by Jo Watson
“An expression of rebellion against our social-media obsessed society,” the man with the Pirates of the Caribbean moustache had said to me. I’d nodded, even though I had no idea what he was talking about. Like I said, the whole place was very fancy and arty, and I really didn’t need to live here. It was all for show, if I was truly honest with myself. The question was, who was I showing?
The elevator was empty when I climbed in; I liked it that way. I fiddled with the beads on my bag as the elevator started to descend. I watched the numbers lighting up, getting smaller and smaller and smaller . . .
14 . . .
13 . . .
12 . . .
I was dreading the moment that it said “1” and I had to climb out and face my fire-breathing agent. My agent was intimidating at the best of times, what with her piercing green eyes and her uber-fancy name, Daphne Kingsley-Hawthorne. Every time I heard her say it out loud, I automatically mumbled, “The second esquire,” in my head. The elevator gave a sudden jerk and then came to an abrupt stop. I looked up. We were on floor nine, one of the office floors.
“I’m leaving now, I’m leaving now, okay?” An agitated-looking woman walked in. “I’m walking into the elevator. I’m in the elevator. I’m pressing the button. I’ve pressed the button. I will be there on time.” She narrated her way in and stood on the opposite side to me. I ran my eyes over her quickly before looking away. She was the kind of woman that had presence. You know the kind I’m talking about? The kind that, if she walked into a room, everyone would look up at her. She oozed professionalism with her neatly scraped-back hair, dark maroon lipstick, high-heel shoes with red soles, AND she was wearing a power suit! Ha! I knew I should have worn one. This woman exuded such strength and power, there was no way someone wearing that was getting fired today, or ever.
“Elevator doors are closing now. They’ve closed. I’ll be there soon . . . uh, hellooooo? Losing reception, sorry . . . uh . . . See you soon.” She hung up hard, as if she was pissed off, and I couldn’t help but wonder who she was speaking to. I made eye contact briefly and gave a tiny smile. She didn’t smile back and her eyes drifted down to my T-shirt. I crossed my arms; I could see she was silently judging my unfashionable apparel. Wench!
The elevator started moving and then suddenly stopped again. Power Suit looked up and gave a long, slow sigh. As if she had no time to spare. She probably didn’t; women like her were always rushing off to important things like business meetings and Pilates—see, two can play at the judging game. The elevator doors opened, and an even more agitated-looking woman stepped in. She pressed the ground-floor button angrily, and, when the doors didn’t close immediately, she pushed the button another five times in quick succession.
“It’s not going to work faster if you push it more than once,” Power Suit said sarcastically.
The other woman whipped around and gave Power Suit one hell of a death stare. God, her eyebrows really were on fleek. Suddenly, the air was thick with pheromone-filled tension. Narrow-eyed stares were coupled with tight, matt-lipped scowls. I felt transported into an episode of The Real Housewives and wondered what was going to happen next. I was ever so grateful when the doors finally did close and the elevator started moving again. But that didn’t mean the atmosphere in the elevator was any better. In fact, you could have cut the tension in that little metal box with a blunt utensil. Power Suit was tapping her phone against her palm, Fleek Brow was tapping her foot and I was fiddling with my bag. I briefly wondered why these two looked as anxious as I felt. What were their stories? Like me, did they also now find themselves standing at some great fork in the road, wondering which one they should take? Wondering who they were, why they were here and what the hell they were going to do? My mind started racing, but it quickly stopped when . . .
Disaster struck.
A loud grinding sound ripped through the silence and forced me to cover my ears. A sudden drop thrust my stomach into my mouth and made all the blood rush to my head so quickly that I saw stars behind my eyes. I grabbed on to the railing as gravity disappeared and my feet lifted off the ground. Everyone screamed as the elevator started to plummet faster and faster and faster and . . .
