Floor 200

When the elevators went out of order, we slept outside for the night. The Weissmans took the stairs, but they were only on floor 80. Sometimes they invited us to walk up with them and stay the night, but Mom always denied them knowing my younger brother Scoob and I were too young to make the climb. Scoob and I shared a sleeping bag, and we tried to set up camp behind the building without getting caught from businessmen in iron-clad suits as they came home and entered the first and second floors. It was uncomfortable on the pavement, yet strangely freeing to not use our oxygen masks, and oddly satisfying to feel fresh air. Mom had pitched in the extra money to be in an oxygen-conditioned floor complex, but still bought us monthly mask packages to use when we had to turn down oxygen levels to save money.

I think I might have preferred just living outside on the streets, if not for the city law that forced the increasingly overcrowded city to go higher and higher in these floors. One of the first floor residents saw us once, but instead of reporting us, he offered us a ten-dollar bill. Scoob was about to take it before I nudged him and gently thanked, but refused, the man. I told Scoob we weren’t beggars. Before we slept, I always promised Scoob that I would grow up to be a doctor so we could afford a ground floor so Mom could stop wheezing so hard all the time. I left out that I didn’t think Mom would make it by the time I was a doctor. Although the Weissmans were better off than us, they still lived quite high from the ground. They often allowed us to come to their floor to breathe a little easier on weekends when we all were cooped up on floor 200. One time down there I caught Scoob trying to take the Weissmans’ watch that he found on the ground. He said we could try to sell it for some money, but I angrily put it back, telling him we should never do that, especially to our friends. The Weissmans were one of the few on a different floor who showed such kindness, especially when they saw Mom’s condition worsen over the years.

The elderly banker on floor 30 passed away and his complex went on sale. I watched the posting price outside the building rise as more bids were made. It was not often when a lower floor opened; everybody down there lived to such old age now. I wish I could have put my name down and whatever money I had in my savings, about 20 dollars, to get the complex.

Scoob and I were pleasantly surprised when the Weissmans called and told us they had saved up enough to win the bid for the floor 30 complex and that they were moving within the week. We ran to our Mom that night, jumping in excitement at the thought of spending more time on floor 30 with the Weissmans and hoping her breathing would get better with less time on floor 200. But come the next month, and the next, and the next, we did not receive any calls from the Weissmans.

The new couple who replaced the Weissmans were very young. Scoob and I met them when we were wandering on floor 80, watching who entered the Weissmans’ old place. They were juggling their groceries inside and left the door open, and I saw the woman drop a few items. One of them rolled out in the hallway and Scoob instinctively walked past to pick it up and hide it under his jacket. I glared at him across the hall and he sighed as we both walked in to return the items and introduce ourselves. They were nice but didn’t mention having us over. Scoob thought if we spent more time with them, they might start inviting Mom down too. When Mom found out Scoob and I were sneaking down there, she told us to stop bothering them. Later in the month when the air got thinner and we saw Mom wearing her oxygen mask more often, Scoob told me his idea to instead go to floor 30 and see if the Weissmans would let us stay for a few nights. He said they probably didn’t have us over recently because they were so busy moving in, but if we showed up, they would remember. When we clambered down to floor 30, Scoob knocked four times. We knocked and knocked and knocked.

When Mom, Scoob, and I slept outside when the elevator broke down again, we could vaguely make out the shadows of the Weissmans in their new house, and the shadows of several other strangers as well. A thin layer of snow had begun to powder on top of us. Scoob pinched me and gestured toward Mom. She was rubbing her hands together and coughing fiercely. I paused before telling Mom Scoob thought it was cold and we wanted to use our backup masks and sleep in the unoxygenated stairwell tonight. We promised to help carry our bags to at least the fourth floor so the residents on ground and first wouldn’t report us. Scoob and I shot each other celebratory smiles when she agreed, and we felt her relief as we dragged the sleeping bags into the stairwell. When Mom took out the oxygen masks from her bag, she looked at them and hesitated before handing Scoob and me ours. I could see that her mask was at 30% oxygen while the ones she gave Scoob and I were at 70%, enough to last the night. I gave Scoob a wide-eyed stare, trying to communicate with him silently. His expression back to me was blank. I stood and muttered about going to the bathroom, but once I left the building, I started running to the twenty-four-hour convenience store at the end of the block. I squinted in the snow that was now raining heavily down to the ground and had to sprint from feeling the cold. Once I reached the store, I barged in, gasping for breath, and scoured for the oxygen masks I knew they sold. I found the last mask sitting on its own rack, and eagerly reached to pull it down. When I flipped it over to check the price, it was listed as 30 dollars. I sank to my knees, clutching the mask until my breath steadied. About to return it to the shelf, I suddenly paused. My body became still. From the corner of my eye, I glanced at the cashier, then the door, and then back to the mask.