Wednesday, November 19th
Spoopy Episode, lol
I burst through the doors of the hotel with my many bags from shopping. Christian hurried behind me, and we shake the rain off our heads. I didn't expect it to start raining today, the weather didn't predict it at all. Therefore, we had no umbrella whatsoever. I look to Christian with an annoyed face, and he hits me with his as well, and soon we both turn to laughing.
"That was crazy, it came out of nowhere!" I exclaim in annoyance.
"Yeah, but we're okay at least," he reminds me. "We need to call Mr. Nolan."
"I'm on it. Let's get to the room and dump this stuff off." I pull my phone out and call to explain to Mr. Nolan that we made it back to the hotel unscathed but soaking wet. He says that he and Mrs. Dwyer found refuge in a pizzeria, so we are here before them and without them. I tell him to bring us something back and then hang up. Christian and I finally reach the room and set our things down. We both dry off and change, then proceed to fight over the blow dryer. I let him have it, because he was throwing around very big threats. He must really be cold and wet and sad right now.
"Are you alright? You're not upset that this excursion was cut short, are you?" I ask.
"I am, but at least it didn't happen at the Empire State Building today," he mentions.
"Yeah, that observation deck ok the 86th floor was sick. Why do we keep going up so high everywhere?"
"It's New York, they're trying to show everyone up with tall shit I guess." I laugh and return to the room, leaving him in the bathroom. Basically today, we did our usual activities. It was cut short, due to a subway being down in the direction we were supposed to head, so we just deemed it a day to shop and freely roam the streets. Mr. Nolan so graciously allowed Christian and I to be responsible adults and take our own journey for the day. The rain got us all scrambled up, but we're good now. Maybe we should've stuck together, but no one predicted that rain. Thanks, meteorologists everywhere for failing at your job. That's mean, I apologize, you work very hard.
I flounce on the bed and pat my hands to a beat in my head. I use my foot to slide open the drawer on the nightstand. I hear a clunk, so I check the drawer. There is a hotel Bible sitting there, so I pick it up and dust it off. I skim the pages quickly, just killing time and flipping through, until I notice one page is covered in bloody black ink from a fountain pen.
AVOID THE 49th
FLOOR AT
ALL COSTS!!!
Holy shit. Christian is still in the bathroom, so I continue flipping the pages. There are more scribblings about the 49th floor, why it's evil, and why spirits lurk there. I get a chill down my spine, I'm fucking scared now. We are on the 48th floor, right below.
"CHRISTIAN!" I yell over the blow dryer.
"Yeah?" he responds, turning it off.
"Come here, I'm scared."
"What?" he questions. "I'm coming, babe." He walks in and sees me sitting there with the Holy Bible in my hands. He pays my shoulder with his hand consolingly. "I know, Jay. They killed gays, it's rough. You just gotta look past all that shit. There some good stuff in there."
"No, it's not that. Someone wrote in this Bible, defacing it first off, but that's beside the point. It's saying shit about spirits and suicides and deaths on the floor above us and how you shouldn't go up there ever. 'AVOID THE 49th FLOOR AT ALL COSTS'? We have to go, right?"
"Oh hell no," he denies immediately. "I did one Ouija board in middle school and I swear I was haunted for weeks."
"Come on, it's total bullshit. People stay on the 49th, right? It must be nothing. You up for a little rainy day adventure?" He cocks his eyebrow, but gives in with a sigh.
"Fine, you're right. Let's go, I guess."
"Yes! Okay, there's a map of most haunted spots and some instructions for something? Idk, but I'll take the Bible with me just in case." Christian gives me an uneasy look.
"You're lucky I'm a Christian." He gives me the worst smirk.
"That was the most awful pun ever, but I love you for it." He giggles, and we get up and head out the door. Heading down the long hallway of the hotel, I already have chills. What if this is really haunted and we're going to die? I doubt it, since we have a Bible to ward off the spirits. Maybe I should've gotten some salt and candles or something sharp. We finally reach the elevator, so we call for it and wait. Thankfully, there is no one else around, so we board the elevator alone. Now that I'm on it, I kind of hate being alone.
