The rest of his morning went by without incident and by the time he was ready to take his break, the building was ready to welcome in the rush of students. There were a couple of classrooms whose floors he’d be stripping down and re-waxing after his break, as well as a few offices whose carpets needed a deep clean. He liked doing floors. It was relaxing and almost meditative and he was glad he had that to look forward to.

Rising six stories upward, the yellow-brown brick building stood out against the purple night sky. It was the education building for the university and during the day was one of the busiest buildings on campus. At night it was a different story. Amber streetlamps shone near the main entrance, flickering from age as well as the numerous moths and other insects that flew in their dizzying circles around the light. The air was crisp and a slight breeze blew down from the mouth of the canyon.

A familiar weight at his side, the large set of keys clanked while Chris walked. He kept the collar of his jacket tucked up and his hands in the pockets. A knit beanie pulled low over his ears was just enough to keep his head warm. His hair itched beneath the beanie but he’d worn it almost every day for so long that he hardly noticed any more.

As he approached the building he listened to the hard snap of his boot heels on the sidewalk. It was only in these middle-of-the-night hours that the world was quiet enough for him to really hear their satisfying tip tap of heel and toe with each step.

As he neared the front doors, Chris pulled on the key chain. It was clipped to his waistband but the keys themselves were on a cable that stretched as he pulled. It was a simple convenience, but one he had worked for years without and, looking back now, wouldn’t ever want to go without. He thumbed through the dozen or so keys until he found the right one and unlocked the door. Once inside he made sure to re-lock the door behind himself and then proceeded on towards the closet that passed for his office.

Down in the basement, his office was just big enough for his desk and a coat rack. In years past it had probably served as a storage closet. Chris hung up his coat and sat down at the desk. He looked down at the calendar and made a mental note of the special projects he had scheduled himself to complete that day in addition to the usual cleaning.

That done, he got up, stretched for a few minutes, and then stepped back out into the hallway. Opposite of his office was the current custodial closet where he stored the cleaning supplies, mops and brooms, gloves, and everything else he needed on a daily basis. Some days he changed up his routine to avoid monotony but today he felt like just going through the standard order of things. He wheeled the large trash bin out of the closet and began going down the hallway, unlocking each room as he went and checking the trashcans within.

While he worked, Chris alternated between humming, whistling, and singing to himself. He liked music, and sometimes he would play music on his portable radio when he didn’t feel like providing the music himself. Other times he would listen to podcasts or news reports, but those were the exception.

As the next door swung open and Chris flipped on the light he was surprised to find the professor, unconscious on the couch that sat facing his desk. Finding people asleep in their offices wasn’t completely unheard of and had this been another simple case of someone burning the midnight oil Chris would have just grabbed the trash and moved on as usual. However, this particular professor was sprawled out on the couch, completely naked, with his shirt and pants folded beneath his head for a pillow.

Before the professor could wake, Chris backed out of the room, switching off the light as he went, and closed the door. Once back out in the hallway he pulled out his pad of sticky notes and quickly jotted down a message:

Please leave your trashcan outside your door when spending the night.

He signed it Facilities Management.

Chris had long since learned that putting his name to such notes tended to lead to problems and professors questioning why he had been allowed into their office. As though their trash was magically removed and their floors were swept, vacuumed, or mopped without someone needing to have access to their offices.

The note finished, he cracked the door back open and stuck the note to the wall beside the door at face level and then moved on.

He had to laugh about it, really. So many people took for granted the fact that there was a small army of people coming in at night and cleaning their offices, classrooms, and every other area of the university buildings. Each time Chris found people in the building was potentially the next funny story he could share with the rest of the custodial staff. Anyone who had worked there for any amount of time had such stories to tell. Everything ranging from professors and students engaging in ‘extracurricular’ activities, to grad student parties had been seen. More than a few people, professors and students alike, had been punished for those actions as well. Every few years something really serious would be walked in on and those involved were often expelled or fired from the university. Most of the time it was mostly harmless, like the naked professor on his couch. If Chris had to guess, the professor was having relationship troubles at home and just coincidentally had a habit of sleeping in the buff.

