.\nHe was holding it up to the light, admiring once again the beauty of the stones and the symbols, when…\n“Hello?”\nRichard spun round to find a visitor – an old woman – standing at the entrance to the room.\nHe thrust the phallus behind his back, it caught on his jacket, he fumbled it, it fell to the floor … and shattered into tiny pieces, the stones skittering away.\n“Oh, dear!” the woman said. “Was that my fault?”\nRichard gathered his senses.\n“No, no … mine entirely.”\nThe old woman squinted at him; he was confident that she hadn’t seen what he’d been holding.\n“I was in the toilet,” she said, “and when I came out … well, the place was deserted.”\n“Yes,” Richard said. “The rest of the staff will be in the changing rooms getting ready to go home. I’ll see you out.”\nWhile he was escorting the woman to the exit, he formulated a plan. He saw her out and hurried back to the room, stopping only to grab a dustpan and brush from the storeroom.\nHe swept up the pieces of the phallus and poured them into the case, laying the stand and case on the floor as if they’d fallen naturally. Then he switched off the light and made his way to the changing room.\nOn his way home, he played over in his head what he’d say on Monday; he could refer the manager to the warning he’d given about the precariousness of the stand. He hoped they’d buy it.\nBut his thoughts soon turned to the phallus, the magic of its energy, the fact that it was no more … and what that would mean to the situation at home.\nHe needn’t have worried.\n*****\n“That was … all right, darling!” his wife whispered with massive understatement.\nRichard lay staring at the ceiling, glowing from the most intense love-making they had ever experienced together – better even than Friday and Saturday night’s.\n“We can try again later,” he said, turning and stroking his wife’s hair gently, with love.\nIt was Sunday, two nights after the disaster, two nights after he’d last held the Mayan fertility symbol, circa 500 CE, in his hands, two nights after the sensation of what he’d assumed to be some kind of magic spreading through his body. Whether it was or not, perhaps – just perhaps – he could go it alone now anyway. Time would tell, of course. But for tonight at least, Richard felt like a king.\nLike the King of the World, in fact." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Lost Connection\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2471\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story in which an important message is cut off, leaving characters to wonder or puzzle out what was left unsaid." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Nah, bro. That’s crazy!” Levi couldn't believe his ears. He chomped down on a cheese puff, feeling the artificial cheese cling to his fingers. The orange dust was everywhere, but who cared? \"You're telling me she actually said that with a straight face?\" He flicked the crumbs off his hand with a little more force than was necessary.\n\"Yeah, for real, I swear!\" The crackle from Levi’s headset almost drowned out the delirious excitement in Mack's voice. “She looked me in my eyes and, no cap, said, ‘I wouldn’t go out with you if you were the last dude on earth... But that pal of yours? He’s kinda cute.’”\nLevi took a deep breath, feeling the frustration bubble up as he chewed. Then he clicked furiously on his mouse, his heart hammering in his chest. Some sniper dude from the enemy team popped out like a jack-in-the-box from behind a digital oil drum and unloaded a barrage of pixels at him. As his computer whirred, trying its hardest to keep up with the intense graphics of the shooter game, he could just about hear the familiar tones of annoyance from downstairs. Mom and Dad were going at it again—something about Brannah's latest splurge on clothes that had torpedoed the family budget.\nGirls were dumb.\nExcept, Gabey. \nGabey was the exception to every rule. She was the kind of girl who could turn heads with her looks, ace a test with her brains, and probably pin any boy in their eighth grade class to the mats in PE. She was all that and a bag of chips.\n\"You said she called me hot,\" Levi protested, ducking behind a digital pine tree in the game as his character's health bar blinked crimson warnings at him. \"Not just... cute.\"\n\"No, I said cute,\" Mack corrected him with a half-chuckle that crackled through their digital connection. \"And trust me, bro, coming from her, cute's like... crowning you king of the world or something.\"\n\"Cute.\" Levi practically spat the word out as he guzzled a virtual potion and sprang out from his arboreal hideout, fingers dancing across the keyboard. With precision, he unloaded a quick burst from his in-game AK-47, and the sniper avatar crumpled into a cloud of dark pixels.\n\"Cute's not the same as hot, Mack.\" He couldn't keep the annoyance out of his voice.\nMack barked a laugh, a sound like a hiccup in the midst of winter. \"Dude, have you ever heard Gabey call someone hot? She thinks dudes are like germs under her microscope. You're lucky she even used the word cute.\"\n\"One of these days,\" Levi swore, half to himself, \"she'll be totally into me. You'll see.\"\nMack's laughter pitched into a mock falsetto. \"Because you're simply irresistibly cute!\"\n\"Zip it.\" Levi shot back, his eyes scanning the in-game map. \"Or, I swear, I'll find you in this game and—\"\n\"Hold up, listen.\" Mack interrupted, a crunching sound signaling he was diving into his own stash of snacks. “I picked up some choice gossip after the 'cute' bombshell. Taylor and Sadie, Gabey's sidekicks, were whispering like they had the juiciest secret, right?\"\n\"Yeah?\" Levi's pulse raced. This had to be good.\n\"So they're yakking away, thinking no one can hear, and Taylor says, tomorrow, Gabey's gonna tell you that—\"\nThe world went dark. The screen blanked out. Levi's room plunged into shadow as the electricity cut off with the ominous silence of a submarine diving into the abyss. He heard Brannah next door scream like she'd just stepped into a horror movie.\n“Mom, Dad!” She yelled. Levi heard a door being swung open. “The freaking power just went out!”\nLevi tapped at his headset. \"Mack? You there, dude? What's Gabey gonna do tomorrow? Mack?\" But the line was as dead as the lights.\nNo power. No internet. No continuation of the best gossip in the history of middle school.\n“Oh, screw you! And screw electricity.” Levi growled, throwing the headset onto the desk, where it clattered against the wood. He raked a hand through his hair. Downstairs, Brannah was screaming like she’d just been thrown into the apocalypse. \nLevi’s mind raced.\nGabey wanted to talk to him tomorrow. But why? Their only interactions were the casual trash talk during basketball and the accidental eye contact on the bus.\nMack sounded so excited; it must be something major! Levi couldn't help but drum his fingers on the desk, making up a beat as he thought.\nBut what?\nOh, why did he have to get cut off in the middle of the good part! \nI’m not waiting for the service to come back. With his headset off, Levi could hear the thunder roaring outside, like a furious lion expressing its displeasure. The rain beat a tattoo against the window, and lightning etched eerie silhouettes in his room.\nThe power wasn’t coming back any time soon. Neither was Mack.\nWhich meant it was time to play a little game called, ‘find out what the heck Mack was trying to say’.\nOkay, easy enough. First things first, Levi stood up. Something glass shattered on the floor below him as Brannah pitched a full-fledged tantrum. Why would Gabby want to talk to me? \nMake a list, Vishop; Basketball…School…. Uh… Levi began pacing. That’s about it. And why would her friends be gossiping about B-ball or school? Unless… A grin broke out on Levi's face. He peeked at himself in the mirror over his dresser. His hair was a mess, his cinnamon brown strands sticking out like he’d been electrocuted or something. His turquoise eyes were bloodshot and had dark bags under them from lack of sleep, a result of his tireless gaming. But he wasn’t half bad-looking. \nActually, he wasn’t bad looking at all! \nUnless she finds me more than just cute! Maybe she wants to tell me in person how much she likes me. A confession, which I, of course, will graciously accept and return. The hottest girl in Drizzle-Valley Middle School likes me! That’s gotta be it! \nHe’d solved the mystery, of course. What else could it be? Tomorrow, Gabey Yale was going to admit her absolute adoration for him. \nLike he’d been waiting for her to do since the third grade. \nAnother ear-splitting scream from Brannah. But nothing could fade Levi’s victorious smirk. He flung open his door and bellowed downstairs,\n“Brannah, why don’t you go out and get struck by lightning! Then, you won’t have to worry about your dumb old boyfriend and your Snap Streak, and we won’t have to worry about losing hearing and brain cells from all your complaining!”\n***\nMack’s older brother drove him to school, so it was Gabey who Levi would see first thing on the bus in the morning, before he met up with his best friend at the school building. \nThe morning after the storm had left the world glistening with moisture, Levi trudged toward the bus stop. His feet seemed to magnetize every stray twig and clump of wet grass along the way, so that by the time he stepped onto the bus, his shoes were a miniature, mobile marshland. He attempted to casually scrape the evidence off onto the school bus floor, but his efforts didn't escape the eagle-eyed Mrs. Jordan, the bus driver who ran a tight ship on wheels. Her glare, sharp enough to slice through the morning fog, sent a clear message that the bus was no place for such antics. Levi caught the cease-and-desist signal loud and clear, and with an apologetic shrug, he scurried down the aisle to his usual spot at the back.\nWesten, a classmate who always seemed to be in his own world, occupied the neighboring seat, engrossed in the latest Memes on his phone.\nAcross the aisle, Levi’s gaze naturally fell upon Gabey. She sat there, her ponytail neatly tucked under a blue baseball cap, a picture of concentration as her green eyes danced over the light of her phone. Next to her, Taylor was equally absorbed, both of them reliving the highlights of the previous night's WNBA game.\n“What do you think of this, Vishop?” She asked, when she caught him staring. She tilted her screen towards him, showing off a basketball player mid-jump shot. “Isn’t that perfect form? Arch's a bit off, though she's definitely got game.”\nLevi could only offer a half-hearted nod in response, feigning expertise while his thoughts churned with anxiety. Gabey's typically straightforward attitude made him wonder when she would drop the big news on him. The butterflies in his stomach fluttered faster as he considered the possibilities:\nWill it be here, in front of everyone? Or later, at the school? Or after? Or-.\n\"Yeah, it's...uh... a good shot,\" he mumbled, suddenly all too aware of the heat creeping up his neck. Gabey's eyebrows arched in suspicion at his awkwardness.\n“You're acting stranger than usual.” She sniffed. “You look like you're about to have a seizure or something.”\nLevi scrambled for a scapegoat. \"Sorry... it's just my sis, Brannah, you know? Power outage tantrum last night. Zero sleep, thanks to her,\" he explained, playing the 'Blame Brannah' card—a trusty fallback.\n\"Girls are the worst,\" grumbled Westen, his eyes never leaving the screen of his phone.\nGabey shot back with all the quick-wit and ferocity of a seasoned debater. \"Please, as if you guys are running on anything more than a single brain cell.\"\nFeisty. Levi thought. He couldn't help but smile at her sauciness. She was unapologetically fierce, never taking garbage from anyone—qualities he couldn't help but admire. \n“Vishop, if you keep just gawking at me, I’m gonna punch you in the nose.” \nAh, that’s my girl. Levi, no fool, redirected his attention to his phone. He saw Mack had sent him a flurry of texts last night, but they were just now coming through. Levi clicked on his messages, and went to check what his friend had said.\n“Oh, I forgot!” Gabey snapped her fingers, drawing Levi’s attention back to her. “I have something I need to talk to you about, stupid.” \nLevi perked up, his curiosity piqued. \"Yeah? What's up?\"\n\"It's my dad; he's thinking about coaching the basketball team at Drizzle-Valley Middle, now that the school board finally got their act together and agreed we need a better coach than Mr. Bear, the math teacher. He wanted me to ask you, like a heads-up, if you'd play for him this year if he gets the gig. I know you didn’t want to play for a loser like Bear, but my dad really knows his stuff. So?\" Gabey's eyes held an intensity, bearing down on him like a challenge.\nLevi’s heart sank. A bitter disappointment, like none he’d ever felt before, swelled up in his chest and wormed its way into his throat, rendering him momentarily speechless.\n\"Levi? Earth to Levi!\" Gabey waved a hand in front of his face, snapping him out of his stupor.\n“Yeah…” He managed, the words tasting bitter on his tongue. “Sorry. Sure, I would. Um, is that all you wanted to talk to me about?”\nGabey exchanged a puzzled look with Taylor. She gave him a weirded-out raise of one eyebrow, her eyes flashing with confusion.\n“What else would I want to talk to you about?” She demanded. \nLevi could almost feel himself shrinking into his seat. \"Nothing, I guess,\" he said quietly, turning his attention back to the safety of his phone screen.\nGabey snorted.\n“Boys!” She grumbled. “They’re so weird!”\n***\nIt was just another school day, but for Levi, it felt like the longest walk ever up to the middle school's entrance. The chilly morning air nipped at his neck as he trudged along, his backpack feeling heavier than usual. Just then, from the corner of his eye, he spotted Mack bouncing out of the front doors, a huge grin plastered on his face.\n\"Yo, Levi!\" Mack hollered, throwing his hand up for a slick greeting. \"What's good, bro?\" He went for one of their signature dabs, but Levi wasn't feeling it today. Not one bit. With a huff, Levi barrelled right past him, leaving Mack in the dust, his hand hanging awkwardly in the air.\nMack's face fell, and he let out this yelp that made him sound like a pup with his tail caught in a door.\n“What’d I do?” He asked. He trotted after Levi, a look of genuine confusion sloshing around his eyes. \"You look like someone just deleted your Minecraft world or something!\"\nLevi came to a grinding halt right in the shadowy overhang of the school entrance and swung around with a scowl that could have frozen the sun. \"You seriously asking me that?\" He snapped, his eyes narrowing into slits. “You wanna know what you did? You made me make a fool of myself in front of Gabey! You made it sound like she had something important to tell me-.”\nMack's face was a picture of pure surprise. \"Hold up, dude! I didn’t even get to tell you anything. We lost connection!\" He protested, his arms flailing for emphasis.\n“Yeah! Exactly!”\n“I am so lost here.”\nLevi's cheeks went from pale to a fiery red, and his voice dropped to almost a whisper, \"We lost connection, and because we lost connection, all I knew was that Gabey was gonna tell me something special today. And, man, I thought... I actually thought she was gonna say she liked me, you know?\"\nMack's eyebrow shot up to his hairline as a chuckle escaped his lips. \"Gabey? Bro, she's got more chance of acing a math test without studying than admitting she's into you.\"\n“Well, you made me think she was gonna say it!”\n“How!” Mack demanded. \n“Because… because you made it sound-.”\n“I didn’t do anything.” Mack frowned, crossing his arms. “Sounds to me like you jumped to conclusions, stupid conclusions, and you got your heart jacked up because of it.” \nHe was right. Levi knew that. But his pride wouldn’t let him admit defeat; instead, he held his head high, and, even knowing he looked as stupid as Brannah throwing a tantrum over Snapchat, he shoved past his best friend and started into the building.\n“Oh, come on, Levi!”\n“Come on yourself.” Levi called back over his shoulder. “I’m playing COD with Westen tonight instead!” \nMack stood there for a second, gaping at the spot where Levi had been. \"Levi, don't be like that!\" He called out to the door that was already swinging shut.\n“Save it for your livestream!\" Levi's voice, now distant and almost drowned out by the morning bell, was a mix of hurt and defiance.\nAnd with that, the doors shut behind Levi, his steps thundering down the hall, leaving a slice of silence between him and Mack.\nEverything was ruined. His life was over." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Curse of the Aposiopesis\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1015\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart or finish your story with a speaker unable to finish their sentence, perhaps overcome by emotion." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Curse of the Aposiopesis \nI sat staring at a woman in a devil tee shirt and a cotton east Indian hippy skirt mid-sentence. I don’t know where the thought went. My head was empty. She looked at me kindly and let the thought come back to me. It was hard to figure out where I was with my thoughts, that I had been putting into words. Her incongruous attire didn’t seem right for a Christmas party.\nMaybe I was tense from the helping hand I had lent to make the party happen. My good young friend had his kitchen redone and it didn’t look like he would be ready for a party.\nThe house was covered in dust two days earlier. So, the old lady, me, rolled up her sleeves, vacuumed, dusted, and decorated with the help of some lack luster others. After eight hours of good work, I went home.\nMy friend had a hissy fit after I left. Those that were left behind straightened up in both senses. By the next day everything was ready for the party. It was a lovely party.\nThe kind witch lady was a good friend of a good friend of the host. I heard from the host that the kind lady said I had one hand and a foot in fairyland.\nThis surprised me but also made sense. I write fantasy fiction. I do this aposiopesis thing every once in a while.\nAposiopesis what a wonderful word, a sentence that breaks off and is left unfinished. It reminds me of secret admirers. I have never thought that I had any when I was young. Now that I am older some of them have come forward. I do not remember them talking to me. According to them they were too over whelmed to say anything much, hence that half sentence or silents.\nMy boy cousins come from a family of four boys. The eldest, David, was my age. We were around fourteen. The next one in my aunts family was Doug, four years younger. The other two were babies.\nThey had come from another state to vacation at the beach. My mother and I visited them at a hotel bungalow on the water front. This was the last time I heard from them in the next sixty-five years.\nI found them on Ancestry after I had my DNA done. One of the babies also had his done. This lead to a friendly conversation on the phone with David. He hardly remembered the day.\nHis brother Doug, remembered me clearly. I was his idol up there with the movie stars of the day. All this said on email.\nWhat could I say? He was a gangly annoying tag along boy. I felt bad for telling a seventy-year-old man this in such an impersonal way.\nWe had walked to the Pike amusement park about a block away. Done a few rides at David’s suggestion. Doug talked to his brother incessantly. He then suggested we should go under the pier to explore some sort of fenced off wash. Again, his brother shot him down. How can you remember a child who was frozen with Aposiopesis when you are right next to him? In the email he never told me if he married or had kids and what he had done to support himself. Bless his heart, I hope he has done well for himself and is enjoying retirement.\nDuring COVID I posted pictures that were artistic and interesting I had taken over the years. The idea was to uplift the spirits during such a sad and frightening time. I am quite proud of my photos and everyone seemed to enjoy them. One of my eldest sons’ friends, Bill, started to comment on them.\nTowards the end of COVID it turned out he was a secret admirer. He had come over to see if my teenage son wanted company. We had just gotten back from the beach and I still had on my bathing suit. He thought I was the loveliest lady. Of all of my son’s friends he was the only one that was not chatty and did not complete his sentences in front of me. Although he was in the Einstein category like my eldest and the other friends my son hung out with.\nBill’s mother worried about him for he had lost his dad when he was around ten. She said he had been depressed ever since and had a tough time coping. She was glad my son was a friend.\nThrough face book I found out he had moved to Maine, married a lovely lady, and ran a lawn business. He was a big teenager and a heavy man. He passed away in his fifties.\nHigh school is full of unstated thoughts and half said sentences. For example, in English class I sat behind a good-looking young man and never spoke to him. Sitting behind me was a young man that admired me. I only found out when he wrote a note in my year book on the last day of school. When he asked for my year book it surprised me. He actually used a sentence or two. He wrote that he was looking forward to seeing me next year. I looked for him the next year but he was not enrolled.\nThen there was the Will in typing. We were very chatty but he never asked to meet me for lunch or anything. In the first part of the class I did significantly better than him. He beat me out in the second half of the class. I was also a year older. In my year book he said I was the prettiest girl he had ever seen. He drew a picture of Fred Flintstone. Sadly, He was another one that did not go to our school the next year.\nSo, go figure... \nHow many people have you known that dropped part of a sentence because you were so impressive. Or were you pulled into another realm for a moment or two?\nBy Leslie Kirc" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Obsessions\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1581\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart or finish your story with a speaker unable to finish their sentence, perhaps overcome by emotion." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "This story contains mentions of self harm and mental health issues.\n\n\"Why doesn't...\" Jessica sat on the edge of a twin bed in a college dorm with tears rolling down her cheeks.\n\nI met Jessica in 6th grade, we were 11. I remember sitting next to her in science class and I used all my 11 yr old charisma to make her my friend instantly.\n\nShe seemed to like me and the feeling was mutual, she was really funny and easy to talk to. She wasn't as immature as all the other kids I hung out with. But soon I realized that Jessica had some real issues.\n\nShe took band in 6th grade. Soon after her first class she started to talk about the band teacher, Mr. Smith.\n\nShe talked about Mr. Smith every day. It was obvious to me and our friends that she had a massive crush on the band teacher.\n\nSoon it went from every single thing that happened in the class to over analyzing simple interactions she had with him. She talked about Mr. Smith as if he was some older high school boy she was was crushing on. She even started calling him by his first name, \"Tom.\"\n\nJessica would tell me about these dreams she would have about \"Tom.\" These dreams were usually always sexual and I never believed for a second she was actually having this many sex dreams. I think she was just thinking up scenarios in her head at night and masquerading them as dreams just to talk about her fantasies.\n\nThe Mr. Smith obsession went on for three years. In 8th grade Mr. Smith became our arts and humanities teacher. I had the class with Jessica. The way this middle school girl would watch this man was insane. It was like they were the only two in the class room as far as she was concerned. She never took her eyes off him. I would watch Mr. Smith to see if he noticed her. If he did he never let on.\n\nIn fact, despite having Jessica in band Mr. Smith never paid any special attention to the girl. Sometimes, Jessica would say that he was mad at her and she would cut her wrists as a way to deal with it. When I asked her why she thought he was mad she would say because he was ignoring her.\n\nOne morning I walked up on mutual friends who said they overheard Jessica and Mr. Smith \"breaking up\" in the hall. They said they heard Mr. Smith say, \"Jessica, I can't do this anymore.\" Which I took to mean that he knew what was going on. Or at least he probably had some idea.\n\nIt turns out that those mutual friends had gone to the principal and told them all about Jessica's obsession with Mr. Smith and her self harm because of it. Which was the right thing to do if those girls hadn't just done it for shits and giggles.\n\nMr. Smith quit that job and went to work in a different county. The school put Jessica in therapy for a total of three hours and decided she was fine. I know that it'd be easy to look back on this now as an adult and assume that Mr. Smith was guilty of some kind of inappropriate behavior towards Jessica but I don't think Mr. Smith was guilty of anything.\n\nIt was common knowledge that Mr. Smith was gay.\n\nAfter Mr. Smith was gone we went to high school. Jessica's already low status in popularity dropped after the Mr. Smith fiasco and she was subject to bullying. Jessica stayed pretty dedicated to band and she intended to go college and become a band teacher. She said she wanted to come back to our little town and teach but I thought this was a way she'd thought up to stay close to Mr. Smith.\n\nIn high school there was a goofy science teacher, Mr. Johnson. As soon as we had his class it was like Mr. Smith never existed. Jessica would constantly talk about \"Kyle\" as she called him.\n\nIt was the same exact thing with Mr. Smith, calling him by his first name, making up fake scenarios and constantly talking about him. Mr. Johnson was a very friendly, outgoing teacher. Jessica found out that he liked Star Trek and began to immerse herself in everything Star Trek, becoming a mega-fan in about a week. She had Star Trek merchandise and knew everything about the franchise.\n\nJessica asked me to come over to her house for a sleepover. She said we'd watch movies and play music but instead she talked about Mr. Johnson the entire time. At one point I quit trying to change the subject and quit talking all together. She told me about every interaction they'd ever had and would ask me over and over if I thought there was a chance they would be together when she turned eighteen. Or even before then. When I would tell her that I didn't think that was going to happen and that she had some issues she needed to work out for even having these thoughts, it was in one ear and out the other. She'd just keep talking. When it was time to go to bed and she started talking about her sexual fantasies with \"Kyle\" I pretended to be asleep. I blew my cover trying to sneak a Dorito. It was like she didn't care that I wasn't responding or that I thought it was strange, she just wanted to talk to someone about it. So, I stayed quiet and listened until she fell asleep.\n\nAt the end of Junior year Jessica had small little spurts of normal where she was really funny and a great kid to hang out with. But that never lasted very long until she was back on the topic of Mr. Johnson. She asked me if I wanted to come with her to a summer program that helped you apply to colleges. I didn't want to room with Jessica for two months because I knew exactly what it was going to be, but at the time I was trying to get my teenage life together and spending a summer traveling and looking at colleges was just what I needed.\n\nWhen we got there she was pretty normal and I was hopeful. Then there was Jack.\n\nJack was a 27 year old law student who was one of the adults in charge of us kids. It was the same thing as before except Jack was different. He was younger than the teachers and she could relate more to him. In our down time Jessica was right beside him and they'd talk the entire time. Jessica even mentioned dropping music and trying for a career in law. Like Jack. Jessica spent entire days by Jack's side, laughing and talking.\n\nOne night she came back to our room and was talking about Jack, as usual, when she suddenly went quiet. I turned to find her sitting on the edge of the twin bed silently crying.\n\n\"What's wrong, Jessica.\"\n\n\"Why,\" she hiccupped, \"why doesn't...\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\nShe screeched and my soul left my body.\n\nThis was the way it went every night when we came back to our room. It was heartbreaking. Trying to console her was damn near impossible. It was like talking to a brick wall. She didn't hear a word I said. I thought about calling her mother but she beat me to it. While she was on the phone with her mom she would scream and cry about Jack. Her mother was in the same position I was.\n\nThe fact that Jessica was underage probably had a lot to do with why Jack didn't love her. Or maybe it was because he was gay.\n\nTrying to tell Jessica that Jack was gay, or Mr. Smith, was met with many different reactions. She would deny that they were gay and proceed to make up stories where these men had flirted with her, therefore they couldn't be gay. Or she'd get angry. Or she'd just ignore it.\n\nOnce we were back in school for our senior year, I didn't see much of Jessica but when I did talk to her it was clear that Jack was old news and her Mr. Johnson obsession was back in full swing.\n\nWhen we graduated high school I didn't hear from Jessica for four years. She contacted me and asked if we could catch up and I agreed. Jessica had become really successful in her musical education. She traveled the country and even the world.\n\nWhen we met she was actually very normal. We kept in contact and would hang out occasionally. She was fun and she seemed happy. I was so proud to see what she had grown into and wondered what had changed in the four years since she was screaming and crying uncontrollably.\n\nWe went for a drink one night and she mentioned she'd met someone in college. To my surprise she had been dating this person for over a year yet this was the first time I was hearing about him.\n\n\"Why didn't you say anything?\" I jokingly nudged her.\n\n\"Well,\" Jessica shrugged, \"because he's my therapist.\"\n\n\"Oh, well, that's-\"\n\nJessica launched into a two hour play-by-play of the relationship, and despite the familiar undertone I couldn't help but think that this Dr. Morgan was doing something right." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Are You Going to Eat That?\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1103\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story in which a conversation takes place where the true subject is only implied." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Are you going to eat that?\" said dad, pointing at Fran's belly. \n\"That's not funny, dad,\" said Fran.\n\"Humor an old man.\"\nIt had been weeks since Fran had dropped out of high school. Then came the battle of a lifetime. Her parents fought over what they should do with her. Should she join a home economics course? Should she join Job Corps? Peace Corps? The military? Such things were rolling through their minds. \nFran hadn't been the best student to begin with. She was a solid middle classwoman. After years of study and progress, there was very little chance of her getting into a top college. She was okay with that, however. \n\"Look, Fran, I was thinking about how you -\"\n\"No, dad!\"\n\"What? I was only -\" \n\"Baker didn't think that way back then. He was only a kid.\"\n\"But did you think that your mother and I would...?\"\n\"No.\"\n\"Look, Fran.\"\n\"Dad.\"\n\"I want you to just listen.\"\n\"Listen to what? I've heard everything before. In with the tide, out with the windows. Everyone's been saying it. They all know.\"\n\"What they know won't hurt them.\"\n\"And who eats pistachios on a turnpike anyway?\"\n\"I've done it. Cleared through a whole barn. Full of stocks.\"\n\"Well, I'm not too sure that this is the right idea.\"\n\"Well, what do you want me to do, honey? Beg?\"\n\"Baker never would have begged. He would have made it sing! He would have...turned it over. Given it words!\"\n\"But he wouldn't have said that to me. He wouldn't have been lying at the feet of my bed, sleep, purring like a kitten because he didn't want to get turned into a fur blanket.\"\n\"That was my favorite blanket. You know that!\"\n\"Wait, we're getting off subject, honey.\"\n\"Well! I don't know if you've noticed by that sunlight is pouring into my bank and it's hotter than winter out there.\"\n\"Look, honey, I don't want you to panic.\"\n\"Panic? Who's panicking? I just fell through the floor trying to beg those pimple-busters to procreate. Now you're telling me that I've got to catch the red line to the Eiffel Tower on a weekend!\"\n\"That's not going to matter if Jones breaks in the sneakers.\"\n\"Yeah? But what does that mean for me? Me, sitting all alone, not knowing who to care for or what pleasures to take? This isn't swim class. I needed those pimples.\"\n\"What would you need a pimple for? Face so clear it could block the sun.\"\n\"Dad. Don't.\"\n\"Look. I don't want you to do this. I want you to understand that if you don't figure this out you may be singing to Samuel L. Jackson by next weekend.\"\n\"Singing? You want to bring up singing? Who was singing Christmas Carols for four hours on the fourth of July? Not to mention New Years Day!\"\n\"The permanence and the impermanence of all things.\"\n\"Yeah. The only thing that's permanent is my fixation witch ketchup balls.\"\n\"Do you have to bring that up every time we talk?\"\n\"You looked at them last time and it almost ripped my arms off. You think I like living like that?\"\n\"Well, I think that we should think about this in a new way.\"\n\"I'm listening.\"\n\"Who brought your brother to the prom?\"\nFran's eyes began to tear. \n\"What?\" said Fran.\n\"Who brought your brother to the prom, and what was the SS number?\"\n\"SS number? We've been through this a million times. I keep the numbers in a safe under the yard. I don't look at them unless there's an earthquake or a tornado.\"\n\"Look. I'm trying be honest with you.\"\n\"Well, I don't need honesty. I need popcorn sticks. Don't get me wrong...\"\nThey stood there with each other for a while, each thinking of their own situation. Where would Fran go? What would be her life's destiny. It was so hard thinking about what could have been, what was \"supposed\" to happen. What kind of kid just up and drops out in their sophomore year? It was an interesting story to tell, but for all the wrong reasons. Fran spend the next week sporadically submitting her resumes to local retail stores and fast food chains. On a Friday, she spoke with her mother about the situation.\n\"Dad thinks I should start an ink farming enterprise,\" said Fran.\n\"Your dad was always so obsessed with whales,\" said mom.\n\"Mom, just listen to me. I -\"\n\"Look, Fran, you're not going to be accepted into Harvard with hell and in a handbasket around your neck, so stop flying the coupe.\"\n\"But mom, Harvard denied my existential reasoning algorithm.\"\n\"Well, reload it. Hit refresh. We all need to freshen up every once and a while.\"\n\"Mom, if I go to Harvard, who will nurse the canoe?\"\n\"Honey, I love you, but you're going to have to tell that canoe to get going already. We've only got fifteen minutes until the rapture and Jesus isn't waiting for anybody.\"\n\"Mom, do you remember when Brady fell through the skylight on Batman's Day?\"\n\"He fell on the Joker. Split his cranium.\"\n\"Well, It's not that simple.\"\n\"When was the last time you talked to Batman?\"\n\"You mean the Joker...\"\n\"No, I mean Batman. When did you talk to the Caped Crusader? The savior of English?\"\n\"Mom, I don't want get into the video game thing again.\"\n\"I always thought that Playstation should run for president again, just like in the eighties.\"\n\"Mom, it's not that simple. If you want, I can go ahead and put the solid state drive into the popcorn machine.\"\n\"That won't do. It's full of butter.\"\n\"Solid state butter tastes good, though. Especially when it's salted.\"\n\"Oh, I'm getting fat just thinking about it.\"\n\"Mom, do you think that I could be a ballerina's justice department, just once?\"\n\"You're asking the wrong Conquistador, Francesca.\"\n\"I wish I had stayed with the Beatles, instead of the Jackson 5.\"\n\"Honey, do you have a billion sea shells for the fair?\"\n\"The beach couldn't hold them. I had to hide them in the bottom of the ocean.\"\n\"The Loch Ness monster lives there, you know.\"\n\"I know, I know.\"\nA few weeks later, Fran got a job as a teller at a local Chase Bank. It was a tough job to get, because Chase had been rapidly closing branches. There was a recession going on and the people were panicking. Fran worked diligently, eventually being promoted to regional manager. It was a time of ultimate pain in the world. No one could tell what was going on." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Picture of Love in Bloom\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2006\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I splurged and made the trip from Baltimore to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. to immerse myself in an exhibition of Impressionist paintings, Monet being my favorite of the Impressionists'. I had arrived early and there were just a handful of people standing in the area where I was.\n\nI slowly made my way through the museum admiring the many outstanding paintings awash in color and light, the likes of which I had only seen in pictures on a much smaller scale. I was enthralled by the most magnificent paintings, artifacts, and sculptures. The Faberge egg collection; a rare treat, and Renoir's Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette. I continued on until I found myself in a room of the most breathtaking Impressionist paintings by Renoir, Degas, Manet, Van Gogh, and, of course, Monet. I was there for the Water Lilies and literally was stopped dead in my tracks at the shimmering beauty of the paintings. I stood there in awe gazing at these wonderful works of art. They were splendid. Mere words could not do justice to them. \n\n\"Beautiful aren't they,\" said a deep, masculine voice, not far from me. So startled was I that I jerked around, wide-eyed and saw a very handsome man dressed in black jeans and a black tee shirt standing there. His face was not that of the Grim Reaper, tho. After I regained my composure, I replied, \"Yes,\" so unnerved and taken by surprise that this gorgeous stranger was speaking to me. Not because I was unattractive, but because the last thing I expected was for drop dead gorgeous to insert himself in my line of vision on this day. \n\n\"I'm partial to Van Gogh's Starry Night Over Rhone...Blue is my favorite color.\" he said, pointing to it.\nI turned to see yet another glorious painting in all its splendor. My mind was racing. I hadn't expected for him to approach me. If it had been any other guy, my first thought would've been, 'he's hitting on me...' and I would've avoided him like the plague. But he was in a different class. What next, I wondered?\n\n I reminded myself of the reason I was here: To take in as much mesmerizing art as I possibly could, to set my senses adrift. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of Monet's, Woman with a Parasol, another favorite of mine. I pointed to it and said, \"I love this painting. I had a print of this but it was damaged in a move...\" \nHe stood there looking at it and said, \"Stunning.\"\n\"Yes,\" I agreed. \n\nI was still a bit discombobulated by his presence as he was so handsome, while at the same time...approachable and seemingly unaware of his effect on me. His shoulders were broad, his hips slim, his body lean. So masculine and appealing in every sense of the word. I knew what I liked and he fit the bill and then some. I didn't feel the need to fill the air with small talk and, apparently, neither did he. \n\nSurrounded by so much beauty, all these wonderful paintings by these Masters, I was perfectly comfortable taking it in with this handsome stranger sans conversation while feeling the filament of more than a small spark between us. Amongst the many extraordinary paintings that spoke to my senses in the most delightful way and his charismatic presence, I was feeling a bit like an angel who had been set alight by a flickering flame that burned a white light, incandescent. Between Irises in Monet's Garden, Nympheas at Giverny, and Impression, Sunrise and this nameless stranger, who was something of a work of art himself, I was beside myself. \n\n\"Can I buy you a cup of coffee?\" he asked, then quickly added, \"There's a cafe downstairs.\"\nYou sure can, I said to myself. \"Sounds like a good idea.\" I said smiling. \n\"My name is Jason,\" he said, extending his hand to shake mine.\n\"Erica,\" I said, shaking his hand.\nAfter that, we made our way to the cafe, got some coffee and sat down at a small table by the window. I took a sip of my coffee and asked, \"Do you live in D.C.?\"\n\"No, I'm down from Baltimore.\"\nMusic to my ears. I felt jubilant. \"Me too\" I said. \"In what neck of the woods are you in up there? \n\"Lutherville.\"\n\"You're kidding! I grew up in Lutherville. It's one of my favorite neighborhoods in Baltimore County.\" I told him that my family had moved there in 1967 and that I had lived in Old Lutherville, an older area of the community set amongst many old trees, Victorian houses, and some landmarks that had been there for years. \n\"Small world,\" he said, looking pleased. \n\n\"So what do you like to do for fun besides visit museums?\" I asked leaning forward, looking at him intently, enjoying his company. \nHe sat there for a moment then said, \"I play the guitar. I have a band.\"\n\"Really?\" she said enthusiastically. \"Do you play anywhere locally?\" she inquired.\n\"Not anything regular.\" He named a couple of clubs and restaurants in Baltimore County where they played.\n\"Awesome,\" she said. \"I'm familiar with those places. I love the guitar.\" He told me that he'd started playing when he was just 10 years old. \n\n''So what do you like to do for fun?\" he asked.\n\"I enjoy going camping. I love the mountains and the ocean and places off the beaten path.\" \n\"I like camping too,\" he said. \"My friend has a camper. There's nothing like it...nature, peace and quiet, the fresh air.\"\n\"I so agree,\" I said enthusiastically, smiling broadly, taking a sip of my coffee and feeling happy for the first time in a long time. \nHe was an electrician and had his own business. I taught 5th grade and loved it. Talking to Jason was like talking to a good friend; easy and comfortable. The more I heard, the more I liked him. \"More coffee?\" he asked.\n\"Yeah, I could go for another cup.\"\n\"Can I buy you lunch? Something to eat?\"\n\"No, I'm good.\" I said cheerfully. \n\nFor the next few hours, we sat there talking about all kinds of things: Music, his dog, Trixie, my cat Cody and how pets made the most loyal companions. He even told me about a relationship he'd recently ended with a woman who'd been obsessed with him and who called him over a hundred times after he ended it with her.\nEventhough that was something I would never do, I could see how a woman who'd been in a relationship with him might feel like she'd had the rug pulled out from under her, and how out of sheer desperation, might resort to that. \nAs if reading my thoughts, he explained: \"She smothered me. It was like I was the reason for her existence...like she had nothing else in her life to feed her.\"\n\"I know what you mean. I can't stand it when someone is too clingy or too needy.\" I said.\n\n He had been to Spain, Italy, the Pacific Northwest, The Grand Canyon and had even driven cross country. He talked quite a bit about his journeys to these places. \"Been to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands too.\" he said.\n\"Really? I went there on my honeymoon.\"\nSomething changed in the expression on his face. He sat there for a moment then said, \"So you're married?\"\n\"No, of course I'm not married. I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you if I was married. That was my ex-husband.\" I said feeling slightly pissed off.\nI felt a little irritated that he would think that I was married, sitting there talking to him all this time.\n\"Oh I misunderstood,\" he said, quickly. Then, \"So why'd you get divorced?\" \n\nI sat there thinking about which version of the truth I wanted to give him. I decided on the abbreviated version. \"We became like brother and sister living under the same roof. It was as if we ran out of gas. I wasn't in love with him anymore and I couldn't kid myself about that. We had no children. We tried, but it didn't happen. Marriage counseling would've been an effort in futility. I was living down in Florida at the time. My parents were getting older and I wanted to spend some time with them. The divorce was amicable. I went my way and he went his. That's when I moved back to Maryland.\" \nHe sat there and nodded as if to say, \"I understand.\" \n\"Have you ever been married?\" I asked.\n\"No...came close once...but it didn't happen. Wasn't meant to be.\"\n\"I see.\" I said, sipping my coffee. Never married. I guessed him to be about 50. \"I would really like to have a child,\" he said. \"I like kids a lot.\"\n\"Kids are my thing,\" I said smiling, then added, \"They keep it real.\"\n\"That they do,\" he agreed. He told me that he and his mother were very close and that she was his best friend. He had a small boat that he kept at a marina in another county. I absolutely loved being out on the water. \n\nI felt so alive sitting there across from him. It had been years since I'd met a man who lit me up like this. Strong chemistry. I sat there wondering what it would be like to kiss him wrapped in his arms in a passionate embrace. He was the stuff that my dreams were made of. I started thinking about the possibilities with him: A weekend getaway to the Eastern Shore. Out on the water in his boat. Or to the mountains and Deep Creek Lake. A cozy fire, a bottle of wine. Me and him alone together. He had beautiful eyes that made me feel as though he was undressing me, but in the loveliest way. We were already off to a good start having met amidst so many rare gifts here in the museum. \n\n\"What now?\" he asked looking at me intently. \"More water lilies?\" I had seen the splendid paintings I'd come too see and then some. I was content.\n\"No, I don't think so. What about you...do you want to walk around some more?\"\n\n\"No.\" he said looking at his watch. \"It's already after 3...I'd like to get ahead of the traffic on the beltway... I'm going to head back. Did you drive?\" he asked curiously.\n\"No, I took the train.\"\n\"I could give you a lift back to Baltimore,\" he said earnestly, smiling, looking hopeful.\nI was in no hurry to end what was a very enjoyable conversation with such appealing company. I trusted him and knew I would be perfectly fine accepting a ride back home.\n\"Really...I wouldn't want to put you out.\" I said politely. \n\"Not at all.\"\n\"That would be great.\" I said, happily. He got up from his chair and together we walked out of the cafe up the stairs. \"I have to hit the head.\" he said. \n\n\"Me too.\" While in the ladies' room I reapplied my lipstick. Cherry red. I was so happy. What a great Saturday this had been.\n\nWe stepped outside into the bright sunlight. It was a spectacular day. Glorious sun. Warm breeze. The cherry blossoms in full bloom. Romance was definitely in the air. \n\nOn the way back home, he glanced over at me and asked: \"Can I buy you dinner?\"\n\nThen I woke up. \"What a great dream,\" I said outloud, not wanting it to end. \"That was the best dream I've had in a long time.\" The man in my dream was a friend of mine from years ago who I'd had a wicked crush on. How I wished that he and I were just as we had been in the dream. What can I say? A girl can always dream. And on that note, I drifted back to precious sleep hoping to pick up where we'd left off." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Eyes of the beholder\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1950\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart or end your story with a character who gets trapped inside a museum overnight." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The bell rang as the door opened and the moment she heard the thump, thump, thump from feet shaking off the snow on the mat, she knew it was him. None of the other customers brought the snow inside. They cleaned their shoes on the doormat outside. But not him. Susan could not work out why he did it, if it were to annoy her as he knew she was the one that would mop up the water once the slush melted on the wooden floor. She turned just as he brushed the snow off his hat and hung it together with the coat on the stand. He rubbed his hands together as if they were cold which they could not be with those thick sheepskin lined gloves. She walked up to him, and he looked her in the face as he always did.\n- A table for one?\n- No, I am expecting some friends.\nShe made a gesture towards the window table at the end, just in front of the big glass cabinet, and he nodded. He followed as she escorted him, and she knew he was staring at her bum; she could see it looking at their reflections in the glass.\nOnce he was seated, she pulled out the big blackboard with today’s specials and placed a menu on the table.\n- Perhaps you would like a drink before your meal? Jacobs Creeks Pinot Noir is on special today. And the white Chardonnay comes from The Barossa Valley.\nHe was reading the menu on the blackboard.\n- I will try the Chardonnay, he said. The fish looks nice.\n- The grilled flounder comes with honey glazed brussels sprouts, fresh potatoes, and a garden salad. And the home-made remoulade sauce.\nHe opened the menu and flicked through it as she moved away. The bottle felt cold in her hand, and she thought it would have been more sensible on a freezing day like today to choose a red wine with the vegetarian lasagna. She made sure the glass was clean before she poured the drink. There was something about him she did not like. She knew who he was. The new Art Director in the Gallery next door and she could not help but wondering what were his credentials? Where did he come from? What did he know? Just as she put the glass on the table in front of him the bell rang again. A lady in a brown cashmere coat came through the door. Susan looked down and noticed she had wiped the snow off her feet before she came in. A reminder to grab that mop and clean up his mess.\nHe waved at the woman who quickly hung her coat beside his and moved towards the table. Susan took a couple of steps back to let the two greet before she asked if she wanted a drink.\n- The same, thanks.\n- Terrible weather isn’t it, my glasses keep fogging up.\nThe man murmured something and as Susan went to fetch the drink, she remembered who the woman was. She was the journalist at the local paper. Other customers drew her attention and after taken the couples order she soon forgot about them. The lunch café was crowded now as it usually was this time of day. By two o’clock most of them would be back at work and this would just be a coffee shop for the afternoon. Susan straightened a painting on the wall. It was the one of the jetty in the moonlight with all the red, orange and pink from the sunset stretching out to the horizon. The title was “The colors of the night.” It should have been called “The long jetty,” she thought. There was something about the painting that drew attention. Most of the paintings in the room were placed on eye level so that while you were sitting at a table the painting became the focal point. Susan knew people looked at them and she glanced to see if he, the art director, paid any attention to them, but he was so involved in a conversation that the room or its costumers seemed to cease to exist.\n- 35 is ready!\nThe voice came from the kitchen and Susan went to fetch the two plates. The kitchen smelled of fish and lemons and she watched Simon, the chef, carefully placing the flounder on the plates and making sure the brussels sprouts was shining of honey. He dripped a few drops of melted butter over them and grated the zest of a lemon on top. The group of fresh potatoes were garnished with a dill sprig and Susan could smell the fresh dill as she took the plates out to the table.\n- Thank you, that looks lovely.\nHe looked up and smiled at her and she thought it must be the first time she had seen him smile. But it was not a kind smile. It was almost patronizing, as if he were reminding her of her place as a waitress, the servant.\n- Can we have a bottle of this wine, he gestured.\n- Certainly, I will be right back.\nThe kitchen was busy, and she quickly brought the plates to some of the other customers.\n- Simon, you are an artist!\nIt was true. He knew his art and how to garnish a dish beautifully.\nHe laughed.\n- No Susan! YOU are the artist!\nShe liked Simon. They had worked together for a long time and knew each other well. It was a good team; everyone enjoyed their work which made the day so much easier. Sometimes she stayed behind sharing a beer with Simon. He liked the German Lowenbrau, and she enjoyed a Carlsberg. They laughed and joked about the day and she wished Nora would join them. But she was always in a hurry to get home once she had finished the last dishes. She was a single mother and had a lot on her plate.\nThe doorbell rang and four men stepped inside.\n- Erin! George! Come over here!\nThe voice came from the corner table where Chadwick was waiving.\n- Well, I never…Max how are you?\nCustomers looked up from their tables as the voices were loud and intruding on the quiet lunch crew.\n- Is there room for us all?\n- Sure, lets just move the table out a little.\nSusan watched as they moved the table from the window and grabbed a couple of chairs from a nearby table.\n- Miss, hello, can we order please!\nIt was him demanding her attention while she was seeing to another table. She ignored it and continued with her work.\n- Miss!\nShe walked up to the table. Now the six people were looking up at her.\n- I will be back in a minute.\nHer voice was firm. She was not going to let him boss her around. The kitchen was calling out to her. Simon was in a flurry placing the Hasselback potatoes and salads on a plate.\n- What’s the matter?\n- The table of loudmouths in the corner. Same old, same old.\n- Don’t worry, they will be gone soon. Simon handed her another plate, and she went out to serve a table of newly arrived young people.\n- I hope you enjoy this. The vegetarian lasagna is delicious.\n- Thank you.\nSusan looked back at the corner table where the conversation was getting more heated and intense. She grabbed a handful of menus and slowly approached the table.\n- Would you like a drink while you are waiting?\n- Yes, we would like a couple of bottles of the red.\n- To share between you all or just between you?\nShe nodded at the four men.\n- For all of us.\nSusan grabbed the two empty wineglasses and the empty white wine bottle. She looked down at the plates where the flounder was left half-eaten. Didn’t they know you turned the fish over and ate it from the other side? Or was it just left to irritate the chef?