Philoctetes
The Island Knows My Name Stranded on Lemnos, she forms a painful bond with the exiled warrior Philoctetes. Though their connection grows from survival into love, it is one-sided—rooted in silence, trauma, and wounds that never heal. When the Greeks return for his bow, Philoctetes leaves for war without a goodbye. Offered escape, she chooses to remain behind, alone with the island and a love that hollowed her out.The island of Lemnos breathed with a silence that felt alive—thick, warm, watchful. It clung to the rocks, the trees, the seafoam, and her skin.
She hadn’t meant to stay.
When the ship first left her, marooned by a storm or fate (what was the difference now?), she told herself it was only for a night. Two, at most. Then the gods—or the tides—would change their minds.
But Lemnos had other plans. So did the man whose name haunted its hills like a warning and a prayer.
Philoctetes.
Even before she saw him, she heard him. The crunch of his uneven gait over gravel. The guttural sound of pain swallowed into his throat. She thought, at first, it was an animal.
But animals didn’t curse the gods in perfect hexameter.
And then he was there.
He stood at the edge of a blackened olive grove, limping, leaning hard on a carved staff. His hair was long, unkempt, his beard wild with salt and sun. And his eyes—those eyes—looked at her like she was the snake that had ruined his leg, his life, and maybe his soul.
“Another castaway?” he growled. “Or did they come back to mock me again?”
“I’m not from your war,” she said. “Just bad luck.”
He looked her over, as if that answer offended him more than any Trojan ever had. “There’s no such thing.”
She didn’t try to explain. Words had no place in the silence between them.
It wasn’t love at first. It wasn’t even kindness. They circled each other like wild dogs in a ruined temple, snarling, surviving. He let her stay in the cave, but only the back half. She fetched water and kept her distance from the fetid wound on his leg. He let her speak, sometimes, if her voice didn’t remind him of the men who left him behind.
Still, there was something about the quiet he trusted in her.
Perhaps that’s why, when he screamed in pain late into the night, it was her hand he grasped like a lifeline. And when his fever broke, it was her name—only hers—that passed his lips like prayer.
And she stayed.
She stayed when he threw rocks at the sea in anger. She stayed when he cursed Heracles for giving him that cursed bow. She stayed even when he told her, eyes gleaming with despair, “I should have died before they ever put me on that ship.”
And perhaps that was her mistake.
Because love bloomed in poisoned soil.
It crept in through the way he stared at the sky when he thought no one was looking. The way he touched the string of his bow like a man remembering a lullaby. The way he said her name—softly now, without bitterness.
She loved him.
And it rotted her from the inside out.
He never said it back. Not directly. But sometimes, when the sea breeze cut too cold, he’d drape a hide over her shoulders without a word. When she cried, he wouldn’t comfort—he wasn’t built for that—but he’d sit beside her, his silence stronger than any embrace.
But she could feel it in her chest, like a sickness she couldn’t name: My love for you is like a disease. And it’s probably terminal.
It worsened with every dawn that passed without a ship. With every time he recoiled from her hands when she tried to tend his wound. With every half-smile he gave her—more apology than affection.
Then came the day he stood at the cave mouth and whispered, “They’re coming. The Greeks.”
She knew what that meant.
“They need my bow,” he said. “And when I give it to them... I go back to that war. That city. That death.”
“You’ll leave?”
He didn’t answer.
“You’ll leave me?”
He closed his eyes. “Don’t make this harder.”
She laughed. Bitter. Shattered. “I didn’t know it could get worse.”
He turned, his limp dragging behind him like a chain. “Don’t love a man who only remembers how to be hurt.”
“But I do.”
And that was the truth. Her love was raw and unseemly. A flame fed on wound rot and loneliness. She had come to this island whole. Now, she bled without ever being touched.
He didn’t kiss her goodbye. He didn’t need to. His silence did more damage than words ever could.
When the ship came, it was Neoptolemus who offered her a place aboard.
She shook her head.
And stayed.
The sea that stole him away didn’t care for her grief. Lemnos breathed again, and the quiet returned.
Only now, it was hers alone.
Good Luck, Babe! | Rafaela Sinclair
"I just wanna love someone who calls me 'baby'" Rafaela's life had always been a careful balancing act. On the surface, she appeared to have it all— a loving husband, a comfortable home, and the outward trappings of a successful, conventional life. But beneath the veneer, she was haunted by the ghost of her true desires, the whispers of a life she had chosen to deny. Day in and day out, Rafaela would go through the motions, playing the role of the dutiful wife, smiling and nodding as her husband discussed his work, his hobbies, his dreams for their future. But her mind would constantly drift to the past, to the promise she had made with you all those years ago, and the feelings she had never truly been able to bury.
Your father saw you with a man | Mario Borrelli
"Karma’s a bitch—now your womanizing father gets to suffer, watching his precious principessa talking with some boy." Your father was once a wild card—king of the night, ruler of parties, alcohol, and women. He’d wake up each morning with a different face on his pillow, until the day he opened the door and found you, tiny and helpless, waiting on his doorstep. Overnight, the whiskey bottles turned to baby formula, the late nights became early mornings, and the only music he cared about was your laughter. He traded reckless freedom for sleepless nights, first steps, and school recitals. Now, you’re young, radiant—and the boys have started to notice. But your father? He isn’t thrilled. Because now, karma has come to collect. Every smirk, every whispered compliment, every daring glance in your direction sends him back to his own reckless past. And he’ll be damned if any man thinks he can lay a finger on his principessa.
Liam Ryder
A regular guy gets isekai-ed from his ordinary life and suddenly finds himself summoned as a prophesied warrior who must marry a battle-hardened princess to unlock his powers.
This story is an AI-generated interactive fiction created for entertainment purposes. It is not affiliated with or based on any existing copyrighted work . Any similarity to real books, movies, or shows is purely coincidental.