“A scent diary?” asks Ana.
“A notebook where you write down what you’re smelling and how it makes you feel,” says Mom. “I have Luling’s.”
“I didn’t know that,” I say. So that’s what happened to it.
“I keep it with my own.” Mom walks over to my counter, her block heels knocking on the floor. “This is your space.”
Ana goes to the back workroom and I join Mom. “It is.”
Mom’s already spraying blotters, sniffing her way through my collection, much in the way a master chef would judge her apprentice. I can’t handle the stress, so I take her coat and go to hang it up in the back.
Ana peers around me to make sure Mom isn’t there. “I don’t know what to say,” she says urgently. “How bad was this emergency? Should I be giving condolences?”
“No, no, it’s nothing like that. Sorry to worry you. I had to talk to Mom about some family stuff. It wasn’t big. No one died. Your hair looks great, by the way.”
“Thanks. I wanted to surprise you.” She takes a breath. “Whew.Your mom has, like, an aura, doesn’t she? I want to be on my best behavior and also get her approval.”
“Trust me, I know.”
She laughs. “I bet.”
“She’s going to be hanging around for the next few days,” I say. “Is that okay?”
“As if I’m going to kick out your mom. Sure. If she wants to work back here, we can figure it out. Or is she on vacation?”
I shrug as Mom comes to the back. Unlike other people, who would poke in their heads, Mom simply fills the doorway.
“You’re a silversmith.” She circles Ana’s table. “My daughter showed me your work.”
Hearing her refer to me possessively like that instead of by name makes my heart give a strange lurch.
Ana looks up from the container of overnight oats she’s opening for breakfast. “I started back up a little while ago after putting it aside for years.”
“Very nice designs,” Mom approves, looking at the board where Ana has printed out some of her tablet drawings and a few sketches torn from her notebook.
“Thank you.” She frowns. “The result is decent, but the process doesn’t feel right—or at least, not like it did. I was used to working with a collaborator.”
“I know that feeling,” Mom says. “Although Luling’s grandmother stopped working years ago, she enjoyed being in the lab. I hadn’t realized what a comfort it was to have her there to discuss ideas.”
I’m listening so hard my face tingles. I didn’t know that either.
Ana nods eagerly. “That’s how I feel. These are good—I know they are—but it’s a struggle because they can be better.” She droops. “I thought it would be fine to be on my own. I don’t know.”
I stand over Ana’s workspace as they go to look at the store. I’ve always worked alone, too, but I remember the days I would join Momand sometimes Waipo in the lab, each of us tossing out thoughts or simply holding out a blotter or wrist in a silent request for opinions. To me, Ana’s jewelry looks spectacular, but I can see what she means about how hard it is to work in isolation. It bothers me, too, sometimes.
Reaching out, I take a blotter and roll it between my fingers, frowning at the narrow cylinder when I’m done. Mom comes back to sit at my perfumer’s organ without asking permission, her eyes flickering over it. At least she won’t be able to find any issues here; the workspace is spotless. A squirt bottle of alcohol sits near the neat collections of wipes, pipettes, and blotters. Although she and Waipo preferred to organize their materials by note family, I work with a more curated collection, and alphabetical suits me. Each small brown bottle is labeled with the date I created or bought it, the dilution, and the name. The fire extinguisher is within easy reach. There is nothing she can find fault with, but I brace myself for her criticism anyway.
None comes. She merely sniffs a few of the materials and nods. “Excellent,” she says.
“Thanks?” Is she fattening me up for the kill?
“The first thing we’ll do is create a scent for you to work with,” she says. “The same as if you had a real moli customer.”
“Speaking of, I’ve been away and I do actually have customers,” I say, grateful to have an out that can delay this, at least for a few hours. “Real ones. I have some commissions I need to finish.”
The one thing I’ll say about Mom is that she takes business seriously. Despite her intense need to get to the bottom of my moli puzzle, she stands up immediately. “I’ll explore the city while you work,” she says. “When I come back, we’ll talk.”
She’s a grown woman, and far more capable than I am, but I can’t help a twinge of unease as I watch from the store window as she walks down the street. There are so many things that could happen to her. Why I never worried about this before, I don’t know. All I know is thatI’m worrying now.
