“So, she focused her energy on my hair. How long and tangled it was, how much time it took her to fix it in the morning. She sat me on top of the washing machine and instructed my aunt, who was in beauty school, to cut my hair. When she was done, I had the same hairstyle as Twiggy, a British model of that era who sported what my aunts called a “boy cut.” When Papi got home and saw my haircut he almost cried and did not speak to my mother for two months.”

Tabu was an adult perfume and that made it a special gift for my adolescent self.