The friday I lost myself

People rarely think about smell until something starts to stink.

It’s like life — no one analyzes it until it starts to rot.

Smell is an honest message from biology: “Hey, something’s decaying,” “Hey, something’s afraid,” “Hey, someone ate garlic — gross.” There’s no lie in it. It’s just truth — you either accept it or try to dodge it. Heads or tails.

If God existed, He’d probably smell like sour milk or a soaked dog. A pretty controversial statement, isn’t it? But think about it — if He created everything, then He also created what stinks. He’s in every dumpster, in every 6 a.m. train, in the breath after cheap wine, and in that little stench under your fingernail that reminds you you’re just an animal, not some angelic being or anything like that. You still think the Almighty would smell like lavender and freshly washed sheets? Or violets and morning dew?

No.

And don’t get me wrong — it’s not about blasphemy. It’s about honesty. About the fact that smell is the one kind of prayer you can’t fake. You can’t pretend you don’t stink when you’re rotting, or that you smell like your fancy perfume when you’ve spent half the evening wrapped around that lover from the ground floor — the one with the hairstyle straight out of the ’80s. “Mom, it’s not what it looks like! I was just at Mary's, I swear!”

My Saturday evening smelled of old frying oil and marital arguments.

From the apartment above came the voices of the Smiths — a couple who’d spent twenty years proving to each other that love is just another form of verbal violence. She had a voice trained by years of passive aggression — high-pitched and sharp. You know that screech when someone scrapes a fork across a ceramic plate during dinner? Yeah, that’s what arguing with old Mrs. Smith sounded like. He, on the other hand, spoke in a lower tone — calmer, slower — but with the same intent. “My dear grandson,” my late grandpa used to say, “war is war, whether you’re fighting Russians for real or your woman for the TV remote.” The Smiths could teach Sun Tzu a thing or two about the art of war, no doubt about it.

“...it’s you...”

“...I told you that...”

“...and I only asked you once, just once...”

Then something fell — maybe a vase, a bowl, or maybe their dignity. There was always a bit of ritual in their fights. As if they couldn’t fall asleep until they’d exchanged the proper number of curses.

And I knew that rhythm.

When the TV hissed and the fridge hummed, I could feel that all those sounds blended into a single organism — the building itself, alive with arguments, sighs, and unspoken grudges. A kind of neighborhood solidarity. In the morning we’d still say “good morning,” looking at each other as if none of us remembered yesterday.

Boom! A sudden thud.

For a moment, I thought it was an air raid. I’d seen it in movies — the classic setup: silence, the camera zooming in on a distant, empty hallway, and then the jumpscare. Used to work when I was thirteen. At thirty-five, it’s just funny.

Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites by Skrillex — the kid upstairs trying to resurrect his dead youth through vibrating air. Funny how it works: once you hit thirty, anyone younger automatically becomes a kid, a brat, an overgrown teenager. Even if they’re twenty-nine.

The bass spread across the wall like grease on an old pan — seeping through it, through my thoughts, through everything still pretending to be calm. And again, I had the feeling that the sound wasn’t coming from the speakers at all, but from the building itself. As if the whole block needed to let something out. Solidarity, as I said.

Each apartment was a cell, forming one living organism. I pictured the sweaty guy next door — sleeveless shirt, bouncing to the rhythm of his own desperation. He probably smelled like the male version of Greta Thunberg — tired of saving the world and wearing deodorant tested on dolphins. Or maybe on lemurs. The Smiths, on the other hand, filled the air with the scent of soup, air freshener (the blue one that scares you half to death in the middle of the night — psssst), and onions. Definitely onions.

