Topic: Cleaning

Author: Chris Dunn

We had waited too long, diddled around in the family room going month to month on our lease until it was far too late. Passing around a bong in our basement between game sessions we would have the same discussion over and over.

“What do you want to do?”

“I dunno. I don’t want to stay here.”
“Me either. Where do you want to go?”
“I dunno. Do you have any leads?”
“No. You?”
“I was going to look around this weekend…”
“Well, we have to do something soon, or they going to kick us out.”

“We could just stay month to month, for a little while longer.”
“Yeah, until we find a place, we probably should. I’ll call them tomorrow and let them know.”

This went on for a couple of weeks into the month, and when I finally got off my procrastinating ass to call the office…

“What? Oh, that’s not an option. That unit is rented. You need to be out of there in ten days.”

Stunned, I plodded slowly downstairs, hoping never to reach the landing and bring the news to the basement crowd. The news was real and severe enough that it shocked right through whatever smoke haze was clinging to their brains at the time.

“Oh, crap! What?”

“Can they do that?”
“We don’t even have any prospects!”

“What are we going to do?!”

“We could just stay put, right? They can’t just throw our stuff out on the curb, can they?”

The phone rang. It was the office. They had had time to think and were willing to make us an offer. The people slated to move into our townhouse were adamant. They wanted the chimney unit. Who could blame them? It was sweet! But, there was another unit, just down the block which was available for immediate move in. We could simply transfer our stuff down the way, sign a new lease and even maintain our current security deposit. Whew! That solved, I settled down on the couch among the other lay-abouts reveling in our momentary reprieve. We didn’t need to scramble. We weren’t going to be evicted. We had time…

As the smoke did its work, a wave of melancholy hit us all. It was going to be sad to leave this place, so much fun, so many nights, all the parties, the mayhem and debauchery. It was the end of an era. Packing up all our things and moving them to a new place with a reversed orientation, it was going to be a major adjustment. And then, we would have to go through all the effort to christen the new place, to put our stamp on it, and make it our own. My mind sorted through all the personal touches we had made to our space and immediately fixated on Kit’s room.

“Oh, shit!” I turned toward the others.

“What now?”
“Kit’s room!”
Their eyes lit up in recognition.

“Oh, shit!”

In short order, I was back on the phone with the office. This time the basement crew sat gathered around me, watching with sadistic insterest as I negotiated our fate.

“Okay, we’re very excited about moving to the new unit, and we’re confident we can get packed and moved by the deadline. There’s just one minor snag. We’re not sure, when you see the place that you’re going to want to rent to us anymore…”
“Oh, why is that?”

“Well, you see… My roommate… He fancies himself a bit of an artist. And well, he’s painted his room.”

“Really? What color?”
“Oh, not any single color, more like, characters and landscapes, and yes the ceiling too. Not a lot, but some.”
“Can we see it?”

I can only imagine what they thought when we let them up to the second floor. Almost every trip we had, Kit would spend a few hours adding to the collage, using whatever medium he had on hand at the moment. Oil, acrylic, crayons, what mattered was that the energy of the night get immortalized in some fashion. There were busts, a river, a village. The work had texture in places, and other “artists” had joined his efforts from time to time. Oddly proportioned faces glared with eyes – mismatched at times in size, position and color – from every surface amid the turgid landscape or the occasional meaningful phrase. Phrases like, “All one tribe…” and “Be here now…”

The office personnel stared and stared, trying to hide bemused smiles.

“Now, we can fix this,” I assured them. “We know a professional painter. He’ll come in after we move and completely restore this room.” Tonya had assured me her father could fix it no matter how bad it was, and the landfolks seemed far more amused than the anger I had expected. They agreed. As long as the room was restored to basic white when we were gone, there was no problem.

I was a young fool then. I didn’t know about the wonders of Kilz primer. It costs a bit, but it can cover up just about anything. So in the coming week, we boxed up all our things, carrying many of them down the street on foot to the amused stares of our neighbors. Then we set to cleaning and called in Bob, Tonya’s dad. He got a good laugh over Kit’s work, but within a day he had plowed it all under, leaving a fresh, white canvas for the next prospective artist’s eager hand.

Settling in at the new, slightly smaller, unit. The Pit Crew poured over the pictures we had taken before the Kilz-ing had washed it all away. We recalled the raucous nights when each piece had been added, and took great pleasure in the notion that the new tenants would never know what insanity lurked beneath their simple, eggshell walls. They would sleep soundly in the midst of an unseen gallery, and we would look to this new fresh canvas where we would paint the next few frames of our lives.