Shaving cream.

Different kinds of cheap perfume all come in different packages, but all have the same, stale smell. In reality, it's not the perfumes; it's the women who wear them. Their clothes were once tight, but have been stretched out because they've been slept in too many times. They've been wearing make-up for so long that it does nothing more than accentuate the deep lines that criss-cross their faces. Friendly women, to be sure. But maybe that's because they've been drinking, no matter the time of day.

I used to meet these women in every kind of place. The department store, the grocery store, various restaurants. "TOM!" they'd shriek. Rarely were they in front of me, and I couldn't see who had made such a piercing noise. I'd hear their call from down an aisle to the side of me, or walking up quickly behind me, heels clicking loudly. I was never positive who was coming over to say hello until that same acrid smell caused my nose to wrinkle.

It wasn't until I was much older that I realised why they always seemed to be coming up from behind me: my father was trying to steer around them. It was with a surprising calmness that he'd remember that he desperately needed shaving cream, or that this store carried the socks he liked, and wanted to take a look at them. And we'd turn around; the decision between Gilette and Barbasol became agonising.

But then came the shriek, and the smell, and the familiar clicking of the heels of a stranger, and I'd be meeting Rita, or Jo Anne. "Oh, you look just like your father! So CUTE!" They'd shoot me a half-withered, half-beaming smile, and extend a hand ornamented with gaudy jewelry and bright but chipped nail polish.

"This is my son. Justin." Always those words, with a dead silence at the end. I think those were the only times I'd ever heard my dad sound unsure of himself.

Maybe it was once they realised who I was, or maybe it was the tone of my father's voice, but they always excused themselves immediately after that. "We're old friends." And she'd bend down and look at me, purposely pushing my father to the peripheral. "I haven't seen him in ages. I just wanted to say hi. You're a very handsome boy." They'd rush off with a basket full of groceries, and a bottle of wine leaning on the edge of the basket. My dad would grab his usual can of Gilette, and we'd continue down the aisle as if it hadn't happened at all.