David Gordon - story


Dance With Me Lavatory Man

 "Wet Floor" reads the sign on the side of the lonely mop bucket.  Where
is the gray haired mop, or the gray haired old man who wheedles the
slimy slop hungry cleaning tool?  The four kids that are standing in the
last stall smoke a cigarette.  I can just see their shoes under the
bottom of the stall door.  I wonder what insights into life are scrawled
into the paint on the other side of that door.  I wonder who's good at
what and what their phone numbers are?  That nicotine stained old fart
of a janitor must be around here somewhere.  I hear the cigarette hit
the water in the toilet, and a collective "COOL" comes from the mouths
of the four juvenile delinquents.  They flush, I hear the sound of
squeaking tennis shoes just as a train whistle blows.  The four boys
spill out of the stall, and make a run for the bathroom door.  I trip
the first boy, and the next three fall over top of him.  "That shit will
kill ya," I say as they wipe the mop water off their hands and onto
their pants.  They leave, and I hear another noise.  I can hear someone
humming a song.  I walk over to the bathroom supply closet and open it.
Inside, the janitor hums a waltz and dances with a damp mop.  Startled,
his slim wooden partner loses its balance and falls.  I ask him for a
cigarette, and he obliges.  He lights it up, I take his other hand, and
we begin to dance.  We slide along the slick floor and leave muddy
tracks in our wake.  His hands are surprisingly soft and his feet,
remarkably light.  The smell of pine trees fills my nostrils.  I think
of my childhood.  What glorious days those were, my childhood.  My
thoughts are interrupted by another patron who enters the men's room.  I
let go of my partner's hands and bow.  I glide out the door on a thin
layer of water.

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