Chapter 33: Man About The House

Monday mornings always seem to come early. But this term, Monday mornings come especially early for us because both Cheryl and I have class first thing. Despite Cheryl’s efforts on Sunday night, I awakened on Monday with a throbbing erection - but there was no time to do anything about it. I shaved while Cheryl showered, and then I started the coffee before stepping under the hot water myself. We grabbed some toast, then headed for school. We decided to take the car, which was unusual, but we were going to sleep at Cheryl’s place that night, and wanted to take our luggage from the weekend there with us.

My morning classes went well, but as I was about to head for the caf and find some lunch I ran into Ian, who told me that our afternoon class was cancelled. Our prof for that class had fallen yesterday and broken her wrist, and would not be in. A makeup lecture would be scheduled later in the term, but my Monday was officially over, four hours before it should have been.

I considered hanging around the campus and doing some work in the library, as I had a research paper coming up, but then decided I might as well go to Cheryl’s place. Since we had the car, I could go to the store and pick up some groceries, then spend a relaxing afternoon making dinner for the girls, and then spend the evening working on my paper. I hadn’t cooked for Cheryl and Megan in a while, and if I made the right thing, it would give us some leftovers for later in the week.

I decided that it would be fun to surprise the girls with dinner, so I headed for the car. I made a quick grocery stop, buying some stew beef and onions and mushrooms and a bottle of red wine to make a stew with, and some noodles to serve it over, and then parked in front of Cheryl and Megan’s apartment building. I knew that the apartment would be empty - Megan had classes on Mondays too - so I used my key and let myself in.

I was totally unprepared for the sight that greeted me as I walked through the door. The apartment was a disaster. There were books and papers spread all over the livingroom, as well as a few dirty dishes, some empty pop cans, and a pizza box. The kitchen sink was full of dishes as well, including our supper dishes from Thursday night and almost everything that Megan had dirtied since, except for the ones that were on the table or out in the livingroom. The kitchen garbage was overflowing. I went into the bathroom to pee, and discovered that it, too, was a disaster. The wastebasket was overflowing with used pads, there was a blood stained towel on the floor, and the toilet was disgusting - it was clogged, and there was a smear of blood at the front of the seat. Megan’s bedroom door was open, and her floor was littered with dirty clothes - and there was a bloodstain in the middle of the sheet on her bed. The whole place reeked, both because of the clogged toilet and the garbage and the dirty dishes. I knew from Cheryl that Megan had had a bad weekend - but Jesus Christ! The place looked like a war zone.

I decided that I had two choices. I could leave, quickly, and pretend I hadn’t been there, or I could hold my nose, roll up my sleeves, and clean it up. On the one hand, it was Megan’s mess, and it was therefore her job to fix it. But on the other hand, it wasn’t like she’d had a huge party and trashed the place. She’d been working on school stuff, and was clearly feeling overwhelmed. And she’d been a good friend to me, and a friend ... well, a friend would clean up a mess for a friend.

So I started work. I opened up all the windows to air the place out, and I collected and took out all of the trash and recycling. Then I stripped Megan’s bed, and threw her sheets and all the towels I could find into the washer in the laundry room down in the basement. While the laundry was washing, I worked on the kitchen, washing and drying sinkload after sinkload of dirty dishes. I had that almost done when I went downstairs to put the laundry in the dryer, and decided to start the stew cooking before I tackled the bathroom.

I dredged the beef in some flour and salt and pepper and browned it in some oil in a big pot, then added chopped onions and let it all fry for a bit before adding broth and wine. I covered the pot and turned the heat down, then finished up the dishes and wiped down every surface in the kitchen, including the garbage bin. If I do say so myself, the kitchen was sparkling when I was done.

I gave the stew a stir, and tossed in the whole mushrooms, then ran down to get the laundry out of the dryer. It took me just a few minutes to remake Megan’s bed with her newly laundered sheets. I considered gathering up some of her dirty clothes and washing those, but decided against it. I was going to be hard pressed for time anyway.

Then I steeled myself and tackled the bathroom. The clog in the toilet wasn’t too bad - or wouldn’t have been, except that Megan had apparently kept using it after it clogged. It was pretty gross, but I guess I couldn’t blame her - after all, even though she hadn’t been able to get it working again, she still needed to poop somewhere. The plunger did its job, and after a couple of flushes I poured in some cleaner and let it sit while I cleaned the sink and bathtub. I scrubbed the toilet, inside and out, cleaned the plunger, then washed down the floor.

