Disgusting

Disgusting

He came home once again. And she wasn't there. She was never there.
And it wasn't he didn't mind all that much he thought, it was just that
it'd be nice if she was there when he came home every once and a
while.

He walked into the house tired and cold. Everyday he had to walk from
the train station that was a mile away. This was because the train
station that was close to his house iddn't travel to his destination.
He didn't mind all htat much he constantly told himself. I like the
walk in the morning he thought. I like the exercise he thought. And
soon he would learn to tell himself that he liked that cold. He figured
that it was his chance to wear coats, heavy socks, extra shirts,
gloves, things like that, things that he was never able to wear coming
from California. He liked it he thought, the change, the difference in
everything. The change he thought. I was all about the change. And as
he entered the house his nose red from the cold, bits of snot clingling
to the straggling hairs on his upper lip, he took comfort knowing that
he was not yet worn out with his familiar door, with its familiar door
handle, or the feeling of warmth that abruptly hits his nose everytime
he walks in from his long but comforting walk form the train sgtation.
This was London he thought.

But she wasn't there.

He took off his coat and looked for a place to hang it among the
others. There were too many coats and not enough hooks. He carefully
removed others and draped them over others which were draped over
others. Some lay on the ground below, so if he figured that one or two
fell to make room for his own then that'd be ok. You give some and lose
some he thought. He put hes keys on the table, took off his shoes and
neatly placed them below the keys. He did this, of course, for a
reason: it's easier to remember where your keys are if they're above
your shoes. He looked immediately to his right and saw his room. He saw
the door lay closed, the lights were off, it was quiet and thought that
he might actually like the solitude. There's nothing quite so delicious
as a man and his solitude he thought.

Hello he said, but no answer. Neither she nor his six other roommates
were home. Roommates he restated to himself, not flatmates. He walked
slowly to his door being careful not to trip over shoes or articles of
clothing. It was dark, but things were getting easier for him now. He
figured that he could probably navigate safely through the house in the
dark. Possibly, though he wasn't sure. He opened the door and placed
his bag in his room. He was hungry and in need of food.

He walked into the kitchen, where there were various windows facing
toward the setting sun made it a little brighter, a little warmer.
However, her absence still left him quite cold.

I don't care he thought. She should do what she wants. After all
that's what they were trying to do, pursue their own lives while trying
to see if they'd work out together. She was pursuing her life and I was
pursuing mine. She was out. I was home. In California, when she had
come to stay for half a year, the situation was reversed. I was out.
She was home. That was the nature of our own countries I guess, or
whoever played the host in their country. The hosting cou8rntry if you
will. In California through, she was always him when I came home.
Whatever he thought. Tea would be good.

He filled up the kettle in the sink, switched it on then waited for it
to boil. He leaned against the counter, using one hand to slightly
support his wait and putting the other in his pocket. The kitchen was
messy again. The table, the very small table was made out of wood, but
no one would know that. You couldn't see any part of it. Papers,
plates, silverware, ashtrays, cigarette butts, and shit completely
caked it. The kitchen counter, the very small kitchen counter was the
same. It was always the fucking same. Always the same fucking mess and
the same fucking people too. He exhaled.

He continued to rest against the counter, casually. His problem was
that he had no friends really. Don't worry he had told her. I don't
really need anybody he had said. I can just do my own thing for a
while. I'll meet people along the way he said. And it was true, he had
planned that. He was going to meet people along the way, he was gong to
develop his own group of friends. In London, he had seen a lot of
steel, a lot of cranes, and buildings.

The sun was setting. It was getting dark.

He exhaled again and stood up straight. He took his hand out of his
pocket and picked up a dirty dish off the table, then a bowl, some
silverware, not cutlery he thought and placed them into the sink. He
could see a section of wood on the table now. He continued, picking up
the rest of the dishes, some with ashes and cigarette stains embedded
within the dried up spaghetti sauce or small pieces of ripped up paper,
rolling papers for whatever stuck to the dried and cracked oils on the
place from dinners over three nights ago and he picked up all the
newspapers and trash gossip magazines that his roommates read, each and
everyone stuck to the table, each and every one read only half way
thought along with unopened letters that had been sitting there for
weeks. He threw it all away. He put it all in the sink. He put all
somewhere else. Then he stopped for a moment and stood there.

He thought that he might actually do something. I might go to a pub he
thought. Yeah I wouldn't mind going to a pub by myself. There's plenty
of em down the street. There's always plenty of em down the street in
London. If only I could just sit down and have a pint, possibly my own
cigarette. Not a fag, not a rollie, just a fucking cigarette he
thought. Down the street huh? Only a ten-minute walk, only a goddamn
half a mile walk he thought. Maybe it'd be good to venture out and
explore my surroundings, my neighbourhood, her neighbourhood.

