Nonprofit Girl Shares the Elevator

Adventures of Nonprofit Girl, Episode 3

(Did you miss Episodes 1 and 2? They're here.)

The sun is just beginning its descent and the last of her colleagues have just left the office as Nonprofit Girl eats the last doughnut straightens up the kitchen and packs up her things. She heads down the hall and a young man from one of the other offices on her floor holds the elevator for her.

Nonprofit Girl knows you are opening yourself up to danger if you smile at people you don't know. A smile, after all, is all it takes to expose any harmless-looking passerby as that infamous imposter, Creepy Stranger Dude. But it was very nice of this stranger to wait and hold the door for her, and she is a superhero after all, so she decides to risk it.

Nonprofit Girl smiles at the stranger, in the face no less, and offers a clear-voiced "thank you."

But Nonprofit Girl is about to encounter something she never could have predicted.

The elevator door closes. The man (Nonprofit Girl is seriously not making this up) the man paces the elevator like a caged lion. It's only five floors, but he paces that four feet of space like death is closing in, and in doing so, chokes on his coffee. He is still sputtering when the door opens to the lobby. Nonprofit Girl considers asking him if he's okay but realizes the answer to that question would take far too long to answer.

She dashes out, thinking, Damn.