Page 17 of Spread Me

Nkrumah carries a laundry basket down the residential hall. She’s barefoot, stepping carefully, moving silently. She walks with her knees bent and her hips low. Her eyes are on the floor.

She almost makes it to the end of the hall when a door clicks open behind her. She winces, closing her eyes.

“Oh, hey, are you doing laundry?”

Jacques asks, poking his head out of the bedroom he shares with Saskia.

“I’m doing my laundry,”

Nkrumah replies.

“Mine and Domino’s. Our room only.”

“Can I throw something in there? Just one second.”

He disappears into his room, ignoring Nkrumah’s furious groan.

Mads opens their door at the sound of swearing.

“What’s going on?”

they ask, their voice sleep-fuzzed. When they spot the laundry basket in Nkrumah’s arms, their eyes light up.

“Someone’s doing laundry?”

“No. I’m throwing everything in this basket out into the desert. Don’t—”

She gives up as Mads emerges into the hall, bed linens wadded in their arms.

“Thank you so much,”

they say warmly, dropping their bed linens on top of hers and Domino’s.

“So nice of you.”

Nkrumah glowers at them.

“I hate this game. I did not agree to play this game. It’s not funny and it never has been.”

But it’s too late. Kinsey opens her door and rains underwear down onto the pile of bed linens. Jacques comes back out with a pile of stinking, sweat-soaked shirts. Saskia shoves socks down into the overfull basket.

“Nkrumah, you are just the best,”

Domino purrs.

“We appreciate you so much.”

Nkrumah kicks the basket down the hall, toward the canteen, where the tiny washing machine will take all day to work through the several loads of laundry that have been compressed into the basket.

“You’re all hanging your own sheets up,”

she calls over her shoulder.

“And next time I catch one of you on your way down the hall, you’re getting all my underwear. Just you wait.”

Mads blows her a kiss. “Thanks!”