The Pawn of Winter
My name is Darrell Spock and I'm twenty-nine years old.
Mature stories
Mature stories. Mature stories, from quick reads to long series. Reads run 22 to 26 minutes. Writers to know: Vermilion Fiction, Drift Diary and Observer of Starling. Readers usually start with “The Talent Show Confession” and “The Quiet End”. Ranked by how many readers finish them. Some are free to read in full; the rest open with a free preview.
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Mature stories, ranked by readers
41 42 Off-Season Dares
The ferry dock at Salt Creek was empty when I got off it, which was normal for a Tuesday in January.
43 The Owner's Proposition
I am sitting in the back office of The Golden Note at eleven forty on a Wednesday night, and the man across the desk from me is looking at…
44 Speed Dating the Wrong Sign
I moved to Middleton Vale in September, six months after the breakup, and for the first three weeks my social life consisted of the night…
45 Vet's Revenge Gone Wrong
I'm Sydney, thirty-two, and I've been a veterinarian for six years, which is long enough to know when somebody's stealing your work and…
46 The Icewater Dare
My name is Alanna Mathews, I'm forty-seven years old, and I've been a deckhand on the M.V.
47 The Last Kiln
The kiln had been cooling since the power died at sunset; I checked the pyrometer and it read one thousand two hundred and forty degrees…
48 Map of Us
I was on my knees in the fire hall kitchen, scrubbing the floor under the stove, when Vincent started his drill in the main bay.
49 Last Call Confessions
The Crimson Oak sits in the lobby of the Wexford Hotel, which is one of those old hotels that costs too much and smells like money trying…
50 The Bidding War
*This one came from thinking about how the most interesting things can happen in the most boring places.
51 The Zucchini Proposition
I turned forty-six on a Sunday, and I mention this only because it frames everything that came after.
52 Hammer and Curl
Traci Ryder was twenty-four years old, and she had spent most of those years with a hammer in one hand and a nail in the other, so when…
53 The Premium on Irma
The Tap and Rail closed at midnight on Fridays and Charlie let me sit while he counted the drawer.
54 Rooftop Exchange
I am forty-six years old and I had somehow reached the middle of a writing retreat in the Swiss Alps without anyone learning my name.
55 The Farmer Takes Her
The county fair came around every July like a bill you forgot you owed, and every year I swore I'd skip it, and every year I went anyway.
56 Late Summer Rooftop
The Bradford Hotel was the kind of place that advertised air conditioning and then delivered a suggestion of it.
57 The Conference Key
Bert met Liz twelve years ago at a yoga retreat outside Sedona, back when he was forty-two and teaching classes out of a strip mall studio…
58 Shift Change Confessions
Carol had been a night-shift ER nurse for six years now, three of them at St.
59 Oil and Early Light
*This story came from a desire to write something tender and slow, set in a world of grease and hay where love finds its own quiet rhythm.
60 Operator, Please
My name is Lindsay Hill, I'm 38 years old, and for the last four years I've made my living talking dirty to strangers.
Mature, by tag
Dry and wry matureCoworkers matureDark and intense matureTender and slow matureA couple who have been dating a while, not married matureStrangers matureFunny and chatty maturePlayful and teasing matureNeighbors matureWarm and nostalgic matureLeather matureLatex matureWriters known for it
Vermilion Fiction, Drift Diary, Observer of Starling, Moss Harbor