Stall Box Correspondences

This was Jon’s first job, a fairly easy job that seems suitable for a tenth grader who only needs a 55 dollar paycheck per week to give him the ample amount of money to spend on taco bell and beer. Jon’s job: To assist in the cleaning of assorted small office buildings, usually two to three in a day. His tasks would include mopping, vacuuming, and emptying garbage, while not disturbing any of the employees who haven’t been fortunate enough to go home already.

The cleaning crew usually started around 3:30 and wrapped up the last stop at about 6:30. It was only 3 days a week, why not? Jon thought. He also got to work with his friend Anthony all three of the days, but then there was his boss Carmine Legasm. The last name made Jon think Leg Gasm, an orgasm only a leg could feel, a Charlie horse? Jon wondered. But no, it was Lee Gas Em. Anthony forewarned Jon of his bosses’ odd peculiarities, who was indeed a neat freak, but chose to wear the same clothes everyday. He would get annoyed when one of them would turn around to talk to each other face to face. Carmine craved conversation and attention. Also, he would cover his car in post it notes as reminders for everything: Gas, Milk, Bags, Clean. One would think he’d go so far as to put a POST IT on one of the actual post it notes. It was because Carmine was somewhat forgetful in his age, an disadvantage to an office cleaner, which in turn served as an advantage to his employees. Jon and Anthony really knew the old creep behind the somewhat already creepy old cleaning guy personality Carmine exuded. What a business this guy created. It was some of the easiest work imaginable, sure by most it’d be considered blue collar labor, but in a sense it could be classified as the work of a white collar, the simple tasks he must finish in the last ten minutes of his day. For this profession, it really all came down to getting the accounts, which paid out quite well for such meager services.
Carmine, being the nagging old bastard he is somehow had all these connections. Carmine had contracts for about a dozen different offices, all with their different businesses in the Farmingdale area. One account was known as SMSB, that was done only on Thursdays was some sort of Soft Drink imaging center, where Jon and Anthony found large tag boards with high quality resolution prints of soft drinks aligned as they would be on shelves.
“Is this all this place does?” Jon asked.
“I think so” Anthony replied.
Another one of the office accounts was a hair products distribution center which was easily the biggest account, and only a weekly account, far too much to handle. The place included such things as an in house salon, a bunch of long dark hallways and corridors that led you nowhere, in complete darkness, at least 2 dozen office rooms, all being very dirty after a week. But there was also a table where a 2 liter bottle of Diet Pepsi could always be found for the drinking. Jon and Anthony found this office to be the biggest fucking pain in the ass, its overall unkempt state far surpassed any other of the offices. Although there was a extremely attractive young girl who could be found working after hours, a young blond with an extremely slim flawless body, complimenting her disproportionately sized breasts.
“She’s fucking hot” Jon would comment.
“I know dude” Anthony would reply.
Carmine walked between the two of them who had paused in their tracks. “I’d barf her” he exclaimed, then walked off.
“Uhhhh, barf?” Jon asked disturbed.
“I have no fucking idea what is wrong with this guy” said Anthony
“What a fucking creep!” Jon said turning the vacuum back on. Anthony and Jon returned to their tasks so they could finish up this hellhole of an office to move onto their final account of the day, the best. The Buckingham palace of office spaces in Farmingdale.
This account was prosthetics, a prosthetics firm which consisted of both a limbs warehouse/workshop, and the front of the building which consisted of administrative offices, examining rooms, a waiting room, and two bathrooms. The process started with the mopping of the rear bathroom joined to the back warehouse. The sight of the warehouse was slightly disturbing but, almost majestic in a sense, especially considering their objective, replacing the legs and arms that have been so unwillingly retracted. This was a body factory churning out new appendages, Jon pondered if some of the technicians ever got bored enough to create prosthetic heads, torsos, genitals etc. Did they ever make an entirely prosthetic body, just to serve as extra company, or maybe just as a prop for a very funny joke.
After finishing up the rear bathroom, the crew moved towards to forwards office. Jon started his vacuuming, arguably the more demanding task, over emptying a few miniature garbage cans, but he would proceed without argument, it was only his second week, far too early argue about positions. Jon also had to use extreme caution when it came to his common work around the office, he was not to barge into any of the examining rooms or offices, he was not to disturb any of the employees while they were working. Especially the wife of the head doctor named Lorene, who at age 45 was barely grasping the vestige of her more youthful attractiveness. This had to be done with an heightened awareness of the surrounding sounds of office meandering. To be successful, his mind must function with the capabilities of a sonar radar, seeking out zones where sound waves had not been emitted, then to proceed and vacuum. So, a fully functioning vacuuming sonar radar. He had a preternatural knowledge of the office’s floor plan, so there would be no unforeseeable difficulties. Jon finished his vacuuming quickly, their really wasn’t anything on the floor at all, with the exception of a few forgotten paperclips. He picked them up by hand.
Jon went to return to the vacuum to it’s designated spot and ran into Carmine.
“Done Already?” Carmine asked.
“Yes I am, wasn’t too bad.” Jon replied.
“Wow, good stuff buddy, you can mop the front bathrooms now”
“Um, yeah sure. Just mop up? What about the woman’s bathroom?”
“Yeah, you do that one too. Mop and receptacles”
“Is that alright? For me to like be in there?”
“All the woman are left the office for the day, you’ll be fine”
“Okay, cool”
For a moment, an awkward hesitation resonated, then quickly dissipated as both walked away. Jon grabbed the mop, and rolled the bucket towards the bathroom. Jon opened the door to the oversized bathroom, it’s parameters capable of handling at least 6 stalls, but for some reason the contractors only chose to implement two. Wow, no urinals, kind of nice, Jon thought. He also noticed there wasn’t any trash cans present. He then went into to each stall to scrub the toilets real quick. And there it was.
A small stainless steel deposit box mounted to the side of the stall, with a lid. At first Jon thought it was a mailbox. What the hell is that, Jon thought. It didn’t have an address with Woman’s Stall #2 written next to it. It could be a tissue dispenser like the ones at school. Nope, there was no bottom slit. Jon peeked the lid up, then immediately dropped it. He saw blood.
Oh fuck, he though. Someone is going to barge in and slit my throat in about 8 seconds. Should I run? Nah, you’re done for. He waited, but never heard the sounds of thumping footsteps.
Maybe I should look again, it could just be some Hawaiian punch a kid left in there, Mmm Hawaiian punch. Jon lifted the lid once again and looked inside. There was a bloody tampon curled up in the corner. Jon first saw one while at his friend bill’s bathroom, when his sister left one in the toiler before. It was hideous, it always looked like something was wrapped inside of it, like a chopped off finger.
Jon had to clean this. He ripped off some toilet paper and crumpled it around his hand covering any signs of skin. He reached in and grabbed the soft moist tampon. He hesitated and studied it for a second. There was a note attached that read,

