Nobody, Somebody, Anybody

by Kelly McClorey

  Watching from the window as he stumbled into a taxi with a rolling suitcase and an oversize backpack, I shivered, unsure how to feel. I pictured him and his broad stomach undulating under the blinking lights of an Odessa nightclub while he told himself, Be selfish, have fun, don’t walk away with any regrets. Some people might laugh at my landlord for purchasing a ten-day tour from Sincere Romance, but I didn’t want to be one of them. Why should I be so quick to laugh? Who knows what will be funny in the end? At first you might find the suffering of a loved one funny because it seems so overdramatic; then, by the time you finally stop laughing, it’s too late.

  I didn’t feel sorry for him either—as quick as people are to laugh, they are even quicker to pity. Take me now, these few months later, as a chambermaid. The other day a guest watched me lug a trash bag down the hallway, leaving in my wake—unbeknownst to me—a trail of brown juice from a leaky corner, and he must have known that once I’d hurled the bag into the dumpster and brushed my hands off in triumph, I’d return to find the trail of brown juice, and this idea probably made his heart want to burst. Probably tears came to his eyes as he thought, Poor thing, with her trail of brown juice, what a pity she didn’t get to go to an elite university like me. And how far from the truth! Since the truth was that I met that trail of brown juice with a sunny resolve, for I would scour and eradicate it, ruminating all the while on Florence Nightingale’s suggestion that we view diseases as conditions, the same as dirty and clean, and just as much under our own control. I happily blotted and rinsed, blotted and rinsed, and I’d gone to an elite university besides. It never occurred to him that at the end of the day, I’d be going home to study for the EMT exam, and that in the future, when he experiences the first sign of a stroke or takes a sudden fall from a ladder, I might be the only person standing between his life and death—me, the one he felt sorry for!

  A couple weeks after my landlord returned from his trip, an envelope arrived from an Irina Mezhebovksy. The tongs shook as I positioned it over the hot kettle. She called him her true love, her one and only. She still couldn’t believe that he’d actually come all the way there to meet her, and she already missed him terribly and wouldn’t be happy until they were together again, but in the meantime, she thought it’d be romantic to send handwritten letters, like in a movie. She wanted to send a little piece of her country—a scattering of dried petals at the bottom of the envelope, from a sunflower. This was more than I’d ever envisioned. They were engaged to be married! She included a photograph of herself in a red sleeveless turtleneck, and even though she wasn’t smiling, she was beautiful, somehow both severe and alluring at the same time, with light hair and dark elaborate makeup on her eyes and lips. I soared with hope that she would soon move into my landlord’s house. How could we not become fast friends when she didn’t know anybody else and I was conveniently located right next door, on the very same property? It was the ideal situation, and she was the ideal candidate. She looked close to my age, closer to mine than his, and I could invite her to teach me aerobics—she said she couldn’t wait to taste his cooking, but she’d have to double her aerobics classes so she didn’t “blow up.” Soon after that, packages from Effortless Epicurean began arriving on his porch, each box stamped with a cartoon frog in a chef’s hat.

  I no longer waited for the mailman to disappear around the corner. The moment he descended from the porch, I raided the mailbox, frantically searching for more news from Irina. I tried to remind myself that they had email and texts and video calls. Even if she had sent another letter, it might take a week or two, even three, to finally reach us.

  One evening I heard a knock. Without checking the peephole, I knew it was him. I dropped to my knees and scooched back against the wall, my heart thudding. I’d let myself get careless. What could I possibly do now? Deny ever touching his mail, pretend to be shocked, offended that he’d even suggest I was capable of something so illegal and unneighborly? But it might not be convincing, and he might have evidence—fingerprints or an abnormality in the envelopes. Without a plan, I groped desperately for the windowsill above my head, thinking I might as well jump. Something on the window latch tickled my finger, and I yelped at the surprise. A harmless spider. My landlord called my name once, then we were both quiet, in a kind of standoff, and I closed my eyes and thought of nothing, and after a long moment like that, he fiddled with some keys and opened the door.

  “Oh!” he said when he saw me hunkered under the window.

  “Sorry,” I said, hugging my knees on the floor. “I didn’t recognize your voice.”

  “No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to barge in. I was scared you might be hurt or something.” He seemed unsure of what to do or where to look, like someone plotting his line of attack. But then he said that he knew someone who was looking to hire summer waitstaff at a yacht club, they’d happened to run into each other and it had come up in conversation, and so he’d thought of me, since he knew I’d been having some issues getting all the rent together on time. Meanwhile I waited for him to get to the part about the police being on their way, waited for it even as he finished and I squeaked out that sure, okay, I’d be interested, he could leave the contact information on the table. He closed the door behind him, and I sat, processing. It was bittersweet. He had gone out of his way to offer me a job and to wonder whether I was hurt and to care enough to barge through my door as though it were nothing sacred, but this meant I’d no longer have any way to monitor what was going on with Irina, since I couldn’t ransack his mail anymore, not after he’d done all that.

