The End of the World

Brad pulled into his parking spot in the garage and shut off the car. Rough day at the office, traffic was hell, but all that noise was behind him, for a few hours anyway. He was home.

He just sat there and collected himself for a few moments before gathering his stuff and headed for the elevator. The aroma of greasy burgers and fries wafted from his carry bag and the evening ahead was laid before him: shower, gut bombs, ball game, memos, bed. Do it all again tomorrow.

Should have grabbed a salad at the drive-thru, he thought, before catching himself at the garage lobby door: Who am I, my mother?

Out of the corner of his eye he could see someone stepping into an elevator, the door beginning to close. "Hold the door!" he yelped. With one elevator out of order -- the residents dourly referred to it as "Long COVID" -- and other likely on service as it usually was, he raced to the remaining functioning lift like it was the last chopper out of Saigon.

The woman inside threw her arm out to stop the door. Brad hopped aboard with breathless thanks and turned to face his benefactor. "Oh... hi there!" he said as he punched in his floor.

It was her, the woman he met at the condo board's "Spring Mixer" a few months back.

"It's Lou, right?" he said with a smile.

She was blushing as the door closed. "You remembered. And I'm gonna say...Bob?"

Ouch. "It's Brad, actually. 2205."

Lou nodded, then remembered to push the button for the 18th floor. "Right, Brad. How are you?"

"I'm good. Long day at the office. You?"

She lifted her now-empty blue recycling bag. "Just taking out the trash." She looked down in dismay at her evening attire: ratty sweatpants, crummy slippers, stained t-shirt. Makeup by AWOL. "Should have jumped in with it," she muttered.

Brad chuckled. "You look fine. Ten minutes from now I'll be sitting on the couch in my underwear with one sock on."

"Yeah, but you'll probably have the good sense to put some pants on if you decide to leave the premises," she said, cursing herself for not doing a risk assessment, or at least look in a mirror, before stepping into the world even for a brief recon to the garage. Working from home had its benefits but personal hygiene and being prepared to face the world from the waist down wasn't among them. She was at least wearing a bra, so there was that.

The elevator stopped at the ground floor and a young couple all over each other floated aboard. As they smooched they fell back on the panel and one of them clumsily pushed a series of buttons before reaching their intended target -- 2. Lou grimaced when she realized the conversation with her would-be suitor would be extended with unnecessary stops on the 5th, 6th and 10th floors.

Brad seized a long-awaited opportunity to deal with one of the careless young lovers. "Hey Mark, great to see back in the saddle after all that STD business -- way to go man!"

The surprised twenty-something turned to him in puzzlement. "Wha-who are you?"

"What's he talking about?" his conquest bleated. "You said you were clean!"

"Oh sure, NOW," Brad continued. "But our bud Nick told me it took another round of meds to kick this latest chlamydia to the curb, amiright Mark?"

The flummoxed lothario stole glances back and forth between the guy he couldn't place and his disillusioned date. "Is he talking about Nick Taylor?" she hissed.

The door opened on the second floor and the girl made a beeline for the Exit light, Mark hot in pursuit. "Babe, I don't even know this guy!" he wailed. The door closed, and Brad chortled, quite pleased with himself.

"What the hell was that?" Lou gasped. "How did you know--"

"Oh Mark and I go way back," Brad explained. "He's one of those guys who yacks on his phone at the gym, revealing his personal business at the top of his lungs while the people next to him are trying to work out in peace. Last week he made half of us ill with his description of something nasty he picked up from a dirty girl. Hey, don't judge me, I just took notes."

Lou puffed out a breath. "Remind me not to get on your bad side." Like she already wasn't.

The elevator stopped on 5. And then on 6. "Remember, we got even for this," Brad reminded her as the door closed.

They didn't get to 10. Suddenly the car jerked to a halt and the lights went out. A few seconds passed and Brad could hear Lou begin to hyperventilate in the dark.

"You okay?"

Lou's breathing became more ragged. "What's going on? Why are the lights off?"

Brad reached out in the dark, hoping to take hold of her hands instead of something a little more intimate. He sighed in relief when he grasped her clammy palms and she held on tight like she was a drowning woman.

"Hey hey relax, we'll be fine," Brad said. "Let me get my cell." He pulled out his smartphone and engaged the flashlight, aiming it at the wall panel. He located the emergency button. It squawked and a moment later dim lights at the corners of the ceiling sparked to life.

Brad pushed the button again. "Hello?"