"Uh, Jay?" Christian questions me as I admire myself in the glass wall of the elevator. I snap out of it and return attention to him.
"Yes?"
"There is no 49th floor." My heart stops.
"What?" I choke.
"Nada. Nothing. No button, just 48, a blank space, and then 50."
"Wait," I say and flip through for the Bible's instructions page. "Okay here we go, it's says–"
"Oh fuck this," Christian says. "If there is a special way to get to the 49th floor, then it is not just a fun adventure, it's a damn suicide mission. Also, this author said to avoid the 49th, why would he give us instructions!?"
"Don't worry, I've got a Bible and a Christian. We'll be fine." He crosses his arms, nodding to me to read. "Alright, 'Press the 37th floor button. Let the doors close, then go back up to 42. Go back down to 24, and lastly 31. Make sure no one boards the elevator at any stops, or the steps are ruined. At 31 though, two women with white painted faces and jet black hair will board the elevator. One of them will tap the blank space where 49 should be, and the elevator will begin to ascend. You are now entering another realm.'"
"This is so fake," Christian says.
"Then let's do it, it's just a game." He shakes his head.
"Fine, but when I die, I'm haunting you forever."
"I'd hope so." I smirk. "Okay, continuing. 'Once you have exited the elevator, you only have until midnight to finish your excursion. If not, you will be trapped in the shadow realm for all eternity. If you take a symbol of Christianity with you, you will be bound immediately to the world.' Wait, does that mean you can't come, because of your name?"
"Honey, I'm far from a symbol of Christianity. I like boys." I laugh.
"Fair enough. Well, let's get this show on the road." I press the button for 37 and stand in the corner, gripping the railing tightly. I feel like I'm in the opposite of an antigravity chamber. This is crazy, and I am now pressing the button for floor 42. No one has stopped our trip yet, and we are descending to floor 24. At 24, we shoo a group away, telling them we stink really bad. I don't want to mess this up, we're so close. We head back up to floor 31. My heart is pounding, I'm gripping Christian's hand so tight my knuckles are whiter than paper. We stop on 31, and Christian and I stand at the door, waiting to see two women, but no one is there.
"Oh my, what a relief," Christian sighs, as do I. We both turn around to back up into the elevator again, only to be met with two painted ladies in odd cloaks. I jump, trying my hardest not to scream and upset the spirits now in my vicinity. They giggle, shoving past us and clicking the invisible button. It phases into reality and glows just like any other button. Christian's chest is heaving up and down, like he's having a panic attack.
"Are you okay, babe?" I ask him. His eyes snap to me in anger, oh shit.
"Are you fucking kidding me?! You think I'm alright?! I'm terrified! This is your fault, damnit!" I take his hands and try and calm him down.
"I know. Listen, I'll press our button and end this game. I thought it was just a joke, but we'll be fine. I'm sorry I put you through this." He nods and allows me to walk over to the buttons. I click the 48th button so that we will get off on our floor, and I walk back over to him. His hands are shaking so much. I can't believe I did this to him, I thought it would be a fun thing where we'd get a little scared but nothing would actually happen. Guess I was wrong, but at least we're going back to the room. This has been exhausting.
The monitor hits 48 and doesn't stop.
"Why isn't it stopping?!" Christian screeches.
"I-I-I don't know!" I yell. I click the emergency stop button over and over, but nothing's working. Suddenly, my collar gets tugged and I'm flung backwards against the wall. I look up to see Christian helping me, and also one of the ladies staring back at me. She has an evil stare, but her voice resonates more with a child.
"You can't leave, you've made it too far. Stay and play with us!" Fuck that!
"Please just let us go, we'll never come back, we promise!" Christian pleads with the spirits.
"Too late, too late, too late, too late..." they continue to chant as the door creeps open. An ominous fog leaks into the door from the floor, screams of blood-curdling torture echo throughout the halls, and sick laughter bursts from right outside the door. I hold Christian's cowering face in my arms, pulling him to my chest. I've got to protect him, this is my fault. As much as I want to cower and break down with him, I don't have the right to. And I'm not dying.
