He opened his eyes and adjusted himself.
“Not really.” Lighting a fresh cigarette, he blew rings of smoke in the air and thought about taking a good snooze soon. He rarely had the pleasure of taking mid-afternoon naps. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d enjoyed one.
“I don’t believe that. I don’t believe that one bit. I think you tune things out, find the ‘OFF’ switch, and twist it… just like when you were little. I’m worried about these folks trying to hurt my child, and I’m worried about you in this line of work, because that’s what started it all.”
“Been doing it for seven years. Damn good at it, too.” He’d ditched the low paying construction gigs and seasonal handyman jobs, and decided to get into a trade. It also afforded him the opportunity to buy property and flip it. His life changed in ways he’d only previously dreamed of.
“Well, you can do other things, Axel, and be good at them, too. You’re real good at fixin’ stuff. How about you—”
“Mama, this is me fixin’ stuff.” He leaned forward and peered out his living room window. His neighbor, Henry McGromer, an older White guy with dull gray hair and thick-rimmed glasses who lived across the street, was pulling grocery bags out of his trunk and heading to his front door. There seemed to be a whole lot of beer. Either Henry was planning on getting smashed, or he was going to be having an epic party. Axel bet on choice #1. The man’s wife had recently left him. Despite barely knowing him, Henry had told him the whole sordid story while in a drunken stupor one night, as he was outside fixing his motorcycle.
“Don’t you get sick and tired of the police snubbin’ you? You told me what happened that one time. They treat you like some janitor.”
“That’s not a constant thing. I don’t just get calls from the police, OSHA, and the EPA, I get called to just regular ol’ houses, too. People who have died in their beds and the family wants to get some closure.”
“Closure? I think the death is closure enough if you ask me. You can’t get more final than that.”
“No, death is just the beginning. Mama, when I get the calls from families, it gets more personal. This isn’t no owner of a big high-rise, or the cops at the scene of a head-on collision with fatalities. This is someone’s home. A family. They want the smell of death out of the livin’ room so the kids can stop crying. Once you smell that odor, you never forget it, and you’re in constant mourning. The memories lock together, wearing on folks’ psyche. They want it gone, so they can pretend for a lil’ while, be in denial that their loved one is really gone. Take it away… all of it.
“The indentation removed from the cushion where their aunt, uncle, mother or father died. The blood splatter off the walls if they blew their brains out when the walls of life caved in on ’em. The piss, shit, and vomit obliterated if they were bedridden or sick. I come in and try to make it like it was before all the bad stuff happened. Probably better. I’m a human magic eraser, Mama. I’ve got a six-man crew that I trained myself. My standards are high, and that’s why I’m the top rated in the entire state of Kentucky. Can’t no maid, professional housekeeping service, or fancy carpet cleaning machine do what I do even if they tried. I think what I do is a form of fixing things, too. Just like I said. It doesn’t have screws, bolts, chains, engines and gears, but it’s still a repair. It makes a difference, and I’m the man for the job.”
Mama was real quiet on the other end for quite some time. He imagined the wheels in her head were spinning hard. She’d been disgruntled about his profession since he’d started his company: ‘Clean Start Cleaning Crew.’ Many probably wouldn’t like the notion of it, which tended to make people feel queasy and uneasy. Hazmat suits, special disinfecting solutions, goggles, masks and gloves… He did play down to her just how grueling it could get sometimes, but it was necessary. Just like air to breathe.
“I know you told me before, but I still can’t understand it completely, Axel. How in the world did this all get started? I’m asking because I want you protected. I’m mighty worried.”
A commercial came on, and he turned the channel. He paused on a station showing a trailer for some action movie starring Dwayne Johnson. There was no reason for Mama to hear this story again. She’d had him tell her a million times, and he told her the same things, in the same way he would have explained to the police. Mama likened herself to a detective of sorts. Perhaps she was genuinely interested, or more likely, trying to find plot holes and accuse him of holding onto pertinent information.