Page 2 of Married in Michigan

But this?

Holy shit.

This mess…I need a bulldozer, and a flamethrower. A hazmat suit, at least.

I look at my contractor-grade garbage bag hanging open off the side of my cart, and realize it’s not going to be anywhere near sufficient. I take my walkie-talkie from the cart, switch it to the maintenance channel, and thumb the mic.

“Rick?”

A gruff, smoker’s voice answers. “This is Rick.”

“This is Makalya, up in the penthouse.”

“You just clocked in, and you’re already calling me?”

I sigh. “I’m going to need, like, a dumpster. Or a garbage can, or something. And maybe a shovel.”

A puzzled silence. “You what?”

“My little garbage bag isn’t going to cut the mess I have in front of me, Rick. I need something bigger, or I won’t get this done by the end of my shift.”

“That bad?”

I sigh into the mic. “That bad.”

I replace the walkie-talkie on the cart, stick my hand into a pair of gloves, and then a second pair, and then, with a deep breath, start cleaning.

Trash covers every surface. In order to get past the foyer, I have to wade through a pile of beer bottles, red plastic cups, chip bags, pizza boxes…god knows what else. The trash is too much and too jumbled to make sense of it all. I take a roll of garbage bags, rip one free and shake it open, and start cramming handfuls of trash into it. Within ten minutes, I’ve filled six bags, and I’ve barely made a dent in the area directly in front of the foyer.

Rick comes by with a big round gray trashcan on wheels. “Let me know if you need anything else,” he says, shaking his head at the mess. “I’m guessing you will, and soon.”

I shrug. “I have no idea. Just the garbage is going to take forever.”

And, indeed, it does. The kitchen and dining room are just beyond the foyer, and it was clearly ground zero for the party. The counters are cluttered to capacity with empty liquor bottles by the dozen, and beer bottles by the hundred, not to mentions stacks of Solo cups and empty two liters, soda cans, tonic bottles, lime and lemon rinds…I haven’t even begun to assess the mess beyond just TRASH.

I fill the garbage can, heave the bag out, replace it with a new liner, and keep going.

I’m finally making a dent in the hundreds of empty liquor bottles—a rough estimate so far would be around a hundred and thirty empty fifths, mostly Grey Goose, Johnnie Walker Blue Label, and Patrón, as well as Dom Perignon, and what I assume are very expensive white and red wines. The amount of money represented here just in liquor is absolutely staggering.

I’m dragging a trash bag to the foyer when I hear an odd honking noise from somewhere in the penthouse—I was so overwhelmed by the mess in here that I hadn’t even looked through the rest of the space. I leave the bag near the others in the foyer and head out in search of the noise. Beyond the kitchen and eating area is an open-plan living room, with a huge set of glass doors which open onto a massive roof-top deck, and then beyond the living room and outdoor area is a hallway leading to two guest bedrooms, a full bathroom, and the master suite. I round the back end of the sectional couch that divides the dining room from the living room, and I stop in my tracks, boggled, speechless.

There’s a donkey. In the living room. They used the coffee table and part of the sectional to create a little makeshift stall, and the donkey is lying down in a pile of hay. Actual hay, for an actual donkey. There’s an empty ice bucket on the ground near the donkey, and the creature is licking at the bottom of the bucket, making a mournful donkey honking sound.

“Now, what the hell?” I mutter to myself.

The donkey hears me, turns its head to face me, and its long ears lay back on its head, it opens its mouth and bares its teeth, and makes a long, low, drawn-outheeeeeee-HAWWWWWWWsound. The donkey is very clearly displeased. It stands up, tail swishing, and kicks the ice bucket with a front hoof.

I’ve never been on a farm, never seen a horse or a sheep or a goat or any farm creature any closer than at a petting zoo, but that seems like a pretty obvious gesture—I’m thirsty.

“You want some water, huh?” I say, edging slowly toward the coffee table separating me from the donkey. “All right, I’ll get you some. Just…you know, don’t kick me.”

I slide over the coffee table, and the donkey trots toward me with the bucket in its mouth. Now, I’m no coward. I’m a kickboxer, and I’m no slouch with a pair of Kali-Silat sticks, either. I’ve faced down muggers, date rapists, and just generally nasty people. But animals? Nuh-uh. No way. Not my thing. A cat is about my speed, and that’s because you don’t have to do anything but give it food and water now and then, and change the litter box. I always thought of donkeys as small, for some reason, but the creature trotting toward me stands almost as big as a horse, and is clearly male—the tackle swinging between its legs is unmissable.

“Heee-haw,” the donkey says.

I scream, back away over the coffee table, and press my spine to the window behind me. “You can’t come at me like that, donkey. We’re not friends, you know.”

“Hee-haw-haw—HAWWWW.” He drops the bucket on the table, and bobs his head at me.