Carrying Other People's Floors

I scrubbed twice yesterday.

The dirt wouldn't come out.

Gray-brown. Specific. Not mine.

From their apartment. From the move.

From carrying boxes through rooms

I'll never live in.

From touching the walls

of someone else's life

and not being able to wash it off

no matter how hard I tried.

It's under the nail still.

The crescent moon shaped like

evidence.

Like proof that I was there.

Like my body won't let me leave.

I kept scrubbing.

Kept digging at it with the other nail

like I could excavate myself

from someone else's dust.

Like I could undo

the particular investment

of showing up.

Of caring enough to carry heavy things.

But the dirt stays.

My nails stay dirty.

And I walk around with this small,

stupid reminder

that I helped.

That I was needed.

That I let myself need to be needed.

My own apartment is clean.

I know every inch of my own floor.

But under my nails is their dust.

Under my nails is the proof

that I spent Saturday

in someone else's life

and couldn't quite

leave it behind.