"No. No. No, no, no? I have a good life. Don't pull this bullshit. You
know that you have a good life. Your in London. Your in London for
cyring out loud," he said to himself.

He shook his head and reminded himself not to take life so seriously.
He knew that the moment you started looking at life as some job, as
some quota to be satisfied, that's when the trouble started. It's all a
joke, some drug that comes in waves. Ups and downs he thought. He had
always thought of himself as the guy who simply went with the flow
so-to-speak. He knew why he came here, why he had followed her here. He
loved her. Yeah, I'm in love he said to himself.

The kettle clicked off to the sound of a soothing boil. It was getting
darker in the kitchen. Tea and food he remembered. He was hungry though
just stood there. The kitchen was still just a fucking mess he thought.
Jesus Christ. I mean there were empty mugs lying on the counters that
had fungi cultivating, the table still wasn't cleared or clean, the
stove seemed to be painted with different assortment of dinners over
the past weeks the sink was full the floor was fucked with mold dirt
and other excrement that's just beyond me people's clothes were even
lying on the chairs and on the shelves with the goddamn plates there
was no room in the freezer for one small pint of ice cream no room in
the trash can, not rubbish bin, mind you for one more stupid
polystyrene encasement for a couple of overpriced strips of bacon or
even those stupid cookies, not biscuits, but cookies that they
buy.

Whatever. He thought.

He opened the cupboard above the counter and picked out his tea.
Echinacia. He thought that he might be getting sick. One should always
be cautious he figured. He placed the bag in his mug, the one clean mug
in the kitchen, tied the string to the handle, then poured the boiling
water in and watched the tea bag slowly bleed its curative contents. It
was getting pretty dark and he would turn the light on.

So that he could see.

But the light being on only illuminated more dirt, more mess,
something that with the other roommates was always there. They were
always there. And even when she was there, they were there too. He
hated that. He never could hang out with her by his self when he
wanted. She would much prefer to hang out with them. They just provided
different ideas, different conversation, meaningless conversation he
thought, but mind numbing conversation nonetheless. He felt that he
never provided that, that his always thick and clogged with drama or
seriousness. However, he knew that cleaning had become something that
he'd come to enjoy, at least something that he had enjoyed in the house
in the past. Maybe he just enjoyed it before for he didn't know these
people. He wanted to please them, to be accepted. The cleaning though,
it kept his mind constructive and focused. He thought that possibly, in
lift of the other infuckability to clean, that he'd be some sort of
example to the others, his girlfriend's sister and her sister's three
friends, all Londoners or English or whatever that he never really knew
prior to living in London. It was convenient she said to move in with
them. It would just be really easy she said. I'd get to live with my
sister and we'd have a cheap place to stay. Yeah, with five other
fucking people. And it was. I admit that. That was two months ago. It
was her idea. It was her country. Her sister. And her sister's
friends.

He would clean. He had to clean.

The tea and the coffee stains were difficult to rub out, but he
scrubbed while his tea sat steaming on the counter. While doing this,
he ruminated over the fact that it was only a simp0le idea in the
universe or simple requests to come home to a somewhat clean kitchen.
But it never was. Because of this, he would clean it. For others to
see. For others.

Eventually, he had put everything away, everything that could be put
away. Most of it was just dirty. He stood back once again and looked.
This is what he called a level one clean. He thought at this point he
might go to level two. It was simple really. Level two was more
intense, more detailed, ridding himself of all the shit that's been
there since he's been there. All the crap that's accumulated since the
day he walked in that door, looked at the kitchen, he, at twenty-seven
years old, they at twenty-one, thinking that his only relief came from
a theraputic exhale. Yeah, he would definitely go to level two. He
would clean with heavy amounts of soap and water. Even bleach. He would
use the mop. He would use the scratchy side of the sink scrubber
thing.

He got the tub out to fill with hot water and bleach for the
mop.

Filling up the tub, his tie constantly got in his way. Flinging it
over his shoulder, he finished filling up the tub, put it on the
ground, and then looked for the mop. It was in the same place. Where he
put it last. It was always in the same place. Like his fucking
roommates would ever use it. It wasn't too hard to find. The kitchen
was small, very small. The whole house was small, or just narrow he
thought, kind of like a flat spacious house squished by some huge
compactor. The house he had lived in in California had been flat and
spacious. All the houses there seemed more flat and spacious, even the
apartments. I like the houses in California she had said, they seemed
so spacious, so free. And I like how each room kind of opens up or
looks into another room she had said. Well, we could find something
similar in London he had told her. I don't think that there's anything
quite like this in London baby she said. Sure there is, we can find it
he said. We'll try she said.