“I didn’t mean it about Yellowstone Park!” I wailed loudly as the thing continued to fall at what felt like the speed of light. I really hoped dying in an elevator wasn’t going to be painful. What the hell was I thinking? Of course it was going to be painful! I closed my eyes tightly and waited for the inevitable big bang, which would no doubt be followed by a never-ending blackness. I was going to die . . .
Now, what the hell was the right soundtrack for that?
CHAPTER 2
Pan-de-mon-i-um! It broke out.
Screams and wails and arms and legs filled the air. A sharp pain in my back alerted me to the fact that Power Suit’s Louboutin had stabbed me between the shoulder blades. Another pain in my face as Fleek Brow’s enormous key ring whacked me across the mouth. I tried to swat all the debris away with one hand as I clung to the railing with the other, my knuckles turning a bright white from the effort. My handbag slipped down my arm and I made a grab for it. And then the strap ripped and, like a million marbles been blasted out of a cannon, the beads shot into the air, pelting me like bullets. They bounced off the floor and the walls and ceiling with the frenetic sound of a death-metal drumming solo. Yes, that was the perfect soundtrack for this moment. A murderous, ear-shattering guitar riff accompanied by the violent shriek of lyrics about dying in the flames of hell.
And then, just as quickly as it had started, it stopped. The elevator ground to a halt, the death-metal song that was playing in my head concluded with a savage, growling crescendo, and then—silence. We all held our breath as the silence around us screamed.
Five seconds passed, six, seven, eight, and then suddenly the elevator was filled with new sounds—our desperate cries for help. I stood up, my heart banging in my throat so hard that I was worried it would shoot out. I was shaking, panting, gasping for air and wailing for help. Power Suit threw herself at the doors and tried to pry them open. Pop—a red-painted false nail flew off and hit the floor. She banged her fists against the door so hard that things started to shake again.
“Careful!” I yelled at her, afraid her shaking might dislodge the elevator again, but it dislodged something else instead. I watched, my jaw dropping in horror, as the steel trapdoor in the ceiling shook and then fell. It plummeted down, picking up speed as it went, and then, to my horror, smashed into Fleek Brow’s head. She stood there for a few seconds, looking stunned, and then her eyes glazed over, the blood gushed and she fell backwards with a bang.
“Oh my God.” I threw myself to the floor and shook her. She moaned and gurgled. “We need to get out of here,” I screamed at Power Suit. She looked at me as if her eyes were about to burst from their sockets, as if her lower jaw was about to snap off and tumble to the floor. She nodded at me, her dark lipstick smudged across her cheeks, and then she turned and hit the big red alarm button. A new sound filled the air. The siren was so loud that I had to cover my ears and bury my head between my knees.
I’m not sure how long we waited like that, alarm blaring, each one of us in our own shocked world. Time, at this stage, seemed to have taken on a whole new nebulous meaning. Seconds felt like years as men chopped at the steel doors with axes and shouted things like, “Don’t worry! We’re coming for you!” All I could do was sit on the floor, my knees pulled towards my chest, and try not to totally flip the fuck out. It’s true what they say about having a near-death experience: your life really does flash in front of your eyes. But not the good parts. As I sat there, regret after regret, and painful memory after even more painful memory flooded me. Broken hearts, friends and family I didn’t have, books with zero words in them . . .
The door finally burst open. Sweaty axe-wielding men in uniforms (which, under less life-threatening circumstances, I might have gawked at) piled into the lift. A paramedic carrying a huge first-aid bag
looked around at us and then made a beeline for the woman on the floor, whose bloody brows were no longer on fleek. I couldn’t move for a few moments, despite the men telling me it was safe to stand up. I think it was in that moment that I finally understood the meaning of the phrase “shell-shocked.” I felt far away, removed from my body in some strange way, and it was only when I felt the hands beneath my arms, the gentle pull, the powerful lifting into the man’s arms, that a part of me clicked back to life. He carried me out and, as he did, applause.
I looked around and, to my horror, realized just how many people had gathered outside to watch the spectacle—iPhones in the air, filming it. A free reality show unfolding right in front of their eyes, no Netflix subscription required. I wondered what the soundtrack for this might be.
