The Scent Keeper

by Erica Bauermeister

I climbed up into my loft and lay there among my blankets, thinking about mermaids and goats and mothers, missing pages and witches. About fathers who don’t tell you everything you want to know. But the day had been long, the boxes heavy, and my father’s love was a sure and steady thing in the room below, so I didn’t ask any more. Maybe everything would have been different if I had.

Smells don’t care what the mind or heart wants, however. Scents will find their way around the darkness of closed eyes, slipping past barricades of thought. The body is their accomplice. We can live without food for weeks, and water for days, but try not to breathe and the lungs mutiny.