Free Short Stories

Quick reads for any moment — 100 to 1000 words

Browsing:

Category: Horror

The Man Who Answered Twice

The call came in just after midnight, when most of the city had already settled into its predictable silence. Detective Rowan Kessler had been awake anyway, staring at case files that refused to make sense no matter how many times Read more…


The Last Broadcast from Harrow Station

The first thing anyone noticed about Harrow Station was that it was still broadcasting. It had been abandoned for twelve years, officially decommissioned after a structural collapse in the lower tunnels made the place unsafe for habitation. The company responsible Read more…


The Sound Beneath the Water

The village of Larkspur Hollow had once been a fishing town, though no one remembered when the fishing had stopped being good. Now it was mostly empty houses leaning into each other like tired men, and a shoreline that locals Read more…


The Last Tenant of Apartment 9B

When Oliver Kane moved into apartment 9B, he thought the cheap rent was the luckiest thing that had happened to him in years. The building stood on the edge of the city, squeezed awkwardly between newer apartment towers that made Read more…


The House That Forgot Names

By the time Clara reached the village of Blackwater, the sky had already darkened into a bruised gray. Rain tapped steadily against the windshield of her rental car while narrow roads twisted through pine forests that looked untouched by time. Read more…


The Knock at Room 17

The rain had not stopped for three days. It came down in hard, silver sheets against the windshield as Daniel Mercer drove deeper into the mountains, his GPS signal fading in and out like a dying pulse. “Recalculating,” the robotic Read more…


The Last Floor

The building had no thirteenth floor. Daniel knew that before he signed the lease, before he ever set foot inside the narrow lobby with its flickering fluorescent lights and the faint smell of dust that never quite went away. It Read more…


The Third Door

When Daniel moved into the house on Vitosha Street, he was told there were exactly seven rooms. He counted eight. The real estate agent laughed it off. “Storage space,” she said. “Barely a room. Not worth mentioning.” Daniel didn’t argue. Read more…


The Static Between Walls

The apartment was cheap, which should have been Ethan’s first warning. Not because cheap apartments are always bad, but because this one was too cheap—especially for its location. Right in the center of the city, within walking distance of everything, Read more…


The House That Knocked Back

The first knock came just after midnight. Ethan froze halfway up the stairs, one hand gripping the banister, the other clutching his phone. The house was old—older than anything else on the street—and it had the kind of silence that Read more…