LJ Idol S11 Week 1: "Resolution"

Resolution and Revolution

The graffiti is stark and violent looking-- bright, poppy red with little drips down the word. Just the one word, with a slash cutting through the word it’s replacing. Simple, really. 

It’s been popping up all over town, and if there’s one thing Eli’s sure of it’s that this case of sign debasement is not being tolerated. Overtime is getting paid out, and that’s how he knows it’s serious.

So he’s out past eight o’clock because the money is good, isn’t it. Spends plenty fine. He’s got his bucket and rag, his rubber gloves, and his industrial bottle of acetone and he’s here to undo what’s been done, to try to put the rabbit back in the hat.

He works silently with only the sound of passing cars and far-away too-loud conversations to keep him company. It’s a weekday so there’s no alcohol permitted in the city, so at least there aren’t any drunks. And curfew is in an hour anyhow, so he’ll be alone and unbothered soon enough.

He dips the rag and starts to work, scrubbing until the poppy-red ‘revolution’ fades away, sliding towards pink as it drips to the sidewalk in a cascade of pungent chemical. It doesn’t fade completely-- spray paint has gotten good, and this is the illegal kind only available on the black market. But it’s better. ‘Revolution’ is just a shadow by the time he’s finished, at least in the hazy light provided by the streetlamp.

The letters spell out the government’s preferred motto now without alteration: In Resolution, Peace. It’s on the sides of almost every official building, stamped on driving permits, and emblazoned on the shirts of federal workers nation-wide. School kids chant it every morning. Eli used to, too.

Eli puts the bucket and rag in the back of his truck. It’s inching towards nine o’clock but he has a work pass to be out after curfew if he needs to be. He snaps a picture of his handiwork for his boss, who requires that, and then puts his phone in the car as well, in the passenger glove compartment where it always lives. He can’t turn the location tracker off-- no one can anymore. So the glove compartment is a good place for it.

Also in the glove compartment of his truck is a can of red spray paint-- the illegal, hard to source kind. He lets his fingers brush over the canister, and drives down the street to the diner that stays open to 10 o’clock to feed people with legitimate after-curfew permits. He parks the truck, orders a burger, and then goes to stretch his legs.

He stops by his truck on the way. His hands are clean when he comes to eat his burger, and of course his gloves have spray paint on them. That’s his job, isn’t it?

He gets the work order the next day, too. Not a curfew job, but a morning one. Same state building, same sign. Strange, unsettling, they said, that someone worked that quick. He nods and frowns with them. Strange indeed. But the money spends just fine, he says with a smile, and goes to collect his bucket.