"Christian, get up." His face lifts up to mine, his tears flowing like a waterfall. He shakes his head furiously.
"I can't," his voice breaks.
"We have to. Look," I say and flip through the pages of the Bible. "It says here that we need to survive at least ten minutes outside of the elevator, then come back. The doors only open after ten minutes, and I will protect you, even if it costs me my life." I toss it to the ground beside me. It's no good outside here.
"Thank you," Christian says, wiping his eyes.
"I promise, you are going to survive." I take his hand and lead him out of the elevator door. Clowns with sharp teeth stare at us, no sounds coming from their dead features. We make it to the middle of the foyer, and suddenly we are surrounded by bloodthirsty demon clowns, who all start maniacally laughing. "Christian, trust me. Get on my back." He hops onto me and I grab his legs in my arms. I charge at one of the weaker looking clowns, who cowers away from me and moves so that I can dash through the circle.
After a minute of constant running, I find an open door, so I duck inside with Christian. I shut it and lock it to keep any followers out and we will be hidden, hopefully. I turn back and walk over to the bed, where Christian has sat down and began crying.
"Hey, it's okay. We'll stay in here until time is almost up, then rush back to the elevator. Simple as that." His face darts up from his hands in anger.
"Simple!? This isn't simple! This is... it's purely horrifying, and we're going to die and it's all your fault!" Every time he says it's my fault, it just breaks my heart even more.
"Babe, don't do this to me. Since when do superstitions come true? I figured this was all a prank, like usual, but this time it happened to be real. We will survive, don't worry. I just need you to forgive me."
"If we make it out of this alive, I don't know if I'll be able to see your face anymore." Fuck.
"You don't mean that," I say, voice faltering.
"Maybe I don't really, maybe I'm not thinking, but right now I'd rather be with anyone but you!" He begins crying again, hiding his face. I sit in a chair and evaluate everything. This wasn't my fault, how could anyone know this was real? I saved his life from demon clowns, but he hates me because this is "my fault". I begin to tear up from the thought of us breaking up. I don't want to lose him because of this- this... nightmare we found ourselves in.
The teardrops fall to my hands, and out of nowhere they begin to glow a fluorescent aqua color, and I look to Christian and same for him. I look over to the floor area of the room, where a TV was before, and a giant magic ritual circle glows the same color on the floor.
"Oh God, what's happening?" Christian gasps.
"It might be our negative energy upsetting spirits!" I wipe my eyes and think about kittens and ice cream and pizza, but it's not helping. The circle glows stronger, and soon books are flying from the shelves and levitating. Wallpaper and drywall start floating around the circle quickly, creating a tornado-like structure. Christian gets sucked away into it, after gripping rigorously at the bedsheets and slipping away.
"Christian!!" I scream from my love but he is gone, and there's nothing I can do. Nothing but one thing.
Follow him.
I grit my teeth and release the chair, getting vacuumed into the tornado and landing on my front. The ground feels like cardboard, and smells like mildew. I hear Christian coughing next to me, so I scramble to my feet and rush to his side. He is okay, thankfully we're both not dead from that. The small room we are in is full of opened boxes and... cleaning supplies?
"The janitorial room," I figure. Feeling around in the dark, I found the light switch and the door. It's locked. Christian stands behind me eagerly, I don't know why, I thought he hated me.
"Is it locked?" he asks. I nod, shrugging my shoulders. He sighs and begins to look around for a key or a pick for the lock. I don't have time to look for a damn key in this cluttered room.
"Look for flammables," I tell him. He gives me a look of misunderstanding but nods anyway. I know he has to trust me at this point, especially because I know he wants to survive. But maybe because he's done being irrational and doesn't hate me anymore. I grab an unknown unopened bucket of liquid that says "explosive when exposed to flame" and open it up. It smells like bleach, but stronger and also rotten somehow.
