editor-curated love prompts for our Weekly Love Tales contest segment, meant to help both newbie and veteran writers gain some fresh new inspiration! Our theme this week is: Amnesia! Oh words other words I missed the contest I forgot to submit because I wasn't sure what name should I name it this novel I came up with two names. I'll let the people decide which they miss it first name.
The Twelfth Wipe
Or
The Red String
It is what it is. I am making a time but I want my will just still give you the work. Tell me how it is. It's a good is it bad let me know down below in a chat here go chapter 1.🥱
Chapter One – The Stranger in My Skin
Part I: The Note She Left Herself (Psychological Thriller style)
The first thing she saw was the red string.
Tied around her left wrist. A simple knot. Under it, a folded piece of paper with three words:
Read me first.
She was lying on a sofa. Not her sofa—she didn't know whose. The fabric was orange corduroy, scratchy against her cheek. Sunlight through venetian blinds painted stripes on the floor. Dust motes floated. She felt forty years old, maybe forty-five. Her hands had calluses she didn't remember earning.
She unfolded the paper.
Hello, Mara.
You've done this twelve times now. Don't be scared. It's a condition, not a curse. The doctor says each episode strips more memory. This time, you might not get back the big things. Like him.
His name is Cass. You've been together eight years. He thinks the amnesia is from a car accident. That's a lie you agreed to tell him. The truth is worse. You wrote it down once, then burned it. Some memories deserve to die.
Check your pocket.
Mara reached into the pocket of her jeans. A key. Brass, old, cut in a shape she didn't recognize. It felt warm, like it had been held for hours before she woke up.
That key opens a locker at the Greyhound station. Locker 119. Inside: a phone, a gun, and a photograph of a woman you used to be.
Do not show Cass any of this.
Do not trust his smile.
—You. From yesterday.
Her hands were shaking. Or maybe the whole world was.
She heard footsteps on stairs.
---
Part II: The Breakfast He Makes (Literary Interlude)
Cass came down barefoot. He was lean, early forties, with a scar on his jaw that looked like a fishing hook had once caught him. He was carrying a cast-iron skillet. In it: two fried eggs, sunny-side up, and a single slice of rye toast cut diagonally.
"You always wake up before me," he said, setting the skillet on a trivet. "But you always wait to eat until I'm there."
"How do you know?"
He knelt beside the sofa. His eyes were green, tired, kind. "Because you told me. The first time you forgot, you said, 'Cass, if I ever wake up scared, just make me the eggs. I'll remember the smell.'"
She smelled them. Butter. Pepper. Something else—paprika, maybe. Her stomach turned, but not from hunger. From recognition. A ghost of a thousand mornings.
"I don't remember you," she said quietly.
He didn't flinch. "I know."
"Does it hurt? When I say that?"
He looked at the red string on her wrist. His expression flickered—pain, yes, but also something else. Something she couldn't name.
"Less than losing you for real," he said.
He reached for her hand. She let him take it. His palm was rough, warm, and exactly the size of hers. Like two puzzle pieces that had been together so long they forgot they were separate.
"Why do I tie a string on my wrist every morning?" she asked.
His thumb traced her knuckles. "You say it's to remember something important. You never told me what."
Smart man, thought the version of her that had written the note. Or careful liar.
She pulled her hand back gently. "I'm not hungry yet."
He nodded, stood up, and walked to the window. The skillet sat between them like a small, warm wall.
"Cass," she said, "what's in the basement?"
He didn't turn around. "Storage."
"Then why is there a deadbolt on the outside?"
Silence. A car passed on the street. Somewhere, a dog barked.
"Eat your eggs, Mara," he said. "They're getting cold."
---
Part III: The First Crack of Action (Bourne-style seed)
She ate one bite. Just one.
Then she stood up, walked to the front door, and opened it.
A man in a gray jacket was leaning against a tree across the street. He wasn't looking at her. He was looking at a phone. But when she stepped onto the porch, he put the phone in his pocket and walked away.
Not casually. Deliberately.
Counting steps, she realized. Measuring distance.
She closed the door. Turned the lock. When she faced Cass again, his expression had changed. The kindness was still there, but behind it: a readiness. Like a man who had been waiting for a bell to ring.
"Who was that?" she asked.
"I don't know."
"You're lying."
He stepped closer. She stepped back. Her heel hit the leg of the sofa.
"Mara," he said softly, "the basement isn't locked to keep something in. It's locked to keep you out. Because what's down there would hurt you more than forgetting."
"Try me."
He studied her face for a long moment. Then he took a key from his own pocket—identical to hers—and held it out.
"I'll show you tonight," he said. "But when you remember what you did, you might wish you hadn't asked."
She took the key. Their fingers touched.
His were cold.
——
Author Thoughts:
🔥 Daring Author Thoughts (Love & Amnesia Edition)
Before I forget (see what I did there? 😉) — warning: I'm breaking my own writing style on purpose.
Why? Because only boring novels play it safe. 💀
I'm switching things up. If you want this story to hit SS class… don't just read. Drop a notification 🛎️ or throw those stones 🪨.
The second I know you're really reading?
I'll make it so much juicier. 🍑💔
Amnesia might make them forget, but don't you dare forget to vote.
The heat level? That's on you. 🔥