The humidity in the air plastered my shirt to my skin and made my lungs ache. Before this afternoon, I wouldn’t have said laundry was actual torture, but before this afternoon, I had never tried to do laundry for a few hundred people. “You! Over here!” The counselor—a chubby woman with a nose ring and olive skin—raised her voice above the din of the machines. Twelve pairs of eyes turned toward her as we each tried to figure out which one of us she was talking to. At the machine next to me, Eve dropped the armful of Thornhill shirts she was holding and pushed back her sweat-damp hair. The counselor’s gaze locked on me. “Over here,” she repeated. I followed her across the long, narrow room to where two-dozen wheeled bins awaited an ever-rotating supply of uniforms, sheets, and towels. She gestured at two smaller bins set off to the side. Unlike the others, they had lids but no wheels. One was labeled Gloves, the other Smocks. “These need to go to the garden sheds by the produce fields.