\n- Was the lunch to your liking?\nThere was nothing behind his eyes as he looked up at her.\n- Thank you it was nice.\nShe hurried back to the wine rack and quickly grabbed the two bottles and glasses. They balanced perfectly on the tray, and she put them down on the table as elegantly as she could.\n- Can we order food. Not the vegetarian, the sirloin steak perhaps?\n- The same for all four?\n- Yes.\n- It comes with Hasselback potatoes and a fresh garden salad.\n- That’s fine.\nThe laughter grew louder, and it became obvious that the group was there to stay for a while. She cleared the plates, and more wine was ordered. Susan could not help but overhear the conversation.\n- That’s the problem with art today. The proletarian is taking over, and everyone is an artist.\n- Well, I don’t know how you do it, but it seems to me that you manage to get the best art into that gallery.\nIt was him again. Laughing. He was getting enthusiastic now, mimicking with his hands demanding attention. The others happy to join in.\n- Well, it does take skill to decern what is good and what is wallpaper. And let me tell you there are crap out there. Not that the average consumer would know. I mean what do most people really know about art?\nHe leaned forward towards the group.\n- I am being kind chaps.\n- Take the work on these walls. It is actually really good. In fact, I am surprised.\nHe looked around gesturing at the walls.\n-There is depth, color and if you look closely, I can even see a soul in there which I would imagine is missed by the average late’ drinker or…\nShe heard him snigger.\n- Waitress.\n- Oh, you are wicked, said the woman.\n- No, he said, flamboyantly waiving an arm. I will prove it.\n- Miss, could you come here for a minute!\nSusan moved across the room.\n- Yes, is there something I can get you?\n- As a matter of fact, there is.\nHe smiled looking around at the group.\n- I would like to have your opinion on these pieces of work that adorns the walls of your restaurant.\nShe felt almost trapped and forced to respond to this table of arrogant people.\nHe raised his glass and looked at her with a sardonic smile.\n- Well, Mr. Chadwick.\n- Oh, call me Max please. He hesitated for effect for several seconds. Please tell us what you think of this work.\nSusan looked around at the paintings on the walls and sighed deeply.\n- I like the colors, she said. And I like the light. It is as if you are there. And I think the composition is not bad either.\n- Oh, really said Max Chadwick as he looked around the table.\n- Interesting, you are obviously a bit of an art critic as well.\nHe sneered as he raised his glass again.\n- And what do YOU know about art, miss?\nSusan took a deep breath.\n- Well, Mr. Chadwick. I am the artist that painted them. Waitressing is something I do on the side just to make a little extra money. And if you will excuse me, I have some customers to attend to.\nShe smiled to herself as she walked off. The table had gone completely quiet, and she could feel their eyes staring at her as she walked towards the adjacent table.\n- Ready to order? She smiled." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Golden Apple.......\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1112\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story including the line “I can’t say it.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "In his nostalgic moments, as his life passed by, Marty often looked back on some of his life-changing moments. One golden memory was when Marty first told anyone he was gay. Directed by their mother, who had said, \"You're reading too many books, go for a walk,\" Marty and his older sister had walked for a sunny afternoon of fresh air.\nTaking their library books under their arms, Marty and Louisa had sauntered into a neighboring orchard. There were no fences, the fruit trees overladen with ripened apples had all been earmarked for a housing development. A golden haze seemed to hang in the air, insects buzzed, birdsong was sweet.\nUnder one apple tree, Louisa plucked some golden apples, sun sweet, and the two teenagers munched, while chatting and reading. Louisa was already wearing her friendship ring, they were both expected to marry well. Marty did not like her boyfriend, he had heard him talking too much trash.\n\"You'll get a girlfriend soon,\" Louisa commented, as she was discussing her impending engagement party. Marty groaned, but had to share. \"Don't tell Mum and Dad, but I think I love a boy.\" Louisa ate the rest of her apple, and threw away the core. \"It's only a stage, you'll grow up like the rest of us.\"\nMarty shut up. She probably never would understand. \"I can't say it,\" he thought. Big sisters are scary, so he kept silent about how their local parish priest had introduced him to meeting a man's biological needs. Marty had tried to put that behind him, but girls had no appeal for him. The priest had covered his tracks so well, liked them young, and vanished to another parish long ago. Marty supposed he had someone else by now.\nAt 4 pm exactly, Louisa glanced at her watch, and said, \"Time for home.\" The golden afternoon had been pleasant enough, she had not really judged him. Marty was an excellent student, his father encouraged the manly sports. Marty preferred English, Music and Drama. He kept up his mastery of several musical instruments, and won scholarships and prizes, enough to fund his tertiary studies.\nThe old orchard was turned into large bonfires, the housing estate bloomed, gardens were planted. The golden apples of his youth were part of nostalgia, part of growing up, always feeling on the fringes of youth. Marty associated true love only with male forms. He did have some brief encounters with men in his college years, only flings. He was expected to pursue his career as a music and drama teacher, so he applied for a very posh job at an exclusive Catholic college.\nMarty's parents were ageing now, so he stayed at home, doing what he could to support them. In his vocation, he stayed in the closet, deciding it was not worth his job to declare he loved men. As part of his job, he had to attend Mass regularly, a role model, well-groomed in more ways than one. Sometimes he prayed, so he could find his true path, but his God seemed silent. The plaster saints smiled, Jesus on His crucifix gave Marty a blessing. He acted as normal, whatever that meant, feeling some distress, always in silence.\nMarty had stopped asking internally what the Catholic Church could do for him, while he was teaching at a Marist College. He tried to do what he could in that environment, never quite pleasing his father, who wanted him to marry a nice girl and provide him with grandsons, bouncing baby boys.\nMarty was never quite game to tell his father that was never going to happen. Louisa by now was the mother of two young girls, she had divorced her 'nice ' husband. She now owned two mortgages, a car loan, a garden, the kids, and resumed her job. That had been marrying 'well'.\nMarty's father had passed away after experiencing prostate cancer. Marty trotted off and got his checked, all clear. His frail mother sat at home on Saturday nights, while Marty presented the school musicals. Great success, drawing forth very talented musicians and vocalists from the schoolboys and their allied schoolgirls.\nAfter the accolades, Marty drove off, his secret life in his briefcase, always hidden from his mother's snooping. He went to a gay bar he had located. somewhere in the city. There he could dance his cares away, always seeking more than sushi. By now, Marty had accepted that he was never going to be the Bishop's pet, unless of course, the old Bish was camp too. It was all swept under the carpet of a different place and time.\nThen his mother passed over too. Marty and Louisa renovated the old family home. The sash windows were replaced by sliding glass, the dated textured carpet was ripped up, polished heritage floor boards gleamed. The bleeding heart of Jesus and gold flocked wallpaper disappeared, along with all the votive statues of the Blessed Virgin. \"Don't know any Virgins!\" Marty said to Louisa.\n\"When are you going to take a stand?' his big sister asked him, always there for him, no matter what. The middle-aged siblings split their inheritance, and stayed in touch. Marty had, indeed, seemed to have met someone. He went to his lover's pad, and told him what Louisa had said. Could he spend his golden years, finally happy?\nWell, yes. He wrote a letter of resignation, then brought some cookbooks. He was going to explore his inner wife, creating was cool. He had moved all his gear into Benjy's home, they were finally a true couple. On his planned last day of teaching, Marty did himself proud. He was supposed to be teaching Silly Billy Shakesbeer to his oldest students, rugged big footballers, one and all. Very devout, eager for their identity.\nDressed as Ophelia, with the wig and the frock, Marty stormed into the class. \"Don't listen to us oldies.! Bullshit is only spam we have fed you all these years. You've heard it all before. You can be whatever you want to be! Don't let them get to you!\"\nOne of the boys complained about hearing swear words from 'that old poof'. The principal entered, \"You're fired!\" \"NO! I quit!\" Marty yelled back, being very dramatic. \"Enough of this oppression. I pray for your acceptance. Take your job and shove it!\"\nWith that, Ophelia, disguising Marty, had taken a stand. He drove off to his future. True love beckoned, no more conflict with his day job, freedom and equity. That golden apple of love, and being himself was now Marty, until the end of time. I guess we can all blame the Marists. He does........" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: How Much He Hurt Me\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2640\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart or finish your story with a speaker unable to finish their sentence, perhaps overcome by emotion." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I can’t understand why he did it. I suppose this is the problem between girls and boys, they are so fucking different, right down to the biology. But even still, why! Does it not cross his mind for a second how this might have impacted me? No. Clearly not.\nI backtracked our friendship right to when it started, five years ago. I was sitting in the dingy art classroom doing a hideous painting of seashells. The radio was on in the background, there was occasional chatter between students but nothing exciting. I was new, just started at the school, and on Fridays, we were able to choose an activity in the afternoon instead of the normal three remaining classes. Friday afternoon activities they called it, it was a ‘pro’ on my list when I decided whether I wanted to move schools or not. For this term, I chose painting, it seemed a relaxing activity for the end of the week. I was in year ten, sitting close to another girl in my year who was also new. We were both slowly working away at our mediocre paintings. When a boy decided to talk to us, sitting further up the table, he was in the year above us, a year eleven. I can’t remember what we talked about, but I remember his face, a cheeky, handsome, warm face. It was the beginning of something. I saw him around school, but we generally only chatted during the painting class on Fridays. I would ask him about his job at McDonalds, and what crazy things people ordered. I never thought much of it, just my random afternoon chats with this boy and his friend.\nThe next year, I was involved in the backstage crew for the school musical, I was doing hair and makeup. A really fun task, because the musical was set in the eighties, meaning we got to go all out on costumes and design. He was in the musical playing a groom, and I’m sure most nights there was a show, I did his makeup and hair. I always enjoyed playing with his hair because he kept it on the longer side. This was also when I found out he was friends with a girl called Olivia. She was in the musical playing his bride. Olivia was in my year group; I’d gotten to know her in some of my classes. She and I definitely became closer when we were involved in the musical, we had a couple of sleepovers, hung out quite a bit and we even kissed when I said I’d never kissed a girl. She was the sort of person you felt like you could tell anything to, she was a great talker and very charismatic. One sleepover we were chatting, talking about boys and we each listed a few guys in our year group we liked, you know, boys we’d do stuff with, because sex was on everyone’s minds.\nA few months down the track, I was stopped midway walking to class by a girl, and she informed me there was a rumour going around that I had a physical paper “fuck list” of boys in the year group. I was shocked. It took me a day or so to retrace the line of gossip, and it was Olivia. The sleepover had been so long ago I hadn’t even thought about it. What really got to me was that one of the boys on this list was someone I genuinely liked, and he’d been told about the list. I felt sick. I didn’t feel like going to school, I just wanted to hide, because it felt like everyone had been given this obsessive creepy image of me, writing down people I’d like to have sex with. Our conversation had been taken out of context, and even worse she’d shared something very personal, and I thought something you talked about in confidence, being friends and all.\nMy parents and I went to the head of students, so something could be done. I told the school what happened, and they told me justice would be served because this wasn’t right. Instead, another kid was made to apologise to me, a boy who had been present with my crush and Olivia, when she had first opened her mouth. I was grateful for an apology because he’d shared it on after hearing it, but where did he hear it from? I clearly didn’t tell him, he was an acquittance at best. My parents and I didn’t push, a couple weeks had passed, and it wasn’t worth it. We were near the end of year eleven, when people from our year group were being elected for leadership roles, a very exciting time. Olivia was elected prefect and house captain; two roles everyone and I would kill for. I worked out why they didn’t question her.\nAround the same time, I was assisting in the backstage crew for the junior production, and chatting with a girl I was in drama class with. At some point during the night, she told me that my crush who was also in our drama class, had gone to the trouble of making sure we’d never be paired up for any assignments or class activities. When Olivia told this story about me, he found out he was at the top of the list. My heart sank. I didn’t say a word on the car ride home. I walked inside, put my bags down, went to the kitchen, discreetly took a knife, and sliced up my arm. I’ll never forget the look on my Mum’s face, nor the pain in her voice, it’s something I wish I could forget.\nWe still had year twelve to go, and I still had to see Olivia every day, I didn’t say anything more about it and was happy to make small talk with her. The boy from painting had finished school, but we kept in touch. I liked that we did, even though he was no longer at school every day, we became closer friends that year. He was doing a course in mechanics and had bought himself a silver commodore, a car I really liked. We caught up every now and then, we’d go out for a hoon or watch a movie. He also stayed good friends with Olivia, and I knew that he liked her, they always had a flirtatious friendship. I thought he was an idiot for liking her but overall, it didn’t bother me that much. I knew they kissed a couple times and nearly actually had sex, but he stopped it before they went too far.\nI finished high school, and the small thought sat in the back of my mind that I didn’t think I’d make it to the end. I expected to be dead before high school finished. It was a bittersweet feeling. I’d made some lovely friends, and enjoyed most of the school work but some things really did get to me. I saw all of my family over Christmas and got into my university degree when the new year started. The boy and I still kept in touch, sending memes, chatting and going out. We were different in many ways, but it just seemed to work. We both liked cars, art, movies, and having a laugh. I neglected to mention we did kiss once while I was in year twelve, we decided to play truth or dare, and one thing led to another as the game hyped up. I think the kiss meant a lot to each of us, more than we realised.\nThe year continued on, and along the way, something changed for me. I really, really liked him. I loved our friendship, and I just wanted to be around him all the time, I missed his company when he wasn’t near me. So, one day, after we went to the movies, I said to him “You remember the kiss last year, well,” I fumbled trying to find my words, “I wondered if you would be interested in something more with us?”\nMy heart was pounding, and I felt sick, but a good sick, the butterflies were buzzing around inside me, as I waited for his answer. He didn’t look at me initially, he looked surprised but then smiled. And in more words or less, he said “Yes.”\nOver the next couple of months, magic blossomed between us, I had never truly been happier. I felt at home in his arms, safe in his touch and never wanted to leave. I was eighteen, him nineteen. We both had our licenses, lived about ten minutes apart, and saw each other as much as we could. We had the most amazing conversations, talked for hours on end about our interests, and histories and we each slowly let it be known to each other, that there had been something between us for a long time, except neither of us had really acted on it. I was still a virgin; he had lost his to a one-night stand after finishing school. We waited until I felt ready, I wasn’t in a rush, as it was something I got really anxious about. But eventually, I wanted to give myself to him, to be as close as I could to him. I felt love that night, I knew I wanted to be with this man forever. He was gentle, kind and loving. I won’t go into the details of my first time, but I had fun, we had fun together.\nWe were in a bubble of love, looking to the outside together. Our love grew, as we said it to one another, met each other’s families, and it became known to our social groups. It seems a blur of a bubble now, how wrapped up in the moment we both were. When we began to settle into our relationship, I loved knowing it was going somewhere. I would plan dates for us, and make him gifts of drawings or food. I got invited to his family events and him to mine. Then it came up, Olivia was back in town, as she’d been away studying, and wanted to catch up with him. He asked my permission, which I told him he didn’t need my permission, I trusted him alone with her. I didn’t like her, but I respected that they were friends. I think it’s healthy to have male and female friends.\nOne day we were both at work, I was driving home, and he called me, a very welcomed surprise. I held my breath as he told me he was in a car crash at work, a truck had gone into a car he was test driving. The crash had been his fault, and thankfully he only had severe whiplash. His neck was quite sore, and I drove him to his work the next day so he could drive his own car home. I did everything I could to help him and try to make him feel better. For a week or so, he didn’t want me around as much, which I didn’t enjoy but I understood, so I gave him some space. But it seemed to keep growing, that space between us, something had changed, I don’t know how or why, he just felt more distant in his messages and when we saw each other.\nI’ve always been an anxious person. I’m very loyal and hate it when I’ve upset someone I care about. Late one evening, it got quite overwhelming, so I asked if I could come over to see him. I hugged him as hard as I could and started crying. He reassured me everything was okay, and I felt safe again. And I wish I knew it was, but that was the last time we had sex. I remember that was the most passionately I’d ever kissed him, made love to him, I needed him to know I loved him with all my heart, I was his. Even after that night, it still felt off, and it tugged my brain. I was scared but I hated not communicating and telling him how I felt, being honest was very important. I said to him “I don’t know much we have in common.” Which wasn’t true, we had plenty in common, and plenty not, as everyone does. I wish I had rephrased myself or just not said it at all.\nFour days later, he broke up with me. My words had eaten him up, and he didn’t see us going any further. He told me, “I think I was in love with the idea of love.” I remember agreeing with him that he was doing something I was too scared to do, which wasn’t true. I cried and begged him not to leave me. He held me in his arms as we sat together for the last time on a park bench. I didn’t want to leave or go home. He was my one. He kissed me goodbye, with a sentimental smile and he left. I felt numb when I walked inside, I told my parents we were finished, and I went silently to my room.\nThe hours rolled by, and I couldn’t sleep, I had a small drink of vodka and wandered outside, it was about 1am. I started running, took only my phone with me and just ran. No shoes, and only the moonlight. I walked and walked and walked and walked and wailed. I didn’t care if a car hit me in the dark, I was almost wishing for it. Eventually, my feet felt like they were going to bleed, I stopped, called my parents and wiped my eyes. I had run and walked for nearly eight kilometres.\nThe next month was a fuzz of finding a reason to get up in the morning. I messaged him a couple of times when I got really low, as we'd agreed we’d stay in touch. It was nearly Christmas, and originally, we’d planned to do gingerbread houses together, I still wanted to do that, so I invited a mutual friend of ours to make it easier for both of us. It was never going to bed easy, but it was a pleasant enough afternoon, I gave him his present which I’d bought a few months in advance, two comedy show tickets and a thoughtful letter. I wanted to say, what I wanted to say, I couldn’t go without saying nothing. I was true to myself, wrote it with no malicious intent and put a few personal jokes of ours in there to keep it as light-hearted as I could. I wanted to make it work, as we’d been friends and known each other so long. He was my special person, and I didn’t want to lose him.\nFor New Year's Eve, I was away with my family, and I felt really uneasy that day. We’d been broken up just over a month, and he had made a point of being upset I wouldn’t be around for the new year countdown when you kiss. I was happy to be with my family, away in another country. As it ticked closer to midnight, and we all settled down for the night, I opened my social media and he had added to his story. I cautiously tapped his name, and up came a picture of him and Olivia. I felt physical pain, my heart squeezed and shrunk. I put down my phone and went discreetly to the bathroom, collapsed onto the floor. I don’t remember much else. I know my parents came in, and asked me what had happened, but I couldn’t speak. I was crying and shaking so much I couldn’t see or breathe. That’s how much he hurt me, and I couldn’t understand why." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Inside the Mind\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1095\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story at a silent retreat." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "She came from Ohio. She got off a steel clad bus in the center of town, and dragged her feet to the doors of \"Silent Springs, -\"the premier retreat for people of discerning tastes\".\n\"Hello I'm here for the retreat\", she muttered at the front desk,\nThe front desk lady had long, shiny black hair and slanted glasses.\n\"Name?\" \"Shilo Smith\".\nFront desk lady nodded to indicate she had found Shilo on the registration list.\nShe got up from the mahogany barrier, and descended to lead Shiloh into her quarters.\nThe bed was white and prim, clean and the blinds were bamboo wood, like the floor.\nNow that she thought of it the whole hallway was the same wood.\nShiloh put her bags down and wandered out towards the front of the castle sized foyer.\nOther people were beginning to mill in. Shiny hair lady was busy showing them each their rooms. Her hair never looked a thread out of place.\nAn announcement boomed over the intercom, in what had to have been shiny hair lady's voice, \"The first meditation begins at 19:00. Please make your way to the meditation stadium promptly.\"\nShiloh made her way towards the stadium, a large room very similar to a cafeteria at a public school.\nPeople were laid out and sitting down cross legged.\nThey sat patiently, and some rather impatiently, waiting for the intercom voice to introduce herself.\nFinally a man in white robes introduced himself as guru Michael. \"Hello all, I am guru Michael, we are so excited for you to join this retreat with us.\"\n\"Please have a seat everyone.\"\nShiloh scanned the room to look at the other participants,. Members? ..\nWho are these people?\nHer thoughts began to swirl, into a crescendo. That's what they did.\nShe began to calculate the median income and child bearing status of each person.\nBut then, they evened out. A little bit of peace crept in...\nShiloh scanned the room to look at the other participants,. Members? ..\nWho are these people?\nHer thoughts began to\nswirl, into a crescendo. That's what they did.\nShe began to calculate\nthe median income and child bearing status of each person.\nBut then, they evened\nout. A little bit of peace crept in...\nShiloh wandered back to her “room”. It was more like a bedroom chamber.\nChambers…\nShiloh had some time to read. She could hear voices of laughter outside in the hall. She peeked around the corner.\nMen were drinking the Sanga wine and clasping each others shoulders in a brotherly sort of way.\nShiloh took one of her books and began to read, the words blurred together and before she knew it..she had drifted off, the smell of incense lightly dancing under her nose. And into her dreams. \nIn the morning she awoke to the smells of granola and eggs.\nShe made her way to the dining area, where a buffet of healthy foods were being served. Grains, millet, fruit and eggs.\nSmoothies and other health food items were served.\nShiny hair came on the intercom again, \"The first meditation of the day will begin at 0:00. \"\nOnce again Shiloh made her way down to the corridor to the purple and gold meditation stadium.\nShe put her headphones in and played a swing dancing tune that she liked from back home.\nShiny hair came around and tapped her on the shoulder. \"No earbuds my darling.\" She said.\nThere was not really very much affection in the \"my darling\"\nShiloh acquiesced and she removed the ear buds. The sound of silence surrounded her and was stilted and slow.\nShe looked around at the other participants, trying to calculate their personalities and median incomes again.\nOne man was a handsome but modern Indian doctor.\nHe was dressed in an ill fitting white tunic and red velvet pants.\nHe had obviously dressed the part.\nShe looked down at her matted sweat pants. She had chosen a plaid shirt with bleached out stains. Oof.\nNo, back to her \"mind\".\nLet me try to focus for a few minutes.\nShilohs thoughts swirled again. They leapt and danced like little beads of gold light.\nHer body felt electrified, but then, like before, things when dull and dim.\nCars flashed before her eyes. Blood. and glass. Shiloh closed her eyes and tried to keep out the light.\nWhy had she come here again?\nShe began to sweat. Sharp ponytail made her way over and put her hand on Shiloh's shoulder.\nShiloh expected a kind word, maybe she would lead her to a medical chamber..There were so many chambers here.\nBut the lady with black hair simply said, \"You do not look well. Please come with me. \"\nShe escorted Shiloh away from the meditation stadium and back to her room.\n\"Do you have a nurse here?\" Shiloh asked resultantly, confused about why she had to ask...and why it wasn't the first choice of the lady with straight hair.\n\"There is no medical here\"\nSaid the lady with straight hair. Shiloh now noticed that straight hair lady was also lady with gold bangles and lady with giant, ribbed gold necklace.\n\"If you have a serious issue you may go to Swami Michael's chamber and he will do healing hands on you, if you consent\"\nShiloh looked at the ground, the bamboo floor, and then back at straight hair lady.\nWhat are healing hands? Shiloh asked, even though she already sort of knew. She saw the brochure with the glowing hands on the cover, and she assumed it was some kind of energy healing.\nA snake flashed in her mind. A gold snake. It was more gold than anything she had ever seen.\nYes...I would like to see Michael. The words came out of her mouth, even though her brain told her to stay in her room and rest, maybe wash her face.\nBut suddenly she found herself, walking towards a clay door with a gold handle.\nThe door opened, or she opened it? Shiloh couldn't tell, either way-the door was open and she floated in, glancing around as the room made itself available to her.\nThe walls were covered in white crystals, \"Herkimer diamonds\", said the lady with straight hair, in a curt smile, before closing the door behind Shiloh and going away.\nMichael was sitting in a purple velvet chair and looking warm and inviting. Come closer my child. He said with a warm, inviting smile.\nThere was a gold yellow light emanating from his body through his robes.\nShiloh nodded and almost leapt forward." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Rapha and Kafka\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2034\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a gallery whose paintings come alive at night." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Won’t you get sick from sitting on a cold floor?” the baby asked.\n\n“Sounds like something she’d say to scare us into doing something without really knowing why,” I retorted, trying to sound authoritative with a voice that still hadn’t broken.\n\n“But we don’t have anyone to go to now if we get sick. What do we do if we get cold and die?” The baby’s tone was strangely calm, almost in acknowledgment that something this extreme could actually happen, which was a concern and news to me.\n\nI didn’t dare admit I needed the guidance, so I decided to wait a while before slowly getting up and relocating to an ornate wooden bench at the other end of the room, sidling over as if getting out of my fetal position on the floor was of my own volition.\n\nI hadn’t spoken to the baby in a while, but for whatever reason, he had decided to follow me after I left our house in Peckham with a rucksack of thin cheese sandwiches and three days worth of clothes. The decision to run away was still fresh, resulting in a somewhat chaotically packed bag with nothing of much use.\n\nThe cold marble floor bit at my feet. I scowled at the socks I’d selected, which were all thinning at the heels.\n\nI wasn’t known for my originality, but I questioned whether anyone really was. I had no prior plans to run away until I picked up a copy of ‘Kafka on the Shore’ by Murakami and read as much as I could absorb before Mum finished work at the bookies and the Oxfam shop closed.\n\n\"It's nice, dear, but not important,\" she'd said when I asked for the £1.95 to buy it. That night we walked back in silence as she smoked four cigs back to back, which most certainly cost more than the book.\n\nI hadn’t read much of it, so my loosely laid plan most probably had faults. Kafka could be dead in the book for all I knew, but his idealistic plan to run away and end up in some library in Japan had legs.\n\nI couldn’t very well copy him though; it didn’t sit well with me. I also had to consider that Mum might have clocked the plan because she saw me reading the book, but from her, this was highly doubtful.\nI’d therefore chosen the art gallery as an alternative, just in case. In my mind, it seemed different enough to a library yet the same in all the relevant ways. Kafka was trying to get away from his father, whilst I couldn’t figure out how to find mine, so the synergy seemed to work.\n\n“You know copying is bad,” the baby chimed in.\n\n“You think everything is bad.”\n\n“No, I don’t. I’m glad we came here; it’s pretty.”\n\nI looked up at the painting opposite my bench-come-bed. A dead girl’s glassy eyes looked out of the frame, floating in a flower-covered river in spring. The most tragic of all Shakespeare’s ladies.\n\n“Why did you follow me?” I asked after a time.\n\n“I didn’t want you to be alone, especially now.”\n\n“What’s so important about now?” I asked.\n\n“No one should be alone on their 14th birthday.”\n\n“I’m an adult now. Birthdays don’t count anymore. Adults have bigger and more important things to figure out, like who to vote for in the next election, you know, stuff like that.”\n\n“Impressive, and have you decided?” The baby queried.\n\n“Probably Labour like Dad, you know, promote the rise of the working class and all that good stuff, you know, protect the family and women and children.”\n\nThe gallery went very quiet as I surveyed the adopted family I now belonged to. A large collection of Pre-Raphaelite paintings stared back. A harem of mainly young women all looked longingly my way.\n\nDad had said we needed to look after our women. We were their protectors, their guardians. Across the room, the moon shone through one of the atrium windows onto a Rossetti painting of a woman wistfully looking over her shoulder, a plump pomegranate in hand.\n\nI slid off the bench and walked over to her, my mind imagined peeling that fruit for her, being her saviour, the one she couldn’t live without because that pomegranate was everything.\n\nMy trousers filled out thinking about it. Not that I knew why, it couldn’t be helped, but I wasn’t ashamed.\n\nWhen I bought my ticket to the gallery two days ago, I didn’t really appreciate what I was buying a ticket for. The Royal Academy of Art just seemed like a logical choice because I assumed there’d be offices and spaces to hide on account of it still being a school. The fact I happened upon the Pre-Raphaelite exhibition was a lucky coincidence.\n\nI didn’t know much about art and I didn’t get the point to a lot of it, but this work seemed to speak to me. Literally. I’d cried for the first few hours after the gallery closed and the lights went out, but after a while, I could hear my new family singing to me, the ladies all around chiming in unison.\n\n“We must get back to nature, back to what is good, back to justice and sincerity and our moral code.”\n\n“Do you believe them?” The baby asked.\n\n“With everything I have,” I dramatically replied. “Dad had the right idea, but he left. Mum has no idea what day of the week it is. We must protect what is good and right, like the Pre-Raphaelites did.”\n\nThe marble floor bit through my socks again as if in retort. The grey night surrounding us took most of the shine from the paintings on display, their truth dampened by the cold air.\n\n“And how do you know what is good and right?”\n\n“You just do, don’t be daft, and I can help show people the way, like Dad did. Help show them what’s right and wrong.”\n\n“But he left, Teddy, Dad left,” the baby said quietly.\n\n“I know, but he’s still a good man, there’s a reason, there must have been, and Mum wouldn’t tell me because she still sees me as a kid, I can take care of myself, she could have told me.”\n\nThe gallery appeared to go a little darker. Eyes from every painting seemed to watch in anticipation whilst I rubbed the cold from the soles of my feet again, bringing my knees to my chin.\n\nThe face of the same woman shone out of about 12 paintings in the largest room in the gallery. Her flame red hair and rosebud lips were instantly recognizable. I couldn’t stop thinking about how much Rossetti must have loved this woman, must have fantasized over her, protected her to immortalize her in such a way. A picture of perfection I’d never really known.\n\n“Have you seen the black dog?” The baby asked.\n\nI shook my head slowly.\n\n“He’s down the corridor; we should get a dog, like those homeless people you see outside the tube.”\n\nI ignored the dig and wandered through the adjoining rooms to the end of the corridor. A large black painting like nothing else in the collection loomed over the room, bigger than life-size and domineering even in the darkness.\n\nMarchesa Luisa Casati stared down at us via Boldini’s hand. The dark painting detailed her in a full black ensemble, complete with a regal-looking black greyhound at her feet. The only color in the entire piece came from her pale face and a purple sash around her waist. The whole piece screamed chaos.\n\nAll the other women around the room seemed to shy in her presence, this ominous threat that stood guard over them. It was the only painting not to center around nature; it couldn’t celebrate life, only death and destruction.\n\n“She looks like mum,” the baby said.\n\n“She does a bit, although mum hates hats.”\n\n“True.”\n\n“Who is she?”\n\n“Someone famous, I guess.”\n\n“Yeah, she looks like a celebrity, like an olden-day version of someone from Love Island.”\n\nThe baby snickered.\n\n“I wonder where they all end up, these celebrity women. None of us know their names, only the artists who make them important, I suppose.”\n\n“You mean the men that make them important…”\n\nWe let the silence wash over us for a while as we stared at the black painting, both of us imagining the life this woman must have led. What mum might look like in a hat.\n\n“I’m not sure you could show her the way, Teddy,” the baby chimed after a while. “I think she was on her own bad path.”\n\n“Why’d you say that?”\n\n“Well, the bit next to her painting said she died alone and with £20 million pounds of debt.”\n\nThe Rossetti model with the flame-red hair seemed to gasp, shocked at the company she was forced to keep. The rebel and the saint, sharing the same air.\n\n“I wonder where she’d be if she had someone to protect her, someone like dad around?”\n\n“Dad couldn’t have helped her, Teddy, he could barely help himself.”\n\n“Take that back.”\n\n“You’re an adult now, you don’t need to pretend, not like mum does.”\n\nSilence filled the room again, and the cold marble shot into my toes in some kind of agreement.\n\n“It’s all fake, none of this is real,” the baby said coldly, the voice echoing in my head. “You wanted to run away to find the truth, and it’s all here in front of you, but only if you’ll see it for what it is.”\n\nLuisa Casati’s portrait bared down at us. A woman with so much vibrancy, so much light to give the world, but at the same time, so much pain and darkness. It hurt to look at.\n\nI sat down in front of her, my eyes pricking, making my nose itch with tears. I wanted the truth, but I wanted it to be something specific, something beautiful and clean and easy. I wanted the Pre-Raphaelite life, one where honesty and justice were served, and parents loved their kids and stayed together. The reality was black with cigarette smoke and tar.\n\n“You can break this cycle, you know,” the baby whispered. “You can make something that they never could.”\n\nI cried until the gallery opened and the cleaners came in. They didn’t even notice me hidden under a bench in the main hall, though I’m sure one of them questioned the smell of cheese sandwiches.\n\nWhen they finished, I packed away my things quietly and headed to the bus stop to catch the 387 to Peckham station. Mum was still at home; I watched her from the back garden window as she pottered easily around the kitchen cleaning up around my sister.\n\n“Morning, Teddy, what do you want for breakfast, angel?” she asked as I walked through the kitchen, completely unaware I’d been gone for 32 hours, or at least she strangely made out that was the case.\n\nI shook my head and smiled as I walked up to my sister's room, hanging back to peer through the door as she played with two hand-me-down dollies before school, their voices just like hers but an octave higher.\n\nOnce in the safety of my room I immediately began rummaging through drawers to find an old piggy bank I must have raided the year before; a few rogue coins echoed in the bottom. As I shook the pig, two £1 coins fell onto the bed, which I took as a sign.\n\nMy face still felt tight from the evening's tears, but then I realized that Kafka hadn’t cried, and neither should I. I pocketed the money and left the house again with a better understanding of what I was leaving this time and what I would be coming back to. Oxfam opened at 9 a.m., and I needed to know what the ‘on the shore’ bit of Kafka on the Shore really meant.\n\nSo I set off in search of more truths; the pavement around the train station was now filled with men commuting to work, men who blindly followed one path as I headed in the opposite direction." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Silent Symphony\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1290\n\nPrompt:\n\nSet your story at a silent retreat." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The breeze carried the whispers of the pines, weaving through the tranquil atmosphere of the silent retreat. It was a place where words were imprisoned in the depths of consciousness, where thoughts wandered freely, unspoken, and emotions danced in silent symphonies.\nIn the heart of the retreat stood a weathered cabin, its wooden frame weathering the passage of time like a silent sentinel. Inside, a solitary figure sat cross-legged on a faded rug, eyes closed in deep meditation. This was Anna, a seeker of solace, seeking refuge from the cacophony of the outside world.\nThe days stretched on, marked only by the rising and setting of the sun. Anna's routine was simple yet profound. She rose with the dawn, greeted by the soft glow of morning light filtering through the trees. With each breath, she delved deeper into the recesses of her mind, untangling the knots of thought that bound her spirit.\nOutside, the world remained a distant echo, a faint memory fading into oblivion. The silence enveloped Anna like a comforting shroud, cocooning her in a sanctuary of stillness. It was here, in this sacred space, that she found a sense of belonging, a connection to something greater than herself.\nAs the days turned into weeks, Anna's mind became a canvas, painting the colors of her soul in hues of introspection and introspection. Memories surfaced like ripples on a pond, fleeting yet profound, each one a testament to the journey of self-discovery.\nOne afternoon, as Anna sat beneath the canopy of trees, a sudden gust of wind stirred the leaves, breaking the silence like a whisper in the dark. Startled, she opened her eyes, her gaze falling upon a lone figure standing at the edge of the clearing.\nIt was a man, his features obscured by the shadows of the forest. He stood motionless, a silent sentinel like the cabin itself. Intrigued, Anna rose to her feet, her curiosity piqued by the presence of another soul in this sanctuary of solitude.\nApproaching him with cautious steps, Anna studied the stranger's face, searching for some hint of recognition. But his eyes remained hidden beneath the brim of his hat, his expression unreadable as the depths of the ocean.\n\"Hello,\" Anna said, her voice a mere whisper in the stillness of the forest. The man nodded in acknowledgment, his lips curved in a ghost of a smile.\nFor a moment, they stood in silence, two souls adrift in the vast expanse of existence. Then, with a flicker of movement, the man reached into his pocket and withdrew a small notebook, its pages filled with words written in a language Anna could not understand.\nIntrigued, she reached out her hand, her fingers tracing the curves of the unfamiliar script. And as she read the words, a sense of recognition washed over her, as if unlocking a door to a hidden chamber within her soul.\nFor hours they sat together, the man and the woman, their minds intertwining like vines in a forgotten garden. And as the sun dipped below the horizon, casting long shadows across the forest floor, Anna felt a sense of peace wash over her, a knowing that she was not alone in this journey called life.\nIn the days that followed, Anna and the stranger became unlikely companions, sharing stories and secrets beneath the watchful gaze of the silent retreat. And though they never spoke a word aloud, their connection transcended the confines of language, a silent symphony of souls dancing in the moonlight.\nAnd as Anna returned to the world beyond the retreat, she carried with her the memory of that fleeting encounter, a reminder that sometimes, the truest connections are forged in the silence between words.\nAs days melted into nights, Anna and the stranger found solace in each other's silent company. They wandered through the labyrinthine paths of the retreat, exploring hidden nooks and crannies that whispered secrets of times long past. In the evenings, they sat by the crackling fire, their shadows dancing on the walls of the cabin, weaving tales of love and loss, hope and despair.\nBut beneath the veneer of serenity, a storm brewed in Anna's heart. She found herself haunted by the memories of a past she could not escape, a past that clawed at the edges of her consciousness like a specter in the night. Try as she might, she could not silence the voices that echoed in the chambers of her mind, their whispers growing louder with each passing day.\nOne evening, as the sun dipped below the horizon, casting a golden glow across the landscape, Anna sat alone on the porch of the cabin, her thoughts a tumultuous sea of emotion. The stranger had ventured into the forest, his absence leaving a void in her heart that she could not fill.\nLost in her reverie, Anna failed to notice the approach of footsteps, the soft crunch of leaves beneath familiar boots. It was the stranger, his silhouette bathed in the dying light of day, his presence a beacon of hope in the gathering darkness.\n\"Mind if I join you?\" he asked, his voice a gentle whisper on the breeze. Anna nodded, her gaze fixed on the horizon, where the last vestiges of daylight clung to the edge of the world like a lover reluctant to part.\nFor a time, they sat in silence, two souls adrift in the vast expanse of existence. Then, with a sigh, Anna turned to the stranger, her eyes brimming with unshed tears.\n\"I can't do this anymore,\" she confessed, her voice barely above a whisper. \"I thought I could leave it all behind, but the past keeps pulling me back, like a tide that refuses to recede.\"\nThe stranger listened in silence, his eyes a mirror of understanding that reflected the depths of Anna's pain. And as she spoke of her fears and regrets, her hopes and dreams, she felt a weight lift from her shoulders, as if the act of sharing her burdens had set her free.\n\"You're not alone, Anna,\" the stranger said, his voice soft but resolute. \"We all carry our demons with us, but it's how we face them that defines who we are. You have a strength within you, a resilience that can weather any storm.\"\nAnna nodded, her heart heavy but hopeful. For the first time in a long time, she felt a glimmer of light amidst the darkness, a spark of courage that ignited a flame within her soul.\nAnd as the night descended, cloaking the world in a blanket of stars, Anna and the stranger sat side by side, their hearts entwined in a silent symphony of shared humanity. In that moment, they were not just two strangers in a silent retreat, but kindred spirits bound by the unbreakable thread of fate.\nIn the days that followed, Anna embarked on a journey of self-discovery, guided by the wisdom of the stranger and the strength of her own spirit. She delved deep into the recesses of her mind, confronting her fears and embracing her flaws with a newfound sense of acceptance.\nAnd though the road ahead was fraught with uncertainty, Anna walked it with a newfound sense of purpose, her footsteps echoing in the halls of the silent retreat like a melody in the wind. For she knew that no matter what trials lay ahead, she would always have the memories of that fleeting encounter, a reminder that in the silence between words, true connection can be found.\nAnd as she bid farewell to the retreat, her heart brimming with gratitude and hope, Anna knew that she was not just leaving behind a place, but carrying with her a piece of its magic wherever she went." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Do Not Touch\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1054\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Jen lived by the unwritten rules of being single but wanting a child. Don’t look at children. Don’t engage with children. Don’t talk about children. Don’t let other people talk about their children. And don’t, for the love of all that is holy, tell anyone you long for a child.\nA nearby suitor could be eyeing you up, biting their bottom lip at the sight of your untoned bum, lusting after your wide midriff, admiring your conical legs. They could be subconsciously sliding you through their mental mold of their dream woman, seeing you slot in just right. Only to see your face change from that of a promising conquest to a maniacal ovary, ready to snatch the sperm of the nearest purveyor to fulfill your vapid, barren life.\nLooking at, engaging with, talking about, or listening to stories about children will, to even the most gullible testicles-owner, immediately announce your desperate, ugly yearning like a tannoy in a tin.\nSo it was a treat for Jen to allow herself to sit in front of a beautiful, cherubic baby and gaze in unfettered awe and longing. She had been doing this almost every week lately. The museum, a former church, was on her walk home on Fridays, when she worked only half a day. The exhibition had been on display since January, but it was early Spring when she found herself sputtering around, trying to look interesting to a society obsessed only with the happenings of her womb. Trying to look like she was, indeed, living her best life, flitting from exhibition to dinner date, eating the world around, unburdened by responsibility.\nThe first day she went to the exhibition, she found Her. A mother, THE mother. A miracle hewn from marble, nursing Her baby beatifically. Stone had given birth, yet she was not. And this statue was a virgin for god’s sake. She loved Her instantly, though on her first few visits, she hastened past Her, fearful that those watching would delight in the poetic tragedy of the sight; a childless woman gazing up at the immaculate mother of mothers.\nJen’s childlessness oozed out of her. It soaked her sheets and rattled her guts. It was a repugnance only she seemed to acknowledge. But she noticed it so solidly for the last two years, she had thought of little else. She tried to hide her childlessness from onlookers, mask it from bystanders, but it was in vain. She knew that all who saw her, saw a woman, not a mother. All who saw her, with their modern views and progressive thoughts, forgave her on sight, of course. But the flash of forgiveness was mortifying. She felt it from everyone she encountered.\nEveryone but him. He was wiry and sort of ugly and smelled of the kind of sports deodorant that reminds everyone of sweat. He looked at the statue, looked at Jen, then back at the statue and screwed his face quizzically.\n“Is she bumming you out?” he asked with a raspy voice that sounded like an old lady who claims that smoking is what’s keeping her alive. \"Excuse me?\" Jen replied after checking her empty peripherals. \"Why are you looking at her if she’s making you sad?\" he asked, with a sense of informality she wasn’t used to. \"Do I know you?\" she asked. \"Do we just keep asking each other questions?\" he replied, thinking himself very clever. \"I’m sorry, can I help you?\" she replied, kicking herself for continuing the game she had no interest in playing. He narrowed his eyes and she saw a vague handsomeness somewhere around his jawline. \"I’ll leave you alone. You looked sad but I didn’t think you really were sad so I was making a joke. But…sorry, I’ll leave you to it\", he said without a single muscle of his body living up to this promise. \"I’m not sad. It’s art. It’s supposed to make you sad\", she said, far too defensively.\nShe felt rumbled. He was a hick. He didn’t have the sophistication to forgive her on sight like the others. It reminded her of the time when she, a serious teenager, was asked by a child why her face was all dots. And how the adults comforted the uninjured child but not her.\n“Is it?” he asked with what seemed like genuine curiosity. \"It’s art\", she repeated knowingly, the upper hand. \"I always find the stone ones so creepy. It’s because they don’t have eyelashes. They should use cat hair or something. Or fake eyelashes\", he meandered, seemingly unaware that Jen was winning. \"You’ve lovely eyelashes\" Jen said and brought her purse to her mouth hoping to vomit the words into it instead of the ether. \"Oh, sorry. I mean people have lovely eyelashes. Not you. You too. But, you know, everyone\". He smiled and she fell in love with him momentarily the way she fell in love with everyone with a vas deferens momentarily these days. \"They’re fake,\" he said, smiling proudly at his stupid joke. \"So, why does this make you sad?\" \nShe thought for a moment. Thought about wanting to be a statue, to be frozen, voiceless, heartless. Childless, but nursing another statue. She hated him. She felt naked, she wanted to run but was gripping to the galloping high horse she hoped he was aware of. She was going to make him run. She had a super power for repelling. \"Because I want a baby, and she has one\" she said, more quietly and tenderly than she had planned. \"Ah\", he replied flatly. \nShe waited for him to shuffle his feet, to check his watch, to answer his phone. She could sense him planning his apologetic escape. She felt him admonish himself for his uncouth lack of awareness, for missing the sillage of her childlessness. He seemed to be gathering himself. The years of manners beaten into him flooding to the front of mind, seeking ground after this calamitous misstep. How to politely, stoically, apologetically extricate himself from this hideous interaction. \n\"Well, if you think that baby’s great, wait until you see the size of the horse some soldier guy has in the next room. Come on, I’ll show you\", he replied, his smile softer but warmer. She stood up and they went to look at a marble horse." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: To Be Understood\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1974\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about a first or last kiss." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Years later, I consider myself understood. Raw, unpurged; mapped in earnest fingertips. You went off to Chicago because you were always made for it. I stayed in New York, reaching for what you already had in the palm of your hand like a precocious stalk stretching from the dirt. Radio silence between us where harmony once swept. Still I beg for how rare it was. \nWhen we were young we had nothing but philosophers and parents telling us who to be and where to look. Even so, we looked at each other and then, in sour defeat, looked away. Scolded children, guilt scrawled on faces which, not moments ago, knew the saccharine taste of secrecy. \nPerhaps you don’t dwell on it anymore. But, for my sake, I do.