Episode 2: Negative Reaction

“Don’t touch! Don’t touch!”

Dancing about the lobby of the Brooklyn Towers, a 20-story hotel where Griffin Folklore decided to hole up for the night, he discovered the side effects of what he referred to as the Rapture. Whether it truly was the end times remained to be seen. For now, he was dodging and weaving and trying to be respectful. When you have nude ghosts roaming the halls and some not so beautiful to look at, it became a challenge to avoid staring. Even worse when he found ghosts more appealing. Hubba! Hubba!

“Whoa! Supermodel at 3:00!” He used a support pillar to hide behind in order to check out the body of a resident. It was easy enough to tell she had implants which made him wonder if clothing got lost in their vanishing acts why did she still have saline padding in those gorgeous mounds? He noticed a gold tooth on the floorboard of a car during his travels, even dentures, so how did something as unnatural as a boob job get passed through? Not that he complained. With his girlfriend Jade now a fond memory he was free to check girls out even if it was only in looking. It wasn’t as if he could touch anyone, the population being ghosts. Right? So, tempted!

“Not yet! My luck I’d be sucked right into the spirit world. Hell, who knows maybe I’m the one on the other side. I’m not even going to try and figure out the logic in all of this.” With the woman prowling about he realized that she must have been the hotel Manager by the way her poise carried her. It was almost as if the inhabitants were moving on with their everyday lives, personality and all. Courtesy when nearly running into one another, waves of friendship, sly unheard whistles of men checking women out in passing. Hell, there was a sneaky middle-aged bastard beating off behind an opened newspaper which of course was on the floor now that his hand could not support it, however his other hand was sure gripping the fine print. You name it! Hustle and bustle!

“This is just soooo bizarre. I think maybe I should just go to my room and wait it out until morning. If they’re still here it must mean everyone in the world is like this, right? Streets would be crazy overrun with ghosts ... if that’s what they are ... strange they look more like negatives than what I’ve always interpreted as ghosts. No chill in the air or anything.” He exhales into his hand on impulse to see if a cloud of warm air showed itself. “Nope! Nothing atmospheric.” Picking up a tiny vase he looks around for the closest ethereal body. “Quick experiment!”

Gently throwing it via underhand toward the man beating off in a lobby chair, the gent reading a paper that was once in his possession but now lay fanned out on the carpet. Sports section up! Paper was made of wood, go figure! The vase passed through him as he acted as if turning pages like a Mime and bounced off the chair fabric and lay there where he sat. It did appear for a moment as if he felt a stir and paused his circulating hand but immediately resumed his masturbation, the girl one seat over acting as if nothing was going on. The only thing it technically did was make him lower his intangible paper, look around, shrug, then resume an accelerated heartrate that was no longer there. “He felt something by my doing that. Maybe on the other side it was like him being nudged. It definitely wasn’t that unsuspecting teenager there. Poor kid had no idea he was a pervert. Weird!”

Relocating the hot Manager, he followed her like a stalker for a bit just to amuse himself. It wasn’t like he was ever going to get her, busty beauty being elsewhere. Fearing physical touch, he instead rolled up a magazine from a lobby end table and moved behind the beautiful ghost. Taking the magazine, he swatted her on the ass with it. Like the man with the paper, she reacted as if something touched her, looked around, directly at him even, but not as if recognizing he was there. Rubbing her butt, she shrugged and went on her way.

“She felt the magazine swat her. Interesting!” Fidgeting as to what to do next he decided his own pervasive act was not right and went up to the woman facing her and waving, “Hi! I’m the guy that just slapped your ass. Just wanted to say sorry, I couldn’t resist.” Her reaction was a warm smile and a wave over him toward someone other than he. Stepping aside he looked back to see a tall male negative of a man waving back. “Boss! I can tell.”

Giving up he went back to the elevator and pushed the up button, waiting on it to arrive. “With no one here that can physically push a button besides me I wonder why it went up again? Guess maybe it’s set up that way.” A shiver expressed; it was more the idea that he might not be alone here amid all of these negatives that was spooking him. While he worried, he might be the only living breathing human left of whatever happened here, the odds were that he couldn’t possibly be the sole survivor. Could he?

