Old Spice

they were the only men who stayed. my fathers, the two who weren’t.

Uncle Patrick — dark hair, long sideburns, a day’s stubble and a gentleness that surprised you. peppermint and tobacco, and the Mainstay snort underneath it. he drank too much and loved me tenderly, and I never felt the drink in how he held me, only in how early he’d go quiet, and how far his eyes would travel while his hand stayed warm on my shoulder.

Uncle Ivor — clean-shaven, ironed shirt, a tie you could cut your hand on. he always had the time, down at the tennis courts at the bottom of the flats. dry as the highveld in July, funnier for never cracking a smile at his own lines, so you’d be halfway down the road before you got it. kind in the quiet way that never announced itself.

they wore Old Spice, both of them — cinnamon and clove and something like the highveld before a storm, hot tar and dry grass. it got into their collars, the cracked vinyl of the car seats, the whole of my childhood.

the smell hung over me like a roof. borrowed, temporary, but a roof, and I sat under it and thought I was safe. and for a while, because of them, I was.

my own father wore Brut. and I only ever smelled it going, a cold chemical sting in the hallway, the door already closing.

the men who showed up
smelled of clove and highveld dust.
my father, of leaving.