Seasons Spent Lying There

Earlier today, as I was writing the previous post while lying, stomach down, on a futon/my bed/living room sofa/former bed of housemate, my face was about 5 inches from the sheet. I was propped up on a pillow and my chin was resting on it while I wrote.

A few minutes into writing, I detected a faint smell. Not a vile one, mind you, just a persistent one I had not noticed before. As I breathed it in, I realised a familiarity about it. Not knowing from whence it came, I sniffed at my pillow and hand looking for clues to its origin in an attempt to discern the memory seeping into my nostrils. Without recognition, I went back to writing.

Another minute later, I could think of nothing but the smell and my mind raced to figure out its cause. It was familiar and unfamiliar all at once, like my name misspelled or misspoken. There was a very wonted aspect of the scent, but not one to which I had been intimately acquainted. I sat up and sniffed the air heavily, my mind scanning all the reasons for its existence. Once there, the smell was completely gone, relegated, I decided, only to that corner of the bed, wiped there, no doubt, by a hand in need of a dry surface.