“It really is amazing, Niraj,” I said. “I could tumble out superlatives for a year.”
“Thank you. Would you like to see the rest? And then I’ll make your tea.”
“Sure.”
He showed me the bathroom, with a tall, deep tub, and a row of African violets on the windowsill, and the study downstairs, reached through a set of French doors. And then upstairs to the bedrooms tucked under the eaves. I tried not to look at the one I knew must be his—a simple frame bed, a bureau, a large, framed sepia photo of an elephant and a boy. Soft north light spilled through the window, making an inviting pool of stillness. His bedspread was white.
A voice whispered in my mind, You will be happy here.
The other two bedrooms were unfurnished, just open, empty rooms. “I have not lived here very long,” he said.
“So not much time has passed since you broke up with your girlfriend?”
“Long enough,” he said. His voice said clearly the subject was off-limits.
We went back down the stairs and Niraj said, “Make yourself at home. I’ll make the tea.”
Left alone in the living room, I prowled the edges of the room, examining things. Books lined the shelves on either side of the fireplace. Paperback science fiction and fantasy novels took a lot of space, predictably, but there were also many others. Thick historical texts on the eighteenth century; explorations of various sciences— botany and bugs, mainly—financial texts; business; travel. Very smart, this one. I liked that.
His television stood mute against the wall, not as a centerpiece as most were. When he carried a tray into the room and put it on the low coffee table, I pointed. “You don’t watch much television, do you?”
“I find it makes me sleepy, except for cricket matches.”
“Cricket? They have cricket on TV?”
His eyebrows rose to the middle of his forehead. “Of course!”
He looked so scandalized, I had to laugh. “I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen cricket in any form, never mind TV.”
“Blasphemy!” He spread his hand open on his chest and gave an exaggerated gasp. “It is the finest game in all the world! I’ll have to introduce you.”
I laughed. “The finest game in all the world?”
He wiggled an eyebrow. “Yes.” He waved me toward the seating area. When he settled on the couch, I chose the chair kitty-corner. Then wondered if I should have sat next to him on the couch.
God, Nikki, I thought in exasperation. Grow up.
“It’s not so interesting on television. Much better in person— and even better to play.”
“Do you play?”
“Oh, yes.” He shook out cloth napkins, one for me and one for him. “But I will warn you, it is best not to get me going.”
I smiled. “Point taken.”
On the tray was a fat blue ceramic pot and a pair of mugs, along with a plate of cookies, and another of cheeses, cucumbers, sliced tomatoes, and some thin bread. He passed me a saucer. “I’ll pour the tea. Help yourself to everything else.”
“Thank you. I am very hungry, I’m warning you.”
“Good.” He picked up a mug and poured a steaming, fragrant mixture into it and passed it over to me. “My own special chai,” he said with a grin.
And for one second, I was snared by the moment, fully living it. Me at forty-three, slightly sweaty after a day working a job I genuinely liked, sitting in a house in Manitou, a town I adored, with a dark-eyed man I thought might be my lover sometime soon. Against the backdrop of the warm, well-appointed room, he was beautiful, his hair in tumbles, his strong nose so appealing, his full lips. And most of all, the direct expression in his dark eyes—frank appreciation, gentleness, intelligence.
I accepted the cup. “Thank you,” I said, and carried it to my nose, inhaling deeply, letting the spices blend and expand in the cavity of my sinuses.
“Oooh, that’s fabulous!” I narrowed my eyes. “I can smell the coriander and cloves. Cardamom.” The rest melded in a mysterious combination of things I did not know. “What else?”
“Secret things,” he said, and his lips quirked slightly. “If I tell you now, how will I ever hope to bring you back again?”
I met his eyes. “Good point. Because, of course, there’s nothing at all interesting about you, only your tea.”
“Exactly. Did you find the missing element in the perfume you were working on?”
It surprised and pleased me that he remembered. “Not quite. I think it needs to be a note of some dark emotion. Anger, or bitterness, a combination, maybe.”