With the elevator arriving the door hissed open. Within it he found two passengers an older man and a girl Griffin’s age. Instead of leaving the elevator they stood idle but seemed almost flirty with their eyes. Swallowing, Griffin stepped in but after pushing the highest-level button hugged a vacant corner. Watching them as the door shut the naked ghosts turned to one another and she jumped up into his arms kissing him with ferocity. “Nice! How they’re clinging together I don’t know. Shouldn’t she just fall to the floor?” He fidgeted over their obvious romance, “Maaan! Don’t make me miss Jade!” He tried to turn away but the guy’s hands on the girl’s ass was too alluring. He knew when this situation actually happened, they were dressed because their clothing was at their feet on the ornate elevator tile.

Seeing her purse Griffin carefully used his foot to drag it toward him. Once in his possession he sifted through it finding and confiscating a pack of chewing gum then snuck a look at her ID. Being nosey he discovered her name. “Kaycee Lance!” Looking over at them he said aloud, “Hey, Kaycee? Bet I have a bigger dick than he does.” It wasn’t like she heard him.

Their kiss pausing the man lowered her back to the floor and they behaved. Obviously, their original destination concluded but did not have time to disembark before the Armageddon effect must have hit. Sighing as Griffin held the door he turned to the girl, “I’m in the penthouse if you get tired of Romeo there. We should party.” With no obvious recognition Griffin released the door and moved on. A housekeeper was the only other ghost prowling the halls. Nothing special to look at as she walked about, leaving her cart behind unable to no longer push it. Watching her closely she simply looked confused that she could not open doors and went from one room to the next before repeating her routine. She even acted as if her universal room key was misplaced.

“Damn! That would suck!”

Curious he found her master key lanyard on top of her uniform by the linen cart. Taking the key, he unlocked a few doors and propped them open to see if she would go inside. It was as if she still could not enter. “I tried Conchita!” He had noticed her name tag on the floor with her uniform. With the maid unable to enter the rooms he took it upon himself to explore them. All but one was empty. On a last door he spotted the Do Not Disturb sign and chuckled. Unlocking the door, he was discouraged by an interior deadbolt. “Well fuck!” Indeed! If he could have gotten in, he would have seen a gangbang in progress between a hot girl and four guys. Just his luck! Sex for all eternity.

Keeping her key for future use Griffin went to the separate penthouse elevator and headed up. Reaching it he stepped in, a sensor light turning on at his crossing a certain threshold. “Cool feature!” From there he grabbed a beer from the fridge and tossed the cap into a waste basket. “One good thing if I moved in here ... I’d never have to take the garbage out I could just toss it off the balcony. 20 floors down I’d never have to deal with it piling up too high.”

Out on the balcony with the rain stopped he took a hard look about the streets to see ghosts everywhere he looked. “If the effect happened early morning, I just don’t get why foot traffic is so horrible. Unless people from cars abandoned them and are just lost. Fuck this is going to take a while to get used to. Mom still hasn’t answered me back, I can only assume the worse. God, I hate the idea of not having her babying me. No more chicken enchiladas with candles on my birthday.”

A moment of depression guiding him he headed inside and turned on the big screen TV, settling into a slouch on the sofa, remote poised for multiple selections. “Ooooo! Streaming services. As long as the power doesn’t go out, I can at least have plenty to watch for a few years. D +, HBOmix, Amazin’ Prime, woohoo!” Excited for all of two minutes he shuts the TV off. “Who am I kidding, I’ll be bored in a week. With nobody to talk to, cuddle with, eat dinner alongside, fuck...” Jade on his thoughts made him weep and down his beer quickly as an intervention. “Nightmare Avenue!”

A door buzzer going off made him jump out of his skin. “What the heck? Where did that come from? How for that matter?” Leaving the sofa, he went to a tiny monitor keypad next to the door. Pushing a response button led to a camera feed outside the penthouse elevator. Before his eyes he saw the negative ghostlike spirit of the housemaid Conchita. Beside her stood the elevator girl in all of her hotness. Both spirits extended their hands as if wanting him to put something in them.