Thank You!

Jon wondered if someone really go to these lengths to be courteous and thank him, or it was just of spite. He couldn’t decide, but wanted to leave a note back. It’d be something funny. Not blatant like Fuck you, but something that would scare the person maybe. Jon scribbled on a shred of paper,

You shall feel the wrath of Khan!

and dropped it in the box. He threw the tampon in the toilet and flushed it down, even though that defeated the actual purpose of the tampon box. Jon finished his cleaning, and went to find Anthony in the lunch room. There they both spit in the cup of water Carmine asked for, he had no clue. He guzzled it down in a second, too quick to notice white cloudy strands floating in it. They locked the place up and drive home and the day was over.

The three of them returned the next day. Jon went to the woman’s bathroom and checked the box. There it was again, another note attached to a used tampon. It read,

How are you today?

This time Jon had no paper and had to maneuver the paper off and flip it over. He didn’t know to write a formal response, that’d be too normal of him. Maybe it was time to be cruel, Jon wrote down

Do you even have legs?
Jon wouldn’t return until next week. Again he found a note that again said,

How are you today?

Jon replied,

You said that already, don’t beat a dead horse.

The next three weeks every note left read:

How are you today?

in different handwritings. Jon finally grew fed up with and gave an actual response,

Fine, but I hate boring topical questions.

the next week the note left said:

sorry, I didn’t know what else to say, isn’t this kind of fun?

Jon left,

strangely enough it is, it’s anonymous, like a pen pal you had in fourth grade.

the next note read:

So, should we meet?

he replied writing:

Woah, calm down, this is simple and better. a meeting would be weird.

her next note read:

fine if don’t want to meet then this is a waste of time.

Jon replied:

It isn’t, and it’s only five seconds time anyway. you know it rules.

there was no note from her the next 5 weeks. Jon was puzzled. Then one Thursday as he entered the bathroom, he found Lorene from the office. She had paper in her hand.
“Oh god!, I’m sorry!” Jon told her.
“It’s alright” she replied.
They both stared at each other for a span of about ten seconds. The longest ten seconds of Jon’s life. They were a foot apart. Lorene walked out of the bathroom, and Jon check the box, no note. Next week, there was no note again. Jon didn’t leave one either. It was over, Jon wanted to quit this job anyway. Carmine complained about where he had to pick him up from. Jon, on his last day of work there, took a urinal cake and put it in a drawer of Lorene’s desk. That’s going to be funny when she finds it, Jon thought.