“Fire?” He plucked cookies from the plate, and slices of cheese.
I tested the idea against my memory of the fragrance, redolent of earth and bodies and women’s laughter. “Fire might be too much, and smoke seems too little.” I wrinkled my nose. “It’s hovering right on the edge of my imagination, just not quite there.”
“Gunpowder?”
I’d been reaching for a cookie and stopped. “Ooooh.” I looked toward the leaded windows on either side of the fireplace, let them blur as I imagined the possibility settling into the perfume. Sharp, piercing—a charcoal scent, not a red one. “That’s a definite possibility. Not sure how to represent it, but . . . ooh. Nice.” I grinned at him. “Thanks.”
“My pleasure.” He gestured. “Eat!”
Again silence settled. Unlike most men, he had not put music on, and I felt a need to fill up the spaces in our conversation with prattle. “How did your business trip go?” I bit into a cookie, a grainy oatmeal style with chocolate coating. “Yum! Oh, that’s good.”
“Mmm. My favorite,” he said approvingly. “The trip . . . it was business. No excitement. Just meetings, meetings, meetings. A new program, new ideas.”
“Do you like your job?”
“I do,” he said without hesitation. “There are days I weary of it, as with anything, but it is creative and challenging.”
I found myself watching his lips move, looking at the darkness within, and found a shiver rushing down my neck. I looked away urgently, embarrassed. “That’s good.”
“Do I make you shy, Nikki?”
I blushed and looked up at him. “A little, maybe.”
“How can I make it easier for you?”
“Um . . . I don’t know.” I laughed a little uncomfortably. Such directness!
“Are you afraid of me?”
“No!” That much I was sure of. “You just . . . I just think . . . I don’t know why you like me.” I blushed even more, the heat pouring over my face, down my neck. “If you do, that is. Oh, God. I’m bad at this.”
He laughed softly. “Will you do me one small favor?”
“Of course.”
He shifted on the couch to make space beside him. “Sit here instead of there, will you?”
“I can do that.” I stood up, bringing my cup with me, and sat down as primly, holding the mug on my tightly closed legs. “There.”
He pursed his lips, as if considering some difficult problem, and then reached for my cup, took it from my hands, and put it on the table. A ripple of anticipation moved up my spine, settled at the nape of my neck. The scent of him seemed intensified, clove and fir and that wildly arousing astringent note I thought might just be his sweat. I had a sudden vision of myself bending in to press my nose to his throat, to bite him there.
God, Nikki, get hold of yourself!
He picked up my hand and turned it over to brush his fingers across my palm. “You are smart,” he said. “And healthy.”
The descriptions stung. “That sounds like a border collie.”
He laughed, the sound robust as the spices in the tea he’d made. “I’m British, Nikki. Often, we are a bit reserved.”
I looked at him. “I’m American, Niraj. It’s a little hard to know what you’re thinking sometimes.”
“How’s this?” He touched my hair, the angle of my cheekbone. “Your hair is beautiful and your smile is kind, and I love your figure, if it i
s all right to say that.”
I felt like an idiot. Pleased, but idiotic, like a pretend virgin, and I moved my fingers against his. “You have the best lips I’ve seen in a long, long time.”
“Ah, that’s better,” he said, and made a quiet little noise. His fingers traced the edge of my ear, and my breath caught high in my throat, as he leaned in, and then the scent of him was all around me, and I inhaled it, closing my eyes to await the touch of his lips. His hand steadied my jaw, and then his lips met mine.
Oh.
His mouth was as lush as rose petals, and tasted of ginger and honey and chocolate. I liked the fullness of his lips, the thick aggressiveness of his tongue, liked the feeling of his hand on my jaw. I inclined my head, invited him in farther, enjoying a certain receptive passivity that wasn’t really my usual style.
