My muscles become tired. I swish the broom back and forth on the floor. How do I know when I am done? Most of the debris is microscopic.
"And remember, Mister Dark Land, I want every single microscopic speck of debris to be gone," Mister Austria calls out from the next story up.
How unreasonable! Cleansing every spare particle out of the ballroom would be like trying to towel dry the Pacific Ocean!
I stop after I sweep clean the entire surface area of the ballroom, neglecting the underside of the piano, which would not shine in the shadows anyway.
Looks sparkly to me. Of course, it looked just as sparkly to begin with. I doubt that Mister Austria was capable of detecting microscopic specks anyway; he was probably exaggerating when he said that he wanted that.
I wait until he is finished with Chopin's Nocturne before I interrupt his peace by telling him that I am finished.
"I will be the judge of that."
Mister Austria descends the staircase and gets down on his knees, brushing his fingers over the floor.
"Very clean, it does sparkle. Now does the piano sparkle?"
He brushes his finger over the piano, picking up dust on it.
"The piano does not sparkle! How could you neglect the ballroom's very centerpiece!"
"M-Mister Austria, you did not tell me to clean the piano..."
"Do you not have any common sense? Did I not tell you that I wanted the entire ballroom to sparkle? Any dummkopf would have the sense to know that a ballroom is not clean if the piano is not clean!"
Mister Austria kicks me over onto my belly and stomps on my bottom. I scream as he sprains my tail.
"I will do this to you from now on if you don't do what I say. Now I need you to mop the ballroom while I prepare dinner."
"M-mop it?"
"Yes, you will have to mop it, and then sweep it again. That is the only way to get it to sparkle properly. Now take this bucket of water to dip the mop in and wear these brushes on your feet while you are mopping so that you do not leave footprints. Do you think you can handle that?"
"Uh... I gape at the ballroom that I had just finished sweeping.
"Need I inform you that you will not be eating dinner until it is done."
Having been reminded of food, my stomach all of a sudden burns. "Yes, Mister Austria".
How can he expect me to have the energy to finish this task to the standard of perfection that he expects without eating? He should at least wait until after I have eaten to do this!
I spill the entire bucket on the floor and swish it around with the mop. The water suddenly becomes very dirty, from the microscopic specks that I have missed.
The chore will be duller, since Mister Austria is cooking instead of playing music. I carefully make my way across the slippery floor to the piano, staring at the smooth ivory keys that his beautiful fingers have touched, and reach my shaking hand over them.
"And you better not be touching my piano or I will stomp on you again!"
I sigh. My only option is to make my own music, using the one instrument that Mutter was always encouraging me to use more.
I take a deep breath and begin singing a few pieces from the opera Carmen, in a voice that is utterly unrecognizable as my squeaky bubbly speaking voice.
Mister Austria does not seem to mind that I am singing as I work, so I presume that my performance is excellent. After I have swished the mop over the entire ballroom, I get the sudden reckless urge to dance over the near-frictionless floor. I turn pirouettes, trying to make myself turn as many times as possible, and then I pull my arms in to reduce my moment of inertia and thus increase my angular velocity the way a figure skater does.
"Dinner is finished - what are you doing?"
I turn my head around as I stag leap, which causes me to shift my equilibrium and crash when I reach the floor.
"You idiot! You made the floor all dirty again!"
Using a towel to avoid dirtying the floor, Mister Austria shimmies his way over to me and once again stomps on my rear.
"Now I want you to clean this entire floor again or you will go hungry tonight! And no singing if it distracts you from your job."
"Owww... yes, Mister Austria."
I turn around to look at my throbbing tail. It may be permanently bent out of shape.