WHEN THEY ARRIVE at Matthew’s, Belinda goes into the living room, and Matthew goes into the kitchen to fix himself a drink. Belinda rarely wants one after dinner.
“Matthew, what on earth happened here?” she asks.
“Oh, I forgot. I should have warned you.”
He pokes his head around the corner. Belinda is looking into the hole.
“There’s a smell, an odor coming from somewhere,” he explains. “In fact, I can smell it in here and in the den, too. It’s not quite the same in the den, not quite the same smell. They’ve been looking for it for a couple of days. The manager brought in a vice-president from the construction company and some sort of jack-of-all-trades. They came in here, moved the furniture around, and pulled the carpet back, and then they — we — all got down on our hands and knees and started sniffing. Nothing. Couldn’t smell a thing. So they asked me if they could open a section of the wall to see if it would come wafting out. I said that was all right, and they made a little hole.” With his hands he indicates a hole the size of a magazine. “They poked around and peered in with flashlights, and sniffed, but they couldn’t get anything. So they made the hole a little larger. Then they had a little conference, and they made the hole a little larger. Then they conferred some more, and sniffed some more, and enlarged the hole some more, and they kept on conferring and sniffing and enlarging until three o’clock, when they all packed up and went home.”
“They don’t know what it is?”
“Not yet. I’m supposed to smell it under various conditions to see — well, to see what I see. Or what I smell.”
“So these are your notes?” She’s reading penciled notes on the wall.
12/6 — OPENED WALL, NO APPARANT ODOR, PULLED CARPET BACK, NO ODOR
12/7 — 6:00 PM, NO ODOR
12/8 — 7:15, SHARP ODOR, ALMOST HURTS MY NOSE, AS IF SOMEONE WERE BURNING ORANGES
“Yeah. Well, not the first one. The guy from the construction company — my fellow vice-president — wrote that. You see he misspelled apparent. I figured that if he wrote right on the wall like that he must intend to have it painted, so now I just write on the wall, too.”
He returns to the kitchen, pours himself some cognac, pours Belinda a lemon-flavored water, though he knows she won’t drink it, takes a condom from a carton in the drawer where he keeps coupons, rubber bands, pencils, and other odds and ends, puts the drinks and the condom on a black plastic tray, and carries the tray to the living room. Belinda has picked out a compact disc and put it on the player. She’s stretched out on the sofa.
“What did you think?” she asks.
“I liked it. I even felt comfortable there, odd as that sounds. Well, almost comfortable.”
“We were the oldest people there, I think.”
“No, we weren’t, not at all. You’re letting your feelings blind you. I checked everyone out, and there were several people older than we are. They were just wearing young disguises.”
“Really? Where do they get those disguises? I’d like one for myself.”
Matthew puts his hand on her breast, caresses it, lightly, affectionately. Belinda stretches luxuriously. “Let me have a sip of that,” she says.
“It gives you a headache,” Matthew cautions.
“A whole glass does, but a sip won’t bother me.”
He tips her head up and brings the snifter to her lips, wets them with cognac. She licks her lips, savors the flavor. Matthew sets the snifter down. Belinda gets up and slips her shoes off and puts them under one of the chrome tables, takes her blouse off, folds it, and hangs it over the back of a chrome chair. Matthew hangs his jacket on the back of another chrome chair, removes his tie and drapes it over the jacket, removes his shirt, folds it, and sets it on the seat of the chair. Belinda removes her bra and hangs it over the arm of her chair, takes her skirt off, folds it, and drapes it over the seat of the chair, pulls her panty hose off and tosses them under the chrome table, onto her shoes.
“Floor or couch?” she asks.
“Floor, unless you prefer the couch.”
“No, the floor is fine.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.” She settles onto the floor. “Come on.”
Matthew pulls his briefs off and drops them onto his shoes. He tears the condom wrapper open, removes the condom, and rolls it down over his penis.
In Topical Guide 426, Mark Dorset considers Sensory Perception: Smell; Reality: Perception of; and Furniture from this episode.
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🎧 426: When they arrive ...