Last January, as in 2005, I was still living in the dorms. Our door made a very distinctive click when it was closed. Not loud or obnoxious, mind you, just distinctive.
In January, Alicia was in Prague, and I was the only one there.
Almost always, I dream. Almost never good things. That morning, though, I didn't dream at all. There was no dream to interfere with the click that snapped my eyes immediately open. It was definitely our door, but I was the only one there.
I didn't move, and the next thing that hit me was a smell I hadn't experienced in two and half years. I smelled Brennan's cologne, just a tatter of it, hanging in the air, the brief scent you catch of someone as they walk by.
I don't know what kind of cologne it is, but I know it. I've checked Men's cologne counters in department stores whenever I'm wasting a day shopping, but I've never found it. And I'll never forget it.
As this scent lingered in my mind, I realized that I was cruched over onto one side of my tiny twin bed (I normally slept sprawled out, taking up the whole thing)...I reached my hand over to the empty piece of bed, so as to stretch my body out...and it's warm. Like someone had been lying there, and had just gotten up.
I can tell myself that I had just been sleeping in that spot, and had just managed to crunch myself over, just before imagining the clcik to wake myself up...but I can't explain away his cologne.
And just now, while walking home in the warm rain, I smelled it again.
Am I going crazy?
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