The Beauty in Moments

The washer machine spits and howls as it attacks the clothes within its confines, the sound echoing across the tiled floor. No one in the LaundroMat pays it any attention. The old woman with a hunched back a few paces to my right simply fills in another answer on her crossword.

              The raging battle fought by the machine that gobbled my quarters is a never-ending fight. Once its current enemy is vanquished, I will remove my limp clothing, and another faceless person will give the machine its next opponent.

              I take a shuddering breath as I resettle myself onto the wooden bench. In a few minutes, it will be time to move my laundry to the dryer machine, but until then, there is nothing to do other than fall into a daze as the clock on the wall ticks on. The world fades…

              …and jolts back into focus. A little girl wearing a glaringly bright pink dress and two ponytails that threaten to escape the band holding them tugs at my arm. I blink at her, not quite processing her presence in my space. After all, LaundroMats are sacred spaces where no one talks, no one interacts.

              She tugs my arm again, a little stronger, and her eyes crinkling at my unresponsiveness.

              “Hello,” I say, my voice hoarse as though parched from days without water. She smiles though, a small, shy thing that blossoms into a wide grin as she pulls more insistently on my arm.

              She wants to bring me somewhere. I cannot help but comply with her silent demand.

              My knees creak with protest as I rise a bit unsteadily to my feet. The girl lets me take a moment to find my balance, but she does so impatiently. Her mouth is set in a firm line as she stomps her feet to keep herself in place.

              When my legs settle with a last, resigned groan, I nod to the girl that I am ready to follow her. She graces me with her smile once more then grips the fabric of my shirt in a tight grasp. She turns and marches to the far end of the bench near the corner of the room.

              Sitting there is a young woman who is slouched in her seat but whose sharp eyes track the little girl’s every move. She seems tired, burdened by life, but it is obvious that her daughter is her treasure. She offers me an apologetic grimace that I wave off. The LaundroMat demands silence, but we are all there for a common purpose. It creates a unity among strangers who may never meet again.

              With a flourish of her hand, the girl sweeps up a handful of papers from the bench next to the woman and thrusts them in my hand. The woman rolls her eyes in fond exasperation but doesn’t react otherwise.

              I flip through the papers, noting that most are blank aside from the top three that burst with shining colors in no pattern I can find. They are strange and beautiful all at once.

              When I tear my gaze from the creations, I catch the little girl rummaging through a bag as pink as her dress only with added sequins for even more brazen attention. She lets out a small “hm” as she searches, then cries out in victory as her hand emerges with a battered box of crayons.

              In the space of a blink, the crayons are in my hand and I am sitting on the floor next to the beaming girl. I’m not entirely certain how I got there so quickly, but it no longer matters. There is a single sheet of blank, white paper on the bench in front of me.

              So much potential. So many colors and designs and patterns. I am lost in my creation.

              I don’t remember freeing my laundry from the washing machine and surrendering it to the dryer. All I know is that one hour later, I have completed my drawing. It has no form, no discernable image, but somehow I am content with the final product.

              The little girl grabs my paper and studies it with a scrunched nose and squinted eyes. After a moment, she hands it back to me, her face filled with approval and pride. Although she doesn’t say anything, I know she has seen the pieces of myself in those colors.

Despite being far older than her, my chest burns with a satisfied warmth at her approval. I thank her, my voice low and solemn as seems fitting for the occasion. She gracefully nods her head in return and turns back to her own new creation. Her mother smiles her gratitude at me for giving in to the whims of a young girl.

I am the one who is grateful.

My laundry sits tamed and obedient in the opened jaws of the dryer machine. It is quick work to fold them and place my laundry in a neat pile in a small basket, actions I have made so many times in this place that it is habit. I lift the basket to sit at my waist and move toward the door.

I feel a pair of bright eyes on my back as I push my way out of the LaundroMat. I flick my hand in a goodbye at a little girl I might never meet again but who will stay with me in the folded paper in my pocket. A few steps later, I have turned the corner.

Two weeks have passed, and I am back at the LaundroMat. The washing machine has begun its screaming battle with my laundry just as it had done the last time and the time before that. There is a man tapping on his phone and a teenage girl flipping through a textbook with blank eyes waiting for their cycles to end. Both seem disconnected from the world, a daze as they sit in silence.

I unfold a towel and place it on the ground in front of the wooden bench. As I sit down, my lips quirk upwards at the confused glances that the two others send my way. Why sit on the floor when the bench is there? I ignore them, though, because there is a blank piece of paper and a box of crayons waiting in my bag. I pull them out, set them up, and pause.

So much potential. So many colors and designs and patterns.

I begin.