  The person my landlord had run into turned out to be Doug, the general manager of the clubhouse and now my boss, and although Doug told me later that there was a mix-up—all the server positions had been filled and the only position still available was in housekeeping—I accepted anyway. I don’t believe either of them meant to be deceitful. It pays $2.50 more than the state minimum wage, and I can work with that, since I limit my expenses and keep my student loans on an income-based plan, which means I pay nothing now, though ultimately it will add an extra fifteen years and associated interest. Whenever I pass Doug’s office, I aim to appear serious and enthusiastic, calm but not casual, so he won’t believe he’s slighted me. Most days his door is open and he’s hovered over a plate of food, moaning with pleasure. One time he called me in and turned his plate 360 degrees so I could behold the consummate slice of meatloaf. “Can you believe when I was a kid, I thought pepper was too spicy?” he said while pouring sugar all over the meatloaf. The sugar sits next to his computer in a ceramic camel whose humps have been hollowed out to form a container. He puts it on everything. He doesn’t bother to use the tiny silver spoon, just tips the camel over and lets the sugar tumble out.

  Since accepting the job as chambermaid, I haven’t opened a single letter from my landlord’s mailbox, and with no sign of Irina, I’ve begun to wonder if she was only leading him on, or if he’s screwed things up, or if the distance itself has torn them apart. When we happen upon each other outside the house, we nod as usual and I search for any clue, good or bad, in his body language, finding none. For my part, I try to show my appreciation through the expression on my face. Even though there was a mix-up and the only position still available was in housekeeping, I believe the job was meant as a true gift. The same as the guest who opened a tin of peppermints and, despite having no obligation, made a motion to offer one to me—the chambermaid. I was so taken aback that I just stood there, and so she carted that peppermint all the way down the hall to the palm of my hand, which at some point must have opened itself in expectation. Then she continued on her way without pausing for recognition, while I cradled the green gem in my palm, rolling it this way and that.

  On the other hand, some people like to torment you with their so-called generosity and use it to exploit your weaknesses. It happened to me back in middle school, when I fell under the spell of a pair of boots, the most perfect boots I’d ever seen, with a cuff of fur, chocolate lea
ther, and gleaming silver buckles that hooked around each ankle. My neighbor Angela was the lucky owner of these boots, and though I never voiced it, she no doubt noticed my gazing at them—she sat next to me in class and liked to tap the leg of her desk in a rhythmic taunt. One day, when we met as usual to walk home from school, she announced out of nowhere, “Here, take them.” She unbuckled the boots, pulled them off, and handed them to me.

  She set off walking down the sidewalk in her socks, so I followed after her, the boots swinging from the notches of my fingers. She wanted me to feel bad, but her socks seemed plenty warm, plus she’d only given up the boots to make herself feel superior and because they were old news to her; soon they’d pass right out of style. She probably would’ve thrown them away otherwise. Her father owned all the Dunkin’ Donuts franchises in the area. Every year for her birthday, they would set up clotheslines in the living room and string powdered doughnuts along them, then hold a competition to see how many you could eat with your hands tied behind your back. Afterward everyone would be walking around with beards of sugar, trampling crumbs into the carpets, and her parents didn’t even care.

  Still, the cuff of fur felt as soft and luxurious as I’d imagined, and as soon as Angela disappeared into her house, I sprinted upstairs to finally have a moment with them in private. But my mother burst in. Though I quickly tried to drain the giddiness from my face, she’d already clocked it. Now she’d have to get involved, take over. She wore me down until I disclosed where they’d come from, and then she wouldn’t stop purring over them and exclaiming how generous Angela was, we were so fortunate to have her as a neighbor and I to have her as a dear friend. She chose to ignore the light scuffs, the faint smell—any evidence they were pre-worn. At dinner she said, “Did you show your father the boots? They’re top quality, and it isn’t even her birthday! Just a thanks-for-being-my-friend present from Angela. Isn’t that nice? We’ve got to write a thank-you note tonight.” She nudged me. “Well, what are you waiting for? Go put them on.”

  “They’re already going out of style!” I fled to my bedroom and tried to tear the boots apart, yanking on the fur cuffs, then the buckles, then the sole, but one thing was true: they were top quality. I couldn’t resist putting them on once more and admiring myself in the mirror. My mother’s meddling had ruined it, though, and I carried them outside and dumped them in the trash can.

  In the morning I dug them out again. I decided to ditch them on Angela’s porch along with an underhanded note, one that seemed witty on the surface but would burrow into her brain, force her to brood over every nasty implication, until she felt ashamed for ever thinking she could manipulate me with fake charity. I spent hours with my notebook searching for the right words, but at the end of the day, all I had were pages and pages of sketches of me and the boots in various places all over the world: the Eiffel Tower, the Great Wall of China, the top of Mount Everest. So I packed them in a box and traded them to a woman in a consignment shop for thirty delicious dollar bills that proved I’d won. Later, I saw them all polished up on display in the window, selling for $75 to any passing moron.