“What is going on? Are they trying to communicate with me?” The buzzing continued even without either ghost touching the button. Pondering the possibilities Griffin lifted the lanyard around his neck and looked at it. “Do they want their stuff back?” The gum he swiped from the hot leggy blond negative, LEGative, in his pocket is drawn out and pondered over. “They must be holding onto what they left behind. When something gets taken from them or moved, they try and get it back. How did Legs get out of her elevator though?” Strange indeed!

Three straight minutes of buzzing he opens his elevator and heads downstairs. Tension and fear rising as he slipped down that single story, he hugged the wall by the control panel. As the door opened, he saw the ladies simply staring straight ahead. With just enough room to slip by Conchita he scurried down the hall and went to the Maid’s cart. Hanging her lanyard on the cart Conchita’s ethereal form moved on to her next door only to look confused all over again.

“Damn! Poor Conchita! At least I know where her entry card is if I need it someday.”

Moving next to the secondary elevator he opened it to find Kaycee’s man standing there lost as to why he was all alone. Stepping into the elevator Griffin placed her gum back into her purse on the floor and stood up as if to apologize to the guy. No words escaping his mouth Grif turned to the elevator door and saw Kaycee blocking his way off.

“Fuck you’re hot!” He swallowed taking in her full-frontal beauty. With a gallant bow his arm offered her entry. Stepping in she resumed her place with her man, they again making out like bandits. “Damn! I’m going to miss that kind of affection. Have fun guys, as much as you can that is.” Stepping out, the elevator again closed and headed down. “Up! Down! Up! Down! At least they have the right idea.”

With the few doors he had propped open earlier it gave Conchita access to at least attempt to do her job even if crossing the threshold was at the moment impossible. “Lesson learned. Don’t take personal items from people.” On that note he headed upstairs and locked himself back in. A ten-minute shower to relax he paraded nude until an attempt to sleep on the master bed. Tossing and turning he gave up and paced the floor. “This just sucks, I don’t know what to do with myself. I miss Jade! I’m not even upset anymore over what happened. I know she didn’t want it to happen as it played out, temporary insanity maybe? I’m no shrink! Obviously even if she did find herself enjoying it, she was going to be murdered. Jade? If you can hear me?” He looked toward the ceiling, “I’m sorry for judging you too quickly. I need you, Babe.” Fondling his cock as a temporary reconciliation he considered rubbing one off but struggled. Maybe he just needed further inspiration. Going to Jade’s backpack he took out her picture to pay homage too in jerking off but stopped cold.

“Hold up! If Kaycee and Conchita came looking for their personal items ... will Jade?”

The Yankee’s coat he had swiped from the produce truck driver made him bulge his eyes, “Oh, Fuck! I bet he comes for his coat too. I need to take his coat back to him after I check on mom tomorrow. I can stop back by Jade’s and stay there until nightfall. See if she comes back to me too.” He was getting hopeful. “I wonder if I keep something if Jade would stay here with me? Better than nothing I can at least keep her close. Right?” Good in theory! Pulling out the ring he gave Jade, he kissed it. “Come back to me Baby!” Careful what you wish for Mister Folklore!

Sleep still denied, he tried again to jerk off, which prompted him to watch the video knowing that a good ole’ fashioned rub off always rested him enough in dire times. He found no inspiration in simply watching Jade, mainly because each time he focused on her image he unavoidably saw the guy who filmed Jade raping her. Only so many times he could rewind her video to just her before he bulged his eyes.

“FUCK! What if that asshole comes after his video camera? Even if I keep the tape, it belonged to him. Son of a bitch! I have got to think more clearly before I do things going forward. I’ll put it all back except for Jade’s things. I want her with me.”

Freaked a bit, Griffin needed air, but the balcony gave him chills suddenly, like it was some allure to jump and end his own life. His constant pacing led him to take a walk. Realizing he was still nude he was tempted to go get dressed then paused, “Who’s going to stop me from streaking? Hell, everybody is naked now. Fuck it!”