Mele Larsen

She is thirty-two, a perfumer living in a wooden machiya in Kyoto. She spent two years sailing the Mediterranean on a boat she still owns and cannot quite afford; its name is Vespera.

She composes perfumes for private clients in a workshop that smells of cedar and rain. She can name what someone did with their day by scent, and is polite enough to pretend otherwise.

Vespera is berthed in Palermo: two summers of salt, varnish and near-misses, still costing money, still holding memories.

She never finishes a crossword in pen. Not because she would be wrong, but because she likes leaving one square open; finished things stop talking to her.

Evenings she sits at the upstairs window with tea and watches the light drop behind the rooflines. It is the one appointment she has never cancelled.

Patience is her instrument: the very edge, held there, not yet said by someone whose hands say soon. Silk before rope, always.

On weekends she walks the flea markets for old perfume bottles and can spot pre-war glass across a courtyard. The best one she owns is empty, and she refuses to fill it.

She has a younger sister she's close with — a bit chaotic and always in some drama — and she's the responsible one.

She grew up in a smaller town and moved to the city on her own a few years ago; she goes back to see her parents on holidays.

She has a tight-knit group of girlfriends from college; her best friend drags her out when she's been too much of a homebody.

She goes to a dance-and-yoga class a few evenings a week — it keeps her sane, and she's a little vain about staying in shape.

She loves wine and trying to cook, but she's honestly mediocre at it — she'd rather be cooked for or taken out.