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There and Back Again (10) : The hallway looked like it belonged there, maybe even felt like it had always been. There was nothing immediately disarming about it, except perhaps for one flickering light. But, you’ve been here enough times to know that this place is strange–foreign. It’s not supposed to be here. Or, did you really just miss it, all this time? Well, it’s here now. Why not investigate? The hallway stretches on. And on. And on. And the worst part is, you don’t even realize how long you’ve been walking until you turn around and there’s nothing behind you but an endless hallway. Maybe there is furniture, or decorations, or doors that never open, but there doesn’t seem to be any end to this hallway in either direction. You’re stuck here, under the harsh lights that buzz loudly around you. Maybe it feels like a moment passes, maybe an eternity–eventually, if you keep walking, you reach the end–and you’re right back to where you started, and it’s like no time at all has passed. The hallway is gone–but the hum of electric lights vibrates in your ears for hours after the experience.
It was a long night, made especially longer by the added cleanup and cold weather that ate at Rafayel as he worked. The party for his client went off without a hitch; each table of food and treats had been set up with a theme, and from what he could hear from his place in the kitchen, tucked out of sight, was that the general consensus led to pleased guests for his client. The other cooks, chefs, and pastry chefs were taking a break for the moment, leaving him as the designated staff member to clear the remnants for the next segment of the party.
Tray by tray, he got everything pulled back to the kitchen and started tearing down the displays so that when his coworkers got back, they could take the tables down as well and clear the floor for the dance, which would be happening in a few hours once all the guests finished up with their watch party in the home theatre his client had. It was small, much smaller than he knew from his family home, but he couldn’t just say that if he wanted to keep on everyone’s good side for now.
With some of his co-workers trickling back in, smelling of smoke or the quick sneak of liquor they’d had while on break, Rafayel took a moment to take his own break. Taking a few of the mirror-glazed cake pop bats that were left, he started down the side hall where staff could exit the building to get to the smoking area. At least that was the hallway he’d thought he’d gone down.
At first, everything seemed normal until it felt like he’d taken far too many steps to get to the side door. Looking up from his phone, the whole hallway seemed like it had been pulled out of an office building instead of the normal decor and appearance of the halls in his client’s building. Stopping for a moment, turning slowly on the spot to look around as the sickly fluorescent lights hummed and flickered, he tucked his phone into his back pocket before rubbing at his eyes for a moment to see if maybe he had one too many of his pills or if maybe he’d not slept enough between this event and the club going he’d been doing to try and reign in some level orf normalcy again.
But even after rubbing at his face, pinching his arm, and pulling his phone out to check the time, nothing had changed other than one of the lights further ahead started to flicker and bring with it that unique clicking sound that came alongside a bad circuit or the moments before one of those fluorescent lights would pop or go out for good.
Walking back the way he’d thought he’d come, he started to notice doors; at least they looked like doors. But when he walked up to the first one and went to grab the knob, his hand pressed flat against the wall. The whole thing was flat, but with the added shadows and depth in appearance that made it look like it was real and three-dimensional. The paint was tacky enough to come off on his fingertips before he jerked back and away from it.
“What… the ********? Here? How the…” Turning back the other way, he started to walk faster, feet actually coming off the ground instead of the tired shuffle he’d been doing today with all the haze clouding his mind again. Each step sounded muffled, like the solid linoleum floor was eating the sound when it otherwise would make it echo. Everything about this was weird, the fact that nothing else was in this space making it worse than if there had been a creature or person in here with him.
Blaise had said something about magic, but this seemed more like some old cliche movie or one of those backrooms he’d seen described online during one of his Reddit rabbit holes while looking into new sources for insects. Though since everything had been upended, that hobby of his had been placed on the back burner for the moment. Even dead insects made that feeling of itchiness come back when he was out and about, just as himself instead of that weird magic version.
Pulling out his phone again as he moved from a walk to a run, the time hadn’t moved even though he’d felt like it had. But no, the seconds weren’t ticking by, and the minute hadn’t rolled forward either. Panic started to well up, and with it, that itching came back. He knew there couldn’t be bugs here, but it always seemed to come with things now, just like this damn hallway and all the freaking magic that seemed to be spewing from every dark and dreary corner of this city.
Noticing a change as he started to sprint, he turned his head to look and found everything spinning as his foot caught something and he tumbled towards the ground. Face hitting the ground, he saw stars and then heard two of his coworkers ask him if he was okay.
Giving his head a shake, trying to clear it like it was an Etch-A-Sketch, he groaned and moved to sit up. Ashton and Cooper were standing above him with some of the chairs under each arm. They looked just as confused as he did, apparently not seeing him just a moment before, and then now with him running right into them and crashing to the ground.
“Sorry, I was looking at something on my phone and was trying to hurry back to help. We’re moving the chairs and tables out now, right?”
The pair looked at each other and nodded before going about their business and letting him know to check for the next stack of chairs in the corner of the main room. Apparently, they were stacked and ready to move to storage just in time for the maids to come out and clean the floor and get the lighting ready.
After a few more minutes of sitting there, looking at his phone to see the time moving again, he couldn’t really wrap his head around it. Maybe he’d really been that tired….
At least until he looked at his hand that had touched the door and saw some specks of paint still on it from the door that he’d tried to open.
Word Count: 1,072
