I stare at the emergency button in the elevator,
red and three times as large as the others,
one other person collapsed against the back wall
should you wish to call it that.
He unwinds a cloth from his forehead.
Had he not been a man, you might’ve called it a burqa,
which it is not.
His hands are large and square,
fingernails chipped and dirty but not chewed,
a backpack slung over his shoulder like a forgotten dream.
We pass between the fifth and sixth floors.
I hear a cry in the shaft, gears ripp metal
as my floor is illuminated in bright amber.
He cautions me as doors open, “The ninth floor
no longer exists.” I tell him wrong, wrong, wrong
and exit in sheer darkness.
