Thé du Matin Eau de Toilette

About the morning he started writing. White tea first, pale and dry and nearly transparent, the way a room is when nothing in it needs anything from you. Citrus, thin and clean. Then white pepper—warm, dry, faintly alert. He is at peace and he is still listening; those are not the same thing, and the habit outlasted the need for it... Jasmine after, soft and full, steeping. Musk beneath, warm, close, a body at rest in it. He is dressed in white and the cardigan is worn through at the elbows. He spent most of his life behind something flawless. This is not flawless. That is what makes it his. Dew on the small white flowers. The fog going. The first ray of the sun.