Elizabeth Rosen
Content Warning
This story contains a number of potential trigger topics, including:
Unwanted Sexual Attention
Misogyny
A Really Badly Stubbed Toe
Stalking
A Toaster That Startles When the Toast Pops Up.
Sexual Assault
This story also has content that may be emotionally challenging for those who have:
Encountered a co-worker who catches you when you snag your toe on a chair wheel and stumble.
Encountered a co-worker who misinterprets gratitude.
Dealt with a co-worker making repeated overtures, but is awkward so you initially feel sorry for him.
Experienced a second, unwanted invitation to go out with him.
Given an awkward but polite decline.
Received yet another invitation to watch the game together this weekend in a faked but-we’re-just-friends tone.
Been forced to manufacture a gently delivered excuse.
This story also contains graphic descriptions of:
A rose left on your desk with no note.
A Fisher Price Little Person propped against your office telephone, its frozen smile turned toward you.
A neon blue Koosh ball left on your seat.
A pack of Pop Rocks taped to your computer screen with a winking smiley face drawn on it.
Male colleagues who shrug and say to just ignore it.
Please be aware that this work also contains potentially upsetting descriptions of:
A series of phone calls with no one on the other end of the line.
A sense of being watched.
A knock at the door in the middle of the night. An empty doorstep.
A sound in the attic that resembles neither squirrels, nor mice.
A breathless call to 911.
A perfunctory search of the house by the police. A bored officer taking a statement.
The purchase of a deadbolt.
Hours lost to reading online discussions about whether a gun or Doberman is the more effective deterrent.
The purchase of a second deadbolt.
Panic attacks whenever you have to enter your home after dark.
Hours lost to exploring how to purchase a Taser.
Moreover, the story has content that might not be suitable for some readers, such as:
The co-worker with eyes as black as a shark’s knocking on your office door and inviting you to have a drink after work. Again.
A blunt refusal. A warning to leave you alone.
A period of uncontrollable trembling in the ladies room that ends on your knees in front of the toilet, throwing up.
A rose, the bloom carbonized black, left on the doormat.
A breakfast appliance that makes you scream in fright when its timer dings.
Finally, the reader should know that this story deals with:
The feeling of a sharp-object pressed into the space between your shoulder blades as you unlock your car door.
The smell of the heat-degraded fabric of the back seat your face is pressed into.
The grip of strong fingers at the base of your skull.
The sound of nothing at all, after the zipper.
The brush burn on your forehead. The bruises on the back of your neck. The flash of a camera too close to your body in the E.R.
The painful glare of fluorescent lights as you listen to the resident on the other side of the curtain give the police officers a description of your injuries.
The knowledge that you will never be able to read a story again without first reading the trigger warnings.
Colorwise, Elizabeth Rosen is an autumn. She mourns the loss of Tab and still wants her MTV. Her stories have appeared in journals such as the North American Review, Baltimore Review, Pithead Chapel, and Flash Frog, and been nominated for the Pushcart, Best Small Fictions, and Best of the Net awards. Her story “Maw Maw’s Cheese Balls” is the 2026 winner of the Raleigh Review Flash Fiction contest. Find more of her work at www.thewritelifeliz.com.
