The Lonely Custodian

Travis Flatt

Mirrors

The LC cleans a mean ceiling. Doesn’t do bathrooms, though. Says he doesn’t like mirrors. They give him the willies. (Those are my words, not his. He says they “unnerve him.”) So, he leaves the bathrooms to me. The Hoop is a small basketball arena, more a gym. In the time it takes me to scrub a few toilets, the LC dusts the corners for cobwebs, changes every blinking bulb down a hallway, or even sweeps the scaffolds above the basketball court. I spend my shifts studying GED preps, then lie on a bench in the men’s locker room, FaceTiming with Allison and Little Booger. Little Booger’s just started talking, calling me “Da-da.” I can’t get enough. The LC looms over my shoulder, asks what’s this “magic compact” I’m talking to? Compact, I figure out, he means, like a makeup mirror. I say that’s my wife. With my baby boy. It’s a phone, not a compact. He looks at me long with his sad, baggy eyes and says, in his day, they wrote letters. “Well, la-tee-da,” I call after him as he pushes the trash cart out the door.

Ladders

The LC doesn’t use ladders. He says they’re hard on his knees. When I ask how he gets up to the scaffolds, he tucks his arms under his cloak and spreads them like wings. I laugh. He kind of smiles. He’s got good white teeth for his age. Long in the tooth—weird expression, never got that. He explains he uses the elevator to the roof, then the fire exit. A kid I went to school with, this theater kid, wore a cloak, more like a cape. Us guys on the football team called him “The Count”—I can’t remember that kid’s name; one time we stole his cloak while he dressed for gym, then nailed it up in the girl’s bathroom with a wooden stake. After a few shifts with the LC, I ask him about his cloak. He says it was a gift. I say, “From your wife?” He just goes to the supply closet for a mop. “Well—who gave you the cloak?” I say when he’s back. He wrings the mop handle. He has these long, thin fingers that squeak on the wood. He goes, “My father, you would say. The man who made me.” I laugh and say, “That’s definitely a way to put it.”

Spiders

One night, when I’m late—Little Booger’s got this relentless fever of 103 and I have to leave him bawling with Allison at the ER—I find the LC sitting at the ticket table. He slides a jar full of spiders between his hands in smooth glides like an air hockey puck. Little black spiders climbing all over each other. I laugh and say, “Jesus—do you eat those things?” He unscrews the lid and lets the spiders crawl down his fingers onto the table. He says, “They watch the games for me. Then perform. Like the television.” They do sort of huddle together—I don’t know about playing out a game, but I learned, serving six months in County for pills, that it’s smoother to give bored people their batshittedness. “So you like sports?” He says no, he just likes to keep track. “Keep track of what?” I say. The spiders rush back into the jar and he screws on the lid. “Everything.” I get up from the table and check my phone—no update messages. “Can you have them run to the ER?” The LC looks up from his jar. “Michael, you are worried. All will be well.” It’s good to hear that. He’d make a grandpa, the LC. I look in his sad, baggy eyes and blurt out, “If something happened to the little guy; I would—” but the LC waves me off. “Life is too precious to waste.” And hell if I don’t loosen up through the chest. The spiders are moving in little circles, like they’re dancing. They’re having a ball.

Crosses

Tonight, The LC and I both come to work dressed up. He’s in a brown suit, and I’m wearing fifty-dollar cologne, my hair’s gelled up. “Hot date, bud?” I ask the LC. That’s where I’ve been. Allison and I’s first date night in forever. The LC stares at his feet and says he visited friends in a graveyard. To pay respect. I notice his knees are muddy, one elbow. I ask if he fell. “Forgive me Michael,” he says, “in the old country, men who wore jewelry—it was a sign of very low character. They weren’t to be trusted. Cutthroats and footpads.” He means my necklace, the gold cross I wear to the club. I go, “Allison gave me this,” and tuck it into my shirt. He says, “I have offended you.” I clap him on his bony back. He gives one of those smiles. It must have been a bad fall, because he scratched up his cheek and there are spots of blood on his shirt collar. “Michael,” the LC says when we’re putting everything in the closet, which is deep and dark and you squeeze together to get it done. He’s standing close. His breath is on my neck. “I was rude tonight. Forgive me.” I step forward, as much as I can, and say, “It’s cool, bud.” Then he’s gone.

Garlic

The LC is allergic to meatballs. He never brings dinner, not even a snack. He’s thin as a splinter. I offered him a bite of my dinner one night. “Like the old country,” he said, when he smelled my meatball sandwich—Allison works at Olive Garden, so she gets a 25% discount, meaning we’re there all the time. “I think you’ll be disappointed,” I said. He took a couple of bites, then removed his cloak, saying he felt itchy from the garlic. He pulled a Benadryl pill from his wallet. I go: “Shit, don’t make yourself sick,” and he goes: “It was worth it,” smiling. Sometimes, he’ll take nibbles of eggplant parmesan or lasagna, then say whether it’s worth the Benadryl. That’s our joke. Tonight, I figure since we’ve got Sunday off for Thanksgiving, I should ask him over. My mom’s cooking real food. I say, “Allison’s always asking about you; Little Booger sees you lurking behind me on Facetime. He calls you “Bah-man.” The LC looks blank. “Batman. Nevermind. It’ll be worth the Benadryl.” He stares at me long with those sad, baggy eyes and says he never turns down an invitation.

Travis Flatt (he/him) is an epileptic teacher and actor living in Cookeville, Tennessee. His stories appear or are forthcoming in Pithead Chapel, Necessary Fiction, Iron Horse Review, Fractured Lit, and elsewhere. He enjoys theater, dogs, and theatrical dogs.

Next Up: Fireplace by A. Muia