Match Your Weakness With A Name

Ten? Are You Fucking Kidding Me?

Jenna wants me to help Derek in the locker room. I can do that, and it'll at least be a change of pace from the usual office walls, so I agree. When I arrive at work on Saturday at six-thirty in the morning, I am starting to regret that decision.

The locker room is musty and smells of dust, chlorine, and congealed sweat. The odor alone makes me want to jump off a bridge. There are far too many mysterious red-brown stains on the floor and walls, which Jenna assured me were just rust, but I don't believe her. The floor around the doorway is almost completely covered in wet towels.

Derek is already there with a mop, bucket, and laundry cart. "Morning, Geoff."

"Mor-" A yawn interrupts me. "Morning."

He laughs like the cocky fuck he is. "Not used to getting up early?"

"It's summer," I complain.

"Yeah, and this locker room needs some serious tidying. Here, you're in charge of the towels," he says, and picks up the mop. There is an unreasonable amount of dirty towels on the floor of the locker room, and the pool opens in two and a half hours. I begin to clumsily gather the towels and place them into a pile next to the laundry cart while Derek mops at some mysterious stains on the floor near the shower. You know what? I don't want to know.

The towels are moist. I can't help but think about all the wet people these towels have rubbed.

Ew.

Derek is really getting into those stains, I think as I look over at him. I wonder who he's thinking about. Before I can stop them, my thoughts wander back to the party. I know I didn't sleep with him, and I still haven't heard back from any of those unknown numbers. Maybe I just made it up? I don't know.

It is about an hour before Derek starts to get bored. I know he is bored because he starts speaking to me, and no one speaks to me unless they're really fucking bored. "So."

"So," I respond.

"What's going on with you?" he asks. "Like, in general."

"Uh, nothing much," I say. Reveal personal information? Yes. "I'm back in therapy, if that interests you."

"What for?"

"Reasons." I fold up another towel and cram it into the bottom of the laundry cart. "It hasn't helped much. But don't worry about me."

"Um, okay," he says. Fuck. I've weirded him out. Abort.

"Sorry."

"No, man, it's all good," he says. "There is something I wanted to ask you, though."

"What?" I ask, even though I already know what it's gonna be.

"Are you gay?"

"Yes."

"Well, you don't fuck around."

"I'm direct," I say. "Also, you slept with a guy, so you can't judge me."

"Eh," he says, and goes back to his mopping. I start freaking out. He hates me now, I know it. I am so focused on freaking out, in fact, that I don't realize I still have to fold towels.

Thank my lucky stars I don't cry. If I cried I'd be totally screwed. Derek would think I was weak, which I am, but I can't let him know that, now can I?

Oh. Right. I have a towel in my hand. I quickly fold it into a nice square and jam it into the cart, praying the scent doesn't linger too long on my hand. I'm gonna have to scrub the skin off my body in the bath after they let me home today.

It is silent again, save for Derek's mop squelching in the bucket and sloshing on the floor, and those aren't exactly ambient background noises. This is the unpleasant kind of quiet, the kind of quiet you can't escape from. The kind you have no choice but to focus on the never-ending whirring of your own brain in. Night-time with company quiet. Classroom quiet. Mental hospital quiet. I wish we could put on some music or something.