The Quarantine Diary of Adam Garrett [mxm]

Day 3

Oh, boy. What a day.

When I woke up at 7:30, Brad was already up and making breakfast. He had showered, dressed—in a t-shirt and sweatpants, but still—and done his usual hair routine. He uses this pomade that I think is for dry hair, but he scrubs it through wet hair and it somehow always ends up looking good. I have female friends who would pay a lot of money for waves like that, but he gets them while using hair product incorrectly directly after showering. Life's not fair.

Anyway, the breakfast thing was really nice. Great start to my day. Usually I'd have some toast or a Pop Tart, make a coffee with the Keurig, and start my day. Brad made bacon and scrambled eggs. After I'd thanked him and shut myself up in my room to work, I heard the sounds of him doing the dishes. Shortly after, I heard the washing machine running, and an hour later, the dryer. I felt like a working man in the 1950s, like I had a hardworking wife keeping things together at home while I worked. 

When I took my lunch break, Brad leapt off the couch and asked me how my work was going while I made a sandwich. He made one, too, and we watched the news while we ate. I went back to work, and Brad went quiet.

I figured he was watching a movie or reading a book or doing something in his room, but when I finished my work for the day and came out into the living room, I found that he'd scrubbed all the baseboards, the kitchen tile floor, and was just finishing up the bathroom. He was on his hands and knees, scrubbing with a toothbrush. When I came out, he sprang to his feet and told me about everything he'd done.

All baseboards. Kitchen floor and backsplash. The entire bathroom. He cleaned the air system's filters, too, and cleaned the seal of the front-loading washer, something I had never done. He was super excited about all of it, happy to list off everything he'd done. He helped me make Caesar salad and lasagne as he told me about all of it.

I got kind of jealous of his boss, at that point. He's such a hard worker. I jokingly told him I'd love to have someone like him on my team at work. He responded by asking if I had anything he could do.

"Not, like, for pay or anything. Just, is there anything you can think of that needs doing that I can do?"

I didn't know what to say. I told him I'd think about it, but as we cooked and ate and watched an HBO documentary about the Unabomber, I couldn't really think of anything and that worried me. He basically cleaned the whole apartment. He's already done everything there is to do within our walls. If he did all that on day 3, how was he going to be able to cope for the next 11 days?

Just before we went to bed, he asked if I'd thought of anything. I told him the truth: not unless he wanted to scrub out all the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen. He said, "Okay!" with a huge smile.

Before I go to sleep, I'm going to google up a list of obscure household tasks and see if there's anything else he could possibly do. I totally understand all the parents who have to homeschool right now. This anxious little part of my brain is constantly thinking about how I can help Brad use this time wisely. I feel kind of responsible for him.