PAST LIFE DIARY 1 - Story 9 - The elevator (Jeremy)

THE ELEVATOR (Jeremy)

I've seen this scene before, briefly, a few months ago. I didn't go further into it, but I assumed Jeremy's the only one, or at least the most likely one, to ever have been inside of an elevator shaft. I've now been shown three scenes that have to do with claustrophobia, even though it hadn't even come to my mind yet to address this issue.

I'm in an elevator shaft. There are two other guys with me. I'm preoccupied with one of them, a short guy. He's Italian. The other guy is tall and slim and has chestnut-brown hair. I'm wearing my work suit, a denim coverall. I'm 41 years old. We need to fix this elevator cause otherwise we can't continue our work. Something got stuck and dysregulated. We're at ground level. There are other guys above us. There's a door with a hydraulic closer. We can get out if needed, so on a logical level I'm not scared, but I'm angry and irritable. I'm twitching. It happens a lot. One of my tasks is to count something which runs up along the wall of the shaft. I hope this is over soon, and I look forward to being home with my kids. We have a ritual in my home. It's called "Be nice to daddy time". Basically, it's an hour of the kids pampering me and, above all, being quiet.

It looks like we're done now, and things are functioning again. We communicate with the other guys above. There's a narrow pipeline in the corner of the shaft which looks like it's damaged, so I'm not sure if things will be fully functioning properly now. I'm angry. "Jesus Christ!" I say. Why does it have to be this way? It's hot in here. The short guy gets a panic attack. I take the lead in the situation and insist on getting him out of this place. The elevator is meant for goods and is right next to the railroad track. Having done what we did, we now get the rest of the day off; this was promised beforehand. It's early afternoon. The weather is warm and sunny. We go to the boss in his office for some administration formalities so that we will be paid for the hours we got off. We're now going home for a holiday period. Me and another guy walk along the tracks. When we get to the road, we part ways cause he's heading in a different direction. I wait here for a while by the side of the road till a pickup truck comes. I have some trouble getting on cause it's quite high. There are about fifteen other workers in the back of the truck. They're all Hispanic. We don't talk to each other. I'm still occasionally twitching. They seem to think I'm possessed, and apparently they don't like me either, barely tolerating my presence. One of them says something in Spanish about Satan. I tell him that I'm not possessed and that it's a twitch. I think they're idiots. It's a bumpy road. The guys laugh as we hit a big bump and the truck shakes violently. After a while, the truck stops. I'm glad to get away from these idiots. "Buenos Dias" I say as I jump off the truck. "Careful!" one guy says. I land kind of badly on my feet, and it hurts. The truck drives away, leaving behind a dust cloud and a strong smell of fuel. It makes me cough. I sit and wait again by the side of the road to wait for another ride. I see a man coming from over the crossroad. As he gets closer, I recognize him. A couple of more guys come over and sit with us, and we talk. I tell them about the "Be nice to daddy time" where my girls have to be quiet. They seem to agree that girls can be quite noisy. One of the two white guys says black girls have a louder voice than white girls. "Whowowow!" I say, indicating that he was treating on tricky territory with that comment, even though I know it's kind of true and I understand that he didn't mean it in a bad way. He says he has three girls: Two daughters and a wife.

After the holidays, I have to get back into the elevator shaft cause there's still a problem. This time, I'm the only one inside. I have to climb a ladder. I'm nervous and scared. I'm twitching a lot, and I start to cough. I tell myself: Calm down, Jeremy. This time I'm the one having a panic attack. They let me out, and I can barely move. They lay me down on the ground outside. I'm twitching more violently, bordering on convulsions. Someone says they should get a doctor for me. The guy in charge tells me to go home, have a drink and get some rest.