Short Story

Undercover

Nancy's Notes 🖊️🎶

Written for The Unicorn Challenge where
we are urged to get creative in 250 words or less.
The photo below is our inspiration; this is my story.

© Ayr/Gray

After the sudden death of his wife, Tony Winston was lost in a fog of grief. One rainy afternoon, a package arrived addressed to his late wife, Eleanor. Curiosity wrestled with heartache as he opened the box. He was mystified to find a pair of mannequin arms, eerily lifelike, along with a note and a stack of photographs tied with a black ribbon.

The note read, “She was always so good at pretending but the truth must come to light.” Tony’s heart raced. He flipped through the photos – Eleanor, smiling with a retinue of strange men, each more unfamiliar than the last. The images were from various locations, some with dates scrawled on the back, all seemingly taken in secret. Tony had never seen his wife looking happier.

Confusion combined with grief now led to suspicion. What had Eleanor hidden from him? As he examined the mannequin arms, Tony noticed faint traces of what looked like makeup. This only left him feeling even more bewildered; the words “always pretending” echoed in his mind.

Determined to uncover the truth, Tony threw himself into a frenzied investigation. He traced the origins of the package to an underground dilettante theater group where Eleanor performed incognito. Each disclosure peeled back layers of Eleanor’s life , revealing a woman who danced between reality and illusion. In the end, Tony was left with haunting questions: who was the woman he called his wife, why did she have so many secrets and who sent the package?

NAR©2025
250 Words

This is “Undercover Of The Night” by the Rolling Stones

The Unicorn Challenge-02/05/25

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

43 thoughts on “Undercover”

  9. And why did some (un)kind person decide to reveal the secrets?
    Tony will never have peace again.
    Great take on the prompt photo, Nancy.
    The tension builds with the pace – the frenzied investigation.
    But yes, many women have a secret land – just mostly they don’t actually go there!

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    1. Excellent question, Jenne! Someone’s got it in for Tony; such a mean-spirited, unkind thing to do.
      There are both male and female secret lands; the big difference between them, however, is women usually don’t actually go while men jump in with both feet!
      Thank you for your excellent comments, Jenne. I’m pleased to know you enjoyed my story today.

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  10. Brilliant!
    WP is doing lot of strange things on my end today, so the scheduling thing might not have been just you. When I ope someone’s post, I get the preview kind of page, just the text and none of the comments and other stuff that usually follows the post. And, when I try to get back to reader, I start all over at the beginning.

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    1. Merci, mon amie!
      Oh dear! They’re at it again! Well this mistake was definitely mine but it wasn’t ‘cleaned up’ as neatly as usual. I’m sorry for your mess, D, and I hope it gets fixed quickly. I also have my first Spring cold (thanks a lot, Colette!) so I’m a big grump this morning. 😠

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      1. Now they’ve changed the editing bar. I went back on my last post and wanted to put something in bold. The setting had disappeared! It took me ages to realize they added a slide bar to access all the text choices! Why! Now there’s an extra cumbersome step!

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        1. This is WP’s MO. Why they can’t leave well enough alone is a mystery. I’m from the old school … if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! The worst part is they seem to make these changes when no one’s looking! We wake up and are greeted with a mess. Perhaps if WP let us know before hand about an upcoming change, it wouldn’t be such a shock to the system. Hang tough, my friend!

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          1. I searched and searched and couldn’t figure out what they did with the button to make text bold. It was quite frustrating. Then, quite by accident, I noticed the little slide bar that was never there before. What a stupid ‘improvement,’ but typical for them because it means more steps.

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