Never Owned Cologne
Text and Photography by Hans Klein
We were in a Tokyo bookstore so I couldn’t read anything. She even apologized but I really think she meant it. Like, she wanted me to have a good time so we looked at pictures. She told me they inspired her. I said I could tell. They looked like her dreamy soft ones. Full of what she said she wanted. And naked people taking shits and doing drugs.
At dinner she said ‘I try to fall in love with people I take pictures of,’ and of course I wanted her to softly press a shutter. Let all the chemicals mix. And damn that curry smelled good. The sweet and the butter and spice.
We were in a Tokyo bookstore so I couldn’t read anything. She even apologized but I really think she meant it. Like, she wanted me to have a good time so we looked at pictures. She told me they inspired her. I said I could tell. They looked like her dreamy soft ones. Full of what she said she wanted. And naked people taking shits and doing drugs.
At dinner she said ‘I try to fall in love with people I take pictures of,’ and of course I wanted her to softly press a shutter. Let all the chemicals mix. And damn that curry smelled good. The sweet and the butter and spice.
We were in a Tokyo bookstore so I couldn’t read anything. She even apologized but I really think she meant it. Like, she wanted me to have a good time so we looked at pictures. She told me they inspired her. I said I could tell. They looked like her dreamy soft ones. Full of what she said she wanted. And naked people taking shits and doing drugs.
At dinner she said ‘I try to fall in love with people I take pictures of,’ and of course I wanted her to softly press a shutter. Let all the chemicals mix. And damn that curry smelled good. The sweet and the butter and spice.
After dinner we went to my place and watched a movie about two people who couldn’t be together. Not joking. My lids were so heavy. Yeah, and I thought a beer would help but it just made my burps spicy. I tried inhaling as they left my stomach so she’d never know.
When the movie ended we said it was very beautiful. I said something about colors being saturated. She said there were so many good parts and I agreed. Then, after considering it all, I told her she could stay over. She said she had work the next day. ‘Are you sure?’ I asked.
Walking her to the train reminded me I wanted to move. I didn’t know anything when I got here, still didn’t, but I’d figured out my area was boring. I wanted more fun. Being cool still sounded nice and that area wasn’t. ‘Don’t give a shit about anything’ I kept saying to myself, but it was hard.
At the station she asked if she could try something.The orange was glowing around her. It was a cold night, and the subway entrance backlit a little smile. It was good. What she wanted to try was. Masks off, bright red, and just a little dry.
The next day I looked at shampoo in a drugstore. Every color and shape. I’d been a cheap shampoo guy for so long. Just whatever was chill if it made my head clean. The most expensive was equivalent to twenty five bucks or so. I picked it up and looked at a label I couldn’t read, but it didn’t matter. I unscrewed the cap and inhaled deep. Yeah, that was the good stuff. I could tell it was the good stuff.
