THE GUIDELINES
Please e-mail me your stories as attachments at FlareHiggins@yahoo.com. The Union website has all the general story guidelines--in short, please include the title and author(s), a quick summary, the main character(s), the year(s) it takes place, and any necessary warnings. Here at Duane Street, unfinished stories ARE accepted; please just try your best to update them regularly. I've seen many an old lodging house full of nothing but short beginnings, and it's downright sad!
Finally, because I'm not a fan of the traditional ratings system, I've blatantly stolen (and slightly modified) a special warnings system from the old Astoria Lodging House. Please include the following warnings (if necessary) when you send in your story:
V - Violence
S - Sexual content
R - Rape
L - Language
DU - Drug Use
DT - Disturbing themes (This is obviously very broad, so feel free to specify.)
If you like, these warnings can each be used along with one of the following: M for "mild" or S for "strong/serious." So for example, if your story includes mild violence and graphic sexual content, it could include the warnings MV, SS. If your story does not require any warnings, please write "No warnings" at the beginning so I know you didn't just forget them. Your story will not be posted otherwise.
By Cricket
Summary:
Characters: Swifty
Year:
By Jeanna
Summary:
Characters: Bumlets
Year: 1889
Before He Was Blink
By Illusion
Summary: There wasn't much Trevor Bennett had to show for his life. He had left home around the age of twelve, gotten mixed up with some of the wrong people, and then had been saved from them by an older boy who called himself Dragon.
Characters: Kid Blink
Year: 1897
Warnings: V
Sundays
By Peep Shakespeare
Summary: Any other day, Itey is Itey, plain and simple. But on Sunday he's Gabriel, the dutiful son named for the messenger of the Lord, the cheerful and teasing older brother, and for a few hours at least, he's home.
Characters: Itey
Year: 1899
Never Going Back to Before
By Goldie
Summary: It wasn't so much that his life was filled with sadness, although it was. It was just that he was always left behind, wondering what he could have done different, even if there wasn't anything he could have done.
Characters: Skittery
Year:
Warnings: DT (suicide, child neglect), DU (alcoholism)
By Amanda
Summary: There wasn't anything that Avery could have done, nor was he stupid enough to believe that there was. A move was a move was the move. And he just had to survive.
Characters: Snitch
Year: 1891
By Ryder
Summary: Mole has a tendency to live in the future. Rider keeps his head in the past. But with a new beginning, and some new friends, maybe, for once, the Brogan siblings can manage to find happiness in the present.
Characters: Rider, Mole
Year: 1899
Hours later, you resurface from the pages of the lodgers' stories and remember where you are. Jack and Racetrack have both wandered off, but you vaguely recall one of them saying that you could find them in the bunkroom whenever you were ready. Ready for what? you wonder, and then you remember. Ready to meet the lodgers you've been reading about all this time.