Xi’an Kim.
It was morning. It was breakfast. Scrambled eggs, toast – the whole damn nutrient shebang. Fuel for another day. Outside the window, the world was its usual mess, but down below, by the sad excuse for a “pool” – more like a concrete puddle – I saw her.
The cleaning girl. Skinny, thin, dark hair tight against her skull. She was fishing stones out of the pool, one by one, like she was dredging for lost hopes. Each stone a tiny, grey lump of nothing, just like us. Over and over. Like some kind of penance. Or maybe she just needed something to do. Something to fill the empty spaces.
I watched her, chewing slowly, the grease coating my tongue. What the hell was she doing? The pool was some pristine oasis. But there she was, meticulously removing each stone, as if she was enacting some silent, personal ritual.
My mind drifted to the elevator in this building.
We’re all just meat in a falling elevator, I thought, pushing around the last of my eggs. It was morning. It was breakfast, but it didn’t change anything. Some of us are up here, eating, basking in the weak sunlight. Some of us dowthere, cleaning up the mess. But the elevator’s going down. It’s just a matter of time.
She paused, the cleaning girl, and looked up at the building. Her gaze swept across the windows. I looked away, quick, not wanting to connect. Not wanting to be seen.
I finished, bored, like everyone else. I got in the elevator, pressed the button. I held my breath, waiting for the inevitable drop. But it came to a stop at the lobby.
Walking past the pool, I saw she was scrubbing the side now, a small, hunched figure against the water. Another pointless motion.
We’re all just meat in a falling elevator, I thought, walking into the grey morning. Breakfast, cleaning, walking, breathing. It’s all just waiting for the fall. And there’s nothing, absolutely nothing, we can do.
The elevator’s going down.
Down.
