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She learned the secret of life from the battered washing machine in the corner of their basement. As the older sibling, it was her duty to help mom manage things. Twice a week, she'd measure and pour the perfect amount of Cheer into the machine's plastic container. After setting the dial to rapid spin, she'd collapse the willows of her legs and sit and watch the clothes collide the way other kids would watch TV. Clean clothes came out, got folded, got worn, and came back to her dirty and stained.  When she was twelve, Sarah suspected the laundry's wisdom was the most important truth of the world. It took another twenty-three years before she knew for a fact that it was.

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Sarah always makes sure to fold Jimmy's clothes carefully, even though they are the messiest. She likes to press her hands firmly on the crease of his small blue trousers, pushing out the wrinkles until they look fresh out of the kids Gap store.  Jimmy's favorite Mickey Mouse shirt somehow seems to get worse every week. Its grassy color turns spilled mustard into a puke brown green and makes ketchup look like dried blood. She would spend hours cleaning them, because Jimmy didn't know how to get the stains out. 

*

She watches her brother giggle as the magician pulls another coin from his nose. Only 9 years old, Jimmy still loves magicians, even the ones mom could afford; the kinds with watery eyes, two dollar gag mustachios, and breath that smells like dill pickles and cigarettes. Jimmy looks back at his friends, making sure they could see the magic happen. He holds the magician's overly long suit tail, so that the man couldn't make himself disappear.

*

Twenty-one and in Las Vegas, another magician does tricks at a party. Sarah sees that this time Jimmy is ignoring the man completely. Instead, he is focusing on the blonde girl next to him. She's wearing a low cut green dress - green like their mother's eyes. He slaps her ass. She slaps his face and walks off. Laughing hard, he pinches open the top button of his polo and pulls out the vial that is connected to his neck by a chain. After unscrewing the top, Jimmy spoons several heaps of cocaine onto the back of his hand. He looks back at his friends, making sure they could see the magic happen. And the last bit of Mom's inheritance disappears back up his nose.

*

At thirty-eight, Jimmy is Jim and magic is dead. Sarah remembers how, when she last visited, his eyes bored into the back of the skulls of his two children, product of his poor judgement, cause for his shotgun wedding. She tries calling him on his birthday, but he ignores all of her calls. She imagines him shifting through static channels with a can of stale beer in hand, occasionally glancing at the closet where he keeps his suitcase. His clothes are wrinkled and dirty. His wife doesn't do his laundry, his daughter is too young, and he still doesn't know how to get the stains out.

Shift, reset, begin cycle.