Nicotine and Caffeine : The Scent That Remains.

How could the smallest things keep him alive in her senses?

She found herself awake at strange hours, lost in a haze of thoughts that never quite settled. Within the quiet of her room, the scent of nicotine and caffeine lingers in the air, pulling her back into memories—too faint and familiar.

He wasn’t here. Not by choice, not by will, but by the inevitable day that they both know. Yet in the deep hours of the night, he was closer than ever, a presence she could feel just beyond reach, slipping through the cracks of her thoughts like smoke curling into the sky.

She could still picture it—the early mornings when the rest of the world lay sleeping, and it was just them, cocooned in the quiet before dawn. He’d light a cigarette with practiced ease, his other hand wrapped around her, as the night still hanging in the sky. His eyes would meet hers, and in that gaze, there was no distance, no impending separation—just them, wrapped in the thick air of smoke and caffeine, as if time itself had paused for them.

But time hadn’t paused. It had torn them apart, not in heart, but in space. She miss him in ways she couldn’t name. It wasn’t just the feel of his hand in hers or the rough scrape of his voice when he spoke her name. It was the scent of him, the way nicotine and caffeine wrapped around him, always there, always marking him as hers. Even now, alone in her room, that smell lingered in the air like a memory that refused to fade.

Each day, every time she held a cup of coffee, inhaling deeply as if it could bring him closer. Pretending as if he was beside her, their fingers brushing, the quiet weight of their love filling the spaces between them. The love hadn’t died. It hadn’t dulled. If anything, it had sharpened, like the edge of a knife that cut deeper with each passing day.

The dreams came often now. In them, he was there—whole, tangible. She could feel his breath on her skin, hear the low rasp of his laugh, and smell the faint mix of smoke and coffee that followed him like a signature. But the dreams always faded with the dawn, leaving her awake and reaching for the scent that was already slipping away.

And though the world had pulled them apart, the scent of him never left. It wove through her nights, wrapping her in a bittersweet embrace, a reminder that love doesn’t fade with distance. It stays, alive and burning, as intoxicating as nicotine, as steady as caffeine.