The apartment smelled fine to us, or so we thought. Day after day, Lena and I shuffled through our routines, coffee brewing, TV murmuring, the hum of our lives masking a faint, sour edge in the air. We didn’t notice it, not really. It was just home—our home, where the couch sagged under years of Netflix marathons and the kitchen table held stacks of unopened mail. The smell was part of the furniture, invisible when you’re always in it, like a bad habit you stop seeing.
In my head, I blamed Lena’s candles, those cloying vanilla things she lit to “set a mood.” She probably thought it was my sneakers, kicked off by the door after jogs I took to avoid our silences. We didn’t talk about it. We didn’t talk about much anymore. We just breathed the same air, recycled our same thoughts, and let the days blur.
Then came Zara, Lena’s friend from college, crashing on our couch for a weekend. She stepped through the door, bag slung over her shoulder, and wrinkled her nose. “Whoa, what is that?” she said, half-laughing, half-grimacing. Lena and I froze, glances darting. Suddenly, I smelled it too—a sharp, rotting whiff, like spoiled milk and regret. It was everywhere, undeniable now that Zara’s fresh eyes—and nose—had pointed it out. We’d been living with it, blind to it, the way you don’t notice your own pulse until someone mentions it.
Zara, with her outsider’s clarity, poked around while we stammered excuses. She found them behind the fridge: three mouse traps, each with a tiny, decomposing occupant, forgotten from a pest problem we’d “solved” months ago. “You guys,” she said, holding her nose, “this is grim. Let’s clean this up.” So we did, gloves on, windows flung wide, the apartment gasping for new air. As we scrubbed, Zara chattered about her travels, her breakup, her new job—stories that felt like a breeze from a world we’d stopped visiting. Lena laughed, really laughed, for the first time in weeks. I caught myself listening, hungry for something different.
That night, with the traps gone and the air clearer, I saw our apartment anew. The clutter, the ruts we’d worn into our lives, the things we’d let fester. The mice were a metaphor, weren’t they? All the little deaths we ignored—dreams we’d shelved, fights we’d buried, truths we’d sidestepped. We’d stayed in the same state of mind too long, noses numb to the rot. Zara’s presence, her different lens, had shaken us awake. We couldn’t un-smell it now.
Lena and I sat on the couch after Zara left, the silence heavier than usual. “We need to talk,” she said, and I nodded. Choices loomed—clear the air for good, or keep breathing the same stale life. The apartment was clean, but the real work was just beginning.
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