But where are my manners. In fifteen sentences I’d already badmouthed God, the Smiths, and that kid — who, if he ever read this, would probably punch me in the face and yell, “Hey! I didn’t give you permission to use my likeness, asshole!” My name’s Ethan. The last name doesn’t matter, trust me. At work they call me E, or Ethan, fix this, send that email, hurry up, Ethan. I hate when people shorten my name. It sounds like a command — like someone pulling an invisible leash, expecting me to bark in sync with the deadline. It’s right there in my documents: Ethan. I like my name. So why flatten it out? It’s not like when I go to the bank, I ask to speak with Jenny-poo instead of Jennifer. Sure, for someone close I can be honey, prince, sweetheart — whatever helps. But at work? No. My boss is the final boss, the arch-nemesis. The rest are just NPCs — background noise in business casual.

That’s behind me now. It’s Friday night. The TV blinks at me like an old buddy who’s got nothing interesting to say, but you still hang out — less out of interest, more out of habit. I’m not even sure what I’m watching. A renovation show, maybe? Some guy showing how to turn three planks of wood, a box of nails, and a bit of TV magic into a table. I watch him sand the surface and wonder if, with his enthusiasm, maybe I could sand something in my own life too. Preferably myself — with coarse-grit sandpaper, until the frustration, the dust, and that faint sheen of failure all disappear.

I change the channel. Perfume commercial. A woman runs across a desert in a two-thousand-dollar dress while the narrator says it’s “the scent of freedom.” Freedom from what, exactly? The meaning of life, or this ad? Then come the untearable napkins, the screaming politicians, and a soap opera where everyone’s crying because someone died — but they all look freshly Botoxed, so the audience doesn’t buy it.

Eventually, I stop on a channel where nobody’s talking — a live feed of an aquarium. You know the type: the schedule’s run out, and the network can’t afford broadcast rights to anything else. The boss cuts costs, there’s an aquarium, everyone’s happy.

I tell myself I need peace, silence, solitude. Because when you’re alone, TV isn’t entertainment — it’s an alibi. Proof that someone’s still talking in the room, even when you don’t have to answer.

I cracked open a Bud Light — cheap, cold, honest. That familiar smell — faintly metallic, with a hint of bread and damp cardboard — reached my nose, spreading through it like a shroud over the bare body of a woman in some Renaissance painting.

By the time I took a sip, the foam had already fallen flat, like even it was having a bad day.

The first sip was always the best. It gave me hope that the rest of the evening might still make sense.

The second one was purely technical.

The third — ritual.

The fourth — obligation.

Fun fact: yeast in beer is alive. So every time you drink, you swallow something that dies inside you just so you can feel alive for a moment.

So I stare at the TV, at those fish swimming in circles without purpose, and I think maybe I should be sitting with Martha right now.mInstead, I’m watching a tank full of mute creatures that have no idea there’s a world beyond the glass. Then again, our relationship wasn’t all that different. Two people, each in their own aquarium. We stood close, but an invisible pane of glass kept us apart. I’d tap on mine with my finger while she nibbled at her seaweed, staring the other way.

Martha had that strange ability — to be right next to you and miles away at the same time. With her, I always felt like I was staring at Mount Fuji in a travel guide while standing at its foot. She used to smell like freshly brewed coffee on a Sunday morning. Lately, that scent’s been changing into something else.

Romance always seemed like a sign of weakness to me. Talking about feelings wasn’t a man’s thing — silence was, and beer, and pretending nothing hurt. “Feelings are for poets, not for men,” my father used to say. Then he died. And that fact hasn’t changed in five years. Heart attack. Can’t say I’m surprised — he spent his whole life keeping everything inside, like his heart was a safe for emotions instead of a pump for blood. Until one day, the clot lit the fuse. Boom. And that was that.

Back then, Martha was everything to me. The one and only rose among weeds and manure. And she still is. At least, I want to believe that.

The clock on the wall read 11:17 p.m. — a ship-shaped thing, a gift from my mother, who’s always had a soft spot for objects pretending to be other objects. A mustached sailor stood in the center, his arms serving as the clock’s hands. Every hour on the hour, he spun on his axis, nodding as if to confirm that time really was passing. I never asked, never had the heart to suggest that it didn’t quite fit the decor of my bachelor apartment. I thanked her, hung it up, and thought, ahoy, adventure — to the lifeboats, lads.

