1
How did I end up here? I’m smart. I’m funny. I look pretty damn handsome if I do say so myself.
But here I am.
Nowhere.
And it seems this is where I will always be: nowhere.
* * *
Bedroom.
It is not an apartment, but it looks like one.
Cheap furniture.
Well-used carpet.
Not clean, but not dirty.
The bedroom is not unique in its wares. Bed. Desk. Chair. Dresser. Small bedside table with lamp. Overhead light. Janky ceiling fan, spinning at a low speed.
Then there is the décor. Pictures hung neatly on the walls. They are strange. Or at least indicate a strangeness that is hard to interpret. Harmless, but different.
* * *
Johnny walks in.
Twentysomething.
Leaning toward twenty.
Pretty damn handsome for an unkempt young man who stays up too late and eats the wrong foods and drinks more beer and whiskey than he should.
He looks at his brother.
Johnny is frustrated.
He tries to remain restrained,
but it can be hard after all
these years.
“What the hell, Cleaner? Man, I told you about these shirts.” Arty looks distraught. Johnny sees. Johnny cannot stay frustrated. After all, this is Arty, his brother. And no one could really be mad at Arty.
“What? Is it not clean?” Arty replies, earnestly concerned, wondering if he has somehow failed his brother.
“No, Arty. It isn’t that it’s not clean. It’s clean. But it’s just a T-shirt…”
“I know,” Arty cuts in. “It’s a hundred-percent cotton T-shirt. I used a warm-warm cycle. It shouldn’t have shrunk at all. I’m always careful about that.”
“It’s not shrunk, Arty. That’s not it. It’s … just … never mind. Forget it.”
“Forget what, Johnny? What’s wrong?” This is killing Arty. The one thing he was supposed to be good at. And it seems like he messed it up.
“Arty,” Johnny replies as kindly as he can, “it’s just that … it’s a T-shirt. You don’t press T-shirts. You don’t put starch in T-shirts, buddy.”
“But the creases are sharp, aren’t they?” Arty replies, wondering what on earth the problem could be.
“The creases are sharp,” Johnny concedes, “but that’s not the point. You don’t put military creases in T-shirts. I’ve told you this before, Arty.”
“But why? Cotton holds the starch really well.”
Johnny starts to get frustrated again. He’s been down this road before.
* * *
Many, many times.
* * *
“Look, Cleaner, I know that. You always tell me that. And I always tell you: You just don’t starch and press T-shirts because … because you just don’t do it.”
“Mom likes hers pressed.”
Johnny lets out a sigh.
Arty realizes he’s gone too far.
“Listen, Arty, I get it. But I’m not Mom. And I don’t want my T-shirts to be starched and pressed. It’s a Black Sabbath T-shirt! I just wear it out with a pair of jeans, okay? Can you just give them a simple wash and dry from now on? Please?”
“Low heat, tumble dry?” Arty asks, wanting to get a good procedure locked down.
Johnny smiles. “Yeah, Arty. I think that would be perfect. Thanks, bud.”
“I can do it now,” Arty offers.
“I have to go.”
“Okay. It won’t happen again, Johnny.”
“Thanks, Arty,” Johnny says with a gentle smile.
“And Johnny?” Arty asks.
“What?”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay, bud. It’s okay.”
Johnny feels a little bad as Arty walks away.
They are brothers—they even look a little alike—it isn’t too much of a stretch to see the similar genes. Dark hair. Blue eyes. Pronounced eyebrows. But that is where the similarities end.
After all, Arty is: different.
A little pudgy.
Glasses.
It is possible to tell from looking at his face that something isn’t quite right. There are medical names that could be assigned, but most of those wouldn’t quite hit the mark. He is older than Johnny by six years. But his peculiarities keep him living at home.
Johnny, on the other hand, doesn’t have an excuse to still be living at home—other than Arty and his mom. They both need him around.
That’s what he tells himself, anyway.
Johnny’s bedroom is the same room he has always had. Mattress on the floor. No box spring. No bed frame. Posters of rock bands on the wall from when he was younger. Black Sabbath. Motörhead. Led Zeppelin. AC/DC. Some muscle cars too. He hadn’t bothered to take them down as he outgrew them. He also hadn’t bothered to clean his room very often. Clothes, remnants of food, and beer cans on the floor.
This is all a stark contrast to Arty’s room: clinically clean with the bed tightly made.
And then there are the walls of Arty’s room and their curious décor. The walls neatly display pictures of clothes, washing machines, and dryers. There are brochures about various lines of laundry equipment on his little desk. Some of the more colorful ones are also hanging on the wall. There are also coupons for laundry detergents, fabric softeners, and stain removal products on the desk in an envelope.
The source of his nickname, “Cleaner,” is no mystery at all.
Arty likes to clean.
Laundry, to be exact.
2
This is it, I guess.
This is as good as it is going to get.
Where did I go wrong?
Where was the misstep?
Was it one? Or was it many? A thousand little errors landing me here.
Landing me nowhere. Nowhere but here.
Copyright © 2021 by JOCKO COMMAND LLC.
