Cleaning up Glitter

The Problem Solver

Breslin Sand

I am always surprised by the stench in my basement. After living in suburbia on Pinewoods Dr., you think I would have become accustomed to the foulness. But I’m not. From the moment the lock on the door clicks free, I propel my body onto the steps and down to my workplace. The stench’s reverberating grunts and whines from being forced to mingle with the fresh air above it protests on my face, melting my nostrils. However, the smell from below is determined to win the war against my can of Lysol. It creeps through cracks. It escapes from holes in my insulation. It clings to the strands of my woolen sweaters.

I gag, putting a cloth to my face. My eyes begin to water. The steps squeal in agony from the weight I make them bear. The sound brings contempt, but not as much as Mrs. Johnson’s yappy Maltese, Eldridge, did. Her only family was Eldridge and that dog was the bane of my existence. Dwelling only thirty feet from my abode I could hear its spoiled mouth cry for more treats while I watched my programs. But the worst was the solidarity it thought we had each morning. I would walk down the drive to retrieve the morning paper while it would do its business on the lawn, trying to lock eyes with me. Despicable. Any...thing that would be so open about its bowel movements does not deserve the groomings it got nor the diamond-studded collar it wore. 

The dog’s volatile actions in the morning yard spoke mountains about its owner, Mrs. Johnson. A woman strung up by pearls and horrid cashmeres, she had a smile that I cannot fathom how anyone saw genuine. “How do you do, neighbor?” she would say while planting tulips. 

“Just fine,” I would say in return. I was dreading the conversation in the upcoming months about the deer eating those flowers.

“Are you coming to game night?” she asked one sunny May afternoon while using her knees as support to stand. “This month is going to be a doozy!”

“No,” I said.

“Well gosh darn that’s just too bad. If you want, I can save you some of my world-famous beef stew so that way you won’t be entirely left out.”

“I highly doubt that it’s world famous.”

“Hmph. Well try it for yourself and you’ll see why it should be then!” Her eyes squinted behind her round cheeks. She showed too much teeth. The dog began to yip and shit, and she excused herself, babbling on about the cuteness overload of something relying on you to be cared for, I don’t know, I didn’t bother to stick around and listen. It made me shiver just thinking about her chirpy attitude fooling everyone. But not me. Letting her dog’s—if that what you want to call the squat monster—feces muck up the vibrant green yard in front of her proud tulips for more than several minutes was preposterous. 

I take a deep breath and exhaled, counting to ten in a mediated manner just like I had been recommended. It is only the old wooden stairs, not the dog. They had moved away, and I no longer had to hear her neighborly remarks about life and wanting to be friends. The block is safe again. I reach above my head for the light chain that dangles somewhere at the bottom of the stairs. The smell almost makes it too painful to see. I decide to look down at the dustless cement floor while my arm flops for the chain higher up. I feel like a silly school kid raising my hand in class again begging for the satisfaction and approval of my superiors. Stretching up causes my sleeve to fall down, to reveal the marks. I stretch onto my toes, hoping the reach won’t crease the leather of my shoes too much. The marks remind me of the lashes I received from the Godmothers at The Academy whenever I disobeyed. I wave my wrist and—got it! Stark images of a blood-soaked floor while my nine-year-old self scrubbed it with a toothbrush flood my brain. My index finger traces down the cool metal until I am nearing the end of the line. No, I will not think of that time. I am thankful. They made me better. I made me better. I wrap the chain in my hand and tug. 

The swelling light floods the room and I am briefly blinded from the overexposure to my pupils. The light cleanses them of their darkness much like the Godmothers cleansed my soul’s darkness or how I expunge it from others. I was used to the bright lights popping up at random spurts of time thanks to phone-belt Steve from three doors down. His motion activated lights blinked their messages like modern scarecrows for people all night long. They were sensitive to anything that came near them. Especially Steve’s goth daughter... Alicia... who should never consider a career in espionage. However, ever since Steve’s wife left him and Alicia for what I frankly believe is much better family, Steve became too busy from having to respond to his remedial work correspondences so quickly that he was forced to holster the smoking phone to ever notice Alicia’s disappearances. 