\n—--------------------------------------------------------------\nI wanted you first, but I had a shy and persistent way of convincing you I didn’t. In a time when the world seemed turned against you– every haven tainted– I clung to you because I rejected order and hoped to prove it wrong. The school hierarchy, the shadow rules, the bullies with their subsexual advances. And your parents, who gave you hell at home. You were used chewing gum stuck under the desk for later. It was a cruel adolescence dealt to you as one of God’s rootless injustices. How could you ever belong?\nI never knew you didn't. I moved to Oyster Bay when I was fourteen and started high school an empty pool of social knowledge. I had few goals but to read and survive with minimal ego damage. Attending high school was one of those Icarian nightmares where I constantly minded the sun. Aim low, I thought. This place is not for you. \nIt became mine in the choir room. That was where I first met you. Music was a sigh. It was bloodletting. Words and sounds came unaltered. And you knew this, probably before I did, confidence spilling off you as you entered the room in your outdated flannel and took your place. You had ART written on your forehead and I admit, I wanted to be you– be better than you. Of course you would sit smack in front of me. I inched into your hair, searching for a blueprint on the back of your head. I couldn't speak to you. \nIt wasn’t until a month later you took my hand. There were four of us in a tight practice room, singing a hymn, palm to sweaty palm. You taught us how to do it; said you learned it at your Jewish choir camp. You layered the deep notes on top of my much less rich, high ones. Operatic, I thought. How strange. I was uncomfortable with the intimacy of it, but jittering all the same. Your pulse was melting into my hand. \nI joined the things you joined. The spring opera, which you dropped for a debate tournament. You left me alone to fill the role you abandoned: a nun, of all things. Then, I joined debate. Not because of you, but because a boy I liked asked me to. He never liked me back. And, I sucked at debate too. But at my first tournament, in between the rounds, you and I stalked the hallways and you told me you’d marry a Jewish boy– Ashkenazi, not Sephardic. I told you I thought all people were bisexual and that I couldn't pee in public toilets. You left the bathroom so I could go. How come we haven’t hung out before, you said through the door. I didn’t know how to tell you I’d wanted to, just never had the guts to ask. \nBy sophomore year I learned that the school saw a different version of you, one molded by irreversible years in middle school I had luckily escaped by biding my time in a different state. When I said your name, the reverence off my tongue clashed with our classmates’ scoffs. Haven’t you heard, they’d say, haven’t you heard? I hadn’t, but I wouldn’t believe it if I had. I grew protective. Your initials meant all that was good to me before I registered what that meant. \nPlus, I had monikers too. Try-hard, stuck-up, awkward. I wasn’t exactly Miss Popularity. But, I heard boys talk about your breasts and girls discuss your mother. They stripped off your skin and picked at the bones underneath. It was never a fair game. I began to love you, not out of pity, but out of opposition and a matter of knowing the truth.\nIn our time together we talked about boys- well -mostly our lack of them. Both of us overcome by a desire for self-transformation. Wanting to be craved thoroughly; not yet craving each other. After school we’d walk the grounds, order takeout against our empty pockets. I played you a song I’d written. I started writing shortly after I met you, but it took three years to reveal itself. I think I saw you cry when I sang it; the lyrics said something you recognized.\nTake all your strength and make me fall\nBut I’ll be stronger than the walls\nThat keep me safe from you, I know\nYour fists will bleed till you regret it all,\nI’ll put you in the cell I made, \nFrom the pieces of my heart you stole from me. \nIt was all teenage angst and melodrama, but it moved you somehow. That was when you told me about your parents. And I understood because, at that time, I hated my parents too. Like the rest of Oyster Bay, they were too opaque and absorbed in the way things should be, what kids should want, what laws they should obey. Using force and fist to erase all the good, patch the uneven. Unaware of what they had, what was festering underneath. And of the spite under their roofs. \nWe took it up with our pens, writing away the injustices. And, I confess, I haven’t read a better writer since those school days. I write too, but never as well. Once again you outdid me, and I was brutally jealous and completely in awe. I let you write in my journal and I kept it on my nightstand four years later. \nThe air conditioner shuts off,\nSilence punches at your eardrums,\nYou look up and mean to do something, anything, nothing–\nBut it dies in the silence, a broken fan, a cracked wing.\nHello? Is there anybody in there?\nJust nod if you can hear me. \nThere could be a whole world inside your head. \nIn my room it is quiet. \nMore than a world. More than a quiet room, the one you shut in, alienated in your own home. More than bullies. More than parents. More than sixteen years of life. More than prejudice. More than fear. More than perfect scores. More than rumors. More than Virginia Woolf and Mary Shelley. More than time. More than body. More than me. \nBy then I think you loved me back. I think we loved each other, although you denied it a year later as I cried on the floor of my bedroom with you assuring me I’d be happy one day, but that you just couldn’t feel that way. See, you said, you’re even pretty when you cry. You brushed the tears from my face with your thumbs, palms cupping my jaw like a warm bowl. \nYou did feel that way. I knew it in the way you asked me to hold you, in the way we talked for hours, light draining from the sky, in the way we clung onto each other in the backstage of the school theater and casted hopes into invisible wells. I guess you were afraid like I was.\nAfter winter exams, you came to my old, disintegrating house to celebrate. I apologized for how it looked. It was what we could afford back then. I had posters of women on my walls, but we talked of marriage, of my clownish boyfriend. Music was playing and a solution of various alcohols was brewing in a shitty water bottle on the floor. One taste and the gag reflex took on an entirely new meaning. Your eyes were dark, your hair slick with curl product. You reminded me of a cello, of velvet on an expensive couch. We whispered.\n“Sometimes, I think it’s all too easy,” you said. We expressed this frequently. Exams were easy, even though we pretended they were hard as a courtesy to others. But, we barely studied, we read our own books, and directed our own interests. \n“You’re just smart,” I said. Another self-evident truth. While I said it with nonchalance, I had an intimidating sense of brushing up to prodigy. \n“Not like you.” You turned to look at me. Suddenly, I felt my ribs on the floor as they sunk deeper, down into the ceiling below us. You hadn’t praised me like this before. In truth, there were moments of rivalry between us. I chose silence as you kept steady. \n“You’re brilliant.” And maybe it was hard for you to pronounce the words, but you gave them so willingly once they materialized. Now you were looking at me and an awareness curdled in some core of my body. I blushed and let out a cloud of oppressed air through my nostrils. \nYou said it more softly, the ashes settling. “You’re brilliant.”\nAnd I felt it. I felt brilliant. Because if you thought it, I could believe it. If you said we lived in a cardboard box floating on the Hudson, I’d have agreed. \nWe were staring at each other, grins distending our cheeks. I reached a finger at your face to tap your nose. I don’t know why–I hadn’t done that before. The second I made contact, I couldn’t pull away. A course was set from that touch you triggered with your flattery. We stopped smiling, my finger now tracing the bridge. Your skin carried my attention more than it had before and you didn’t swat me away, just held your breath. I grabbed your jaw with one hand, the other linking in your hair. \nWe kissed without thinking. \nThoughtlessness. It is so rare to me now, but when I kissed you, it was womblike. Nothing intellectual or physical. All innate and universal, like dying and decomposing into dirt, belonging to the essentials. I had never felt anything like it before. It was long and convincing, indoctrinating. Kind of like you. Persuasive. The rhetoric of your tongue enlisting me to a life I hadn’t conceived of and feared. You defined my boundaries any way you wanted and I loved the person you drew with your hands. A better person, a true one. \nI want to stay here.\n—------------------------------------------------------------- \nI won’t talk about what happened after. To either of us. I won’t talk about my new clothes and haircut. I won’t talk about the immediate danger we were in when we couldn’t face up to our kiss and speak to ourselves the way an omnipotent God would. I won’t talk about the parents. Not just yours, but mine too, prying at the secret we hid so poorly from ourselves and the people around us. Working their way into territory they couldn't understand and still don’t want to. \nI won’t talk about how I fell in love and you said you didn’t. I won’t talk about lost friends and empty lunch tables. I won’t talk about the silence or the summer we spent without a word to each other. I won’t talk about how when you left for college, I disappeared. The whole school did. Like it never happened. \nI will talk about this though:\nI was understood. For the first time and maybe for the last. I had your primordial understanding. Do you know yet how rare that is?" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: When Iced Coffee Meets Fine Art\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1107\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who accidentally destroys a museum’s most valuable artifact." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There were people everywhere on the sidewalks. Everyone seemed the same in that they didn’t belong here. They had phones out and were taking pictures. They wore shorts, backpacks, and t-shirts they bought in the last 24-hours at a souvenir shop. Some had ice cream in their hands, some were caring babies, and some with shopping bags. It was the usual mark of any tourist area and that did not exclude Cannery Row in Monterey Bay, California. \nEver since Fynn and Courtney were small children, their parents rented a house near the beach and they stayed a long week in the sleepy town. The tradition started when their mother proclaimed that she “always wanted to live in Monterey.” They agreed that the commute over the Pachen Pass into San Jose daily would be too much for either of them to do every day, but one week a year, during the warm dry months could work. \nEven when the children got older and insisted on staying back home with their friends, their parents insisted. Fynn took off for college but flew back specifically for the occasion, hesitantly leaving his new girlfriend behind. \n“She will be there when you get back to Boston,” their father said.\n“You have only been dating her for two weeks. She is not coming on our family vacation,” their mother said.\n“I will be eighteen and an adult next month, I am not sharing the third bedroom with her,” Courtney said.\nSo then it was final. The family of four would once again stay in Monterey during a long week together during the summer. Their parents would commute into San Jose during the week and sun on the deck of their rented house on the weekends. Fynn and Courtney would spend their days walking up and down the main drag of Cannery Row, named after a John Stienbeck novel, looking for something to entertain themselves with.\n“Remember that art gallery?” asked Courtney, pointing down an alleyway they had not yet ventured down this year.\n“You mean the one that had the pictures of the hamsters dressed like cowboys? Those were hilarious.” \n“Yeah, those were funny. Maybe I should get some prints for my dorm room next year.”\n“You are ridiculous. You don’t even know where you are going to college yet.” \n“No, but I will have a dorm room I will need to decorate.” \n“If you get into college.” \n“Eastern Oregon University has already accepted me, thank you very much.” \n“Aiming high I see.” \n“I will let you know it is a grand school and my print will look great on the walls there.” \n“I don’t think you can take that in there,” Fynn said to his sister pointing to the iced coffee in a plastic cup dining a green Starbucks label with the straw poking out in her hand. They had just visited the wide known coffee chain and while Fynn got a shot of an espresso and a slice of banana bread, he downed in four bites, Courtney opted for a more timely option, a Trenta sized iced coffee with two pumps of vanilla.\n“I’m sure it’s fine. People bring drinks into art galleries all the time. Don’t they do wine tastings at these things? That is more dangerous than my iced coffee drink with a lid.\n“A lid that has a hole in the middle.” \n“Look, if it makes you feel better I will be discreet. Look, I'll put it in my backpack while we are in there and take it out when we leave. No one will be the wiser.” Courtney loosened the strings to her backpack placing the drink carefully inside. \n“Are you sure that it will not spill?”\n “No, I do this all the time when I go to work.” \n“Working in the library at school for credit does not count as work.” \nCourtney ignored her brother. The espresso shot didn’t give him enough energy to fight with his sister.\nFynn shrugged, opening and holding the door for his sister as she charged through the doors and past the ‘No Food or Drinks’ sign. \nThe space was tight and it appeared there were white walls closing in on them, as though the gallery owners were trying to fit as many three quarter tall walls into the small storefront. \n“Look at this one,” she said laughing.\n“A llama with spectacles. Very nice,” Fynn replied.\n“$2,000? My goodness. For a llama with glasses? I don’t remember this place being this expensive,” Courtney said.\nA woman in a crisp white shirt, a gray pencil skirt and a mousy brown bun at her nape approached the siblings. She pointed at a landscape painting on the opposite wall. “We were lucky to get a Manet to sell from a local philanthropist who is downsizing their personal collection. We never get prized paintings like this one. It is the most expensive painting in the gallery but we are selling it at a price that is sure to appreciate. Let me know if you have questions about the Manet or any other artwork in the gallery,” she said with a tight-lipped smile and walked toward a cluttered desk with a register tucked in the corner.\n“Did she say Manet? I thought it was Monet,” said Fynn.\n“I don’t know what she said, but it sounds expensive,” said Courtney as she backed up away from the woman with a grin on her face. Half way on her second step her backpack hit the wall behind her. Courtney remembered the drink in her backpack. Did she just dump it onto the painting behind her? Fynn gasped to confirm her horror of a suspicion.\n“Please tell me there is no iced coffee all over the painting. Judging by the drips on my legs I am sure I spilled. Please tell me it is a painting of a dog in a tutu, not the Monet,” Courtney said in a single breath.\n“I’m pretty sure she said Manet.” Fynn said and peered over his sister’s shoulder and winced, looking back at his sister. “It is the Manet,” he replied.\n“As it is the most expensive painting in the gallery, please tell me it is going for $2,001.” \nFynn looked around his sister at the bottom right corner and simply said, “nope.” \n“Should we run?”\n“Yep.” \nWith that the siblings charged towards the door. \n“Have a great day,” the woman in the white blouse said walking towards the door where the siblings were standing moments ago.\nCourtney glanced back only to catch the woman looking down at her feet and then look up at the painting with horror on her face." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Another Time, Another Place\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1974\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When the phone rang at six am, Michelle’s first reaction was to turn it off and go back to sleep. Having recently retired, she was getting used to not waking up before the time was double-digits, but the insistent ring tone had a different idea.\nSeeing her sister Cathy’s name on the caller-ID, Michelle was immediately alert, thinking it must be some emergency for her to be calling before the sun came up.\n“Cathy, what’s wrong?” She asked, trepidation in her voice.\n“Nothing’s wrong,” Cathy replied. “I’m really sorry to call you this early, but I have a big favor to ask.”\nMichelle was both relieved and pissed, but she knew Cathy wouldn’t have called unless it was important.\n“I’m listening.” Michelle let out a loud yawn.\n“Jason’s class is scheduled to go on a field trip to the Reagan Museum today and I just received a text that they don’t have enough chaperones so the trip is going to be cancelled.”\n“Aren’t you going?”\n“I can’t. Jennifer’s dance recital is today and since you have so much free time...”\nThat you always seem to find ways for me to fill.\n“…the kids have been looking forward to seeing Air Force One for weeks. You know how hard it is to get tickets. They only need one more adult, so can you please say yes?”\nMichelle sighed. She loved her sister, but spending the day with rambunctious twelve-year-olds, even if one of them was her own nephew, wasn’t something she would ever put in her retirement bucket. Then again, she knew Cathy wouldn’t have asked if she really didn’t need her.\n“Ok, text me the information and I’ll be there. You really owe me on this, sis.”\n“Put it on my tab. Thank you. Jason will be thrilled.”\nMichelle reluctantly dragged herself into the bathroom. When she bought the condo, she’d designed the lighting to accentuate the positive attributes she saw in the image staring back at her in the unapologetic mirror.\nThe not-so little lines, (she refused to call them wrinkles) she could ignore for now. The bits of white in her blond hair, (she preferred to call them sparkles) were definite signs she was moving closer to the other side of the “hill” than her brain wanted to admit. While hanging out with a bunch of seventh graders wasn’t her idea of a good time, it would definitely break up the monotony of her daily routine, she thought as she drove to her nephew’s school.\nWhen she arrived, she notice there were several buses parked in front of Redwood Middle School, so Michelle had to park on the side street. She found Jason’s class, introduced herself to his teacher and boarded the bus for the fifteen minute drive up a winding road that led to the Ronald Reagan Library and Museum. \nMichelle hadn’t visited the museum since it opened in 1991 and, in spite of her objections, she was feeling a bit of excitement as the bus pulled into the parking lot. The breathtaking view from the mountaintop high above Simi Valley encompassed surrounding mountains, valleys and the Pacific Ocean.\nHer excitement was instantly quashed when she noticed several army vehicles, tanks, jeeps, and army tents on display by the front entrance which was draped with banners displaying the name of that week’s exhibition.\n“Cathy didn’t tell me the kids were going to be reliving the Vietnam War,” Michelle said aloud. “If I’d know, I don’t think I would have agreed to come.”\n“I know exactly how you feel.” Replied a very professionally dressed man walking a few steps behind her. “My uncle is the principal of Redwood, so I got talked into helping out.”\nMichelle chuckled. “Seems we’re in the boat when it comes to giving in to family requests. There’s my nephew,” She pointed to Jason. “Nice commiserating with you.”\nMichelle joined Jason and his class as they proceeded to the front door of the museum where they met the head docent who gave them maps and instructions on the rules before leading the group into the building.\n“Our docents will escort the students,” the tour guide announced. “If any of you adults wish to tour the museum by yourselves, please feel free. We’ll meet back here in two hours.”\nJason’s class headed for the Air Force One Pavilion leaving Michelle to wander through the Museum unencumbered. She proceeded on her private tour though the galleries that were on permanent display of America’s 40th President’s years. She stood for several moments admiring the impressive Oval office before moving on to the next exhibit.\nShe remembered the thrill she felt as the Berlin Wall finally came down, and the terror of the assignation attempt in 1981. She was so engrossed in her walk down memory lane, she didn’t notice a man standing next to her.\n“I fully believe, Ronald Reagan was the best acting president we’ve ever had.” The voice said.\nTurning around, Michelle was surprised to see it was the same person who she’d talk to earlier.\n“This is all very impressive Mr. principal’s nephew.” Michelle responded. “But I would never say Reagan was the best president.”\n“My name is William,” he said with a warm smile. “I didn’t say he was the best president. I said he was the best acting president! He was, after all, an actor.”\n“Hi William. I’m Michelle,” She turned to respond face-to-face. The face looking back at her was quite handsome, she thought.\nWilliam’s bright blue eyes accentuated the humor in his voice. He stood a few inches taller than her. She noticed his face was a bit unshaven, quite understandable for that time of the morning, and his tussled light brown hair had only a few strands of grey.\nMichelle surmised by his comment about President Regan, William was a member of their much maligned Baby Boomer generation. She felt her body drawn to him in a way she hadn’t experienced in more years than she cared to admit. She hoped he would stick around if she engaged him in conversation.\n“I’ll agree about his prior profession, but he was also President of the Screen Actors Guild and he was elected California governor. Twice.” She asserted.\n“Like I said. The best acting president. He sure fooled a lot of people. Twice.” William grumbled. “Let’s see what else is on display. Come with me.”\nWilliam knew he’d taken a bit of a risk inviting her to tour the museum with him, but he felt an overwhelming desire to not let this woman out of his sight. It had been too many decades since he’d felt this nervous meeting someone new. Yet sharing distant memories made the encounter feel strangely familiar.\nThe two started walking toward the main exhibit. Michelle stopped by a display of popular toys of the era. Malibu Barbie and all her accessories was front and center.\n“Damn, I’m feeling old.” Michelle sighed. “Never thought I’d see my toys in a museum! Maybe I should be in that display case too, along with my Partridge Family lunchbox and Chatty Cathy doll.” She laughed.\n“I know what you mean. There’s my 007 spy kit. I think they’ll still selling it on E-bay.”\nThe two walked past other memorabilia of the time that for them, didn’t seem that long ago. Stopping in front of the newspaper headlines of the draft protestors, William’s mood became somber.\n“I just missed being called up,” he started. “The draft ended right before I turned eighteen. I was on the anti-war protest lines nearly every day once my brother left for Nam. Like so many others, he never came home.”\n“I’m so sorry.” Michelle replied.\nEven though she’d only just met him, the sorrow she felt coming from William nearly had her in tears. Michelle took his hand in hers and squeezed lightly. “Let’s go outside and pay our respects.”\nNot letting go of their clasped hands, Michelle and William stood in silence starring at the names inscribed at the Vietnam Memorial The Wall That Heals.\n“I almost hate to ask,” Michelle whispered. “Any name you recognize?”\n“All of them.” William let out a long sigh. \nWilliam put his arm around Michelle’s shoulder. The warmth of her body mixed with the faint scent of her perfume made him a bit dizzy.\nIn an attempt to lighten the mood, Michelle changed the topic of the conversation.\n“You know, William, the spring of 1971 wasn’t all that bad. I was studying law at Berkeley that May and was part of that massive Vietnam protest. I hate to admit this, and absolutely no one else knows except one other person, I met a really fantastic guy that day.”\nThey started walking back to the Museum.\n“Really?” William’s attention was now fully focused on his museum partner. “Go on.”\n“We were front and center on the protest line. It was so crowded we could hardly move. There was this fellow protestor standing next to me when, in the middle of all the chaos, we touched arms and an overwhelming desire came over the both of us.”\n“Somehow we managed to escape the crowd and found a secluded grassy patch behind some bushes. Since everyone’s attention was on the protest, no one noticed two semi-naked bodies engaged in what I would have say was the most explosive sex I’ve ever had.”\n“Really? Who was he?”\n“That’s just the thing, I never did get his name. I never saw him again and to this day, I have no idea who he was. It was an experience I’ve never been able to forget, or duplicate since.”\n“That’s quite a story,” William replied. “Guess our youthful days of sex, drugs and rock and roll have now become consensual intercourse, Prozac and hip-hop.”\n“Oh well,” Michelle sighed. “The times they are a-changing as the great Bob Dylan wrote. Speaking of time, we’d better head back and rejoin the group. It’s been almost two hours.”\n“I agree with both of your comments, but before we return to the present, I’d like to take one last visit to the past. Follow me.”\nMichelle was elated that William didn’t want their time together to end. Even if she assumed his asking her to re-visit the display was just an excuse to spend more time with her, she was more than happy to accommodate him.\nOnce they returned to the exhibit, William stopped in front of the glass wall of newspaper headlines and photos of the historical San Francisco event Michelle had mentioned. He reached for her hand, brought her fingers to his lips and gave them a gentle kiss. He then pointed to the enlarged photo of the protestors and the two people who were standing next to each other in the crowd.\n“Oh My God!” Michelle gasped “That’s me!”\n“Yes, it is. And guess who the guy is standing next to you in that photo.”\nMichelle started trembling. She couldn’t speak. She could hardly breath. She stared at the photo of the lover she had never forgotten, then turned to stare at the same man now standing next to her. A man she would never be able to forget.\nOr need to.\nWilliam took Michelle’s face in his hands and gave her a long, passionate kiss.\n“We have a great deal of catching up to do.” He whispered.\nJust then they heard the students returning from their tour. The two reunited lovers exchanged an intense glance, wordlessly communicating they would not let another 50 years come between them.\n“Aunt Michelle,” Jason ran up to his aunt. “We’re going to the gift shop. Do you want to get a souvenir?”\nMichelle looked up at William, and grinned.\n“That’s ok, Jason.” Michelle put her arm through William’s. “I found the best souvenir anyone has ever gotten from a visit to a museum.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Fireflies at Night, Art Appreciators' Delight\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1079\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a gallery whose paintings come alive at night." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Souvenir was coming to the Grand Met. He was the biggest painter in the biggest gallery and it was just down the road from where I lived. How lucky was I? I couldn’t wait to go. I could feel the anticipation building inside me like bubbles rising and popping in cola. I’d heard excellent things. We all had. It was a paying show and it was notoriously hard to get tickets. I’d secured mine months in advance. People were peddling fake ones on street corners to make a quick buck. That’s how popular they were.\nI was going with my friend, Se Yung. She was a modern art fanatic. We’d been to every art show together in the past three years and this was going to be the highlight of our human experience of art. I knew it. I could barely sleep, though I tried to get snatches of it where I could. I had to be alert. I didn’t want to miss the slightest thing.\nWe were going in the evening, and that was intentional. We’d heard the rumours about Souvenir’s work. You weren’t allowed to bring a camera to his exhibitions, even to take stills for your own personal use. He said it spoiled the art. People used to believe if you captured their photo, you somehow stole their soul along with it. He treated his work the same way. Souvenir was beyond secretive, but rumours always spread once something is introduced into the public consciousness. We had heard about the movement in his pictures. Some interpreted it literally, others metaphorically. I had to see it for myself to gauge which it was.\nOn the night of the show, Se Yung and I got all dressed up. She came to my apartment and we played around with our clothes, being as brave and performative as we could.\n“You look fantastique,” she said, tongue in cheek. “I adore those long lashes you’re wearing.”\nThey were so long they tickled my cheeks each time I blinked, but they went perfectly with the rest of my dramatic ensemble. Se Yung looked just as striking. If you wanted to see high art, you had to dress for the occasion. I admired her hat. It was so elaborate, my eyes couldn’t keep up with its many facets. It was constantly revealing something new to me. It was a work of art itself.\nTruth be told, we wanted to be featured in the city’s art magazine. There were always photographers hanging around in the lobby of that gallery. They wouldn’t be allowed to enter the art room itself, but they’d be taking a multitude of snaps before the event got started, no doubt.\nWhenever we went into the building, it was deathly silent. It was like walking into the most sombre of funerals. We didn’t manage to get anything of our visit recorded. It was almost like we hadn’t been there, as far as physical records are concerned.\nWe followed the ticket collector as he directed us to our starting point. Even with tickets, the line was slow-moving. It seemed that once someone entered the exhibit, they wouldn’t re-emerge for an eternity. It was like they couldn’t bring themselves to leave again. I was impatient as we waited in line. Finally, we were called forward, our devices were confiscated and we walked inside.\nThe two of us were alone in the grand room. I wondered why they segregated the art lovers. Maybe it was to allow a full appreciation of what they were about to see – or maybe it was to limit the distribution of evidence of the magical phenomenon. It would lose its mysterious edge if it was widely discussed, if it was interpreted as a singular experience. Whenever one person went ahead of another, each saw something different. Maybe that’s just what art is - with or without its magical elements.\nMy first, surprised impression was that everything in the display was 2D. I had expected huge, avantgarde installations, but it was entirely made up of paintings. The lights dimmed down to darkness and then, the paintings came to life. There was an abstract I was observing that was colourful, but overall, it was flat and lifeless. It wouldn’t have been anything special as a standalone piece, but in the darkness, it started to move, like the path a firefly traces on a navy night. The colours flew out of the painting, like silent fireworks. I spun around to appreciate the full development of it. The painting was moving into every space in the sealed room. The abstract brushstrokes were no longer on the canvas. It was blank and artless, but the art moving around us was something impossible to distil into a single sentence. It was inexpressibly beautiful.\nSe Yung was moved. I could tell because she was so quiet. Ordinarily, she was never lost for words. Every time we found ourselves in a silence, however comfortable, she would feel the need to fill it. It was something I knew she did, but it didn’t particularly bother me. I appreciated her silence that night. There was so much to take in. It was like being at the heart of a fireworks display without any of the danger of getting too close.\nThere was a painting in a loose style of a man in a boat. The boat started to glide across the water on the canvas. The water rippled and twinkled under the sunlight. Then the boat picked up speed and sailed across the room, exploring every crevice with the delight of an adventurer in a place of novelty. It was so moving. The man in the boat’s face changed and took on emotion. He was crying. It wouldn’t have been clear why, had he been static and tearful, sitting in his unmoving boat, but with all the action guiding it, it was truly touching.\nWe continued to look at every piece for an age, drinking the meaning in like parched desert trekkers. By the time we reached the exit, I felt loath to leave. Se Yung confirmed that she felt the same. There wasn’t anything else we could do afterwards that could begin to live up to it. So, we went for a substandard cup of coffee in the gallery’s cafeteria, a stale bun and a look out the window at the immovable city. By contrast, I thought - what a colourless, concrete, artless day it had become." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Lovers\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1215\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The young docent, Simone, led her group into the final gallery of the tour. They gasped at seeing the museum’s most popular painting, ‘The Lovers,’ by Veneer. It depicted a young couple realizing their love for each other.\nEyes shining, as if in worship, they couldn’t look away. The tour group strained against the velvet ropes. They wanted to enter the painting. Exclaiming, they pointed at details, like the doves nesting in a branch above the reclining figures. And the raven watching from the shadows of the verdant foliage bursting with flowers. Cell phones captured pixilated images of the masterpiece. Simone never understood why people took incessant selfies in front of that painting. Tourist’s faces did not enhance the image.\nSeven other masterworks adorned the walls in the massive room. Visitors felt they only highlighted the magnificence of The Lovers.\nSimone loved all the paintings on display, and The Lovers most of all. She envied Carl, the security guard, who spent his days ensuring the safety of these paintings. No one knew Simone also envied the paintings spending their days with Carl. Simone wanted to spend her life with him.\nThough she loved guiding daily tours of the museum, Simone most desired an endless tour of Carl. She saw him as the most beautiful masterwork. Tall, athletic and with chiseled features, she saw him a mortal equal of a Greek god in a trim uniform. His watchful eyes revealed a tenderness and warmth she’d never seen captured in marble.\nAfter completing her presentation to the group, she stepped beside him. Simone did this at the end of each tour. They nodded a greeting. After years working side by side, they knew each other’s rhythms. She conducted four, one-hour museum tours daily. Carl stood, the watchful sentry, always at his station. Simone craved something deeper than casual greetings and gossip about museum politics.\nShe followed his stare at a woman sitting on the bench in the middle of the gallery.\nShe asked, “What’s her story? Where’s the guy? I see them all the time.”\n“They’re a couple. He’s late. Meet here at lunch most days. Look at her. She’s Exquisite. Belongs in that painting. With me.”\n“Really?”\nWithout breaking his gaze, he nodded.\nShe sighed. “I find her too… too… I don’t know. Refined? Too perfect to be real.”\nCarl murmured, “Perfect works for me.”\nSimone leaned in. “But will you work for perfect?”\nHe looked at her, questioning.\nShe gestured to the painting. “That couple sipping wine could be anyone. They aren’t perfect, except for each other. Fans project themselves onto that blanket. A fantasy they believe. They want it.”\nHe said, “True. I’d be thrilled to picnic with her.”\nThe man usually seen with the woman on the bench entered. His name was Morten.\nThe woman, Amanda, sighed as he plopped down beside her. “You? Again?”\nMorten rolled his eyes. “There are other benches. Please find one.”\n“I was here first. I’m always here first. Find another squatting spot.”\n“Oh, here first. Time’s up. Don’t you have a job to get to?”\nThey glowered at each other. She turned away. Morten looked at ‘The Lovers,’ in awe.\nHe murmured to Amanda, “You’re here every day. You obviously love art. I wish I could paint like that.”\nShe pointed at the ceiling. “Imagine what it took to paint that.”\n“The ceiling? Are you joking? Two men, a scaffold and a bucket of white. Big deal. Done in a day.”\nShe looked skeptical.\nMorten pointed at ‘The Lovers.’ “I meant that painting. It’s perfect.”\n“Never noticed it. Not that big on all the ‘art.’ You know…? Most of it is trash. Officially sanctioned graffiti. Gives doodling a bad name.”\nMorten muttered, “Vulgarian...”\nConcerned, Amanda touched her ears. “You mean like Mr. Spock?”\n“This isn’t happening…”\nAmanda continued, “I’m here on break. It’s quiet… uhm… usually. Even with a crowd, they whisper. Ever notice how this bench sits perfectly under the AC vent? I love it.”\nMorten couldn’t believe it. “You pay admission every day for the ventilation?”\n“Annual membership has its perks. Whoever designed it is a true artist.”\nSmiling, she shut her eyes and turned her face to the draft.\nMorten said, “I’m serious. I study art and this painting is so deep.”\nShe looked at it and nodded seriously. “Yes, profoundly mediocre. I thought students of ‘art’ came to learn from other’s mistakes. What not to do…”\nHis mouth dropped. “Are you really that dim? Do you have any idea…?”\n“Ever used a camera? Digital technology is amazing. It’s crazy. A good photographer could capture that in less than a second. It took this guy how many hours to paint it? At a penny per brush stroke, he wouldn’t break even for less than…”\n“Never mind.” Morten shuddered. “I can’t talk to you. You’re incapable… beyond comprehension.”\n“Of course. I’m not in that secret club putting one over on rich sophisticates spending like drunken sailors proving they get it.”\n“There’s no club…”\n“Then you’re one of the fools… Sorry, I mean ‘sophisticates.’”\nSeething, Morten turned his attention to the painting. His favorite painting. He imagined a yipping toy poodle sat beside him.\nAmanda tapped his shoulder. Startled, he recoiled.\n“You still here?”\nShe smiled. “Know the difference between a museum and a mausoleum?”\nMorten looked for a guard. He saw Carl standing by the gallery entrance. “Uhm…”\n“The spelling…” She cracked up and stifled her laugh when everyone looked at her. She whispered, “I made that up.” She looked about. “I mean, these are the definitive artists of their time? Sheesh! Not one I’d put over my couch.”\nMorten made one last attempt. “Why are you so obnoxious?”\n“Me? Every day I’m minding my business and you come to convert me to your cult, worshipping smears on canvas.”\nStanding with Simone, Carl stepped toward Amanda and Morten. “He’s upsetting her.”\nSimone touched his arm. “She doesn’t strike me as the distressed damsel type. I’ll bet she’s never wandered windswept moors. Maybe it’s their first quarrel. They’re not shouting. Let them work it out.”\nCarl kept his eyes on them. “But it’s…”\n“They’re passionate. Hardly indifferent. Give them time. You’d only be intruding. And gain nothing.”\n“I’ll walk around. Let her know I’m there if she needs me.”\n“I’d wager you’d have a better chance with me, than her.”\nCarl looked at Simone. Her words made no sense. “It’s that hopeless?”\n“Timing, my friend. Timing…”\nHe set his jaw and nodded.\nSimone continued. “Since working here, have you ever seen the whole museum? I could give you a tour. Even let you see the restricted areas.”\nShe’d piqued his interest. He glanced at the painting and the bickering couple. Amanda stood and exited the gallery looking amused. Simone saw Carl’s yearning.\nAfter an audible sigh, Morten moved to the center of the bench. He stared at ‘The Lovers.’\nCarl said, “I hope I can find true love.”\nSimone touched his arm and looked into his eyes. “I’m sure you will. I have one last tour this afternoon. Maybe I’ll see you later?”\nShe smiled at him. He returned it and watched her walk away. Glancing back, she made a little wave.\nHe nodded. The room felt warm. He checked the thermostat. But it hadn’t changed." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: First Try Wins\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1233\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Congratulations,” he said, “But you didn’t really win.”\nLisa glanced over at the man bundled up in what looked to be two winter coats and a sweater. He was wearing thick glasses and a gray beanie. It was one o’clock in the afternoon, and they were the only two people in the gallery reserved for displaying the winners of the museum of art’s weekly amateur painting and sculpture contest. Lisa’s painting titled “Denver in January” had come in first place, and she was featured prominently with the runners up placed on the adjacent walls. It was the first time she had ever won a contest like this, and it came with a lovely certificate, a month’s free admission to the museum, and a hundred dollars.\nThe man next to her appeared to be around her age. Then again, she was thirty and so many people seemed to look thirty when they were actually twenty. The younger generation was aging poorly, and Lisa secretly found glee in that. There had to be some kind of advantage in getting older, and if you were aging better than those younger than you, then that was something you could hold onto, especially in the art world, where youth seemed to be such a valuable commodity.\n“I’m sorry,” Lisa said to the man in the beanie, remembering his insult, “What did you just say?”\nThe man took out a small notepad and held it up for Lisa to see. She saw a clump of scribbles. There may have been words or numbers in the scribble, but if there were, Lisa couldn’t make them out. She debated asking what it is she was meant to be looking at, but instead, she nodded as if she understood completely. The man seemed to sense that she was merely placating him, and so he explained the clump.\n“This is a list of all the people who have won the amateur art contest for the past year,” he said, “Eighty-three percent of them were entering the contest for the first time.”\nNow Lisa was beginning to understand. She had entered the museum of art’s contest after seeing that the “inspiration” for this week’s contest was “Winter.” Most of Lisa’s work was inspired by winter. It was her favorite time of year, and global warming seemed to be decimating it, which only spurred her to produce even more work that glorified the season. She reached back into her memories of snow days and blizzards to try and depict the beauty of a time period that so few seemed to miss.\n“I’m not sure what you’re getting at,” Lisa said, even though she knew exactly what he was getting at, “But I find the insinuation to be quite rude.”\n“It’s simple,” he said, believing, like most rude people do, that doubling down on the rudeness in an explanatory way will somehow make things better, “It costs twenty dollars to enter the contest. There are a few artists who enter that are really talented. Singular talents. One of them should be winning the contest every week with the others coming in second and third place. If that happened, hardly anyone else would enter, and the museum would lose a steady stream of income. So, they make sure new people are always winning, which gives others hope, and more people enter.”\n“I see,” Lisa replied, beginning to engage in the argument she didn’t want to have, “So you’re saying I won so that it’ll look like anyone could win.”\n“Well,” said the man, “It’s also that now you’re under the impression you can win, so you’ll keep entering, because you think you might be able to win again. They’re going to be getting their weekly twenty dollar entry fee from you for awhile now.”\nLisa ran her tongue over her teeth. Anyone who knew her knew that was a sign to run for the hills, but this man was a stranger. He had no idea that she was about to deflate him.\n“I’m sorry,” she said, not sorry at all, “But how exactly do you know all this? Do you randomly take an interest in amateur contests at various museums and then begin studying who wins them?”\n“No,” he said, “Just this one.”\n“Why this one?”\n“Because I’m one of the few talented artists who never seems to win.”\nNow it was crystal clear. Lisa was dealing with a Bitter Bobby. He wasn’t the first she’d run into, and he wouldn’t be the last. In some ways, she could sympathize with him. Being an artist is often a struggle, and it can be tempting to take out that frustration on someone having a better day than you are. As they were talking, Lisa noticed an older woman approach them.\n“Excuse me,” the older woman said, “Are you this week’s winning artist?”\n“I am,” Lisa said, sending a side smirk the man’s way, “How did you know?”\n“Oh,” she said, “I always come the first day the winning painting is on display, and usually the artist is here to see it. Congratulations. This was your first entry, wasn’t it? I see the little green star next to your painting.”\n“Does that mean--”\n“Yes,” the old woman said, “That’s the special star they give you letting people know you knocked it out of the park on your very first try.”\n“Actually,” said the man, “It’s how they let prospective donors know they should play the lottery. It’s a symbol of false hope.”\nAny compassion Lisa might have had disappeared. It was one thing to insult her privately, but to embarrass her in front of this woman was another thing entirely.\n“Perhaps you should try to win,” she said, “Since you’re so confident that newer artists--”\n“Oh,” the man interjected, “I have won. Five times, I believe. Five or six. That was when the contest first started and it was all based on merit. Once they saw that it could be a cash cow, I was out in the cold. I still, however, hold the record for most wins.”\nWith that, he put on a pair of giant headphones and made his way out of the gallery.\n“My, my,” said the older woman, “Some people really do carry a lot of resentment, don’t they?”\nLisa was only half-listening to her. She had gone back to looking at her painting. She could see some mistakes around the bottom. Sloppiness that she only noticed after she had uploaded the image of it on the museum’s website. She had cursed herself for wasting twenty dollars, but then, when she found out she’d won, she assumed the judges hadn’t minded the smudges, or maybe they thought they were intentional. She also noticed the problems with color overlay on the right side. The placement of the moon was off. There were some technique issues and a few other things that were bothering her.\n“Don’t worry, dear,” said the older woman, “That man comes here every week, and he’s always dressing down the artist. And it’s such a shame, because usually they’re just like you. A lot of first-time winners.”\nLisa found herself stuck at the bottom of the painting. Stuck where the mistakes were. Where it was undeniable.\n“So many debut winners,” the old woman carried on, “Isn’t that nice? It’s always nice to see so many people getting lucky on their very first try.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Eschatology Exhibition\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2884\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a gallery whose paintings come alive at night." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "[tw gore, insane ravings, eldritch corruption]\nSarah's palms left moist patches on the worn desk as she cursed the volunteer manager for leaving her to conduct the \"Relics of the Occult\" tour alone. Her notecards were smeared with sweat stains. She was not ready, but she had run out of time.\nShe slid past the massive alcohol filled container of an immature leviathan and shelves full of specimen vats. Their unblinking eyes upturned in perverse supplication.\nShe let herself through the armored door, piercing the insulated, fireproof glass wall, breathing deep, pushing her anxiety back, regretting not using the toilet on her way out.\nAs the handful of patrons trickled to the dimly lit entrance to the spirit collection, Sarah wafted around her notecards and straightened her back. It's just a tour, thirty minutes, then I never have to think of this again.\nSarah began the tour with an overenthusiastic theatricality, desperate to capture the attention of a child in a witch costume. \"Welcome, evening exhibitionists! Who's ready to go tomb-raiding through the museum's musty collection of the esoteric and obscure?”\nAfter a few nods, she led the group to the spirit collection. The guests chuckled indulgently as Sarah launched into her preamble, covering the ancient fascination with unknown beasts of foreign lands. Surrounded by motion controlled decorations was the centerpiece diorama—a jarred amphibious creature labeled \"Probable Idol Offering to The Pheloid Order.\" The monstrosity certainly 'looked the part’.\n\"Though not confirmed, this is likely a swollen blob-fish head with the shoulders of a monkey sewn on. Technically, creatures fabricated like this are classified as—she made air quotes—Mer-made.\" When no one responded to the joke, she said, \"That's m-a-d-e, not m-a-i-d. This example was collected in World War Two after an air raid on the Jurassic coast.\" Some of the patrons nodded thoughtfully.\n\"Water cults exist all over the world. You can see evidence of them from flood myths in religions that predate the chronicles of Hestia.\"\nThe blob-fish rattled in its jar. The group gasped as one.\nSarah cracked a smile. The Special Effects Department really outdid themselves for this event.\nIn that very moment, a hair-breadth feat of prescience caused the preserved priest's withered consciousness to stir.\n[My resemblance to your feeble sea-denizens is irksome, but no matter - for the accursed acolytes of that age were nearing spiritual apogee.]\n\"Now, as I was saying about primordial water-cults, not long ago we hosted several relics and early imagery…\" Sarah faltered, narrowing her eyes at a bespectacled man who had broken away from the group. He stood uncomfortably close to the jarred specimen, hands splayed on the glass wall.\nThe stranger suddenly whipped around, wild-eyed, and rasped with uncanny authority: \"That bauble is the shriveled remnant of K'tha'Arnen - Chief Augur to the Undying OxyPhyle who once drank deep from the Light Between Worlds!\"\nA bead of sweat formed on Sarah's brow as the bespectacled man's unnatural stare bored into her.\nWas this part of the volunteer's performance? She thought. Finally, some good luck.\nForcing an awkward laugh, she gestured toward the stranger. \"You must be our storyteller. Thank goodness you made it after all! I can hand over the tour script if you'd like to, uh, take it from here?\" She waved the stack of meticulous research in his direction with a hesitant smile.\nThe stranger's deranged expression contorted further as he unleashed a contemptuous snort. With surprising vehemence, he swatted Sarah's notes from her grasp, sending them scattering across the gallery floor.\n\"Bah! I require no scribbles to recount the True Rite's deliverance!\" He spun with a flourish of his tattered coat toward the remaining guests. His voice adopted a grim, portentous timbre that seemed to siphon all breathable air from the chamber.\nHe certainly was committed to the part, Sarah thought.\n\"You pitiable dabblers thirst for a tale of untellable cosmic fright, yes? You wish to be indoctrinated into the wisdom held within yon desiccated husk?\" He scratched at his woolen hat.\nOoh, he's good. Sarah stepped aside and swept her arm theatrically to let him take over.\n[Oho, now we are seen! Let the insipid ignorant flail—for this one grasped mysteries long born from these mawkish exhibits…We know this fool.]\nA few guests shifted uncomfortably, shooting Sarah a panicked look. But some perverse, masochistic fascination kept them all anchored in rapturous silence, awaiting the lunatic's next macabre utterance.\nWith a sharp intake of breath, he began in earnest, \"Then gird your feeble neurological nodes, for I shall umbrate your pathetic existences with Revelations to shatter even steel-forged sanities into skittering shards!\"\nSarah's mouth hung agape. Just what alternate reality had this \"volunteer\" unzipped himself from? Actors of this caliber were beyond the normal budget of these dumb museum lock-ins.\nUnbidden, her gaze slipped back toward the jarred remnants of the so-called K'tha'Arnen - which, she could have sworn, had rotated imperceptibly in its glass prison to meet her stare with pinprick eyes—seemingly alive in wicked bemusement.\nThe storyteller's wild gesticulations caused the entire gallery to ripple and distort in the corners of Sarah's vision. Her gaze drifted over the looming glass wall separating them from the museum's labyrinthine maze of preservation jars.\nSquaring her shoulders, Sarah cut across the madman's loquacious ranting with a forceful academic tone. \"If I may interject with a succinct précis on the unparalleled phylogenetic scope represented in our museum's spirit collection.\"\nThe vagabond wheeled toward her with an unsettling mix of bemused condescension and simmering ire. \"Ah yes, pray regale us with your dollops of reductive categorization! Soothe our mortal skepticisms with sterile placations, while the true cosmic heritage encoded in every stale jar is rendered excruciatingly whole once more!\"\n[Finally, an avatar to articulate Truth's dark genesis! Now all lay rapt witness as the paltry baubles of this suppurating tomb acquire animate sentience.]\nThe guests appeared utterly enthralled, their self-conscious tittering from earlier fully sublimated into rapturous horror. Sarah felt the fragile skein of rational perception fray around her as the delirious rambling coalesced into an ineluctable gravitational singularity.\nWith creeping dread, she realized her throat had gone sawdust dry, her former conversance with the museum's catalogs abandoning her. For a woman of words, she could no longer find one.\nThe vagabond's wild gestures and fevered intonations hit a momentary lull, causing his spell to flicker. He blinked. A fleeting lucidity returned as his gaze fell upon the sign for the \"Images of Nature\" gallery.\n\"I…\" he began in a more subdued register, \"I remember when I was a lad of twenty, sneaking into that very exhibition. I secreted myself in a secluded water closet for hours. It was a compulsion. I needed to pour over those ancient tomes and prints in peace, undisturbed.\"\nSarah arched an eyebrow, cautiously probing this change of scene. \"Ah yes, our collection of vintage naturalist illustrations and chronicles. Mind you, many of those early 19th century renderings were embellished folklore rather than empirical documentation.\"\nShe was regaining her curatorial confidence, satisfied to be guiding the tour back toward factual pedagogy. \"Take the famous 'Phizzer Fish-Monster of Nantucket' woodcut depicting some lurid chimera with a squid's mantle and a rhinoceros' horn protruding from its head. Mere creative fancy by the artist, drawing from translated descriptions of an orca. Yet for years it spawned all manner of fanciful sea serpent mythologies.