He first smelt it on a Wednesday morning; bitter yet tangy, musty yet sweet.

It was unusual but familiar and he tried to identify it. He was a synesthete, and it was strange that no word had triggered that smell. Or maybe it was the early morning stillness, he thought, as he continued his run, trying to quell his unease.

The smell followed him for the next three days. The base note was the same, though the hints varied, leaving him anxious and disturbed. He also noted an increase in pungency of the odours; they were sharp and acrid. His failure to identify what the smell could be left him restless and irritated.

On Sunday, he could not run, so he walked, hoping that the ache in his chest would settle down. A few minutes later, he became breathless and collapsed to his knees, his body wracked with pain as his mind struggled with the myriad odours that assaulted him.

As he sank into the enveloping darkness, he realised what that elusive smell was; it was the fragrance of his memories, the aroma of his experiences and the scent of all his mistakes.

It was the smell of Death.

Submission for round one of the the Reading List Marathon, where we had to write a fantasy / paranormal duodrabble (story with exactly 200 words) with a title borrowed from one of the books added to WattpadShortStory's reading list - 'Realistic Fiction'. 

Note:

Synesthete: A person with synesthesia, a condition in which the normally separate senses are not separate. Sight may mingle with sound, taste with touch, etc. The senses are cross-wired. For example, when a digit-color synesthete sees or just thinks of a number, the number appears with a color film over it. A given number's color never changes; it appears every time with the number. Synesthesia can take many forms. A synesthete may sense the taste of chicken as a pointed object. Other synesthetes hear colors. Still others may have several senses cross-wired.

Estimates of the frequency of synesthesia range from 1 in 250,000 to 1 in 2,000. People with synesthesia are 6 times more likely to be female than male. Most synesthetes find their unusual sensory abilities enjoyable.

People with synesthesia often report that one or more of their family members also have synesthesia, so it may in at least some cases be an inherited condition.

It may be that synesthesia arises when particular senses fail to become fully independent of one another during normal development. According to this school of thought, all babies are synesthetes. Synesthesia can be induced by certain hallucinogenic drugs and can also occur in some types of seizure disorders.

~Source: medicinenet.com

And this won an Honourable Mention 😊