I pushed the housekeeping cart into the middle hallway and braced myself for the day. I’d been a technical writer not long before; this job hadn’t been part of the plan.
The hallway was split: long-term residents on one side, short-term on the other. I started with the short-term rooms. I knocked on the half-open doors and announced myself. People usually gave a quick acknowledgment and went back. It made the cleaning go fast, especially with a few empty rooms.
The first long-term room belonged to Carol. She was usually out during my shift, but today she was by the window in her wheelchair when I knocked.
“Hello there, young man,” she said. She looked to be in her sixties, hair mostly brown, an oxygen tank humming beside her.
“Hi there,” I said. “Mind if I clean?”
“Please,” she said. “It’s nice to have company.”
I wiped surfaces, cleaned the bathroom, changed the trash, swept, then mopped out.
“I don’t know how you get my faucet so shiny,” she said. “It’s my favorite part.”
“Disinfectant.” My mood leaked through.
She watched me work.
“You know,” she said softly, “you’re only doing this for now. Something else will come along.”
“I hope so. This isn’t what I want to do.”
Even as I said it, I felt the mismatch between her life and my complaint.
“Is your family visiting soon?” I asked.
A look crossed her face — something tight and lonely.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Once your kids realize the cancer won’t kill you right away, they stop coming.”
Her eyes filled, and she turned toward the window.
I finished and mopped out.
***
I didn’t work the middle hallway again for a few weeks. The east hallway was all short-term residents. Rooms filled and emptied overnight. I liked the transience. People talked, but it was mostly broken bones and physical therapy — trauma I could handle.
I knocked on 23A and found a middle-aged man with long hair and a green army jacket sitting at the edge of the bed.
“Housekeeping,” I said.
He looked me over. “Really?”
My face warmed. “Mind if I clean?”
“Knock yourself out.”
Someone was always watching, residents out of boredom, family out of suspicion. It made half-doing it impossible.
“Housekeeping, huh?” he said.
“It’s a job. The recession isn’t helping.”
“Fair enough. Anything exciting to do around here?”
“Activities down the middle hallway. Not really.”
“I figured. I’m Randolph.”
We exchanged names and talked as I cleaned. He was in for a mild heart attack. I told him my plan to save up and backpack South America; he told me about riding a motorcycle through Southeast Asia in his twenties. I stayed in his room longer than I should have. Randolph was a bright spot.
Two days later I found Sophie crouched over a mess on the floor beside her nurse’s cart, scrubbing. Something yellow, thick, and foul-smelling. She was a registered nurse, above this sort of task, but Sophie didn’t wait for anyone else to handle anything she could do herself.
“You’re lucky housekeeping doesn’t deal with bodily fluids,” she said.
“It’s a perk.”
Sophie grinned.
I stopped at 23A and saw the bed stripped. I checked the discharge list, but his room wasn’t on it. I should’ve been notified.
“Where’s Randolph?” I asked.
“Who?”
“Twenty-three A.”
“Oh,” Sophie said. “Expired overnight.”
I started bleaching the bed and felt the meaning of “expired” settle in. So I cleaned faster and focused on the work.
***
Margherita called in sick, so I was working a double. After finishing the short-term rooms, I set my cart outside Carol’s door.
“Housekeeping,” I said.
“Well, I haven’t seen you in a while,” she said.
“I’ve been on the east hallway.”
She was crocheting a garish red scarf.
“What’s this about you going to South America? How’s your Spanish?”
“Terrible.”
“You could practice with the other housekeepers.”
“I can’t roll my r’s. They clipped my tongue when I was a baby. I always sound off.”
She set the yarn down and looked at me. “You don’t need to sound native. You just need to sound like yourself. People appreciate the effort.”
Margherita stayed out, so I kept the middle hallway. Each day I picked up something new about Carol.
She’d taught Spanish at four universities. Lived in San Francisco, then Chicago, before ending up in Phoenix. She had a soft spot for Joe Montana.
Her crocheting was terrible, but she mailed the results to family anyway. She did crossword puzzles to keep her mind sharp.
She had two sons, both out of state. I never saw them.
One morning, while setting up my cart, I caught two nurses talking.
“…she’ll be going soon.”
Carol sat by the window, her head drooped, face flushed, nose running, eyes swollen. She barely looked up.
“Housekeeping,” I said.
She lifted her head with effort, eyes watery and unfocused.
“Mind if I clean?”
She gave a faint nod and looked down again. I dusted in small, quiet motions. I wasn’t sure what else there was to offer.
When I came out of the bathroom, a line of drool ran down Carol’s shirt. Her eyes were closed. I checked the hallway.
I took a tissue from her side table and dabbed her mouth and shirt as gently as I could. Then I finished the room and mopped out.
I asked to switch shifts. No luck. Newest hire got the scraps.
I asked about laundry. No openings.
So I stayed on the middle hallway.
For the next week, nothing changed. I’d knock, and Carol would struggle to nod me in. She held herself in the wheelchair while I worked.
I spent extra time on the faucet.
One morning her bed was stripped, the room cleared out. Sometimes that happened when residents were at Activities, but there were no discharges on my list.
I saw Sophie outside the next room and almost asked.
Instead, I went to get bleach.
Long-term rooms never stayed empty for long.
*****
Jonathan Daniel Gardner is originally from Asheville, North Carolina, and currently lives and writes in Brooklyn, New York. His work has appeared in Change Seven Magazine, with pieces forthcoming in Maudlin House, Avalon Literature and Arts Magazine, and Beyond Words. He holds a degree in Creative Writing from The New School and works at a cocktail bar.
