Mirror Man

Cleansing!.

Finding himself nervously pacing around the flat, not knowing what to do with himself now that his day was thrown into turmoil, the order that he had in his mind, get up, take meds, visit hospital, have lunch with the Chandlers, come home, take meds, shower, take meds, sleep, having been messed up he didn't know what to do.

In a desperate attempt to clear his head of all the thoughts and decisions and what ifs rolling around Danny decided to clean the flat.

Digging under the sink he pulled out a battered bucket, some scouring pads, bleach, disinfectant and cloths.

Changing out of his half decent clothes he donned an old pair of worn joggers and a faded green t-shirt and began his mission to forget, for just a few hours.

As he scrubbed he realised the walls of his flat weren't dirty grey.

The sitting room was actually quite a nice light lilac colour, the lampshade in the sitting room wasn't grey either, that was ivory.

His bedroom walls were actually a delicate blue, the lampshade the same colour, the skirting boards and window frames were white and the bathroom was in fact a pale yellow.

The bathroom floor and the scrap of laminate flooring in his tiny offset kitchen alcove were both surprisingly light grey with flecks of black and white, not the sludgy grey he always thought they were.

The ceilings were also white, not cream as he'd supposed, the noticeable difference lightened up the entire small space, giving it the illusion of being bigger and dare he say, warmer.

He threw his few rather tatty thin rugs, curtains and grimy bedding, that hadn't been washed since the last time he bothered to change them, two weeks before the night of the accident, that still bore faint blood stains from the night he scraped his chest on the broken spring, into the wash.

When his new mattress had arrived he'd simply moved the bedding from the old to the new, being so tired he'd simply wanted to sleep, without expending extra energy on putting a whole new clean set of bedclothes on.

As he carried on cleaning with the washing machine swishing and gurgling in the corner, seeing the results of his hard work come to life Danny was spurred on.

Next he tipped out the cupboards and the fridge, cleaning as he went, disinfecting every surface, every knife, fork, spoon, every plate and bowl, glass and mug, every utensil, until everything shone and the strong smell of lemon and bleach seeped through every pore.

Finally, stripping the sofa of its cushions and throwing the covers into the wash, having removed the first load and hung it over the radiators to dry, he discovered where half his cutlery had disappeared to, £40 in notes (he had wondered where that went thinking he'd dropped it on the street and it was gone forever) and £5.63 in change.

A multitude of chocolate wrappers and crisp packets followed, and enough dust to choke an elephant.

His vacuum cleaner didn't know what hit it, three times out to the bin outside the door to empty the thing out, twice pulling it apart and unblocking the pipe where detritus had become lodged, the poor thing grinding and shuddering as he manically cleaned and cleaned, definitely on its last legs.

Having rehung the now totally different coloured curtains and relaid the rugs, he shifted the sofa back flat against the inner wall, the coffee table beside it in the previously full of junk corner by the bathroom, creating a good amount of space, the huge beautiful bouquet from the Chandlers taking pride of place in its centre.

He moved the TV cabinet flat to the opposite wall instead of at an angle near the middle of the room making the whole place seem huge.

Finding a roll of wide heavy duty tape he stuck lengths around the draughtiest parts of the windows, instantly raising the temperature it seemed as the cool air from outside was prevented from seeping through.