Chapter Two

I stepped into the elevator with four other harried workers and pressed the second-floor button. It appeared that it was not going to be my day because the elevator abruptly stopped with a jolt between the third and second floors.

My companions uttered frightening sounds. In despair and worry, a forty-five-something woman with long flowing hair screamed in fear. She looked like something who had just come out straight from a daily newspaper with her modern pencil skirt and exquisite jewelry. The sparrow's paws at the corners of her eyes were the sole indication of her age.

"What actually occurred?" a skinny middle-aged guy with thinning hair said from beside me.

I had a strong suspicion that his name was Justine, but I wasn't certain. I just knew who he was because I sometimes saw him in the reception room.

"The elevator suddenly stopped. Oh, my God," one of our coworkers stated.

The only thing I noticed about the guy who replied to Justine was that he had a beer belly and was roughly my age. I glared at the man who was nearest to the buttons as if he'd placed us in this situation.

Thank you very much, Captain Obvious. What do you mean you've stopped?" the woman wailed once again, far too excessively for the confined, cramped location.

"I mean, we're trapped," the beer-gut guy, who I suppose Daniel was, commented dramatically, before pressing furiously all of the buttons on the panel.

"You do realize that tapping every button there is not really going to help, don't you?  Just hit that goddamn button down there," Justine remarked, indicating the bright scarlet button at the bottom of the panel.

Before pressing the emergency button, the beer-gut guy hit the open-door button a bit more frequently for comparison purposes.  He alerted the emergency personnel of our dilemma by speaking immediately into the speakerphone.

"Sit back and wait, we'll have someone over there right immediately. You will be out within no time," a man suddenly spoke over the voice command.

"How much time will it consider taking?" the lady inquired, her fingertips fluttering to her abdomen, to no one in terms of context. I saw her respiration become faster, and I began to worry whether she was suffering from claustrophobia or anything.

"Long," murmured the beer-gut guy. His demeanor indicated he was utterly unconcerned by the weak sensibilities of the woman just beside him. "It'll definitely take hours," he remarked.

Another person, which was Peter who was with us groaned. “What? Oh, Jesus. I need to pet my golden retriever. Poor Aztrazenica.”

“We have no choice, do we?” Justine replied.

Everyone who was staying inside the elevator heaved out a deep sigh. Justine seemed to be aware of the woman's worsening mental condition. So, he smiled gently at her and attempted to soften his own rigid posture.

"It really shouldn't take that long, maybe an extra few minutes," he reassured. "You have to overhear him on the voice recognition; people will be coming shortly, so just calm down a bit."

And with that, everyone was put at ease. I hadn't realized I'd been gazing down at my smartphone for three hours until I saw it had already been one thirty in the afternoon. That meant we'd been trapped inside the goddamn elevator for three fucking hours.

My jeans were completely dry, but they were not comfortable to wear with and unpleasant as I squatted cross-legged on the elevator platform, fiddling with my cellphone. Daniel, a courteous middle-aged guy across from me, sat down. He'd spent most of the past forty-five minutes performing breathing techniques with Marina in an effort to calm her down.

I could not really help but wonder if this would be a fantastic start to their love narrative. Peter, on the other hand, was in a very other situation. With each passing hour, the beer-gut guy appeared to get more irritated. He crouched in front of the elevator control, sometimes tapping buttons and talking to himself. We hadn't heard anything from the voice command since the very first time we talked to them.

Marina had thrown a tantrum, but I felt whoever was on the other end of that emergency service had something more to do than chat to a handful of irate, frustrated, and now sort of famished office employees. Unfortunately, after constantly checking the time and the minutes that had passed, I began to question whether elevator maintenance was routinely this lengthy.

"That's enough!" Peter said as he rose to his feet.

I assume he'd had enough of pressing the buttons. Marina trembled and leaped in response to the shout.

Justine gave Peter a stern look before returning to his mindfulness meditation. "We have to get out of here; it has been hours; what would be taking longer than expected?"

In annoyance, Peter raked his fingers through his short, black hair. "You know what? I'm dialing 911; this is outrageous," he said as he took his phone from his jeans pocket. I observed that he was holding the cellphone so firmly that his knuckles became pale white as he phoned. "It's crowded," Peter grumbled, his face crumpled with perplexity.

“Busy?" I blurted out for the very first time, instantly becoming aware, and everyone turned to look at me.

