Lillyanne

Lillyanne

Chapter One

The mop moved in wide perfect figure eights, forcing dirty water and suds to swirl in patterns and floating shapes like cream in a coffee cup. Joseph Williams, the one who moved the mop back and forth, stood tall over the floor and watched his work with what could only be described as wonder, or maybe a deep concentration.

The Willows, that is, this ancient retirement home, was found on the corner of West Second and Main. Joseph cleaned the floors at The Willows every night between the hours of midnight and seven. He was the Maintenance Officer. It was the job he had applied for when he came because he had liked the sound of being a Maintenance Officer. He had not realized then what he knew now; that the title simply meant Late-Night-Floor-Mopper.

Strangely, he had to admit it. He actually liked the long hours of scrubbing floors. He imagined he was the Lord of the Mop, and that he could create other worlds with the mop and the suds. Tonight, for instance, he had made a beautiful female face, the bubbles cascading like curls tossed by a spring breeze around her fluffy cheeks. He had imagined she loved him, and that they had vowed to be together for all time. And, then the supervisor had rung him on the cell phone clipped to his belt. It seems that even a Maintenance Officer must have a superior. Joseph Williams had scurried off to the front entry-way to remove the spilled coffee someone had dumped on the floor. He imagined he could transform the brown stuff and scrub it into warm fields where the beautiful woman waited for him peeking out from behind waving stalks of heavy brown grain.

It wasn’t true. He knew it wasn’t true, but he imagined it that way anyway, and spent hours at a time imagining the strange inhabitants of the worlds he formed on the floor amidst the suds and the imprinted outlines of boots and grit that had been forced into the beige tile during the day; little powder-puffs of people with crooked smiles and expanding bellies who grew out of the floor in the foam. He imagined he saved them with his mop; transported them to the pail.

Well, the soapy hills and valleys were much better than the cold harsh reality of living in the city. Who wanted to think about the small kerosene heater and the empty refrigerator, or the lumpy mattress with the stained sheets which hadn’t been washed in months because he just couldn’t rationalize using his remaining pocket change for the laundry mat? He would always choose the strong cup of orange Peko tea at the cafeteria dispensary, or a bus ride to the warm library over clean sheets for a bed he never slept in any way. He could doze on the bus until they threw him off. If he was lucky, a resident at The Willows would offer him the remnants of their lunch. One of the women always had a muffin from breakfast hidden in her pocket. They always saved him some; said he looked like a skinny alley cat.

A gust of chilly air whirling in from the entry door made his breath suddenly visible. He watched the small cloud bleed into the poorly lit hallway; like soap on the floor, he thought. . . . Like the soap on the floor.

His eyes traced the pattern of the mop. Another perfect figure eight that splashed over and stopped unexpectedly at two ragged boots laced up the front with frayed brown shoelaces. It took William a minute to realize a person was actually attached to the boots and was sitting on the bench at the overly decorated entrance of the Willows; that these feet belonged to the hunched human quietly sitting there in the fuzzy light of the hallway. The boots weren’t really meant for winter weather, he thought. They looked wrong on the fragile legs covered in two pairs of mismatched socks that peeked over the top of the loose lacings. The socks looked pale and child-like under the ripped green gauze skirt that swung freely under a brown car coat with fur pockets. He noticed the buttons were in the wrong holes. The visitor looked like a kindergartener from the Projects waiting for the doors to open on the first day of school. He saw ratty fingerless gloves and the active fingers drumming strange patterns on the cushions of the bench; the only real sign that anyone with a pulse was waiting there. Steel-blue eyes snapped to meet his. A look of caution was replaced by a widening grin transforming the face that stared unashamedly back at his. Like soap on the floor, he thought. And as quickly as the woman had looked up, her head dipped back to her chest; her features hidden under a curtain of stringy gray hair and a blue stocking cap crowned with a purple crocheted flower. Her breathing once again only barely perceived as her fingers continued to drum the rhythm both strange and haunting onto the wooden bench she sat upon, the sound melting into the long hallway.

Suddenly, without warning, her fingers disappeared into her grimy pocket. She brought out a small black book with ragged well-used edges. She moved the pages as if reading; looking for something specific that was not there. The pages were blank; empty and white. Yet she deliberately stopped at a page somewhere near the middle. Satisfied, she reverently lay the book on the bench next to her. Her hands floating; fingers spread for mere moments before she quickly reached for his mop. Taking the handle, she plopped the mop head onto the floor between her toes and leaned the long handle against her right shoulder. She reached beyond the mop in front of her like a child begging to be picked up. Her fingers wiggled in front of her, thumbs extended straight up in the air.

Joseph watched her hands and face. Their eyes met

Joseph grinned like a fool. She thinks she is playing the harp, he thought.

Like soap on the floor.

Just like soap on the floor, the air transformed, and he almost heard the resonating sounds of ringing strings that were not there. Not there at all.

“Lillyanne!” Joe never saw who spoke; his eyes unfocused and clouded. A light behind him shimmering without definition or source. “Come on!”

A whisper warm by his neck. Hands grasping his. “Keep my music book. Keep it safe.”

Joe slowly blinked. The mop flat on the floor spread out and covered with suds lay at his feet. In his hands was the worn book, and he was utterly alone. He fluttered the pages. They were all empty. Every single page. But the back cover formed a pocket and spilling from the pocket were bills. Twenty crisp flat $1,000.00 bills. Joe slammed the book closed frozen in place as a distant siren wailed in the street accompanied by flashing colored lights. As if his body wasn’t his own, he carefully placed the book deep in his pocket and picked up his mop. Like a strange familiar dance, he made repeating figure eights humming quietly as several city policemen poured into the room and moved past him to the elevator and up to the residence floor. It was as if he wasn’t there. Disappearing like the shadow-like bubbles of soap on the floor.