I saw him most nights on his phone pacing upstairs as the brutish boyfriend pulled up in his brutish car below, forgetting to turn off the head lights yet again. The shadowed bushes shivered, and a silhouetted head popped out. Unlike facial black heads, I was unable to pop this one at the time. In the twilight hours I could just barely make out a smile, but I could perfectly hear a rebuke about the head lights. I didn’t need to see what they were doing to know why the car was shaking. How Steve never heard anything was a mystery if I heard everything from three doors down. Maybe he was too stupid to hear or too stupid to believe it to be true, either way, he was too stupid. I watched them veer off. 

It was sickening, just thinking about how a child could be ill-mannered enough to walk all over a parent like that. It didn’t help that the parent was as equally spineless as she was detestable. But Steve and Alicia had nothing on, “single for life” Susan with her pink barrettes made for those younger than ten splattering her hair and her “Honk if you love Jesus” bumper sticker roaming the streets of the neighborhood. Or loner Jeff from the next street over with his constant middle-aged garage band practice. Didn’t he know that playing at the local pub, Ricky’s, for free on Tuesday night during the third week of every month wasn’t worth the brag?

I close my eyes and begin my breathing exercises. In. Out. “I enjoy order, long walks, clam chowder, cleanliness.” In. Out. I roll my shoulders back to release the coiled tension I had unwittingly built up when coming down the stairs. The only specs of dirt and dust in the unfinished basement that cluster the edge of my shovel in the back corner to the right next to my windbreaker with the logo: GATE OF HEAVEN CEMETERY EMPLOYEE. I make my way over to my cluttered work bench to the left of the stairs. Pulling out a lock box from beneath the tile in the floor, I open it. I nestle a guitar pick between the pearl necklace and phone belt. After re-hiding the box, I find my rubber gloves, apron, and bleach hiding under the bench. The basement’s cleaning day is notorious for the excitement and dread it fills me with. 

I’m about begin Mozart Symphony No. 25 for the joyous occasion when I am interrupted by a knock at my door. I ignore it. The Girl Scouts will know one day that I only buy my boxes at Kroger where adults can handle the cookies with care more than the sticky children. I place the needle on the record player and dance my way back to the bench.

I grab wire cutters to remove the knots of guitar strings from the throat and limbs and chair. Then, just as the crescendo begins to rise, my doorbell sings, followed by more knocking. It is hardly etiquette to keep knocking when it is apparent that someone does not want to be disturbed. Rule 37. I walk to restart the beautiful music once more when the undomesticated beast begins to yell. 

“Please! I see your car in the driveway, if you are home, I just have some questions. No one else is answering their doors, they’re all at work!” the voice rasps.

Stripping off my gloves and apron, I charge upstairs. This is preposterous!

The bell rings again. And again. “Hello!” 

“In God’s name, what did my door ever do to deserve this treatment,” I say swinging the door open wide.

The woman at my stoop was slight with wild eyes and hair matching. “Hi – I – I’m looking for my brother – “

“Haven’t seen him,” I say swinging the door closed.

“Wait!” the woman says. Her voice cracks as much as the dog’s did. 

I try closing the door again, but her foot is in the way. 

“Please, I haven’t spoken to him in years, I came to see him, and people say he’s been missing. Please miss, I just need some answers.”

I contain a chuckle; it’s been several years since I’ve had the pleasure of being called “miss.” “Again, haven’t seen him,” I say.

The woman takes advantage of my swing to close and thrusts her way into my house. I holler at her, yet she hardly has time to breathe over her blubbering let alone hear my complaint. While her back is to me, I do a quick scan to ensure that no speckle of blood has reached my clothes. She finds her way to my couch. In my spot. Doesn’t even acknowledge that I have not consented to her being here. She keeps talking about her brother. This fight they had over her wedding, how her upcoming divorce has shown her the error of her ways. She’s about to see the error of her ways once more if she doesn’t leave. She sobs explaining the near decade it has been. How she’s so lonely. Blah blah blah. People are too fickle nowadays.

“I’m so sorry, I just miss Jeff so much.” 

Wait a second, did she just say Jeff? I checked. Jeff was all alone. Even his band hated him. Why would this woman show up out of nowhere without a text or call to his phone? I would have responded. I would have told her that he had picked up and moved. And what does she mean other people have questioned his whereabouts? In the digital age, nobody ever notices their neighbors’ disappearances. It’s only been two days too. They must’ve noticed the harmonious sounds of sweet and utter silence rather than the frequent raucous he provided.

“Jeff? I thought he went out of town or something with his band.”

