Read Online Just a Couple of Days by Tony Vigorito - Free Book Online Page B

something’s wrong, and Glade isn’t the answer.”
    Sophia chuckled. “It’s like body odor.”
    â€œRight!” Blip interrupted. “Have you heard about that? I saw this commercial the other day, trying to sell something called
deodorant
. Deodorant. Have you heard about this shit?”
    Before I could answer his sarcasm, Sophia pursued the point. “An advertiser would have you believe that humans couldn’t stand the smell of each other until deodorants and antiperspirants were developed in the 1800s. Tell me, Mr. Geneticist, how would that be conducive to the survival of the species? Body odor is most unattractive, and so how could such a trait be expected to survive the gauntlet of natural selection? If we stink, it’s because our bodies are excreting poisons. Poisoned people are not healthy, and thus do not make very attractive mates. Consequently, we hide behind petrochemical perfumes.”
    Blip nodded, tapping away. “And did you know the toxins we ‘throw away’ from us reach their highest concentrations in our own bodies? There was a public health alert in California in the sixties that advised against breast-feeding. Toxins reach higher and higher levels of concentration at each level of the food chain. Because we’re at the top of the food chain, human breast milk had dangerously high concentrations of DDT, absorbed from the food the mothers ate.”
    â€œThat reminds me,” Sophia asked with an abrupt air of sensuality. “Would you like some cheddar cheese, Flake? I made it from the milk of my own breasts. One hundred percent organic, free-range. Aged three years.”
    I was astounded, horrified, and embarrassed. I was on the verge of either screaming or laughing out loud. “No thanks.”
    â€œAre you sure?” She got up from the table and walked over to their solar-powered refrigerator. “Weren’t you breast-fed?”
    â€œDon’t be ridiculous. I was also weaned.”
    â€œNo you weren’t,” she teased. “I’ve seen you drink cow’s milk.
That’s
ridiculous. You’d rather drink milk that comes from the teat of a cow than from a woman.”
    Â 
    24 Once, when she was about four, Dandy tumbled into the dining room when Sophia and Blip had guests over. “Why do power flowers stink?” she asked directly, wrinkling her nose.
    â€œPower flowers?” Sophia responded. “You mean flower power, Dandy, and flower power doesn’t stink at all. Flower power is wonderful.” Have I mentioned? Sophia is what some crusty clerk at a gas station off the interstate in the middle of nowhere might mutteringly refer to as a “damn hippie.” She did not, after all, shave her legs.
    â€œI know what flower power is, Mommy.” Dandy giggled. “
Power
flower.”
    â€œYou’re the power flower,” Blip teased her. “You don’t stink.”
    â€œNo.” Dandy was adamant and becoming frustrated. “The
power
flower.”
    â€œPower flower?” Blip and Sophia asked each other, puzzled.
    â€œIt stinks,” Dandy added.
    â€œIt stinks?” they repeated.
    â€œYuck,” she nodded hopefully.
    â€œWhere is the power flower?” Blip attempted.
    Dandy fell to the floor amiably. “I don’t know.” She sat up suddenly. “The
power
flower, remember?”
    â€œWhere did you smell it?” Sophia inquired.
    â€œIn the car.”
    â€œHow did it smell?”
    â€œReal bad.”
    Everyone fell silent, stumped at this four-year-old’s riddle. “Ideas, anyone?” Blip opened the floor to all present at the table, but we may as well have been spinning around blindfolded trying to pin the tail on the donkey at a piñata party.
    â€œWhat does it look like?” I tried, and for a moment I was the hero of the house. But the congratulatory backslapping ended abruptly when we looked to Dandy for an