Music played over the store’s speakers as well-dressed older ladies fingered merchandise and murmured to each other about their planned purchases. Snooty-looking women with elaborate hairstyles and perfect makeup held out samples of overpriced cosmetics to passing customers, extolling the virtues of their wares in such words to make a person think that what the women held was from the Fountain of Youth, rather than manufactured in a common factory. Among all of this high-class hustle and bustle, a solitary black-clad adolescent walked, her head held high, looking neither left nor right, with an expression on her face that seemed to say, “I have as much right to be here as you, and my money is as good as anyone’s!” A few customers looked in the direction of this young lady and tittered to their companions or murmured about the youth of the nation making the world go to hell in a hand basket, but she seemed to either not hear them or not care, even when one worker asked if perhaps she was lost or looking for her mother.


“No, I’m not,” she replied, her eyes fixed on the worker’s face. “I’m looking for a birthday present for a friend of mine. If you feel that I don’t belong here, I will be more than happy to spend my money elsewhere.”

Flustered but determined not to show it, the worker responded, “No, no, you’re welcome to shop here. It’s just that there’s not too many teenagers who shop here. It’s funny; you’re the second one I’ve seen here today.”

“Second?” Ophelia (for it was she) asked.

“Yes, a boy came through here about five minutes ago.”

With a slightly dismissive shrug, Ophelia walked away from the worker. I think the teen clothes are on the second floor, she thought, looking up at the high ceilings briefly. They reminded her of a cathedral. It’s a religion, that’s for sure, she thought derisively. It’s the Cult of Beauty. And they sure as hell aren’t going to brainwash me!

She slowly walked in the direction of the elevator, and then paused to take out her cell phone. “No signal,” she muttered. “I forgot, I can never get reception in this building. And, I swear, some of the stuff in here needs to be updated; I think they’re been paying the fire marshals some really good money to stay in business.” Chuckling about this thought, she strolled over to the elevator. The door of the nearest one was beginning to close.

“Hey,” she called out, hurrying toward it. “Hold the elevator, please!”

The occupant inside complied, holding the door open. Ophelia laughed in relief and clambered into the elevator. As she stuffed her cell phone back into her pocket, she said gratefully, “Hey, thanks for that.” She looked up and her smile quickly left her face.


AJ looked at her, a slightly surprised expression on his face. “Hey,” he greeted her. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for a birthday gift for Emily.”

“Same here. Those workers sure are snobby. They acted like I was planning to rob the place.”

“Mm… yeah,” Ophelia replied, leaning against the elevator wall, looking away from AJ.

“What’s wrong?” AJ asked.

“Well, for starters, you haven’t pushed any buttons for any of the floors,” Ophelia said slowly.

“Oh, right,” AJ replied. He pressed the button labeled “Second Floor,” and then looked back over at Ophelia. “Before I left the house, they were saying on the news that there were power outages happening in this area. You know, because of the bad weather. I swear, this elevator is going at about half the speed of smell, or something. Hey, you know what would be really messed up? If the power went out, and we were stuck in the elevator for a while.”

“Don’t say that,” Ophelia wailed. “When people say stuff like that, it ends up happening.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“Yes, it does.”

“No, it doesn’t!”

Not surprisingly, just then, the power went out at that very second, and the elevator stopped dead. Ophelia squinted over at AJ in the darkness and said wryly, “I told you so!”