“No, he hates going on the road,” the woman sniffled.

If they haven’t spoken years, how would she know what he likes and dislikes? Especially, if she says they had a falling out. Jeff and his band have certainly gone out of town for gigs, Mrs. Johnson told me that one afternoon when inviting me to yet another game night because she thought the guest list would make it more appealing than it already wasn’t. An estranged sister who hasn’t bothered to check up on him would not know of any such novelty detail. Wait. She wouldn’t know that. I am well prepared for this kind of situation. No sane sister comes unannounced. Ordered chaos, long walks in the woods, New England clam chowder, home cleanliness, soft throw pillows.

The last time I saw him was about five-ish years ago,” she says. “I was in town visiting some friends. We stopped into Billy’s and he happened to be playing. He didn’t even know I was there.”

“Ricky’s.”

“Excuse me?”

“Where he plays. The name of the bar is Ricky’s. Been playing there for six years now.”

I look a long breath, making sure the tension in the room between us was palpable. She wouldn’t know that. She couldn’t. I knew Jeff better than she did. I knew his bowl movements, his favorite cereal (Frosted Flakes), I knew who his most frequented contacts were, and I knew that him being “employed” really meant living off severance and watching Rick and Morty all day. Nobody would truly miss him. And any family member would not be running after a man who scratches his bum as if he were racking a hundred-dollar bill out of dried cement. I had her. “I thought Jeff was an only child?”

The woman looked thrown off. Her face flopped like a fish out of water. Emotions ranging from aghast, to confusion, to anger, and finally to pleasure fought for control on the freckles and deflated football eyes. I swear I saw her hide a coy smile behind those thin lips.

“He was an only child,” she says. She thought I didn’t, but I caught the stutter in her affirmation. “His mother remarried my father while we were both in high school. I was a senior while he was only a sophomore. We were never that close.”

Lie. His mother was a widow who never remarried. I did my research. You don’t think that I wouldn’t casually invite him over, accidentally cut his finger to take a blood sample and then fill him up on drinks to make sure he peed in a toilet I made sure wouldn’t flush and was low on water? Silly girl, I know his lineage. I know who he talks to and what ties might become an issue when I cleanse this neighborhood. Now, the real question is, who are you?

“I thought you said you were close until your wedding?” I ask.

“State University. We both went there, I bought him beer his first year. I actually took him to a party where he met his bandmates,” she responded.

False. “I thought that he played with his high school band?” 

She paused.

“Or at least that was what he told me,” I interject with a swoop of my head. She reminded me of myself lying to the Godmothers about cleaning the toilets or that I had messed up the hospital fold on my sheets and hid the disarray under the comforter.

“Not all of them,” she said almost instantly after I finished my sentence. Her head may have stayed level, but twitching hands betrayed her. Her nails bit into the skin of her other forearms and her knuckles faded of their color. “Rudy dropped so he could go west on a Lacrosse scholarship.”

I knew Jeff. Don’t kill without knowing the contingencies. Rule 3. The Godmothers taught me that, right behind rule number 2: Living is only for the souls who care about the well-being of themselves and others. I gave a chortled breath. I stood to move to the kitchen. “I’m sorry. Where are my manners? You must be tired from your travels and now with his disappearance…would you like a cup of tea? I have peppermint, blueberry, earl —”

“Coffee is fine, thank you.” The woman smiled without teeth. It looked eerie. Who was she? And who did she think she was to simply expect coffee when it was never offered? 

Moving to the kitchen, I turned my kettle on for water then moved to the coffee maker. Filter in. Order. Coffee grounds next. Long walks. Start the marker. Clam chowder. Grab a mug. Cleanliness. This woman gives off the same tense feeling as a scrunched face from the sun streaking freely in through a windshield below the visor on a summer highway. Soft pillows. Who is she? Vintage wine. 

“So how long have you lived here?” the woman asked from the other room. 

The coffee began dripping and the kettle began screaming while I reach for the honey.

“Oh, eight months or so. Why do you ask?”

I don’t catch the woman leave the sofa and wander down my hallway.

“This is quite the smell to be living in for eight months.”

She walks toward the basement. 

Shit.

“I never asked for your name,” I say. 

“Beth.” 

I turn. She’s right behind me now.

“It smells like you just bleached a whale,” she says scrunching her nose.