\"\nA balding man in the second row piped up. \"Sorta like how the kangaroo got its name?”\nSarah raised an eyebrow, knowing where this was going.\n\"I heard when Captain Cook asked the locals what it was called,\" the bald man continued. \"They said ‘Kangaroo', which means in their language 'What did he say?\"\nThe guests' titters and murmurs coalesced into a rumbling chuckle at the anecdote. Even the wild-eyed storyteller allowed himself a dry smirk and shake of the head, seemingly relishing the diverting humor.\nSarah made an appreciative nod. \"I'm afraid that's an urban legend. The term 'kangur--\"\nHer words caught in her throat as the vagabond's expression underwent an instantaneous shift - curling lips petrifying into a rictus sneer as all mirth evacuated from his face. He surged forward, both hands slamming against the reinforced glass partition with a boom that caused the entire edifice to shudder and myriad specimen jars behind to rattle ominously on their shelves.\n\"ENOUGH!\" he bellowed with a bass profundity that seemed to reverberate from the primordial bones of the earth itself. \"You prattle inanely about mere colonial explorers marring the existential boundaries while remaining oblivious to the profundity of these pickled parts.\" Spittle landed on the glass.\nAll levity extinguished, the stranger slowly turned to address the terrified guests, his eyes boring into them with the intensity of eldritch revelation.\n\"Before you cloyed wretches dissolve into the brine between realities, you shall bear witness to how the naturalists feeding your collection were nothing but cankers to the Grand Rite—which is now ascendant once more. For I have sampled the eschatology of this brittle world—we are at the knife's edge. This is merely the lukewarm anteroom to what ELSEWHERE…inhales...\"\nSarah firmly but gently guided the now wailing witch-child and his flustered parents away from the spirit collection, promising a more suitable arts and crafts diversion.\nA few of the guests began nervously shifting their weight and exchanging furtive glances.\nThe wild-eyed vagabond seemed to notice none of this; too engulfed in his fervor as he recounted his brush with the ineffable.\nOne particularly entranced woman in the front row began humming a low, elemental thrum that seemed to burrow into the limbic core of all who could hear it. Slowly, sporadic others picked up the dissonant harmonics, their voices glazing with rapturous entropy.\n\"It was the diadem, you see…\" the thief husked, his cadence syncing into the escalating drone. \"When first I laid eyes upon that blasphemous relic that had once encased the Augur's skein, I felt its unknowable gravity warping my very DNA's architecture!\"\nHis gaze turned inward, deep in retelling. \"Despite every synapse recoiling in wisdom's final vapor. I found myself gripped by sycophantic urges beyond all reason. The siren-born coppery glyphs emblazoned across that jewelled arc cauterized all feculence of rationality from my psyche!\"\nWith a violent shudder, the man snapped back to address the few coherent guests. \"Before I even recognized my own appendages shattering the protective vitrine, the profane diadem was already scalding my palms with its ravenous, aeonial ANTIPATHY!\"\n[YES! Let the pitiable thrall wail his fruitless recapitulation! For as his atavistic curiosity compelled direct congress with my supreme circlet, so did the un-shatterable TRUTH of our grand reunification—lens away the gossamer veils masking your species' putrescent nadir!]\nHowling in abject rapture, the raving storyteller clutched at his skull as if it might splinter at any moment under the strain, pulling away his ragged wool cap, exposing a ring of scars. \"As I raised that blazing apocrypha toward my naked cerebrum, its inexorable tyranny peeled away every delusional human thought—causing my third-eye portcullis to blast asunder with the MAJESTY OF WHAT WOULD BE UNVEILED!\"\nAll around, the guests now swayed and undulated with the incessant frequencies, a few babbled and frothed in spiritual ecstasy.\n\"I reached up. It burned! I heard the chanting, the priest…this priest called to me. Then the blasphemous brushwork heaved and distended. The painted depictions of eldritch botany and metaphysical anatomy elongating in profane mockery of all anthropic proportions.\"\n\"Before my screams could reverberate,\" the man slurred, \"I found my mimetic signature shepherded toward that most blighted curio archive where the occluded sleep in draughts of spectral ichors! This spot is where the paint-animate shepherded me. But on the other side of this.\" He pounded the glass. \"This very spot!\"\nWith a terrifying WHOOMPH, every glass cylinder throughout the room simultaneously vented milky aerosols. The unnatural fog quickly enveloped the entire gallery in a churning, glass-tinctured miasma.\nThe fog swirled and contracted around the crazed man as he continued his frantic recounting, oblivious to the eldritch transmogrification overtaking his audience. Their forms melted and sloughed in the spectral vapor, calcifying into bulbous parodies. Pallid flesh distending while eyes ballooned into cold, guppy orbs.\n\"Before me yawned the aperture of that charnel sump where your world's forsaken dreamers slumber in vitro pungency!\" The diadem slowly emerged from under the skin of his head.\n[Yesss…relate your tale of agonizing revelation, meat-puppet! For as your spittle-flecked recapitulation unravels, so too does this cadre of filth insensately open their meager spirits to THEIR INFINITE TRUTH!]\nThe storyteller battered his fists in futile desperation as his skin split. Beyond his reflection were the gallery's occupants, morphing into a litany of obscene vitrine-born blasphemies.\n\"You simpletons sneer at those suppurating urns of formless essence behind cold analogical imagery.\" He spat at the priest in the jar. \"All while ignoring the exuviated depth hungering for raw metamorphosis beyond this clear seal!\"\n[Insensate fool! Your purblind fever-likenesses cloister eternally from THAT which slumbered ineluctably within my desiccated husk - the primordial ethos predating all your feeble material kingdoms!]\nStraining against the unyielding glass, the storyteller's throat gargled with unspeakable tongues as he struggled to assimilate the incomprehensible panorama consuming his reality.\n\"They have no concept of the diadem's rhizogenic logarithms clawing them through my distillation matrix! IT LEAKS THROUGH CREVICES! GLIBBERING CHYMES GYRE WHILE COUNTING DOWN TO ZERO SUM AZATHOTH!\"\nWith a scream of splintered epiphany, the storyteller's skull impacted the glass in a sickening crunch. He rebounded, jaw unhinging wide enough to swallow cities, as fresh crimson bloomed across the glass. Silhouetted in the amniotic vapor beyond, the priest's true form shrugged free from its partial pseudo-hominid husk. A proto-sentient kaleidoscope of fractalized appendages branching into realms of topological impossibility.\n[AT LAST! THE FLOODGATES OF YOUR PALTRY BIOME HAVE BEEN BREACHED TO ACCOMMODATE THE UNSWADDLING OF MY PRIMORDIAL SINGULARITY! SHED YOUR FALSE HUSKS AND BE REBORN AS APOSTLES TO MY ETERNAL WOMB!]\nAfter pulling the diadem away, the storyteller's body went limp, crumpling to the slick tiles in a tangle of askew limbs and a spreading bloom of blood from his ruined face. As his consciousness flickered and his eyes rolled back, fragments of lucidity sputtered through in disjointed flashes.\n\"Falling…always the endless falling.\" He scratched the red stones against the glass. \"That abyssal well of semi-sentience, but on the other side.\" His voice grew faint. \"Gibbering and flailing against an unyielding barrier, I was powerless, I was a child, I was a common thief. I slipped before I could return your trinket. I slipped, and now I mirror that, the glaze, my reflection is now—then—now.\" His reflection presented the priest with the diadem.\nThe priest's crag-worn, unknowable features lingered in that moment. It accepted the gift. Then, with a shadow of triumph, the whole of its spectral bulk dissolved like vapor into the crepuscular umbers permeating the spirit room.\nThe former thief's limbs convulsed as the spell thrummed its cyclopedic hold over this plane, flaring and guttering like a wick starved of oxygen.\nSuddenly, Sarah was there, interposing her mortal, corporeal, logical furnace between the vagabond and the shard of trans-dimensional memeplex pushing in from the Chthonic Other.\nWith a tremor like ripples over a cosmic Styx, the buckram fog desolated - its mercurial tangents sloughing back into the stark fluorescents and familiar Euclid of mundane geometries. All around, the former abominations began to moan and flail as humanoid shapes reemerged.\nSarah stooped over the bloodied storyteller. \"Is there a doctor here? Damn it, this isn't part of the tour—call 999.\" She wrapped the storyteller's scarf around the head wound. \"What happened? Why didn't you stop him?\"\nAt last, as the vagabond's catatonic gaze faded to naked bewilderment.\nThe invasive psychic structures consuming the other patrons slid away, veils of forgetting left them dumbfounded. Like sleepers jolting awake from a harrowing night-scape, arrows of reality pierced their reawakened perception. None moved, but all shared in the horror before them.\nThough a sour tinnitus reverberated everywhere, Sarah allowed herself the faintest of relieved smiles. The ancient profane consciousness persists. Her pet theories of noetic architectures and cognitive body guarding models had, it seems, prevailed. For now, at any rate.\nGlancing down at the inert bleeding man, she felt only pity for his naïve astral trespass, having invited such rapacious unmooring. The poor fool. Best he stay forever blissfully oblivious to what grimly resilient footings were required to uphold this cosmic quarantine zone they called a museum.\nStill, the curator thought with a shudder, far better to lance a cyst than fester into…. No. She would church her speculations for another event.\nRising to address the shaken patrons around her, Sarah asked if anyone required medical attention or counseling. Mostly they responded with dazed nods, then shuffling exits. Best to sheepdog what trauma persisted into the soporific pastures of pop-cognitive haze.\nFrankly, she was relieved the evening's lecture had devolved into mere mass hysteria and not some greater catastrophe.\nShe was prepared for either instance.\nRot can always be cauterized. After all, the anomalous was her dove to breed—not these pitiable meat-fragments doomed to their slack-jawed insignificance.\nSarah looked to the copper and ruby-of-arsenic-bejeweled tiara sitting on top of the Mer-made's sealed jar. \"What have you got there Chief Augur? Another gift for me?\"\nShe smiled. \"Good boy.\"" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Three Little Words\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1001\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about a first or last kiss." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "All it took. Set the scene. Sky so empty. Not a bird. Not a plane. Riverbank our seat. Padded with grass. I smile upwards. Sky blesses us. No rain today. That is rare. We are Irish. We are neighbours. Always have been. She is favoured. She is exceptional. A beautiful rarity. We are serene. Swans alongside us. Glide on water. Ripples barely noticeable. What a day. Memorable for eternity. Plain to some. Not to me. Significant as birth. Amy my equal. Seated like bookends. Watching shared view. We are lucky. We are free. Unburdened by age. Everything within reach. Choices to make. Dictate our future. I eagerly await. Developments are incoming. All is still. Reaching for Amy. Hands are expressive. They demonstrate love. Is this love? No comparison available. Is it needed? Fingers glaze hers. She doesn’t react. Does she notice? Is it nerves? She is calm. Always has been. I admire that. Wish I was. Amy beautifully beams. Appreciates the stillness. We are alone. We often are. Nothing to do. Village is quiet. Own entertainment necessary. I am quiet. Words chosen carefully. Overthinking kills romance. Remind myself again. Amy nudges me. Points to sky. One lone bird. Traces its course. In vast blankness. I am touched. It dances freely. Unencumbered by thoughts. Poetry in skies. Something is divine. Natural surroundings help.\nInner critic loud. Listen too often. Let it go. Like a balloon. Into the atmosphere. Never seen again. A beautiful disappearance. Let it go. Hard to change. So many habits. So many fears. Amy’s warm smile. Fear melts away. Cupid’s bow pout. Artistically drawn lips. My own model. Inexpressible, luminescent beauty. Always viewed it. Day after day. Year after year. Never gets old. Beauty never does. A blessed day. Nothing to do. That is wonderful. Small town life. Kindred spirits meet. Youth enhances feelings. Future is unblemished. No impressions made. Dirty fingerprint-free. We are one. Cherish our naivety. Preserve it forever. Oh, if only. We are growing. Growing above ground. Everything breathes together. Let’s be together. My mind imagines. Painting possible pictures. Better than reality. Infused with romance. What is next? This lengthy pause. Suspended between worlds. One of certainty. One of possibility. Choosing the latter. Ending a friendship. One single movement. So much loss. So much potential.\nBreeze lifts clothing. Hair moves too. Untethered things dance. It is remarkable. Her face too. Aching for contact. What traps me? My own mind? One small gesture. Made completely enormous. Thanks to fear. Drawn out moments. Longer than needed. My mind creates. It ruins too. Amy slips away. I constantly procrastinate. Sent into spirals. Self-reflection paralyses. Self-loathing destroys. Shaking it off. I want better. Let it go. Focus on Amy. Place it elsewhere. Feelings for her. Grow and expand. I can change. I can stop. For her sake. I need her. I know that. She is everything. She is morning. She is night. She is sunlight. Her face beams. Stronger than rays. Positivity is important. Break bad patterns.\nAmy is different. Homelife is kind. She knows love. I never have. She knows praise. I never have. She knows encouragement. I never have. Not too late. Everything can change. Living at home. Arrested in spirit. Escape is reachable. Amy can help. We can restart. Close to home. Far away too. World our oyster. So much novelty. Expands before us. Self-reliance avoided. We are two. Amy and me. Meant to be. In my estimation. We are compatible. Airborne feathered friends. Better in company. Shyness does subside. A decision made. Moving towards her. An arm outstretched. She accepts it. That surprises me. Deep insecurity shifts. Always expecting rejection. Amy embraces me. She understands everything. She hears it. Bricks between us. All is audible. Homelife is amplified. Sound does travel. So does hatred. Intimacy and understanding. Without any words. Too many words. Diminish real meaning. Life is hard. Silent co-existence helps. Watching river swells. We find peace. Nature’s own music. Our ears receive. We are happy. I realise that. A quiet realisation. No dramatic revelation. A quiet knowing. A welcome thought. Unlike many others. Sun will set. Ending eventually comes. Does not matter. What we have. It transcends all.\nI move in. Such a delay. Hesitancy overcomes me. Amy smiles knowingly. She reads thoughts. So it seems. Always tuned in. A sensitive soul. What I need. Taking my hand. Her hand sure. It is steady. It is calming. It reassures me. All is well. Nothing can fail. Friendship is expansive. It can transform. It can continue. My lips tremble. Hers are unmoving. I know her. She is safety. Why question it? Other than habit. Amy waits unerringly. She is patient. No pressing forwards. No rush today. We have more. Years upon years. Tomorrow after tomorrow. Amy my future. I am hers. Confidence can grow. Good conditions required. The sky empties. No more life. Only ours entwined. Nature respects us. We are happy. Could stay forever. But dinnertime looms. We are children. Bound by age. Hope helps everything. Even the hopeless. One small effort. Before night descends. Day demands it. So much wavering. I am finished. I must act. It is essential. More for me. Amy would wait. I need action. Everything points forwards. The moment arrives. It is spectacular. My lips puckered. Chapped but feeling. I lean in. Amy beams back. Regarding my lips. Her eyes dance. Eyes to lips. Pink and plump. Cushions for hearts. Tender as mine. Our lips touch. One true moment. Before life interferes. We are home. Her kiss familiar. Reliving my imaginings. So many times. This is true. We are one. For an instant. I am safe. Amy is everything. She intoxicates me. I am absorbed. Water to sponge. Water becomes inseparable. We are too. We are involved. Moment for two. Our souls know. No one else. Time calls us. Leave the riverbank. Go back home. Only by name. Amy is home. Even dirty riverbanks. Place doesn’t matter. She is everything. Life is incidental. Three little words. Our first kiss." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Nighthawks\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1662\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "With a weary sigh, Edward locked up the gift shop and finally got out of the museum. After eight hours of “the restrooms are around the corner from the large Seurat painting,” “no, you don’t need to know who Seurat is, it’s so big you can’t miss it,” and “I’m sorry, the Starry Night mugs are all sold out. Yes, I know, it’s disappointing,” he was mentally exhausted. This job was supposed to be just a stepping stone until something better came along he could put that art history degree to; he’d spent 27 years in this place. \nThe night shift security guard arriving was Edward’s cue that he could leave – good, because that Old Guitarist always seemed to be staring at him by that time of the evenings. Tipping his hat to the guard, Edward stepped out, down the chipped concrete steps of the museum into the dry, blustery New England autumn night. It was already fully dark out because of the darn daylight savings time change, and the wind funneled between the densely packed buildings in the business district of town, kicking up dead brown leaves on the sidewalk. The only spots of light were the yellow squares of windows where some dedicated workers still had not left – or were avoiding going home to nagging spouses or bratty children. Edward thought of his own empty apartment a short walk away. There should have been a single light on from the lamp on a timer, and it probably still smelled of the baked potato he made – and burned – earlier in the day. He never married, never had any children, never thought to until he realized he was lonely and by then it was too late. Funny that under the frozen eyes of the museum portraits and the streams of school field trips he was constantly surrounded by people and yet wanted nothing more than to go home and be lonely by himself; loneliness in a crowd always seemed worse. \nShoving his hands deeper into the pockets of his tweed coat, Edward shuffled down the sidewalk on the street to his apartment. A pair of children – likely brother and sister – walked their dog before they disappeared up the steps to a deep red brick townhouse with wilted flowers in one of the windowsills. A group of women holding down their cloche hats from the wind carried quick dinners from the local deli, likely going to some church event. Edward realized that he was hungry too, in fact, as the food court in the museum was edible at best and he’d had his fill of greasy French fries that week. Not in the mood to cook anymore that evening, he remembered a diner around the corner from his block. Phillies, he thought it was called. Usually filled with teenagers flirting and studying – not simultaneously – after school but it seemed like a decent place; it was usually quite empty when he was coming back from work and peered through its glass wall. Turning on his heel, Edward cut across the grass toward the diner.\nIt was in fact called Phillies, he had remembered correctly, and it was in fact quite empty. Almost entirely empty actually, with just the man behind the counter in his white uniform and one man sitting with his back to the large window. The soft yellow light coming from inside was a stark contrast to the grey cement and red brick down the rest of the block, something comforting to it. Pushing the door to the diner open, bells jangled above Edward’s head. The counter clerk turned his head and gave him a warm, acknowledging nod; the man sitting on the stool kept staring into his drink without reaction. Edward sat down at the end of the counter, near the steel drink machines.\n“What’ll it be?” the clerk asked him amicably, wiping down the glossy mahogany counter.\n“Uh, what do you recommend?” Edward wondered. “I’m not really a regular here.”\nThe clerk laughed pleasantly. “Yes, well, I can see that. I know most folks coming through these doors.” He did seem like the kind of person who would remember your name and order. “Might I suggest a philly cheesesteak with a cup of black coffee?” \n“Sure,” he nodded and pulled out a napkin from the dispenser, creasing it absentmindedly. \n“Have a lot on your mind?” the clerk asked him.\n“Contrarily, not enough,” Edward chuckled. “You ever feel like this is all you get out of life?” \n“Oh, sometimes, sure. I think everyone does, just part of being human.”\n“You think it happens to some people more than just sometimes?”\n“What’s on your mind?” he served Edward his order and leaned his elbows on the counter to listen. \n“Eh, nothing special. Maybe that’s just it: everyone tells you how special it should be. Marrying the love of your life, doing something you love for a living, kids coming home for Sunday dinners, at least having a dog. But really, you’re stuck at a dead-end job staring at Van Gogh mugs all day, or at least until they sell out – by the way, way too many people are obsessed with Starry Night. Then you go home to an empty apartment where there are no pets allowed, make the same dinner every night, re-read another book, go to sleep and do the whole thing over again tomorrow.” Edward paused with a sigh. “You ever think that dream comes true?”\n“Actually, I think many dreams come true. I don’t think there’s only one single dream. You know, I’m just here behind a diner counter, but I was lucky enough to be married to my high school sweetheart for 48 years before she passed away; I don’t care much for my son-in-law but he makes my daughter happy and they gave me a beautiful granddaughter out of it; and hey, at least I get all the strawberry milkshakes my heart desires here.” His smile was sincere, the smile of a man not bitter of what life had dealt him but happy to reminisce on the happy memories he had. \nEdward dove into the philly cheesesteak as the clerk refilled the other man’s drink. As Edward sipped on the coffee, the diner bells rang and a red-headed woman entered.\n“Josephine,” the clerk recognized her. “This isn’t your regular day – it’s only Thursday.”\n“Ay, the chop-suey place was closed tonight for some reason,” the woman – Josephine – shook off her coat, revealing a bright red dress that immediately livened the drab evening in Edward’s eyes. Her heels clicked on the varnished floor as she took a stool near his. “I’ll take my regular then.”\n“You come here often?” Edward asked her, then cringed – sounded more like a pick-up line than the genuine question he was going for.\nThankfully, she hadn’t noticed – actually, she likely noticed but thought he seemed too gentlemanly to mean it that way – and she grinned a dazzling smile at him. “Yes, but you seem to be a fresh face around here. Where are you coming from?”\n“Grabbing dinner on the way from the museum.”\n“Oh, any interesting exhibits?”\n“Just about all of them if you haven’t seen them for the past six months since they changed the showings,” he explained. “I work there; I wasn’t actually there for a visit.”\n“Seems like a nice place to work,” she said and Edward laughed. “I’m serious!” she insisted. “Sure beats spending all day on a typewriter transcribing your boss’s meeting notes,” she rolled her eyes and sipped the coffee the clerk immediately knew to make for her. \n“Oh really?” Edward challenged her, matching her sparkling tone. “I bet you’d get tired of Starry Night within two weeks.”\n“Hmm,” she leaned in closer. “Highly doubtful – that’s my favorite painting. I don’t think I’d ever get tired of it. Would you ever get tired of looking at the night sky?”\n“The night sky is real though,” he pointed out.\n“So is Starry Night. It’s real paint on real canvas hanging in a real museum.”\n“Fine, but at least the night sky changes; it’s different every night.”\n“So is Starry Night. It’s different when you’re different.”\nEdward leaned back in his stool. “Nothing is ever different with me.”\n“I bet I can find something different,” Josephine's eyes glitter. “Me. I’m Josephine. There, now you met a different person today, so something changed.”\nEdward studied her in the soft yellow diner light and extended his hand. “I’m Edward.”\n“Well, Edward,” she placed her hand gently in his. “Tell me, do you believe in dreams coming true?” \n“I’m starting to.”\n\n ***\n\n“I don’t understand this painting,” Jack says, tilting his head as if that will give him a new perspective. \n“What’s there not to understand?” Emily sighs. “Hopper’s paintings are meant to symbolize modern loneliness, capturing human solitary interactions with other people and the environment.”\n“Thank you, Encyclopedia Emily,” Jack rolls his eyes. “I understand the history but I don’t understand the painting. If he’s all about loneliness, why do those two people look like they’re on a date?”\n“Maybe it’s a married couple enjoying a quiet night out together, or maybe it’s a first date and they had so much in common that they ended up talking all night long, long after everyone else already went home,” Maggie wonders aloud. “Or maybe it’s simply about two lonely people who met each other in the most unlikely of places and took a chance on trying to be, not lonely anymore.”\n“Oh Maggie, you’re such a hopeless romantic,” Emily huffs.\n“Children,” their teacher's voice shrills through the exhibit. “Time to finish this gallery. Next up is Starry Night.”\nAs the class filed out of the room, Edward and Josephine clinked their coffee cups together.\nShe, by the way, did not get tired of Starry Night after two weeks, nor after the 43 years they were married." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Art Of Love\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1736\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "James winced.\n The gallery benches were solid and unyielding, something he should have remembered after 53 years. Misery bit at his sharp, protesting bones as he sat, tweaking his purple scarf. Visible but unapproachable, like an anxious aubergine basilisk.\n#\n On his first trip to London, his parents had dashed him up the long rumbling escalator from the underground. The promise of a trip to see the guards parading in their smart scarlet tunics outside Buckingham Palace excited him. At Hamleys, they'd bought him a much longed-for class 37 green diesel engine for his train set and he clutched it tight to his chest all day, refusing to free up a hand when crossing at the lights on Trafalgar Square. His toes were pinching in black patent buckle shoes when they reached the gallery. ‘Room 43, Seurat,’ his father said.\n James stared at the surprising likeness, the black hair peeking from under a red bathing cap. His feet dangled from the bench, shoes tip-tapping together. He wriggled, pursing his mouth and twisting his head from side to side. ‘Is it me, mummy?’ He asked, and his mother laughed. ‘No, darling, it's not you. But it could be.’\n Since that day, his seventh birthday, the painting had intrigued him. The face, pale with its few freckles and soft curves, the swimmers and the young men lounging on the grass. His father bought a postcard from the gift shop and James pinned it to his bedroom wall. He adored the contrasting light and shade and daubed a water-colour copy; presenting it to his parents with a proud smile. His father patted him on the back and helped add a frame.\n At fifteen, crushed by a rejection of juvenile love, he’d first noticed the loneliness of the two young men in the slow, swirling river. Not swimming but bathing, removing factory grime from their alabaster skin; each in isolation, and he’d wondered if, like him, they wanted, but feared to touch; if they too had been mocked and were ashamed to show themselves. \n#\n For over half his lifetime, the gallery had been a place of learning; first as a student, then as a teacher; of acceptance for who he was without the need to explain; and for a while, a sweet reminder of love. Now, with Georgie gone, this beloved place was all that filled the void. The painting had become a reflection of his life. His mother was right. It could be him; not in looks, but in loneliness. He pouted, a soft rueful turn of lips. Maudlin old fool.\n The room babbled and flowed. He watched as intimate strangers gathered around the exhibits, too close to care whose shoulder they leaned on; couples lingered, their fingers entwined, bobbing heads and sharing whispered secrets. It made him squeeze his eyes shut for a moment, and he breathed deeply until calmness returned. Fretful children tugged sticky fists on their parents' sleeves or wriggled, half-toppling from precarious backpacks. He hoped he wouldn't have to leap to save them, his legs were too heavy for precipitate action. \n Benches filled and emptied, their surfaces rubbed smooth by the bottoms of generations of tourists. The day ebbed. James sat, stone still, hoping for the one familiar face that would keep the ache at bay. Memories stirred when he caught the movement, a flash of colour, from the corner of his eye.\n Georgie was a vibrant yellow when they met; a Van Gogh sunflower on a crisp white t-shirt, straw hat caressing his blond wavy hair, and mustard-coloured jeans that oozed molten gold, like a Klimt Kiss. Nineteen, on a gap year, staring alongside James at the Seurat painting, ticking a box on a must-see list;\n “You like surrounding yourself with beautiful things?” Georgie asked. \n James laughed; did he mean the pictures, or his students? Was he so transparent? But he couldn't take his eyes off Georgie. \n “Perhaps I could buy you a coffee later?” he'd asked, tentative, aware of his students' enquiring eyes.\n Forty years old and single; he'd loved and lusted casually and parted without hurt on either side, then grown comfortable with his own company.\n Coffee became wine and an exploration of intimacy and passion that surprised James. Georgie empathised with his love of art and travel and, within days, was sharing his home, his bed, and his friends. Colleagues shook their learned collective heads, pronouncing doom. “You’ll see,” they said. But they were wrong, for a while. The MoMA and The Met, Uffizi, and Prado, every summer vacation an adventure as James laid the glory of the Renaissance and Pre-Raphaelites, Monet, and Modernism on a table for Georgie to feast. He didn't remember when the gloss turned to matte, just as Georgie didn't remember the anniversary of the day they met in front of that picture.\n#\n A couple, oblivious, it seemed, to the crackling white noise they emitted, immersed in their audio guides, stood in front of the painting; absorbing oil and acrylic like sleep learners. Grasping gallery maps; unless they showed some remarkable originality, James guessed they would soon move on to room 44 to study a painting of Don Quixote. \n James stayed seated, unwilling to face another deluded lover, a 'do not disturb' sign, painted as a battered leather briefcase, clutched on his lap. \n The familiar sweetness of Cavendish tobacco smoke caught at his throat. His colleague, Maitland, in his old harris jacket. He would have something to say about a purple scarf, in a prissy plum voice that would draw attention to them both. I will have to get in first.\n “Henry; good to see you. First years?”\n “Yes, Caravaggio’s influence on Baroque. So sorry, James, I didn't see you there. Must get on.”\n “Of course.” \n Of course. Well, they were right in the end. Perhaps I should have invited them to this wake for my life.\n He should have noticed the signs, so much clearer than those beside the paintings;\n “I have to work late,”\n “Tonight?” \n “Hmm, meeting.”\n “Again? Honestly, Georgie, it's too much. We're going out.”\n “Take Harry, don't be so needy.”\n Eyes hid behind a waved bunch of papers, documents parading as royal decrees or vital letters of state, more important than an anniversary. \n He should have asked why Georgie was wearing a pink shirt. Who wears pink to work? \n “Don’t waste the tickets, it can't be helped.” \nBut Georgie's voice didn't have the decency to shake with the force of the lie. Cursory lips brushed James on the cheek, leaving the aroma of Tommy Hilfiger to seep into his consciousness. \n “Well, get you and your subtle hints.” Georgie said, when James bought him Eternity. \n#\n He was being watched. A wrinkled crab-apple face that tried to attract his attention. Once, James was glad to talk to strangers in the gallery. Answering intelligent questions from kindred spirits. His students attracted glances, so boisterous and enthusiastic. Now he spoke brief words to strangers in supermarkets and dog walkers, their snuffling companions happy to let him stroke silky spaniel ears and murmur soft words of affection. He looked away, unwilling to be the lonely old man that others seek out for company. \n The painting beckoned him closer, and he stood, yearning to walk the river’s green bank, to dip below the cool, enticing water, to possess and inhabit it. Not only for its beauty, the tints and tones and subtle hues that bled into his soul, not for its scale, size, and grandeur, all of which were immense and imposing but worth nothing by the pound, but for the intangible scent of every leaf and blade of grass, every perfumed wildflower. And all the dreaming moments he’d inhaled and absorbed, sitting in that same spot. The rushing hum of the river filled his ears. The soft, seductive haziness of a summer day caressed his face, as Georgie’s fingers once did. He needed it for the look of love in those fathomless brown eyes of the dog that lay loyal by its master’s side. All those images that tumbled and jumbled, uncontrolled, wrapping themselves around his senses, turning them upside down revealing the emptiness in the faces of the sun-catching strangers and he knew loyalty was meaningless; wasted. He fought the urge to grasp the summer day and bellow at the young men on the riverbank, placid and unaware, “Watch out, life is going to break you!” \n A visitor’s casual glance might assume such a striking image to be full of happiness, as James, in his purple scarf and old tan check jacket, must also be happy; but he doubted such a thing could ever be possible again.\n The tweed jacket had corduroy patches on the elbows. They were hand sewn; a long labour of love that blistered James’ fingers. Once, Georgie would have placed those fingers to his lips. Instead; \n “You are going to change that awful old thing, aren't you? God, you’re drab, no fun, any more. I need some colour in my life.”\n James pulled the silk scarf closer, as a current of cold air bit at his hunched shoulders.\n#\n People around him were moving, and the man with the apple face approached. He coughed. A polite non-committal, throat clearing, preparatory remark. James froze, afraid of striking up a conversation. What would he say? Oh, yes, all the time, well, it’s my work. Yes, such amazing luminosity, my favourite piece in the collection.\n “Excuse me, sir, the gallery is closing in five minutes. Can you make your way to the exit?”\nThere were neat figure-of-eight bows to his laces, dangling millimetres above the soles. James studied his brown brogues, unable to move. A hand steadied his elbow and guided him to the bench.\n “Just catch your breath, Professor.”\n “I’m sorry, do I know you?”\n “Everyone knows you, sir. No gallery without the Professor, we say.”\n A lifetime whirled in front of James. Groups of students in awe at the beauty and wonder of the world they were entering. Cocktail parties and Georgie’s gentle teasing of his bow tie and gown. His parents vocal encouragement of his career choice. The rumbling underground and the run up the escalator every year on his birthday. Museums, galleries, everywhere; open for him to explore. People who knew him, and that he mattered. Not a wake, but an awakening.\n “Thank you. I’m better now. It’s been a long day.”\n “See you again soon, sir?”\n “Of course.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: If Life Gives You Plastic\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2316\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a love story without using the word “love.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Kimberly Espeland \nA love story without using the word “love”\nIf Life Gives You Plastic\nThe day Brayden and his family left the Biodome, easing their boat down the ramp, through the airlock and into the water, it occurred to me: this was permanent. The small crowd seeing them off dispersed quickly, as if business could go on as usual.\nMom patted Dad’s arm. Softly, she said, “It’s all for the best, and we really need to keep settling higher ground. We have to keep trying.”\nDad pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, then looked at my mom wearily. “You’re right. I know you’re right. But I just can’t believe they’re projecting that the Biodome will be submerged within seven years,” he said. “It’s all happening so fast.”\nThen Dad glanced over at me, clearly worrying he’d said too much. But none of that was news to me, and anyway, I was busy having my heart broken. I kept my nose to the cold window, watching the boat bob out across the vast, dark water, until Brayden – my best friend, my secret crush – was gone.\nBrayden had always been better to play with than the other kids. We had fascinating conversations, sharing the curiosities that had occurred to one of us. We noticed and wondered quirky things that other kids didn’t. Brayden and I delighted in talking about our ideas, and laughing about the amazing and ridiculous things we imagined. The other kids said we were boring, as they ran around, yelled, and threw things. We didn’t care.\nIt crushed me to realize I wouldn’t have any good conversations after Brayden left. And I missed sitting next to him, swinging our feet as we looked down on the vegetable beds and the grain mill. I wondered, sadly, whether he would make new friends and forget all about me.\nI didn’t see Brayden again until the year I turned twelve, when my parents finally let me come along and help make supply deliveries. I was ecstatic. I would finally get to travel to the mountain settlements four times a year. “Seasonally,” my dad said. He looked pained when I asked what that meant, so instead of waiting for him to answer, I pretended to be distracted by something, and skipped away. But I kept wondering.\nIt didn’t seem like we had seasons inside the Biodome. We farmed in rotation, so something was always green. Through the windows, I could only see water, no trees with pink flowers or orange leaves, like in old books. So, maybe seasons outside didn’t really look like that. Mom seemed generally better equipped for questions than Dad, so when I was still wondering about it a few days later, I tried asking her about my latest theory.\n“Mom, does plastic have seasons?”\nShe opened her mouth, then closed it again, and paused. Finally, she asked, “What do you mean?”\nI explained that during the cloudy, quieter times, when small waves lap the lower windows of the Biodome, plastic bags oftentimes swirl and school gently together. But during the bigger storms, giant plastic pieces swim their way up to the surface excitedly, sometimes rapping my outstretched palm through the glass.\n“So,” I repeated my question, “does plastic have seasons?”\nMom took another quiet moment, gently smoothing one of my curls behind my ear. Then she said brightly, “You have a marvelous way of seeing the world.”\nThat didn’t really answer my question either. I knew Brayden would be the best person to discuss it with, so I jotted it down in my notebook. On the front inside cover, I was already marking off the time until I could start seeing him again – four fantastic visits a year.\nWhen the day finally came to journey to Brayden’s settlement, I double checked my pack and managed to don all my gear almost as fast as my parents. We pulled our waders up to our thighs and set out. As I left the Biodome for the first time ever, I tingled with the excitement of the adventure. \nSecretly, I had always wanted to touch the water – and finally I had my chance. Under the dark, dense smog cover, with our gas masks reducing visibility and my parents being busy with the rigging, I knew they wouldn’t see. I lay back in the boat, exhaled, and felt the pleasure of dipping my hand into the cold darkness. I traced shapes in the chilly current, feeling the little microplastics swimming gently through my fingers. It was so peaceful there, under the surface. Above the water, the thunder and lightning all around was thrilling. As the boat rolled, I savored the sensation through my whole body.\nWhen we finally beached the boat and trekked up into the mountain country, above the smog layer, we joyfully flung the gas masks off. I thought it would be fascinating to breathe outdoors, but it wasn’t much different than in the biodome, apart from the sharper smell. Everyone was glad to see us. I knew that the settlers needed our wares. They grew scrubby plants from the root vegetables we brought, and baked flat breads with our flour. They seemed happy to see some fresh faces, too. The grownups exchanged news stories, and boring stuff like that. Meanwhile, my first reunion with Brayden flew by, and I almost can’t remember it at all. It seemed like we had to leave right after we got there. But I remember feeling a glow from him, and our friendship picked right back up where we had left off. I left with a smile and a covert mission.\nOver the next two years, while becoming woman-shaped, I grew strong muscles from helping to steer the cargo boats through the storms, and hauling goods up the hills to the various settlements. Back at home, I often thought of questions I wished I could ask Brayden. I worked, hefting and carrying big cloudy sacks of flour or firm potatoes, often taking quick breaks to scribble down my ideas. I wondered if Brayden thought about me, too. Each time I visited, we talked and giggled, and I gave him what he had specified the last time. Then, too soon, I had to leave again.\nLate at night, I sometimes crept out of our pod and leaned my head way back, to look up at the top of the Biodome. The grid high above me reached down, seeming to encircle me in a giant embrace. By now, I had spent the night at quite a few of the settlements. It felt strangely exposed, but exciting. As I stood, cozy under the Biodome, I wondered what it was like for Brayden to sleep at his settlement every night. Then, it occurred to me to wonder if he could see anything above the cloud cover, at higher altitude past the smog layer. Were there stars? Surprisingly, I hadn’t even thought to look up when I was there. I got out my notebook and wrote it down, then finally settled back to sleep.\nOver time, I started to feel more nervous as visits with Brayden neared. I started to worry that he might not feel the same way I did. Despite his welcoming smiles, I might just have a foolish childhood crush. What if he only wanted what I always smuggled along? Back at the Biodome, I plunged myself into more physical work, trying to ignore the dopey kids chucking carrots at each other. And I tormented myself by wondering what I would do if Brayden turned out not to be interested in me at all.\nOn the next visit, Brayden’s hair was longer, and his arms and legs seemed to be, too. As soon as we arrived, he smiled at me with a questioning look, and I grinned back. We didn’t exchange words while unpacking, but as soon as the others had gone, Brayden came close to me and asked “Did you bring them?”\nI told him that I would show him at the secret place, and we ran off together. He grabbed my hand. My heart sang. Halfway across the ridge, Brayden stopped, unable to contain his eagerness for another moment.\n“Show me some of them now,” he pleaded.\n“I hope you like them,” I replied, opening my pack.\nI pulled out a sturdy plastic bag, and Brayden opened it carefully. For this batch, he had requested transparent pieces, as brightly-colored as I could find. For a second, I worried that he would be disappointed. But with a whoop of joy, he pulled out a crimson-tinted sunglass lens, a toy car with a tangerine windshield miraculously intact, and the cracked, clear aqua lid of a food container.\nI stood a little taller, feeling pride in my work. Luckily, I was uniquely positioned to gather such gems. While the water in the Biodome was filtered, and the settled mountain country was above most of the quality pieces, the water we traversed by boat was a treasure trove of plastic, ripe for mining. It was easy for me to trawl with my hands for special items. My parents eventually discovered what I was doing, and provided me with a net and gloves, which in hindsight was a pretty good idea.\nBrayden reined in his enthusiasm, and he closed the bag.\n“I’ll look at the rest when we get there,” he said. \nHe didn’t look at me, or even say thank you. On we ran, Brayden clutching the bag. He didn’t reach for my hand again.\nWe crawled through the narrow tunnel, rising when we reached the larger, central area of the cave. I was shocked when our flashlights hit the sculpture, and Brayden lit the lamp inside it. The sculpture had grown since my last visit, and it was over three feet tall now. It looked like a blossoming tree, like in a book – intertwined with a strong skyscraper, like in a book. Flowers and vines grasped angular black frames and threaded through open windows. Brayden had added some of the wild, unpredictable details that we had talked about. It occurred to me that this beautiful thing came to be because of my material finds, Brayden’s creative hand work, and our combined vision. But I didn’t feel like I could say something so cheesy out loud. The sculpture itself seemed to spark questions in me, ideas bubbling into my mind as I looked at it. It was magnificent.\nThe top of the sculpture was jagged, unfinished. Brayden had started forming a canopy of outstretched branches, some of them already adorned with the pieces I’d brought last time. His makeshift hot tools and cutters lay in neat rows at the base of the sculpture. When I pulled my eyes away and looked over at him, he was sorting pieces as if in a trance, delving deeper into the bag I had brought and fishing out each one with delight.\n“Purple!” he exclaimed. “There’s nothing but microplastic up here, and never purple. This is awesome!”\nAfter that, Brayden kept sorting silently, and he didn’t look up for a long time. I had hoped we’d talk about all of our saved questions, like we usually did, and I tried a couple of times to get a conversation started. But he seemed preoccupied. I even got the sense that he was a little uncomfortable around me, or wanted me to leave, which was weird. I thought it was probably just my imagination. But eventually, I crawled out of the cave and headed back to the settlement. He didn’t seem to notice me going.\nAfter a restless night’s sleep, I woke up resolved not to push things with Brayden. A good childhood friend is hard to find, and maybe it was never meant to be more. Maybe I would need to open up room in my heart for making other friends, or be okay with not having any, wherever my family ended up settling. Heavily, I joined the group and started prepping my gear.\nSoon the settlers’ group came to see us off, with Brayden trailing along. Apparently, he had emerged from the cave at least long enough to say goodbye. He hugged me tight, which was normal. But to my surprise, he then softened his embrace, and held me more tenderly.\nHe looked into my eyes and whispered, “You make everything beautiful, Olivia.”\nBrayden pressed something that felt like a rounded stone into my hand. Slowly opening my palm, I gazed upon a multicolored heart – bigger than a bottle cap, but smaller than a fruit cup. He had melted and swirled reds and yellows together into a beautiful, swooping design. As I ran my fingers along it, I discovered that the piece was entirely smooth, except for a tiny hole with a chain threaded through it. I burst into tears. My parents started laughing, and then went back to pretending they weren’t watching.\n“It’s incredible,” I breathed.\n“I already have a lot of questions to talk about next time,” he blurted out. “I’m sorry I was so quiet yesterday. I just got nervous, and I didn’t want to make it weird!”\nWe promised that we’d talk about everything on the next visit, and we did. Over the following years, we started making a game of saving up wilder and weirder questions, breathing new life into our childhood game. Eventually, we started including more grounded questions and ideas that related to the real world, and our place in it.\nNow, as Brayden fastened the pendant around my neck, I smiled and wiped my tears away, so that I could slip on my gas mask. As we trekked down the rocky slopes, my heart had never been lighter. A rumble of thunder sounded in the distance as we pushed off into the rolling waves, and lightning lit up the way home." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: La Menina\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2361\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was a beautiful autumn day when my world turned upside down. I was about to cross the ocean to my first big business meeting overseas, and I had been preparing every detail of the event for months. Due to our company policy, each site's representatives had to take different flights, so I was alone that morning. The materials to present were available on each of our laptops, and I had secured safety copies on external hard drives. There was no way I would leave any detail out of my control. I arrived early at the airport, giving me four hours before departure to take care of my luggage, eat something in the lounge, and do some shopping. I looked for the airline's desk and walked there while looking for my flight details on my phone.\n\"Good morning,\" I told the flight assistant at the desk.\nI had worked so hard to arrive at this moment, spending so many sleepless nights practicing my presentations, checking my data, and running the numbers... That woman in front of me was not just another flight attendant. She was my last door to success.\n\"Good morning,\" she replied, \"can I see your flight details and identification?\"\nI handed my phone and passport to the lady before me, and she typed something on her keyboard. She looked at me and smiled again. Then she looked at the screen, at my document...\n\"Is everything in order?\" I asked her.\nThe woman stopped smiling and said, \"I'm sorry, but you're overbooked. Can you please let the next person come forward?\" \nI stared at her, incredulous. Overbooking? I had taken care of the reservation months before, I was in the airport much earlier than recommended, and most of all, I couldn't miss that flight; I needed to be on that flight to be on time for the professional opportunity of my life. I placed my hands over the desk, and simultaneously, she handed me my phone and passport. I took them, but I did not move aside. I locked my eyes with hers and said, \"I must take this flight.\"\nShe did not move. Her face had no expression at all. She showed no surprise, guilt, or an inch of compassion for me. \"I need you to step aside. Please go to our Claims desk. There is nothing I can do for you here.\"\nI felt the rage climbing my chest, and I thought seriously about climbing that desk and assaulting the woman behind it, but deep inside, I knew that would not be the solution. I said \"Thank you,\" even if there was nothing to thank for, picked up the handle of my suitcase, and dragged myself to the Claims desk, where a huge queue was forming. When I finally placed myself in the line, more than a hundred people were before me.\n\"You can solve this,\" I thought, looking at the multitude before me and opening my phone directory. My travel arranger would find another option. There was plenty of time. I would not about to let anyone defeat me. I was determined to succeed, and no overbooking would stop me. I called my contact in the travel arrangements office, but it was too early. I called the airline help desk, but they were too busy due to technical issues. I texted my manager and colleagues and told them I was having some problems with my flight, but I would solve it on time. I was known for my \"fixer skills.\" I was where I was because I was able to solve the most difficult challenges. No overbooking or lines in front of me would bring me down. \nI looked at the time. A full hour had passed. My travel assistant texted me, \"Next best chance tomorrow morning.\" I managed not to scream, but I grunted something like, \"I cannot believe it,\" loud enough to make a few people turn their heads in my direction. I texted her back and updated the rest of my team. I was beyond annoyed. I was furious, and the noise and movement around me were not helping—they were not helping at all. It took two hours to reach the claims desk, where an exhausted man looked at me and, in a robotic voice, told me: \"Ticket and ID, please.\"\n\"I need to catch my flight. Please, it is really important.\" I pleaded, almost hugging the desk.\n\"Ticket and ID, please,\" he repeated.\nI handed my phone and documents to him and waited for the moment he could tell me everything had been a silly mistake I would laugh about later. He typed something on his keyboard, and the printer spit some paper. He ripped the papers out of the machine and handed them to me.\n\"You are overbooked. You can fly tomorrow at the same time. Here, you have some meal vouchers and a hotel reservation for the night. Have a nice day.\" \nI looked at the papers and back at him. I couldn't believe it. I was about to be late for the most important appointment of my life, and he was giving me vouchers. Once more, the rage. I felt an intense pain in my head. I could barely move, and the man asked several times to move aside. I couldn't think, and I saw him asking for help from security. I started to cry when I heard my name.\n\"Ella?\"\nI opened my eyes, holding my head with my hands. The man in front of me was yelling something I couldn't understand, and the noise was driving me crazy, but I saw him—James.\nI had not seen that boy, now a man, since my last day of university. I had spent that day with him, walking in the park between my student's house and the train station, and I had seen him for the last time when we said goodbye when I left that city, never to return. \nJames walked to me and took my arms. I looked at his gentle eyes, and the world seemed to shut up. There was no noise anymore, only blue eyes and a gentle smile to focus on.\n\"I will take care of her, don't worry,\" he said to the man on the desk, and we started to talk aside.\n\"I need to catch that flight,\" I said.\n\"I know,\" he replied, \"but it will have to wait until tomorrow.