I wiggled and jumped out of his arms, almost losing my footing as I went. His arm shot out and stopped me from falling. A few gasps rose up as I steadied myself on my feet.
“Careful there, ma’am,” he said. I felt confused, nervous, and my hands reached for the beads on my bag. But it wasn’t there. I looked over at my empty arm.
“My bag, my bag,” I wailed loudly, as if it was the most important thing in the world. I looked around for it, and that’s when I remembered all the beads. Bouncing, ricocheting, pirouetting inside the elevator. I turned and looked inside. The woman on the floor was still there; the paramedic was securing something around her neck and setting up an IV. I shuddered as the needle slipped into her arm, and then quickly looked away; I could feel the color drain from me as the white static buzz of dizziness prickled my skin.
“Sit, sit.” The fireman guided me to the floor, gently putting my head between my legs as it spun like a planet on an out-of-whack orbit.
I heard a woman’s voice, soft and sweet and kind. “Here,” she said, reaching into her shopping bag and pulling out a Coca-Cola. She opened the can and passed it to me. I nodded gratefully and raised it to my lips. Sugar and fizz and sweetness made me feel instantly better.
“I’ll get your bag,” the fireman said sympathetically. “Just sit for a while.” I nodded again, aware that I was in worse shape than I’d initially thought. I sipped the Coke and, with each sip, I could feel my color return, my head steady itself, and soon my legs were no longer shaking. The fireman came back with my bag and handed it to me—well, what was left of it, anyway. The strap had been ripped off and a large gaping tear in the bag rendered it useless. I looked inside to make sure all my things were still there—cell phone, wallet. And that’s when I saw it.
“What the . . . ?” It looked like a secret compartment inside the bag had been ripped open. I stuck my fingers into the tear and touched something, a lot of somethings. I gripped what felt like pieces of paper between my fingers and pulled them out. I stared at them. They looked old, very old. Stained brown and dusty from time, creased as if they had been read over and over again. I scanned them briefly. They looked like they’d all been written by the same person, same handwriting. I opened the first one and started reading.
9 July, 1949
My love,
I’m sorry I couldn’t get away to meet you today, but I was stopped by the police, demanding to know where I was going. We are all in such shock about what happened yesterday. It’s all over the radio, it’s all anyone can talk about, and I feel sick because I don’t know what this new law is going to mean for us.
I turned the letter over in my hands and studied it carefully. There was no address on the back of it, nothing to tell me where it had come from or who it was for. I looked down at all the other letters and started reading them briefly. They were all love letters, that much was certain. As I skimmed them, familiar words and phrases and dates caught my attention. And, just as I was starting to piece the bits together and understand what these letters were about, my phone rang. I jumped at the loud sound; it reminded me of that alarm. I grabbed my phone and looked at the name flashing across the screen. My heart fell into my feet once again.
The phone stopped ringing and I breathed a sigh of relief, but that was quickly interrupted by the stream of WhatsApp messages pinging angrily on to my screen.
Daphne (the second esquire): Where are you?
Daphne (the second esquire): You’d better be on your way.
Daphne (the second esquire): I cancelled a lunch meeting for this!
Daphne (the second esquire): I am fast losing my patience here.
My fingers were shaking as I tried to type as quickly as possible.
Becca: I’ll be there in five minutes. Was stuck in an elevator.
Daphne (the second esquire): Sure you were.
I could almost hear the sarcasm in her voice dripping from those tightly pursed lips of hers. I looked up as a gurney rushed past me; it was Fleek Brow and she was being rushed away with a great sense of urgency. I watched as the gurney raced through the hallway. I could see the flash of red and blue ambulance lights as she disappeared out of the front doors. I hoped she was going to be okay.