You could say that. I hear the Godmothers in my head scolding my poor house manners and the smell. I would have been in the closet for three days if they were to catch me now. No. They no longer have the ability to dictate my life or anyone else’s after the last time I saw them. I choose how to cleanse.

I chuckle hoping Beth does not catch the unease seething through. “Yeah, I was drinking a glass of wine in bed last night and spilled my pinot noir all over my white duvet. It was horrid!”

I dump honey into my mug and smile. I catch my hand shaking each time the spoon taps the lip of the cup while I stir.

“Are you gonna get that?”

I turn to see where she’s looking. The kettle is still screaming. How had I completely forgotten? “Yes!” I say. “Silly me, I’m such a scatterbrain. Feel free to pour your coffee, it should be done now. Creamer is in the fridge.”

I slowly ease the kettle from the stove.

“Black is fine.”

Of course it is. I watch out of the corner of my eye as she pours her coffee. I search for the knife I just had. Shit. It’s by the coffee maker. How could I be such an idiot! Shit. Shit. Shit. What do I do now? I pour my tea.

She turns to face me. I turn to face her. We sip. We mhmm.

“I watched you take him, you know,” she says smoothly without a hint of dissonance.

“Watched me take who?”

“I’ve been watching you for a while now.”

My hands are slippery. I had been so careful. I slide a pinky under my cup. My heart has won the battle. It is the only thing I can hear. My knees lock. My feet feel like cement blocks. Am I breathing? I don’t think I’m breathing. Breathe goddamn it. Breath. Am I doing it? I should have responded by now.

“Have you now,” I say. Stupid. Why did I say that? That’s as good as a confession. Rule 26: Never admit to the good you have done. What they may appreciate, they will never accept.

“Take me as a — a curious admirer,” Beth says sipping her coffee. “Mhm! Where do you buy your coffee? It is truly fantastic!”

This can’t be happening. Who is she? Anything but this. I was so careful. I changed my name, persona, my entire appearance. She must have me mistaken for someone else. “It’s international. I order it directly from a little farm in South America.” I enjoy long walks. Clam Chowder. Cleanliness. Soft pillows. Vintage Wine. Solitude. Lists that calm my nerve. “If you want, I can give you the information to my supplier.” Lists that calm my nerves. Lists that calm my nerves. 

“I watched you kill my mom, you know.”

I hide my expression behind a sip of tea, it scalds the insides of my mouth, but I welcome the pain. The Godmothers taught me that pain should be a welcomed friend.

“I’ve been following you for a few houses now. Alice, Denise, Shanda, blonde, brunette, dresses, jeans, what type of socialite are you now? I’ve lost track.”

I swallow. This was impossible. I was so careful. I cut my luscious curls. I dyed my hair, lost weight. I changed everything. It would be impossible to follow a ghost. She had to be lying. 

 “I watched you bury her too.”

I envision my body being a solid block of cement and hold it there before finally saying through a relaxed smile, “I ensure you. I have no idea what you mean.”

“Dawn Eaves in Coventry Hills, four years ago.” Beth smiles and takes a drink of her coffee as pleasant as ever.

I remembered her. She cursed every few sentences, stank of cigarette, and clearly had no understanding of good versus well. She would have been manageable had it not been for her being an obnoxious chatterbox. She wasn’t as callous as the try-hard, never-cuts-his-lawn-to-attempt-to-reseed-it, 50-year-old Allen in that neighborhood. Dawn was a contender, nonetheless.

“I’ve never heard that name in my life,” I chuckle. 

Beth, following my laugh in suit, continues, “You may change, but your habits never do.  The OCD never changes. I just had to wait a few months until the same pattern popped up. The number of houses in one neighborhood going on sale, cheap real estate, no actual seller present, you just need to know the signs.”

I tighten the lock on my knees.

“Then I checked the graveyards before funerals. You always bury your kill under a freshly dug grave. No one would ever question a grave digger digging a grave.”

She wouldn’t know that. That’s impossible. If I could smuggle candy past the Godmothers, I could get away with anything. This was cake compared to that. The stakes are much lower here. 

“I just had to wait until I caught you in the act before approaching to make sure it was you,” Beth continues. “I’ll give you credit, you didn’t make it easy. I would sit for days and months, waiting and watching, and nothing. You would then move without a trace and people were gone. Until Jeff.”

My heart is hammering in my ears, I beg any celestial all-powerful being that may exist that Beth doesn’t hear it. My face keeps its cool composure.

