Very Short Story Examples for Students: Two Complete Stories to Study
Quick answer: Two original very short stories written for students aged 13 and up, each under 160 words, with a plain breakdown of beginning, turn and ending you can copy.
A very short story for a class assignment needs a named character, one place, one problem and an ending that changes something, all in fewer words than a long email. The two original stories below are each under 160 words and were written with secondary school and college students in mind: the settings are familiar, the stakes are real, and nothing in them requires a footnote. After each story, the breakdown shows exactly where the beginning, the turn and the ending sit, so you can build your own on the same frame.
The Spare Pen
Noor's pen died in the third line of the essay question. Not faded, died, mid-word, with forty minutes on the clock and Mr Haddad already at the far end of the hall. She shook it. She scratched a spiral in the margin until the paper tore. Across the aisle, Devan, who had beaten her in every history test since Year 9 and had never spoken to her outside that fact, slid a black biro to the edge of his desk without looking up. Noor took it. It was warm from his hand and chewed at the cap. She wrote for thirty-nine minutes and did not think about him once, which was the point. When the bell went she put the pen back on his desk and he pocketed it, and neither of them said anything, and on results day, when she came second to him again by two marks, she found she minded less than she had planned to.
Locker 212
Jonah's new school gave him locker 212, and locker 212 came with a photograph taped inside the door: a girl with a swimming medal, sun in her eyes, laughing at whoever held the camera. Nobody had cleaned it out. He left it there for a week because taking it down felt like evicting someone. On the Friday a teacher he did not know stopped beside him, looked at the photo, and said, 'That's Amy. She moved to Perth in June. Her mum's job.' Jonah nodded as though he knew Amy. That weekend he found a photo of his own, taken at his old school, him and Marcus and Lee on the low wall by the bike shed, the last day before the move. On Monday he taped it under Amy's, not over it. Two people who had been made to leave somewhere, sharing a door. It was the first thing about the place that felt like his.
Where the parts are
The Spare Pen opens on the problem in its first sentence, which is the safest way to start a very short story: the reader knows what is at stake by word ten. The middle adds pressure (forty minutes, the teacher far away, a torn margin) and then introduces a second character in one sentence that also carries their whole history. The turn is the pen sliding across the desk. The ending skips ahead to results day, which a story this short can do in a clause, and lands on a feeling that is smaller than expected, which makes it believable.
Locker 212 uses an object as the whole plot. The photograph is introduced, explained by a stranger, and then answered with a second photograph. Nothing dramatic happens. The turn is the decision to tape his picture under hers rather than over it, and the last sentence tells you what that decision meant to him without explaining why.
How to write one for class
Start with a problem in the first sentence. Give the character a name and a specific place: not a school, but a hall, a locker, a wall by the bike shed. Add one other person who does a single thing. End on an action or a small, honest feeling, not on a lesson. If your teacher sets a word limit, write over it by a third and cut back; the cutting is where the story gets good.
What writers can take from this
- Name your character in the first three words.
- Choose a problem that fits in one sentence.
- Use a time limit inside the story: a bell, a clock, a deadline.
- Cut every sentence that explains what the character feels; keep the ones that show what they do.
- Read it aloud to one person before you hand it in.
Try it yourself
Write a story of under 150 words in which two students who are not friends share one object for a short time. Neither of them may say more than one sentence of dialogue.
Questions
How long should a very short story be for school?
Most teachers mean anything from 100 to 500 words. If no limit is given, aim for 250 to 300: long enough for a complete arc, short enough that every sentence has to earn its place.
Does a very short story need a title?
Yes, and the title is free: it does not count toward the word limit in almost any setting. Use it to do work the story cannot, naming the object or the place rather than the theme.
Can students enter short story competitions?
Many are open to writers of 13 and above with a parent's consent. Writory's short story contest accepts entries from 100 words, and every entrant receives a score out of 100 and a certificate, which some students use as evidence of extracurricular writing.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working writers. Updated September 2026.
Enter a Writory story contest
Enter the Writory Short Story Contest and have your own story read and scored out of 100. Entries close 25 November. That first entry makes you a Writorian.