“I’m on my bloody way, okay! I’m up. I’m walking. I’m on my way!” I heard that familiar agitated voice and looked over to my left. Power Suit was talking into her phone again, the urgency in her voice palpable. She hung up angrily and then turned and marched away from me. Her heels clanked loudly on the marble floor as she went. And then, it was just me. The other two women who I’d shared this harrowing experience with were gone. And I didn’t even know their names. I stood up and dusted myself off. It was time to go. Time to face the music. Whatever the hell that music was going to be.
CHAPTER 3
My agent’s office was just as intimidating as she was. Large brown leather couches were scattered across her dark-wood floored waiting room. They were the kind of couches that, if you had a sweaty ass, you would stick to. The kind that required you to peel yourself off with a spatula. I lowered myself on to the couch as one of her little minion assistants—they always looked terrified—rushed up to me with a toothy grin.
“Can I offer you some coffee?” she asked in a small, fast voice. She smiled quickly and then moved her head from side to side, like a little meerkat might do.
“No, thanks.” I didn’t think coffee was a good idea right now; it might be like adding petrol to a fire, since my heart was already racing like a pack of greyhounds. In fact, it felt like my heart might burst through my chest at any moment and splatter itself across her shiny wooden floor. I smiled nervously as I imagined one of her assistants having to mop up the mess. My agent would ask, “What the fuck happened here?” (she swore a lot) and her speedy meerkat assistant would reply that one of their former so-called authors, “a nobody, really,” had her heart explode out of her chest.
I folded my arms across it and attempted a long, meditative in-breath. But trying to rein my emotions in was like trying to wrangle a wild, galloping horse. It was just too hard to control the nervous panic that was rushing through me, flushing and prickling my skin, dropping cold marbles into the pit of my stomach and shaking them around. Some doomsday soundtrack started playing in my head. The kind that starts as everybody drops their grocery bags in the street and stares up at the sky as the massive mothership moves in and blocks the sun . . . Duh, duh, duuuhhhh. Do you hear that?
“Where the fuck is she?” I heard the scream. It wasn’t subtle. And I knew the “she” she was referring to was me. The meerkat who’d offered me the coffee raced across the room nervously and stuck her head around the door.
“She’s here,” she whispered sweetly. So sweetly it was almost bitter, like sucking on a packet of artificial sweetener.
“Send her the hell in.”
I stood up and started walking towards her office. Slowly. The soles of my feet felt like they were coated in sticky gum and it was hard to move. I needed a distraction and I reached for the beads on my handbag. But it wasn’t there. Shit, I felt so exposed right now. I needed my bag like a child needed its favorite blanky. I slid half my foot over the threshold of her door and paused
. I couldn’t do this, so I lurked in the doorway like a creepy stalker for a few seconds, until . . .
“I can fucking see you!” Her loud voice came at me like tossed daggers. “Get in here.”
And so I did. I walked in and there she was. Sitting behind her huge wooden desk, leaning back in her old leather chair that looked like it had once inhabited the halls of government. Thick smoke hung in the air as she pulled on a strong Camel cigarette . . . Okay, so that last part was a lie. She wasn’t smoking. But she should have been, because she was the kind of woman who looked like she gave zero fucks. The kind of woman who would use your rotting corpse as a lifeboat, who drunk petrol shots from a poisoned chalice and ate men alive after sex . . . That’s if she even had sex.
“So, tell me,” she said in her gruff, raspy voice. “Has someone figured out a way to halt and reverse global warming?” She leaned forward in her chair; it creaked loudly.
“Sorry, what?” I asked nervously.
“I don’t know, or has someone discovered all the secrets to the universe?”
I shook my head. “I don’t follow.”
She stood up; another long, loud creak. I wondered if it was intentional. Did her chair have an “intimidating creak” setting?
“I’m asking if a miracle has suddenly occurred and you have some actual words on a page that can be made into this thing commonly referred to as a ‘book.’ ” She gestured air quotes. It was so slimy and patronizing, and, had I been a different person, one with a much firmer backbone, I might have picked up that pompous look-at-me-I-hunt taxidermy pheasant that she had on her desk and stuffed it down her throat, or at least plucked its tail feathers out and poked her with the hard parts.
