Green frog with footprints on lower back

The lift at Tanner House has been dead since Tuesday, so I was on the stairs with the shopping when I found the first footprints. They were little black marks on the landing lino by the eleventh floor, each one a splayed star, as if someone had dipped their fingers in ink and pressed them down on the way past. I thought it was the Kowalski boy messing about with paint, until I saw the frog.

It was sitting on the fire door's push bar, bright green as a traffic cone and not the least bit bothered by me. Its toes were orange, its eye was red as a cherry, and it looked at me the way Mr Dunmore looks at the council letters. I said good morning. It said nothing, which I took to mean yes.

So I did what anyone would do and followed the trail. Down we went, floor by floor, the prints crossing each landing diagonally as if the frog had hopped from corner to corner and never once bothered with the stairs proper. Mrs Achebe from nine joined me on six with her walking frame and a bag of onions, and by the ground floor we had a small procession and a dozen theories.

The trail ended at the bin store, where the door was propped open with a brick. Inside, under the wet cardboard, the frog sat very still on the lid of the green wheelie bin, as if it had been waiting for us to catch up. Mrs Achebe said it had come down to see the sea. I told her frogs don't do sea. She said neither did she, until she married a man from Lagos. Write and tell me whether Dad ever got the lift fixed. I have a feeling the frog found a way out first.

Love, Dee