Young Adult

Loneliness and chess
I thought I'd be playing the last game of chess in my life against myself. But in my old age, fate played a trick on me. "I moved White toward him without saying anything. I wanted to see what he would do. He reached for a pawn and moved e2-e4. Classic. I responded symmetrically. We played without a word. He didn't look at me once, and I only looked at him out of the corner of my eye."
By piotrmak10 months ago in Fiction
The Archives. Top Story - October 2025.
The Archives Walking to her post she noticed her manager shuffling through papers. “What’s wrong?” She asked. The stern stare in her manager’s eyes made her forget she showed interest. Her boss has always been a hardcore man, when he walked you can tell he was going somewhere important. When he talked you can tell he meant business. He was always dressed and had a significant amount of respect throughout the company. He was mean but in the right way, a way that earned him the title of boss. Lately, she has noticed this has been disorganized, and she strolled in today to see what was going on, his desk was messy, he didn’t smile like his usual self, and he smelled like he hadn’t showered in weeks.
By Charelle Landers10 months ago in Fiction
Coffee, Leaves, and Wagging Tails
Most mornings, he grabbed his cup of coffee and disappeared into his office for another morning of clacking away while listening to the podcast fitting the moment.
By Matthew J. Fromm10 months ago in Fiction
Echoes of the Soul: Urdu Stories That Awaken the Heart
Urdu literature is a garden of emotions — filled with fragrance, sorrow, love, and reflection. Every story carries a heartbeat, a hidden lesson, and a whisper from the soul. These timeless tales are not just about characters; they are about life itself — about forgiveness, honesty, sacrifice, and kindness. They awaken something deep within us and remind us that to be human is to feel, to care, and to grow.
By hamad khan10 months ago in Fiction
How I Stopped Comparing Myself to Others
I used to measure my worth by other people’s timelines. If someone got a new job, I wondered why I hadn’t. If a friend posted travel photos, I questioned why my life seemed so ordinary.
By Manal11 months ago in Fiction
The Call of the Minaret
The early sun had just started to rise from behind the house tops of Medina when Bilal woke up. The air was still cool and heavy with the smell of sand and date palms. For a moment, he listened to the faint sounds of the city waking -- the distant bleating of goats, the clatter of water pots and the quiet hum of life returning after the silence of the night.
By Nusuki11 months ago in Fiction
The Light of the Desert
And the wind sang along the dunes, and Malik took a brush against his shabby cloak, and the desert sand was like tiny sparks on his face. This was hours of walking on part of him, in pursuit of the horizon that kept on pushing away. The sun was now setting, and coloured the sky with fire and gold.
By Nusuki11 months ago in Fiction
Through The Keyhole Blooms A Flower. Runner-Up in Through the Keyhole Challenge. Top Story - November 2025.
We didn't always look through a keyhole to case a house we wanted to rob. Sometimes we could look through windows, other times we were invited in after we cut a lawn for the owner.
By John R. Godwin11 months ago in Fiction
An Old Game
It was happening again. His father, all silent, was standing in the crack of the doorway, not moving a muscle. And he, sitting caught on the bed, did not know what to say.
By Kendall Defoe 11 months ago in Fiction
Through the cellar
Never before had he seen this door cracked open. Clark had always assumed the cracked rotting wooden door hiding in the back of the wine cellar led nowhere and was just there for decoration, it's what he had been told after all. When he'd first started just over a year back, he'd asked Jerry, his boss, about the oddly placed door and he'd said the whole time he'd been working here at The Hecate Inn it had been locked with no living memory of a key.
By Liam Storm11 months ago in Fiction
The Sand Clock That Stopped On Thursday. AI-Generated.
"First, let's agree on one rule: there is no time. What you are reading now might have happened yesterday, or will happen tomorrow, or perhaps it is happening the moment you close your eyes. The story does not follow a straight path; rather, it breathes and twists like blue smoke."
By elhacene benmami11 months ago in Fiction
The Light of the Desert: The Story of Bilal ibn Rabah (RA)
Heavy with the sun, with its rays scorching the desert into an oven of light and heat, the sun stood over Mecca. In a small corner near the Kaaba, a man was lying on the ground chained to the burning sand, his back raw from the whip, his lips dry and cracked. Each inhalation was punctuated by pain but from his shaking lips was uttered a word that would not die.
By Nusuki11 months ago in Fiction