“I’m okay,” she said, sliding down the wall until she was sitting on the floor, her elbows resting on her knees. She attempted a smile, which emerged a little wobbly. “I’ve heard monsters prefer closets to elevators.”
“Then I think we’re in the clear,” he said, sitting down, too, his back against the opposite corner. He pulled his phone from his pocket, and in the dim light, his hair glowed green as he bent his head over it. “No signal.”
“It’s usually pretty iffy in here anyway,” Lucy said, reaching for her own phone before realizing she’d left it upstairs. She’d only run down to grab the mail, a quick round-trip to the lobby and back, and now it felt like a particularly bad moment to find herself completely empty-handed.
“So,” the boy said, tipping his head back against the wall. “Come here often?”
She laughed. “I’ve logged some time in this particular elevator, yes.”
“I think you’re about to log a lot more,” he said with a rueful smile. “I’m Owen, by the way. I feel like we should probably introduce ourselves so I don’t end up calling you Elevator Girl whenever I tell this story.”
“I could live with Elevator Girl,” she said. “But Lucy works, too. I’m in 24D.”
He hesitated a moment, then gave a little shrug. “I’m in the basement.”
“Right,” she said, remembering too late, and she was glad for the darkness, which hid the flush in her cheeks. The building was like a small country in and of itself, and this was the currency; when you met someone new, you didn’t just give your name but your apartment number as well, only she’d forgotten that the super always lived in the small two-bedroom flat in the basement, a floor Lucy had never visited.
“In case you’re wondering why I’m on my way up,” he said after a moment, “I’ve figured out that the view’s a whole lot better on the roof.”
“I thought nobody was allowed up there.”
He slipped his phone back into his pocket and pulled out a single key, which he held flat in his palm. “That’s true,” he said with a broad grin. “Technically speaking.”
“So you have friends in high places, huh?”
“Low places,” he said, returning the key to his pocket. “The basement, remember?”
This time she laughed. “What’s up there, anyway?”
“The sky.”
“You’ve got keys to the sky?” she said, and he knitted his fingers together, lifting his arms above his head in a stretch.
“It’s how I impress all the girls I meet in the elevator.”
“Well, it’s working,” she said, amused. Watching him over the past weeks, studying him from afar, she’d imagined he must be shy and unapproachable. But sitting here now, the two of them grinning at each other through the dark, she realized she might have been wrong. He was funny and a little bit odd, which at the moment didn’t seem like the worst kind of person to be stuck with.
“Although,” she added, “I’d be a lot more impressed if you could get us out of here.”
“I would, too,” he said, shifting his gaze to scan the ceiling. “You’d think the least they could do would be to pipe in some music.”
“If they’re planning to pipe in anything, hopefully it’s some cool air.”
“Yeah, this whole city’s like a furnace,” he said. “It doesn’t feel like September.”
“I know. Hard to believe school starts tomorrow.”
“Yeah, for me, too,” he said. “Assuming we ever get out of here.”
“Where do you go?”
“Probably not the same place as you.”
“Well, I hope not,” she said with a grin. “Mine’s all-girls.”
“Then definitely not the same one,” he said. “But I’d already figured that out anyway.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well,” he said, waving a hand around. “You live here.”
Lucy raised her eyebrows. “In the elevator?”
“In this building,” he said, making a face.
“So do you.”
“I think it would be more accurate to say I live under this building,” he joked. “But I’m betting you go to some fancy private school where everyone wears uniforms and worries about the difference between an A and an A-minus.”
She swallowed hard, unsure what to say to this, since it was true.
Taking her silence as an admission, he tilted his head as if to say I told you so, then gave a little shrug. “I’m going to the one up on One Hundred and Twelfth that looks like a bunker, where everyone goes through metal detectors and worries about the difference between a C and a C-minus.”
“I’m sure it won’t be that bad,” she said, and his jaw went tight. Even through the darkness, something about his expression made him seem much older than he’d looked just moments before, bitter and cynical.
“The school or the city?”
“Doesn’t sound like you’re too thrilled about either.”
He glanced down at his hands, which were resting in a knot on top of his knees. “It’s just… this wasn’t really the plan,” he said. “But my dad got offered this job, and now here we are.”
“It’s not so bad,” she told him. “Really. You’ll find things to like about it.”
He shook his head. “It’s too crowded. You can’t ever breathe here.”
“I think you’re confusing the city with this elevator.”
The corner of his mouth twitched, but then he frowned again. “There are no open spaces.”
“There’s a whole park just a block away.”
“You can’t see the stars.”
“There’s always the planetarium,” Lucy said, and in spite of himself, he laughed.
“Are you always so relentlessly optimistic, or just when it comes to New York?”
“I’ve lived here my whole life,” she said with a shrug. “It’s my home.”
“Not mine.”
“Doesn’t mean you have to play the sullen-new-guy card.”
“It’s not a card,” he said. “I am the sullen new guy.”
“Just give it a chance, Bartleby.”
“Owen,” he said, looking indignant, and she laughed.