"Concierge, front desk." It was Neil, one of the friendly staffers in the joint.

"Neil, it's Brad. There's two of us stuck in Car A. I take it the power is out?"

"Oh hi Mr. Paynter. Yeah, it's out all over. Sit tight -- I got a call out to the service company. It could be a little while."

"I gotta get out of here!" Lou cried as she paced the small space from wall to wall like a caged and coiled puma in regrettable sweats.

Both Brad and Neil tried to soothe the frightened woman. Neil wasn't much help.

"Try to stay calm and conserve oxygen!" he urged.

"For fuck's sake, Neil!" Brad spluttered. "We're not running out of air -- this isn't a submarine!"

They could hear Neil feverishly flipping through a binder. "Oh yeah -- here it is. You're right Brad, lots of air. But 'try to stay calm' still applies."

Brad slapped his forehead then looked at Lou with his best "can you believe this shit?" expression and managed to get a smile out of her. "We're gonna be fine, Lou. Neil, please let us know when the cavalry's on its way."

"You got it." The buzz of the speaker cut out.

Brad and Lou faced each other awkwardly in the dim light. She then closed her eyes and took deep breaths as she willed her heart rate back into double digits. The deep breathing brought a welcome diversion to mind.

"Something smells good," she said finally. "And that wouldn't be me."

"Oh yeah!" Brad said as he suddenly remembered his takeout food and opened his carry sack. "My dinner -- you hungry? We gotta keep up our strength." Suddenly his gluttony in ordering two sloppy burgers with extra-large fries and shake looked like amazing foresight.

"I could eat," Lou croaked and together they sank to the floor where they sat cross-legged while Brad spread out the feast between them. Lou didn't have to be asked twice and snatched one of the burgers.

As Lou gorged on the valve-clogging offering, Brad recalled a snippet of their earlier conversation at the party. "Wait, I thought you were a vegetarian!" he said, his mom's voice again reminding him he should've snagged a salad.

By now Lou was well into her burger, closing her eyes and savouring the greasy beef juices as they flooded her mouth. "Not anymore," she cooed when she was finally able to speak. It had been about a decade and her high-minded university days since she'd last sunk her teeth into processed animal flesh. Funny how all that principle vanished the first time she got trapped inside an inescapable death box on a cable. "Hey, how did you remember I was a vegetarian?"

Brad shrugged. "It's my job to pick up things."

She pointed at him. "You're....a prosecutor!"

He shook his head. "Ad agency creative."

She groaned before taking another bite. She retained absolutely nothing from their first meeting. "My mind is a sieve."

"Well," he said before delving into his burger, "that was, what, six months ago?"

Lou sighed. "I'm sorry. I do remember that I said I would call you and I didn't. I'm a schmuck."

Brad frowned. "Can a woman be a schmuck? I'm not Jewish, I have no idea."

"I think it's gender neutral, but maybe the better term is 'klafte'," Lou said.

"The semitic C-word?"

Lou giggled. "I think that's what the Urban Dictionary says. But I'm pretty sure it means 'bitch.'"

Brad test-drove it. " 'You son of a klafte.' Nah, let's stick with schmuck."

"Anyway, I'm sorry. I should have called you back like I said I would, gone out for that coffee, THEN concluded this was going nowhere."

Brad snorted. "Well, with that attitude, maybe you did me a favour by ghosting me. I just thought we got along fine, we seemed to have a few things in common. But what do I know?"

Lou wrinkled her nose. "Trust me, I have instincts for this kind of stuff. Sorry again. Thanks for dinner, though." She wondered if her brief dalliance with beef could be put down to stress eating and if she'd resume her fealty to plants once sprung from the elevator.

Brad reached back in the bag and produced the shake. "Ain't over yet -- dessert!"

"One straw. Not sure I'm ready to swap spit with you yet."

Brad wiggled his eyebrows and proffered the cup. "So you're saying there's a chance?"

Lou accepted the shake and drew on the straw with her cracked, unpainted lips. No way this could turn anybody on, she thought hopefully.

"So this is our coffee date, sorta," Brad said.

"It's not a date," Lou groaned. "It's more like a hostage situation."

"Oh, I dunno -- two people, sharing food, having a conversation in close quarters? It's at least date-adjacent."

Lou considered the carpet for a moment and drew her legs back up until her chin could rest on her knees. "Do you realize how many incontinent dogs almost got as far as the street before tinkling here? Very romantic setting, Mr. Paynter."