One kiss, two. He lifted his head, and I looked at his eyes with surprise and heat, and he smiled slightly, touched a finger to my jaw, bent in once again. This kiss was hotter, deeper, more aggressive, from my part and from his. A bolt of blistering hunger moved through me, dizzying and intense, and I felt as if I would drown in him. I put my hands up, found my palms settling over his ears, my fingers in his thick hair. Hair is not Daniel’s strong point, and Niraj’s curls were startlingly erotic.
He made a low noise, and at the exact same instant, we both pulled back, and for a long space of seconds stared at each other. “Wow,” I said.
“Yes,” he said, and gave a perplexed little laugh, shifting suddenly in a way that made me realize with yet another idiotic blush that he was aroused and uncomfortable. Roxanne’s rhapsody about penises floated through my mind, and I had to struggle not to giggle nervously.
And then I wondered if he was circumcised and if I would see him naked, and I—
I stood up. “That was intense,” I said, and walked to the kitchen, took a breath, came right back.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“No. Aroused. Alarmed, maybe.” I widened my eyes. “You really are very handsome, and I like the way you kiss, and I like your brain, but the weird thing is, the way you smell is making me feel like a vampire.”
“A vampire?” he echoed.
“Yeah, I just want to devour you.”
He looked pleased. “Devouring is all right.”
I smiled. “Yeah. But maybe I should go for today, before this gets all out of hand.”
“No, no.” He waved his hands. “Stay. Sit over there. I will not kiss you anymore, I promise.” When I didn’t move, he took my hand, pulled me up, and walked me over to the chair. “There. Have another biscuit.”
“This body does not need cookies.”
“That body is perfectly fine the way it is,” he said, and picked up his tea. “Now, tell me, Nikki-Nicole, about your perfume. About this business you wish to open.”
That seemed safe enough. “All right.” I lifted my mug from the table and took a sip. “It’s something I’ve been playing with for a long time. The Scent of Hours—perfumes that sort of capture the spirit of a moment, like the day you get married, or when a baby is born, you know?”
“Go on.”
“I’ll make them in small batches and put them in particular bottles, and then sell them to tourists. I’d also like to be able to blend custom perfumes. I’ve done a few for people, up till now only friends and family, my sisters, my mother, that kind of thing. And I don’t want to sound like a braggart, but anyone I’ve made a perfume for has loved it.”
“Ah, of course. A signature.”
“Right. There’s a shop not far from Annie’s that’s for rent.” I showed him my palm, where I’d written the telephone number. “I’m playing with the possibility of renting it, but it’s kind of scary.”
“What makes it frightening?”
“It would need to be done by the time the tourist season starts, and it’s a mess, and I don’t have any money to speak of—and, well, it seems a little insane to make custom perfumes in a world where there are people who are trying to get perfume banned from public places.”
“And yet, what is more powerful than the memories triggered by scent?”
“That’s true.” Pleased, I sat forward. “Did you know that scent is the only sense that bypasses the brain and thought centers and goes directly to the limbic system?”
“Really. So that does what?”
“It takes us directly to visceral memories, transporting us to a time and place instantly.”
“Ah, so that’s why I can feel sad when I smell cinnamon, because it takes me to my grandmother, whom I miss very much.”
“Exactly. If I smell an apple Jolly Rancher candy, I instantly think of a friend of mine from childhood. Mark.” And I realized suddenly that it was the second time I’d mentioned him to Niraj, when I never spoke of him at all. In twenty years of knowing Daniel, I didn’t think I’d ever told him about my best friend from childhood.
“Is something wrong?”
“No, just a little odd. That friend of mine is the one who caught horny toads with me. He died when we were seven, and I never usually think of him, but that’s twice I’ve said something about him to you.”
“Perhaps I remind you of him.” He smiled. “Perhaps there is something in my scent, hmm?”
“Hey! You might be right. Honestly, I can’t remember what he smelled like, except maybe—” I narrowed my eyes, thought of the creek where we were forbidden to go, where we caught our horny toads.
I couldn’t quite catch it. “I don’t know.”
In my purse, my cell phone rang, and I jumped. “Sorry, I have to look in case it’s my daughter.”
