Usually, the back and forth motion soothed her. Jeannie pushed the vacuum cleaner forward and pulled it back to her and she pretended it was rowing practice for a minute. She wouldn't allow herself to get lost in a fantasy. She tried to stay present while she cleaned, especially the floors. She liked tending to the ground she stood on. She swept the floors and vacuumed the carpets and pressed her bare feet onto the wood and then the rug and thought about how much she enjoyed caring for a space she inhabited.
She saw Roby sit at the table and start scratching away, taking notes, making things. She looked down at her feet on her floor and flinched. Both actions, writing and sweeping, were repetitive and never produced perfect results. She looked up at the ceiling and saw that she was way behind on knocking the spider webs from the corners. She didn't enjoy that task as much. Maybe it was the guilt she felt over destroying a spider's masterpiece, their home, and their massacre spot.
Jeannie never once wiped the table. She only cleaned the tablecloth if Roby remembered to put it in the hamper. She tried to think of the last time she sat down there. The idea of sitting at the table felt as foreign to her as the possibility of spending time in a spider's web. She'd get stuck. She'd be among killers who made intricate things.
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