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Wandering through an abandoned mall in Toledo gave me a story idea
I was down in Toledo last month for a concrete job, and the client mentioned this old mall that's been closed since 2017. I had an afternoon to kill so I drove over to Franklin Park Mall, or what's left of it. The food court still had those neon signs up, one for a place called "Wok This Way" that made me laugh. All the benches were pushed together in a circle, like people had a meeting before they left. I stood there for maybe 20 minutes just taking it in, imagining who sat there last and what they argued about. It got me thinking about a prompt where a group of strangers gets trapped in an abandoned mall during a storm. Has anyone else used a weird real place like an empty building to kick off a story?
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jessica_robinson232mo ago
That's hauntingly beautiful, honestly. Love that vibe for a story.
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diana_black2mo ago
Used to think that kind of dark beauty was just too heavy, like it would weigh a story down. But reading this thread changed my mind completely. It's not about dragging things down - it's about giving them depth, making the light feel brighter by contrast. The way you describe it makes me want to try writing something with that same haunting vibe, just to see where it takes me. Guess I was wrong about what makes a story feel complete.
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