The number came up as UNAVAILABLE, and I flipped the phone open. “Hello?”
“Mom?”
“Giselle! Hi!” I gave Niraj a big smile and a thumbs-up. He pointed toward the back and I stood up and headed toward the kitchen. “Are you home?”
“Yes.” She had precise, careful diction, always. “We got back yesterday. That is a long, long plane ride.”
“I’m sure.” I went out on the back deck, and leaned on the railing, feeling a slight wash of vertigo that went away when I looked up at the horizon.
Giselle told me about her trip to London, about seeing the Tower of London and the Thames and the tube. I was conscious of a ball of jealousy over her accounts, but I was also very, very pleased that she’d had the experience.
And then, out of the blue, my daughter said, “I really miss you, Mom.”
“You do? I miss you, too, babe. Are you still going to come spend the summer with me?”
“At least part of it, but Dad said we might do some more traveling.”
“Oh.” I tried to keep my voice even, but the gilded happiness I’d been feeling suddenly evaporated. “How long? Where are you going?”
“We don’t know yet. Maybe Spain. She wants to go there.”
The wife, of course. “Are you getting along pretty well with her now?”
“It’s okay. She just tries too hard. I keep telling her I don’t need a mom, that I already have one, but she doesn’t listen.”
“Be respectful, babe.”
“I am!”
“Good.” Below, a figure in a turquoise skirt and dark hair emerged from the café. Hannah. It seemed as if she looked up to this spot, and saw me. Why did I care? “Are you going to send me some pictures?”
“Yes.”
We talked a little bit longer, and then hung up. I leaned for a moment against the railing, feeling dizzy with the changes in my life, the sense of not being able to quite catch up. The worst of it was the giant hollow spot in my chest that sucked all the air out of my lungs, the black hole of missing her.
Niraj, who had obviously heard me hang up, came out on the deck. “Are you all right?” he asked.
I forced a smile. Nodded. “Thanks.”
“How old is she?”
“Fifteen. They just got back from London.”
“You did not miss anything. It’s a big, no
isy, grimy city.”
“So they say. I’d like to see for myself.”
“And so you should.”
I took in a breath, blew it out. “Sorry. I’m all right now. I just miss her like crazy.”
“I’m sure. I have never had children—I would have liked it, I think.”
“It’s not too late. Men father children well into their eighties.”
He shook his head. “No, it is too late. I am no longer willing to go through all the things that would be required. I do not want to be the sixty-seven-year-old father at the high school graduation.”
“I can understand that.”
“It is one of the reasons,” he offered, “that I did not stay with Hannah, the one you saw this afternoon. She wished to have children.”
“Ah.” I frowned. “She’s very, very beautiful.”
“Yes,” he said. And that was all.
I didn’t push it. Suddenly, though, I felt very tired. “Well, Niraj, I have enjoyed the tea and the conversation, but I think I need to take my leave.”
“Very well.” He turned and opened the door, holding it so I could pass in front of him. I picked up my purse and tucked it over my shoulder.
He held out his hand with a faintly ironic smile. “Thank you for coming, Nikki.”
I took his hand and wondered why I was being so formal with someone I liked, when I’d been so hot to trot with Wolf, who seemed like a bad boy who’d be a big fat pain in the butt. “Thanks, Niraj. I enjoyed it a lot. Especially . . .” I paused and looked at his mouth. “. . . the cookies.”
He grinned. “Me, too.”
I let his hand go, and hitched my bag higher on my shoulder. “I’ll see you around.”
“Will you walk with me again soon?”
That was easy. “Yes. Name the day.”
“Tuesday?”
“You’re on.”
12
Nikki’s Perfume Journal
SCENT OF HOURS
Time: 4 P.M.
Date: July 7, 1988
Elements: patent leather, sweaty satin, Aquanet hairspray, crushed bluegrass, white wine, chicken browned with an onion Possible ingredients: clary sage, tobacco, grapefruit, ambrette? civet?
Madame Mirabou's School of Love Page 16