Page 12 of Garbage

“Duw helpa fi!” Evan murmured, before looking away.

“What?” Quincy asked. It sounded like words, but they didn’t mean anything.

“Nothing. I, uh, speak a little Welsh. Not fluently. My grandparents speak it and uh…” Evan trailed off, his eyes fixed on Quincy’s pants, as he used the claw hooks to start opening them along both sides.

“Sorry,” Quincy apologized again. “It’s hard to take them off with my hands.”

Evan nodded, suddenly looking at the shower behind Quincy’s shoulder. “That’s great. Yeah. Uh, you should totally use your pincers. Um… I’m gonna go start some dinner. Do you want me to wash your clothes in the washing machine?”

Quincy considered. He was curious about the washing machine, but not sure if it was a good idea. “I can wash them in the shower.” That was just water. He knew about water.

“OK, good, good. So, enjoy your shower. There are towels in the cabinet.” Evan gestured to a door on the wall with a round handle then left the room in what seemed like a hurry.

Maybe he was hungry.

Quincy wanted to see the towels, but he didn’t want to touch anything more than he had to. He’d have to figure those out later.

He used his claw arms to unzip his pants down the sides of both legs, so the front and back fell into two pieces that he caught and held. Taking all his clothes with him, he stepped into the water.

“Ohhhhh….” There wasn’t anyone around to hear him, but he couldn’t keep the sound inside. It wasn’t even a word, but maybe there weren’t words for how warm and lovely the shower was. It was like summer rain, but splashing on his bare skin, where he could enjoy it indefinitely. He turned so that it hit the back of his neck and another sound came out of his mouth.

Quincy officially loved showers.

For a long time, he just stood under the stream, until he realized he should really cleanse himself.

Then he cleaned everything. Every crevice and joint, every container and cavity. He cycled the clean water through his water reservoirs, then sprayed it back at himself through his pressurized steam hoses. Then, he did it again with Evan’s body wash.

Now he smelled good, too.

When there finally wasn’t anything left to clean, he reluctantly turned off the shower and stepped out.

The towels were folded rectangles of blue fabric that were soft on his skin. He noticed that they absorbed the water on his hands, so he rubbed one all over himself, until it was wet and he was dry.

He stepped out of the bathroom. “Evan, where should I put this towel?”

Evan spun around, his eyes traveling up and down Quincy’s form, before he jerked his head away. His face was very pink. “Uh, you can hang it on the empty hook to dry. That towel can be yours.”

Quincy had a towel. His very own towel.

He hung it on the hook, then petted it a few times. His towel.

He already had a plan for folding it up and storing it in the glove compartment of the truck. He was pretty sure it would fit, and no one would ever look for it there.

“Do you want to put your clothes back on?” Evan called from somewhere closer. “I could also get you something comfortable to wear. You want pajamas?”

“Pajamas, please.”

Maybe those could be his, too. Though he didn’t want to be greedy. Just wearing them once would be nice. He’d seen a picture of the pajamas Mo bought for her grandson a long time ago. In the picture, a child who wasn’t little Quincy, was grinning, dressed in a shirt and pants with red fire trucks on the front. Quincy had suggested that maybe Mo should buy him pajamas with garbage trucks, but she’d laughed and said they didn’t make them.

Sometimes Quincy was really good at jokes, but other times Mo told him he was funny, and he didn’t know why.

Evan went through another door, so Quincy followed him. “Uh, here.” Evan was looking really hard at the drawer. Then at the wall beside Quincy’s head. “I think these should fit you.” He held out a bundle of cloth, which Quincy accepted with delight. He held them up with his two claw extensions so that he could pet them with his hands. A yellow shirt with a picture of a fuzzy animal hanging upside down from a branch, and a pair of silky black pants. They didn’t seem to have zippers along the sides, but he thought he could fit his feet into the top and pull them up.

He loved them. “What animal is this?” he asked. The shirt said Not to brag, but I totally got out of bed today.

“It’s a sloth. It’s a joke, because sloths move very slowly, so people think of them as lazy.”

Quincy laughed. He liked the joke. He liked the shirt, so he took one more look before hugging it to his chest. “Thank you, Evan,” he told him. “This is the best day ever.”