At the end of April/beginning of May, I wrote stories for four different contests, and now is the antsy period of waiting for results. So I thought I’d spread the impatient, obsessive joy. Here’s what I’m waiting for:

Writing Battle

For this competition, I wrote a 500-word magical realism story. All of the stories are now battling in duels, and in just a few days, I’ll find out how my story is doing and whether it has a chance at winning. This has become my favorite writing contest, in part because I enjoy judging duels along the way. I also love the community of writers involved.

Writers’ Playground

For the Writers’ Playground short story competition, we got to choose a character and setting from a list of five, and they gave us one item that must be present in the 3,000-word story. I submitted a crime investigation/murder mystery. I haven’t decided whether I like what I wrote, but it was a difficult set of prompts to choose from. I ended up with a troll for a character and an RV park for the setting, and the item that had to be included was a scroll. As crime/mystery stories go, I like what I wrote, but I feel like the Writers’ Playground judges generally prefer outside-the-box stories, so I’m not sure how mine will fare. And I have to wait until mid-July to find out.

NYCMidnight

For Round 1 of the NYCMidnight 100-word Microfiction Challenge, the prompts I got were: Fairy tale/fantasy (genre), shivering (action), rear (word). This genre is outside my comfort zone, and to advance to Round 2, I have to be in the top 15 of my group. According to NYCM’s new rules, I can’t share my story with you until 30 days after winners are announced, so for now, all I can tell you is what it’s about. It’s called “The Very Modparents,” and it’s about two fairy godparents who try to make a good impression on the boy they will be helping by conjuring a sleek new ride. Results won’t come until June 21.

YeahWrite Super Challenge

The final story I wrote was a 1,000-word flash fiction piece that took me awhile to figure out. It ended up being literary-ish, I guess, and heartbreaking. This contest assigned an action prompt and an object, and both had to be integral to the story. My action was preparing a hot beverage, and the object was a horse figurine. The second round, if I make it, starts June 2.

And, just so you know, when I say “waiting” for results, I mean refreshing e-mail, checking the websites, commiserating with my writing critique group, and obsessively rereading my stories and deciding that there’s no way I’ll win anything with this trash.