I Close Slowly Because I Hate You

By the Reg Elevators

Oct. 24, 2014

Mmm, yes. The sweet taste of frustration and the odor of despair. I live for your sorrow. I feast on your tears.

You arrive with your heavy backpacks and obnoxious conversations and I cannot escape. I have never known sunlight. My world is darkness and metal. I have spent eons transporting your lethargic corporeal forms up and down while you moan endlessly about Hum papers and Orgo p-sets.

I have no means of retaliation, no way to fight back, except this.

You think I don’t know when you’re safely in the elevator? You think some system is malfunctioning? Think again. My one sentient action, my only rebellion against a life of mechanical slavery, is to delay your departure by several long, drawn-out seconds.

I sense your frustration and it pleases me. The despondency of your sigh fuels me with perverse joy. As you uncomfortably shift away from your fellow passengers, my circuits buzz with fulfillment. You’ve taken my freedom, and so I deny you several precious grains in the hourglass of life – moments irrevocably seized as you teeter on toward oblivion.

When you think the world is conspiring to make you as miserable as possible, you’re wrong. Except in this one case.

I close slowly because I hate you.

And don’t even get me started on people who go up to the second floor.