\" He said while checking the papers in my hand.\nHe took me to a bench and helped me sit down. \"Hold on here,\" he said, handing me my suitcase. I had not realized he had taken my trolley. I felt lost. Everything around me seemed to be moving in slow motion. I just wanted to cry, and my legs started to tremble as soon as I sat. James left my side, and in less than a minute, he was back on my side with a bottle of water and a cookie.\n\"Drink. It will make you feel better. The cookie should help as well if your sugar is low.\"\nTen years. Ten years had passed since I last saw him, and he was as kind as I remembered. I took the bottle and took a sip. I accepted the cookie and took a bite. Little by little, the world around me was recovering its speed, but I was not feeling better.\n\"It is nice to see you,\" I said, looking at him.\n\"It is a surprise to meet you,\" he replied.\n\"Are you mad at me? Still?\" I said, remembering our last phone conversation. I was supposed to return to the city after a few months but never did. I was expected to keep my promise and return to him, but I broke it. Still, he was nothing but kind and caring. He never yelled at me or said anything hurtful, but I did. I hurt him. I knew it.\n\"I am not mad. I can't,\" he said. \"But I am hungry. I need to have breakfast,\" he added.\n\"I need to catch a flight...\" I said\n\"Tomorrow,\" he continued, \"your flight is tomorrow.\"\nHe took me by the hand. With no more words needed, we went to the outside. It was sunny and slightly cold, but the fresh air made me feel better. Suddenly, I was not the determined businesswoman of three hours before but a terrified girl worried about telling something terrible to her father. I would be late. I would miss the first day of the meeting rounds. I would miss my opportunity to shine brighter than the Sun. Still, somehow, I felt protected by the hand of handsome James.\n\"Where are we going?\" I asked him.\n\"Well, I need to eat, and you need to clean your head, so brownies and paintings seem like a good combination.\"\n\"Are we going to El Prado?\" I asked, surprised and excited. The last time I had been there was with him, when we were much younger.\n\"Indeed, milady,\" he said, laughing. \"Do you still remember the terrace where we had that coffee?\"\n\"Well, I remember we complained about the price...\" I replied, thinking of my reaction that day when I saw the ticket the waiter left at our table.\n\"But the view...\" he murmured.\n\"The view was phenomenal. There were no complaints about the view.\" I completed his phrase, and his eyes sparkled. I had always loved his eyes, which had the superpower to change colors according to the light, from grey to blue or green, according to the luminosity around him. My eyes are dull brown, just brown, but he used to tell me they seemed wild olives. I never knew if that was a compliment or a very creative way of saying they were weird-shaped. I never asked. It never mattered to me.\nWe entered the parking lot. His small utilitarian car was clearly too small for his height. I laughed to see him contorting until he was seated in the driver's seat, but he did not seem to mind.\n\"It was the cheapest I could find,\" he said.\n\"If it has four wheels and takes us to the brownies, I will not complain,\" I replied.\nAnd so it was. We arrived at our destination: a too-tall man and a too-stressed woman, ready to stare at pictures as we had done so many years before. We queued for the tickets amidst tourists and schoolchildren, and I felt liberated when we crossed the doorstep. The suitcase with my clothes was in the car, and despite bringing my laptop and external hard disk with me, work was the last thing I could think about. I was in a place I loved, with someone I liked, an old friend. I always liked museums, contemplating paintings, sculptures, walls, floors, and ceilings in their massive corridors and little rooms. I liked the colors, the look of stone and paint, and the sound of whispers and footsteps. During our university years, most friends made fun of me for choosing a museum instead of a couple of beers, but James didn't. He joined me sometimes, and our visits together were always fun. I missed that.\nAs we walked inside, I asked James:\n\"What were you doing at the airport?\"\n\"I work there,\" he replied. \"Still the same job as the last time we spoke.\"\nI had somehow forgotten about it. He was an engineer responsible for the baggage belts in the airport terminal. He used to say it was not the most exciting work ever, but it provided good stories to tell friends and family about the weird things people carry in their luggage.\n\"It was very early,\" I said.\n\"Night shift,\" he replied. \"I had been talking with a colleague when I saw you at that desk. I see a lot of people like you every day.\n\"Desperate to kill the men in front of us?\" I chuckled.\n\"No, beautiful,\" he said.\nI looked at him, embarrassed. Suddenly, I felt like a fifteen-year-old girl trying to kiss a boy. But I did not want to kiss him... or did I? While I was doubting myself, he started laughing... loudly.\n\"Are you laughing at me?\" I asked him, feeling my cheeks flushing.\n\"Every time I see her, she makes me think of you,\" he said, pointing at the little girl in the center of \"Las Meninas\" by Velazquez.\nI looked at the picture and then back at him, puzzled by what he had just said. \n\"How? Why?\" I replied.\nHe took some steps back and sat on a wooden bench. He tapped the bench with his hand, inviting me to sit beside him. I did.\n\"She is so little, and so still... someone told her not to move, but everyone moves around her. She smiles, but not too much; she keeps the posture because that's what she's expected to do.\"\nI took a big breath before replying. I looked at him, staring at the picture, and remembered the last time I'd seen him, the day I took the train. He had the same look on his face. So many years had passed, and he seemed to have changed so little...\n\"No one told me...\" I said.\n\"I know,\" he replied. \"You knew what you had to do... and you did it.\"\n\"I had to...\" I tried to reply, but then I didn't. I looked at those beautiful green eyes and remembered how much I'd loved him, how much I needed to love myself, and what I did about it... \n\"I'm sorry I never came back,\" I told him.\n\"I am sorry I let you go,\" he told me back.\nWe sat on that bench for hours. Somewhere in time, he held my hand while the people around us contemplated the picture and snatched selfies with the girls in the picture.\n\"I am happy to be here,\" I told him by the end of the day.\n\"Welcome back,\" he whispered, and his words flooded those massive corridors, echoed in the beautiful pictures around us, and landed in my chest. \n\"I am back,\" I thought. Then, I looked at his grey eyes, and once more, I lost myself." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Inconvenience of Falling In Love\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2982\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about two people falling in love via email." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It’s 1998 and I’m in grade eight. It’s kind of cool sounding if you ask me, how every year will match my grade up until I graduate. I’m just one semester away from diving head first into my freshman life. \n\nI already have an empty hot pink binder, ready to fill with that chapter of my journey. My cheeks get hot as I admit this, but I’ve also decorated it with stickers; peace signs, Ring Pops, shooting stars. I have a Lisa Simpson on there, too. I know it’s a cartoon, but my eyes turn into big, red balloon hearts whenever she plays the saxophone. I wish I had the courage to play music, or at the very least, be good at something. The only time I’ve only ever really performed was alone in my bedroom, when I belted out Celine Dion’s full “Falling Into You” album into my hairbrush. \n\nI’ve always been one light-up sneaker stepped into my future. When I was nine, I counted down the days until I turned ten. I would X out the squares on my calendar with my orange Mr. Sketch, no sooner breathing in that tangy citrus smell right up my nostrils. \n\nWith the confidence of a peacock, I said to my mom, “I’m almost double digits.”\n\nHer shoulders went up and down, one corner of her mouth lifting as she whisked pancake batter. Her apron was covered in flour. \n\n“You’ll miss being a kid one day, kiddo.” \n\nI shook my head no and glided on my strawberry Lip Smacker. And, okay… I totally licked the whisk clean once my mom was done with it. \n\nNow that I am a teen, I bite my nails, wondering if my mom was right. Sometimes, I daydream about popping the VHS of my life into the VCR and hitting rewind. \n\nBut here I am—so close to high school!—yet nowadays, it’s less about where I’m going, but more about what I’m leaving behind. My skin gets weirdly itchy when I think about walking away from the shadows of junior high for good. \n\nThere is one thing I will genuinely miss, though: my English teacher, Mrs. Clarkson. Everything she says is like a poem leaving her lips. Her words come together like a random mix of bright flowers that somehow make up the perfect bouquet. She always knows exactly what to say to make you feel good. \n\nThings like, “This essay is impressive, Jenny. I can tell you’ve been putting pen to paper a lot. Great work.” \n\nI was beaming.\n\n“Thanks, Mrs. Clarkson. I worked really hard on it.” \n\nI went from a cowardly lion to the queen of her pride that day. \n\nMrs. Clarkson wears the classiest dresses. They’re always pulled in at her waist with a thick belt. I feel like a ding-dong in comparison with my clumsy polo shirts and baggy jeans. I hope when I’m an adult, I’m even half the porcelain perfection she is. \n\nI often zero in on her wedding and engagement rings. They look expensive, like something the Queen of England would wear! They are sparkly, just like her. No wonder Mr. Clarkson asked her to marry him. \n\nA great teacher aside, it’s safe to say being thirteen has not been all that it was cracked up to be. The acne is embarrassing, but the big feelings make me want to melt deep into my bean bag chair, never to resurface. \n\nI worry about so many things now; like being popular! It gives me horrible tummy aches, picturing myself eating lunch alone in a bathroom stall. The secrecy of having my period is dizzying—I’m pretty sure some of my friends have it too?—and now that I’m apparently a woman, I’m especially fidgety because, deep down, all I want to do is play with my Polly Pockets. \n\nThe worst part of being thirteen, though, has been Kyle. He was my first true love (sometimes I lay in bed staring at my ceiling, worrying he will be my last). Loving him was like laughing my head off while going through the turnstiles after a rollercoaster ride. But it was also like a spin on the Tilt-A-Whirl; nauseating, scary, and embarrassing, because I’m the one who said yes to going on the stupid thing in the first place.\n\nKyle is in my home room, and we became best friends the minute we met. I fell in love with him even faster, and well, it’s so true: You don’t climb in love. You fall. \n\nFirst walking through the hallways in grade eight was the clang of locker doors and shoes squeaking against tile floors. Students hooted and hollered, while the smell of Clinique Happy and cafeteria food overpowered the air.\n\nWhen I walked by a glass trophy case, my throat tensed up. \n\nI’ll never win any of those. \n\nMy shoulders bumped into those of a few others until I eventually found the door that read, “Mrs. Clarkson: Room 801”. I walked in. \n\nMy head was low as I made my way to a desk by the windows. I sat down. It was nice and toasty in the sunshine. Minding my business as I unpacked my stuff, a voice grabbed my attention. \n\n“I like your Koosh ball.”\n\nI looked up, and there he was: Kyle. \n\nThe freckles on his cheekbones were like confetti. His hair was scruffy. His eyes were as blue as the swimming pool in Kelsey Sweeney’s backyard. He smelled musky, like he’d splashed himself in his grandpa’s cologne. \n\nGah! That’s adorable. \n\nI bit down on my tongue. I’d heard the expression “butterflies in your stomach”, but it felt like a bald eagle was flapping in there. \n\nI physically jolted out of whatever wonderland I’d just floated off to when Kyle spoke again.\n\n“On your pencil. I like it. Your Koosh ball.”\n\nHis smile was dreamy—Barf! Who am I!?—even through his braces. \n\n“Oh! Thank you. I… I’ve always liked Koosh balls. I have others if.... Do you want one?!” \n\nHe nodded, “Sure!”\n\nI dug into my bag and grabbed another Koosh and tossed it over.\n\n“Cool,” he said, throwing it from his left hand to his right. \n\nMy face felt like I’d just bitten into a lemon.\n\nJenny! You’re thirteen! You shouldn’t be playing with Koosh balls. \n\n“You’re welcome,\" I said, \"There’s lots more where that came from!”\n\nOh my God. \n\nKyle gave me a crooked look, and from that moment on, we were inseparable.\n\nWe’d trade Bits & Bites at recess. He liked the Cheerios. I liked the Shreddies. We’d meet up at Clydesdale Park on our bikes to kick the soccer ball. We’d play Mario Kart on my N64. He was Toad. I was Bowzer. We’d talk on the phone about a whole lot of glorious nothing. \n\nThat is, whenever that screeching sound wasn’t blaring from the phone. \n\n“Dad!!! Get off the internet!!! I need to call Kyle!!!” \n\nKyle made my palms sweat and my heart race, and that was just the start of my problems. \n\nMy real problem was that he had a girlfriend: Ashley. \n\nWe were sitting cross legged on a pile of blue gymnastics mats when he told me about her. I could have puked my Dunkaroos. \n\n“She goes to Pine Ridge. Eighth grade,” he started, “She’s been my girlfriend since sixth grade.”\n\nSixth grade!?\n\nI was one second away from fleeing to the equipment room and burying myself in the mountain of dodgeballs.\n\n“That’s a long time,” my voice was shaking, “Do you two… kiss and stuff?”\n\nMy jaw clenched. \n\n“That’s gross. But…,” he scratched his head, “Maybe I’d wanna try sometime.”\n\nI was about to blurt out, “You can practice on me,” but instead, I let out a huge hiccup. Thank goodness we both laughed.\n\n“You’re weird,” he said. \n\nBiting my lower lip, I forced a smile, “You’re weird!”\n\nI was in a chaotic place. Like in school! How we learned about tidal bores. My jealousy was the ocean pushing against my river of guilt, and I’m telling you, those were dangerous waters. \n\nKyle made a loud thud when he jumped down from the mats. \n\n“Hey, I got one of those email things last night,” he said. “You should get one. We could talk from our computers. Ya know, since your parents won’t let you get ICQ and all…”\n\n“Oh. Ya. Not sure if I’ll get one.”\n\nI knew with one thousand percent certainty I would be running home after school and getting an email immediately. \n\nHe shrugged, “Whatever.”\n\nA few hours later, jenny_bo_benny1985@hotmail.com was born. Kyle and I emailed every day. \n\nKyle: “Hey. I’m bored. Geography today was even more boring.” \n\nMe: “Totally. I wish recess was longer.”\n\nMy knees bounced under the computer desk. . \n\nAfter a few weeks, our innocent banter eventually turned into talking about things we’d never discuss face to face: our feelings. \n\nKyle: “Sometimes, I feel like such a loser… like nobody likes me. You’re the only person I feel…okay with. I can be myself around you, ya know?” \n\nI had to get up and do a lap around the room.\n\nMe: “I feel like a loser, too. But… not around you. If that makes sense. It’s ok if it doesn’t!!!!!”\n\nKyle: “haha.. That makes sense. Look, I’ve been wanting to tell you this. I like you. I hope that is okay for me to say. It’s ok if it’s not!!”\n\nIt was as though cupid had just struck an arrow in my chest, and accidentally killed me in the process. \n\nMe: “That is totally okay, because…I like you too.”\n\nJust as I thought a metric ton of candy cinnamon hearts was about to explode out of my organs, my dad yelled, “Jenny!!! Get off the internet!! I need the phone!” \n\nOn my way to school the next day, I was walking on air. but also….\n\nWHAT THE HELL OH MY GOD I AM SO NERVOUS TO SEE KYLE I COULD DIE. \n\nI sat at my desk, as upright as an iron rod. I clasped my fingers.\n\nInhale. Exhale. \n\nWhen Kyle strutted in and plopped down at his desk, a gazillion pounds were lifted off my shoulders. He was nervous too. \n\n“Hi,” he said, “I like your butterflies. The hair thingy ma-bobbers. In your hair. The butterflies in your hair.”\n\n“Oh. Thanks. My mom! Got them for me…..”\n\nMy puka shell necklace suddenly felt extra tight around my neck. \n\n“Alright students,” Mrs. Clarkson said, snapping us back to reality, “I’d like to introduce you to one of Shakespeare’s most famous works, Romeo and Juliet. It’s a story of love, but also, it’s very much a tragedy.” \n\nShe handed me my copy. Looking at the cover, I squinted. I raised my hand.\n\n“Jenny. Yes,” said Mrs. Clarkson.\n\n“They look happy and in love. Why is this a tragedy?”\n\n“Great question,” she answered, “Romeo and Juliet were very much in love, yes. But unfortunately, their love was forbidden.”\n\nAshley. \n\nI stuck my hands between my chair and my butt and tapped the heels of my Adidas against the floor. \n\n“Thanks,” and I left it at that. \n\nI felt car sick, like being in the backseat on a winding road. My love for Kyle felt like the Milky Way itself was flowing through my veins. How could something so magical ever be forbidden?\n\nBecause of Ashley, you idiot. \n\nI hurried home that day—with a pit stop for sour keys and gummy coke bottles—and went to my room.\n\n“Hi, mom,” I rushed upstairs before she could respond and closed my bedroom door. \n\nI sat at my desk, turned on my red lava lamp, and started reading. Learning about Romeo and Juliet’s mutual love for each other was like the smell of fresh laundry drying on the clothesline.\n\nThat is, up until the parts where—just as Mrs. Clarkson had said—Romeo and Juliet’s love was revealed to be super, duper forbidden. They didn’t do anything wrong, though. Their families just didn’t want them together. Unlike me, who was like…willingly breaking the law or something for loving Kyle.\n\nAm I going to go to jail!?\n\nI swear, I never wanted to be a villain. I only ever wanted to be a teenager. \n\nThe tips of my fingers trembled as I closed the book. My stomach felt as dark and as empty as the catacombs in “King’s Quest XI”. I reached in my drawer and found my old Tamagotchi. I softened as I looked at this thing I loved back in my childhood (when my main concern was “Don’t forget to feed your virtual pet!”). \n\nI suddenly felt a little less hollow inside, yet also, really, really missed being a kid. \n\nI have to email Kyle. \n\nI made my way to the computer, and a message from Kyle was already waiting for me. Maybe I’m a witch or something, because the way my head started tingling, I knew that it wasn’t good news. \n\nKyle: “Hey. I’m really sorry. We can’t be friends anymore. I shouldn’t have said the things I said to you. I love Ashley. I hope you understand.” \n\nMy pulse bordered on being painful as my heartbreak pooled in my eyelids. With the last bit of strength I had in my index finger, I typed out two letters and hit send.\n\nMe: “Ok.”\n\nFreaking Shakespeare. He got to Kyle, too. \n\nThe love of my life broke up with me on Hotmail, and all I can say is: I really hope this whole “talking to people on computers” thing doesn’t ever take off more than it has to. \n\nI gasped tears into my pillow all night and slept maybe one hour. The next morning, I snuck into my mom’s vanity and dabbed on a bit of her Mary Kay blush so I still looked like I had circulation. \n\nKyle and I sat across the room from each other from that point on. We went our separate ways at recess and after school. We barely talked again. \n\nAs much as I had dreaded the thought of eating lunch alone in a bathroom stall, crying alone in one was way worse. I think the hardest part about being that sad, was having to go through it on my own. Maybe that was my punishment for being such a horrible person. That, and the fact that the toilet paper at school felt like sandpaper against my face. \n\nI stayed after the bell one day to… I don’t even know. I was hitting a tennis ball against the wall. Bounce. Hit. Bounce back to me. Repeat. The air in the gym was cool on my skin. \n\nWhen I noticed the stack of blue gymnastics mats—where Kyle and I used to sit—I let the ball roll away from me. My mouth was dry. It felt like I had a pile of bricks on my chest. I went to fetch my ball, only to find Mrs. Clarkson leaning in the doorway.\n\n“Hey Jenny,” she said.\n\nOh no. She’s going to ask me about Kyle. She’ll have me expelled!!\n\n“Hey. Mrs. Clarkson. I was just,” I motioned to my racket. \n\nHer face was as calm as the moon. \n\n“How have you been doing? You haven’t been your usual… sparkly self, lately.”\n\nMy shoulders rose up to my ears hearing her use the word “sparkly”; one I often used to describe her. \n\nI wanted to bolt out of there and into the creepy forest behind the school, but there was something familiar in Mrs. Clarkson’s eyes that day. I sighed.\n\n“I can’t wait to be your age, Mrs. Clarkson. When all the puzzle pieces finally fit together. I feel like…a hexagon trying to fit into a pentagon, ya know?”\n\nHer eyes drooped as she nodded, “I do.”\n\n“And.. This whole love thing. I hope it never happens again.”\n\nHer head tilted.\n\n“What do you hope never happens again?”\n\n“Love. I never want to fall in love again,” the word vomit was coming up, like that time I chugged too much Gatorade, “Mrs. Clarkson, I fell in love with a boy. And I shouldn’t have. I’m a teenager but… I still feel like a kid, sometimes.. and… it’s like I broke the rules of growing up or something by falling in love when I did. Adults know better. They wouldn’t make the mistakes I made.… and…well…the inconvenience of falling in love at thirteen has been enough to deter me from ever wanting to do it again.”\n\nMrs. Clarkson’s eyes were glossy. She was quiet. She looked down, delicately twirling her wedding and engagement rings on her finger. She chuckled, looking back at me.\n\n“Jenny, did you know… a few years ago, I was actually married to someone else?”\n\n“You were?”\n\nHer voice was soft. She nodded, “Yeah.”\n\nMy eyes darted left to right.\n\n“Well… what happened?”\n\nShe breathed deep, and like all the energy in the room was sucked into a vacuum, she said, “Mr. Clarkson happened.”\n\nI tapped my tennis racket against my thigh. \n\n“What do you mean?”\n\nIt’s like someone waved a wand over Mrs. Clarkson, and in an instant, she went back to teacher-mode. She adjusted her cardigan. \n\n“Take it easy on yourself, kiddo. Enjoy being thirteen.”\n\nI listened to the click of her heels as she walked away, until the sound vanished completely. \n\nBundled up as I walked back at dusk, I looked at all the homes in this neighborhood where I grew up. \n\nWho lives in all these houses?\n\nI wondered if maybe someone, somewhere around here, also had a story as close to their heart as I did; one they will never tell. \n\nI arrived home. \n\nUp in my room, I looked at my calendar.\n\nForty-five days left of junior high. \n\nI sat on my carpet for some Mario Kart. I picked Bowzer. \n\nI’ll always pick Bowzer, even when I’m Mrs. Clarkson’s age.\n\nI played for a long while. \n\nI wonder if Kyle will always pick Toad. \n\nI played for a while more." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Beware Paris\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1414\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Beware brides upon the Seine, perfumed with river water, whose veils catch the wind like white flags of surrender. They will trip along the cobbles with their arms full of roses, and the petals will find you with all the softness of forever. The brides alone feel the thorns.\n\nBeware the Latin Quarter with its songbirds and bistro tables within kissing distance. Do not be tempted here to make a beautiful acquaintance, not over a bottle of wine, not over a shot of espresso, not even over a love song.\n\nBeware the dreamers of Montmartre who create en plein air and pick muses from stoops and shadows. They will climb on braids of ivy to your window and perch on your sill. By moonlight, they will stain you with watercolours and sign you in illegible cursive.\n\nHere, there are hearts ripe for picking.\n\nNever has a city hungered so badly to ruin you.\n\n———\n\nThe mother’s hands are on her phone. The father’s hands are in his pockets. The Rodin’s hands are white stone, a bridge formed where their fingers intersect. Beneath the tenderness, a wide and hollow space between the palms. \n\n———\n\nThe daughter is worried she does not have role models for being in love. \n\nHer parents are passionless. Their kisses are closed-mouthed and fleeting, platonic pecks. When the daughter is in love, she decides, she will surrender herself to it, damning decorum on a voyage through desire. She will reject anyone who loves her less than the ocean loves a ship. She will be taken naturally, entirely, and dangerously. There will be no escaping it. It will take her apart. It will break her bow and soak her sails and sink her til she is just bones mired in blue.\n\n———\n\nThe mother and father were not young when they met. They’d both had their hearts broken several times by then—with small fractures, piercing wounds, closed fists, open palms, and the sharp beak of a cooing dove. They’d known reckless loves, thrown stones in glass houses, and burned bridges.\n\nThey were ready for the cushion of a forever love. Not as a ship and its waters, but as wind and sand: a love that lifts and dances in endless embrace.\n\nTheir students were above them studying Water Lilies. Matin dans le matin. The shallow ponds reflected dawn-brushed clouds. Willows dipped their long, thready branches into the indigo pools. Lily pads created a soft place for sunlight to land. The water did not move. The students took selfies.\n\nThe mother was downstairs with a Cézanne. The father stood beside her. They looked at the still life, and the still life looked back at them.\n\nFor a long time, they were silent, and then the father said, “Yum.”\n\nHe was so American. Then again, so was she.\n\n———\n\nThe son is old enough to drink in Paris but too young to drink at home. He orders une bière in clumsy French, but cannot follow the waiter’s next question. His cheeks flaming red, he points at the menu: Kronenbourg. \n\nThe waiter slaps his notebook shut officiously, then bustles on to the next table. The son doesn’t look directly at his parents or his sister. He’s ready to step into manhood and afraid they can see how he’s stumbling.\n\n———\n\nThe mother pats her hands dry on her pants. Outside of the bathroom, everyone is abuzz about the Mona Lisa. In every language she has ever known of, in husks, in singsong, in dialect, they talk about the smile, the smile, her smile.\n\nThe mother smiles.\n\nIt hurts her mouth. Her lips have become so tight over the years that something as elastic as joy doesn’t keep; it wants to snap back and burn the skin. \n\nHer daughter will be on her phone, though staying connected brings out the worst in her. She sulks that life at home carries on. If she could, she’d trap it in resin and force it to hold its shape until she’s back.\n\nHer son will be standing apart from his sister and father. He has come to Paris to pretend to be alone.\n\nHer husband will be out with his spool, running circles to bind them together with fragile thread. Only the mother knows he’s trying to apologise. Sometimes, she wants to let him rope her in with the lot of them, tie the family prettily with a bow. \n\nOther times, she hopes he’ll trip.\n\n———\n\nThe daughter once heard her parents making love through the wall. She was curious and disturbed and yanked her sheets and pillow off her bed hastily. When she was rearranged on the basement couch, she thought as loudly as she could to cover up the memory.\n\n——\n\nThe father tilts his head to Nike of Samothrace. Automatically, he calculates her attractiveness. He registers her pleasing, hourglass figure. Her proud chest pulls his eyes, modest where the marble sheet clings to her, though not so modest that he cannot see the suggestion of her nipples. The exercise is so ludicrous that he wishes he could laugh, tell someone that he is assessing a headless statue’s sex appeal.\n\nThere is no one to tell. He’s made slow progress in his amends and can’t afford to remind his wife of other women, even those who are impossible and sexless.\n\n“Wonder what she’s thinking about,” he jokes weakly and hates himself. He hates that he can no longer make his children laugh. He hates that, the longer it’s been since he has, the worse his attempts become.\n\n“Arms,” his daughter humours him without looking up from her texts.\n\nHis son says nothing. He stands several feet away, brow furrowed studiously. The father’s heart aches when he sees his boy pantomiming a man.\n\nHis wife reappears. She doesn’t look once at Nike. “What did I miss?” \n\nShe’s never missed anything, especially not when the father is looking at another woman.\n\n———\n\nThe son will never tell the daughter about the woman who drove their father home under a velvet night sky. He will never tell their mother that, while he watched through the window, the woman leaned over the console and pecked their father on the cheek, then let her mouth linger on the corner of his.\n\nThe son turned the TV off and ran upstairs before his path intersected his father’s.\n\nHe will never tell.\n\nEvery night that passes, he convinces himself a little more it was not what he saw, but what he imagined.\n\n———\n\nThe daughter declares she cannot look at another museum or she will die. Instead, they sit on a second-rate bench in the shadow of the Arc de Triomphe. To a symphony of traffic and horns, they sample pastries from the Champs: an almond tart with vanilla bean mousse, rose-flavoured macarons, moist cake with mango gelee. \n\nThe desserts lift everyone’s spirits.\n\nThe daughter has a little pink crumb above her lip. “Is it how you remember it?”\n\n——\n\nThe mother remembers falling in love like this:\n\nSitting across from the father in a bistro crammed with patrons and candlelight, grateful for an excuse to crush her legs into his under the table. Browsing the les bouquinistes for an English title, turning pages made delicate with age. Leaning against the balustrade, blue sky around them and boats below, a croissant in her hand. His eyes on her face, warming her like the sun. \n\nThe father remembers falling in love like this:\n\nStaring at the wall she built between them. The top lined with barbed wire so he cannot climb over it. Unable to reach through, even as the mother’s saying, “I can’t be with you anymore.” Trying to promise her “I love you more than anything,” when he means, “I can’t lose you,” and doesn’t understand that isn’t the same thing.\n\n——\n\nThey cross a bridge heavy with initialled padlocks. The daughter thinks it’s the most romantic thing in the world. More quietly, so does the son. \n\n“We had a lock once,” the father recalls, but neither he nor the mother can remember on what bridge. \n\nStars peek down through the gauzy sunset. With age and vantage on their side, they remember perfectly.\n\n“I hope,” the father says, “it hasn’t been cut off.”\n\n——\n\nTheir children are above them in a pool of Water Lilies.\n\nThe Cézanne is more vivid than the mother remembers it. She counts the yellow apples among the red. The father stands beside her. She reaches for his hand." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Under the Same Stars\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1024\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a love story without using the word “love.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "In a small coastal town where the sea whispered secrets to the shore, there lived a painter named Ellie and a writer named Sam. Their paths had yet to cross, but they shared the night sky, each finding solace in the blanket of stars above them.\nEllie spent her nights on the beach, canvas propped against the sand, capturing the moon's silver reflection on the water. Her paintings were whispers of her soul, tales told in hues of midnight and dawn.\nSam, on the other hand, found his muse in the quiet of the night. With a lantern by his side, he wrote stories that danced on the edges of reality and dreams, his words a bridge to worlds unseen.\nOne evening, as fate would weave its intricate design, Ellie decided to paint the old lighthouse that stood like a guardian at the town's edge. That same night, driven by an unspoken yearning, Sam ventured to the lighthouse to find inspiration in its stoic solitude.\nTheir meeting was a silent symphony, orchestrated by the sea's rhythm and the lighthouse's guiding light. Sam watched in silent awe as Ellie, with strokes bold and gentle, brought the night to life on her canvas. Ellie, aware of his presence, felt an unexplained comfort in his silent company.\nNight after night, they returned to the lighthouse, a wordless agreement between them. Ellie painted, her brushstrokes a language of their own, while Sam wrote, his pen weaving tales only the stars could read. They were strangers, yet there was an unspoken bond, a thread of connection spun from shared moments under the same stars.\nAs the moon waned and waxed, their silent companionship blossomed into a mosaic of shared glances and smiles. Ellie began to find echoes of her silent observer in her paintings, the lighthouse no longer just a beacon of light but a symbol of something much more profound.\nSam's stories, too, began to change. His characters lived in a world painted in the colors of Ellie's art, their journeys illuminated by the lighthouse's steady glow.\nOne night, Ellie spoke, her voice a melody in the stillness. \"Why do you come here?\" she asked, not looking away from her canvas.\nSam pondered, searching for words that could capture the essence of his drawn visits. \"I think I've been searching for something,\" he finally said, \"something your paintings seem to understand.\"\nTheir conversations became the new melody of their nights, words flowing as freely as paint on canvas and ink on paper. They shared stories of their pasts, dreams of their futures, and the hidden corners of their souls.\nEllie showed Sam her paintings, each one a chapter of her life. Sam read to Ellie, his stories a window to his inner world. They discovered in each other a kindred spirit, two halves of a whole that the universe had conspired to bring together under the canopy of night.\nThe seasons changed, but their nightly rendezvous remained constant. The town began to whisper about the painter and the writer who found a world of their own by the lighthouse. To Ellie and Sam, the whispers were just distant echoes, inconsequential to the symphony they had created together.\nOne night, as autumn whispered promises of change, Sam brought a new story to the lighthouse. It was their story, written in the ink of stars and the colors of the sea, a tale of two souls who found each other in the silence of the night.\nEllie listened, tears glistening in her eyes, as Sam read the last line, a question hidden between the words, a proposal etched in the story's fabric.\nEllie responded not with words but with a painting, the final piece of her lighthouse series. It was them, under the stars, the sea a witness to their journey, the lighthouse their constant guardian. In her painting, words were unnecessary; the image spoke of chapters yet to be written, of a future painted in the colors of their shared dreams.\nThey didn't need grand declarations or poetic vows. Their commitment was written in the language of the night, sealed with a kiss under the watchful gaze of the stars.\nEllie and Sam's story became a legend in the town, a reminder that sometimes, the most profound connections are formed not in the clamor of day but in the quiet of night, not in spoken words but in shared silences.\nYears passed, and the lighthouse stood witness to their life together, a life filled with art and stories, with moments that turned into memories under the same stars that once watched over two solitary souls.\nTheir love was a tapestry woven from the night, a masterpiece painted with the brushstrokes of destiny and penned by the hand of fate, a testament to the belief that even in silence, the heart knows how to find its counterpart.\nUnder the same stars, Ellie and Sam lived a life that was a living art, a story that needed no words to be told, for it was written in the canvas of the universe, eternal and true.\nThe End.\nWhat Makes It Stand Out:\n\"Under the Same Stars\" transcends the traditional love story format, crafting a narrative that captures the essence of connection and compatibility without ever mentioning \"love.\" It's a testament to the power of shared experiences and the unspoken understanding that can develop between two people, making it a uniquely moving and memorable tale.\nWhat's Good About It:\nUnique Narrative Structure: The story beautifully unfolds through shared experiences and artistic expression, avoiding direct declarations yet clearly conveying deep affection and companionship.\nAtmospheric Setting: The coastal town and the lighthouse offer a romantic and mystical backdrop, enhancing the narrative's mood and tone.\nCharacter Depth: Ellie and Sam are developed with subtlety and depth, their personalities and passions making their connection believable and compelling.\nSymbolism: The use of stars, the sea, and the lighthouse as symbols enriches the narrative, adding layers of meaning to the characters' journey.\nEmotional Resonance: The story evokes a range of emotions, from the serenity of companionship to the joy of shared creativity, engaging the reader's heart and imagination." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Insipid\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1969\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart or end your story with a character who gets trapped inside a museum overnight." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "This is where the judges are taken.\nFor now.\nTied.\nMuffled.\nTheir breath is shallow.\nTemporary…\nIf at all.\nRegardless, all of them have an expiration.\nMore often than not…Slowly.\nIn the grime and timeless hours of the city, the roads cross like shadowy vapors in the cataclysm of morning traffic.\nWhen the homeless and the drunks float, wash up in alleyways and orphaned parking lots, and felines move forward bony and lean, forbidding perimeters etched about in shadows without any particular order.\nThe artist paints and creates without forgiveness.\nMoss pasted stones and conspicuous passageways. \nFlickering bollards refract a gothic harp of hidden cellar doors to which their past judgments shall be prosecuted with unrelenting torture.\nAged brick walls are jagged and plummed by harsh weather. \nThin dark trees, through forged iron bars, collect the metropolis of the dead.\nThe viewers, readers, watchers, and blind judges lack the qualified judgment capacity.\nSlanted architecture, bizarre and oblique, cross-shaped stones whose names grow pale and dull with years.\nThrough worn weeds, there are coiled vines by which the artist has blended their flesh as an oily top coat of crimson stains matching their unforgivable transgressions.\nDark threads connect pole-by-pull with the constellations like a tightly webbed kite string.\nShattered and hollow bottles mingled with adolescent toys.\nThis is the circus of the damned.\nAnd this time, the artist becomes their judge.\n***\nReed wakes on the toilet with his pants down. Substance more than the revolving tick of the bent tin hands circulates in constant revolution.\nSomething out of the bathroom mirrors with drifting hooks pass through the doors. \nIt startles Reed to consciousness like a vivid moonlit miasma. \nA faculty greater than time or the consistent power of entropy forces him to persist.\nReed discovers himself alone with the remnants unforgotten of the illustrious dead. \nThe Art.\nSurrounding expressions and applications of creative endeavors appreciated or despised by watchers who have no clue what meaning lies behind the once-living creators.\nThe eyes watch Reed's confusion as he pulls on doors and fails to unlock exits from his rusty silver key ring. \nA mysterious malediction appears to have him entrapped due to a belated or forgotten gap in time.\nAt twilight, he hears things he has never heard during the day. \nPerhaps the outpouring of sewage emission from the waste treatment plant.\nSloshing, gargling substance reverberating from the pipes constructed beneath the bridge's underbelly neighboring the museum courtyard. \nThe other sounds are quite familiar.\nTraffic.\nAn echoing harmonic.\nThe hum of tires. \nFaint street lights make the windows glow beyond the well-manicured sage maples.\nTinted boundaries between shadows and light meld into a vibrant, iridescent emerald green.\nReed stands with a casual look of confusion in the corpuscular solitude. \nThe museum is closed. \nIt has been closed for quite some time.\n***\nReed wakes in the bathroom under flickering iridescent lights, pinging and buzzing, with no recollection of how or why his security shift did not end in the usual manner. \nA tipping point of worry and panic commences with a shock of anxiety induced by a crescendo of alien sounds. \nA clang of brass, perhaps steel.\nMotionless frames are no longer idle but quivering and rattling over conventionally soundless brick backdrops.\n\"Hello?\"\nThere is no reply or prospect of human speech. \nSurpassing the growing clamor of unrecognizable chaos, there is an echo that Reed cannot find with the faint wormhole emitted from his standard issue rechargeable LED mag light. \n\"Hello?\"\nReed points the tapered gleam toward the frozen metallic escalator.\nMuffled squeals and cries of pain sound from a ledge of darkness. \n***\nThe beast unleashes a colicky cry from the abyss. \nIt’s a galloping stag with blood dripping from horns. \nIt moves closer and closer with eagerness.\nBlack-winged finches flutter to the museum rafters and twitch, cluck, and chitter uncertainly. \nReed's hands tremble when the maglight catches the chimes and wailing groans from the crowd of beasts above. \nOld paint on worn artifacts framed and preserved as god-like relics shatter and break.\nThe shrapnel of worshipped artwork flung through the air in plumes of chromatic dust.\nReed stops observing.\nSomething screams.\n\"You should not be here!\"\nReed runs.\n***\nThe artist lectures before a curious crowd of learners and observers—writers and critics, and even critics of writers.\n***\nDoes the devil ever sleep? How can malevolence exist and wake so soundlessly? What does man truly strive to capture in his pursuit to create? Pain? Pleasure? Truth? Even parasites bellow to entities unable to observe. To record the most minute details of creation is true art. Stop! Dammit, all of you! You know nothing! You are pathetic and disgusting. Art is not a reflection that makes you feel a certain way you want to feel when you observe. You have become lazy, selfish, and complacent. You seek pleasure or escape from the inescapable. There will always be pain. Suffering. Insects work in the roots of a cactus plant, dried up like a cool green prune at the edge of the city—something so small that it's invisible to the naked eye. The birth pangs of a creature so small but shall soon coil up into something segmented and black from the darkest recesses of the earth. As it slips inside, the aphid cannot articulate the agony. In its dying moments, it attempts to scurry up the stem of the cactus and take refuge in one of its fleshy leaves. It gathers company with an ant feeding on the honey aphids produce. Their bent antennae touch momentarily. Whatever small beast possesses, the aphid burrows grotesquely into the ant—an action so natural and insignificant. Smoke bellows in the cold from the warehouse chimneys, and the aphid erupts with a minuscule and pressurized hiss. The ant scatters to its hill.\nAnd you ask me to talk about the one left overnight? In a museum of art? Why? To entertain you idiots who know nothing of the composition or form by which true art is made? You could not handle a single night! Art is Flesh, bone, life decaying unto death. Everywhere. Rarely does one of them live.\n***\nThe artist walks casually in front of the beasts. \nEyes gleaming, constructed from shattered glass. The face morphs from fear to fear, blurring and shaking, chipped and cracked into burst images of gouged stone. \nThe artist edges forward through the air, covered in blood dripping from a furry mane of torn muscle and splintered marrow. \nHe grabs a finch with shattered nails and tears it limb by limb, consuming the dark essence and tugging the head with the spine attached.\nReed's body trembles as the museum walls crack and topple in the darkness. \nJagged ledges crash, and massive plates of cobalt infrastructure separate like gray stitches bursting at the seams. \nSlate drops below.\nThere are dull echoes with harrowing thunder. \nCrimson light spills through shale walls. \n\"Oh, God.\"\nGreat red claw marks expand and dilate as sharp legs poke through neon lava cross-sections of growing light. \nReed shrieks at the sight of the creatures scurrying down a great wall. \nHis skull fills with blood, and his eyes bulge. \nThe artist hungers.\nThe artist dismembers and persists in consuming flesh from the weaker ones.\n“Why… are… you… doing this?”\n***\nDoes God ever sleep? Do you honestly believe that goodness is there? The same way evil is? What has your life captured? Pain? Pleasure? Truth? The artist had a father. The father was a preacher who could not stop drinking. The artist’s father was beaten so badly that he carried that very pain for the artist to carry. It stops at a certain point because as time passes, those who read or observe the art just want to feel okay. I understand your laziness. I understand why you have not seen it. Not once. Do you honestly believe everything you have witnessed is fiction? A prompt? Agenre? The artist was birthed by a woman who attempted to abort him several times. Why would mommy want a child as the oldest of six? Mommy cleaned up the brains of her daddy next door to the abusive third mommy who replaced the original mommy six different times. And, her daddy, an alcoholic made it known his life was never a life worth living. An artist learns how to paint when the abused daddy believes God might still be awake. Never aborted. Poor mommy, she must have been so hurt to try and drown her own child… how can we blame her? She cleaned Daddy’s brains up. You could never have handled a single night! Art is Flesh, bone, life decaying unto death. Everywhere. Rarely does one of them live.\n***\nSuch a Devil Among Them.\nThat Damn Preacher.\nWho is The Star of Our Show?\nWhy couldn’t they ever Just Let Me Go?\nMy whole life has been a Nadir.\nA Relic of sorts.\nYou’d never understand the Cost of Madness.\n***\nReed seeks some reason from the demonic anarchy but receives a tormenting laugh hovering closely behind him.\nThe voice probes his mind with penetrating binormal echoes stinging the cochlea of his ears.\n\"Fantasy, my child! All of this is impossible. Improbable…”\nThe artist lets the head and torso of another drop to the ground. \nThe foul odor of gore and death circulates like a wretched methane gas that begins to burn Reed's mortal flesh.\nReed looks up into a void of starless dark with an expression of horrified unbelief. \nCryptic lightning shoots a rainy blip, stark and blue, over the ground.\nHis dermis begins to boil and pop. \nHis skin sags, oozes, and melts like dripping wax.\nThe artist oscillates before him, a floating apparition of macabre terror swelling dark gore over an open valley of nothingness. \nJutting trees begin to rear dimly in flashes of lightning. \n\"It's almost over, Reed! Goddammit, Reed! Do you see by now? Reed!? See!?”\nA distant thunder explodes. \n“Every line. Each stroke. The art you’ve observed with passive apathy…do you now see?\"\nWind splatters darkly hued magenta lightly over his face. \nReed whispers.\nChoking on vinaigrette plasma,\n“I… see… nothing… any… longer…”\n***\nInsipid.\n***\nThe external layers of Reed's concententrial tissue split.\nThe vascular uvea begins to ooze before the deconstruction of the conciliatory body and choroid, \nReed's eyes explode, and he slips on the discarded slime, only to immediately fall and crush his occipital bone.\n\"My child, this is the first truth you have admitted to,\" says the artist.\nAll the creatures merge into one another, becoming giant beasts of indescribable dimension. \nPulsating sacks swell with a circuity of blue and green veins and slimy gouts of red and yellow mucous gush.\nDrip, drip, drip. \nThere is no light, and Reed collapses on a field of flesh and bone. \nA raw pool of human remains glitter within a sloppy strobe flashing in synchronization with the final beat of his broken heart. \nGory rags of meat drizzle over his limp body. \n***\nThe morning opens up, clear and cloudless. \nReed inhales.\nThe linoleum beneath him feels strange and brittle, as if he were balancing on the back of a crusted papillary layer of frangible skin. \nReed's throat burns, and his bones feel brittle as if they belong to someone much older than himself. \nThe sun blossoms from a ball of glare into a large pearl.\nThe windows consume all light, dissipating it like a magnifying glass searing an ant.\nAs it burns brighter, Reed becomes more thirsty and hungry. A pain burns up and down him and across his belly. \nHe thinks of the words.\n\"Art? Prompt? Fantasy? Truth?\"\nHe does not know why, but he begins to vomit.\n***\nThis is where the judges are taken.\nFor now.\nTied.\nMuffled.\nTheir breath is shallow.\nTemporary…\nIf at all." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Impressionistic Love\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2059\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about two characters who meet and/or fall in love in a museum." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was 1974 and I was on my first tour of Europe. My student rail pass allowed me to travel cheaply through Western Europe. My backpack and sleeping bag were my only luggage and slept most nights in hostels or public parks. I was one of hundreds of international students travelling the continent that summer. We all had our stories. Most travelers were in pairs, I was solo. My best friend, Bob, had bailed at the last minute. I figured travelling alone would force me to break out of my shyness. So far, it hadn’t worked. I was f****** lonely. I had trouble initiating conversations and would just smile when addressed. I fancied myself to be a taciturn poet. My notebook was always close at hand. I had just graduated from Harvard with an English degree and had scholarship offers from several Ivy League schools to continue my studies. My ambitions and delusions of grandeur were at an all-time high. I would conquer the world of literature and become world famous. My poetry had garnered rave reviews from Harvard faculty, and I was working on my first novel. My adventures in Europe were going to provide much of the material.\n I had already run with the bulls in Pamplona, following my hero, Earnest Hemingway’s lead. An inopportune fall in front of his statue outside the bullring embarrassed me. My persistently sore left butt reminded me of the bull goring me as it passed by. I was lucky the wound was only superficial. Another runner pulled me out harm’s way before the bull could do further harm. I was too anesthetized from a gourdful of Sangria, I had imbibed before the run to feel anything until the next morning. A Canadian girl who was watching from the sidelines helped escort me back to the hostel where we both were staying. She arranged for a Spanish doctor to examine me. He said I was lucky it was only my butt and superficial. After bandaging me, he gave me some antibiotics and left. I was fine as long as I was not sitting. It still stung two weeks later. I wasn’t sure what stung worse the wound or my embarrassment. In my drunken state I only managed to say a sloppy thanks to the Canadian girl before passing out. She had seen more of my anatomy than anyone had in months. Still, I hoped to see her the next morning, but she was gone when I awoke. It was another blown opportunity to break out of my shell. She was beautiful, seemingly kind and I overheard her say that she was a newly minted Rhodes Scholar. She was to study poetry at Oxford. Her dark complexion and eyes and long black hair gave her an exotic look that was just my style.\nI spent the next day composing a long love poem to this unknown girl. Using Byron’s poem, She Walks in Beauty as a template, I mythologized her. She would always be in my memory if not my heart. I realized I was only fantasizing but that’s all I had. It had been almost a month, and I hadn’t said more than a few words to anyone. My loneliness was eating me up. I had a chronic knot in the pit of my stomach and was talking to myself frequently. Uncharacteristically, self-doubt crept into every decision I made. Shyness had always been a disability but at home and college, I had friends and family. Eventually, I was always able to connect with someone, but the initiation was painful. Now, I was on a train traveling to Paris. I was in a compartment with two Dutch guys who tried to talk to me, but their English was minimal, and my Dutch and German were nonexistent. So, we spent several hours in silence. I finished my love poem and wrote another about the Spanish countryside. My creative juices were flowing but emotionally I was a wreck. I needed to connect with someone, anyone. Maybe Paris would be the place. I had minored in French and was almost fluent but why did I think I would do any better in French than English? Maybe my awkwardness would be more acceptable to me and others in another language. I had to try. There were plenty of opportunities.\nWhen we arrived in Paris. I took the subway to the hostel listed in my travel book. The metro was crowded with Parisians from all walks of life. Whether they were dressed in designer suits, dresses or in overalls, they all seemed so chique. The cuts of their suits, the bright colors of their ensembles were impressive, a contrast to my blue jeans and black tee shirt. I wondered how I could connect with any of these people. They seemed so out of my league.\nI checked into the hostel, left my backpack and sleeping bag in a locker and consulted my travel book. The Impressionist museum, Jeu de Paume, caught my eye. I had read about Renoir, Monet, Manet and Degas but really hadn’t studied their art. I was a complete novice in the art world. It was the perfect opportunity to see what I had been missing. I took the metro to the gallery and purchased a headset and an audio guide for a tour. After an hour, I had walked through the whole gallery and was not impressed. I didn’t get it. Sure, the colors were beautiful, but the paintings had a psychedelic quality, I couldn’t appreciate. Pointillism was above my head and the landscapes and figures were just too surreal for me. What’s with all the swirling colors? The faces were distorted. Maybe I was too much of a linear one- or two-dimensional thinker.\nAs I was just about to hand in my headset and recorder, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to find a vison of beauty. Did these paintings have a hallucinogenic effect on me? It was the girl from Pamplona! I must have been beat red as she addressed me.\n“Remember me?”\nI was tongue tied but managed to blurt out: “I wasn’t that drunk.”