  When my mother realized they were gone, she moped around the house, saying “I’ll never understand you.” This struck me as odd, for I was just as understandable as the next person, and this was my own mother speaking, the person who’d created me and known me my whole life. Though we had little in common, I believed I understood her, and everything else, for that matter—there were no mysteries to me at that age. I’d presumed it was her disappointment talking: she could no longer go on obsessing about the boots; she’d have to find something else to do. But she said the same thing—“I’ll never understand you”—many times after this, so that it stopped surprising me and began to infuriate me, until finally I snapped. It was a stupid disagreement, over what I needed to pack for college. Really, she was just desperate for any sign that I would miss her. But when she felt small, I could always crush her smaller. I can remember exactly where I was standing in my room—I’ll never understand you—and how I slammed the suitcase and sharpened my voice: “Well, I guess now you can do us both a favor and stop trying.”

  Three

  On the fifth of July I had a meeting scheduled with Doug after my shift. I’d requested the meeting myself after compiling an extensive list of recommended changes for the hotel floor, informed by Florence Nightingale’s writings and some more contemporary literature. I carried my proposal down to his office in a handsome leather folder, passing Roula in the housekeeping closet, who made a point of setting down the fertilizer she was sprinkling over her plants so she could give me a skeptical look.

  Doug was engrossed in something on his computer, his head zoomed in almost touching the screen, so I helped myself to a chair opposite him. He banged a few keys, then finally popped his head out to acknowledge me. “Hey, you’re my resident genius,” he said, and squinted back at the screen. “Any good with computers?”

  “Not really. Sorry.”

  “A Toshiba,” he said. “So what should I expect. Brought to you by the same people who brought you Pearl Harbor.” He laughed with his shoulders, while the rest of his body stayed still. “Now there’s another winning example of diplomacy. Ha.” He pushed his keyboard so it retracted into his desk. “Don’t get me wrong, I like diplomats. They make great hostages.” Again he laughed, his shoulders heaving, then leaned back with his fingers cushioning his head and his belly on full display.

  Just as I opened my mouth to begin, his telephone rang. He snorted at the caller ID. “You’re lucky you don’t have to deal with this swarm of mosquitoes,” he said. I gave him a look meant to show I didn’t understand but also wasn’t overly curious; I was hoping to get on to the purpose of the meeting. “Came up with that myself,” he said proudly. “The perfect word, don’t you think? All those little bloodsuckers trying to worm their way in here without going through the proper channels. Mostly new money, if you catch me.”

  “It’s actually only female mosquitoes that suck blood,” I said. The phone kept on ringing. “And they can carry serious diseases. Malaria, West Nile—”

  “Of course, even better! I knew I liked you. You’ve always got something going.” He held a button to make the ringer shut off. “Now, when are they going to make a mosquito net that’s big enough?” His gaze shifted above my head. “Oh, good.” I turned to see Roula in the doorway. “I thought Roula should sit in for this. Seeing as she’s head housekeeper. Best one we got,” he said, then loud-whispered from behind his hand, “Also the only,” as though this would entertain us. I should’ve known Roula would find a way to interject herself—she was intent on policing me at all times. “In any case,” he went on, “I’ve got a tee time in twenty. So brass tacks, if you will. What’s on your mind?”

  I breathed and tried to refocus. He would never be expecting such a studied and thorough proposal! And perhaps Roula would take something valuable from the experience. I opened my folder and passed a copy to Doug. “I only brought two,” I said, then slid the other one halfway, a little less than halfway, between Roula and me. “Someone with my educational background is in a unique position here.” I couldn’t help peeking at Roula from the corner of my eye; though I hadn’t aimed it at her, this was how I’d always planned to start. “I’m able to offer some guidance on how we can elevate the standards of health and sanitation on the hotel floor. To this end, I’ve put together a list of some high-priority items that should be addressed. I’ll go through a few of them now to flesh out the details.”

  Doug didn’t say anything, so I went on like I’d planned, my enthusiasm building. “You’ll see that the first item is carpeting. A dirty carpet literally infects the room.” This was a direct quote from Florence Nightingale, and I twitched as it sailed out of my lips. “The ideal course of action would be to remove all carpeting and replace it with wood or tile, but, as you’ll see here, I’ve taken into account both long- and short-term goals. I’m aware that it can be difficult for organi
zations like this to implement large-scale changes. In the meantime, the recommendation is to shampoo regularly, with a deep clean at least once a month.”

  While I explained the advantages of replacing wallpaper with oil-based paint, I noticed Doug check his watch and had a flare of self-doubt. I tried to speed up. “So, skimming down here, you’ll see most of the instructions are self-explanatory. And some can be done in tandem, like with the ventilation fans and air-conditioning units. Or with some simple coordination among departments. Like putting our vacuum filters through the dishwasher once the kitchen’s closed.”

  “I see,” Doug said. His eyes traveled the page. “This sure is comprehensive. Feels like I’m back in school, getting homework. No, but in a good way.”

  All at once I felt drained and started to regret the whole endeavor. “I hope I didn’t overstep my bounds. It’s just, I feel a sense of responsibility to our guests, seeing as I’m going to be an EMT. I couldn’t have a clear conscience if I didn’t try to do everything in my power to protect them.”

  “I appreciate that. And we’ll do the best we can with this. Right, Roula?” She made a noise, but I refused to look over. “Yep, we’ll see what we can do. You put a lot of work in here, I can see that.”