Short Story

Unnoticed

Nancy's Notes 🖊️🎶

Written for The Unicorn Challenge where we are
asked to get creative in 250 words or less using
the photo below as inspiration. This is my story.

© Ayr/Gray

The claustrophobia started gradually for four-year-old Phoebe.

She had climbed into the back of her father’s flatbed truck to investigate the crates of chickens ready for market. Phoebe went unnoticed as her father threw a tarp over the back and locked the tailgate. When her dad found her, she was curled up in a ball, crying pitifully.

Over time, Phoebe seemed to forget about the incident in the truck.

Years later Phoebe was accidentally locked in her bedroom closet when a gust of wind blew through the window and slammed the closet door closed. Her parents were out and her older siblings were watching television; her frantic cries for help went unnoticed. Exhausted, Phoebe fell asleep in the closet, her family unaware. Her mother found her the next morning, traumatized.

Incidents like that kept happening. Phoebe became obsessed with her surroundings and her parents sought professional help. After eight years in the hospital, Phoebe was declared “cured”.

She met Evan, a great guy, and they began dating. Life was good again for Phoebe. For her birthday, Evan and Phoebe planned to see her favorite band. She felt safe with Evan and was unafraid to ride public transportation.

The train was packed. During one stop, Evan was pushed out with a crowd of passengers; the doors closed before he could get back in. Phoebe panicked when the train started up. She lost it.

At the last stop, Phoebe was found in the corner – disheveled, mumbling, eyes wild in terror. She was finally noticed.

NAR©2024
250 Words

The Unicorn Challenge-09/08/24

This is “Crazy Train” by Ozzy Osbourne

All text, graphics and videos are copyright for The Sicilian Storyteller, The Elephant’s Trunk and The Rhythm Section and are not to be used without permission. NAR©2017-present.

39 thoughts on “Unnoticed”

  1. Incident by incident, Phoebe’s trauma is being increased. No wonder she reacted so badly when the train incident happened. You’ve enabled us to follow along with her as she grows, by describing the separate incidents, and when the climax occurs, the story has so much more impact. I note your comments about the mental health podcast you listened to, and I agree that the world has a big problem. (Well, not just one 🫤.)

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    Reply

    1. Thank you so much, Margaret. I truly appreciate your in-depth comments. I think it’s important to build a story, one that (hopefully) grabs my readers’ attention and holds onto it. Sometimes I’m actually successful in doing that!

      I’m delighted to know how much you got out of this story. Many of us focused our thoughts this week on mental health. The podcast I referenced gave a sobering statistic: 26.8% of adults in the United States, or roughly 60 million people, have some sort of mental illness. It is a big problem for sure.

      Thank you, Margaret. I always enjoy reading your comments.

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  4. ah! the single difference (or rather, inability to understand) between fear and anxiety.

    good story that, unfortunately too many of us can identify with

    interesting synchronicity-ette! Ozzy and the local in my ‘corn. (well, not so much a connexion as an overlap of playlist… i.e. ‘Mr. Crowley’)

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    Reply

    1. Oh, Jenne. It certainly is!
      If you read through the comments, you’ll see I was prompted by a recent podcast on mental health. I believe we all have ‘something’; most of us can deal with our fears and phobias while others are barely making it through the day.
      It would be wonderful if the people of the world were kinder, gentler and more accepting .

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      1. Still being on holiday, I haven’t had much time for writing, so my story this week doesn’t make a lot of sense, I fear. But it was meant to be about just that – someone dealing with mental illness by routine and rote behaviour. It’s a tough world.

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    1. It really is, D. As I told Willow, a new podcast about mental health influenced me to write this story.

      I can’t handle crowds. They never bothered me when I was younger but now I get anxious in a crowded place. I’m sure the anxiety started after my knee surgery and I couldn’t walk too fast. When we were out I’d become afraid of getting caught up in the crowd and separated from my husband … or falling. My rock concert days are over!

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      Reply

    1. Yeah, tis. In hindsight I can say I was influenced by a podcast about mental health. There are countless phobias and varying degrees of each one. You may be totally unfazed by riding in an elevator while the person next to you is barely holding it together.

      Thanks much for your comments 🩶

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