Static and Steel

The 2 AM shift at Sudz City is the kind of job people don't believe exists until they see it. Somebody has to sit behind the bulletproof glass and take quarters from insomniacs, and for two years now that somebody has been me.

I'm Kellie, twenty-four, and most nights my whole job is watching people argue with dryers.

There's a strange intimacy to a laundromat at two in the morning. People come in half-dressed, no makeup, carrying everything they own in a trash bag sometimes. You see a whole city with its pants off, literally and otherwise. Nobody's performing. They're just tired and out of clean socks.

So I got to know the regulars. Old Denny who washes one load at 3 AM sharp every Tuesday. The nurses coming off shift at St. Mary's. The guy who washes his dog's bed weekly and never buys a new one.

But the ones I liked best were the ones with no routine at all. The walk-ins. You never know what walks in at 2 AM.

Thursday night, the answer was her.

The bell over the door went off at 2:15 and I looked up from my crossword and there was a woman standing there who was taller than me, and I'm six feet. She had a duffel bag over one shoulder like it weighed nothing, arms that said she used them for a living, and a sleeve of tattoos running down one forearm. Short dark hair, easy grin, moving like the floor belonged to her.

"Hey," she said. "You got anything industrial back there? My machine at the shop died mid-cycle and everything I own now smells like chain grease."

"Back row, left side," I said, buzzing her through. "Big loaders. Eight bucks a cycle."

"Eight bucks. Robbery." She grinned and dropped her bag on the folding table. "Worth it though. I can't show up to a job smelling like a transmission."

I watched her load the thing. She moved quick, no wasted steps, stuffing work clothes in, feeding quarters. She'd pulled a cardigan over a tank top, and the tattoos went further than the arm. I caught a bit of a rose at her collarbone.

"Rough night?" I asked, because that's what you ask.

"Rough week, actually. My building's washer's been broken for a month and the landlord keeps saying next week. Then the shop machine died on me tonight. So here I am, laundering at a place called Sudz City at two in the morning like some kind of gremlin."

"Gremlins are underrated," I said. "They had good tech support. Rules were simple. Feed them after midnight and don't get them wet."

She laughed. Real laugh, head back. "Okay, you're funny. What's your name?"

"Kellie. Yes, I know. It's a whole thing."

"I'm Rio."

"Like the city?"

"Like the river. Same thing, really." She leaned a hip against the machine. "You do crosswords all night, Kellie?"

"Somebody has to defend that crossword's honor. It's a tough job but the pay reflects that."

"What's the pay like?"

"Comically bad. But the hours are quiet and nobody bothers me, which after my last couple years is honestly the selling point."

"Oh yeah?" She didn't push, just left the door open. "Bad breakups, bad jobs, or bad everything?"

"Breakup. Two years back. Three years together and she decided I was furniture she'd bought in a different season." I shrugged. "That's the whole sad story. You want the short version, that's it."

"Three years. Ouch." She looked at me with something softer than before. "I've mostly dated women too, if you're taking notes."

"I wasn't, but now I am!"

She laughed again. "So you're recovering from a breakup, working nights at a laundromat, doing crosswords. That's a very specific flavor of sad, Kellie. I respect it."

"It's artisanal sad. Small batch."

"You're twenty-something, right? You've got time to rebuild."

"Twenty-four. How about you?"

"Thirty." She said it easy. "Thirty and standing in your establishment at 2 AM, so clearly I've peaked."

The washer chugged through its cycle and she grabbed a folding table and started working through her clothes. I went back to the crossword but I wasn't really doing the crossword. She caught me looking once and just winked, didn't make it weird, and I felt my ears go hot.

Around 2:40 the dryer nearest the back wall made a noise like a cat in a blender and then went quiet.

"Oh no," she said. "Was that mine?"

"That'd be number four. Hold on." I grabbed my toolbox from under the desk. "You're in luck. I fix these. The owner's cheap and I got tired of calling him."

"You're the night clerk and the mechanic?"

"I contain multitudes. All of them underpaid."

I popped the panel off the dryer and got my arm in there. She came over and stood close, watching, and I could feel her there, this warm presence at my shoulder.

"So what's the verdict, doctor?"

"Belt's frayed. Lint buildup on the drum seal. Give me ten minutes."

"Ten minutes of you elbow-deep in a dryer while I supervise. Best date I've had in months."

I snorted. "Low bar."

"Extremely low bar. You're exceeding it anyway."

