Globophobia

**I'm taking another writing course and one of the prompts that the teacher asked us to write about was using a random phobia from this website. He prompted us to write a story about said phobia that was picked at random. This is what I managed to come up with.**

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I sighed heavily while coming up the stairs to my apartment after a long day of work, my briefcase seemed as heavy as my day was. I didn't know what Janet's plans were tonight but she had sent me a quick text while I was at work stating that she had a some sort of surprise for me at home tonight. I didn't know what to expect, I just knew today had royally kicked my butt and I wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and throw an episode of Criminal Minds on.

Janet and I have only been dating for three months. We deicided hat she move in after only a month of us seeing each other because her previous living situation before wasn't super great. She needed an out from living with her weirdo roommate. The girl literally pissed into a cup in their shared shower facility and left it there for Janet to find. Yeah, talk about gross.

Reaching the third floor of our elevator-less apartment building. I sighed yet again. I don't know if Janet's the one. I hadn't even told her today was my birthday. I was contemplating my life choices as I walked down the dimly lit hallway towards door 309, my one bedroom bachelor suite. The lights were flickering, and there were a couple dead flies littering the brown carpet.

Once I reached the door, I set my briefcase down to fish my keys out of my pocket. Only then did I notice the door was slightly ajar. I hesitated for a millisecond before cautiously entering my apartment. I expected the worst case scenario. A dead body on the floor and a burglarized apartment. Oh boy, it was the worst case scenario but not that particular one.

"Surprise!" Janet's shrill voice rang out clear as day. My jaw dropped. She was wearing a party hat, a bathrobe, and was holding a cake. But worst of all, there were a million fucking coloured balloons littering the floor of my bachelor's apartment suite. Instantly I felt the bile rise in my throat.

"Janet, what did you do?" I tried remaining calm but I could feel the anxiety rise from my stomach into my chest. "And why was the front door left wide open? I thought there had been a burglary!"

Her smile faltered. "I didn't mean to Leon. Honest. I think I just got so excited about throwing you this birthday party that I forgot to lock it behind me when I came in with the cake. Aren't you surprised?"

"Surprised is a good way to put it." I said curtly. My palms felt itchy. I was sweating now.

She set the cake down, with a concerned look on her face. "You're not mad are you?" She asked sadly, her usually sparkling blue eyes ready to burst into tears. "I found out it was your birthday today from Ben."

I smacked my palm into my face. Of course my best friend would tell her it's my birthday, but not the fact that I am petrified of one thing and one thing only- balloons.

"Yeah here's the thing about Ben. You shouldn't ever listen to him. He's a good guy and all but there's not much going on up there if you know what I mean." I grabbed my briefcase from the hallway and proceeded to shut and lock the door behind me sparing a quick peak at the enigma of a woman I found myself with. She's sad, I know she is. She tried to do something nice for me and I'm being an asshole. I grabbed a garbage bag from the kitchen and began cleaning up the party decorations, making sure I was careful not to pop any balloons in the process.

I got half a garbage bag full before Janet stopped me by placing a gentle hand on my shoulder. "I'm really sorry. I thought I was doing something special for you- for us. But Leon, at least pop the balloons, they take up too much space in the bin if you don't."

Turning to look at her, I knew I had to say something about my globophobia (fear of balloons) but my heart broke the minute I seen her face. Mascara was running down her cheeks and she was clearly upset at my reaction to her surprise party for my birthday. My skin was crawling though. I hated the way ball0ons sounded. The creaking of the plastic was driving me insane but I couldn't risk one popping either. "Janet, what exactly did Ben tell you?" I tried to force a gentle tone but I know it came out harsher than I intended.

She huffed and took her arm away from mine. More tears. "He said today was your birthday and that you don't normally celebrate with anything special so that I should do something special for you to help you realize what a special day your birthday actually is." She was blubbering at this point. "He said I should get you a chocolate cake because that's your favourite and to get some party decorations."

I scowled. That rat bastard. He knew I was afraid of balloons and didn't tell her. "I hate chocolate cake." Was all I could muster saying.

Janet just wiped her face and began slowly tearing down the streamers. I sighed heavily and tried to grab her arm, but she moved her arm away from me. "Janet," I said softly.

"Don't Leon." She started crying again. She shoved the streamers into the garbage bag and grabbed a knife from the kitchen.

"Janet," I tried again. "Please don't pop the balloons."

She started hysterically laughing. "Oh now you want to keep the decorations up Leon? Screw Ben, and screw you." She jabbed a knife into the closest green balloon.

POP.

My hands went to my ears. Now I'm the one crying. "Janet please stop that."

She looked at me in astonishment. "Wait. Are you crying?"

"Yes Janet, now please put the knife down." I couldn't hide how embarrassed I was. A grown ass man, scared of a bunch of balloons.

"Leon," She started softly, mascara still running down her face.

"Don't say anything Janet. It's my turn to talk." I gestured to the couch, inviting her to sit down. She sighed heavily but flopped onto the couch, her robe flashed open slightly but she fixed it quickly and I groaned internally- wishing this night had gone better.

I sat down next to her but she shuffled away from me. I sighed, out loud this time. "Janet, I'm globophobic."

She burst out laughing. "What?"

I tried again, " I'm globophobic."

She looked at me, puzzled. "I don't understand, are you scared of your birthday Leon?"

"No Janet, I'm scared of balloons." She tried to interrupt me but I continued on. "I get anxiety whenever I see them, the sound they make makes my skin crawl and I hate the noise of them popping. It's like a gunshot goes off everytime I hear one pop."

I've never seen anyone look so defeated and lost at the same time before. "Leon, why didn't you tell me this sooner?"

"Because Janet, I'm supposed to take care of you. I'm supposed to be manly. I thought with the door open I was going to find you dead. Then this. I don't know, I just wanted to impress you, not scare you off with a weird phobia of mine." I rambled slightly, knowing my words were not coming out the way I wanted them to. "What I'm trying to say Janet, is that I'm serious about you. I didn't want to let my issues overrule our relationship."

She laughed. "Ben was lying to me wasn't he?"

"Depends on what else he said." I was hesitant when speaking.

She looked at me with more tears in her eyes, "He told me you loved balloons Leon."

I just shrugged. "He knew about my globophobia. He just is a self-absorbed asshole who thought he could poke fun at me. I'm not mad at you, I'm mad at him."

She hugged me carefully and sniffed. "Some friend."

I hugged her back ferociously. "I agree. Now can we get these balloons out of here, please?"

She giggled. "Of course Leon. Can I change first though?"

I winked. "Absolutely not, nope." She swatted at me as I tried to pull her in for a kiss. Later she was saying without words.

And we began throwing the rest of the party decorations into garbage bags. Together. No more tears, no more arguing. We were still only three months into our relationship. It was to be expected that something like this could have happened. Especially with assholes like Ben out there in the world. I breathed through throwing every single balloon into the garbage. We will work through my globophobia- together.

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I had SO much fun with this prompt. I was thinking to myself at first like, "What am I going to to with a writing prompt about a fear of balloons?" But thoroughly enjoyed writing this piece for you guys.

Thanks for reading.

Chloe Rose Violet🌹