Part One

The following is a story that is straight out of a science fiction movie; the only difference is, what happened to me was real and not fiction.

I had just finished a meeting with the Human Resources Officer of a well-established insurance company located on the 11th floor of a tall building in Makati on 2 February 2004. Ed, the employee relations officer, even accompanied me to the elevator.

I saw a woman in a white dress waiting at the far-left elevator. There were, I think, four elevators. Ed pressed the “down” button. When the rightmost elevator lighted up indicating a downward movement. I said goodbye and entered. I saw inside three lean-looking men in gray overalls, similar to what construction workers wear. They glanced at me as I entered. I noticed that all of them were taller than the usual Filipinos, but I ignored this observation. I stood near the door. The three men were behind me, so I do not remember their faces.

When the elevator stopped on the 14th floor, I was surprised but said nothing. The three men got out. I was left alone wondering why it went up instead of down. I had not yet figured out an answer when the elevator stopped again, this time on the 11th floor where I came from. I said to myself, “This can’t be!” When the elevator doors opened, I peeped out to see if it was indeed the 11th floor, where I came from. I saw again the same woman in white, this time texting. The elevator then closed and went down to the lobby of the building.

I was somewhat puzzled by that incident and walked out of the elevator still wondering whether I just did not notice that the elevator went up instead of down. But that could not be because I would have felt the elevator going up instead of down. Furthermore, I was dead sure the light outside the elevator indicated it was going down, not up. No way could I have made that mistake. My host, Ed, would have pointed it out to me if that elevator were going up. Ed waited for me to get into that elevator before he left. So, he knew it was going down.

I have heard of strange and funny things going on inside elevators. There was the case of a group of women who went up in an elevator that transported them on a floor with unfamiliar features. It was dark and looked like a warehouse. They immediately closed the elevator. When they got out and asked, no one could identify the floor they had been brought to. When they checked all floors in the building, that floor was nowhere to be found. The elevator did not stop at that nonexistent floor anymore. Could something like that have happened to me? Is there a way of finding out?

I happened to meet Ed again a week later and asked him if he saw the three men in the elevator. He said, “What three men? You were all alone in that elevator!”

No wonder I saw those three men as taller than most Filipinos. They were floating! Since I do not normally see ghosts, it did not occur to me that those men were dead!

(To be continued next week.)

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