“So, how many people have you murdered now? Ten? Thirty? It’s hard to keep track nowadays.”

I smile. Murder is a strong word for what I do. “Care for another cup?”

“Please.” Beth held her mug between the two of us in the narrow kitchen. We aren’t even a yard apart. While I pour, I survey my surroundings. My white cabinets and marble counters for something, anything. Why do I have to always be so clean? “Thank you.”

“Of course,” I say. I put the coffee pot back in the maker.

We drink. 

“The woman disowned me when I came out. Expunged me from all her records, couldn’t deal with her perfect little daughter liking girls.” Beth moves the cup away from her mouth and down to her diaphragm. “She wasn’t your kill to take.”

I look up from my tea to see that her eyes have grown darker. I couldn’t have heard her right.

“I guess I’ll settle for you instead.” 

The next thing I knew, I was splashing my peppermint tea into her face. 

She gasps, dropping her coffee.

I sprawl onto the counter behind me, trying to grab the closest weapon. Why do I have to be so clean? Throwing a drawer open, I settled for the rolling pin coming to my outstretched hand. 

I hear Beth unsheathe a knife from the counter dock near her. I whip around and she slashes me in the arm. I gasp.

I swing the pin, smacking her in the temple, not enough to knock her out, but just enough to give myself a few seconds head start. I run to the dining room and scan for anything that can be of use. My cornflower blue walls accenting the glass table in the middle of the room and the china cabinet in the back corner. I head to the china cabinet. Beth is right behind me. The only thing I can do in this room is make space between us. 

Beth makes it to the table by the time I get the china cabinet open. She hollers in rage. I throw my second-best china. It feels like a stab to the heart hearing the shatter in the adjacent wall.

She dodges the china. Pausing for a second to catch her breath, she flips the table in my direction. How? Why did I give her the time to do that? Glass explodes onto my knit Persian rug, making it sparkle. I whimper. The Godmothers would lash me for this mess. They remind me how I’ll never be clean enough to be worthy. I’ll never be worthy. I’ll never be worthy. 

Beth throws the knife, pulling me from my thoughts. I duck just in time.

With no table blocking us from each other anymore, I charge. Beth meets my charge. In two long strides, we slam together. Taking her into the glass, I grappled for control. This couldn’t happen. I am always so careful. We roll. Fuck ordered and methodical killings. I need a long walk if I make it out. Hot clam chowder would be nice to dump on her face. This is going to take so long to clean. I knew I should have waited to kill Jeff. Fuck him. Why did this neighborhood’s personality stop going to the gym?

Despite Beth having me on my back and straddling my midsection, my arms were a good hand-size longer than hers. I held her throat while she couldn’t reach mine. The glassy rug bit into my back through my shirt, but I was not about to give her the pleasure of seeing my pain. She took the shard and stabbed my thigh. Screaming without control, I release her throat and wait for her to lean forward. When she does, I clock her jaw in the crook of my elbow. I move to punch her ribcage.

Beth leans right and I take advantage of her momentum to move to the top position and send her to the ground. She kicks up at me with no avail. Steadying her with my legs, I grab the shard still in my leg. This was about to hurt the carpet more than me. Tugging and gasping, I pull it out. I stab. Over and over and over and over and over again. I keep stabbing until the blood from her body spurts onto my face. 

The sunset dances through my window making the room glisten from the mix of blood and glass. My body aches. This pain is similar to the pain the Godmothers put me through. I think of their leathery faces as I slit their throats all those years ago. They saved me from a dull life. They showed me etiquette. How to be clean. How to clean. I have more glass in me than I thought. Rule 100: You have more to be grateful for than you believe. Looking around the room after a long silence, I can only imagine how much bleach I’m about to need.

© 2020 Breslin Sand

About the Author

Born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, Breslin Sand is a graduate from the Creative Writing undergraduate program at the University of Cincinnati and is the Treasurer for UC Rogue Writers. At school, Breslin has written for the school paper, The News Record, for over two years and has been published in Cincinnati Magazine. When she isn’t writing, she works for the Academic Writing Center on campus, as a peer tutor to help other students with their papers. She plans on pursuing a Master of Fine Arts degree in writing to one day become a Creative Writing professor. You can read more about her on her website breslingracesand.com. You can also find her on Twitter (@sand_breslin) and Instagram (@breslin_grace).