Christian hands me a box of matches and some cloth. I snap off the end of the handle of a mop and wrap cloth around it. Then I move the bucket over by the locked door and pour some of it out ok the floor to leak under the door. Christian and I retreat behind the fallen bookshelf and duck. I light a match and set fire to the makeshift torch, tossing it directly onto the toxic bucket. The explosion is loud and shakes the whole room, leaving my ears ringing and fiery debris surround us. We are unscathed though, so we get up and head out of the flaming hole in the wall.
In the hallway, naked women with spider legs spot us and release an inhuman screech at us. I scan the signs in the hall and find the arrow pointing to the elevators. "C'mon," I say to Christian and take his hand. We run as fast and hard as our legs and hearts allow. Christian struggles to keep up with me, so I hike him up on my back again and take off even faster somehow. Their cackling behind us is definitely a motivator for speed.
The elevators come into view, so I put the rest of my energy in my body into long strides, dodging giant metallic spider legs from crushing me from behind. I run straight into the elevator, smashing into it head first. As I lie on the ground, temporarily incapacitated, Christian presses our floor's button and spams the close door button. The door shuts on one of the spider legs that almost got in, crushing it as we go down. Silence fills the air for a few seconds, and then Christian starts chuckling. I laugh with him as well, relieved we are alive.
He helps me off the ground and we exit the elevator finally. I grabbed the Bible off the floor and took it with me. We walk back to the room and get inside fast. I strip immediately and get in the shower, washing the sweat off my body. Christian joins me, surprising me entirely.
"Are you sure?" I ask.
"Yeah, I'm sorry for being irrational earlier. I was just worried about myself, so I was being stubborn. I still love you, and I'm grateful to be alive. Thank you." I hug him close to my body and kiss his warm lips. Once we are clean, we get dressed and crash in the bed, trying to forget this awful experience. I put the Bible back where I got it and closed the drawer. Christian falls asleep instantly, so I snuggle up close to his heavy breaths and join him in slumber.
~
"Jay," I hear a voice to wake me up.
"Yeah, I'm up," I respond, rolling over and sitting up. I rub my eyes and struggle to open them, and in view is Mr. Nolan standing there. "Hey."
"We're back, and we've got your pizza. I'll just put it over there, okay?" Mr. Nolan asks and I nod in agreement. He sets it down on the table and waves, stepping out of the room. I'm surprised he didn't freak out, considering we were sleeping together. I guess he has a soft spot for us, which makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. I shake Christian's shoulder to wake him.
"Hey, we forgot about dinner." Christian rolls over and sighs, groaning and shoving sheets back over his head. I give him a kiss on the top of his head and brush it with my fingers, letting him go back to sleep. If he isn't hungry, then so be it. I walk over and munch on a few pieces before I am full, then head over to lock the door. Heading back to bed, I'm curious to see the Bible in the drawer, considering that crazy dream I had during my nap. I open the drawer and flip through the pages, finding the scribblings and confirming one of my biggest fears.
My nightmares were real.
"This can't be happening," I say under my breath. Christian grunts something unintelligible and I move away from the bed quickly. If that actually happened, then I need to hide it from Christian. He needs to believe it was all a dream, and I'll tell him it was a dream we had together so it felt real. Yeah, that'll work. I go out of the room into the hall, finding a trash can far from our room and tossing it in. Without this, no one can get to the 49th floor again, and Christian won't know it really happened.
"Where'd you go?" Christian questions when I enter the room again.
"Oh, I had to... ask Mr. Nolan something before he left. But he was already gone, so I'm gonna just text him." Christian gives me an obvious odd look, but he just shrugs and lies back down.
"Sure you're not hungry?" I ask him as I lie next to him. He nods, his smile fading and his eyes scanning my face.
"I'm working up an appetite for something, though," he says, taking my lips. Night time is definitely my favorite, because I get to lie next to my boyfriend and kiss him as much as I want. But Jesus, what the hell was that elevator? Guess I'll never know.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
idk, this can be considered non-canon to the story. i needed a refresh, like a creative buffer from the story and how it was going. so the day happened, but what happened in this chapter with the elevator isn't really important to the story. that'd be a weird twist this late in the book. hope u liked it.