top notes. top notes of bergamot spring and summers in the flowering chinese countryside, rice paddies and gentle starch, of home and my childhood before i even told you where i was from. top notes of quickly broken grass stems and salt air scraping past us. top notes of the baccarat rouge from the cosmetics counter mingling with the replica jazz club i emptied over your wrists because i’ve never wanted to impress someone so much, still stuck to my clothes weeks after the act. top notes of momentarily, and quietly so i won’t pay careful attention to catch us red-handed. 

heart notes. heart notes of vanilla, warm amber. heart notes of gut-punch cinnamon and the feeling of being blind-sided. heart notes of fall rain washing out the smell of smoke and burning joss money, incense, and double red candles in adjacent gold holders that still make me cry, which you’ll regret asking about and i’ll regret betraying so many secrets. heart notes that remind me of quiet family dinners and you of that older brother you say isn’t yours anymore, and so many things i can’t possibly take back now. heart notes of the expensive edp i keep untouched in the drawer because it’s the same blurry milk-sweet as your laundry detergent, at least to me, at least to my nose from a few feet behind your shoulder. heart notes of faint blood metal creeping across my soft palate and throat because my heart bleeds more now and bleeds darker red. heart notes, spoken into the mess of your cotton t-shirt: fuck can you please tell me more? can you please tell me who you are? heart notes are whispered back patiently and quietly against my forehead, your tears and life through my hair. heart notes, that are deceptive and violently honest at the same time, because i decided earlier that i can’t love if i don’t love you. 

base notes. base notes of synthetic skin musk, which i learned is really just the smell of wet faces and bed sheets after not enough fabric softener to hide you. base notes, base notes are what’s left after the florals and vanilla cream rub away against my clothes enough, so i can smell your bare skin and peel it back to try on for size, only to see that we’re far too much the same for this to work, better off friends because the backside of your skin feels too similar. base notes of ashtrays in the rain and thick sprawling woods, they give me chills because you know everything now and you always will, wherever you go and i don’t. base notes of char and aftermath, sweet smoke i was already used to, i told you that. base notes of sugar that burns down to become rot—the end is never as fun, even though i still smell like you and will for a while. because i think we’re both good at the falling, but only that.