I didn’t want to disturb any of Megan’s school stuff, so I contented myself with giving the livingroom a quick tidy, and then ran the vacuum through that room, the hallway, and (for good measure) Cheryl’s room. I would have vacuumed Megan’s room, but I couldn’t, because the vacuum would have sucked up approximately half of her wardrobe from the floor.

A few minutes before Cheryl’s class ended, I texted her to tell her that my afternoon class had been cancelled, and that I had her car and was at her place. I suggested that she meet up with Megan, and that the two of them walk home together. I didn’t say anything about the cleaning. If Megan didn’t tell Cheryl how she’d left things, I wasn’t going to do so either. I also didn’t tell her I’d made dinner. Cheryl replied with a smiley face, so I knew she’d gotten the message and wouldn’t look for me at the school.

It was only then that I remembered that our luggage from the weekend was still in Cheryl’s car. I had been meaning to go back down and get it as soon as I got the groceries inside - but the condition of the apartment had changed that plan. I ran down and brought the bags up, and unpacked a bit. Then I looked over my handiwork one last time as I closed all the windows. The place smelled a hundred times cleaner now, but it had gotten kind of chilly. As soon as I shut the windows, I could smell the stew, and my stomach reminded me that I hadn’t eaten any lunch. Oh well, too late for that now.

Just then my phone buzzed. It was a text from Megan.

“Hey! Cheryl says you’re at our place. Sorry about the mess. I was going to tidy this morning, then I slept in and was almost late for class. Can I take you and Cheryl out for something quick to eat?”

I texted back.

“No need. I’ve made dinner. And no worries about the mess. Shit happens.”

She texted back an emoji with its nose scrunched up.

“Yeah, literally. The toilet is clogged. Don’t go in the bathroom. I’ll get the super to come tonight.”

I texted back a thumbs up, and left it at that.

I put on a pot of salted water to start heating for the noodles, and was just leaving the kitchen when I heard the apartment door opening. Cheryl was the first one in, with Megan right behind her.

“Guys, I’m really really sorry about the ... what the fuck? John, did you clean up the livingroom?”

I nodded.

“And the kitchen,” I said.

Megan’s mouth dropped open. She stuck her head in the kitchen, then disappeared down the hallway. Cheryl looked inquisitively at me.

“What’s going on? She was really wound up on the way home. Said she’d been working on school stuff all weekend and had let the apartment get messy. When you texted her that you’d made us dinner, I thought she was going to pass out. Was it really bad in here?”

I nodded, but couldn’t say anything, because we were interrupted by a shriek from Megan, who propelled herself back into the livingroom and into my arms. She grabbed my face with both hands, then tried to stick her tongue down my throat. When she finally broke the kiss and let me breathe, she immediately started to gush her thanks.

“Oh. My. God. John, I can’t believe what you did! You cleaned up the whole apartment! And especially the bathroom. It was so disgusting. The toilet got plugged up on Saturday night, and I was so stressed about getting my project done for Tuesday that I just couldn’t handle calling to get it fixed. I stayed up really late last night working, and then slept in this morning. I barely had enough time to get to class. I ran out of tampons - and when I woke up this morning, my pad had slipped to one side, and I’d bled all over my bed. I ran to the bathroom and made a mess on the toilet seat while I was peeing. I tried to clean it up with my towel after I showered but ... ugh. It was the worst period weekend ever.

“I kept telling myself I’d get to a better place with the schoolwork and then clean everything up before you guys got home, but I just never got there. Cheryl, this place looked awful. And it smelled. And he cleaned it all! The kitchen. The bathroom. He even washed my sheets and made my bed for me! And on top of all that, he made us dinner, which smells great bee tee dubs.

“John, once I get this paper in tomorrow, I owe you.”

I shook my head, but she continued.

“No. Really. I know what things were like here. I made a shit mess of this place. And you must have worked like hell to get it all cleaned up. So, think about it, and you can tell me how you want me to pay you back. I can go and clean your place for you, if you want, though I bet it’s not even close to half as bad as this place was. Or if you want, maybe I can pay you off with sex.”