He was of the opinion that, as long as they weren’t causing problems, he didn’t really care. It was when people began to go out of their way to make his job harder that he tended to take action. Like the time last Spring when someone began writing obscenities on the bathroom walls with feces. For a long while Chris thought it was some freshman and was dumbfounded when he finally caught the culprit, brown handed. It had been one of the department heads. Turned out she was upset with something the Provost had done. She knew he frequented that particular bathroom and had intended her messages for him. After the dust settled from that episode, she had been let go from the university and the Provost got a private restroom installed just for him.

University politics were something Chris worked very hard to stay out of. The amount of petty insults and acts of professional assassinations that went on had shocked him when he first became aware of it. Everything from what offices were assigned to people, to how quickly their supply requests or work orders were fulfilled were used to mess with each other. More than once, Chris had been instructed by higher ups whether he should either hurry up or drag his feet on this project or that since so-and-so owed a favor or had a feud going on. Chris never listened to those instructions. He did each job as they came in and if people didn’t like it they could fire him.

Of course, if they fired him he would fight them in court for wrongful termination. It wasn’t something he liked to think about, since he was mostly a pacifist and preferred to avoid confrontation, but he liked his job and that was something he would fight for. Over the years most everyone had learned that he didn’t play those games. In a lot of ways that had earned him a fair amount of respect. There were times when different departments would lobby to have him transferred to their buildings just so they could stop whatever sabotaging had been going on. None of them ever acknowledged that they could just stop it themselves if they would only get along.

After collecting and throwing out the trash, Chris went back and swept and vacuumed the floors. He only mopped the floors once a week unless there was a spill or other obvious mess that sweeping and vacuuming wouldn’t get. Then he moved on to the bathrooms. Pretty much everyone hated cleaning the bathrooms when they first started out, but after a while, most people found that to be their favorite task. Extreme messes were uncommon so most bathroom cleaning was pretty quick. Just spray everything down, give the fixtures a scrub, refill the paper products, and then give the floor a quick mop. Once a month he liked to give them all a deep clean to keep any hard water mineral buildup from getting out of hand, as well as to scrub into the little nooks and crannies that were often missed in the regular daily cleanings.

As Chris wheeled the cart holding the supplies he used in the bathrooms out into the hall, a harsh voice called out to him.

“Hey!” they said with obvious surprise and anger. “What do you think you’re doing in here?”

Chris turned to face them. It was a man, middle-aged, wearing a blazer and carrying a briefcase. Few professors actually used briefcases these days, favoring backpacks and laptops over the bulkier alternatives. He was advancing on Chris as if he intended to perform a citizen’s arrest or something.

“I’m the custodian for the building,” Chris told him and gestured to his cart.

The man hesitated at this explanation as his eyes bounced between Chris and the cleaning supplies.

“Oh,” he said, deflating somewhat, “well then, why are you still here? Shouldn’t you have finished by now?”

Chris checked his watch. It was just after 6:30 am.

“Now, I really don’t care but It’s actually you who aren’t supposed to be here,” Chris told him. “This building’s supposed to be closed for another hour. Only custodial staff are allowed inside right now.”

“What?” the man blustered and Chris regretted his remarks already. “You can’t throw me out! Do you know who I am?”

“Sorry, I don’t get to see people most days. I’m Chris, what’s your name?”

Chris pulled his right hand out of its glove and held it out to shake.

The other man just sneered and waved it away.

“That’s disgusting,” he spat. “You’ve been touching who knows what and you think I want to shake your hand?”

“Well, that’s what the gloves are for,” Chris said but retracted his hand all the same.

The man stood there awkwardly for a moment and then turned and left. Chris watched him go. He stamped away from Chris and ultimately exited the building. Curious, Chris pulled the walkie talkie from his cart and radioed the campus police. He gave a brief description of the man and the encounter he’d had and left it at that. It was probably nothing, but it never hurt to be careful. There was never any lack of unstable people on campus, it seemed.

Chris also checked the door the man had left by and was surprised to find it unlocked. He relocked it and then made a quick check of the other entrances. He found a couple more doors that were unlocked. He radioed that in as well. Unlocked doors weren’t uncommon but finding this many unlocked was surprising.

The rest of his morning went by without incident and by the time he was ready to take his break, the building was ready to welcome in the rush of students. There were a couple of classrooms whose floors he’d be stripping down and rewaxing after his break, as well as a few offices whose carpets needed a deep clean. He liked doing floors. It was relaxing and almost meditative and he was glad he had that to look forward to.