No matter how many times he washed, he couldn’t get clean. His hands stayed stained with ink, blood, and dirt deep in the wrinkles of his hands, where not even the strongest of soaps could reach.
Each stain held a memory. The salmon colored paint he used on the upstairs bathroom, the blood caked under his nails from plugging his buddy’s gunshot wound in ‘68, the dirt trapped under his wedding ring from when his wife had wanted to start a garden (despite her black thumb).
All memories he couldn’t wash away with mere soap.
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