A dangerous challenge spreading on TikTok and other social media platforms has metal box lovers and timeless pranksters on alert across the country — challenging young adults to steal certain models of elevators with lockpicks. Is your refrigerator running? You might want to check that. But “stealing” might be too generous a term. Mostly, they’re just there.
The targets? Certain makes and models from the 1973-1974 season, so top-of-the-line that the screws were barely rusting on the grounds onto which they’d fallen down, an unanticipated yet erotic showing as one prays that the tension straining upwards against the weight of three underfed first-years (and their crumbling egos) won’t come crashing down. It’s no wonder that those gorgeous, gorgeous girlies of elevators attracted attention: Anyone would be drawn to their molding green floorings of indeterminate texture. That’s one carpet nobody would pass up pressing their face into. And who could forget the dull, sulky sheen of bacterial cultures draped invitingly over those mysterious shaking walls? Elevators have been playing hard to get for too long. I keep pushing the buttons but they never come!
Troubled youths with twisted tendencies have resorted to unprovoked violence to satisfy their elevator craze. The perpetrators reportedly inserted an Amex Black into the swipe reader, which beeped red twice, charged them a cool $50, then figuratively rolled over like a little bitch and literally let them have their wicked way with the death contraption of their dreams. Close acquaintances of the dirty, dirty criminals expressed discomfort with their “weird fixation with watching the doors open and close” and claimed that one party “would sneak his hand in at the last second to feel how tight it squeezed.” One can only hope this degenerate has since found the help he needed, or has at least resorted to drawers and other translational forces found in the comfort of their own home.
But there’s one thing about elevators that these punks forgot. Unless you are traveling with time-hardened doctors in pressed white shirts or the world’s premier chocolatier, travel by elevator is, how shall I say, extremely limited. More than limited. You go up and down and it’s not even fun. No benefits, no air attendants pouring you a beer or pouring themselves into your lap. One floor, two floors, four or maybe even eight — you’ll be bored through and through. In a last-ditch effort to attain the life of crime and splendor these rapscallions had set out for, they nicked ethanol and had a quaint little housewarming for their repossessed property. As EDM remixes of elevator music blared, our not-so-intrepid silly little protagonists tried to figure out if squatters’ rights could apply to 4×4 floor spaces traveling through the sky.
All good things must come to an end. Vacations, river rafting escapades, a nice drink, and the allure of a sexy hypebeast elevator just waiting to be stolen. The four thieves see the brave new world that sinks slowly below them and say no, thank you. The elevator is returned to its rightful place, which it had never actually left. The kiddos go home to dream up bigger and better crimes. The ding sounds. The doors open. Life moves on.