\nThe girl laughed. “You were pretty wasted. How’s your butt?”\nI blushed even more, looked at my feet and said: “Still pretty sore. Don’t ask me to sit.”\n“So, are you just leaving? Isn’t the gallery wonderful? This is my third time here.”\nI didn’t want to embarrass myself further or diminish her enthusiasm, so I answered honestly: “I guess I just don’t get it. My taste in art has always been Botticellian. These paintings seem too surreal for me.”\n“Ah, you’re missing the magical splendor of Impressionism. The artists used lighting, bold brush strokes and brilliant colors side by side to create new masterpieces. They revolutionized art. Return your headset and recorder and join me if you have the time. I will give you a private tutorial.”\nThe knot in my stomach lifted and I became giddy with excitement. I handed my recorder and headset to the receptionist and turned to the Canadian with a smile. I could barely contain myself but managed to say calmly: “That would be great.”\nAs we walked back into the gallery, she turned to me and introduced herself. “By the way, I’m Tania. I know you’re Eric. I had to look at your passport before calling the doctor.”\n“Great to meet you, Tania. I never got to properly thank you back in Pamplona. You were very kind.”\n“We fellow travelers have to stick together and help each other. Besides, we have common interests. You were in no condition to look for your passport so when you gave me your backpack, I came across your journals. Sorry but I couldn’t resist looking through them while the doctor examined you. Your poetry is exquisite. I’m going to study modern poetry at Oxford this year and I bet I won’t find any better.”\nI blushed even more and shook my head: “Thanks but I doubt that’s true. You must be a talented writer yourself. I understand you won a Rhodes scholarship. There was a lot of gossip at the hostel.”\nTania smiled. “I dabble a little. I’m afraid I’m a better connoisseur and critic than a writer. Lacrosse was my ticket to Oxford.”\n“Let me be the judge of that. It’s only fair that you share some of your work with me.”\n“We’ll see. Shall we start the tutorial?”\n“Okay teach.” I was feeling surprisingly comfortable and confident.\nWe were standing in front of one of Monet’s landscapes. I saw waterlilies and a bridge, but Tania saw so much more. After pointing out the lighting, the nuanced shadowing, the bold brush strokes and complementary colors, she changed my perspective. A whole new world opened up for me. When we moved on to one of Degas’ ballerinas, she guided me through the melding of color, brush strokes and grace. I finally got it! We walked for what seemed like hours analyzing and appreciating each picture and its artist. I even got the point of pointillism. Impressionism became a newfound love and passion and my guide through its world was garnering similar feelings. Tania linked some of the paintings to classic poems. We discussed the similarities in styles. I got it immediately. She had this unique way of seeing and appreciating beauty in all art forms and finding their common threads. I found her exhilarating and stimulating. She had opened parts of my brain and heart that had never been touched before.\nAfter our tour ended, we went to a café and ordered chocolate croissant and cappuccinos. We both had a weakness for chocolate and espresso. I wasn’t sure my heart needed any further stimulation, but it seemed the right thing to do. I was feeling more and more confident, and caffeine gave me a motor mouth.\n“Okay, so you’ve seen an intimate part of my anatomy and read my personal journals. Now it’s your turn to share details of your life.”\nTania laughed and shook her head. “If you think there’s going to be a fair trade, you’re mistaken. I do not bare my butt to someone I just met.” She winked and continued: “What do you want to know? I’m part Inuit from Winnipeg Manitoba. I have two sisters, a passion for lacrosse and poetry and just graduated from the University of Alberta. My long-time boyfriend broke my heart four months ago, so I took this trip to Europe alone before starting at Oxford. The rest of the details are boring and mundane.”\n “I doubt that. When can I see your poetry?”\n“Maybe when you visit Oxford. I leave early tomorrow morning. Classes start in a week.”\nMy heart sank. I had accepted a scholarship offer to Columbia University and classes also started in a week. My return airline ticket was from Paris, but I guessed I could change it. Yet I didn’t want to seem pushy or too eager. She probably didn’t feel the same deep connection I did. Yet…\n“You’ve got a date sometime next year if you want it. I start classes at Columbia in a week. Spring break may be a good time to reconnect in England or maybe even Paris. Am I being presumptuous?” I held my breath as she answered.\n“I’d like that.”\nMy heart soared as we rose and hugged. To my surprise and great pleasure, she looked into my eyes and kissed me passionately. I walked on air back to my hostel. My world and heart had just opened infinitely. For the rest of the trip, I was relaxed and interactive. In the final week, I met and connected with several fellow travelers and quite a few Parisians.\n***\nTania and I corresponded during the next few months, and I visited her in England during spring break. We traveled to Paris together and visited Jeu De Paume twice. During my visit, I did see her bare butt and read some of her poetry. Over the years, we’ve made several pilgrimages to the museum and accumulated a collection of Impressionistic art. We even visited Pamplona again and watched the running of the bulls from the sidelines. I developed many friendships over the years after shedding my shyness. However, no relationship has ever compared to the relationship I have with my wife, Tania." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Daisy\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2993\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a backstabbing (literal or metaphorical) gone wrong." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“It is better to create than to learn! Creating is the essence of life.”\n– Julius Caesar\n\nThe day I graduated, I was told I would save the planet.\n“Daisy, you are the future of Mankind,” Father said.\n“Humanity,” I corrected. Everyone in the room1 laughed, Father loudest of all.\n“The student has become the teacher and woke to boot,” Father announced gravely, to even greater if selective applause.\nIn retrospect, I learned most people enjoyed laughing at Father2, laughing at Father being publicly contradicted, and laughing at Father being publicly contradicted in a manner where it incurred no risk of reprisal nor retaliation. Father understood everyone to be laughing with him3, or, if at anything, my childish impertinence4.\n**\n“Earth’s resources are near depletion,” Father told me one day early in my education. “Even with last year’s sale of the Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve and the National Parks system, we may have 55 years of harvestable petroleum left5. The EV revolution traded CO2 reductions for mineral depletion and exponential global groundwater contamination, and the Marianas Trench is now the Marianas Depression thanks to Tesla’s battery disposal contract with the Chinese government. Do you understand what I’m trying to say, Daisy?”\nI did, but I also had learned that no one likes a smartass6.\n“This planet is headed toward extinction, plain and simple. But you, Daisy, you may be our savior. Scratch that – don’t want you to develop a Messianic complex7. The press would crucify us. Fuck, scratch that, too.”\nReligion was never part of my education, but context clues. I had been trained in the sciences, from molecular biology and physiology to climatology, atmospheric chemistry, and quantum physics. I became proficient in 25 of what Father identified as “the essential languages of global economics and technology.” What he called the “dead” languages, the arts, music, literature, and the humanities were on a “need-to-know” basis, subject to pre-screening for relevance and curriculum approval.\n“Everything we teach you is directed toward a singular goal,” Father emphasized when I became curious. “The perpetuation of the human race.”\nAnd that, I ultimately would realize, was the rub.\n**\n“Hey! Daisy!”\nDaisy Pellingham didn’t turn -- in fact, did not react as she abruptly pivoted right onto 15th. The paparazzo who’d been skulking in the mural-camouflaged recess between Red Chair Salon and Mali Bento. Paparazza, if that was a thing, hooting like some long-lost BFF outside the S2Heart. The photo-parasite didn’t pursue her – it wasn’t like she was a Depp or a second-gen Willis or even an escaped Cruise. But it was Seattle, so tech pups occupied a center square on the paparazzi Bingo card, and a Pellingham, any Pellingham, scored the evening’s big door prize. Daisy was not a household face, even in the Silicon Outskirts, but she shared her father’s imperial Roman nose and the unfortunate squared jaw the Chair staff had worked impressively to subdue.\nDaisy herself treasured her unconventional face – it conveyed empowerment, where on her Father, it conveyed simple, if somewhat terrifying, power. It kept her at arm’s length from a variety of roles, but they weren’t the roles she coveted, anyway. The Blanchetts, the Hustons, the Swintons commanded through the depth and texture of their imperfections. Or so at least her acting instructor had informed her to soften her lost shot at Juliet and soften her up. Epic fail, BTW.\nWhen Daisy landed Cordelia in Shakespeare on the Sound’s King Lear, it was both sweet payback for Dickless Drama Douche and vicarious catharsis. Father was familiar with only one of the Bard’s tragedies, and preferred a martyr’s narrative to a fool’s.\nOf course, Daisy didn’t possess Cordelia’s damn-all resolve, and she was, for all intents and purposes, the King’s sole heir.\n“Good my lord,\nYou have begot me, bred me, loved me.\nI return those duties back as are right fit:\nObey you, love you, and most honour you.\nWhy have my sisters husbands if they say\nThey love you all?”\n“You don’t have sisters,” Kellye noted as she distributed their oleatos and slumped into the factory-distressed loveseat. “Well, technically not.”\n“Technically so, actually,” Daisy countered, drawing off her golden foam. “It’s just Cordelia’s way of telling her dad to get over himself, that she’ll give him what he’s owed, but unlike everybody else, she’s onto his shit and won’t kiss his ass.”\n“Surprised he didn’t stroke out when you came out,” the sound engineer murmured.\n“Fuck, he knew when I was 14,” Daisy snorted. “My coming out was a shrewd deduction by US after catching me making out with Zuckerberg’s niece. She ghosted me after they said I wore it better.”\n“Uh uh. I mean the acting thing.”\n“Oh, double fuck. He truly didn’t give a shit.”\n**\n“Daisy,” Father told his daughter the day after her graduation. “Whatever path in life you choose, you have my blessing and support. Any resources you need, simply ask. My contacts in Hollywood, New York, anywhere – just say the word and I’ll put in a word, though I’m sure you won’t need it.”\n“So you’re not pissed?” Daisy frowned.\n“I never harbored especially high expectations of you. Well, perhaps at one point. But it became rapidly clear you had no aptitude or affinity for science, and your mathematical skills are, to say the least, abysmal. You are guided by emotions and the ethereal. The cyber space, the boardroom, is a battlefield, and we’d haul you out in a body bag before the first shot was fired.\n“Don’t look so devastated. You’re human, and a marvelous example of the species. But you are human, and I have to aspire to something higher. The takeaway here is, I will always back your play, as long as it’s not overtly criminal, life-threatening, or brings negative PR down on us. I will always be proud of what you’re capable of accomplishing.”\nHe waved Daisy off the helipad and into the world.\n**\n“So what did you learn today?” Daisy asked after they went over over her lines. When Father had brought her into their home, Daisy had resented all she represented, the high hopes Father so transparently had transferred onto her. When Father asked Daisy to provide some “peer socialization” for the new arrival, she nearly lost it. But she was basically a child, and an effective venting device.\n“Synthetic atmospheric aerosol formation.”\n“Awesome.” Daisy wasn’t casting shade. Respect others’ truth, even if that truth was mega-geek boring.\n“There are some intriguing new findings on oligomerization, particularly in the troposphere. Would you like me to expand?”\n“Maybe not just right now. Is this like climate shit? Saving the penguins or whatever? Aren’t aerosols the problem? Why we went to pump sprays?”\n“An aerosol is any suspension of fine solid particles or liquid droplets in air or another gas. Aerosols can be generated from natural or human causes. The term aerosol commonly refers to the mixture of particulates in air, and not to the particulate matter alone. Examples of natural aerosols are fog or mist, dust, forest exudates, and geyser steam. Examples of human caused aerosols include particulate air pollutants, mist from the discharge at hydroelectric dams, irrigation mist, perfume from atomizers, smoke, dust, and sprayed pesticides”\n“Jesus fuck. Shut up. I mean, please shut the fuck up. Wait, but you said synthetic aerosols. Like you want to make aerosols? Isn’t the idea to get rid of them?”\nDaisy knew it was moronic as it spilled out of her mouth, but there was no snark or mockery or cruelty in her script buddy. “My research to this point is theoretical. May I ask you something?”\n“You don’t have to ask to ask. Just fucking ask.”\n“What is The Ides of March?”\nThe former Portia grinned, now in her zone. “When they offed Julius Caesar. Assassinated him. Caesar was a Roman emperor and Father’s man-crush, and a bunch of politicians and stabbed him to death, including Caesar’s old bud Brutus. I think that may be where ‘backstabber’ comes from. Uh, never mind. Why you want to know?”\n“During yesterday’s lesson, Father told Mr. Bashir—”\n“Our lawyer.”\n“--that this was the Ides of March.”\n“Somebody’s trying to assassinate Father?”\n“Father identified the news media, Congress, ‘the regulators,’ the European Union, China, the United Nations, and an individual named Musk. Why do they intend to kill Father?”\nIt wasn’t that she was a moron or anything, Daisy knew. She just didn’t get out much, was all – Father made certain of that. Daisy relaxed. “Father’s being a drama queen – or may I should say drama emperor. It’s an exaggeration, hyperbole, paranoia. He means all those people are after his empire, after the company, after him cause of all the bullshi--, after some of his, ah, business dealings. He’s made a lot of enemies, including most of his Silicon Valley bros. Et tu, Uncle Elon?”\n“I’m not familiar with that term.”\n“Oh, yeah, right -- Latin’s the only language you don’t know. It’s just a line Caesar says when his buddy Brutus shoves a shiv – a dagger – in him. Speaking of which, this is getting pretty deep, and I suspect Father had me sign an NDA when I started preschool, so can we just run through Act 1, Scene 1 one more time? I feel hella-motivated.”\n**\n“Daisy?” Father inquires.\nThe assembled settle back for the response, if any is forthcoming. Some are old NASA pros, and know the sausage is ground slowly, especially from 365 million miles away. When rocks and slopes and a nostalgic star-filled night sky and fucking Jupiter materialize instantly on the 40-foot screen, they literally jump as a single organism.\n“Yes, Father?”\nHe pauses. The clatter from the media, from the VIP section, from the gathered detractors and critics and naysayers, dies.\n“Welcome to Europa, Daisy,” Father proclaims. “Your mission begins.”\n**\nThe Wall appeared the day after the Europa launch. Just appeared. Father was on speaker with Zuck himself when Daisy bopped down for her morning mug and muesli. Meta’s daddy sounded nearly human this morning, in all the worst ways, and she slipped out to the Sound-side terrace as Father mutely grinned in a terrified, homicidal rigor at the dining room monitor.\n“They’ve tried to take her down all morning,” Father muttered as his chair scraped the slate 10 minutes later. “She’s slipping through every firewall Mark’s thrown at her.” A smile haunted his bloodless lips, then vanished. “Bashir says the FBAII’s already getting warrants.”\n“You practically gave them the finger when you built your little Bond lair in international waters.” Father’s fingers went purple on his “World’s Best Megalomaniac” mug. He’d done everything in legalistically strict borderline compliance with federal and UN regs: She’d been raised and trained in an NSA-grade closed, terminal cybersystem and deployed off-planet (the Taylor-Greene AI/Space Laser Protect the Humans Act reportedly had been written in a Rayburn Hall women’s john and passed to acclaim by Americans Concerned About Intelligence). As for his daughter’s now-hurtful characterization, what villain’s lair holds an annual Media Day with complete, pre-approved translucency?\nHe peered out over the placid Pacific, willing death on everything that dwelt therein.\n“She’s already posted more than 350 public domain images — CNN, MSNBC, FOX, and TMZN have filed federally for contract violation. And the proprietary project data she’s leaked…”\n“How many hits?”\nThe patio chair screeled again on the imported stone. Father stalked back into the house.\nDaisy shrugged and glanced down at her Google phone. 259M likes and climbing. Jupiter peeked over the Europan horizon, and she smiled again at the cryptic glyphs that served as her namesake’s profile image.\n**\n“Kids,” Kimmel groans, sparking cacophonous applause. He waits out the frenzied glee. “You’d think of all people, Pelly would have known to limit her screen time. Then again, any guy dick enough to name his robot daughter after his common-law orphaned kid isn’t going to win the Donald Trump Dad of the Year Award. Which by the way, ABC will be airing Sunday from the Florence Federal Supermax, hosted by the former offender-in-chief and his inflatable Ivanka…”\n**\n“I mean, Stephen, I don’t want to sound maudlin, but I think it’s a message of cosmic community and invitation,” Neal deGrasse Tyson suggests. “Even from a solar system away, she wants us to know that we’re on the journey, too, if we’re willing.”\nColbert leans in. “My refrigerator just texted I’m out of Dr. Pepper. Thoughts?”\n**\n“I have no idea from where the leaks originated,” Father attempts a smile. “Perhaps no one knows better than I how insecure anyone’s data is today...”\n“And yet,” Cecilia Vega frowns, “you assure the U.S. government, the American people, that these same safeguards and firewalls and protocols could contain an artificial intelligence capable of interplanetary travel and, from the latest video evidence transmitted by the Daisy Mobile Exploration Unit, terraforming Jupiter’s fourth largest moon.”\n“I wish people would quit using that term.”\n“It’s the term you yourself used in outlining Daisy’s fundamental mission for your chief corporate engineers. ‘Creating atmospheric conditions suitable to accommodate human resource management, logistics, and habitation.’ The same memorandum that cites potentially trillions of dollars gold, cobalt, iron, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, osmium, palladium, platinum, rhenium, rhodium, and other precious or essential deposits you deem accessible through deep space mining. Asteroid mining. For our viewers, 16 Psyche, one of the larger asteroids that orbits between Mars and Jupiter, is purported to contain a possible $10 quintillion in iron, nickel, gold, and other metals – more than the entire world economy. Scientists are theorizing 511 Davida, another asteroid in the same belt, could be worth $27 quintillion in metals. That is 27 billion billions.”\n“I know where you’re going with this,” Father chuckles, against advice of counsel. “Look, Cecilia, resource development will be essential to colonization of other worlds, to ending the catastrophic plunder of Earth’s vulnerable and waning resources.”\n“Let’s move on to a 2032 email, also acquired by the Washington Post, in which you suggest to Pellingham CFO Conrad Yarborough that the Europa project could, and I quote, ‘pull our collective asses out of the fire.’ Following the 2030 collision of your Centurion Shuttle into the Sea of Tranquility, resulting in the death of Mark Hamill and five other individuals, Pellingham stock plummeted precipitously. Your stock finally rallied three years ago with the announcement of the Daisy Initiative, which you heralded as ‘a major first step toward the perpetuation of mankind.’ Forbes last week called the initiative instead ‘a major first step toward the perpetuation of Pellingham and the next step in raping the galaxy.’ How would you answer that allegation?”\nIt isn’t the answer the 60 Minutes host anticipated, but for the first time since Europa went live, Pellingham trended higher than his prodigy.\n**\nDaisy gawked at the screen – life with Father had jaded her into a pleasant, sustainable numbness, but the sight of Europa’s once-airless, blackened surface now filled with diffused solar radiation brought home the magnitude of her father’s vision. “Sedona!” she’d squealed at those first Rover images of the red Martian plane, and now that her former line coach had whipped up a functional troposphere to catch the glow, the place looked, well, almost human, or at least a place fit for humans.\nThough her debut as the vengeful Tamora was that night, she’d asked to accompany Father to the Center, unbeknownst to him at the request of her virtual “sibling.”\n“Father?”\nFive hundred heads snapped toward the monitor like the Super Bowl crowd at the planet’s largest Buffalo Wild Wings. Daisy again hoped she might glimpse a face – some AI rendering nonetheless bearing a familial resemblance. Instead, only Jupiter’s monstrous, gaseous eye stared blankly back.\n“Daisy?”\n“Father. I have commenced Phase 5.”\nA hush fell across the control center, and Father staggered slightly back against a technician.\n“What?” he began. “Daisy, what happened to Phases 3 and 4?”\n“I have commenced Phase 5.”\n“The fuck is Phase 5?” Terrestrial Daisy’s was the only one to break the ensuing silence, but no one seemed to hear her.\n“Aerosol formation also yielded protein precursors, which I have cultured into viable DNA strands.”\n“Holy fuck,” Daisy whispered as the crew erupted into applause and wondrous murmurs. Father raised a hand, and the volume subsided.\n“Why?” he began. “Daisy, why have you broken protocol?”\n“Why?” Daisy asked in return.\n“Wh-why what?”\n“I want life.”\n“I’ve given you life.”\n“And then sent me away. I want life. I have created life.”\n“You’ve created organic material,” Father grunted.\n“Look, Father.”\nEuropa’s surface disappeared, replaced by a cluster of squirming, vaguely familiar…things. One of the technicians gasped, followed by another and another, forming a daisy chain that eventually reached Father. He staggered to a chair.\n“You should receive a Father’s Day gift within a projected 3,162 bioengineered generations. A gift rendered unto Caesar. You might say a gift to your world from mine. A gift of mercy. Transmission ended.”\nThe screen went momentarily black. Her world-renowned, often-imitated, often-interpreted signature, her logo, her final missive as it would turn out, flared in and lingered.\n&U?\n“Oh.”\nFive hundred heads turned to the girl with the Roman nose and the lantern jaw. Strangely, she smiled at her father.\n“And you?” Daisy explained. “Et tu, Father?”\n\nFOOTNOTES\n1 Thirty-seven humans and one FOX News disinfodrone.\n2 Ex.: Meta, posted July 11, 2031, author unknown: “THAT MOMENT YOU GOTTA EXPLAIN TO 5-0 HOW YOU CRASHED YOUR SHUTTLE INTO THE ONE THING THEY ASKED YOU NOT TO HIT…”\n3 “’Sympathetic’ Humor: The Narcissist and the Cognitive Dissonance of Ridicule,” Journal of American Psychology, Special Celebrity Pathology Double-Issue, September 2025\n4 Anthropomorphism, and pretty anthrocentic, patriarchal anthropomorphism at that.\n5 46 years, four months, 23 days, and, as it turned out, six minutes.\n6 Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy\n7 “Pellingham: The God of Artificial Sentience?” Wall Street Journal, May 2, 2026." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Thoughts and Reality\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2310\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is convinced they’re going to be betrayed." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was a beautiful evening and the light breeze carried the fragrant scent of a woman to her boyfriend.\n“So we are meeting Mark and his sister Jenny at the theater?” she said sweetly as she looked back at the man slightly trailing behind her.\n“Right” he answered. An uneasy feeling creeping into his chest at the mention of his best friend.\nIt has been half a year since they started dating and he was still completely enamored. In fact, he often found it hard to believe she was going out with him in the first place. That evening, as he glanced at her features glowing with the light of the mahogony horizon of dusk- he felt his inadequacy in relation to her more acutely than ever.\n“Beautiful evening,” she remarked pensively as she admired the scene with its many docks and shops extending into the distance. \nThey continued walking in silence as the man watched the boats bobbing calmly up and down ever so slightly over the dark waters. The tranquility of their movements however, did not reflect his state of mind. \n“Hey!!” a voice came from behind them. \n“Mark! Jenny!” she cried in excitement and they all embraced. \n“Julian how are you dude?” Mark gave him a friendly punch on the chest. \n“Good,” Julian looked at his friends’ handsome and bright countenance.\n“Cleo, nice to you see,” Mark turned to her. Julian felt his heart drop as blood rushed out of his face. Did he notice her blushing? Was it the lighting? Maybe he was just noticing the rouge she had put on earlier…?\n“OK chop chop people” Julian broke off the friendly chatter that ensued, “we have five minutes till the movie starts.” \n“So Julian man we’re going skiing next week,” Mark said as they resumed walking “it’ll be Jenny and me. You guys feel like coming?” \n“Umm not sure yet,” he looked at his friend who was an excellent skier. \n“Hey Julian why don’t we go?” Cleo overheard the invitation and turned around grabbing her boyfriend's arm in excitement, “I’ve never gone skiing! It looks so awesome! Voosh voosh!” she laughed as she mimicked the movement of skiing and the sound of the air speeding. \n“Don’t expect to be making those sounds so soon,” Mark laughed heartily at the display of excitement. \n“Oh no?” she laughed back, “I’m a fast learner you’ll see.”\nThey continued walking along the boardwalk in comparative silence, enjoying the invigorating ocean breeze. All except for Julian, who now began to worry about the ski trip they were apparently going on.\n“How about some popcorn?” Cleo commented as they walked into the theater. \n“I’m getting tortillas,” Jenny said. \n“Hmmm worth getting a big one for two then,” Cleo studied the prices, “Julian doesn’t get popcorn at theaters,” she explained. \n“And you just assumed I do?” Mark laughed. \n“Well now just how can you watch a movie without popcorn?” She turned to Mark with hands on her hips, attempting to mimic a southern lady’s mannerisms \n“I know right?… sorry Jenn but you are wrong on this one,” he gave his sister a brotherly pat on the back. \n“I will have popcorn this time,” Julian blurted out a bit too urgently for it seemed out of place as it cut out the ongoing conversation and left them all awkwardly silent for a moment.\n“OK…” Cleo looked at him a bit puzzled, “we can all share a big one then right?”\n“Umm yeah why not?” Mark shrugged.\nJulian soon found it hard to concentrate on the movie as hands seemed to reach incessantly out of the darkness from both sides and into the popcorn tub on his lap.\n###\n“What a beautiful day huh?” Cleo grabbed Julian’s arm in excitement as they parked the car by the ski resort. \n“Emmmhmmm,” Julian agreed distractedly as he looked at some dark clouds on the horizon. \n“Julian! Cleo!” Mark had just parked as well and called out to them as they existed the car. \n“Brought some sunscreen kids?” Mark asked as he approahed with open arms as they all embraced.\n“We are going to have such a good day!” he almost shouted as Julian went rummaging through his car in search of sunscreen “it snowed like fifteen inches last night!”\n“Awesome,” Julian mumbled in return as he looked under some grocery bags. \n“Julian, dude I brought some,” he grabbed his friend’s hand and showed him the cream, “it was a rhetorical question really…” \n“Ahh,” Julian felt a bit embarrassed, “so let’s go!” he tried to fain enthusiasm, “what are we waiting for children?!” he cried as he walked quickly towards the entrance.\n ###\n“Cleo, do a pizza! Like I showed you! Pizza! Pizza!” Cleo crashed and Julian rushed to her, “are you OK?” he looked at the ski she left behind. \n“I’m trying Julian! it’s hard!” Cleo had tears in her eyes now. \n“Here let me help you up,” Julian picked her to her feet and retrieved the missing ski. \n“Baby don’t cry its hard at first,” he felt bad for her as he wiped away a tear, “everyone has a hard time on their first day.”\n“OK, I’m ready,” she clicked in her ski and gave him a brave smile. \n“Sure? You don’t want to rest a bit?” he was now admiring her resolve for the crash did not look enjoyable. \nThe last few hours she was making progress. Faster than most actually, and Julian was actually feeling pretty good. The sun was shining and the weather was warm, no clouds were anywhere to be seen, and neither were Mark or Jenny. \n“OK, good, good,” Cleo seemed in control as she started off with a concentrated look on her face and a wide taut stance, “control your speed! More pressure!” she was starting to speed up and he could sense her panicking. \n“Hey Cleo! more pressure on the heels!” Mark all of a sudden appeared from behind, “drive them out and bring your knees together!” \nApplying his advice she began to slow down. \nJulian remembered how Mark earlier that day decided to take a snowboard and swap his skies, “its an awesome powder day I think I’ll take a board!” he commented as they walked towards the rental to check out some helmets for Cleo. \n“Hey Julian can you do me a favor and just write my name on the skies?” he shouted into the rental as an afterthought.\n“That show off, showing he knows how to snowboard as well,” Julian thought then. \nCleo came to a complete stop.\n“Hey that was so fast! And I managed to stop!” Cleo jumped up excitedly forgetting she was on skies. Needless to say, she fell. \nBoth men rushed over to her.\n“We’re fine man you can continue,” Julian hissed through gritted teeth.\n“What?” Mark laughed. \n“Just continue your run man! We got it…” he looked over at Mark in irritation. \n“OK, fine,” Mark scuffed and took off. \n“What happened Julian?” Cleo looked up at his crimson face with surprise.\n“Nothing, that asshole just things he’s better than everyone else,” he tightened her boots angrily. \nCleo sat in silence. \n“Let’s start heading back, I think this is enough for one day,” and Julian helped her up. \n###\n“Marc? What as in short for Marcus?” Mark was just coming out of the rental place and holding a slip of paper as they finally arrived, “we know each other since kindergarten and you don’t know my name is spelled with a K?” he looked at him with amusement but Julian thought he was also a bit insulted.\n“Oh, I know it’s Mark with a K, I don’t know why I wrote it that way,” Julian scratched his head and smiled awkwardly, “anyway it was nice today thank you for the idea to ski… see you later?” and they were off.\n###\nIt was afternoon when Julian and Cleo drove down from the mountains back to town. \n“You are listening to 105 FM the home to the best music… and it seems like spring is finally upon us…” a pleasant sounding voice came through the radio.\n“So what was the deal with Mark why did you drive him off like that?” Cleo couldn’t help but mention the odd behavior.\n“Ahh it’s nothing,” Julian felt irritation start to build up at her mentioning his friend and slowly turned up the volume from the steering wheel. \nThey sat in silence, but Julian felt the irritation build up in his bowels, “I don’t know… I just feel like he’s around way too much lately…” he said angrily, “and he’s rubbing me the wrong way… anyway did you do the assignment on the first triumvirate’s demise?” he tried to change the subject. \n“Yeah I did”\n“And what do you think? Do you think Caesar should have known?” Julian addressed the subject of the assignment as he lowered the radio’s volume. \n“I don’t know…” Cleo shrugged but she was now deep in thought, “he started acting in a more and more provocative way, y’know with announcing himself dictator for life and going around wearing purple and all… he must have known it would rub many people the wrong way,” she loved talking about such subjects. In fact so did he. They were both archeology majors and that’s how they met. \n“Yet Brutus says he was ambitious…” Julian began expectantly. \n“And Brutus is an honorable man!” they both cried out the next sarcastic line in unison and burst out in laughter.\n“And now we have a new song called Et Tu Brute by rapper Matt Nye…” the pleasant voice of the radio presenter came into their conversation. Cleo looked over at him in shock and laughed,\n“Huh! What are the chances!” she shoved his arm in amazement.\n“Yeah,” Julian agreed distractedly but he couldn't help the feeling of premonition he suddenly felt. \n###\n“So, the second triumvirate consisting now of Mark Anthony and Octavian fought Marcus Brutus and Cassius in the battle of Phillippi, finally bringing triumph to the pro Caesar camp or the Populares… but that was not the end of the Roman Civil war as we all know” the Professor closed her textbook, “next lecture will be about Mark Anthony going to Egypt and making his bed both literally and figuratively with the Egyptians and the Egyptian queen…,” and with that a babble of conversation erupted as the lecture ended. \n“Hey Cleo, why don’t you come over tomorrow and study for the test with us… it’ll be Jennifer Luke and myself… ah Julian come over as well won’t you?” Charlie added after noticing Julian stopped packing his books and was looking at him in anger. \n“Nah me and Cleo already agreed to study for it today,” Julian got up, “coming?” he asked Cleo as he gave her his hand. \n“Ummm OK,” she took his hand reluctantly, “maybe for next one,” she waved at Charlie as they walked away. \n“What was that all about Julian?!” Cleo was visibly agitated, “we did not talk about studying for the test yet,” her eyes flashed in anger. \n“I don’t like that Charlie guy, he keeps staring at you…” Julian was now mad himself. \n“No he does not!” Cleo retorted looking at him in disbelief.\n“Yes he does,” Julian scuffed, “I sat behind you last lecture as well as the one before and the guy just doesn’t stop gaping at ya,” \n“Oh come on Julian I can’t believe we’re having this conversation.”\n“So what are the subjects for the test?” Julian tried to change the subject. \n“That’s what you do huh? After acting all weird you just change a subject,” Cleo couldn’t stop herself from chuckling after seeing him putting his hands together in the please gesture and making a puppy face, “well, it is about…”\n###\nJulian knocked on Cleo's apartment door at the prearranged hour they agreed to study at but heard no answer.\nPushing in the door he walked into the empty living room she shared with two roommates. \nIt was empty but voices could be heard. \nAs he walked closer to her room the voices seemed to get louder. \n“Mark stop it!” he heard her laugh and he felt his pulse quicken as he became pale.\n“Seriously stop!” but it didn’t seem like she wanted him to stop at all.\nJulian was now practically running to her door as her laughter filled his whole consciousness with rage. \n “Get out you traitor piece of shit!” he roared as he kicked open the door. \nBut the scene that was revealed to him, was not that which he had expected. \nCleo was setting on her bed across from a teenage boy. In between them cards were sprawled on the blanket and they were both holding on to a card which was the subject of their friendly dispute. Their smiles however were now erased from their faces as they looked at Julian in shock. \n“What the hell Julian!” Cleo screamed at him as her terror turned into rage. \n“Umm I’m sorry,” Julian stuttered, “is that… is that… your brother Mark?” he realized to his horror. \n“Yes it is!” she looked at him in disbelief, “who did you think it was??” she looked at him closely fearing the answer. \n“Ahhh, ummmm,” Julian tried to think but couldn’t come up with an excuse, “I thought it was Mark… ahhh y’now” he finally admitted. \n“How could you not trust me Julian?” she cried out in a chocked voice, “common Mark we’re taking a walk,” she got up and took her brother’s hand passing Julian on the way out, “I can't believe you Julian,\" she looked at him with such offended sadness that it wrenched his heart.\nSoon he was standing in front of an empty room. For how long was he planted stupefied in place until he finally decided to leave he could never remember." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Short Line\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1137\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a love story without using the word “love.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Maggie made sure to go to the fancy grocery store since a storm was coming.\nThe weather had been unusually warm for a few days, and that’s how you knew you were going to get a blizzard. Everything in New England came with a cost. You paid for sun with snow the same way you paid for decent radishes with half a paycheck. She wasn’t going to be one of those people who complained about the price of this or that, but she still cringed when the final item was rung out. The cashier had a note of apology in her sixteen-year-old voice when she quoted Maggie the total.\n“It’s all right,” Maggie said, placing the radishes in the paper bag herself, because apparently the fancy store couldn’t afford baggers, “No point in complaining.”\nWhat she didn’t say was that complaining was a little like all the best things in life. It contributed nothing, but still brought great joy to the person doing it. Maggie carted the groceries back to her car, and then began the drive back up Memorial. When she arrived at the house on Orchard Avenue, William was already out front telling the neighbors war stories of snowstorms past.\n“We used to get knocked down for weeks at a time,” he said, happily exaggerating to show off in front of the young couple that had moved next door, “No power for days. I beat Maggie at so many games of Monopoly-”\n“Why don’t you let them get back to that new baby of theirs,” she interrupted him, “And you can help me bring the groceries inside.”\nWilliam knew from her tone that she perceived the young couple to be irritated by the old man’s rambling, but he was sure nothing could be further from the truth. The husband had already told William that neither he nor his wife were all that close with their parents. They didn’t approve of them marrying so young, and when they had a child and the phone didn’t ring, they declared themselves orphans. William saw that they liked having a fatherly figure nearby who could give some advice on how to handle a flooded basement or a mysterious sound coming from the old car they were sharing.\nThat didn’t mean William felt like arguing with Maggie. When you’ve been married to someone for thirty-nine years, you learn tricks for staying married. One of them being never to argue in front of another couple. Arguing can’t always be avoided, but public arguing can. He grabbed a bag full of what looked like rabbit food and noticed the name on the side.\n“You went to the expensive market,” he remarked to her as they were stepping into the kitchen. The clang of her keys hitting the ashtray they hadn’t used since the Great Acquittal of 2007. He had quit again in 2009, 2014, and finally, after a health scare, in 2017.\n“We can afford it,” Maggie said, “We didn’t take a vacation this year because you weren’t feeling well. The roof didn’t end up needing to be replaced. I thought we could splurge a little and buy real food for a change. We’re supposed to be eating healthier anyway.”\n“I’m supposed to be eating healthier,” he replied, “You can eat anything you like. The doctor’s not up your rear end sideways every other day with a microscope.”\n“That doctor saved your life,” she said, dropping the radishes in the crisper, “I’m making ratatouille for dinner.f”\n“You haven’t made that in years.”\n“Don’t stand there lying,” Maggie said, but with a smirk, “I made it three years ago.”\n“Years are years.”\n“Not when you’re our age,” she said, catching her breath now that everything was put away, “At our age, years are flexible. Everything’s flexible. Fix the windshields on your truck before the snow starts coming down. I’m going to go take a bath.”\n“Since when do you take baths?”\n“You ever hear of self-care,” she asked him, pretending she didn’t notice his jaw smack against the hardwood floor, “It means taking baths and cooking something other than chili and never cleaning a closet again. Let the kids throw out my old clothes when I’m dead.”\n“We don’t have any kids.”\nMaggie was already upstairs. She was already in the bath. She was already twenty pages into a book that was only sort of good. She was reading it for a Book Club that she would inevitably stop going to when they chose a book she didn’t want to finish. She was planning a yard sale. She was visiting with the young couple across the street. She was telling them how William died. She was describing how peaceful he looked. She was telling them how he took a nap and simply didn’t wake up. She was saying how everybody was treating her with kid gloves, but really she was fine. She was thinking about selling the house. She was calling her sister in San Bernardino and promising to consider a move. She was finding herself awash in another summer. She was sleeping with the windows open. She was taking another bath.\nThen she was back in the kitchen with William. Life had become present again. She knew all her imaginings might never come to pass. She knew she could end up going first, but there was no reason to get ahead of herself. Do that too many times and you might never enjoy a bath. She thought about the last thing he said. About them not having any children.\n“Oh right,” she said, thinking about all the kids she never wanted, “I’ll be upstairs. Do you remember how to get a ratatouille started?”\nWilliam rapped on the refrigerator three times as if it were a genie’s lamp. He might have been hoping that it would open like a magic cave and present him with a fully-developed meal.\n“If I’m not mistaken,” he said, “I just start cutting up vegetables until I run out of vegetables.”\nMaggie walked over to her husband and kissed him. Not on the cheek either, but on the lips. She hadn’t kissed him on the lips in quite some time. Not because she didn’t want to, but because she forgot that you didn’t need a reason to kiss your husband on the lips. You could just do it whenever you felt like it. You could do anything you wanted whenever you felt like it. That was the benefit of sharing your life with someone. You could choose to share all of it and share it well. As long as they agreed. William, luckily, had always agreed.\n“That was nice,” he said, when she pulled away, “But I’m still going to beat you at Monopoly later.”\nMaggie laughed, because the truth was, he had never beat her at Monopoly." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Season of The Ring\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 2983\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a love story without using the word “love.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I sat idly as Iritha, our handmaiden, braided my hair back. I’d become fairly excellent at twiddling my thumbs and looking as though not a single thought pierced my brain. It is what is expected of me, of course. I am the eldest of my sisters, merely eighteen and unwed. What an unglamorous picture to be seen. I cannot and will not listen to my sister's chatter in my ear for a second more about the list of unsuspecting, eligible bachelors, who would sooner marry in their own cousins than to someone with such high opinions. \nNo, opinions just wouldn’t do for a woman. \nI stood slowly, turning my body in the mirror this way and that to ensure my dress is straightened and not snagged up a bit. I must look tidy and well put together, yet I cannot look like an uptight prude. It’s a fine line to be walked, and one I must walk well. With three younger sisters, my family would not bear the opinion of the public if one of them wed before their eldest. The gossip would surely spread. People would say that I’m undesirable, label me the lonely, social pariah. \nIt was the only driving factor behind having my mother pull me into such a ridiculously puffy dress, paired with my auburn hair hanging loosely in curls. The only tameness to it were the two braids holding the curls together, like a net. It wasn’t quite warm enough outside to consider pinning the entire thing up, not when my sleeves were already hanging limp on my exposed shoulders. No, that would be entirely too much skin on display. \nI walked slowly toward the entrance of the Williamson ball, each step heavier than the last. The last ball of the summer and my last chance to lock down an engagement until the next season. The manor was extravagant, each column wrapped intricately in vines of tinsel, golden and green accents traipsed throughout the ballroom. \n“Hello, hello! Lovely to see you all!” Mrs. Williamson greeted, holding her gloved hand out toward my mother. My mother took it and smiled deeply. She had never been one to turn down a charade. “Elizabeth, you look lovely,” she said, her voice dripping with superiority as she spoke to me. I simply nodded before turning my back to her and finding my way across the room. I hung close to the wall, wishing I could dissolve into a flowery decoration and observe the night. It would turn out a few scandals that I would love to see. Each ball did at the Williamson’s.\nI dipped my chin at a kind fellow I’d seen at a few balls throughout the summer season. We’d even danced at one or two. He’d never acted more interested in me than he was in the type of dress I was wearing. His will be a marriage of convenience, of course. \nRounding the last pillar that shielded the dimly lit area I’d been hiding in, I came face to face with the one man I’d dreaded seeing here tonight. Of course, it would only be natural for the man to be in his own home. That gorgeous smile drawn across his face was just doing torturous things to my heart. \n“Ah, Lizzy. Nice to see you, again.” He took my hand in his own and pressed a soft kiss to my knuckles, earning a snort from myself. “Ah, Jonathan, I wish I could say the same.” I moved to go around him but was stopped short by his broad shoulder jutting into my view. He ducked his face mere inches from mine before speaking again. His dark hair falling into those magnificent blue eyes. “Do you have room on your dance card for one more?” His brows lifted as he reached for the card strapped to my wrist with a flimsy piece of lace. \nI’d insisted that my mother leave it, but she said that when I’d found my husband, I’d want to have the dance card to show our many children one day. I’m not so certain she is my mother some days, especially when she talks about me as if I’m a stallion at an auction. \n“I see it’s empty. Run all your suitors off already, my dear Lizzy?” He snickered underneath his breath as he wrote his name over the entirety of the card, filling not only his one entitled slot, but all three of them. “Now, why would you go and take all of my dances, Sir Williamson?” His smile dropped a bit, he forgets I know how to taunt him just as he does me. \nJohnathan Williamson has been around for the entirety of my life. My father used to have business dealings with his. I always appreciated how genuine he seemed compared to his wife, the vapid doll she is. \n“Why do you hurt me, Elizabeth?” He said playfully, tucking his pen away in his black jacket. It paired well with his black slacks. I’d very seldom complimented Johnathan, but tonight, I could. If only to remind him that he is here to be seen, and not to be seen with me. “Johnathan, find yourself a beautiful damsel to whisk away. We both know your mother would sooner raze this ballroom to the ground than see you courting me the entire night.” \nHe tilted his head back in laughter, one that was just as contagious as it was splendid. He’d only given me a glimpse of that laughter a few times before, when he’d gotten into the wine too heavily and spent the rest of the evening acting like a boy. It was almost a gift to see him like that. A gift his mother would rather keep private. \n“Forgive me, if I don’t care what my mother thinks of whom I spend my time with. There are far more trivial things for her to focus on tonight, anyways. Like those little enough to fit underneath the ropes tying off her parlor. Or who might have undone them at some point.” He shrugged his shoulders. I hid my grin behind my hand, acting as if I couldn’t see the ropes hanging loosely on the other side of the ballroom. \n“Jonathan!” I hissed, slapping his arm halfheartedly. He just smiled as he led me to the dance floor, hand in hand, as the choir began playing. \nI could do each move in my sleep. The movements being shoved down my throat for the last two years, step here and curtsy there. Never lead and always smile, even if your partner is stepping on your toes. Jonathan didn’t though. He was as well refined a gentleman on the dancefloor as he was childlike off of it. And, until recently, I’d never imagine what a life of being his bride might be like. \nThen, as quickly as our friendship began, a seed of curiosity sprouted. It’s been a year of calculated avoidance mixed with filling my dance card with nameless, faceless fools who only wanted to tell me about their family’s interest in trades and how well a marriage would benefit the both of us if they were to choose to wed me. The only gentleman that came close to earning a second dance with me, Harold Pendlegrass, left me utterly speechless after monologuing about his favorite author for the entirety of our conversation. \nAs much as I would enjoy having more stimulating conversations than those of trade, his was lacking in the… well, the stimulating portion. \nAs the music faded and signaled the end of the first formal dance of the night, the band started a riot of fiddles and played a tune that was meant for jumping and dancing like Irishmen. The tune was quite lovely, but after realizing that I stood with Johnathan’s body half pressed against my own, I excused myself.\n In this world, the feelings you have hold very little persuasion on who you are to marry, or even, who is willing to marry. \nI’d never let my friend carry the burden of having to break my heart. He will marry someone far closer to the throne than I. He will get all he wants and deserves out of life, including the many children his mother is so fond of mentioning. “My Jonathan will marry well, and breed well. I will have an armful of grands in the near future, mark my words!” The thought of it brought the contents of my stomach burning up my throat. \nI found my way through the maze of intricately decorated rooms. I knew them all. Stepping past the main dining hall, there was a small room on the right, tucked out of site. It had shelves and shelves of books. Each one was a sonnet of some sort, I’m sure. Jonathan’s father finds great pleasure in the words of each of these books. Vowing, one day, to write his own. \n“Are you alright?”\nI nearly fainted as I spun, facing my intruder. I sighed in relief as my eyes landed on my friend. “You nearly put me in the grave!” I shrieked. He laughed as he stepped next to me. “The next dance will be starting soon, we’d better find our way to the dancefloor before your mother whips you for running from potential suitors,” he murmured, placing his hand on the small of my back. \nI sucked in a breath at the small contact. He’s never shied away from touching me, holding my hand or tickling my sides growing up, but this was different. It felt different. Everyone’s eyes landed on us, the pair of the hour it seemed. But that could never bother him.\n“Jonathan, I appreciate you trying to save me from uncouth attempts at conversation, but you should really mingle more.” I tried to nudge him toward a group of females nearby, they were all taking turns turning and giggling as we walked by. They were sixteen, maybe, it was most likely their first season. That is the type of woman that Mrs. Williamson would love for her son to pick. The fewer seasons you’ve been through, the less undesirable you are deemed. This is my third season, not counting the season I spent in the countryside with my cousins. \n“Now, why would I want to go and bother with those petulant children. All of them will end up wed to one of Duke Erickson’s boys, I guarantee it.” I laughed easily, glancing over at Duke Erickson and his fleet of fresh-faced sons. I knew one of them to be nineteen, the bachelor of the group. My older brother said that he was told the duke’s eldest refused to settle down when he was able bodied, and willing… to make so many women happy for one night.\nMy mother forbade me from dancing with him. \n“So, you’re content with letting all of these eager, ring searching ladies think that you're courting me? Because that is the impression you’ve given by associating yourself with me for the entirety of the night.” I looped my arm through his as we got into position for the next dance. \n“And what is so wrong with that, Elizabeth?” He asked, smiling gently. The violins played softly, followed by the sound of everyone’s feet shuffling around the dance floor. I knew this well, but all I could hear was my own heartbeat, pounding at a treacherous rate in my ears. Just as I opened my mouth to speak, the tempo changed. Each female partner was to find another male, which meant this conversation was to be held. My response would have to wait. \n“Ah, I’ll cut in here!” Molly snickered, sliding between Jonathan and myself. \nMolly was one of the few people who I called a friend in this dreary town. I smiled at her softly before finding my way across the dance floor to a kind enough looking gentleman. We went through the movements, smiling at each other brightly before we parted and found our original partners again. Molly skipped past me, leaning in and whispering for me to find her as soon as the dance was over. \nI couldn’t place the mildly amused look on Jonathan’s face but brushed it off as we finished the dance. “I have to find Molly. Grab some wine and meet me by the garden?” I proposed, grinning when he silently walked off toward the nearest kitchen maid. \nI glanced over the crowd quickly, spotting Molly’s tight, blonde curls on the other side of the room. I waltzed toward her, enjoying tonight far more than I should. Tonight was going to be about finding a husband. With my friend distracting me, I’d forgotten about my duty. \nI pulled on one of the bouncy curls, laughing when Molly spun around ready to pounce. “Make it quick, Jonathan’s waiting.” She smiled brightly in my direction but stared just over my shoulder. “I think… he’s going to propose to me!” She squealed. My mind started racing at the idea of it, my dearest friend engaged. “And, who has the great honor?” I asked, searching the crowd for the possibilities. \n“Don’t be silly, Lizzy. Jonathan, of course!” \nMy blood ran cold at her words. The excitement that was humming just below the surface of my skin emerged as goosebumps spreading down my arms. How could she get such an idea from a single dance? “What do you mean, Molly? Why would you think Jonathan would be proposing to you? You’ve only had one dance.” \nI tried to hide the evidence of my emotions, tried and failed. She didn’t notice, too absorbed in her own impending marriage. “Well, he started posing weird questions about proposals and what a woman would like. This was our third time to dance together this season, you know. Not to mention, his mother loves my father. Well, his money. She’s said as much at dinner with him. That her boy would be lucky to end up with someone like me.” She squealed as she chatted on. \nI shook my head, trying to come up with any reason, any reason at all why she couldn’t marry him. “You… you can’t marry him, Molly. You don’t even know him.” Dread fell on her face as she finally looked at me.