"I prefer 'intimate, candlelit dinner, emergency lighting edition.'"

Lou took another hit of the rapidly melting shake and returned it. She'd look at it his way, and perhaps be a little less of a schmuck. Or a klafte. "OK, so it's a date. What ground didn't we cover all those weeks--"

"Months!"

"Months ago. What don't I know?"

"We'll get to that, but I'm just curious: what did your instincts tell you before you deleted my number off your phone?"

Lou frowned. Her phone was unhelpfully upstairs on her bedside table. "I'm pretty sure your number is still there under B -- building party guy."

Brad brightened. "So I made an impression. Then..."

"Oh you know, I had just split up with another guy and I started seeing a trend in the men I seem to attract."

"Huh. You mean unattached, non-monosyllabic early 30-something professionals who know how to listen and leave their phones on mute while giving you their full attention, that kind of guy?"

Lou pointed at him. "Bingo! I just thought maybe it's time to give losers a shot."

Brad pointed down the shaft. "I'm pretty sure Mark is available. But you may need to give yourself a shot first."

She laughed. "You're right. The alternatives are worse."

Brad neatly folded the junk food wrap and tucked the refuse back into his bag. Lou was impressed with the neatness while worrying what he would make of her hoarders' paradise of a condo. That is if she ever gave him permission to cross the threshold.

"I get it," he said as he carefully placed the shake cup in a corner beside him. He pointed to it. "Bathroom," he explained.

Lou's eyes widened. I had been a few hours. "Oh gawd, why did I drink that shake?"

"It's got a lid and everything."

"Easy for you to say -- you've got a built-in aimer."

Brad opened his carry sack one more time and rummaged through the contents before producing a small plastic container he'd neglected to drop into recycle that morning along with a blue latex stretching band he'd been using as part of his physiotherapy for a muscle pull. As Lou watched in fascination, he used his Swiss army knife to neatly cut the container in half and used the band to cover the sliced edges. He then placed the container opening over the empty shake cup. Finished, he held up the improvised device for her approval.

"Madam, your pee funnel, ready when you are."

Lou was impressed with his craftiness. "Just my luck to be trapped in an elevator with MacGyver."

The emergency speaker crackled again. It was Neil.

"How are you guys doing in there?" he asked.

They answered in unison. "Fine!"

"That's good. Listen, so we have a problem. The whole city is dark and the elevator guys and the fire department are concentrating on hospitals and seniors homes so there may be a longer wait."

Lou began hyperventilating again. "Oh gawd oh gawd oh gawd!"

Brad scootched over and put an arm around her, risking the possibility that the gesture wouldn't make her feel even more claustrophobic. Instead, she melted into him and seemed to relax.

"Thanks for letting us know Neil. We'll keep it together in here but you won't forget about us, right?"

"No worries, man, I'll keep on 'em. Stay cool!" The speaker stopped crackling.

They sat in silence for a few minutes before Lou gently freed herself. "Thank you," she whispered.

"S'okay," he said. "I forgot to pack my teddy bear in the bag."

She chuckled. "You are great in emergencies. You got that."

Brad nodded. "Resourceful. Generous. Kind. Great texter. Have an account with FTD." He smiled. "What a catch!"

Lou rolled her eyes. "But can you MacGyver us out of the elevator?"

Brad didn't even make a feint toward his amazing carry sack. "Nope. All that stuff you see in the movies about trap doors in the ceiling is crap. There is an escape hatch but it's bolted shut, from the outside, for use by the pros to get us out if necessary. Trying to force the door open isn't a good idea either."

Lou sighed. "So we wait."

"Yup."

"I dated a guy from work."

That came out of left field. He turned to face her. "Okay."

"This is before the pandemic and we started working from home."

"I hated that," Brad said.

"I vastly prefer," Lou said. "Anyway, he was a sweetheart like you, and we had a thing and then we didn't. And he continued sitting in the next cubicle and across from me at meetings for like, months afterward until we all got sent home. I felt so relieved to not have to look at him anymore, like rubbing my nose in an old mistake."

"You think it was a mistake?"

She nodded. "They used to call it 'fishing off the company dock.' It's just awkward. You can't see somebody naked one day and look at him objectively the next in a sales meeting. Or maybe you can, I just don't have that talent."

"You think dating a neighbour falls under the same category?" he asked. "Even though this is literally the first time we've crossed paths in half a year?"

