There was something about that concoction of smells...the Old Spice, the Chanel No. 5, her pressed powder, his freshly cleaned suit...I loved it when they got dressed up to go out. They seemed different. Young. When I was little my older sisters and I would do silly stuff while they were gone...we'd dance on the coffee table and try doing cartwheels in our tiny living room. In my teenage years those smells meant that I'd have a boyfriend over who'd run out the front door as my parents came in the back way.
They'd always come home with a centerpiece of wilted flowers or little pink and blue candied almonds bundled in white netting. The delicious perfumes from the early evening would be replaced by stale traces of rye and vermouth, smoke and nail polish remover. He would have danced to make her happy. She'd complain that her feet hurt. By the next morning, they'd be snarling at each other and everything would return to ... normal.
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