Jason did not like being here. The trailer park was so different from anywhere he had ever lived or been in his life. He wasn’t sure how he should feel about these people. Fear came to mind. Fear of what people who lived in such a disgraceful state thought of him and might do to him if they felt so inclined. Fear that they would even touch him; contaminate him with whatever diseases and filth they had in and on their bodies. He felt disgust and loathing for people who would let themselves and their families degrade to such a state as this.

He was so different from these people. He was well educated and cared about improving himself. Perhaps he was all these people had to bring them out of the gutter. He just wished that he didn’t have to enter the gutter with them to be of assistance. Why had he volunteered to visit this man in his home? When asked at church he was happy to lend a hand to help a fellow Christian in need. He figured he would help a nice old woman to clean up her garage and perhaps do her yard work. He had not expected to be asked to help with the house cleaning for a man on disability. A man who was on disability for no reason other than the fact that he was a fat lazy slob who clearly didn’t mind living off the hard earned money of other people. As far as Jason knew he had never even been to the church. He had only learned about the man through one of his fellow parishioners. Jason had mentioned who he would be helping and was told about this man’s less than appealing state of existence. His informant had maintained the perspective that people who did not work or contribute, should not be given charity, unless of course there was a true medical need. Jason tended to feel this same sentiment.

Slowly Jason trudged up the rickety steps and onto the small deck of trailer 2B. The trailer was a mess. The skirt was falling off and the paint peeling. The grass was patchy and muddy with large piles of trash and other debris laying up against its edge. Jason searched for a doorbell before finally knocking loudly on the door. He had already convinced himself to leave quickly if his knocking was not promptly answered. Because of this he was very much hoping that the inhabitant of the trailer was asleep or for some other reason couldn’t hear him.

But then the deadbolt clicked and the door was swung wide open. A man stepped into the doorway clad in old beat up and dirty sweat clothes. He walked in a sort of penguin like strut, holding out his hands in an effort to balance his immensity. His flabby cheeks and chin enveloped the top of his shirt veiling his neck. On his chest, two small round bumps poked out like the breasts of a malformed woman. Rolls of fat protruded out from under his shirt in the form of a huge bulbous blob, like an alien appendage that was not truly a part of the man. In the back, his pants hung low revealing his large flabby buttocks and the crack running down the middle. The air around him was rank from the odor of one who had become unable to properly wash himself and had eventually given up trying. Jason felt himself retch inside his throat and had to gulp and shake his head and steady himself on the rail to keep from evacuating himself on the porch. He averted his eyes from the man and pressed himself to the rail in an unconscious effort to get as far from the glutton as possible.

The man stared at him blankly. Jason stuttered to start talking, “I, I was told you needed some help with some things.” The man continued to stare without response. Jason’s eyes flicked to the gloom behind the man to try and see what exactly he was getting himself into. He continued, “I am coming from New Covenant Fellowship Church.” The man’s appearance changed to that of recognition and motioned for Jason to enter. The man wheezed and waddled back into the room and in an air of exhaustion and heavy breathing sat himself onto a nearby stool.

As Jason entered the trailer he felt the atmosphere grow heavy, damp, and foul. The air smelled like mold and garbage and seemed to be in a fog. All of the curtains were drawn, windows were shut, and only a couple of solitary shadeless lamps lit the space. A small television buzzed in the background with the rantings of a talk show host. The floor and furniture were crowded with clothes, trash, and old discarded food. Jason walked on tip toes, as if standing directly on all the trash would plunge him too deeply in the filth. Beer bottles and overflowing ash trays cluttered every spare surface. Where the carpet could be seen it was black with grime. The walls were streaked with grease and dirt. Jason fought hard to not reveal a look of disgust.

The man caught his breath and in a deep phlegmy voice said, “I need some help with my cleaning.” The man’s bulk seemed to envelop the stool he was sitting on. His skin looked sickly pallid in the light of the room and was sleeked with the oily sweat of a man who was continuously perspiring regardless of the ambient temperature. Jason peered around and shifted his weight from foot to foot uncomfortably.

“Well,” Jason started, “How about I clean up your living room.” He tried to sound bright and cheerly, but in reality what he said came out flat. The man said nothing. To avoid his own discomfort Jason began to move around the room as if he had to figure out what exactly needed cleaning. The real question was what didn’t need it? He would just as soon torch the entire place and start from scratch. How he wished he had worn something that he could just throw away after this experience. No clothing could be cleansed after this defilement. “Do you have any plastic bags?” Jason asked demandingly.

