as a writing exercise, try writing a short story with no "hook" premise, where the character interations/differences and not the plot will carry the story and the conflicts
This works because plot hooks do the reader's work for them, while character friction has to earn attention on its own, forcing you to sharpen voice, want, and contradiction until people feel real rather than functional. Try this: two siblings splitting their late mother's kitchen items, one wants to keep everything, the other wants to keep nothing, and the whole story lives in how they argue over a chipped mug. No twist, no stakes beyond who they are to each other. The caution is that without any forward pull, scenes can drift into aimlessness, characters just being quirky at each other with nowhere to go. You still need small pressure, a deadline, a decision, a door closing, something that makes the differences matter right now, not just exist.
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