The Janitor

by TerribleSpeller

Rating: everyone
Tags: Slice of Life, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 1610

A janitor introspects on his job.

A janitor introspects on his job.

Inspired by me cleaning my classroom in Middle School and High School, and a recent seminar held by a janitor in my University.

Thanks to Stinium Ruide for proofreading.

Published 2022-09-13 14:50:01 UTC
Last updated 2022-09-13 14:50:01 UTC

The Janitor

A janitor’s job is simple.

The sun had risen a few moments ago, and Squeaky Brush knew how his duty was ever since he got his cutie mark. It was just a simple bucket along with a mop right on top of his calm lime coat.

With the mop in his grip, Squeaky’s hooves pushed the mop against the stained floor below it. The once clean marble floor let out a small squelch as water and soap fought against the stain upon it that was a split cup of coffee.

His hooves had experienced this action an infinite number of times before, he knew this song and dance. The quiet tunes of the squelch, the drag back, and him pushing the mop forward pressed deep into his mind. He let out a hum as he looked down, the sound of the squelch having disappeared, just as the stain had.

Squeaky let out a small smile to himself at the sight. A stain upon the mess that was his boss’ floor gone.

Squeaky picked up his mop and placed it onto the cleaning service trolley he had been provided with. His trusty cloth and spray bottle hanging off a bar of the trolley. The main sight of it was the bucket, yellow enough to make lemons jealous, it was iconic in its mediocrity.

With the mop in place, Squeaky chuckled to himself as he checked the mop was strapped to its place. Remembering the time he had forgotten to do so, leading to him being smacked in the face by the mop once he tried to push the trolley.

“It’s clean now, boss,” Squeaky turned to the stallion positioned within the room, an old unicorn mare. Her coat, maroon. She had a delightfully blonde mane, and the suit and tie were the same as he remembered. A mare that he knew, knew not his name.

“Yes, yes, thanks,” came the grumble from the boss, and Squeaky kept his small smile as he began to push the trolley away.

The other unicorn sitting opposite of the boss was instead of a more brownish colour. His mane seemed to dance among the shades of red and black, presumably simple dark red would be the word fitting, but Squeaky knew not the word to describe it.

A small, sheepish smile from him reminded Squeaky that he was the one to have spilled the drink, necessitating his presence in the first place. Squeaky merely gave a small nod as he headed out, needing not to know the Boss nor the Boss’ client name all that much.

He was an old janitor, and a janitor’s job was simple.

Clean up everybody else’s messes.

A janitor’s job is simple.

The sun was high in the sky as Squeaky Brush grunted as he balanced on the ladder, his hindhooves dancing on the precipice of balance and falling. A foreleg, outstretched as the window wiper in his hoof brought down the bubble ridden liquid holding against the window.

A younger Squeaky would have been exasperated at the thought of cleaning such a large window, twice and a half his height. The first time he had tackled such a high window was when he helped clean his high school’s second story windows from the outside. The entire time he was squirming to himself from the height.

Even as he strained his foreleg, he chuckled at the memory.

The janitor back at his old school was anything but a fragile mare. Gruff-looking, bags eternally underneath those dolomite eyes, and a mane seemingly having a natural position in a bun. Squeaky had looked up at the mare before. After an angsty phase in his earlier teenage years that he couldn’t possibly be a mere janitor, he had embraced his destiny wholeheartedly.

The mare was, more to say, disappointed to see that a colt had pinned her as a role model.

She had remarked to him many times that the task of a janitor was inglorious and something that he should try to avoid no matter the cost. She claimed it was a thankless job. One where the pay was meagre and existence unacknowledged by the world around them.

“Listen kid, your work’d be useless as a janitor,” Squeaky remembered her saying once, “No matter what you do, things will get dirty. It is pointless.”

“But Miss Tear had said this was an important job!” He had replied, but the mare had shook her head.

Her words were of a quality that only old mares could provide, dripping with wisdom of those who had seen enough, “That’s what they say to make us feel better. We are noponies to those more fortunate.”

Even now as he descended the ladder, having finally reached that last spot, he wondered if she was right. Squeaky knew for a fact that most ponies here in this office knew not his name. Most didn’t even notice him wandering the halls cleaning up their messes.

But Squeaky knew better as he began the slow process of folding the ladder.

Even if a Janitor’s task was simple.

Cleaning up everybody’s messes, an important task.

A janitor’s job is simple.

And the sun had long set as Squeaky placed his mop back into the water, a hoof pushing down on the pedal integrated into the bucket. It made his job just a bit easier in preparing the right amount of water within the mop to continue cleaning the floor.

The mop let out a small sqleuch as it placed onto the tiled floor, pushing against the small hints of dirt, grime, and dust hidden in the reflections of the tiles. He wondered how they managed to evade detection by the common eye this long, but that was a line of thought he kept returning to every day around this time.

It was just muscle memory guiding him now. Lift the mop up, drench it in water, press down a hoof, spin it for five seconds in the bucket, wipe the floor with twenty strokes, and repeat.

Squeaky wondered what the boss did today as he looked at his reflection against the wet floor. His limey face and yellow mane looked back up at him. Squeaky paused for a moment in his actions, as he looked at the reflection.

He looked old. He didn’t need a mirror to spot the signs of wrinkles across his face, and the black bags underneath his eyes. Squeaky wondered when he began to look like this.

He searched his memory for a moment, but forced himself back to the mop and floor. A janitor’s job was simple. Clean, clean, and clean. This was his task.

He wasn’t here to ponder upon the days he had lost in his service of proper cleanliness of the office. He wasn’t here to question the point of his existence. He wasn’t paid to be philosophical. He was here to clean.

It was a mind numbingly simple task that Squeaky found himself falling back into. The task of what the janitor from his high school had called the job of noponies. For a moment, Squeaky wondered what his job would had been if he didn’t choose to be a janitor…

Would he have been a scientist?

Would he have been a factory worker?

Would he have been a soldier?

Would he have been a doctor?

Would he have been an electrician?

Squeaky pushed those thoughts away as he focused back on his job. A janitor was that. Just that. A janitor. A pony whose job was to clean.

But the quietness of the hallways, the emptiness of the office, and the tools with him refuse to let him stop thinking and go on autopilot. The quiet whispers of the mundane around him, asked him. And they asked him pointed questions to his mind’s rebellion against the situation now.

If his mind raised a question of a better career, the potted plant by the side of the hall questioned who would have cleaned the floors.

If his mind raised a question of accepting the statements of the janitor before, the floors asked if he would’ve cared about them.

If his mind raised a question of the usefulness of the job, the instruments of cleaning which his hooves held, questioned if they could do the job without their conductor.

Squeaky let out a small sigh as he placed his mop back into the bucket, spinning it around with a hoof on the pedal as he let it soak.

He supposed that the janitor from his high school was right, this job was a task for noponies. A quiet job for those most ponies cared not for. A job about cleaning up things that would merely get dirtier later.

Squeaky pondered on the question of what the office would be without a janitor. Perhaps much more prudune in smell, and intolerable in appearance. He held a small thought of disgust at the idea of such and he brought his mop upon the floor with much more vigour this time.

He supposed that this job was a thankless job. One where nopony really cared about him.

But what was the workplace without him? It would moult and decay into ruin. And nopony liked a ruined place.

Squeaky let out a small sigh, and then a small smile as he looked at his face in the reflection of a now clean tile.

If everypony else saw it beneath them to clean up things, better him, a thankless soul than to let it all rot.

A janitor’s job was simple.

Cleaning up everybody’s messes, for who else would do it but him?