“In the kitchen,” was the only response. Jason crossed the room and into the kitchen. He was going to flip on the light switch, but then decided he would rather not see the true state of this room. In the dim light it looked like mud or, God forbid, animal crap was smeared across the floor. Jason edged around the wall and with pointed fingers opened one cupboard after another until he found what he was looking for. He reached inside quickly and grabbed the entire roll of trash bags, along with the nearby cleaning solution and paper towels, and returned to the living room.

The fat man hadn’t moved. Jason bent over and started to quickly put all of the beer bottles and trash into one of the trash bags. He kept his back to man so that he wouldn’t have to look at him, but he felt the man’s eyes watching him make his way around the place. Was the fat pig going to just sit there and watch him the whole time? Wasn’t he even going to try and help and get his fat slob of a butt off that stool and do something useful with his pathetic life? Jason felt himself getting hot with anger as he moved quickly around the room filling one bag and then two. He kept everything at a distance trying to put as little of his body into contact with the room as possible. Still the man just sat, not saying a word.

After Jason finished picking up all the trash he moved on to the clothing. He grumpily asked, “Do you want to keep any of these?” Now he wasn’t even attempting to be pleasant.

The man looked at Jason as if this was an odd question. “Those are my clothes. They just need to be cleaned.”

“Do you have washing machine?” Jason asked anticipating the answer.

“No, I have them done at the Laundromat.”

Without a response Jason threw the clothes quickly into a separate trash bag. He tried to avoid identifying each item as it was picked up, but gave involuntary shudders when he touched yellowed sweat stained shirts, brown streaked underpants, and an assortment of other foul smelling garments.

Eventually the floor and table space in the room was cleaned of debris. Jason whipped up the bottle of cleaner and liberally sprayed all the surfaces while furiously wiping them down. The fat pig still sat on his stool, eyes flicking from Jason, to the television, and back to Jason again. Jason continued to ignore him. “Alright,” Jason thought, “You’ve helped him enough. It’s been an hour and a half and the room looks much better. I’ll take his trash and laundry, dump the one and soak the other in bleach at the Laundromat, and then give the clean laundry and task of future cleaning to someone else at the church. I have had enough of the good Samaritan life for awhile.”

Jason turned to the man and tried to put on a cheery smile, “Okay,” he said, “I’m going to take away your trash and do your laundry. Someone else will probably stop by and finish things up here and bring back your laundry.” The man looked at him as if in thought. His lips were moist and slightly parted as he panted softly. Jason noticed large dark wet spots leeching out from under each arm of the man and how even his fat flabby arms seemed to be dwarfed and out of proportion with his huge belly.

The man spoke, “I disgust you don’t I?”

Jason didn’t know what to say to this direct and obvious discernment of his feelings, so he lied quickly, “No, no, of course not.” His response was quick and, it seemed to him, obviously evasive. So he mumbled on. “I think you have a nice place here, but life can be hard on people at times. That is why I came here to help.” There was an awkward silence for a moment before Jason continued, “So I guess I should be going then.” Jason practically lunged towards the door, dragging the trash and laundry bags behind him. “It was nice to meet you,” he said trying to muster all the cheeriness he could find. He walked quickly down the stairs and threw the bags in the trunk of his car before climbing into the driver’s seat. As he started the car and backed out he saw the man peering out of the trailer after him and then close his front door.

Jason felt sick. It seemed to him that he should feel good about himself and the day’s work, but instead he just felt miserable. He tried to push those thoughts down, but the words the man had said to him kept coming back. “I disgust you don’t I?” It bothered him a lot that this man had been able to read his own feelings so clearly. He had thought that he had been able to conceal his feelings, but apparently not. “I didn’t matter what the man thought of him,” Jason thought to himself, but he knew he didn’t really feel that way. “My God!” Jason realized, “I never even introduced myself. I was in so much of a hurry to just get the mess over with and get away from there.” Jason was suddenly overcome with disgust with his own behavior. And then he became angry, “Why shouldn’t I feel disgusted with that man? He was disgusting!” Jason pressed on the accelerator is if to escape from his feelings of misery. The old car rattled as it moved faster along the bumpy road. “This was too much,” he said to himself, “I am doing the best I can.” He did not feel satisfied by his self justification.

Eventually his anger abated and the car slowed. He felt defeated and deflated as he continued to drive towards home. But as he got closer he acknowledged his own feelings about the man for what they were, and gradually began to feel a little better. As he pulled into his own driveway he happily realized that tomorrow was a new day.

Copyright 2007 Wesley Freeman
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