6. Nicole meets the Clockmaster
How long had she been asleep? She was woken up by the mid-afternoon sun that shone a white light through the open window, like a slap on her face and blinding her.
Nicole lay on the bed, lazy and inhaling the fragrance of her perfume in her bed linens mixed with the odour of cigarette smoke of yesternight, sweet and acrid. Other smells gradually filled her bedroom; from the smallish kitchen where left over pasta and tomato sauce blended with coffee brewed several days ago; from the bathroom – sanitary products, bath gels and foams and aromatherapy oils left open on the tub; and from her own body scent, in multiple variations. She’d had too much to drink and it only made her olfactory senses more acute at the first moments of awakening.
She lay there for about an hour, fighting the lingering dormancy of her body and the headache that prevented her from slumber, until finally she got up to wash herself. Looking herself in the mirror, she noticed the make‑up she forgot to remove, the deep grey circles under her eyes, the wrinkles, made grossly visible from sleeping into late hours, the lassitude of her flesh, the tousled hair. She let the water run in the shower, muffling the noises from the street that she had gotten used to, but of which she was unintentionally aware now.
The water showered, heavy and hot, over her body like a second, liquid, skin that you put on and peel off the next instant. The soft thundering of water on her head, the big fat successive drops running into streams through her hair, opened a window into an invisible intangible compartment where her thoughts ran free and her naked body was released from modesty and shame.
In the vapour, her mind began to clear and all odours gradually vanished. All except for one: an odour that although familiar to her was unexpected, misplaced. The smell of sperm. It enveloped her till it stuck to her skin; it was in the running water, in the steam, in the tiles. In the mirror. It became thicker in the air; sweeter like a balm of roses; penetrating like ripe figs cut open. It did not turn her on. In fact, there was nothing sexual about it. It seemed rather like a prank her senses – numb last night, over-stimulated today – were playing on her. And this caused her repulsion above all.
After a while – and after putting the cap back on all her bath gels, foams and shampoos she usually kept open –, she got out of the shower, still saturated with the male smell of sex.
Back in the bedroom to get dressed, she noticed that the air was filling up with other scents – of flowers, fruits, spices, oils. Forlorn amid such invasive, alien odours, she opened the window wide open to let fresh air in. But to no avail. Instead, the humming noise from the street below became louder and a strange buzz intruded her head.
She dressed up quickly – a pair of jeans (any jeans would’ve done, but she picked some designer jeans, $300 she paid for in a shop in SoHo) and a black tee‑shirt over a push-up bra. No make up, just a quick brush of the hair.
She ran down the flights of stairs of her building to the street, somewhere in the Upper 100’s, gasping for air, only to realise she’d forgotten her purse and watch. She reached for her house keys, unwilling to go back to the apartment and be immersed again in that smell which, by now, was like a stench to her, and found a small pack of $50 bills. This came as a blessing to her: she no longer had to come up to her flat; she could go for a coffee, even spend some money shopping, for long enough until the air cleared.
She walked to the next Starbuck’s where she ordered a caffé latte (no adding vanilla or cinnamon, this time!). While sitting there, sipping her hot coffee and gazing out the window, she saw a small shop across the street she’d never noticed before.
It was a watch shop and feeling her bare wrist, she decided, on a whim, to go in and buy herself a new watch.
Despite its apparent normalcy, something struck her as odd in the shop. A man, in his fifties, was looking at her, smiling attentively behind his turtle-rimmed glasses, halfway down his nose. But he looked perfectly normal as any other shopkeeper. Then she spotted the large clock behind the shopkeeper – an ordinary wooden bow‑shaped clock, lacquered black, with two oversized dials and ornamented bezels in gold. The strange thing about this clock, which took centrepiece in the array of clocks and watches on display, was that the fingers on each dial ran in opposite directions: the fingers on the right dial ran clockwise, while those on the left ran counter‑clockwise. And none of them told the correct hour, because one (the one on the right) read 20 past 3, whilst the other marked 9.40. None of the watches and clocks, in fact, marked the same hour – each and every one read a different one, although the date mark for the day was right. “Odd”, she thought.
“Hello, miss, how can I help you?”
“Well, er, good afternoon – I’m looking for a watch, something casual, nothing fancy, really”. And, still a bit aloof (and slightly put off by being addressed as “miss”), she enquired “Can you tell me the time, please?”
His smile widened in a gentle avuncular way – “I can see you do need a watch, miss! Well, then, let’s see…” He took his pocket watch, an old battered gold pocket watch, slipped his glasses up his nose, looked at the watch in his right hand and, stealing a glance at Nicole, finished the sentence “… it’s e-xactly one minute past eight!”
