Letter to elevator number three

Dear elevator number three,

I know that sometimes I leave you for other elevators, but you know that I love you, don't you?

You are by far the best in the building. You're faster than elevator one, take less sick days than elevator two, go to more floors than elevator four. Elevator five is delinquent. It likes to get stuck between floors and trap people. Elevator six? Well, elevator six and I had a fight in August and we're not on speaking terms yet.

You're the only elevator without a mirror. No need to reflect me back at myself. No, you have a personality of your own. You have your quirks, like how I always have to punch the button for the tenth floor twice for you to go there.

Day after day I count out the floors with you, listening to the beeps and watching the numbers flash, but at number four you're always mute, and there's never a reason why. You're complex like that.

You got a facelift last month. Before you were a little outdated, but not completely unattractive with some sort of plasticy, dark coloured wood grain veneer on your walls. Midway through your transformation they had stripped this to leave your interior bare - black painted metal. Elevator rides were dark, not unlike being swallowed up in the maw of a giant beast.

Then they laid a new floor and new paneling on the walls. And for a day, or possibly two, it was the talk of the office. All nineteen floors of us shared a moment of unity when we recoiled in horror at what they did to you. I wish I could say I was happy with the result but I'm just not sure what they were thinking. The floor is now a pistachio pudding green speckled linoleum and the walls are now arborite in a taupey beigey almost silvery... something pattern. I'm sorry, but it's hideous, and if they added a pink or peach coloured curtain, you could almost be mistaken for a hospital room.

But you've still got the same personality. Keep being yourself, elevator number three, because I like you just the way you are.

Truly yours,

Erin