I couldn't help but wonder why else on earth would it be busy unless something really mind-blowing and crazy was happening outside?

"Lemme try that one, maybe it'll work one more time. Is it possible it's your phone?"

When I opened my and attempted to call, it rang twice before giving me the irritating busy signal.

"It's busy," I responded as I removed the phone from my ear.

I looked up and made eye contact with Justine. His bewildered expression probably mirrored mine.

"I tried to tell you. It won't work," Peter grumbled. "And I really do not know about you guys, however, I'm not planning on sticking in here around all day. I'm going to get out of here as soon as possible.

Peter moved his attention to the automatic doors and began to wrench them open. This resulted in Marina's total deterioration.

 

 

"Don't do that!" she panicked, then started to cry.

 

 

Justine tried to reassure her by putting her hands in himself. Surprisingly, it helped to calm her down a little.

 

 

"Stop it. That isn't going to help the situation. We just need to stay calm and wait. I'm sure there must be a delay of some kind. Maybe there's a fire nearby? That could explain why we can't get through to the police,” Justine said.

 

 

He was clearly attempting to justify the circumstance; however, I didn't believe it. For maybe the first time in the previous three hours, I discovered myself siding with Peter. We'd waited long quite so, and I realized that something didn't seem quite right. It was as if everything wasn't adding up. So, without a doubt, I stood up and knocked my sweaty hands across the front of my slacks before putting my smartphone inside my jeans pocket. 

 

 

"I believe we should have at least attempted to open the door of the elevator. No one is answering us, so I think perhaps we should check if we can go out via the doors," I proposed.

 

 

Peter's aquamarine eyes met mine. I guess I surprised him off surprise, but he nodded and went alongside him, taking one of the elevator doors while he seized the latter.

 

 

"I really don't think-" Daniel started as we began to pull on our respective doors.

 

 

But then, shortly after, there was a deafening scream at that time. Not the frightened yelps we'd been having to hear from Marina, but muted cries from the opposite side of the automatic doors. My pulse quickened and my heart skipped a beat in my chest as the boom penetrated the atmosphere. Because of the cacophony, every hair on the back of my neck rose up.

 

 

What was that?

 

 

Peter and I both stood frozen in place, just gaping at the doors and trying to comprehend what we were hearing.

 

 

As startling as the scream was, the manner it quickly ended was much more so. We were having to listen to a cacophony imbued with such fear that, even suppressed, my whole existence felt it one millisecond, and nothing much. The stillness in the elevator was so cool and collected that you could have heard a pin drop.

 

 

"What was that?" I broke the silence, unable to take it for a moment longer.

 

 

"I don't-" Daniel started again but was again cut off by another muffled scream.

 

 

This time, Peter and I leaped away from the doors, as if they were about to attack us. We all stood there calmly staring at the doorway, listening. Every moment, it just seemed, a fresh screech or shriek was contributed to the symphony coming from the opposite direction. It may have been milliseconds or an eternity, but the noises soon got too much for me.

 

 

I couldn't place what I was starting to hear, but it ended up sounding like people were in emotional turmoil. Was indeed anybody being threatened or fired? Would that be a terrorist act? To be honest, I did not really care about the causes of the screaming at the time; I simply wanted them to cease and completely disappear.

 

 

I moved to stand alongside Daniel, covering my ears with my palms and backing away from the entrance. I clamped my eyes shut, shielded my ears, and pretended I was somewhere else. I imagined my mother and me giggling as we watched another corny love story on prime time tv. I imagined my sister on her engagement day, beaming at me as we started laughing and cheering at her reception. As I attempted to blot out my reality, my mind was overwhelmed with wonderful recollections.

 

 

I reluctantly slid to the ground next to Daniel and risked casting a glimpse his way. His countenance had lost all of its pigment, and his eyes were firmly locked on the doorway. He kept his grasp on Marina's hands, but it seemed more like a death grip than just a comfortable hug. Marina was just as pallid as Daniel, if not paler. I couldn't tell whether she was struggling to breathe since she was so motionless. Her anxiousness and panic attacks seem to have taken a back seat to anything that's going on now.

 

 

Even Peter seemed unsettled. He stood as rigid as a board, being unable to budge or shift in any way. With the tragedy still playing out, it astonished me that Marina was the one to break the stunned hush that had descended on us.

 

 

"W-what is that... are we... oh, my goodness! What the fuck is going on?" she inquired, her voice trembling.