Past eight o’clock already? How long had she been asleep?
Nicole lay on the bed, lazy and inhaling the fragrance of her perfume in her bed linens mixed with the odour of cigarette smoke of yesternight, sweet and acrid. Other smells gradually filled her bedroom; from the smallish kitchen where left over pasta and tomato sauce blended with coffee brewed several days ago; from the bathroom – sanitary products, bath gels and foams and aromatherapy oils left open on the tub; and from her own body scent, in multiple variations. She’d had too much to drink and it only made her olfactory senses more acute at the first moments of awakening.
She lay there for about an hour, fighting the lingering dormancy of her body and the headache that prevented her from slumber, until finally she got up to wash herself. Looking herself in the mirror, she noticed the make‑up she forgot to remove, the deep grey circles under her eyes, the wrinkles, made grossly visible from sleeping into late hours, the lassitude of her flesh, the tousled hair. She let the water run in the shower, muffling the noises from the street that she had gotten used to, but of which she was unintentionally aware now.
The water showered, heavy and hot, over her body like a second, liquid, skin that you put on and peel off the next instant. The soft thundering of water on her head, the big fat successive drops running into streams through her hair, opened a window into an invisible intangible compartment where her thoughts ran free and her naked body was released from modesty and shame.
In the vapour, her mind began to clear and all odours gradually vanished. All except for one: an odour that although familiar to her was unexpected, misplaced. The smell of sperm. It enveloped her till it stuck to her skin; it was in the running water, in the steam, in the tiles. In the mirror. It became thicker in the air; sweeter like a balm of roses; penetrating like ripe figs cut open. It did not turn her on. In fact, there was nothing sexual about it. It seemed rather like a prank her senses – numb last night, over-stimulated today – were playing on her. And this caused her repulsion above all.
After a while – and after putting the cap back on all her bath gels, foams and shampoos she usually kept open –, she got out of the shower, still saturated with the male smell of sex.
Back in the bedroom to get dressed, she noticed that the air was filling up with other scents – of flowers, fruits, spices, oils. Forlorn amid such invasive, alien odours, she opened the window wide open to let fresh air in. But to no avail. Instead, the humming noise from the street below became louder and a strange buzz intruded her head.
She dressed up quickly – a pair of jeans (any jeans would’ve done, but she picked some designer jeans, $300 she paid for in a shop in SoHo) and a black tee‑shirt over a push-up bra. No make up, just a quick brush of the hair.
She ran down the flights of stairs of her building to the street, somewhere in the Upper 100’s, gasping for air, only to realise she’d forgotten her purse and watch. She reached for her house keys, unwilling to go back to the apartment and be immersed again in that smell which, by now, was like a stench to her, and found a small pack of $50 bills. This came as a blessing to her: she no longer had to come up to her flat; she could go for a coffee, even spend some money shopping, for long enough until the air cleared.
She walked to the next Starbuck’s where she ordered a caffé latte (no adding vanilla or cinnamon, this time!). While sitting there, sipping her hot coffee and gazing out the window, she saw a small shop across the street she’d never noticed before.
It was a watch shop and feeling her bare wrist, she decided, on a whim, to go in and buy herself a new watch.
Despite its apparent normalcy, something struck her as odd in the shop. A man, in his fifties, was looking at her, smiling attentively behind his turtle-rimmed glasses, halfway down his nose. But he looked perfectly normal as any other shopkeeper. Then she spotted the large clock behind the shopkeeper – an ordinary wooden bow‑shaped clock, lacquered black, with two oversized dials and ornamented bezels in gold. The strange thing about this clock, which took centrepiece in the array of clocks and watches on display, was that the fingers on each dial ran in opposite directions: the fingers on the right dial ran clockwise, while those on the left ran counter‑clockwise. And none of them told the correct hour, because one (the one on the right) read 20 past 3, whilst the other marked 9.40. None of the watches and clocks, in fact, marked the same hour – each and every one read a different one, although the date mark for the day was right. “Odd”, she thought.
“Hello, miss, how can I help you?”
“Well, er, good afternoon – I’m looking for a watch, something casual, nothing fancy, really”. And, still a bit aloof (and slightly put off by being addressed as “miss”), she enquired “Can you tell me the time, please?”
His smile widened in a gentle avuncular way – “I can see you do need a watch, miss! Well, then, let’s see…” He took his pocket watch, an old battered gold pocket watch, slipped his glasses up his nose, looked at the watch in his right hand and, stealing a glance at Nicole, finished the sentence “… it’s e-xactly one minute past eight!”
Past eight o’clock already? How long had she been asleep?
posted by Shardul at 10:12 am
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