What's That Smell?

What's That Smell?
A.K.A.:  Brothers Are A Pain!
A true-life embarrassing moment

         It had been a typical summer vacation:  my older brothers promised to play games with me and even let me choose which game to play first.  In return, I had to promise to play whatever game they chose, by their rules, no quitting, for as long as it lasted or the end of summer, whichever came first.

         The game I picked lasted less than an hour; then it was their turn and they chose Monopoly.  I protested but to no avail.  The game started off as usual but soon they were borrowing money from other games and building high-rise hotels with lego blocks and charging astronomical fees if I landed on their property.  The way they played, the game went on for weeks at a time.

         It was a relief to be invited to visit with friends one evening.  After eating barbequed burgers and hotdogs we all took turns cranking the ice cream churn.  We watched the sun set over the Colorado Rockies and played tag until it was dark.

         Once inside, we played ping pong in the basement, boys against girls.  My friend Leslie and I won the first match against my brother Jim and her brother Scott.  "Let's go see what Tom and Doug are doing," Jim suggested. Leslie and I continued to play.

         The boys came back a while later.  "We made you a prize for winning the game," they said, holding out a small bottle. 

         "It's perfume," Scott explained.

         Jim held the vial up to his nose and sniffed.  "Mmmm, wildflowers," he said.

         Tom took the bottle and put his finger on the sprayer.  "Here, try it."

         Leslie and I held our wrists out, but immediately knew our trust had been misplaced when the first squirt of ‘perfume' hit the air.

         "Eewww!" we squealed. 

         The boys laughed and ran outside yelling, "Skunks, skunks!"

         "Mommy," Leslie shouted up the steps. 

         "What's that smell?" both mothers exclaimed as they came down the stairs.

         We held out our wrists and Leslie explained, "The boys said they made us perfume because we won the ping pong match, but now we smell like skunks."

         We scrubbed and scrubbed, trying to get the smell off, while the enraged mothers chased down four naughty boys hiding in the dark tree house in the backyard. 

         "You boys had best get inside and explain yourselves to your fathers," one of them hollered from the bottom of the ladder.  From the bathroom we saw the four of them climb down and saunter past the window toward the deck stairs.  The kitchen door slammed and their slow footsteps dragged across the floorboards overhead.

         "Where did you get it?" Leslie's father's voice bellowed.  I shivered imagining the boys withstanding his anger, but then the skunk smell assaulted my senses and my pity evaporated.

         "You were in my hunting gear," the rant continued.  By the end of the evening all of the boys were grounded for the remainder of the summer and were put to work doing yard chores for family and neighbors.

         As the weeks passed the smell faded, but everywhere we went people sniffed the air and looked around with their noses twitching.  As hard as we scrubbed, the smell would not go away.  Weeks later as we began the school year, a faint hint of ‘eau de skunk' still lingered but at least our eyes had stopped watering.

         My brothers never fooled with the hunting gear again, but they still tricked me into playing Monopoly.  I hate that game.  Ask my family; I don't play it to this day.

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ID: 284049   (Rated: ASR) Boy, Was My Face Red  True-life embarrassing moments, large and small...most of them my own by justme