Stories by Iris Lau

The Cyberstalker

August 20, 2026 by Iris Lau Hot, Summer 2026 Writing Contest, Thriller/Suspense 2 Comments

The blue light of the screen hummed, casting a pale glow over my cramped desktop in Mong Kok. On the monitor, the interface of InkWell—the story-writing platform where I had spent two years building a modest following as an emerging writer—was open.

But I wasn’t writing. I was staring at the notifications.

@Void_Watcher: “The tea shop in your third chapter feels so real, Elise. Almost like the one on Sai Yeung Choi Street where you sit by the window every Tuesday at 4:00 PM.”

@Void_Watcher: “You changed your hair. The shorter cut suits you, but I miss the long strands you used to tuck behind your ear when you got stuck on a paragraph.”

My breath hitched. I hadn’t written about my real-life schedule. I hadn’t posted a selfie on InkWell. The platform was supposed to be a sanctuary for my fiction. Now, it felt like an panopticon. The stranger wasn’t just reading my words; he was reading me.

Blackwood Manor: The Archivist

January 1, 2026 by Iris Lau 2025 Fall Writing Contest, Drama, Hot 3 Comments

Elias Vance, in his fifty-seventh year, was defined by the dry, precise comfort of the archive. Air was messy, full of humidity, pollen, and unpredictable scents. Archives were dry, labeled, and governed by the immutable laws of evidence. That preference made his current location—Blackwood Manor—not just a chore, but a profound insult to his meticulous nature.

The manor was a colossal, decaying Victorian house, huddled against the relentless coast of Maine. It was less a home and more a coastal fortress, its gables sharp and its windows empty, perpetually scarred by the salt spray and winter gales. The dense, old forest pressed in from three sides, its massive, silent pines seeming to judge the rot. Elias, dressed in a practical charcoal suit and white cotton gloves, had returned here after his estranged father’s death to do what he did best: inventory and liquidate. His father, Arthur Vance, hadn’t been a man of history, but a man of accumulation—a hoarder who used baroque furniture and obsolete knowledge as a heavy, physical insulation against reality.

“A shame,” Elias murmured, the word echoing in the cavernous, dust-choked entry hall. The house was not history; it was a memorial to a petty, solitary life, and Elias was determined to dismantle it piece by clinical piece.