(The TL;DR version is at the end.)
I kinda have a special story and at the same time I don't. To elaborate:
For me, writing "simply started" one day when I was in 9th grade in high-school. I took a notebook and wrote my first short story, about a fantasy football match that was basically Chaos League/Blood Bowl with the serial numbers filed off. It was tacky, it was simplistic, it was glorious. Barely about a thousand words long; more flash fiction than short story.
Fast-forward to 2010, when I played Mass Effect for the first time. The game's story blew me away. I was totally floored. I was convinced it was the best sci-fi story ever, and I immediately wanted to write something that was bigger, better, and more profound.
Supreme foolishness. Arrogance too, in that late-teens "I'm the king of the world!" kind of way.
So I started writing this sprawling, supposedly-epic science fiction series with multiple plot threads, loads and loads of characters, glorious mess of a story that hit all the wrong notes - tons of exposition, trite dialogue, one-dimensional characters, random "gamification" of the narrative, etc.
Then, a year later, through luck and providence, I attended a week-long writing workshop. I learned a lot during those precious few days. The end result was I threw the first manuscript in the trash.
I started learning to write by reading. Science fiction mainly: real high-concept stuff like Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light, David Zindell's Requiem for Homo Sapiens, John C. Wright's The Golden Age, and so on. This did two major things for me: it gave me a solid foundation to become a writer, and ignited my passion for futurology and advanced theoretical science(s). I still have a long way to go yet (so much reading, and so little time!), but at least I gained some understanding about what makes good speculative fiction. (Both sci-fi and fantasy; I've also read a fair number of the latter.)
But my real "special stories" were those that featured dragons prominently. They REALLY made me want to write stories of my own.
I'll cheat and say that the very first story which had a profound effect on me was the movie Dragonheart. That and The Last Castle* with Robert Redford were when I shed my first tears as a wee lad, because in both movies the protagonist dies at the end.
*(Ever noticed how stories about prisons are almost universally good? Even comedies like The Longest Yard. There's some hidden revelation here...)
Back on topic. In 2012 I read the novella "Да пробудиш драконче" (To Wake a Dragon Lass) by Nikolai Tellalov. A classic "boy meets girl" love story, only said girl is a dragoness that has to return to her homeland within a set limit or else Bad Things(tm) happens. Stellar stuff. Followed by "Слънце недосегаемо" (Sun Untouchable), one of the most epic books about dragons and dragon lore ever. Unfortunately, there've been efforts to translate the books in English for... decades now, but due to lack of funding/support, only drafts exist.
The Temeraire series by Naomi Novik was the one which humanized dragons for me, and showed me how they could co-exist alongside humanity. The series' duo protagonists, Temeraire and Laurence, are an absolute delight to read about. But to my great disappointment (and anger), the latter books are rather lackluster and downright stupid. His Majesty's Dragon (Book 1) and Throne of Jade (Book 2) are an absolute must-read for any dragon-loving fans. Beware the Victorian-era language; it's a bit heady to get used to it at first.
The Last Dragon Chronicles by Chris d'Lacey convinced me that dragons and sci-fi truly can mix, and can mix very well indeed. In the series' latter half, we get interdimensional aliens, time-traveling shenanigans, parallel worlds, and quantum mechanics. Plus magic and dragons, 'fcourse. This series, alongside the tv series Surface, should be a case study about how to raise stakes throughout a story.
And finally, another cheat: the videogame/visual novel Golden Treasure: The Great Green. The story here is deeply spiritual, profound, and well worth the experience, even if dragons aren't one's prime passion. I don't know how many people on this forum know about the rising movement/genre of solarpunk (aka hopepunk/noblebright/lunarpunk/etc.), but I say that GT:TGG is one of the leading stories of this new wave of positive fiction.
So, yeah. Lots of special stories, for different reasons. All of them had influence on my writing. All of them I heartily recommend. And lots more still waiting on the TBR list.
If you reached this far, thanks for taking the time.
Regards,
Sagacious
TL;DR VERSION:
Thought I was a boy-genius writing-wise back in the early 2010s, "got better" after some rude awakenings.
Did a lot of reading in the interim, with my special stories being the ones about dragons: the movie Dragonheart, To Wake a Dragon Lass, Temeraire, The Last Dragon Chronicles, Golden Treasure: The Great Green, to name the major influences (and a host of other "minor" ones).
Finally began writing "for real" in 2017. It took a lot of effort.