flash fiction winners 2026

Aaditri, Year 8

Beaconsfield High School

Deleted

We took a selfie outside the arcade, three friends, neon lights glowing behind us.

Night, I scrolled through and opened it. Only two people stood, smiling. The space where Jay had stood was blank.

I thought it was a glitch.

Morning, Jay was gone. His phone disconnected, house empty.

Evening, I checked the photo again. Now Lila was missing.

Terrified, I scrambled through the software. It wasn’t just a picture—it was rewriting reality. Each time someone vanished from the photo, they vanished from the world.

I tried deleting it, but it regenerated like it was fighting.

Next day, Lila was gone.

Last time, I opened it. Only neon lights.

It struck me—it had already erased me. The clock struck twelve - a burst of energy. I was being transported and there I stood in a white room surrounded by my lost friends. Was this a parallel dimension?

Amoli, Year 8

Beaconsfield High School

A Click to Erase

We huddled together under the glow of the arcade, laughing as I snapped a selfie. Five faces. Five friends. But when I checked the photo, only four smiled back. Jamie was missing. I frowned, turned to him - he was still beside me.  "Weird glitch"; he shrugged.

The next morning, Jamie didn't show up to school. His phone went straight to voicemail. His house was locked, empty. No one remembered him - teachers, classmates. Like he'd been erased.

I stared at the photo again. The space where Jamie stood looked...warped. Like reality had bent. I asked the others. They remembered him, but vaguely. Like a dream fading.

That night, I took another selfie of us. Just to test.

Four faces.

The next day, Mia was gone. I deleted the photo app, smashed my phone.

But I can feel it.

Watching.

Waiting.

For the next click. 

For the next friend.

Elisa, Year 7

Beaconsfield High School

The Missing Fourth

We crowded together beneath the old oak tree, laughing as the sun dipped behind the hills. I stretched my arm out, snapped the selfie, and everyone groaned at how ridiculous we looked. It felt like one of those perfect, ordinary moments you never expect to remember.

But when I checked the photo, my stomach tightened. Four of us had posed. Only three appeared.

“How strange,” I said, nudging Pippa. She frowned.

“What are you talking about?”

I turned the screen toward her. The space where Gabby should’ve been was empty—just a patch of blurred light, as if the camera refused to acknowledge her.

Gabby stepped closer, confused. “Let me see.”

The moment she touched the phone, the image flickered. For a heartbeat, her outline appeared—transparent, fading—before vanishing again.

A cold breeze swept through the branches. Gabby swallowed hard. 

“I think,” she whispered, “something followed me here.”

Umar, Year 9

Aylesbury Grammar School

The Last Photo

If only we had steered clear. I mean, four homeless friends finding a mint condition polaroid camera. We thought we’d won the lottery.

"Check if it works- we’ll sell it"; Daz exclaimed. Dutifully, we stood, smiling for the selfie, tummies rumbling and hair standing on end in excitement.

A blinding bright light flashed, accompanied by a low whirring noise. Once the picture developed, I held it for everyone to see. There were murmurs of confusion, then shock spread across their faces.

“What’s the matter?” I asked

“Take a look for yourself.’

I turned the picture around. It looked ordinary, except for one problem; I was missing.

I shrugged. We wandered around, settling in a dark alleyway for the night. Upon awakening, I found myself alone, not in the alleyway, but in the moment the picture was taken. Then the horrible truth dawned on me - I was trapped in the photo.

Eleni, Year 9

Beaconsfield High School

When Emily Went Missing

Posted online, our sunlit smiling picture-perfect faces in the golden March sun. Later, I scrolled through my phone—and Emily wasn’t in any of the pictures. How could this be? I could see only a lock of her beautiful ginger hair, before her whole face is cropped out the shot.

Fast forward to tomorrow, she doesn't show up for school. Her locker empty, her desk untouched. Panic ripples through our group.

I go through every photo I own. Group selfies, candid shots, snapshots from trips. Emily is cropped out every frame.

The truth hit like a punch: Emily hadn’t just vanished. She'd meticulously removed herself from every memory, every image, every trace. She disappeared completely, taking even her paper copy printed material pictures with her—leaving the world looking, and me explaining, with nothing to show she had ever been here. She'd pulled a Houdini just like that.

Zarina, Year 11

Beaconsfield High School

"Who is Mika?" My friend Dani replied with a genuine, confused look on her face. Was this a prank or something?

Dani, Mika and I have been friends for as long as I can remember, yet Dani doesn't seem to recall knowing a Mika at all, not anyone I've asked as a matter of fact.

 However, what I find bizarre about this whole thing is the fact everyone only began to forget about Mika the day we found out about her mysterious disappearance.

 What's more, the fact that she had completely vanished from the picture the three of us had taken the previous day, has left me in shock. It's as if she never existed. I feel like I'm the only one who remembers her. Surely, this can't be right. Could all this add up to something? 

I have a feeling this is only the beginning of something truly terrifying.