“That’s because today is my first day. I haven’t had a chance to decorate yet.”
She looked around. “You should paint your office purple.”
I laughed. “Not sure that would go over so well with your father.”
“He let me paint my room purple.” Charlie sniffed a few times. “Your office smells good.”
“Thank you. I’m actually a perfumist. I make perfumes.”
“You make perfumes?”
“Yup. It’s kind of a cool job, isn’t it?”
She nodded fast. “How do you do it?”
“Well, it’s a lot of science, actually. But what your dad and I are working on together is making a perfume based on how much people like a bunch of different smells. Would you like to try out some of my samples?”
“Yes!”
I’d brought a few sample kits with me today, so I grabbed one from my desk drawer and sat next to her on a guest chair. Opening the box, I took out one of the smelling jars and offered it to her. It was calone, which told me if a person had a penchant for a sea-breeze-type smell.
“What does this smell remind you of?”
Her eyes lit up. “Mmm…chocolate-banana ice cream.”
My brows knitted, and I lifted the jar to smell it myself, even though I’d smelled the ocean the second I twisted off the cap. “That smells like ice cream to you?”
“No. But Dad took me to the beach last week, and afterward we got ice cream on the boardwalk. I got a banana split because that’s my favorite. That smells like the beach, but now the beach just makes me think of that yummy ice cream.”
I had asked her what the scent reminded her of and not what it smelled like. So her answer was right. I picked up the banana that had been sitting on my desk all day. “You’re a banana fan, too, huh? You want to share this one?”
“No, thank you.” She swung her legs. “My dad writes on my bananas when he packs my lunch. Sometimes oranges and tangerines, too. But never apples because those you don’t peel the skin off of.”
“He writes on your fruit?”
She nodded.
“What does he write?”
“Silly stuff. Like ‘Orange you glad it’s Friday?’ Sometimes he writes a joke. On Halloween he wrote ‘What is a ghost’s favorite fruit? A boo-nana.’ Get it?”
I found that very interesting. I wouldn’t have envisioned Hudson doing something goofy like that.
“Can I smell some more?” Charlie asked.
“Of course.”
I opened another jar. This one smelled like sandalwood—oil from the Indian sandal tree.
She scrunched up her little nose. “That smells like a bellyache.”
I had no idea what that meant. I brought it to my nose to try to figure it out. “Really? Does it make your belly hurt just by smelling it?”
She giggled. “No. Sour ice cream does. That smells like the man at the ice cream store around the corner from my dad. We don’t go there anymore because the ice cream might have been bad.”
Ohhh, well, that made more sense. Sandalwood was in a lot of popular men’s colognes. Charlie had a knack for this. She was also apparently really into ice cream. “You know…” I said. “That’s the second answer you’ve mentioned with ice cream. I’m sensing a pattern.”
A deep voice from behind me chimed in, “Figured that out already, huh?”
I turned to find Hudson leaning against the doorframe to my office. It looked like he might have been eavesdropping for a while.
“Charlie here has a great sense of smell.”
Hudson nodded. “She also hears things from a mile away, especially the freezer door. If I so much as crack it open, she comes running, thinking ice cream might be involved.”
Charlie scrunched up her nose again. “He likes strawberry ice cream.”
“I take it you don’t?” I asked.
She shook her head. “It’s gross. All lumpy.”
“I’ll have to side with your dad on this one. Strawberry is one of my favorites.”
Hudson smiled, and I realized it might’ve been the first genuine smile I’d seen on his handsome face since the night of the wedding.
“You ready to go, Charlie?” He looked over at me. “We’re going to dinner.”
“I know. You’re taking the subway.”
Hudson’s lip twitched. “The subway, Dolly Parton, and ice cream. She’s not hard to please…yet.”
“And notes written on fruit and the color purple.” I motioned to my office. “Charlie suggested I paint my office purple. I told her I’d think about it.”
Hudson smiled. “I wouldn’t put it past you.”
Charlie surprised me by jumping out of her chair to give me a hug. “Thank you for showing me your smelly things.”
“You’re welcome, sweetheart. Enjoy your dinner.”
She skipped across my office and grabbed her father’s hand. “Let’s go, Dad.”
He shook his head like her being the boss of him was a bother, but I could tell she was probably the only person in the world he enjoyed being bossed by.
Nodding at me, he said, “Don’t stay too late.”