Chasing the Missing Item Receipt Through a Fire Alarm Staircase

Chasing the Missing Item Receipt Through a Fire Alarm Staircase

I was standing in the lobby of my office building, but the reception desk was a grocery checkout lane. A woman I hadn't seen since high school—she looked like my old math teacher and my neighbor at the same time—was scanning a basket of apples and handing me a receipt that said "Missing Item: Evidence". I tried to ask her what it meant, but the intercom crackled and a voice announced that the fire alarm was going off on the 12th floor. I ran toward the stairs, but every floor was labeled with a different year, and the numbers didn't line up. When I finally reached the door marked "12", it was locked and a security guard—who looked exactly like my dad—handed me a set of keys that weren't my own. He said, "You need to find the file before they do," and then the lights flickered out. I woke up with my heart racing, still half expecting to hear that alarm.