Paris – Dakar Pour Homme by Parfums Codibel

We strolled down the shopping centre corridor as if it were Constantinople in ruins. A labyrinth of glass, dampness, broken bulbs and shuttered shops with ‘To Let’ signs, some so old the phone booth was from the old Telefónica. It was spring, yet inside it smelled of cheap winter. My friend wore his usual military green parka, undiagnosed but adorned with every medal. He was the living image of a frustrated school shooter who let his opportunities slip. He spoke of Eyeless in Gaza and Solid Space, claiming there were no good bands left and that millions had to die, in his low, monotonous tone. We were looking for a Games Workshop shop that a forum member from 2009 swore existed. We navigated by faith, though he merely wanted to tell me that a Finnish girl on Telegram had sent him a heart, his only chance to leave white offspring before the collapse. And we found it. Closed, unlabelled, with vinyls ripped out as if erasing a painful past. Through the dust, one could make out shelves with flyers and tables where young men of the film Tesis phenotype once played. They were not today’s soyjaks; they smoked, listened to metal and chewed gum. That freakishness died by success, leaving only dusty display cases and the silence of a desacralised church amidst Warhammer posters defeated by time and Gamergate. I found Paris-Dakar at ‘Aromas Élite’, the liquidation perfumery in the corridor. It only opened in the mornings and some Thursdays if it wasn’t raining. At the back, between an Azzaro Acteur tester and dented boxes of Impact. Mrs Conchi, nearing retirement, approached with that slow step of someone who has already said everything. I asked about Codibel. She said it was Spanish and accessible, and that this bottle was from 1987. I sprayed it and the impact was immediate. It was like bathing in that layer of dust from the closed shops. The clove and patchouli formed an odd alliance, like an obituary, yet something clean wanted to sprout. A soapy green of a freshly watered garden struggling against decrepitude. In the background, a non-sexual musk, like clothes forgotten in a wardrobe. A smell of spring that will never return. I told Conchi it was probably a hidden fougère, and she, with pity, confessed it hadn’t sold in years. ‘Take it, you know these things and you seem like a good person,’ she said. Meanwhile, my friend waited outside. He didn’t want to enter a woman’s shop because it made him feel very violent, very gay. He had bought seeds and told me they hated everyone here. On the street, he pointed to a 19-year-old girl: ‘Have you seen how she changed direction when she saw me?’ I didn’t answer. I sprayed two sprays on my wrist and he said ‘It smells like old toys, I wish to be reborn.’ Perhaps it smells like this because it was formulated in a world with faith in the future. A soapy, green perfume that didn’t seek to be sexy or mysterious, but correct. Clean. The scent of a middle class with dignity. That is why, when I wear it, it is not just the aroma that returns, but a scheme of values that no longer exists. Paris-Dakar is not just a fragrance, it is a last barricade.