Laundry

Laundry:
by Robert Aquino Dollesin

I am slumped in a scoop-shaped chair in a Seventh Avenue laundry-mat, near the entrance. A plastic cupful of quarters rests squeezed between my thighs. Ahead of me, trapped in the glass face of an industrial-sized dryer, the reflection of someone I no longer know gazes back. Beyond the reflection my clothes clink round and round and round.

Before yesterday, it was Marcie who laundered my soiled clothes. Every Sunday. It didn't matter that I'd walked out on her three months earlier. In fact, Saturday evenings she continued to phone, asking me if after church I would still be stopping by, so that she could clean and press my laundry.

I still went to church, right? Marcie needed to know.

The laundry-mat's front door opens and a blast of cold rain blows onto my face. A woman enters with a basket balanced on her hip. She hurries by without looking down, hurries to the rear of the building, where the washing machines stand side-by-side like regimented soldiers.

Why are things so different now that we no longer live together? Is it because the nothing quarrels we once had have ceased? Or perhaps, it's because neither of us make mention of past mistakes.

Harmony. That's what separation has led to. Harmony.

The door blows open and shut. I swipe drops of rain off my face with the back of my hand. I tug my knit cap low, then tuck my hands deep into the pockets of my camouflage hunting jacket.

Taco Bell. Rumbling inside me, like my laundry tumbles in the dryer. Until yesterday, Marcie prepared my meals.

Three or four times a week Marcie insisted I come home for dinner. After meeting me at the door and leading me to the dining room, she'd pull out the seat at the head of the table. A seat I rarely sat at when I still lived there. Steam rose warm off the heaped plates. My favorite foods sat on her finest china. Dinnerware so precious to Marcie, I'd never been allowed to touch them until after I'd left.

She'd sit across from me at the table, rest her tilted head in the palm of her hand and gaze. Afterward, while Marcie cleared the table, I settled back and enjoyed a cigarette.

“Can you stay a while?” Marcie always asked while she stood at the sink.

I'd nod. Then, after stubbing my cigarette out in the clay ashtray, she'd usher me to the sofa.

She'd excuse herself, disappear into the bedroom we once shared. A few minutes later she'd be back in the living room, smiling, her beautiful body visible beneath her transparent gown.

“A little jazz?” she'd say. And after my nod she would dance across the room to the stereo. The needle she'd place in the groove of an old Motown favorite – something from our past, something we'd both loved – and then the lights she'd dim.

While she sat on one end of the sofa, I sat on the other. With my eyes shut I let the haunting horns of Miles or Kenny or Chuck take me away.

When a heavyset woman removes her clothes from the dryer next to mine, the smell of fabric softener drifts my way. I hold the fragrance in my nostrils, savor its warmth and sweetness. The woman tosses her clothes into a wire cart and wheels the cart over to a green table. While she folds and stacks her clothes, the woman glances at me and says,

“Is it the rain? The rain gets me down, too.”

I shift my seat and buck my shoulders. She continues to smile brightly, but doesn't say anything else.

After I moved out, Marcie still wanted me to sleep over. Not every night, of course. Just when the feeling was right. It felt almost perfect lying with Marcie on top of the covers, neither of us uttering a word. Like young lovers, I'd suggestively brush my knuckles against her thighs. Her breaths would deepen. Then I'd pull her close against me and not let go until daylight seeped into the room through the edges of the yellow curtains.

“I still love you,” Marcie would whisper.

“And I love you more than ever,” I'd whisper back.

When I would wake in the morning I'd be greeted by a freshly laundered shirt and a breakfast fried the way I like it. In the doorway, before kissing her goodbye, we'd linger in each other's arms.

Strolling to my car, I'd glance over my shoulder and see her waiting in the doorway, a piece of my soiled clothing held in her hands, close to her nostrils.

My dryer stops spinning. I stand with my plastic cup, the coins jangling, and shuffle over to the dryer and feed more quarters into the slot.

When it roars back to life, I once again return to slump in the chair beside the door.

Marcie didn't call yesterday. It was the first Saturday since I'd left that the phone didn't ring.

All last night I tossed awake in bed. This morning I raised the phone receiver from its cradle and dialed my old home number.

When she picked up, I said, “Should I bring my laundry?”

She didn't answer.

I held the receiver close to my ear. “Marcie?”

“It's time to let go,” she said.

Still gripping the receiver, I collapsed onto the small chair next to the wall and rested my chin on my chest.

“Marcie?” I said.

“We--” I could tell she was struggling to keep her voice from breaking. “--We need to move on.”

“But I love you, Marcie.”

“Do you?”

“More than ever.”

She grew silent.

“Who,” I asked, “will do my laundry?”

After another long silence, Marcie said, “I need time to think. Can I call you in a couple hours?”

The laundry-mat's front door opens again. A man appearing spent, used up, comes inside holding a basket full of laundry in front of him. His box of Tide slides off the top of his load and hits the floor. The man curses and kicks the box.

I'd left her a message when she didn't call back, told her exactly where I'd be. That was nearly six loads ago. I stare at my sorry self in the glass and shake my cupful of quarters, wondering how much longer until my coins are exhausted.