The Smiths’ argument had finally gone quiet.

The bass from upstairs stopped too — like someone had suddenly cut the power to the entire building, leaving only that unpleasant hum of silence ringing in my ears.

But on the TV, the fish kept circling, their movements steady, hypnotic. The picture, though, had turned oddly grainy.

I figured it was the decoder acting up. Or maybe my eyes just weren’t covered by the full-HD warranty anymore.

I pushed myself up from the couch, though my body protested loudly. It felt like I was trapped inside a heavy diving suit soaked through with water. Every movement lagged by half a second, and even straightening my limbs felt like some kind of heroic act.

I didn’t dare push it.

Maybe the beer had gone bad.

Sure, alcohol’s bad for you — but this bad?

So I sat back down. My arms felt like they were made of cotton. My fingers trembled slightly, yet they didn’t feel like mine — more like they belonged to someone just pretending to move them.

I told myself it was just the circulation. Or nerves.

Or maybe just a long day finally cashing in its debt.

The cushion of the couch sank deeper beneath me than it had a moment ago. I tried moving my legs. The response came with a delay. My brain had clearly sent the signal but must’ve forgotten to include the delivery address. So when I tried to bend my knees, it felt more like a mechanical reaction than an act of will — move, pause, pause, pause… sensation.

I felt a tightness in my throat. Strong, paralyzing. For a second, it brought back that thing with Martha. She’d wanted to try something new. A friend of hers had recommended a certain shop — you know, the kind that doesn’t advertise with giant banners but somehow everyone in town knows exactly where it is. Probably because it’s the only one selling that kind of accessories. And, well — studies show that introducing novelty into your sex life (new activities, breaking routine, all that) is statistically linked to higher relationship satisfaction and sexual fulfillment.

So we tried.

I’m not into weird experiments, but I love her.

Or at least… I don’t want to lose her. I think.

Anyway. She was wearing a collar that night — her idea, I just went along with it. I don’t know how it happened — maybe I pulled too hard, maybe I misread the moment. At first there was laughter, then silence. She tore herself away, stepped back, and looked at me like I’d crossed a border without a stamp in my passport, carrying a rifle and a mouth full of amphetamines.

But that wasn’t the worst part.

She looked at me — I looked at her — and I saw real pain. The kind you can’t describe. The kind that doesn’t need adjectives. That’s why most writers don’t know much about real life. Or maybe they just don’t have the right words for it. I wouldn’t know. I’m not a writer.

Then she got off me, got dressed, and went to the bathroom. We didn’t talk about it that evening. We tried again later — out of politeness, out of habit — the way we always did.

But it wasn’t the same.

The first and the last time. From then on, I knew there are things you shouldn’t touch — even when someone hands them to you willingly.

I felt nausea building up, that familiar warning when you know it’s best not to move — just lie still and pray that motionless surrender might calm the storm of half-digested misery inside your gut. I curled up, arms tightening around my stomach.

Then I looked back at the TV.

The fish were moving slower now, as if something had gotten to them too, and they were trying to settle in for the night. I closed my eyes. The world stopped existing for a moment — only that humming remained, that low, steady mmmm, like an electrical panel right before the breakers blow. I thought maybe I was already asleep. Or maybe just trying to be. Didn’t really matter.

I could feel the warmth of the screen through my eyelids, the faint flicker of light brushing across my face, as if someone were waving a small lamp over me.

Inhale.

Exhale.

Silence.

And then something changed. I don’t know when, I don’t know how.

I just… wasn’t there anymore.

Not inside myself, but next to.

I was looking at the couch. My body sat there, motionless, eyes open, staring at the screen — at the fish frozen mid-swim. It breathed calmly, steadily, like someone who’d finally found rest.

For a second, I wanted to say something, to call out, to touch myself — but I couldn’t move. Everything hung in suspension. The world had pressed pause.

Only that body — my double, my container — kept breathing, rhythmically, peacefully, as if relieved that it no longer had to be me.