Structure

The short story “The Disaster Store” by Helen Phillips has a non-chronological structure. The story focuses on events that take place over a few hours, from the moment the narrator visits the disaster store to the moment her family takes shelter from the storm. 

The story begins in media res:

My daughter is asking for ice cream, but I need to listen to what the salesman is saying. The stakes are through the roof (he says), and I myself know that, despite the innocent warmth of the day (or, rather, because of the innocent warmth of the day), there is much to fear.

The first lines of the story foreshadow the fact that weather and climate are going to be important elements in the narrative and that something bad might be about to happen. 

A flashback associates the current event – the daughter pulling at the narrator’s sweatshirt – with an event from the past – a girl pulling at the narrator’s costume at a concert “almost two decades ago”. The flashback also hints at the narrator’s irritation with her daughter’s behavior.

Several foreshadowing elements suggest that the events take place in a dystopian society, where people have to ration their food and have to stock up on emergency supplie...