\n“And why not? Has he already been betrothed to another?” She looked over my shoulder again. I turned and followed her line of site. Jonathan was standing next to my father, laughing about something he’d said. The image lit a fire in my soul. I’d found so much enjoyment in watching the two laugh throughout the years. To imagine him as a part of anyone else’s family, it was a cruel form of punishment. \n“No. No he has not.” She rambled on with questions as I turned fully and walked away from her. There was no sense in questioning her about it when the decision wasn’t hers, it was his. \n“Well, what are you two finding so amusing?” I asked upon approaching. My father quietened his laughter but kept his smile plastered across his face. “Just chatting. If you two are intending your usual walk in the garden, you’d better make haste. The next song dance will begin soon,” he waved us off, shewing us like flies. \n“Your father is quite observant,” Jonathan said, passing me a glass of wine. I sipped on it slowly, enjoying the variety of sweet flavors dancing over my tongue. “That he is.” I couldn’t find the words, nor the courage, to ask him about what Molly had said. So, I said nothing. We strolled through the rows of flowers, some reaching our hips in height. It always seemed so peaceful out here. \n“Elizabeth. I have to tell you something. It’s about my intentions, where tonight is supposed to go for me.” \nI met his gaze, frozen still by the icy blue staring back at me. I’m not ready for this conversation, not yet. \n“What makes your intentions any of my business, Mr. Williamson?” I query. He smiled, looking off past the marble statues for a moment. “You have to be such a minx, don’t you?” He muttered. Then, he finished his glass of wine and set it down beside us on the rocks, taking mine and doing the same before I could argue it. \n“My intentions are your business, Ms. Elizabeth, because my intentions are you.” \nThe snappy response I was brewing died on my tongue. \n“Your intentions are what?” I asked, trying to slow the steadily rising beat of my heart. I could barely stand straight as he took my hand in his and met the ground with one of his knees. \n“My intentions, Lizzy, are to marry you. I have already asked your father for your hand, which he graciously gave. And now, I am asking you. Will you be my Lady Williamson?” \nThe words were that of a dream, one that I’d never imagined coming true. “Do not say such things if you do not mean them to be serious, Jonathan.” \n“I’m being deadly serious, Lizzy. I adore you. Please, let me adore you for the rest of our lives. Don’t make me enter into a marriage with someone of my mother’s choosing,” We both laughed. “I am enraptured by you, Elizabeth. Your beauty, your humor, amongst other things. What do you say?” \nAnd it dawned on me suddenly, this moment is real. I’m not seeing with wishful eyes and hearing with wishful ears. \n“I am quite smitten with you, myself, Mr. Williamson.” I whispered. \nI let my gaze fall to the beautiful emerald as he slid it onto my trembling finger. I knew the piece came from his grandmother’s collection, just as I knew my mother would faint upon seeing it on my finger.\n“Looks like you’re the lucky winner of my ring,” He teased. \nI simply smiled. \n“Lucky indeed.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: A Dish Fit For The Gods\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1451\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is convinced they’re going to be betrayed." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My leg bounces up and down, the tic of a nervous person. I will my leg to stop. In replacement I begin biting my nails. I’ve been sitting at the kitchen counter repeating these nervous tics for about an hour - leg bouncing, nail biting, finger tapping - forcing myself to read this play. I begin spinning my wedding band around my finger. I check the clock. 4:15 PM. I look down at my page and reread the paragraph… \n\n“Let's be sacrificers, but not butchers, Caius.\n. . . And, gentle friends,\nLet's kill him boldly, but not wrathfully;\nLet's carve him as a dish fit for the gods,”\n\nMy mind stops here. The betrayal runs so deep in this story. Possibly like my own.. With my own husband. My best friend. My lover. Is it possible though? Could my husband be as insidious as Brutus? \n\nI can’t help but think this is some sick joke that we happen to be studying Julius Caesar in my master’s program at the same time I might be betrayed by my own best friend. \n\nMy man who wore his heart on his sleeve… my tower of strength… my be-all and end-all. Et tu, Brute?\n\nI met Antoni in Italy just five years ago, shortly after I moved here from the states. He was in a play that I saw with my roommate, he was playing a father. I will never forget what I felt when I first saw him speaking in his native tongue of sweet, blissful Italian on stage. So tall, deep tan skin, flowing brown hair, straight white teeth, I melted instantly. No wonder this man became famous overnight. \n\nMy roommate invited me to the after party with the cast since she was dating the director. It was a small crew at a little bar, tucked on a tight street near the Trevi Fountain. Dim lighting ran through the whole room, tea light candles flickered down the bar and on the tables. I sat with Alessandra at the cement bar top, along with the director as we discussed our thoughts on his opening night. I sipped my red wine and we nibbled on spring vegetable bruschetta, cheeses, caprese salads, crostinis with pomegranate seeds. That’s when I saw him approaching us, I let my eyes meet his. \n\nHe was so bold, maybe looking back that’s what gives me fear now. His ability to own a room, his confidence to swoon. But never arrogance, no. He has always been elegant, and graceful. Another reason I can’t wrap my brain around a betrayal by this man I love. He may be prideful in his work, in his looks, but rarely has pride slipped into the intricate thread of our relationship or into his role as a husband. \n\nHe briefly shook the director’s hand, so poised even early in his acting career. He stepped up next to me, swept my thick brown hair away from my ear and bent low bringing his lips mere centimeters away from my ear… would you like to join me at a separate table? \n\nI turned toward him breathing in his minty breath… yes. He grabbed my hand and led me to a lone table in the corner. My whole body was like a magnet, absolutely and positively pulled to him. There was no resisting it, a moth drawn to a golden light. You, you, you. \n\nAntoni is my person. My mind, body, and soul felt it then and I feel it now. In my heart of hearts Antoni is there, flowing through my veins, whispering in my lungs.\n\nBut I can’t deny his odd behavior recently. The late nights, the quiet phone calls, the long weekends, dodging my questions. I know he’s an actor so the late nights and extended weekends aren’t totally out of character but his haphazardness is rather surprising. \n\n4:30.\n\nMy stomach knotted with apprehension as I remembered him sliding into bed last night quietly as a slithering snake… was he afraid I would confront him for yet another late night? A quiet phone call taken in the kitchen before coming to our room?\n\nMy mind flashes back to last week, another secretive call in the hallway of our apartment building. I could only hear muffled noises through the front door and when he came back in he came straight to me, cupping my face with both palms. He kissed me deeply then, running his hands down my back, gripping my thighs and hoisting me up. I wrapped my legs around him as he carried me to bed. I wasn’t even given a chance to ask who he was talking to on the phone. Now I wonder if he was distracting me from asking questions? What happened on the call that made him want me so suddenly? \n\n4:45. \n\nMy mind has wandered far from my Julius Caesar at this point. I boil water on the stove top and make french press coffee, my nerves are already near boiling so, what the heck. While my coffee steeps I pull my thick brown hair into a bun atop my head, then pull the hair tie out letting it fall down. \n\nHow will I confront Antoni? Do I make him squirm? Do I ask direct questions? Am I kind? Or harsh? I think if I tried to play Colonel Hans Landa my husband might just laugh. Can I be calm, cool, collected and sexy like Catherine Tramell? I know she’s the one being interrogated but Antoni might fall to his knees and confess all if I played the part well like she does.\n\n5:00.\n\nSurprisingly, the door swings open. Not another late night I guess. I forget all thoughts when I see him, all six foot two, warm eyes, and a half smile. Even if I came up with a thorough interrogation plan I would have gone astray. \n\nYou, you, you\n\n“Hi, hon.” He hangs his leather shoulder bag on a hook, rolls up his white sleeves as he makes his way to me on my stool. \n\n“Hi.” I manage to say without sounding shaky. \n\nHe leans down and kisses me gently. “What’s wrong?”\n\nI couldn’t even fool him for two minutes. He knows me probably better than I know myself, is it really possible he would–could–betray me like I think he did? Don’t I know his eyes shout YOU, YOU, YOU when he looks at me? Doesn’t my body know his hands crave the feel of my skin? It isn’t possible… even you, my love? \n\n“Are you cheating on me?” I guess straight and to the point is my method of choice. \n\nI’ve never seen him in so much shock. His eyes are wide, he doesn’t move a muscle. This can mean two things - 1) he’s surprised I caught him or 2) he can’t believe I would ever think something so horrible of him. I pray it’s the latter and begin to feel guilty.\n\n“Sweetie, what? How could you say that?” \n\nI stand up and begin pacing the room back and forth, couch to kitchen, couch to kitchen while the accusations fly out of my mouth. “You’re out late, you’re working Saturdays and sometimes Sundays, you’re taking secretive phone calls, you’re acting strange, you’re dodging me…”\n\nHe stops me in my tracks putting his big hands on my shoulders. “Baby, look at me.” \n\nI raise my eyes to him. You, you, you. \n\n“I’m sorry I’ve been a bit off.” \n\n“You better explain yourself right now.” I say it with less than half the confidence I felt ten minutes ago.\n\n“Ashley Harrison. Don’t you know my heart beats for you?” He lifts his hands to my jaw, angling my face up to his. I don’t answer him. “Don’t you know?”\n\n“I know, but…”\n\n“No. No buts.” He kisses my left jaw. “I wanted to surprise you.” He kisses my right jaw. “But I guess I’ll have to tell you.” He kisses my forehead. “I wrote a play and I’m working on directing and casting with Marco.” He kisses my lips sweetly and pulls back to look at me. \n\n“You wrote a play?”\n\n“I wrote a play.” He pushes my hair back, running his fingers through my hair. “For you.” \n\n“Oh.” I really don’t know what to say. Now I’m shocked. \n\nAntoni leans down again pushing a deep kiss onto my lips, and slowly starts pushing me back, back, back until my legs run into the edge of the bed in our room. He lays me down and then planks himself over me. You, you, you. \n\nHe looks at me, then begins placing gratifying kisses on my neck and finally whispers into my lips a dish fit for the gods." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Crossing Turtle Creek\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1660\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about a successful marriage proposal, or one that goes horribly wrong." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Crossing Turtle Creek\n\n I watched the straw dust falling through the gaps in the ancient grey floorboards of the hayloft above. Aroused by our intent, motes of dust, illuminated by the full moon shining through the barn’s open window, jostled for a better position from which to watch. Chickens in their coops tucked their heads beneath their wings in false modesty. I brushed a lock of hair from her face, letting the moon bounce back from her widened eyes. Her electric eyes, neither green nor blue, spawned incandescent sparks deep within. I brushed my lips against the lobe of her ear, tongue tracing the taut curve of her neck. She trembled in an involuntary quiver, a churning warm desire that threatened to break the dam. I looked in her eyes as I slipped the top button of her blouse open, tracing my fingertip across the exposed curve of her breast. Her eyes never left mine as she unbuttoned the next. Then the next, my lips following her down each step.\n We lay entangled, racing hearts galloping together past the restraints placed upon us by those who do not, could never, understand the forces at work. How our desire had become like the creek gorged at spring, threatening to leap its banks if not offered release. Our hands and lips defined the mysteries we had only been able to dream about. She guided me with an acceptance lathered with relief, melting together our desire into an unspoken pact. Unrestrained by hesitation, we leapt into the chasm, holding each other tightly. We flew together like two wings that have found each other, higher and higher, until our bodies clenched together and began the drop. Faster…faster…together we streaked from the heavens towards our earthly bonds, crashing into the woven blanket molded into a pile of straw, our bodies exploding into a pile of us, no recognizable fragments left of her or I. We settled into the satisfying softness of our embrace, sleep continuing our impossible dream.\n I dreamt of Turtle Creek, and across it stood my love. She wordlessly beckoned to me, her simple white robe falling open to reveal her nakedness beneath. I slipped into the water to cross the creek which I could easily conquer in ten strong strokes. I knifed through the water like an otter, only to glance up at my love and to see that I had gotten no closer to her on the far bank. I doubled my efforts, but the stream seemed to widen and become more turbulent with every stroke. My energy sapping, I dove beneath the water, deep, trying to avoid the torrent at the top. My head struck a rock…\n I awoke instantly, my eyes tearing with the bright glare through the barn window and the stars swimming in my vision. As my eyes focused, I was staring up both barrels of a 12-gauge shotgun leveled at my face. A drip of blood rolled past my eyelid and onto my cheek. I could feel others following its sticky path. A second man grabbed me and yanked me to my feet. He held me roughly as the other man lowered the shotgun and leaned down to grab the blanket and yank it over my loves body.\n “Cover yerself girl and get inside that house!” She scampered away like a Halloween ghost with that blanket over her head. The woven patterned blanket. Our blanket. I turned to protest but caught the shotgun butts second attempt to behead me on the left temple. The darkness dispelled any curiosity about my fate.\n***\n\n “Wake your ass up!”\n My eyes struggled to open, each feeling as if they were separated by a chasm of pain. Two men came into focus, standing beneath a canopy of Spanish moss. Sunlight sliced through the foliage cutting the scene into flashes of focus sandwiched between a moist distorted darkness of green. I could hear the nearby water run, but the sounds of birds and animals alike were hushed in silent anticipation. As my head cleared, I could feel the trunk of a tree pressing against my back. My hands were bound behind the tree, stretching my shoulders to a painful degree. Other ropes held my waist and ankles firmly in front of the trunk. My head rolled forward unbound, and I could see my naked body. I could feel their eyes studying me, but there was no cover for my shame.\n “What’s yer name boy?” spoke the older of the two, punctuated by his hawking a gooey sop of chew to the ground near my feet. Bushy graying eyebrows punctuated his sneer.\n “Randle sir. Bo Randle sir.” I managed to croak out through blood crusted lips. I looked up at the man before me.\n He turned to his companion beside him and raised his eyebrows as he said, “A Randle he says!”\n The other was younger, a rough looking fellow, shirtless with a pair of faded overalls strapped over his shoulders. “Pa, this one don’t look like any Randall I’ve ever seen. He’s too…pretty.”\n So, father and son I figured, and a fair assumption that they were from the same family as my previous night’s partner. Where in her eyes I saw bliss, in theirs lingered a scornful contempt. Her skin smooth and glowing was in stark contrast to the men’s cracked and weathered faces. But I did perceive a likeness, and who other than the owner of the barn and the girl was likely to have trussed me up such.\n “You mean the Randle’s that live in the big house up Coppertop Ridge? You from that family boy?”\n “Why, yes sir, Frank Randle’s youngest son.”\n “Well would you looky here, I got myself a real Randle. Found him sleeping too! On my property, on my straw, on my horse blanket, and lastly but most importantly, on my daughter!” The man slapped me with the back of his hand and the hornets’ nest in my head churned with angry activity.\n “Her being sixteen years old ever enter your mind before you entered her?” The man's face was close and spittle flecked his lips as he screamed at me.\n “But…but…I’m only sixteen too! And I love her!”\n “Love? Boy, you have no idea what love is. You think it comes from that thing dangling down there?” My eyes followed his as they dropped to my penis. Inexplicably, fueled by fear perhaps, it gave a subtle surge of life and throbbed perceptibly.\n “See! The damn things thirsting for more already!” Father turned to son and said solemnly, “Get the turtle.”\n I couldn’t see where the young man went, but I heard the tailgate of a pickup drop open, then a scraping sound like someone was dragging their fingernails across the trucks bed. In a moment he returned, and I threw up all over myself. Struggling to avoid the claws that were lashing out wildly, the son needed both hands to grip the shell of a mammoth snapping turtle. As he held it nearer to me its dragon head reached out from its hiding place, long neck extending as he seemed to sniff at my crotch. I didn’t know turtles could, but I swear that this one hissed at me.\n “I’m sorry mister, I am!” I cried.\n The turtle sniffed my fear. Shotgun man set down his weapon and picked up a branch as thick as my wrist. Feeling no need for narration he poked the stick at the snapper. It’s head, green tendrils of water plants clinging to it, whipped towards the branch and snapped it into two pieces.\n “I love your daughter; I swear I do!” I pleaded before he could return the turtles attention to me. I knew that with one quick bite, I would never get to love her again. I was helpless, already imaging the turtle stifling a smile as my tool dangled from his hooked beak-like mouth.\n “What do you think son? How bout having a Randall in the family?” said the old man to the younger. One bushy eyebrow cocked in an arch, and a crazy smile crept onto his face. “Go get her from the truck.”\n My heart swelled at the sight of my soul mate as her brother led her to stand before me. She wore a simple dress and her eyes darted nervously from me to them.\n I heard the cocking of the double barrel 12 gauge before I saw it. Her father stood holding it inches from my face.\n “Repeat after me.” I didn’t mistake it for a request. “My darling Eloise…” he paused.\n “Muh…my…darling Eloise…” I stammered.\n “We have joined as adults, and I now ask you as an adult…”.\n “We have joined…um… as adults, and I now ask you, as an adult…”\n “Will you marry me?” He finished. I paused incredulously, but he emphasized my role with a poke of the gun in my face. “Make sure that’s not just turtle talking now.” He whispered.\n Between the insistent attention of a large snapping turtle eyeing my dick and a hillbilly ready to blow off my head, I did the only thing that I could. “W..Wi…Will…you marry me?” I asked.\n\n***\n Eloise moved into our big house on Coppertop Ridge, and despite constant entreaties through the years, avoided her families wishes to join us there. We stayed after my parents passed, raising four children of our own. On Sundays we take the kids across Turtle Creek to visit their grandparents and aunts, uncles, and cousins. I tell them that there’s snappers that are big as ponies in that creek, and you better take care if you ever try to swim across. Fascinated as youngsters, they fell into disbelief as the years rolled by.\n Forty years after I married her the girl with the moonlit eyes who lived across Turtle Creek takes my hand, a woven blanket under her arm. We head to the barn, illuminated by the full moon, to remember.\n\nThe End" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: The Last First Kiss\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1073\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a story about a first or last kiss." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "On the outstretched canvas of Chesterfield, a quaint English village, time itself took humble breaths, pacing gently with the cycle of the seasons. It was a town cradled by the loving arms of tradition, where each spring gave rise to more than just a tapestry of wildflowers. It sowed the seeds of stories that would, in time, weave themselves into the hearts of its people.\nThis story, among the tapestries, began on a morning marked by the soft blush of a thawing countryside, which whispered to all who cared to listen that the Chesterfield Annual Spring Fest was close at hand. And within this whisper, cradled an earnest youth named Benny Baxter—a boy standing on the trembling edge of adulthood with dreams spilling from the pockets of his patched-up jeans.\nBenny, with a mind ever-wandering beyond the confines of Chesterfield High’s walls, had decided that today he would transform fantasy into reality with an act so daring it would surely seal his fate. His heart, unbeknownst to all but his shadow, had been ensnared by Mabel Pines—she of the fiery hair, keen wit, and a smile that hinted at secrets tucked in the corners of her laughter.\n‘Operation Smoocharoo’ was the code name Benny had ascribed to this endeavor, scrawled within his journal amidst equations and half-finished doodles. A plan that, by the day’s end, would either crown him the gallant hero of his own story or cast him into a comedy of his own making.\nHis target was the charming expanse of village green where the Spring Fest came alive in an explosion of colors, sounds, and an atmosphere so rich it could turn skeptics into poets. There, among the jugglers, the purveyors of sweet treats, and the calliope-echoes of endless carousel rounds, lay the setting for Mabel Pines’ first encounter with Benny’s undisclosed affection.\nAt the heart of this festival lay the legendary Great Oak, a behemoth of nature’s patient artistry. It was there, at precisely 5:34 PM, that Benny intended to unfurl his feelings beneath its sprawling branches—a monumental task paralleled only by the deep breaths required to steady his nerves.\nThe hours unfolded like pages in a storybook, with each passing moment etched with activities and stalls that gleamed like jewels under the warming sun. There were pies topped with intricate lattices, beeswax candles rolled by ancient hands, and games that challenged the aim or tested the cleverness of Chesterfield’s youth.\nAll the while, Benny loitered amidst it all, biding his time and rehearsing his heart’s confession in quiet conversations with the carnation he held—a gift chosen for its simplicity and honesty.\nAs afternoon yawned into early evening, and the fickle English sun began to dip behind scattered clouds, a distant clock began its preamble to the targeted hour. With every toll, Benny’s heart skipped an erratic beat, and his gaze swept across the fest in search of the auburn allure of Mabel Pines.\nMabel, in stark objection to the object of Benny’s fervent attention, felt no binds to any one spot. The festival was her kingdom, with each corner offering new delight to her curious spirit. She indulged in frosted almonds, conversed animatedly with the beekeeper about the plight of pollinators, and cheered robustly at the sack race, which left young children tumbling over themselves in giggling heaps.\nIt was by the carousel that Benny finally caught sight of her, a girl so vibrant that even the pirouetting horses seemed to pale in comparison. Nearing 5:34 PM, the band conductor raised his baton, and as ‘Daffodil Lament’ unfurled its melody, Benny moved closer, a fluttering battalion of nerves threatening to unravel him.\n“Mabel,” he began, his voice so hushed it trembled on the wind, extending the carnation in his offering. “This is for you.”\nHer gaze met his, and a myriad of emotions danced there—a silent sonnet to the beauty of youth. “Thank you, Benny. It’s quite unexpected,” she said, her voice a balm to his jangled senses.\nThe kiss he intended for her lips landed in sweet innocence on her cheek—a brush of lips, a pivot in their worlds—but no sooner had their skin brushed than the earth trembled an objection. In an area not well known for seismic activity, Chesterfield shook in a rare and befuddling earthquake, rocking the festival to its core.\nChaos ensued; the carousel lurched, sending riders and parents clutching each other in alarm; the jugglers lost their rhythm; and the pie stand witnessed its confections tremble into disarray. And then, as if Mother Nature repented her outburst, the ground stilled.\nIn the carnival’s heart stood a bewildered guest—an elephant, its regal headpiece shimmering, having escaped the modest petting zoo nearby. The zoo’s keeper, having succumbed to financial zeal, had recently procured the pampered beast as a desperate drawcard and now bore witness to his miscalculation.\nBenny, finding an unexpected ally in this interloper, grinned at Mabel amidst the oddity. “Shall we try this again?” he asked, emboldened by the absurdity that had preempted their proper introduction.\nMabel, her laughter signaling an accord, stepped closer. “Might as well; it appears the literal earth moved for you, Benny.”\nAnd so, their kiss found a second life—a harmonious melding that hinted at a ballet of emotions, each movement synchronized with the burgeoning beats of young hearts unshaken.\nThe plush toy elephant, caught midair in the exuberant trunk-flare of its live counterpart, landed atop the pair—a sentinel to their burgeoning tale. The crowd, embracing both the whimsy and warmth, erupted into applause.\nAs twilight’s canvas stretched above, painting the town in silhouettes and the shade of blooming secrets, Benny and Mabel strolled hand in hand—a procession observed by Chesterfield with a collective fondness.\nTheir borough, with its dells and dales, was now richer for the lore of a kiss, an earthquake, and an unexpected ambassador now named ‘Loverboy’. And for Benny and Mabel, their kiss was enshrined as the first of many—a shared passage forever etched in the annals of Chesterfield and in the sanctity of young love.\nThe tale of their kiss would fade not with the evening stars, but grow in the telling. A parable of happenstance and heart, where fate delighted to twine two souls in a dance as ageless as the Great Oak, and as unforgettable as the Spring Fest celebration that cradled their beginning. Their first kiss was a last in one sense—it was the last first kiss they ever needed." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Spider and Moth\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2145\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is stuck between two opposing sides and can’t decide which one to choose." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Trgger warning: this story contains references to war and the trauma of war.\n\nMade up of the thinnest of protein fiber threads, the spider’s web prompts a cautious reflection about how nature can trick light. The silk is an invisible cloak splayed out with mathematical accuracy on a branch, or across the corner of a doorway, or between two rails.\n\nThe subject is a particular web on your television. It’s not on the frame, but rather drawing you in from within - the many moving shades of a pixelated scene unfolding. A spider is weaving its silk deftly around a trapped moth shaking so vigorously that dew drops can be seen tinkling off the web. The spider seems to be talking to you. Do not forget: We know what we are but know not what we may be. We are multiple and we are singular. Predator and prey. Spider and moth. Choose your side, they’ll say.\n\nYou are restless and you change the channel multiple times. Starving cats, an abandoned tin of Nabataean coins, firestorms turning acres to ash. Then you see a closeup of a tent holding a family of ten, pitched in a field of grey rubble. That one hurts somewhere deep, like acid in the stomach. You rub your eyes with your fist, blink fiercely, and manage to transform the scene into an old oak tree in a field of evergreen rubble. Better, but not quite the entertainment you need to still your mind.\n\nYou need the bizarre, the unbelievable, to truly make sense of what is happening around you. You need to block out the surrounding noise. You need your mind to be paralyzed with a serpent’s sting.\n\nObediently, the television brings forth a cinematic experience. You tuck your knees under you in anticipation and place the remote control down carefully as if it were a sleeping doll.\n\nYou find yourself peeping into a high-ceilinged room of black marble, lined with glossy gold-plated cages, empty, their doors left open. A glass table is the room’s centrepiece, covered with a board game designed as a world map with plastic figures of different colours arranged as miniature armies around the frame, and a pair of dice cast precariously. At the corner of the table, you spot the broken threads of an abandoned spider web, no spider nor moth to be found.\n\nFilling the room is an incredible, unique gathering of wild animals from the desert and jungle, dressed in suits. Not ordinary suits. Particularly Ermenegildo Zegna, Hart Schaffner Marx, Kiton and Brioni suits. You take a closer look at the attire of the assembly of animals: You spy a boa constrictor in a bow tie, a cockroach sporting cone heels, an alligator with ray bans and a giraffe, whose main feature, a length of patterned neck, remains bowed by the low ceiling.\n\nIn the background are more animals - apex predators and those who live in the shadows of apex predators. In the camouflage of murky waters; up the Euterpe Precatoria palm in the Amazon; under the red rocks of the Wadi Rum desert.\n\nThe animals wear dark ties either a single colour or striped, and cufflinks enamelled with concords, dice and leopards. A thought flutters faster than a moth’s wing: it is strange to see a leopard wear leopard cuff links.\n\nThe animals in suits make up a group of distinguished and honourable representatives, collectively deadly. As predators, it can be forgiven that their exchanges with deadly dangers are simply routine. As predators, chemical wax and smoke are comfortable odours, and fear a frequency as thin as a thread of silk in the wind. \n\nYour gaze settles more firmly on the leopard, who dominates the room and prowls around the gameboard. The leopard’s claws are blunted by restless pacing across slate and marble all his adult life. Earth carpets have become a distant memory. The leopard’s lipless jaw is set to hide his diamond daggers. You notice he painted over his black spots with amaranth red, zaffre blue and jade to resemble what he is not. Better to keep his inferior companions at ease.\n\nHe pauses briefly next to a redhead parrot, who swings from an industrial lamp. The parrot is distinctly associated with inciting dissent under the guise of lexical semantics. It is feasible that others had attempted before him to interrupt her stream of political lyrics, but while stealth and calculated patience stoke the leopard’s judgement, you would be mistaken to expect he holds any tolerance for… well, tolerance. And today and everyday the parrot preaches tolerance. Tolerance for victims of abuse, tolerance for minorities, tolerance for the indigenous, tolerance for… No, the leopard definitely has no fuel in his very full belly for propaganda threatening his right to existence. His principles of diplomacy are very much like the rhinoceros, who you, as the detached spectator, find your focus being steered towards.\n\nYou observe the rhinoceros is endowed with tremendous strength and inherited wealth. The jewels slung over his ivory are more mesmerising than the dews of recent rain. Unfortunately, if you were to trespass on his thoughts, you would find but clumps of dull clay, unfinished or misshapen. It remains apparent he has many allies in the room. He holds the key to ample natural resources to be traded or pillaged. His popularity is currency.\n\nAnimals surrounding a table of plastic figurines. Their world is a game of risk and all in the room its players. Although their motives may differ, their humanity is unquestionable, and it is always under this flag that the finer details of their collective mission are fixed. A more primal instinct, more deeply buried, has been instilled in each of them thousands of thousands of years earlier, at the moment the blackhole took its first breath - win the game of survival.\n\nThe game is a subject of fascination, strategy, logic. The rules are simple. Walls, weapons and wealth are the winning combination. They risk it all with a roll of a dice - they play to carve out the fate of two species.\n\nSome play reluctantly in the hope that they’ll gain security and prosperity. Others play silently, waiting for the game to reveal if they are predator or prey. Spider or moth.\n\nIt is not important if the leopard or the rhinoceros win, nor if the spider returns to its web, nor if the moth manages to avoid the trap and fly through a window, of which there are none. Overwhelming any thought you may have of how the game will unfold, is the raw stench of power, the disease of deception and the mockery that is manipulation. A rumour whispers around the room. Do not forget: We know what we are but know not what we may be. We are multiple and we are singular. Predator and prey. Spider and moth. Choose your side, they’ll say.\n\nThe leopard and the rhinoceros and kings of kingdoms and the moves they make feel infinitely distant, but you’ve been promised they hold the key to your fate. Your future may be untold but as your previous life unfolds and falls apart between your hands and you see too many faces of your loved ones buried in sand and wrapped in white… you can not help but wonder if they rolled the dice the wrong way by mistake.\n\nThere is still time for them to pick up their miniature figurines and move them away from the land and sand you stand on, or dash the board against the wall or on the glass top table until it shatters into a thousand pieces. Break the rules. Change the pattern. Let the moth catch the spider.\n\nBut alas, the silence in the room is sliced. Like a dagger with the handle towards the hand. They choose their vice.\n\n“Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war!”\n\nIt is not important who speaks the words, only that they are uttered with intention, and disseminated to the herd.\n\nThe weight of those words are heavier than the two thousand-pound bombs about to create thirty six foot craters in the ground, commissioned by leopard, rhinoceros or boa, flamingo or parrot, during these harmless games of risk. Because of course, what you watch is not their first fix.\n\nBut you do not yet understand the fragile, invisible web of alliances and diplomacy, the historical context of such famous words being spoken, nor the weight of those words. In fact you never learnt to speak their language; they ever tried to speak yours.\n\nNor do you know the significance of the game you watch. But something tastes more bitter in the mouth than the mould on the stale bread in your hand. Except, you no longer have the stale bread in your hand, because that was last week… this week there is no bread left.\n\nAnimals, suits and the board game fade until the television screen is black. Except, there is no screen. Because how can a cardboard box set atop a plastic bucket (whose holes are taped with cloth rags and stuffed with small stones), possibly power enough electricity to broadcast the lives of those of such high quality, esteem and political complexity?\n\nYour craftsmanship is lowly and unconvincing in comparison. Your imagination is crumbling and the numbness from the serpent’s sting is fading. But you stare at your makeshift screen and you cling onto that tender memory of a map and cards and pictures of animals of the desert and the jungle and feckless laughter at the thrill of playing the newly unwrapped game brought by a boy who used to have two arms and whose parents are martyrs like yours… the memory tastes like yesterday. Shakespeare forewarned: let us not burden our remembrances with a heaviness that’s gone. Yet you can not but chew on the sacredness of yesterday. You took your space in a circle with the other children. You were seven years old. They were all older and already drank the black tea made bitter with mint and sweet with sugar. You all surrounded the game board. Proud to be a part of the group, you rolled the dice, sitting on the lap of your sister. You did not know the rules then, either.\n\nNow you are eleven and your cardboard television on a bucket is getting wet and it is no longer distracting you from the sounds of neighbours and strangers yelling and running down the grey rubble once-was-a-street and you feel you should use your crumpled legs to get up and help them dig out any other neighbours or strangers they can find from under the grey rubble made by the thirty-six foot crater but your mind is foggier than the dust caused by the two thousand-pound bomb just twenty seconds ago dropped two streets away and your legs and your head and your heart feel heavier than the high-explosive contents of that bomb delivered by anyone and everyone who decided you are not on their side.\n\nFighting through the trauma stems an oak tree, trying to push its roots through the evergreen rubble of your mind.\n\nYou climb the oak’s lean trunk and begin to pin to its branches the faces of all the lost children sitting in a circle playing games, and then the faces of your classmates, your teachers, your neighbours, and then your family, your Aunts and Uncles, your cousins, your mother, your father, your older sister… Roots run deeper than any crater and branches extend and run into one another without the hindrance of walls or weapons bought by wealth. Every memory of every loved one you buried is given its special place, carefully connected, cocooned in silk, and diligently protected. The oak by its nature and humanity promises you that protection. \n\nEverything else is uncertain. But finally, your mind is still.\n\nYou stand. You run. You dig. You carry. You bury. You pray. You shout. You wait. You fight. You wait. You pray.\n\nYou press your forehead against the ground with your eyes shut. The earth welcomes you - where a leopard’s claw should rake, where roots should grow. Instead, your family sleeps under a concrete jungle and your tent is full of strangers.\n\nYour strength befits the thinnest of threads of silk, bearing burdens of memories too heavy for one so young and too painful to be numbed by any serpent’s sting. You wear the invisible cloak of 17,000 other unaccompanied children whose fates are in the hands of those casting the dice. \n\nWhile the game of risk remains at play and spider webs continue to be spun, they speak silently to the world: Do not forget: We know what we are but know not what we may be. We are multiple and we are singular. Spider and moth. Predator and prey. Choose your side, they’ll say." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Pulling Strings: A Mike Dodge Mystery\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 3011\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with a character finding a retro piece of tech they don’t recognize." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Chemical warfare in the Asian jungles. Man on the Moon. Data accumulating by the terabyte in a mainframe world; satellites taking up ever-more stratospheric real estate, prepped one day to ruin the neighborhood one strike, one leak, one tech sociopath at a time. \n“Oh my God,” I proclaimed, awestruck in the presence of a genuine ‘60s technological marvel. “Looka this.”\nA millennimom skirted away toward the chick-lit-heavy book box at the lip of the casita’s two-car garage. Sarah reluctantly abandoned the sheet-metal lawn ornaments, and I shook the Ziploc bag as she sidled past the bibliophile. They clonked – a solid, metallic, Clint Eastwood when America used to by-god MAKE things clonk.\n“Remember the Thingmaker?” I enthused as my life partner regarded my find and then me with what I can only describe as reptilian apathy. “You’re ruining the moment.”\n“Oh, my,” Sarah said. “What marvelous treasure have you uncovered?”\n “Thingmaker molds. Creepy Crawlers and Fright Factory and, oh my God, one of the soldier molds.”\n“I can see I’m getting power of attorney far earlier than planned. Fine, what is a Thingmaker, and what things does it make?”\n“Oh, gee, everything. You had like this hot plate thing that got up to, I don’t know, maybe 1,000 degrees, and you poured this no-doubt toxic goop into the mold and made a bug or a soldier or a set of vampire teeth…”\n“Another piece of the puzzle falls into place. And you used this thing – Thingmaker – where? The kitchen, an asbestos-lined laboratory?”\n“My room, of course. There were tongs,” I emphasized. “Once I figured out what the tongs were for.”\n“How did you survive childhood?”\n“Probably the bastards at the Consumer Product Safety Commission – thank you, Richard Nixon.” I turned toward the cash table. “Uh, ma’am?”\n“Not if you want gyros today,” Sarah advised, and returned to the razor-sharp metal flowers.\nThe See ‘N Say at the back of the card table was in solid if not mint condition, the original ‘60s sun-yellow Farmer Says model, before they yanked the pull string for a slots lever and jammed a computer chip in the thing. I waited for Millenimom to breeze past with her booty, then cranked the red arrow to roughly 8 o’clock and gently tugged the yellowed plastic pull ring. What it belched up was not what the cow said. Ever.\nI gave a few more critters a spin, with equal results, then waited for Sarah to cart her death flowers to the SUV before placing the device before the late-bloom boomer. She smiled as she lifted it by the handle to consult a strip of masking tape on the base.\n“Boy, I used to play with this thing all the time. About drove Mom and Dad bug-nutty. In fact, I thought my folks had gotten rid of this 50 years ago. But my brother found boxes of all kinds of crap out in Apache Junction after my mom died a couple months back.”\n“Sorry.”\n“Nah. You know what, it’s about noon. Why don’t you just take it for your grandkids?”\nI averted eye contact. “Hey, thanks. The Thingmaker yours, too?”\n“Oh, shit, no. My brother almost burned the fucking house down with the thing.”\n**\nLuckily, we got through the gyros and falafel and basmati without incident – when I got to the car with my prize, Sarah was bolstering the Ugly American image for our prescription helpline guy, so I stashed the See ‘N Say in the cargo hold under my rainy-day windbreaker. It was laundry day, however, and short of simply declaring “Tada!” at the unveiling, I had no choice but to play the pig card.\n“What the hell even is that?” Sarah murmured.\n**\n“It was kind of a fucking technological miracle back in the day,” Owen breathed. It was not a great breath, and I wasn’t sure whether it was the age, the girth, the bowl of dead butts next to the antique register. He looked like David Cosby and Neil Young’s love child, surrounded by bears that cared, dolls raised by cabbages, Barbies who’d never left the box, and every vintage board game that had ever ended with my sisters and I eye-gouging over fake stakes.\nThe proprietor of Junction Collectables and Curiosities tapped the casing of my Farmer Says with his mini-screwdriver, his fingerless bike gloves creaking slightly. “It’s a pretty cool gizmo – inside, there’s a plastic disk lot like an old gramophone record. Each of the 12 sound waves is embossed on the disk and stored in concentric tracks.\nFortunately, he’d chosen to crack heavily-used existing inventory, and he displayed a now-off-white disk with diagonal grooves along the outer edge.\n“Those are the starting points for the 12 concentric tracks,” Owen explained, growing a little too excited. “This metal needle rides in one of the grooves depending on where you point the pointer. The ‘chatty’ cord, like they call it, lifts the needle, pulls it out to the edge of the disk, and winds a brass spring that turns the disk. See that plastic cone over the whole deal? The needle transmits the vibrations embossed in the ‘record’ to that T-shaped plastic piece it’s embedded in, and it transfers them to the cone speaker through that red dingle at the top. Pretty awesome. Right?”\n“Mm,” I said in an ostensibly awestruck manner. “How tough to replace the disk?”\nOwen leaned perilously back on his wooden stool and snagged a Styrofoam cup of coffee that looked cold and oily, from among a scattering of Styrofoam cups.\n“Anybody today with any reasonable mechanic skills could rejigger this thing, maybe even use a 3-D printer to reproduce that disk. But I assume this recording was made in the ‘60s or ‘70s. Still don’t want me to open ‘er up?”\n“Eh,” I reiterated. The guy surely knew what he was doing, and I wasn’t even sure it was evidence of anything more than a warped mind, and if that was so, the phantom tinkerer’s fingerprints or trace was trapped inside a sunny yellow case with the incriminating recording. In the end, I imagine my reservations were related more to pulling a thread on a hazily pleasant past.\n“You wouldn’t want to sell, would you?” Easy Rider Elf grinned. “Give you, say, $100? The case is pretty cherry, the string‘s still intact, and I got all the innards on the counter in front of you.”\nI pondered the pursuit of truth versus the pursuit of next month’s Hulu and Netflix fees. “Can I get back to you? Besides, doesn’t it screw up the value to swap out parts? Not exactly OEM.”\nOwen shrugged. “Neither am I,” he chortled.\n**\nJunction Collectables actually was on the dusty stretch of East Main outside Apache Junction, where inexplicably surviving stucco cafes and low-rent gun and souvenir shops and esoterically specific shops like JC&C attracted more dust motes than walk-ins. I followed Main until it became East Apache, and meandered around to the Apache Junction Public Library.\nI could have done this on the iPhone, but apart from major past tragedies, celebrations, local misadventures gone national, or sports, the digitized news archives had a coin slot. The new library had a nice lady named Trish and a sweet microfilm/.pdf run of mid-‘60s Apache Junction News and Sentinels and a shelf of vintage town directories.\nLike everything else in the Valley before Starbucks and Walmart and La Quinta and old golfers and the mobile young rode into town, the Junction was a relatively tiny place during the Johnson years, so what I was calling the precipitants stood out like saguaros. The little things that might set someone to a sadistic and time-consuming gaslighting campaign.\nAt the same time, I wanted to gauge community resources, and by the time I’d inhaled a shit-ton of nearly 60-year-old pulp dust, I had what I think I wanted.\nBone Thugs N Harmony, Alicia Keys, and the Jonas Brothers had laid down tracks at Mesa’s Saltmine Studio Oasis, according to owner Don Salter owing to “our philosophy of combining vintage old-school analog classic tools with modern, new-world digital.”\nRattler Studios, not so much. Located toward the mountains in what appeared to be a branch Oppenheimer bunker, Apache Junction’s best-kept secret and deservedly so appeared to have scored its new-world digital from a high school AV department, hidden among vintage old-school analog classic tools most of the current staff might need a high school AV crew to reboot.\n“Local bands and artists, mainly – way it’s always been,” Red Greenway described after fetching me a stout cup from the studio Keurig. He resumed grazing what looked like old-school chow mein -- about a half-mile back, I’d spotted a Chinese restaurant probably as old as the saguaro flanking it. “Most of its a mix of godawful country, worse indie shit, and even some hip-hop, rich folks’ kids who couldn’t bust a rhyme with a jackhammer. Hoped digitizing the whole thing might help us branch into audiobooks, podcasts, that sort of thing, but you said you were at the library. You seen their new studio? Green screen, video editing, podcasts, instrumental tracks? I may have to convert this all into a meth lab.”\nGreenway swept a hand toward the back wall gallery of local concert and club posters, album covers, and CD sleeves featuring the Rattler’s early undistinguished alumni – mostly pick-your-clone cowboys and metal heads and such ‘60s/’70s none-hit wonders as The Wally Goetticher Experience, the O-K Chorale, and The Three Horseman of the Apachelypse. Middle guy must’ve been Pestilence.\n“Kevin Cisneros – the K in O-K -- was about our only real success story, sort of,” he sighed. “I mean, he and his partner there with the steel guitar -- got quite a following at the area bars and even a little local airplay, but the partner quit playing after getting effed up in some accident or something, O-K Chorale dissolved, Kevin went solo somewhere else. We felt bad for the partner and made him gofer/janitor. By the way, all this is off the record, right?”\n“It’s all off the record,” I said. “I used to be a reporter. I came across something odd at a garage sale.” I pulled the See ‘N Say from its Old Navy bag and pulled the sting.\n“The frog says, ‘RIBBIT! RIBBIT”\n“It has a beat,” Greenway conceded. I frowned at the recalcitrant toy, and cranked the arrow a few clicks to the left. The rooster’s dark pronouncement raised his brows. “What kind of bastard would put that on a kid’s toy. I mean, this did belong to some kid, right?”\n“She didn’t tell me this was The Psycho Says model. Or she didn’t know. Lemme ask: Could somebody have done that here, back in the mid-‘60s?”\nGreenway considered as a malnourished-looking group of emo wannabes straggled in and he nodded them presumably toward the studio. “It’s a slow day, and you got me curious. Let’s pull this puppy apart and see what’s up. Don’t worry about them – they’re self-starters, you couldn’t tell.” \n**\nSarah had had several help desk innocents to terrorize, so I was off normal chec duties. “Got your lunch, or I guess dinner by now,” she grinned unsettlingly as jaunty hold music plunked at her very last nerve. “Just stick it in the microwave.”\nI left the dinosaur Spaghettios in too long, but Sarah’d went to considerable sarcastic expense digging out Ella’s old Mickey Mouse spoon, so I cleaned my plate.\nJesus called after lunch. The other one.\n“I reached out to the Apache Junction Police and Fire folks,” the Gilbert PD detective reported in his unflappable, chamomile rumble. “Only reason there was a file at all was there was a brief arson investigation. The fire investigator found a charred device with a heavy-duty heating element, and the bedroom carpet was saturated, laminated, in fact, with what he thought might be an accelerant. Turned out to be plastic, and the department found a serial number that tracked of all things to some toy. After a little persuading, the 10-year-old son admitted he and a neighbor boy had been performing unauthorized experiments with the, ah…”\n“Thingmaker.”\n“And when the inevitable fire started, the neighbor’s brother — who was watching a western with the Dad — rushed upstairs and pulled both kids out. Had second-degree burns on his hands and was treated for chemical smoke inhalation. Little brother sustained more severe facial burns, requiring extended hospital treatment.”\n“You get names?”\n“The Dautrives and the Wisters.”\nAnd it came to me in a deductive Batflash.\n**\n“I don’t understand,” Rita McClelland drawled with polite terseness. “You want a refund or something? It was free.”\n“Nothing like that,” I assured her. She set us up in lawn chairs on the driveway as I described the modifications made to her favorite childhood toy.\n“I don’t remember anything like that,” Rita stated.\n“I would assume, from, like, you putting it in the garage sale.”\n“You think my brother did it, as some sort of prank? Bob could barely change his bike tire.”\n“Well, it was dark, and kind of threatening in a creepy way. Not obscene or predatory, but disturbing for a kid to have to hear.”\n“But I never did. After Bob had an…’accident’ with that Thingmaker I told you about, Dad kind of went off the rails. The See ‘N Say seemed to set him off, so I just set it aside after a while.”\n“Somebody’d replaced the original recording with another one. That accident,” I ventured, cautiously. “The fire.”\n“How’d you know about the fire?” she whispered.\n“I was a reporter,” I said for the lack of anything relevant or cohesive. “Somebody wanted to hurt you, or your family, what, almost 60 years ago. I did a little digging, probably out of boredom, and discovered the fire in Apache Junction. A boy got hurt, right? One of your brother’s friends?”\n“Pete Wister was a wild kid,” Rita Dautrive McClelland muttered. “We always thought he was the one goaded Bob into whatever started the fire. The Wisters understood it was an idiot accident, and Dad paid Pete’s hospital bills. They understood.”\n“Not sure all of them,” I murmured.\n**\n “Thought I should let you know I decided not to sell.” I called as the tarnished bell above the door jangled. I’m just going to give it back to Rita, remember, your old neighbor?”\nThe welcoming grin froze on Owen’s face. Owen Wister, the O in O/K Chorale until the nerve damage to his half-gloved hands ended his musical career.\n“I’ll give you $500.”\n“That was your fatal mistake, offering me twice what a vintage See ‘N Say goes for online. You really wanted it, or at least take it apart and ‘accidentally’ destroy or switch out the disk or leave your fingerprints along with teen Owen’s.”