I paused today before an array of leftover baked treats in the office and inhaled deeply its intriguing odor. It was a morning selection, cast by mysterious hands onto the long and wide credenza across from the main door, as usual, at the conclusion of some catered meeting. Muffins, granola, honey, yogurt, bagel halves of various types and their cream cheese accompaniments: a ludicrous boat of chive-flavored on a bed of lettuce leaves, ornamented by wan tomato slices, and a bowl of individual Philadelphia brand portions which some reptilian part of me considered stealing a handful from to bring home and populate the top shelf of our refrigerator door until God knows when or what.
But I did not.
The odor: a sticky, sickly sweetness with a trace of something sour. I breathed deep, contemplating it and the place it put me, in the middle of the sixth floor of this Midtown office building, beside a gray sea of cubicles, one of which I could call my own.