Lou laughed. "Probably not! The first time I was really bored and glad to meet anybody interesting. And now today trapped in an elevator. We only get together when I really need you!"

"Glad to be of service," Brad said amiably.

She pointed to his phone on the floor beside him. "Can you find out what's happening in the world?"

He pressed the button and saw NO SERVICE. "Wi-fi's out, of course."

Lou gathered her knees in again. "This could be the end of the world, for all we know."

"We still have each other. And Neil."

She laughed. "Classic third wheel situation."

Then the emergency lights went out. Brad pressed the emergency panel. Nothing. No Neil. Without the idle buzz of the lights, the silence was deafening.

"Okay," he said, "NOW it's the end of the world."

Lou didn't lose her shit this time, even though Brad had furnished a place to put it. "The backup generator?"

Brad nodded then realized that was a meaningless gesture in the dark. "There's only so much juice. But we haven't been in here that long. Another complaint for the board."

He felt her controlled breath against him as she gathered closer. "You all right?"

She said nothing for a moment. "I think I'm going to need that arm again."

Brad gently wrapped it around her shoulders and felt her burrow her head into his shoulder. "I'm sorry. I ought to be braver," she said.

"Don't worry about it. This is still way better than watching the Jays lose again."

"In your underwear and solo sock."

"Hey, hey, hey! Undressing me with your eyes...in the dark!"

They shared a chuckle but maintained the hug, waiting for any signs of life or rescue from behind the door. They heard occasional distant voices in the halls and the clip-clop of shoes in the stairwell next to the elevator. They thought better than to cry out for help -- people knew they were there and they'd need a little more patience. A couple hours passed as they dozed on and off.

"You need me to get off your arm?" Lou asked finally.

"Nope, you're light as a feather," Brad replied with a yawn. He flicked on his phone. "It's 11 o'clock." He saw her face in the half-light and that she was grinning.

"What is it?" He turned the light off.

"It's nothing," she said.

"You're smiling in the face of danger -- why?"

She playfully tugged his loosened tie. "I was just thinking this is the most fun I've had on a date since I can remember."

"Whew," he said, "I wouldn't go bragging on that."

"It's true, though," Lou continued. "You've kept me centred in here, you made me laugh and you may have ended my miserable existence as a vegetarian. Is there anything you can't do?"

"Well," Brad said, "there's one further test, if we're courageous enough to risk spoiling the evening."

"You mean not getting totally grossed out when the other one uses your 'She Pee' device?"

Brad chuckled. "No, I mean...we could...you know, make out. See if THAT totally grosses you out."

Lou lifted her head out of the comfortable nest she'd fashioned out of Brad's suit jacket. "Do you want to?"

"Pretty much from the minute we met by the punch bowl."

"Wow," she said. In the dark Brad couldn't tell just how alarming she found the prospect. But he had a notion. He touched her face and she didn't recoil and, in fact, leaned into his hand.

"I look terrible and smell worse," she warned.

"Pucker up," he warned back. Their lips docked. A fire was lit in a room with no ventilation. He could taste the shake on her lips and the bacon from the burger on her tongue. As a healthy male, that's pretty much all he needed. And she was game. She moaned quietly as they rolled sideways onto the floor, pressing their bodies together urgently on the disgusting carpet.

Lou got busy removing Brad's three-piece suit, tie, cufflinks, belt, pants and probably clean underwear. Lou's tee-shirt practically evaporated with the first tug and her unstrung sweatpants surrendered without resistance, her slinky thong underwear eight floors above on the night table next to her cellphone. She was mobilized and ready.

Lou's Victoria's Secret brassiere was an adventure to remove in the dark and she tore the damn thing off as she could no longer stand Brad's persistent yet futile fumblings as though he was trying to solve a Rubik's Cube. She pulled his face to her breasts and cried out as his mouth sucked her nipples, promoting him quickly to her waiting snatch to prove his expertise there.

Without further ado or foreplay, she mounted him reverse cowgirl and plunged his likely above-average sized circumcised cock into her swollen pussy and began riding him furiously. Brad, dazed by the sudden burst of enthusiasm, cried out in pain and ecstasy with the durable yet uncomfortable carpet fibres digging into him from behind while his lover delighted him above. He promised himself he would gently request vertical doggy style for round two as he began kneading her generous breasts while she rocked.

That was the inopportune moment the elevator shuddered, the doors rolled opened, and three bemused members of Toronto Fire Detachment 335 peered in, pouring beams of light into the sweaty proceedings within.