Secrets
The Last Voicemail
The voicemail disappeared while my thumb was still on the screen. That is the first thing I need to confess. Not after some long sequence of bad decisions. Not after the lying, or the editing, or the careful little adjustments I made in the name of love. It began with one ordinary movement: my hand, her phone, a cracked glass screen, the tiny trash icon in the corner.
By Jason Hair-Wynn5 months ago in Confessions
There's No Going Back
Anna never knew there was another world trapped inside her great grandmother's music box. *** On a gray, rainy Saturday in the middle of April, Anna found herself rummaging around in the attic for no reason in particular. She had just turned 14 and had already tried all of her friend's phone numbers that morning looking for company. And of course, she heard all the usual, sheepish and obviously rehearsed excuses answer on the other end.
By Maddy Newt5 months ago in Confessions
My First Love Was a Mirror
For 23 years, I had an enemy. She lived in my bathroom. My bedroom. Every shop window I passed. She had my eyes. My scars. My failures written across her face. She was my first love. And I hated her.The Girl in the Glass. I was 8 when I first learned to flinch at mirrors. “you look fat now,” an aunt said at a wedding, pinching my cheek. The mirror agreed. I was 14 when I learned to avoid them. Acne, braces, “you’d be pretty if.” The mirror kept receipts
By sonu6 months ago in Confessions
The Good Wife. Runner-Up in I Made It Worse Challenge.
Men wearing wet-suits dragged a body up from the depths of Wheatley River just before the bridges opened for morning traffic. They huddled in waist-high water, like nature’s pallbearers, faces ghostly pale beneath the blinking emergency lights, their breath clouding into the freezing air. The woman’s matted blonde hair stiffened with frost while chunks of broken ice bumped gently along the rivers bank unable to keep up with the fast-moving current.
By K.H. Obergfoll6 months ago in Confessions
Oh no, I can't sew
Made It Worse Challenge: The Prompt - Write a true or fictional confession about a situation where you tried to fix something and only made it worse. Trying to fix something can feel like progress, even when it isn’t. Good intentions have a way of complicating things. Start with the moment something goes wrong, then follow the attempt to set it right. Each step should move the situation further off course, whether through misjudgment, overcorrection, or simple misunderstanding. The voice can be reflective, defensive, or matter-of-fact, but it should stay close to the logic that led things there. Let the piece hold on the outcome. What matters is not just that it got worse, but how and why it did.
By Denise E Lindquist6 months ago in Confessions
The Road to Hell. Runner-Up in I Made It Worse Challenge.
Framing Hanley blasted through my cheap headphones that I used at work. I had been mopping for what felt like forever... the guys in the labs had really trashed the place today, and of course the night crew—me and old Ed, who could barely move and just really hung on to the cleaning cart that squeaked all the way up and down the halls—got stuck with all the work.
By Alicia Anspaugh6 months ago in Confessions
Cleaning Up for Vanessa. Runner-Up in I Made It Worse Challenge. Top Story - May 2026.
I logged in to Vanessa’s computer and was immediately disgusted. So much crap on her desktop! This has to be cleaned up. First, let's drag all the files to the trash. Next thing is to fix the desktop appearance from the standard view to her favorite color, yellow, and put a graphic of all the planets down the side. The screen isn’t bright enough, so I'll adjust that in the settings.
By Andrea Corwin 6 months ago in Confessions
DARLEEN'S PHONE. Runner-Up in I Made It Worse Challenge.
The music was still playing inside, though it no longer sounded like a wedding. Voices drifted out into the garden in brief bursts: someone shouting a name, a glass breaking, waiters trying uselessly to calm people who no longer wanted to be calmed.
By Isidora Luna6 months ago in Confessions
