“Ding!” Rang the elevator as I stepped out into the empty lobby. The rain slammed against the windows, begging to get in. Out on the street was an endless crowd, to be expected for the city.

As I’m exiting the door, fully ready to book it towards a cab so as not to get too wet, I trip over an umbrella stand. I take out one, raise it over my head, and merge my way into the crowd. People bump into me left and right, each on their way to get to their own destinations.

One man bumps into me exceptionally hard, knocking my bag out of my hand. For a moment I thought I was being mugged by the way he ran off, but he didn’t take a thing. I called after him, “hey, watch where you’re going, you twat!”

He did not turn around, and no one else seemed to take any notice either. I saw a cab in the road and desperate to get off this bustling street I nearly ran in front of it to get the drivers attention.

The cab stopped and I hopped in the back. The man had the air conditioner set to it’s lowest setting, and he had all of the windows lowered so that rain was pouring in. Just as I was about to ask if he could roll up the windows he spoke up,

“You alright, miss?”

“I’m fine, just wet is all. You mind if we roll up the windows?”

He didn’t answer, he didn’t turn around, and just then I realized that he had still not moved the car.

“I’m headed uptown, by the way. Anywhere along broadway, doesn’t really matter where.”

“Miss, are you sure you’re alright?”

“I’m fine, why do you ask?” I’m starting to get annoyed by this point.

“Nothin’, just, you seem a little disoriented. I was watching you out on the street, holdin’ your umbrella as if it was raining, and actin’ as if you were tryin’ not to bump into anybody when no one else was within a mile of ya. And it seems a bit odd you’d be wanting to head uptown toward broadway when that’s exactly where you are now.”

Each sentence the cabby spoke made my made head spin more and more. Normally I would’ve said the cabby was insane, trying to trick me, but just then I looked up to see the street sign to read ‘broadway and 5th’. My heart dropped, my vision going dark.

“Miss? Do you need to go to hospital?”

His voice felt distant, echoing. I kept out of the cab and ran down the street. There was no rain, and my clothes were bone dry.

The crowds had completely disappeared, as if they had all vanished. If this is a prank, it’s a damn good one, and damn terrifying too.

I ran around the corner, trying to get my bearings, trying to figure out how I had ended up in the wrong apartment building without noticing it. As I rounded the building, I ran into something. Now on the ground I look up to ask them where we are, but what I see is no man.

His dripping wet trench coat draped over hunched shoulders, his spindly fingers wrapped around the hook of an umbrella, my umbrella, and his face. His face was the worst of all for his skin was a pale grey, his face drooping down without shape like a sheet layered over a ball. His eyes were perfectly round, made of glass and lined with gold, a skeletal hole where his nose should’ve been, and a bit of surgical thread sewn in the pattern of a smile to from a mouth.

He swooped his umbrella down and around, spraying me with a splatter of water. As he held his arms out, in what would normally be the symbol of a hug, lightning struck and…

The end.

P.S. If anyone has ideas for a better ending, I’d love to hear it. I got stuck once she see’s the creature.