Stuck

The elevator broke.

To be specific, the elevator broke with me and four other people. A girl in front of me tried pressing the emergency button but nobody's answered yet.

A guy to the left of me tried calling 9-1-1 but there isn't any service here. At first we were all laughing and joking about it, but now we're all dead silent. Waiting for the elevator to start and the doors to open.

After twenty minutes or so the lights started to do this annoying flicker, we tried to ignore it but it was hard. At this point everyone was just scared, and thinking.

A few minutes later the lights just cut, I looked at my phone and it was 9:24 p.m.

"The place is closed." I said.

"What are we gonna do???" The man to the left asked.

Nobody answered and nobody could see each other. A few more minutes passed and the lights started to flicker again, looking around something looked different. I don't know what but it's just different.

I don't know when we'll leave but I'm sure all six of us will think of something.

The neighbor that tried to groom me

I was quite a naive teenager, and the first twelve/thirteen or so years of my life were very sheltered, as I grew up in a small-town community and attended schools that had fewer than 100 students. We moved when I was fourteen to a larger, urban area (at the time I thought it was a big city, but it's not) and at the new house was where I met the neighbor in question. I didn't realize until recently, when I really thought about that period of my life, that he was trying to groom me. I could've been a potential victim of his. It's twelve years on now, and I've only just realized what he was trying to do.

When I was fourteen we moved. Packed up our lives and moved. We moved into a quiet cul-de-sac and I attended the local school. My mom found a new job, and she worked a lot so she was out of the house quite a bit. I had an older brother, but he was 20 and out partying or staying at other people's houses, so I saw him even less than I did my mom.

I met the creepy neighbor the day after we moved in. He lived three houses down from us, and because it was a sleepy cul-de-sac, he had seen the comings and goings of cars and moving trucks. He came over, introduced himself, and presented my mom with a dish of lasagna and asked if there was anything he could help us with. Normally my mom is quite wary of new people, and she's been burned by users and abusers in the past, but she seemed comfortable around the neighbor, and he did very much put her at ease, even making her smile and laugh.

He helped us with some of the larger items of furniture, and he even gave mom the contact information for the local plumbers and electricians, should we need them. He told us which were the best companies in town for the internet, etc. In short, he was very friendly and helpful, going out of his way to make sure we were settled in.

At first, he kept to himself, we didn't really see him in the first three months. If I walked past and he was in his garden, then, of course, I'd stop and say hello. He asked a lot of questions; he asked about school and my friends, which teachers I liked and didn't like. He asked which subjects I liked and if I had homework. Again, I didn't read too much into this. He was just being polite and neighborly. I guess as he figured out mom's work pattern, and that I was home alone a lot after school, then he became bolder.

One day I was walking home, it was after 4, as I'd volleyball practice. He was out in his garden. It was a really hot day, and he said hello and asked about school. Asked if I had enjoyed practice. He then invited me inside for a glass of lemonade. I told him I needed to get home and get dinner started so that mom had something to eat when she finished in a few hours. He told me it was just a glass of lemonade, and I had nothing to worry about. Long stories short, most weeks after practice I'd have something to drink with him.

He was easy to talk to and friendly. He wasn't like any of the other grownups in my life. Looking back on it now, it seemed that it was easy to relate to him in a way. He wasn't trying too hard to be cool, or 'hey kids, I'm one of you,' but he seemed to trust my intelligence in a way that no other adults could. He wasn't condescending, and he wasn't a rule enforcer like the teachers or other adults in my life.

He also started dropping by the house a bit too. On the odd chance that mom had gotten off work early, or if it was her day off, then he wouldn't, and if my brother was home, then again, not a peep out of the neighbor, but if it was the evening, and I was home alone, then most days he'd come by. He was quite a good gardener, so he'd ask what had been left for me to start dinner with, and he'd give me tips or sometimes he'd go to his garden and pick some herbs to go into the meal. He also pick me flowers from his garden. Each time I thanked him he'd say something like, "that's what friends are for." or, "you deserve flowers, you work hard in school." One time he even said to me, "pretty flowers for a pretty girl." That one washed right over me. I thanked him and put the flowers in a vase. I didn't think on that at all.

He somehow found out it was my birthday, and so two days after, when I was once more home alone again, he came by and gave me a silver bracelet. When I told him I couldn't accept it, he shushed me and did the whole, "nonsense, think nothing of it." he then told me that it could be our fun little secret and that I could only wear it when no one else was around. It could be 'my thing' a fun little thing, and I could think of him. Again, despite the fact that red flags were all around me, I didn't think about it too much. He was the neighbor, he was being a friend and keeping an eye on me because he knew I was home alone a lot. He very much wanted me to believe that I could trust him, and view him as this protector who I could go to when/if I needed something.

I got a few more gifts from him over time, and again I was told it was our secret, that no one else need ever know, and that they wouldn't understand the dynamics of our friendship. "After all," he told me, "you wouldn't want to get both of us in trouble," and he was right, I didn't.

And then one day he hugged me. I had quickly gone over to his house to help with some odd job, and he hugged me. I'm also certain he sniffed my hair too, but I can't quite remember. I remember then, feeling like it wasn't right. I was sixteen, nearly seventeen by that stage, and we had been 'friends' for two years now. He tried to convince me to stay longer, and I really remember having to spell it out to him that I had to get home. I really had to state explicitly several times I couldn't stay. I ran the very short distance home and I must've looked out of sorts because my brother, who was home for once, asked me what was wrong. I didn't tell him about the neighbor, I made up some bullshit story about the neighborhood kids being rude and bullying me. So luckily, the next few times I went out, he was with me to protect me. He wouldn't let me out of the house without him. He sensed that I was really scared. The neighbor, seeing us always together and that my brother was actually home for a change, backed right off. We moved two months later. Mom got a better job offer, and we could afford a nicer house in a nicer area, so we moved.

I shudder to think what would've happened if I'd stayed that day he had hugged me, and it makes me sick to think I ever ate or drank anything he gave me. It could've been spiked. I can't believe I was so easily fooled, and I was able to let someone do that to me.

ETA: Thanks for the supportive private messages, yes I am okay. Shout out to the nice guy who told me that I "should've given him a chance," and that "chicks like me are the reason nice guys lose out." Nah fam, not today.