in a month. I wondered how long he’d go on suffering. How long he’d have to wait for his life to end.
Before I left Henry’s house, we spent a long time talking. It was hard to tell him I couldn’t afford to continue working for the company he’d used to keep his house clean for so many years. He held up his hands and shrugged a little, then started to suggest that maybe I could help with landscaping, before remembering he already had a crew of men outside mowing his grass and trimming the bushes. I had the urge to comfort him, suggesting he could be a reference for my résumé. This made him straighten again, and then he began rattling off all the qualities he’d be happy to tell anyone who asked.
“You’re a hard worker,” he said, lightly stamping his foot and making a fist in declaration. “One of the hardest workers I’ve ever seen.”
“I really needed to hear that,” I said softly, and smiled at him. I wanted to explain how difficult the decision had been, how uncertain my future was. All I had were a handful of my own clients and student loans to float us through until fall. I wanted to tell him I was scared. It was an odd moment, yearning for comfort from a stranger, but Henry seemed almost like a father figure to me.
The woman who lived in the Farm House happened to be there on my last day. I’d grown to like her. She had called the office once to tell them how much she loved the way I cleaned her master bathroom, and I had to admit that I felt proud of it, too—even though the glass shower was a bitch to get spotless. I always brought my tweezers with me to her house to pluck the stray hairs from my eyebrows in her light-up magnifying mirror. On my way out, she helped me load my cleaning tray, then asked me to look through a box of things in her SUV intended to go to Goodwill. I took a non-stick KitchenAid pan that would be perfect for cooking Mia’s pancakes. Before I got in my car, she looked like she might hug me, but then she reached out to shake my hand. Even though we had a relationship of trust, there was still a divide. She was still a homeowner. I was still a maid.
Our new home had a washer and dryer downstairs in the garage. I could wash Mia’s stuffed animals whenever her cough started to get bad. There was forced-air heat, and air filters and wooden floors, and I doubted mold would ever consider creeping in.
My landlord for the studio wasn’t pleased when I gave him fifteen days’ notice instead of thirty. He said he’d keep my deposit, subtracting whatever amount he lost in not having a tenant to pay rent the next month.
“I’ve done a lot of updates,” I wrote in an email. “This place looks a hundred times better than it did when I moved in.” I added photos of the new curtains in the living spaces and shelves and towel holders in the bathroom, adding that I’d leave it completely detail cleaned. And while he found a new renter by the time I moved out, he still kept part of my deposit.
I started making trips to the new apartment when I could, packing my car with as many books, clothes, towels, and plants as possible. Kurt and Alice invited us over for dinner one night so we could introduce the girls. They ran together in the yard, the huge black dog, Beau, barking occasionally while the two older dogs watched with indifference. At almost four years old, Mia fit right in with the older girls, who were two and four years older than her. Kurt and Alice seemed excited and a little relieved at Mia’s sweet and playful personality.
After dinner, Alice pulled out several legal documents for the rental agreement, walk-through, and something she’d drafted for the work-trade on rent. Landscaping hours worked out to be about five per week spent pulling weeds from their naturally landscaped areas. And every other Thursday from nine-thirty to two-thirty, I would clean the house. I hoped it would be enough time. Their house was huge, but she said it took the regular cleaning company only two or three hours to finish it.
“How many cleaners did they have?” I asked, already knowing the answer would be more than one.
“I’m not