Carl made up his bed with military precision, folding the sheets and blankets carefully and tucking in the corners.
This small utility room in the church basement had been intended to be used by the janitor to hang up brooms and mops, so Carl kept them there neatly where they belonged. A long shelf for supplies ran the length of the small room, and there was enough space left over for Carl’s cot and the small trunk the preacher had scrounged up, in which Carl kept his few clothes. He stored his toothbrush, comb, bar of soap, and two washcloths on the shelf beside the cleansers and floor wax. He owned so little that he didn’t need much room.
There was no window to the room. The floor was bare concrete. The walls were made up of gray concrete block. When Carl got his first paycheck from the church, he intended to buy some white paint for those walls. He’d had enough of gray to last him a lifetime. Being allowed to choose any color he wished felt quite luxurious.
As sparse and as cramped as his living quarters were, at least it was his own personal space for now, and he cherished the privacy.
He did not have to make sharp corners on his bed. No one would mind or be surprised if they looked in and saw the covers lying in a heap, but it pleased him to keep his few possessions nice and neat. He had always been that way. It gave him some control over all the disorder of his life that he couldn’t control.
He took his toothbrush, comb, and one of the washcloths to the men’s bathroom around the corner and locked the door behind him. Unlike the restroom upstairs on the main floor, this one had only one stall and one lavatory.
George, the preacher of the church, had apologized for the fact that there was no shower. Carl assured him that it did not matter. He was telling the truth. It didn’t matter. Knowing that he could wash his body without fear of being attacked trumped the best shower Carl could imagine. Having a basin of warm water all to himself, with a lock on the door that he controlled, was another great luxury.
He stripped off and lathered up with one of the extra bars of sweet-smelling hand soap that some thoughtful woman had placed in the upstairs women’s bathroom. It felt like a bath from heaven to Carl. Even his hair could be washed in the basin, not that there was much of it anymore.
Once finished, he went back to his room and rummaged in the trunk for his cleanest work clothes, also a gift from the preacher, who had purchased them from the Mennonite-run Save-and-Serve thrift store in Millersburg. George had taken Carl along with him so he could choose his own clothing, but it had been twenty years since Carl had any choice in what he wore. The task had proven to be daunting. In the end, George had to pick five work outfits for him.
Carl had now been out of prison a whole three weeks.
Today, he would repair a dripping faucet in the women’s bathroom. Tomorrow he would give the wooden pews in the sanctuary a good polish. The day after that, he intended to wash the windows. He cherished the fact that he was free to make his own plans for each day.
First, however, he would make coffee in the church kitchen. George would arrive soon to put in his morning office hours before going on hospital visits and checking on shut-ins. George always appreciated a fresh cup of coffee.
The preacher had given him permission to use his office and read any of the books that lined the walls. It was a nice offer, but Carl wasn’t much of a reader. Making sure her son went to school had not exactly been a priority to his mother.
What Carl hoped for was to save up for a small television to keep in his room. He liked watching ball games. When he was a kid, he loved playing baseball. He and the other neighborhood boys played pickup games in an abandoned lot nearby his home. They had almost always ended in a fight, but he had liked the feeling of running the makeshift bases and snatching the ball out of midair. Remembering those summertime games in detail had helped him use up a lot of hours, lying on his bunk and staring at the ceiling, during these past twenty years.
Carl had no idea what George had gone through to get permission for him to work and live here. He was afraid it had been a struggle. It was not a large church; they could not afford to pay much. He thought that perhaps the fact that he came cheaper than most janitors had helped get him the job.
All he knew was that he was grateful for a roof over his head and for the small paycheck. He was absolutely determined not to do anything that could put George’s faith in him at risk. With the last third of his life lived behind bars, he was lucky to have any place to stay at all…even if it was a utility room in the basement of a church. It was warm and dry, which was all he really needed.
After starting the coffee, he took a box of cornflakes out of one of the kitchen cupboards and a quart of milk from the refrigerator. There were some mismatched bowls and spoons to choose from that had accumulated over the years. Carl preferred the yellow bowl with sunflowers painted on it. Yellow had become his favorite color. It was the color of sunlight.
He ate the cereal and then washed and dried his bowl and spoon and put them away. By then the coffee was finished, and he heard George’s car pull up outside. He poured both himself and George cups of coffee then added a dollop of whole milk to George’s. For himself, he’d long ago learned to drink his black. It was simpler. He walked to George’s office with the cups, prepared to enjoy a short conversation. In the few weeks he’d been here, having morning coffee with George had become a routine and Carl’s favorite part of the day.