We kept talking while I worked. She told me she does stage work, builds and runs sets for a theater company downtown, picks up bike mechanic shifts when the theater's dark. I told her about the laundromat ecosystem, Denny and his Tuesday loads, the nurse who falls asleep waiting on her delicates.

"You know everybody's whole life," she said. "That's sweet. You're like the bartender of dirty laundry."

"Somebody's gotta hear it."

"How'd you end up here, anyway? Not judging. Genuinely asking."

"Dropped out of community college when my dad got sick. Needed something nights so I could do day shifts at his place. He passed two years ago and the job just stuck. It's easy and nobody expects anything from me here." I tightened the belt pulley. "Which is either healthy or deeply sad, and I've stopped checking."

"That's real," she said, quiet for once. Then, lighter: "Me, I like work where I can see a thing get fixed by the end of the day. Sets, bikes, washers. You'd probably like it."

"You offering me a job or just making conversation?"

"Conversation. But I'll keep the offer in my pocket."

The dryer started purring again and she applauded, slow and mocking.

"Take a bow, Kellie. You're a hero of the working class."

"Eight bucks, please. The machine's fixed but the robbery continues."

While she fed clothes back in, a voice came from the front, an older guy in a bathrobe standing at the glass with his arms crossed. I buzzed the door.

"Kellie," he said. "That noise. Third time tonight. Some of us are trying to sleep in the chairs."

"Sorry, Mr. Hanson. It was a belt. It's fixed now."

"It better be. People wash at night because it's quiet." He gave Rio a long look and left.

"That guy lives here?" she asked.

"Practically. He's fine. He's just earned the right to complain about things."

"You've earned that right too, you know. Two years and a dead-end shift." She tilted her head at me. "Come on. It's stuffy in here. Walk me out front while the load finishes."

"It's two in the morning."

"Exactly. Best hour there is."

So I propped the door and we stepped out onto the sidewalk. The air had that washed feeling the city gets after rain, streetlights haloed, nobody around. She leaned against the brick next to the door and looked down the empty block.

"This is my favorite time," she said. "City's honest at 2 AM. Nobody's pretending."

"That's what I like about it too. Everyone who's out is out for a real reason."

"Your reason is a crossword and a belt."

"And now a woman with chain grease in her laundry." I said it lightly, and then I made myself say the rest plain, because she'd been straight with me about who she dates and it felt right to be straight back. "I'm trans, by the way. Better you hear it on the sidewalk than upstairs. Kellie's the name I picked, that's the whole thing."

She smiled, not surprised. "Takes one to know one. I'm trans too. Most guys go quiet when they work that out about me. You just kept talking about dryer belts."

"I like dryer belts. And I like talking to you. Both true at once."

"Huh." She looked at me a second, deciding something. "Well. The dryer's still got twenty minutes. Come sit on the curb and tell me about this breakup. Only if you want. I'm not collecting material."

"I might," I said, and sat down on the curb, and she sat down next to me, closer than she needed to.

We sat there a while, not saying much. Her knee was a few inches from mine and I was aware of every one of those inches.

"So how long off the market?" she asked finally.

"Off the market?"

"That's the phrase, right? When somebody's been single so long they start growing moss."

I laughed. "Two years. Give or take. Since Amara and I ended things."

"Two years." She whistled. "Okay, that's not moss, that's a full ecosystem."

"Thanks. Very encouraging."

"I'm not making fun. Okay, I'm a little making fun. But two years after a breakup is normal. What I'm asking is whether it's finished. The mourning part."

I thought about it honestly, which took a second. "Yeah. It's finished. I just got comfortable being nobody's anything. It's a low-effort lifestyle. Highly recommended."

"Sounds terrible."

"It's terrible. That's the joke."

She picked at a crack in the sidewalk. "So if some woman asked you out, right now, tonight, would that be a problem? You'd need notice? A formal invitation in the mail?"

"I'm twenty-four, not a duke," I said. "No, it wouldn't be a problem!"

"You're sure."

"I'm sure." And I was, which surprised me a little. My heart was doing something but it wasn't dread.

"Okay." She turned to face me. "Then I'm asking. Come upstairs with me, or rather, come upstairs with you, since you live above this place and I live forty minutes away. Or say no, and I finish my laundry and ride home and we're still fine."

I looked at her. Streetlight caught the rings in her ear and the ink on her forearm, a line of something in a font I couldn't read at that angle.

"Yeah," I said. "Yes. I want that!"

"Good." Then, softer, like she was giving me an exit anyway: "You can change your mind at the door. No hard feelings."

"I won't."

The dryer buzzed before either of us moved, which was almost funny, like the