The Scent of Memory

: The scent of jasmine feels unbearably intense these days...
like lifeless tuberose.
Tell me, have you found any way to measure intensity?
I mean, like this—
intense touch, intense feeling, intense fragrance?

: Enough of this obsession with scent!

: Ha ha ha!
This is exactly why I stay with you.

: Why do you stay, Tithi?

: Everything intense in my life—
all of it is you.
That piercing fragrance of your skin...
faintly sweet, intoxicating—
that somehow heals
the wounds on my body.
This is why I can never leave you.

: Can't leave?
Or don't want to leave?

: Ha ha ha!
Both.

: When I gently
run my fingers through your hair
you fall asleep so peacefully, Tithi.
You look so ethereal then.
Listen...
if one day
you couldn't catch the scent of my body—
would you disappear?

: Yes.

: Where to?

: Into the abyss of emptiness.