Chapter 1 – #Rule 2

Mackenzie Elevator Repair Company was a low budget operation. As such, the buildings we were sent to were often high rise apartments in the poorer sections of town. I was heading out to one such place, with my new trainee in tow.

He was fresh out of school and eager to impress. A bright young kid named Tommy – tall with short buzzed hair, always quick to smile and constantly joking around, but able to take things seriously when he had to. I was beginning to like him.

We got to the building and climbed out of our white service van with our duffel bag full of diagnostic gear. Only a week before we had visited the place, to repair the same broken elevator. It was always on the fritz. At least they had a back-up, though, so we wouldn’t have to climb the stairs. That was one of the worst parts of the job. Some buildings had thirty flights of stairs and only one working elevator, or both would go out on the same day. Those were not fun jobs to go to, since it would often mean climbing up and down the steps multiple times to reach the problem, and fetch the necessary parts and tools.

The superintendent met us in the lobby. Immediately I couldn’t help but notice a fat cockroach scurrying up the wall of the foyer. The place smelled like wet farts and flood damage that had never been repaired. There were yellow water stains on the ceiling and puddles on the aged vermillion carpet that we walked across towards the one working elevator.

“I don’t know what the hell is wrong with this thing,” the superintendent said.

I knew what was wrong with it. I had told him he needed to replace an expensive part but he was too cheap to fix it. As a result people were getting stuck in it constantly. That had happened to me in the same elevator not long before and I didn’t envy anyone in that situation.

We stepped inside the other lift and I hit the button for the correct floor. I held down “close doors” and the “28” button at the same time. This would let us rise up to the top level without having to wait for people to get on and off. A little secret that firemen and repairmen alike use to get where we need to a bit quicker.

The door closed with a squealing rattle as it dragged heavily across the threshold. It clanged shut with a loud metallic noise and we began to rise in the shaking box. It heaved back and forth as we ascended, knocking me off balance and into the wall. The old piece of shit was not improving with age.

“Is that normal?” Tommy asked.

“No.”

We got to the top floor and the door opened up. Exiting the elevator, we heard the desperate calls for help from the box next to ours.

“HELP! It’s so hot in here! I can’t breathe! Please help us!”

“Hey, I’m the elevator repairman,” I called down to them. “I’m here to get you out.”

“Thank God!”

I heard the muffled sounds of their grateful voices as they spoke to each other. It sounded like there were a few of them. No wonder it was so hot in the tiny box. The thought of all that body heat and packed people in such a crowded space filled me with sudden claustrophobic terror. I had never been scared of confined spaces, until I got stuck in that very same box those people were trapped in.

I remembered back to that day, sitting on the floor of the elevator, cockroaches scurrying around me everywhere in the dim and flickering light. The heat becoming oppressive and overwhelming the longer I waited, the air becoming thick and humid and impossible to breathe. I can still remember it like it was yesterday.

Tommy and I tried to pry open the door and found it was completely jammed shut. Unusual to say the least, but not unheard of. It would require a trip downstairs to the van for a different tool. I let Tommy know what the plan was and the superintendent, Ronny, decided to come down as well, so that he could let us back in.

Down we went in the squealing elevator. It rattled and shook violently, descending to the lower levels.

We heard a ding and the door began to slide open, revealing the lobby. I had told Tommy a few rules before we started working together and as the elevator door slid across its steel track, he unthinkingly broke rule number three – “Don’t get off the elevator while the door is still opening.”

He began to exit as the door rattled open, and I began to say something, reaching out to grab his arm, but it was too late.

As he went through the threshold, the door suddenly slammed shut with tremendous speed and force. I would later find out that the superintendent had put this elevator out of service earlier that day, since it had almost decapitated someone else in a similar fashion. He hadn’t wanted to climb the stairs, though, so when the other one went out of commission he just started using it again. None of this he bothered to mention to us.

The elevator was old, the steel door heavy, and when it slid shut it slammed into Tommy with incredible force. Once it hit him it did not stop, but continued, crushing him like a sledgehammer through an overripe watermelon. Ever seen Gallagher? Yeah, kinda like that.

His nose caved in and his jaw shattered as the door crushed him with overwhelming power before I could intervene. He gurgled and spat out teeth as I rushed forward to try to push the door open. His head appeared partially caved in and I saw shards of his skull protruding from the flesh like broken pottery.

I was about to put my fingers in the gap but then thought better of it. Using the pry-bar instead, I tried to wrench it open. I jammed the edge of it into the doorframe, just above Tommy’s head.

That was when the elevator began to suddenly ascend again, this time much quicker.

Tommy was still partially trapped, half in and half out the door, with the entire thing slammed through the middle of him. The pry-bar, and then the top of the elevator door came down on his head as we rose up to the next floor, caving his skull in from a different direction.

That was all his brutalized body could take, and the left side of him collapsed into the lift. The other half was still outside, in the lobby, and we left it behind as we went up.

I began to scream with terror at what had happened, but the superintendent didn’t seem fazed. He just looked at me calmly as the box rattled and went up with increasing speed.

“Shit,” he said. “That’s not good. Hey, can you keep a secret? I’ve got cash. We can tell people he was screwing around and got caught in the door. Nobody’s fault. Or I can tell them you shoved him. It’s up to you.”

He smiled with his greasy grin. A thick gold chain necklace hung around his sweaty neck and his bald head gleamed with beads of perspiration as he waited for my response.

Before I could say anything, we began to freefall. The box dropped as if the cable had been cut, and I felt my stomach lurch and the cheeseburger I had eaten for lunch began to rise up into my throat in sudden protest.

If we had been up on the top floor we would have died for sure, but as it happened we hadn’t gotten that far up yet. Still, the impact was deafening, and the force of us stopping suddenly rattled my bones with horrifying pain.

Ronny, the superintendent, had been brought down to the floor with sudden force, and I saw his forehead was bleeding. He was missing a couple teeth as well. We began to ascend again, and my heart began to hammer even fast in my chest. I wanted to get off this hellish ride.

Suddenly it stopped.

I heard another ding and the elevator door opened in the lobby, revealing the other half of Tommy, as well as a small crowd of disgusted and curious tenants.

The super got up, scrambling to his feet, and tried to dive out of the box. He didn’t quite make it.

The door stopped moving and slammed shut once again, landing with sickening force against his bloated midsection. I heard several ribs cracking loudly and he screamed as it drove itself into him. Blood poured from his mouth and I raced over to the controls and hit the “door open” button.

Nothing happened.

With a large spray of blood like a beach ball sized water balloon exploding, his body was torn completely in half by the door.

I hit the button again and it opened. I waited patiently for it to slide all the way across the track and reach the other side. Then and only then did I step forward with confidence, leaving the gore-filled elevator behind.

There was going to be a ton of paperwork after all this, I thought. Too bad, I had liked the kid. But you gotta remember the rules. Maybe I should move that one up the list.