Concluded Space

EVERYTHING THAT WASN'T FOR ME I HAD TO CHASE

by AE Paulino

She was older and smelled really good. I was still asleep when she woke and brushed up her hair and got half-dressed. My roommate was still away so she used his towel, she made herself coffee and answered a few texts by the living room window. When I woke up I assumed she had left but that's where I found her, on the window sill, she smiled up with her wide mouth and dark lips. I pretended I wasn't just talking to myself, maybe she heard me. I said hello, so did she. Her chin indicated a cup of coffee she made me; it sat on the stove, heat, like an apparition, hovered out from it like an exorcism. I nodded and expected her to understand it meant thanks. I brushed my teeth and she was fully dressed when by the time I was finished, she was ready to go. This was disappointing because I was hoping to join her at the window sill and talk a little more. 

"I'll call you later if I can." She said, her hand petting my abdomen and her words, tracing my ears. 

I wanted to kiss her but she had already began to walk away and I felt silly holding her or calling her back for something as little as a kiss. I went out to the fire escape to smoke a cigarette, blowing the smoke into the breezy Sunday afternoon. I wish my window was to the front of the building so I could watch her walk away. I'm sure my pillow still smells like her scent. A mixture of shampoo, cigarettes, sweat, and I swear there is something else--something only detected by the nose when attracted to someone, when stimulated by them in such a way that an awareness opens the nerves and vacuums in all sorts of information usually kept from entering by both parties. if estrogen had a scent, maybe it was that but I think its something else. Maybe her soul, aura or her DNA.