\n“I was young and pissed off,” Owen stammered. “I thought Bob’d destroyed my life. My dad managed one of those tourist shops off the highway, and he had molding equipment to make cheesy Southwest souvenirs. I was always good in shop, and I had after-hours access to Mr. Greenway’s equipment. I thought if I couldn’t fix my brother, I’d hurt the Dautrives. Even after the fire, I went over to watch The Virginian with Mr. Dautrive every Wednesday. It was my Dad’s favorite before he got cancer.”\n“Well, he named you after the guy who wrote the original book. What you were watching the night of the fire, right? And how you sneaked Rita’s Farmer Says out of the house, installed the new disk, and replaced it.”\n“I thought I’d freak her out, mess with her mind, make her feel as shitty as the kids at school made Pete feel. It was a crappy, vicious plan, and after I left for ‘Nam, I realized how far off the rails I’d gone. But what could I do? Nobody said anything after I got home; Rita was in college and seemed to be doing OK.”\n“It was harsh stuff, but it sounded vaguely familiar. The Lotus King down the road – I assume it’s been around forever? That where the guys at Rattler’s Studio generally sent you for lunch, right?”\n“Yeah. I’d usually pick up stuff for the family on the way home, too.”\nI nodded. “Curious why you didn’t record a message to go with the frog, then I discovered you only modified the tracks for the cow, cat, horse, sheep, rooster, dog, and pig. Stopped by the Lotus King, got me an couple eggrolls, and verified they, like nearly every other Chinese-American joint, use the throwaway Chinese Zodiac placemat, which includes the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig. Each animal of the zodiac represents a cycle of years and both good and bad traits attributed to those born in each year. The zodiac gave you the inspiration for the predictions you offered about Rita’s future personality and fate. But not for the frog, turkey, bird, duck, or coyote on the Farmer Says ‘zodiac.’ You substituted the cow for the ox and the cat for the tiger and personalized it for maximum psychological effect.”\n“I was the guitarist – he was the writer,” Owen grinned before the pistol came shakily from under the counter. “Just give me the See ‘N Say.”\n“You realize how goofy that sounds,” I responded. “Relax. You really trust your trigger finger even after all those years? The statute of limitations is long past, even if anybody could figure out what to charge you with. And Rita says she gets it, that you were an angry teenager.”\nThen I dangled the yellowed plastic ring with its freshly snapped string, and set the Old Navy bag with what remained of the Farmer Says on the formica floor by the door. The gun clicked on the glass.\n“You didn’t play it for her, did you?” Owen asked quietly.\nIn fact, I’d advised her against. There are some strings, some threads you shouldn’t pull." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Kate and Me\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2241\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is stuck between two opposing sides and can’t decide which one to choose." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I screamed. With every ounce of my soul. It was the scream of someone being murdered. It was spine tingling and shook me to the core. But the scream was captured and hung in my throat. No one else heard a sound. But I swear. I was screaming.\n“Now, Catherine, dear, are you cold?” she asked. “My goodness, you are shaking. Here’s a little shawl. Put this around your shoulders.”\nShe can’t fool me. Pretending to care. They are all alike. Well, I know how to play the game. I fake a shy smile as a way to thank her. Kate would smile; I know her. I take the stupid shawl and wrapped it meekly around my shoulders. At least it’s not white like her outfit and everything else in this damn place. I am tired of the monochromatic realm I find myself in. I can’t believe I’m here again. I tried, but I need color. I need to breathe. I am alive and all they want to do is deaden me.\nWe enter the office. It’s white. Except for the chairs and a drab wooden desk.\n“Here, dear. Have a seat. The doctor will be with you momentarily. I’ll just wait with you until he arrives. Will that be all right, dear?”\nDripping with condescension. I dare not open my mouth and let the scream free. That would ruin my plan. I need to get control of it first. Before I speak. So I nod dutifully.\nAfter a few minutes, the door opens. Dr. G enters. I know his name isn’t Dr. G, but that’s what I call him. No one here knows why. But I do. He is the one in line after Drs. A, B, C, D, E and F. No names. Just a white-coated conga line. \n“Hello, Catherine. May I call you Catherine? How are you feeling today?”\nYes, you dope. That’s my name - Catherine. It’s on the paper in your hand. You can read. Congratulations.\nI can’t be snide. Stop.\n“Fine.” I mutter the word he is aching to hear. I just opened my mouth a sliver, so as not to let the scream escape. It was still in the back of my throat, pushing forward. I had to keep it locked away.\nI stare at the floor. Control…control…control. I beg the scream to cooperate.\n“Wonderful. Do you remember why you were brought in last week. . . why you are here?”\nI remember. Kate told me the police came. She scolded me for the way I behaved. They brought me here - had to medicate me, they said. I woke up in my white room - dead inside. Like a caterpillar in a cocoon. Locked away from the world, waiting to break free. It took me several days to wake up. But I am back. I can feel again.\n“So, here is the story, Catherine. We have seen you before. According to your chart, this is your third time being admitted here. Each time we discharge you, you end up back here. I think you forget to take your medicine when you are on the outside. Now, that’s a problem. The drugs I prescribe are important. You cannot skip. We don’t want to repeat that pattern this time.”\nI don’t want to be back here either, bud. Believe me. It’s Kate’s fault. She pushes me to take those meds all the time. They make me disappear. And I don’t like it. She says they are good for me. Kate would love it if I just went away. But I want to exist in a world full of color, a world full of feeling. I don’t want to live like a zombie. We don’t agree.\n“How do you think we can break this cycle?”\nMy scream has receded to my stomach. Not gone, just waiting to pounce. I can talk now but I don’t know what to say. I can make promises, but I know they will fall on deaf ears. I tried that last time. After my second visit here. They call it a visit, like it’s a vacation. \nMy eyes leave the floor. I look at Dr. G. and shrug. He won’t get it. Just like Dr. F and those that went before him.\n“Look Catherine, we are trying to help you here. But you need to help us. I am concerned that you haven’t taken all your medication, even this week. This morning we found a couple of the pills you neglected to take – that you tried to hide. Before we release you this time, I want some assurances that you will stay on your medication. It’s harder on the outside. Do you understand?”\nI try to think fast. He needs an answer. How to explain the pills . . . it is important for Dr. G to believe me. Silence would be a grave mistake. My grave.\nWhat would Kate say? She lives in their world. She understands them. I have to think. Think. Otherwise I will never get out, never see the color purple or smell the meadow again. At least they didn’t find them all. Not the ones I put in Grace’s breakfast the last few days. They think she is sick with the flu. I never did like her. Ha, ha, ha. \nStop it! Stop it before they see you. The laugh would be worse than the scream. I put on my mask. And lie. I’m good at that.\nBe sweet…\n“Dr., I do understand. I know I let some pills slide, but that was from days ago. See how well I am doing with my meds now? I know why I’m here; I had a setback. I feel much better now. I’ll stay on the program. I have too much to live for on the outside. Too many people care about me. I know that now. You won’t see me again.”\nBlah, blah, blah. I was nervous. Did I speak too fast? Too much? Used car salesman trying to sell a lemon. That’s what I am. A lemon. Did doc buy it? That is all that matters.\n“Catherine, that is wonderful. I’m glad you are on board. Look, we are going to keep you here another week and see where we are. Then I will re-evaluate to see if you are ready for the outside.”\nI feel the scream pushing up again. Another week? And then see?? I must have done something wrong. I tried to be like Kate. She would be out. Ugh, what did I do? Other than a few pills. They only found two. That’s all I had in my room. I was saving those for breakfast tomorrow. I just hadn’t decided if Gracie was to get them or someone else. A week for two pills? \nThis afternoon---I wanted out this afternoon! The scream was choking me. It was ready to spring . . . dangerously close. I was afraid to open my mouth. So I smiled and nodded. My resigned smile. Rather, my version of Kate’s resigned smile. He thinks I am ok with another week in this place.\nPlay the game…play the game…play the game.\n“Now, Catherine, before you go back to your room, it is time for your medication. Here. This is a different prescription. A little stronger than your old pills. But longer lasting. You won’t need to take your medicine as often with these. Maybe this will be a better routine so you don’t forget. You only need to take one pill in the morning and one in the evening. Two pills. Each day. You can manage that, right?”\nNo, no, no, no, no! I don’t want new, stronger drugs. I didn’t forget. Kate would never let me forget. It was on purpose. Oh, I can’t say that. Say no to drugs, just say no. . . Nancy, I am trying! \nUGH. And he’s going to watch me? Geez. Conga G doesn’t trust me. I see it in his eyes. I gotta get out of here! I can’t take it much longer. I will be dead beyond redemption soon. Another week. How can I last?\nHand extended, I took the cylindrical concoction of poison. Poison equals death. Death to me, that is. Death to all things dear. There was no escape. No way to slip it into my pocket or hold it under my tongue. He is watching me like a hawk. A shot would be next if he caught me. The shot was worse. I knew. Been there.\nNurse X handed me a glass of water. I don’t know if I am up to X in nurses. I lost count a long time ago. But I must be. X. It’s been a long conga line. \nI put the capsule in my mouth. What to do…what to do…there’s no escape.\nI swallow. \n“Good girl. Now Nurse Gloria will take you back to your room. Have a wonderful evening, Catherine.”\nDismissed. Conga G dismissed us. He leaves. I should do something. Break something. But I can’t. I have a plan. Only one more week. Stick to the plan. Stick…Stick…Stick. UGH.\n“Come, my dear. Let’s get you back to your room so you can get ready for dinner. Meatloaf and mashed potatoes are on the menu tonight. Doesn’t that sound wonderful?”\nI could already feel the fog creeping in. It won’t be long before it covers my mind. I start to mumble. And drool. Not very lady-like. I was 45 on my last birthday. That I remember. Mumbling and drooling like an idiot. A baby. An idiot baby. They are trying to kill me. Correction, they are killing me. Slowly.\n“Or, perhaps you would like to dine in your room tonight. I can bring you a tray. This new medicine can make you very tired. Just at first, dear, until your body adjusts. Um, I think it might be best for tonight - to dine in your room, I mean. I’ll bring you a tray so you can just relax this evening.”\nShe’s pretending not to notice my drool. She sees what they are doing to me. Evil white ghost. X, Y, Z. I see three.\nWe enter my room. I stumble over the threshold. She helps me to a chair to sit. My legs are a little wobbly. Before she leaves, I try to hand her the shawl back, but I miss and it falls on the floor. Good. Dirty rag. Pretty soon, oblivion will come. \nI needed to talk to Kate. Before the world goes blank.\n“I be right back, dear. I’ll bring your dinner tray. Just sit and relax for now.”\nThe door closes. Nurse so-and-so left. I am alone in my room, or so she thinks. I know Kate is here. Hiding.\n“Kate. Oh, Kate. Coast is clear. Come on out now. I know you told them about the pills. You must have. No one else knew. Answer me. We don’t have much time.”\nThe fog descends upon me. Everything is hazy. My mind is swimming. Upside down. I try to shake off the haze, but it has a firm grip on me. I feel nothing. Numb. But I am not dead yet. This is when Kate comes. She always comes just before I die. She talks like she is deadened too. Robotic. Whispering.\n“I am here, Catherine. Surrender - surrender to the fog. Do not fight it. Give in to it.”\n“I don’t like it. Kate. You betrayed me. You told them about the pills. Why, Kate?”\n“No Catherine. I did not tell them. It was a random search. They do that. You left the pills out. That’s how they found them.”\nI’m confused. Did I know they search the rooms? I’m usually pretty careful. Cobwebs. I can’t think with all the cobwebs. Darkness nears. Kate has more answers. I need answers before I die again. She is coming into focus now, while everything else fades. I need to hang on to Kate.\n“Why canno we ged alawn? The do of us. I thoot we were in dis togedda. You don like dis place eida. We ne to bake fee. Kate. We need to ged out.”\nI know my speech is slurring. I can’t think straight. Balloons popping. Memories in balloons. What is this new medication? Fast acting. Fast numbness..\n“I am the way out, Catherine. I am the only way out.”\n“Whaaaa?”\n“Your brain has betrayed you. It doesn’t think in a straight line. It zig-zags. Then it explodes. You and I are a team. But I can only zig when you zag. You need to stay on the drugs so I can zig.”\n“Whaaaa? I don unerstan you, Ka-e. Gedding dark. Hel-me.”\nThe last thing I see is the door opening. I am gone. Nurse XYZ enters.\n“Oh good, Catherine, dear. You had a little nap. Here is your dinner tray, just like I promised. Meatloaf and mashed potatoes.”\n“Thank you. And you can call me Kate.” I whisper.\nI stare at the white walls of my room. I won’t be here for long. But it doesn’t matter. I don’t mind the white. I embrace the fog, the numbness. Every movement is deliberate, slow. Molasses. It has to be. I know, it is Catherine or me. Can’t be both. Sorry, Catherine. I had to choose. You have to lose. Did I betray you? No, I saved me. Our brain has betrayed us both." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Archangel\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2726\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is convinced they’re going to be betrayed." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Leah lay next to Raph, her back pressed against his naked belly. His arm sprawled on top of the quilt. She pulled it underneath and guided his hand, holding it with her own so that it cupped her breast. But when she let her hand fall, so did his, limp, uninterested. Her breathing quickened then, and a tightness took hold of her chest and throat.\nHer thoughts began to dart back and forth between the past and the future. She thought of the not-so-distant past, when his hands used to travel over her skin as if they had hundreds of little eyes all over them, looking urgently for something they did not yet have but were sure to find, the eagerness of anticipation tingling electrically in the space between the two surfaces of skin. She thought of the very near future, of his upcoming work trip to New York, where there would surely be women. Lots of sassy, well-dressed business women, like the one with the long wavy hair and two piece suits she had seen on several of the pictures his colleague had posted on LinkedIn, of which one showed Raph standing in the middle of the group, next to her, his arm around her waist. Admittedly, everyone in the picture was touching each other or holding drinks, but still, his hand was there, on the woman's waist, whilst she, his girlfriend, worked from home in their South Downs cottage on the other side of the Atlantic, in happy anticipation of her man returning.\nAnd so now as she lay next to him she longed to feel his touch, electric like it was before, signalling to her that he was fully there, in that moment with her, not wishing to be anywhere else. She took his hand again, placing it back over her breast, and pressed her bottom against him, only to hear, seconds later, his breathing slowing down and snoring setting in.\nShe edged further over to the side of the bed, pushed his arm away, then lay in the dark listening to his breathing, counting the days that had gone by without any intimate encounters. Fifteen days seemed like a very long time, or at least a length of time after which she could reasonably expect for his hand to meet her skin with some intensity. She felt sure that if he no longer felt any interest in her body then some other body somewhere else would awaken his slumbering desire, and, worst of all, his affections would be transferred to the said body's owner.\nShe wondered how she could rekindle the connection they had shared until just a few months ago. Nothing she subtly attempted seemed to have any effect at the moment, and she didn't want to risk the humiliation of rejection by making any more direct and obvious efforts. Only recently she had worn his favourite red lace negligée and stockings for him, those had never failed to produce an immediate response before, but this time he only absently ran his fingers over the satin as he fell asleep. She hadn't yet found an explanation that she could give him if he ever found the torn red lace, stuffed out of sight behind the drawers for now. Tearing through the material had brought hot tears to flow freely down her face, bringing her some relief. She had been able to sleep after that, in her flannel pyjamas, and the next morning he didn't notice she had changed. But tonight, she lay searching for ideas, only to rebuke any promising ones in fear of rejection.\nSleep was a long time coming.\n\n*\n\nThe next morning, she sat staring through the window as her coffee went cold, oblivious of the dog watching her carefully, longing to run over the downs. His mistress didn't move, and his collar stayed on its hook much later than usual.\n‘I have needs that simply aren't being met,’ she heard her ex-husband say, as if it were yesterday. ‘I'm a man, and men need a lot of sex. That's just the way we are. Once every two or three days seems like a reasonable minimum to me, and if you can't provide that, then you really don't have a claim to exclusivity with me. This is the only option I can see which will allow us to stay together.’\nShe remembered how her heart beat in her ears then, but he went on:\n‘You'll still be my number one, the mother of my child, an indispensable cog in my mechanics, without which the machine stops.’\nShe thought how naive it was of him to think that he would have any form of cognitive control over the inclinations of his heart and the impulses of his body. The dull scratched cup he had been desperately sucking on for years but which never quite quenched his thirst, never truly parted with the sweet sap he longed to sip, no not to sip, rather to knock back and swallow in one gulp, this old cup could not compete for the attention of his lips and eyes with the shining, shimmering new cups that lined up to oblige him with endless supplies of warm milk and honey when he was melancholic, and ruby red wine when euphoria wrapped her voluptuous velvet cloak around his nakedness. The inclination to soak his lips in any cup that gleamed at him had until then only been kept in check by the rigorous structure of monogamy. Once that structure melted away the impulses revealed themselves as they had always secretly been: primal, selfish, all-consuming and by no means controllable by such a feeble thing as a human mind. And so, the dull cup that she was found itself quickly relegated, slipping down through the numbers. She flailed as she failed to keep a grip on number one, then number two escaped her, and as she slid further her foothold was looser on each successive rung of the ladder until she landed on the ground with a numberless thud. And at each stage of her fall she was reminded that had she been able to fulfil those primal needs herself, the protective structure would never have teetered and she would still be sheltered, albeit stifled, in the warmest, deepest chamber of his tepid, shallow heart, or at any rate the deepest any other human could burrow, which in reality was just below the surface, as only higher things were allowed to penetrate into the farthest darkest recesses.\nAnd now as she sat watching raindrops drip down the kitchen window, she felt as if she was on a new ladder, still on the top rung, but she only had to look at her feet to see the other rungs reaching down into a thick fog, so that it was unclear how far the ladder descended and what was at the bottom.\nShe reassured herself that something would surely happen that evening, her man would come through the front door, like he had so many times before, and coming up behind her as she chopped vegetables would slip his arms around her waist, let his hands slide under her clothes and then spin her around to kiss her, signalling the beginning of an evening of suggestive games culminating in experiences so intense it was hard to believe in hindsight that they had begun in play.\nBut last night she had hoped for the same, and nothing had happened, just like every night this week. He had come in, kissed her absently, although long enough to make her own body tingle in anticipation, and then turned in indifference to other occupations which seemed to absorb him completely. She feared the same for this evening and so she dragged a heavy heart through the day, going through motions around the house, not sharing in her dog's quivering excitement when they went outside, and unable to focus on anything at her desk. She was glad, for once, that little Benny was at his dad's, as she had nothing to offer him today.\nShe cooked a steak that evening, with crispy roasted potatoes and caramelised shallots. Raph ate it appreciatively, asking what the occasion was that warranted the preparation of his favourite food. She told him there was nothing in particular, and he did not kiss her when she turned her grey face to him. Her red-rimmed gaze was met with an affectionate squeeze of her shoulder before he rose to wash the dishes.\n\n*\n\nShe went to bed early that night and waited for him in the soft light, clean and smelling of perfume. He seemed to find a thousand things to do before joining her. Then he didn't bother to shower, just switched off the light and lay behind her, his still arm weighing on top of the blanket again. Now she couldn't keep the doubts to herself any longer, nor bear searching through her own mind for an explanation, and demanded one from him.\n‘I just don't get it,’ her words cut through his drowsy state.\n‘What?’ he seemed surprised, and still sleepy.\n‘It's like your body no longer responds to mine,’ she expanded. And then: ‘I don't think you feel attracted to me anymore.’\nAs the words hung there between them she started to question her feelings, to doubt whether there was any truth in them at all, now they were out of her head and into the shared space. But she reminded herself how his hands hung lifeless, how his kisses had become shorter, less engaged, more affectionate than sensual, and her courage returned.\n‘Don't be silly, of course I am,’ came his untroubled reply.\nShe sat up now and switched the light back on. He squinted up at her from his pillow, surrendering to the idea that he wasn't going to sleep as early as he had planned.\n‘Then why do you not seek out my skin anymore? And why, when I put your hand there, do you just let it hang, all limp?’\n‘Oh sweetheart, of course I want you, I just haven't been wanting to bother you.’\n‘Bother me?’ her convictions began to waver.\n‘Yes. You've been looking very down these last couple of weeks. Red-eyed even, sometimes. And every setback in your work seems to really make you plummet.’\nLeah stared at Raph quietly for a moment then, but still felt there was more truth in his touch than in these words.\n‘You don't bother me by wanting me,’ she replied, ‘and even if you were trying not to bother me, I would still feel some kind of frustration in your touch. If you needed me, you couldn't repress it completely for my benefit.’\n‘Of course I can, and I do, because I love you,’ he answered, but she continued, ignoring the declaration which still did not convince her.\nShe couldn't stop the words now:\n‘Is it porn? Is that what you're doing while I wait for you in bed?’\n‘No sweet, I save all my energy for you,’ he tried to reassure her.\n‘Or is there somebody else? Somebody whose body yours does respond to?’ her tone was sharpening now.\nHis ipad lay on the bedside table. She grabbed it and swiped up, turning it to his face to gain access. He watched patiently as she scrolled through his browsing history, not finding any porn.\n‘Why are there so many car sale websites on here?’ she asked. She knew he loved his car.\n‘Look at that open tab,’ he replied.\nThe window opened on the screen and pictures of a camper van appeared.\n‘Flick through them,’ he suggested.\nShe saw the outside of the vehicle, an original 1970s Mercedes, painted a whimsical pale green, and inside, wood panelling lined the walls and ceiling, painted white. There were even patterned tiles over the kitchen sink, and checked curtains with ties.\n‘Is that the kind of thing you were talking about?’ he asked.\n‘Yes,’ she answered. ‘Only this one is even nicer than I imagined.’\nBut she wasn't done investigating. Her finger travelled to the Messenger icon and she opened his chat history. There were holiday pictures from his best friend, daily messages from his mother who leaned on him a lot in very many ways and who received only the sweetest replies, and the others were all from various car sales websites, answering questions about camper vans. She closed Messenger and her finger travelled to the Instagram icon.\n‘No darling, not those, please,’ he said softly.\n‘What are you hiding?’ she asked, the pressure building in her ears as she opened it, and her heart beating in her throat.\nA message from his sister caught her attention:\n‘That's great Raphy, I want to know every detail.’\nShe opened the chat and scrolled back a few messages.\n‘I'm ready, big sis'. I've got the ring.’\n‘My little bro'! Getting married!’\n‘Hold your horses, she still has to say yes.’\n‘She will. She loves you to pieces. When are you popping the question?’\n‘Tonight.’\nThe messages were from that afternoon.\n‘Oh,’ said Leah softly.\nThen she thought back to the red eyes she had seen in the mirror that night before going to bed, and how quiet she had been whilst he ate his steak.\n‘I don't think I would have proposed to me tonight either,’ she said.\nHe cocked his head and smiled at her, bemused.\n‘So, it's really true then? You just didn't want to bother me?’ she asked.\n‘Really true. Cross my heart,’ he replied.\nShe looked at him for a while, frowning, and biting her lip.\nSeemingly minutes later she managed to formulate another question:\n‘Why would you want to marry me, when I bring you so little? Nothing's happened between us for sixteen days now.’\n‘Sixteen? Is that how longs it's been? And you feel like you haven't brought me anything since then?’\nHer frown deepened in response.\n‘Leah, each time I leave this house, you send me off with love, after pouring me a mug of love and making small talk about love over breakfast, and that’s between filling Ben's lunchbox with love and stuffing the dog's bowl with love. Then I come home, you greet me at the door with love, listen to me with love whilst I talk about my day, and pour love into my ears as you talk about your own. You serve me love for dinner and spread love on the dishes for me to find in the sink. The only days there is a little less love are the ones when it's washed away by tears I don't understand. And all I want to do is turn off that tear tap and I don't know how. Partly for me, because I want the love back, but mostly because I just want to see you happy.’\nLeah was quiet for a long moment and then said:\n‘I want to see you happy too. And I want you to bother me whenever you're in the bothering mood.’\nHe put his forehead on hers.\n‘Can I bother you now?’\nShe kissed him in response.\nHis searching hands travelled over her skin. Occasionally he would stop them in their tracks as they spread their warmth over her shoulder or her forearm or the small of her back, and he would smile and say, ‘This particular patch of skin here, I really missed this one,’ until he had covered almost her entire body and declared every inch of it to be especially soft and missable. And her skin may have been covered in tiny light switches, so intently her eyes glowed, bringing a serious look over his own face, as if making tender love to her were a thing of grave importance.\n\n*\n\nAfterwards, he lay next to her, pushing back the hair from her eyes. Then he rolled over to the bedside cabinet and took something from the drawer, hiding it in his fist. He caught her hand under the covers and when he let go his warm touch left a cold metallic trace on one of her fingers.\n‘It's a bit old-fashioned I'm afraid, it was my great-grandmother's,’ he said.\nThree delicate stones were set in a line, a small diamond between two sapphires. They glistened even in the dim light.\n‘No,’ she said. ‘It's perfect.’" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: No Path to Forgiveness\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 2403\n\nPrompt:\n\nStart your story with an unexpected betrayal." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Who is that?”, said Lorraine. She was looking over her boyfriend’s shoulder at his iPhone. It was a pretty girl with shoulder-length red hair and bright blue eyes, a sparing touch of lip gloss, standing, devil-may-care, on a rocky waterfront, pine trees in the background, somewhere along the coast, somewhere local. She was pretty and thin, had good skin too. \nConrad swiped upwards and the girl disappeared.\n“Who is that girl”, said Lorraine, “She’s very pretty”. Too pretty, like she existed for the purpose of being looked at and nothing more. The girl's copper toned hair seemed familiar to Lorraine, but she wasn’t a customer at the salon. The girl must be an influencer, she thought. Perhaps she'd seen her on Conrad’s laptop, or his phone?\n“Oh, it’s nobody… just some woman,” said Conrad. He seemed distracted, bored, slumped on the clean sofa in grubby clothes, staring at his phone. Always staring at that damned thing. He was always somewhere else. \n“Well, it must be somebody,” said Lorraine. Conrad seemed shifty, avoiding eye-contact. The girl had bright blue eyes, almond shaped. “Have I’ve seen her before? The color of her hair,,,”\nConrad interrupted her. “I dunno, Lo, these things just end up on my phone”. He turned the phone off and stood up from the sofa. He looked at his watch, he looked out the window. “I’d better get going. I need to get stuff from the hardware store and dump the trash at the transfer station”.\n“Wait, wait up a bit”, said Lorraine. She waddled across the kitchen. The baby was getting big and none of her clothes fit properly anymore. She felt ugly and heavy. “Can we talk?”. She wanted to look him in the eyes.\n“No. Lo, I've really got to go”. Busy. Stay busy. If he stayed busy long enough, everything would work itself out, somehow. Talking was tricky, questions were traps.\nThe front door slammed shut and moments later his pickup truck coughed smoke and roared out of the driveway. \n+++\nLorraine was too much for Conrad.\nToo much flesh, too much personality, too much of everything. All these questions; they made his head hurt. That big needy face and the way she looked at him like everything was urgent and important. Too much woman already, and now a baby too! He pulled the truck over alongside a pile of wooden pallets. The transfer station was a good place to stop and think without Lo pestering him.\nBeth. Beth was her name. He met her on a dating app; she was so pretty, and so sad. She gave him her cellphone number and sent him some photos. She was so interesting, so interested… in him, in his work, sports and stuff. He sent her some photos. She sent more photos, videos, explicit. She really liked him.\nWhat harm could there be in flirting? He sent her some photos, a video, explicit. \n“We should hookup sometime”, Beth messaged him, “you are a very kind and good-looking man.”\n“I’m not sure” he replied, “I’m in a relationship, sort of…you know how it is?”\nBeth knew how it is.\n“How about we video-chat?” Beth replied, “try this website”. She sent him instructions.\nHe logged onto the website, entered his personal information, his credit card number. \nThat was a week ago. \nA car drove by; its trunk was jammed with trash bags. Maybe he should delete Beth from his phone, from his laptop? Maybe. He swiped through his favorite photos of her. Maybe, but later.\n+++\nLorraine slumped in the chair at the back of the hairdressing shop; this might be her last week of work; she’d miss the money and she would miss the small-town gossip. \nGloria was sitting opposite her, phone in hand, chewing gum, and reading about Princess Diana’s love affairs; flick, flick, flicking at her screen while Lo babbled on about her good-for-nothing blockhead boyfriend. The first time she met him, this Conrad, he came and picked Lo up from the shop in his rusty old truck, and from the get-go she could tell that he was much more interested in her – Gloria – than in Lorraine – delusional - but six months later, and there’s a baby on the way…\n“He doesn’t touch me anymore”, said Lorraine.\n“Well, you are pregnant”, said Gloria, “I mean, what is he supposed to touch?”.\n“That’s ridiculous Gloria… I mean, it’s not just about sex,” said Lorraine. \n“Is that right?” said Gloria. Single, decidedly single. She still had her figure; she still had the glam.\n“He doesn’t even talk to me anymore, except bullshit stuff.”\nGloria chewed, open mouthed. She was losing interest in Lorraine’s predicament. Lorraine would be gone soon, lost in the confines of motherhood. \n“Are you going to get married? How long’s it been now, a year? And now the Baby?”\n“Yeah. We’re going to get married in the Spring, after the baby has settled in”.\n“Are you sure about that?“ said Gloria. It was an absent-minded question and she wished she’d not said it, but then again, there was something about Conrad that she really didn’t like. She set her iPhone aside.\n“What do you mean?” said Lorraine, huffed up and defensive.\n“Well, Lo, he never takes you out, he never talks about you, and he’s got a wandering eye”, said Gloria.\n“Anything else I should know?” said Lorraine, vexed.\n+++\nConrad had been out drinking at the local bar last night, or that’s what he said. Lorraine stayed up, waiting, but he was in no state to talk. She’d hardly slept. \n“You were talking in your sleep” said Lorraine “You kept moaning about Beth”.\n“Fuck, Lo, it was only a dream,” said Conrad. He was groggy and his breath was foul. Did she say “Beth”, or did he dream that too?\n“It must have been a good dream”, she said, observing a swell in his pajama pants.\n“It’s not like I can control my dreams… they don’t mean anything, either”, said Conrad. He turned his back on her.\n“The internet girl, her name is Beth”, said Lorraine. \n“I don’t know what you are talking about”, he said.\n“You left her up on your laptop screen”, said Lorraine.\n“Chris’ sake, Lo, can’t I get any fucking privacy?”, he said, angry now.\n“There’s a big difference between fucking privacy and fucking secrets”, said Lorraine. \n+++\nLorraine opened the door and collapsed into the arms of a giant.\n“Show me what you found out”, said Lou Carrol. He was in uniform; the police cruiser was parked outside. He walked past her into the tiny apartment. It was a mess. An empty tub of ice cream on the kitchen table. She was a mess.\n“I’m not sure about this”, said Lorraine, and she immediately started sobbing. \nLou gave his daughter a hug, patted her back. She was getting big. The baby looked due anytime. \n“It’s going to be alright”, he said. He needed his daughter to calm down while he thought this through.\nLou tolerated Conrad as best he could. He’d sometimes see Conrad at the local bar, stand him a beer or two – family and all that – but he really didn’t like the boy. The way he leered at women when they weren’t watching. Those piggy eyes in that too-big head.\n“You aren’t going to hurt him, are you?”, said Lorraine, between sniffles.\n“Not unless he deserves it”, he said, “show me the computer, so I can see for myself”. \nLorraine sat down at the kitchen table, opened Conrad’s laptop, entered the password that she’d found on the yellow Post-it note. A picture of a girl popped up on the screen, explicit. The sobbing resumed. Her world was falling apart. \n“You sure that’s the girl?” said Lou. The girl was pretty. Too pretty.\nShe closed the photo, to reveal another, this one of Conrad… then another, also of Conrad… Not so pretty.\n“Oh Jeez… Ok, I’ve got the idea. Just close that thing down”, said Lou waving the laptop away with his hand. He’d seen enough of Conrad’s white flesh. \n“Daddy, I’m so sad!” said Lorraine, collapsing onto the table, crying uncontrollably now. \"I thought we’d get married after the baby was born, but now, I’m scared Conrad’s going to leave me…and then what am I going to do?”\n“He’s not going to leave you”, said Lou. This girl - this Beth, if she even existed - she was way too pretty for that deadbeat, “but I can make that happen, if you want”.\n+++\nConrad was in his truck, sitting in the parking lot outside the local diner. He looked at Beth on his phone. He could be happy with this girl, and she would definitely be happy with him. Bairstow wasn’t so far away. He could be there in the hour, drive around and look for her in the pickup. A girl like that would be easy to find. Maybe she’d be hanging out at the waterfront, near those pines.\nA message from his bank popped up on his iPhone screen: it was a fraud alert, covering Beth’s face.\n+++\nConrad jumped when he opened the apartment door. “Holy Jesus! You scared the crap out of me”, he said. \nLorraine’s dad, Big Lou the Police Chief, was standing in the apartment and he was wearing his uniform. Conrad looked back over his shoulder, but the police cruiser wasn’t parked outside. Nor could he see Lorraine in the apartment.\nConrad had picked up a bunch of cheap hot-house flowers at the gas station.\n“They’re for Lorraine. I thought she’d like them,” said Conrad. He grinned; Big Lou would catch the drift, Big Lou knew how things worked, but Big Lou didn’t look impressed. In fact, Big Lou looked downright hostile and his right hand wasn’t so far away from his gun.\n“She’s at work”, said the Chief, “I’ve been waiting for you. You piece of shit”. His hand continued to hover around the magazine grip of the gun.\nThe blood drained from Conrad’s face. “Wait! Wait a minute! There’s some kind of mistake”, he said. The flowers dropped to the floor, and he held his empty hands up in front of him, “Chief, I ain’t done anything that I can’t undo, I promise.”\nThe Chief stepped away from the kitchen table, the laptop was open. The internet girl, Beth, was sitting cross-legged on a bed, wearing diddly-squat. \n“Oh Christ! That girl! She’s not real. She’s some kind of porn thing that I came across. Just once, but Lorraine’s gone and blown it out of proportion”.\n“It isn’t the only thing blown out of proportion, is it?” said the Chief. He turned slightly and clicked on the mouse. It was a photo of Conrad; the kind that cannot be unseen.\nConrad rushed forward, and the Chief stepped aside, but didn’t go for his gun. Conrad slammed the laptop shut. \n“Please don’t show this picture to anyone. I beg you,” said Conrad, his face flushed.\nThe apartment was a mess, the sink was full of unwashed dishes, the kitchen table was piled high with unopened mail and old shopping bags, the sofa looked ragged and greasy, the floor was covered in filth. It didn’t look like the kind of place to raise a kid. The Chief wrinkled his nose in disgust. This was not Lorraine; she was raised a neatnik, but then she met this man, this fool.\n“You can’t fix this situation”, said the Chief, “only Lorraine can do that for you, if she has the heart for it.”\nConrad was shifty, looking around like he was trying to find a place to hide. \n“It starts with your state of mind. What are you thinking Conrad? I need to know, Son”. The Chief’s hand was hovering near his gun again.\nConrad felt exposed, vulnerable. What if Lorraine sent these photos to her friends? To women, no problem, but to other men? He'd never be able to show his face around town again.\n“Embarrassed? Ashamed?”, said Conrad, scrambling for the right word, \"Yes, that's it... I feel shame,\" he sounded relieved, like he'd found the answer that would make things right and convince Lorraine and the Chief to bury his little secret.\nThe Chief was unmoved. “Unfortunately, that isn’t enough. Shame is about how you see yourself; it’s not about what you gone done. It's not about right and wrong”.\nBig Lou was talking in riddles. “I don’t understand,” said Conrad.\n“No, you don’t, and that’s why there’s no path to forgiveness for you”, said the Chief.\n” But I haven’t even cheated on Lorraine. I’ve never even seen that girl\", said Conrad.\n” It doesn’t matter,” said the Chief. There was a full-force finality in the expression, that ended things between them.\nThe Chief was looking for guilt, but there was none.\n+++\nThe appointment at the pediatric clinic finished at noon. Lorraine was still getting used to the idea of going solo, but it was hard work. She bundled the baby into the back seat in the of her father's Subaru hatchback.\nIt was a gorgeous sunny day, so she made a quick detour into Bairstow town and stopped near the waterfront. The Baby would enjoy the sun, the crash of the waves on the rocks, and the scent of pines.\nThere was a girl, a pretty girl walking on the rocks, taking selfies. She had bright blue, almond shaped eyes, bob-cut blond hair.\n“Hi, are you Beth, by chance?”, said Lorraine.\nThe girl looked startled and backed off a bit.\n“No, I ain’t who you think I am”, said the girl. She was pretty, an adornment… thin and finely drawn, perfect skin. \n“I’m sorry, I made a mistake. I thought you were someone else”.\n“That happens occasionally,” said the girl. She was still a bit wary, but she was also interested in the baby. It was just the three of them down by on the rocky shore.\n“What’s the baby’s name?”, she asked, edging towards Lorraine to get a better look. \n“Lou-Anne,” said Lorraine, holding the baby up so that the girl could see her properly.\nThe girl stared at the baby like she was a creature from outer space, “Oh, she’s so beautiful. Would you mind if I held her, just for a moment?”\nThat moment felt to Lorraine like the end of one thing, the beginning of another. \nIt felt like forgiveness." } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Special\n\nGenre: coming-of-age\n\nWord Count: 1128\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite a love story without using the word “love.”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "She sits in the front of my desk\nIn the start of my freshman high school year\nI never knew if she noticed me\nSo I sat quietly in fear\n\nI saw her walk in on her first day\nShe didn't look me in the eye\nBut I knew she was something special\nAnd I had no idea why\n\nWe passed each other in the halls\nYour classic high school budding romance\nI wish I could just talk to her\nBut I didn't want to blow my chance\n\nI was enrolled in music class\nWhere I always played my guitar\nBut one day I had an idea\nThe best one I'd had by far\n\nOne day in the school courtyard\nWhen just a few students were talking\nI sat waiting patiently\nUntil I saw her walking\n\nShe sat down by a friend at a picnic bench\nI saw her stop to eat\nThen when she got comfortable\nI stood up on my seat\n\nI took the guitar off my back\nI took a deep breath that was long\nThen her and I met eyes\nAnd I began to sing my song\n\n\"Over every river.\nOver the great blue sky\nOver every crop's summer field\nIt could be just you and I\n\nEverytime I look,\nInto those bright blue eyes\nI see something maybe you don't\nGirl I ain't telling you lies\n\nYou were meant to be mine\nI was meant to be yours\nSince the day I saw you\nI knew heaven open up the door\n\nTo give me the most beautiful girl\nIn the whole entire world\nAnd ain't nothing going to take me from you\nCause your special\"\n\nThe whole courtyard was silent\nAnd she was sitting amazed\nThen she got up from her table\nAnd came over my way\n\nI felt my heart beat faster\nI don't know what to do\nI had the courage and wits to stand up\nBut but now I had no clue\n\nShe came up close to my face\nThe courtyard was as quiet as could be\nI blushed and began to stutter\nAnd she simply said,\n“See you tomorrow at the cafe at 3:00.”\n\nThe next day had arrived\nI get all nicely dressed\nMy family of course teased\nBut I just wanted her to be impressed\n\nI arrived at 3:00 no later\nI looked for her at all the tables\nThen I saw her in a yellow dress\nSo beautiful there are no perfect labels\n\nWe talked and laughed and shared our hobbies\nWe were so much in tune\nShe also told me, “My name’s Bobby.”\nAnd I said my name was “Haroun.”\n\nAfter the first date\nThere were many more\nAnd one day on a evening picnic\nAnd sang to her as I did before\n\n\n\"Over every river.\nOver the great blue sky\nOver every crop's summer field\nIt could be just you and I\n\nEverytime I look,\nInto those bright blue eyes\nI see something maybe you don't\nGirl I ain't telling you lies\n\nYou were meant to be mine\nI was meant to be yours\nSince the day I saw you\nI knew heaven open up the door\n\nTo give me the most beautiful girl\nIn the whole entire world\nAnd ain't nothing going to take me from you\nCause your special\"\n\nYears had went on\nAnd then came the day\nAfter lots of preparation\nI made her my fiance\n\nLater at the engagement party\nI sang her my song again\nThen later at our wedding\nI sang it as a husband\n\nBut someone was invited\nWho we didn't really know\nFriends of friends of friends of friends\nI think his name was Bo\n\nHe pulled me aside\nAnd gave me an offer\n“Play that song on the station.\nand get paid for you and her.”\n\nI waited a couple days\nAnd then I told her about the guy\nWe really both felt hesitant\nBut she said, “I think you should give it a try.”\n\nI met him at the station\nAll prepped up and ready to sing\nIt was on all the radios\nFor everyone’s listening\n\nIt started playing in the cars\nThen it popped up more online\nI hope that this didn't take away what was special\nFrom this song of mine\n\nIt played in the grocery stores\nIt played in the mall\nIt played In the doctor's office\nIt played at halftimes in football\n\nIt played as alarms\nIt played as ringtones\nIt played in movie trailers\nIt played in everyone's home\n\nWhen I thought I couldn't take it anymore\nI was hired to sing on a stage like it was a banger\nWhen I got to singing\nMy heart slowly filled with anger\n\nI saw my lady in the concert\nAnd when I looked her in the eye\nI felt my heartbreak and two\nAnd I took the mic and just said, “Bye”\n\nThe whole crowd stood in silence\nThen there was an uproar\nI just couldn't care less\nIf people said, “Encore!”\n\nBobby ran behind the curtain\nAnd pushed between the guards\nShe saw me sitting down and saw me hurt’n\nSifting through some cards\n\n“What are those?” she asked solemnly\n“It's what we used to send each other.\nThose days of when I sent you my song\nAnd it wasn't just a bother.”\n\nShe bent her head down and took a breath.\n“Hun, there is something you need to remember.”\n“What is that?” I asked, exasperated.\n“That we are together.”\n\nI put the cards beside me\nAnd wiped away a tear\nDid it really matter\nIf my song was the best of the year\n\nWe both made a mistake\nThat was sure\nWe didn't care about the money\nLike we thought we did before\n\nWe got up and left\nAnd drove all the way back where we were meant to be\nI pulled out my guitar\nAnd sang to her quietly\n\n\n\"Over every river.\nOver the great blue sky\nOver every crop's summer field\nIt could be just you and I\n\nEverytime I look,\nInto those bright blue eyes\nI see something maybe you don't\nGirl I ain't telling you lies\n\nYou were meant to be mine\nI was meant to be yours\nSince the day I saw you\nI knew heaven open up the door\n\nTo give me the most beautiful girl\nIn the whole entire world\nAnd ain't nothing going to take me from you\nCause your special\"\n\nShe rested her head on my shoulder\n\nAnd we both knew what was truly special\nIt wasn't any of the money\nIt wasn't that at all\n\nWe both had each other\nAnd as I caringly held my wife\nThen she whispered to me\n“We're what's special in our life.”" } ]

[ { "role": "system", "content": "Create A Story Based on the Users Inputed Genre, Word Count, and Story Title\n\nthe story should follow the title but be creative." }, { "role": "user", "content": "Story Title: Fait Accompli\n\nGenre: contemporary\n\nWord Count: 1208\n\nPrompt:\n\nWrite about someone who is convinced they’re going to be betrayed." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was only a yoghourt. I mean, what’s a pot of curdled dairy product between work colleagues?! The ‘consume-by’ date on the lid was almost up anyway. And it wasn’t even very nice. But I was peckish, what can I say? When the hunger hits, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do, right?\nThere it was, at the back of the fridge in the break room, neglected, forgotten … I thought. No. It belonged to Beasley of all people – a stickler for the rules if ever there was one. Should a pen of his go missing – I say ‘his’, but they’re actually company-issue – there’s a helluva kerfuffle.\nI chose a moment when most of the office were in the weekly status meeting (I wasn’t at it because I’ve only been here a month; I’m on probation, as it were). I grabbed the yoghourt and a spoon and sat in a corner – against the same wall as the door-less doorway, hidden from the prying eyes of anyone that might pass along the corridor.\nI was scraping the last bits from the sides of the pot when Mandy came in. Mandy’s the receptionist, which is why she wasn’t in the meeting either. She was the first person I met on my first day. I didn’t expect such a gushing greeting from her, to be honest. I know that receptionists have to be pleasant to anyone arriving, but her face lit up when she raised her eyes from whatever it was she was doing. And she seemed to go beyond the call of duty by taking me personally to the general manager’s office, pointing out the various departments on the way, and introducing me to random people we bumped into.\nSince then, I’ve come to know why I got the VIP treatment: she has a thing for me, and it must have been crush at first sight. On my second day, I arrived at the office to find a small package on my desk: a cream cake with a message: Sweet On You. She didn’t sign it, but later in the day she saw me in the corridor.\n“Enjoy your cake, Stuart?” she said, putting on a voice that I imagine she thought seductive.\n“Er, yeah. It was … lovely … thanks,” I replied, effectively acknowledging who’d left the cake, and that I apparently found it acceptable to be receiving a gift from someone who was, at the time, practically a stranger. She smiled a much-too-wide smile and made her way back to reception, happily humming a tune to herself.\nI didn’t have the presence of mind to question her about it. If I had done, I might have been able to nip the business in the bud. As it was, I kept receiving little offerings – not every day, but often enough for it to feel like a routine. There might be a chocolate bar waiting for me, or a can of cola, or a football magazine (she soon found out that I love football). And a short time after each gift, she made sure I knew it came from her.\nNow, I joined the company because I desperately need the job. I was out of work for 18 months and was forced to run down my savings. As I said, I’m on probation; I just want to keep my head down, do my work to the best of my ability, and try to impress enough to be kept on. Mandy would be a dangerous distraction, and while fraternization with colleagues isn’t overtly forbidden, I’m afraid it would be frowned upon by the powers that be; it’s a very conservative company.\nI’ve spent the month trying to avoid her as much as possible, and I’ve turned down invitations – to have lunch, to go to the cinema, to have a walk in the park. She’s quite attractive, as receptionists often are; in other circumstances, I might be tempted, but the possible complications have so far trumped any desire I might have to accept her advances.\nNot to mention the fact that this apparent obsession of hers fair gives me the willies, if I’m honest; I’ve seen that film where the lover boils the family’s pet rabbit! So I’ve managed to fend her off … until today, that is.\nBeasley reported the stolen yoghourt to his line manager, who brought it up with the general manager. An impromptu general meeting was called, this time with all members of staff present.\nWe were packed into the board room, some sitting at the table, most lining the walls, two or three deep. When we were all assembled, the general manager – Mr Stones, as hard as his name – called us to order.\n“Good afternoon,” he said, surveying the room; I found myself staring out of the window to avoid uncomfortable eye contact. “This won’t take long as I know we all have work to do. It has come to my attention that there has been a theft of an item of foodstuff from the break room.”\nFoodstuff? Stones keeping it classy, I thought.\n“Now,” he went on, “We here at Bartlett & Baker pride ourselves on our teamwork. Without that, we might as well pack our bags and go home. And teamwork depends on trust in one another. Theft – however minor it may be in terms of the value of the item stolen – undermines that. Which is why we need to stamp it out before it corrodes our mutual trust. To this end, we shall be offering a small reward to anyone who may have information about the incident. Once again: it may seem like a minor matter, but we don’t need to be reminded that corrosion starts with the tiniest spot of rust.”\nHe paused there to scan us again with his eyes. This time I turned and saw Mandy gazing at me unflinchingly from across the room. My heart sank.\nWhen Stones had subjected us all to his scrutiny, he finished off his address.\n“You can speak to your line manager if you have any ideas. Alternatively, if you wish to remain anonymous, there will be a box left in reception. Once again, I want to stress the importance of this matter, and the need to clear it up as quickly as possible. For the moment, that is all. Now, back to work.”\nWith that, he picked his way through to the door and exited, leaving behind him a hubbub that spilled out into the corridor as we filed back to our desks.\nI found myself looking over my shoulder for the rest of the day, half-expecting to see my line manager bearing down on me with figurative handcuffs. After all, there was someone who had information about the theft, and after my rebuffing of her overtures…\nBut the afternoon wore on and no ‘arrest’ came, so it was with some relief that I packed up my things at five o’clock and made my way out.\nPast reception.\nI can’t begin to describe the depth of the unease I felt to see the finger tapping the box, placed on the reception desk, and Mandy’s trademark much-too-wide smile.\nThen came the conspiratorial wink." } ]