New stories every 1st and 3rd Friday
No one remembers when the booths first appeared.
No one who pays the toll ever comes back the same.
What will you pay for your heart’s deepest desire?
Welcome to the Toll Booth Universe
The Wanderer
When the first man awakens, he learns the world by pain, fire, and wonder.
When he learns love, the gods teach him loss.
In this mythic origin of the Toll Booth Universe, The Wanderer faces the oldest toll of all — to walk forever toward the one he can never reach.
Attention All Writers!
It’s Christmas time in the Toll Booth Universe! Do you love the TBU? Do you like to write? How about cold hard cash? Combine all your loves in one! This year at CodekasWrites we are hosting the first annual TBU Christmas Short Story Contest! Please submit your original story and perhaps you’ll be part of the TBU!
The Neon Vein
The trading floor roared like a battlefield—phones screaming, tickers bleeding, men moving like storm fronts. Yet around Serrat there was silence, a bubble of calm cut from marble and shadow. His eyes flickered neon green, digits racing across them like a living ticker.
“Money burns,” he said softly. “Reputation doesn’t. Control a man’s appetite and you control the man. That’s the real market.”
Dane swallowed, the black pen heavy in his hand. On the parchment before him, one line remained clear:
I affirm my obedience.
He thought he had brought nothing to the table. Serrat smiled. “Then how about what’s left?”
The Long Frost
Out on the tundra, Brusk stumbled upon a confessional carved from ice, gleaming like a cathedral built by winter itself. The Still Child stood waiting.
“The price is always shown,” she whispered.
His hand went to his collar, stiff with frost. All these years he had worn it like armor. Now, at the altar of the Booth, he had to decide: cling to it… or surrender.
The First Toll
Stone reached for vine, vine curled to stone. When they touched, creation shuddered—rivers carved new paths, mountains clothed themselves in forests, and the sky blazed with light. Yet they could not remain entwined, for the weight of Thalen’s stones would crush Q’elva’s delicate vines. So they parted, though their love endured, etched forever into root and rock.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Toll Booth CONCLUSION
The road has carried Elias to the Toll Booth at last — but the price it demands isn’t measured in coins. As the Hitchhiker warns and the Taker waits, Elias must decide whether true adventure lies beyond the barrier… or within the journey that brought him here.
This is the exciting conclusion to the 3 parter, “A Funny Thing Happened”. You won’t want to miss it.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Toll Booth, Part 2
The neon flickered in the storm: GATES MOTEL.
Inside, the innkeeper slid a scorched ledger across the counter.
“Secrets,” she rasped. “That’s the price here.”
Elias gripped the pen, the laughter of strangers rattling the walls.
The book seemed to breathe, waiting.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Toll Booth
“Here’s a final piece of wisdom,” the Hitchhiker said, tapping Elias on the chest with a gloved finger.
“The Booth don’t care about your maps, or your pins, or your clippings. You don’t find it.”
He grinned, teeth flashing in the desert dusk.
“It finds you.”
Yvette’s Tale
The first screen lit up:
“May 17th, 2016. Riverside Park. 6:42 p.m.”
My breath caught. The golden hour. The day he proposed.
Then the second screen appeared:
“Payment Due: Every memory of his voice.”
I thought about it for less than a minute. His laugh. His good-morning rasp. The way he’d say “Hey” like it was the only word that mattered. All of it gone.
But I could make new memories. I’d hear him again. This was fine. This was worth it.
“Yes,” I said.
The arm lifted. The road shimmered.
The sound of his voice began dissolving before I’d even reached the horizon. Each note fading until it was like trying to remember a language I’d never learned.
The Toll Booth to Everywhere
Like a mirage an old Pontiac slowly lurches forward, unsure if I too am a mirage in this booth. The Pontiac comes to a halt. The driver’s a woman, late thirties maybe. Sunglasses, lipstick, funeral-black dress. She rolls down the window and stares straight ahead. She doesn't speak.
I slide open the panel.
“Arm.”
She doesn’t argue. Just shifts in her seat as if rethinking every decision that led her here and slowly stretches out her arm through the window like it’s a toll ticket.
The Diviner hums. One drop of blood, and it begins.
Welcome to the Toll Booth Universe
How far would you go to claim your heart’s desire? Enter a universe where you can go everywhere you want, and every when. Welcome, to the Toll Booth Universe.