The Closet

I was building Curtis's closet in the dark hallway of his house. I used a big rectangular sponge, the size of an old King James Bible, instead of sandpaper to sand down the final layer of spackle. That was a very intentional way to eliminate that fine white dust that you would get from sanding the normal way. It was also supposed to yield much better results.
Curtis was a pastor for a small church. I wondered if he drew a commission off the tithes, or if he lived by faith. I didn't want to judge him either way. I was a very easy going guy.
He had taken off a while ago and I forgot to ask when he would be back. I suspected any minute.
I pushed the sponge to the bottom of the warm water in the blue pail and squeezed the air bubbles out. Then I pulled it up and squeezed out the water. I tried to focus on being a part of things.
I pressed the damp sponge against one of my joints and rubbed it back and forth, massaging the already smooth surface. I had taped and spackled so deliberately and carefully that it almost didn't need the sanding, wet or dry. I could have almost gone straight to the painting.
That spackle, dry as a wood splinter, sucked the moisture from my sponge. It felt like washing a rusty car.
There was a guy, I couldn't remember his relation to Curtis, who lived there, on his couch. I should have known him better by now, but for the life of me, I couldn't remember the details of his life. He was roaming the house, aimless as a ghost. I could hear him singing one of those irritating Christian rock songs. It was a love song to Jesus, but if you didn't know any better, it would have sounded homo-erotic.
As he approached the door of the closet he sang, "I want to be in his arms again." He sounded sad and he had his hands behind his back, like this was Sunday school.
I looked at him, which caused him to stop his serenade. He commenced staring closely at my handiwork.
"What do you think?" I asked.
"About what?"
"Anything."
"I think I've just been dumped," he said, holding up a cordless phone. "She said we should spend time apart. I'm too immature."
I could imagine that. He was wearing a backwards baseball cap, a football jersey and long glossy basketball shorts.
I shined the fluorescent flashlight across the spot I had been sponging. I could see tiny deep lines that would show through the paint. This was a setback. "I'm gouging it," I said.
"You need sandpaper or something?"
"The sponge is supposed to be the best possible method. This's never happened before."
I squeezed the sponge extra hard and barely dusted the spackle. "How's the job hunt?" I asked.
"Well, it's tough when you don't have a car."
I remembered seeing him and his girlfriend stepping out of a car. It must have been hers. She also had a kid about four years old. I couldn't remember how old this guy was, but he seemed much younger than me. Nor could I remember his name.
You can only ask someone their name so many times. After a while you start to look callous.
I shined the light across the seam again. It made shadows inside all the scratches the sponge was making. It looked like the tiny lines they scrape into sidewalks just before the concrete sets. "I need to get away from this for a minute," I said.
He was tossing the cordless phone, making it flip and spin like a high diver. He needed inspiration, or at least someone to tell him what to do.
The most inspiring thing I could think of was, of course, my Shogun. "Let me show you my bike," I said.
He followed me outside where I pulled my bike off the side of the garage and rolled it to the middle of the driveway.
"You rode here?"
"That's my point!" I said. "It's only ten miles to the light rail. If you had a bike, you could apply all the way from Philadelphia to New York!"
He pinched the front tire, kind of condescendingly. "Man, that's a nice bike," he said with strained enthusiasm. "You must fly... like Lance Armstrong."
I was a little confused at that comment. I stared at him. Apparently he thought speed was the whole point. "It can only go about fifteen miles an hour," I said. I pointed to the center of the rear wheel, where there would normally be a derailer and gears. "I took it down to a single speed."
"No kidding! This thing is tight! You must go like," he paused, "friggin' Lance Armstrong."
I took the bike and leaned it back against the garage. I couldn't tell if this guy was joking or not. His girlfriend was right. This guy was just a kid. "Yes I do," I said. "I fly just like Lance Armstrong."
"Must be in shape, dude."
I was completely deflated by his stonewalling. All I wanted was to help him out and he was shutting me down. "Yes, that's why I brought you out here: to tell you what great shape I'm in and to say that I fly like Lance Armstrong. Any questions?"
He was back to flipping that phone again. He was chewing something and when he spat, he dropped the phone and the battery danced across the driveway. Where the spit landed it was black like chewing tobacco.
"If you really wanted to work," I said, "you could make it happen."
He stooped down, grabbing the pieces. "I know I'm a loser," he said. "I'm gonna' go kill myself now."
Did he think that was funny? I wondered. Then he laughed nervously and gave me a wink. It was the kind of wink your uncle gives you. It was a demeaning thing to do, but he must not have understood. So I let go of it.
"You're in a slump," I said. "You can turn it around. You just have to want to. You know you can choose to want it."
"I see your point," he said, defeated. He opened the door and held it open for he. Now I needed a break not only from the work, but from this guy too. Being nice is hard work sometimes. He tried to push the battery back into place. As soon as the cover snapped back on, the phone rang, like an automatic reset alarm had been triggered.
Of course he answered and forgot about me. The door shut behind him.
I wasn't ready to go back in there and face him again, or the spackle, so I scrounged around in the garage for a while. It was an absolutely devastating use of space. It made me never want to own a house. Bicycles were lying onto of a radial-arm saw. A ladder was leaning across a decapitated basketball hoop. Under a crumpled sheet of plastic I found an unopened Coke. Jackpot, I thought.
I sat down on a paint can and started to drink it. It was sweet and perfect and the bubbles bit into my tongue. I held it there in my mouth, savoring it. You have to try to be part of things this way. Ultimately it makes you more compassionate.
Then I realized that if Curtis returned at just that moment, it wouldn't look good for me. So I downed the rest of the Coke, cutting short my meditation session. I returned the empty to where I'd found it and went back inside.
The guy looked much better. Much happier. He was in to some serious phone twirling.
"She take you back?" I asked.
"Nope," he said. "Forget her! That was Sarah. Looks like I'm not single anymore!"
I gave him back that wink. He was back on top, thanks to me. I wanted him to hold onto that triumph, but I couldn't share in his little celebration. Whatever he was feeling was certain to be temporary. He hadn't figured anything out. In the long run, I realized, it would be better if he had to find his own way. He seemed like a puppet.
"Praise God!" he said. Then he waited for my reply.
Of course, I nodded. That's what you do. He looked closer at me, to make sure it was the real deal, so I kept it up. I kept nodding until he believed me. Then I reluctantly picked up the sponge again. It was heavy with water. I was beginning to think it would ever do the trick. "Maybe I'll take you up on that sand paper," I said. I dropped the sponge a little too hard into the bucket, and a few drops splashed onto my wall.
He surprised me by pulling a sanding sponge out from behind his back. Those basketball shorts didn't have any pockets. He must have had it tucked between the elastic and his skin. "Here," he said.
"That's been touching your ass hasn't it."
He stood there holding it out to me. "I guess."
I hesitated to accept because something seemed strange about it, the way he was holding his arm out. He looked like a statue, almost. And I was like a smaller statue, looking up at him. It made me a little uncomfortable but reluctantly I accepted. "I hope you like dust," I said.
I took the pail into the bathroom just across the hall and poured it down the toilet. I poured it slowly, watching the cream colored water fill the bowl. As the dirty warm water flowed in I could hear it forcing the cold clear water down the pipes, unused.