It was seven o'clock and the bleach that used smelled incredibly
strong. It smelled potent. Good he thought. And he was careful not to
get any on himself.

Where was she?

He grabbed the mop, placed it in the tub, and let it soak for a
moment. The mop didn't work very well, he knew that. But with enough
effort, he could get the floor clean enough he thought. The mop was
saturated and beads of sweat started trickling from his arm pits. As he
placed the mop on the ground, he was careful not to get any of the
bleach on his nice dress shoes. His only pair of nice dress
shoes.

His tea lie steamless on the table and he started rubbing the floor,
pushing hard on the synthetic rubber of the mop that kept giving away
as he pushed harder but it was difficult to get it to work properly
causing him to reach down lower and lower on the handle to gain better
control of the mop head because he would clean the floor. Level two
cleaning was hard he knew that. He pushed harder and harder, finally
using the edge of the mop for more stability and strength, for the
deeper stains, pouring an extra amount of bleach on the more in grained
spots, the ones that were part of the floor, he moved chairs, he moved
papers that like scattered between counter tops and under the dish
washer, and he moved the trash can, not the rubbish bin, but the trash
can. The fucking trash can.

He mopped well he thought. And when it was seven thirty, he noticed
that his undershirt was drenched in sweat. He stood for a moment and
looked at the cleaner counters, the tidier table, and the somewhat
mopped floor and thought that this kitchen was just pretty damn dirty.
In fact, he thought, as he stood there, that it was just disgusting. He
figured that no matter how hard he scrubbed or washed or scraped, he
knew that the stains and blemishes and crap would never come out. All
the grit and shit embedded with in the cracks in the tiles, the food
caked surfaces of everything would just never be removed he thought.
And besides, he said to himself, it will just continue to pile up. They
don't care, he continued. They just don't care.

He stood there, still wearing his tie, a silk blue tie that he had
borrowed from his girlfriend's father because he had none to use when
he came to England and started looking for jobs. His pants looked nice.
They were pants he thought, not trousers. He almost thought that
possibly they were too nice, that he dressed up every morning a little
too much for work, that he was being a little over ambitious. After
all, he was only an English teacher, a twenty-sex year old English
teacher, standing in a disgusting kitchen that was thousands of miles
away from California, wearing the nicest clothing that he has.

It was eight-thirty by this point, and she still wasn't home. No phone
call. No text message. Nothing.

I should probably move he thought. I have the money. I have that
feedom. I could move tomorrow he thought. I could move tomorrow and be
done with this house, these roommates and this filth, this disgusting
crap-filled place. I could fucking do anything he told himself. That's
what he always told himself when he was alone. And this is what he told
himself right now, standing in the kitchen wearing his ties, nice
pants, and his shoes. It was pitch black outside.

He stood there a moment longer, then decided that he was tired of
cleaning. The mugs were as put away as they were going to be, the
dishes were as put away as they were going to be, the stains were as
rubbed out as they were going to be, this kitchen was as clean as it
was going to be. He simply figured that it probably just wouldn't get
any cleaner. He looked at the conglomeration of pictures on the wall,
the collection of various photographs and magazine cut outs that his
roommates used to cloud the bright blue walls. He looked at the empty
wine and liquor bottles on top of the cabinets that his roommates had
said were trophies. Why people wanted trophies of their drinking was
beyond him he thought. He wanted to get rid of it all. To tear down the
pictures, recycle the bottles and paint the walls white.

He exhaled once again. It's just too much he said.

This isn't necessarily what I bargained for he thought. She told me
that she loved me and to come to London and have some sort of life
together, that'd it'd be fun, that we'd reach normality together. I
can't even remember what some of my friends look like he thought. He
turned around, turned off the light and left the kitchen.

As he walked to his room, he took his wallet out of his pocket and
looked at its contents, seeing his bankcards and couple of pounds. In
his other pocket he took out his mobile and turned it off. He heard the
front door handle jiggle and unlock. He turned and saw his girlfriend
walk in and jumped back, then lean against the wall, putting her other
hand over her heart.

"Jeez. You scared me," she said. He simply stood there in the dark
hallway

"Are you ok," she asked.

He walked towards her, put his hands on her waist, hugged her,
noticing her breasts against his chest and exhaled. She simply stood
still holding her bag in one hand and her keys in the other. They went
into the room. She turned on the light and he put on a T-shirt, a pair
of comfortable trousers, and sat on the bed, looking at her. She, in
all her supercilious beauty, sifted through her mail, concentrating on
which bills had come today.