Dating Disasters·
THE VANILLA SHAMPOO
A couple's simple grocery run sparks a heated disagreement when a vanilla shampoo reveals how scent and desire can complicate trust in a relationship.
Sweet gesture or too much with the shampoo?
Be one of the first to vote.
He brought home a bottle of vanilla shampoo and accidentally turned a simple grocery run into a relationship fight.
The poster's girlfriend used a rotation of shampoos, and one of them was vanilla scented. That was his favorite. So when she asked him to pick up a few things for her at the store, he did the errand, and spotted the shampoo on the shelf while checking out. He bought it too, thinking it would be a small surprise.
Back at her apartment, the moment he set the bags down, she was already putting the items away. Then she saw the extra bottle and asked why he got it.
He told her he noticed she used that kind and grabbed it for her.
She said she wasn't running low on shampoo.
He shrugged it off, saying it doesn't expire and that it was his favorite. Then, in a teasing tone, he added that she should use it if she planned to wash her hair that night.
That's when she paused and asked what he meant by it being his "favorite."
He answered honestly: he liked the way it made her hair smell, "like cookies."
Her reaction was immediate. She looked weirded out and told him it was "weird that I sexualized her shampoo."
He tried to play it down. Smelling nice is sexy, he said, and asked if she thought he was sexier when he used nice-smelling soaps and deodorants. She said, "not really, as long as I don't actively smell bad."
He said maybe it was different for everyone.
But she wasn't letting it go. She said it bothered her that something as mundane as shampoo was sexual to him. Then she asked him point-blank: if someone else smelled like vanilla, would he be attracted to them?
He said no. She was misunderstanding him.
She asked him to clarify, and he later admitted he didn't think he did a good job. What he meant, he said, was that he specifically liked the smell on her, not other people.
The conversation didn't really recover. She still seemed put out, so he left to give her space.
Now he's left wondering if buying the vanilla shampoo and telling her he likes when she uses it made him the asshole.