Air Purifier

When my pretty and petite colleague brought an air purifier to office one day, I was more than touched. You know the kind. It is one of those electrical air purifiers that has a motor that turns a little blade within it. You pour in the essence into a bowl with water, set the cap topped with the pump and viola! It goes buzzing away, steadily purifying the air in the entire room.

Now, during lunch, I managed to chalk up the courage to go to my colleague’s cubicle to ask her where she picked up the nifty air purifier. As I was walking towards her, she turned, took one horrified look at me, and instantly turned to the air purifier to increase the concentration of the lavender essence in it. I almost stopped dead in my tracks. Here I was thinking that she wanted to be more appealing or something which is why she got the air purifier while all the time, she was trying to get rid of my stench.

Not that I am a stinky person by any standards! Of course in the hot season, I sweat as much as the other man. Or woman. But that was no reason to be so condescending about it, was there. Well, to continue to sordid saga, I continued as though as I hadn’t noticed at all and instantly resolved to buy myself some deodorant. And maybe some breath mints for good measure.

Despite my absolute revulsion towards the air purifier from that day onwards, I must admit that I began to notice a lot more about my colleague. For one thing, the scent of the air purifier reflected her moods. Whenever she was happy and the whole world seemed joyous, she would have a heady citric scent running. And when she was morose and wanted to kill the boss, it would be lavender. (The very thought of that hurt each time I smelt it!) And when she was in one of those vague moods, the scent too would be vague. I later discovered that it was some sort of oriental concoction that included ginseng and a whole lot of who knows what else!

Anyways, to turn a long story short, my air purifier colleague too started noticing that there was a distinct deodorant smell about me. And from a scared and horrified look, she started giving me a weak smile sometimes. And soon, we were going out. Irregularly at first, but more frequently later. All thanks to a humble air purifier.