To avoid certain number 13’s, remember: it means nothing until proven otherwise.
Remain neutral until evidence is clear.

Steeped in golden warmth, I wonder if this metal is brass. I’m almost sure it is, as my stomach lurches into my throat with the rise of each floor. The wood is cast in warm light, making it appear richer than it is. The marble walls I had walked through to get here, were cast in a similar overwhelming amount of soft light. As I moved through them, I found the black of the marble to my liking, drawn to the darkness where thin bits of white wisp along the surface as if they flourished on their own in the elegance of this 1930’s building. Desire rose, urging me to trace the lines with my fingers. I forced it back, keeping my hands at my sides.

Here, now, in this small rectangular box, a row of illuminated numbers runs in a precise, lateral line. I analyze the font, try to guess it, but I can’t place it. Each number is softly lit as it slips us past each floor, their little glass faces catching the light as we go, like small beacons of light in the dark, carrying me upward. I look away, down to the floor, and sigh for the millionth time, wondering how long this battle of dark and light will command my life.

The vertical corridor moves me up and down and I think about the symmetry again, of how the light and dark push me up and down in this world. With my camera wrapped around my neck, resting like a shadow rests against a body, forever with me, I absently lift it toward the numbers. With a small, deliberate act, my fingertip meets a gentle resistance that gives way to tactile and unmistakeable “click”. The hum of movement quiets from this lifting cage, and a metallic chime signifies we’ve arrived and the doors split and slide evenly open.

On the other side of the elevator, white, san serif numbers greet me from the dark hall. I pull on the door with “1670” illuminated next to it. The room is small, filling with bodies in finely dressed attire. I settle into what can only be called a wooden pew, it’s smooth surface worn by decades of patrons of the law, locked in their own battles of light and dark. I fight off memories of places like this and, instead, to distract myself, I lift the camera to review the frame I just captured. The image comes to life on the screen. It’s how I remembered it looking, the warm light, strong vertical brass lines reaching for that horizontal line of numbers and then suddenly, there it is: the number 13. Illuminated in quiet declaration against all the other options.

Quieting the snicker that rises in my throat, I let out a huff of air, almost rolling my eyes as I do. This tiny moment, this unfocused click, this lazy photograph, captured the quiet tension, the bit of mystery, the lore of “13”. I wonder about my luck. I wonder about what it means in my unending battle of light and dark. And I wish it didn’t feel accidental.

To avoid certain number 13’s, remember: it means nothing until proven otherwise. Remain neutral until evidence is clear.