Wet Paper Towel

The smooth recycled brown ones on a roll (clunk-clunk, clunk-clunk, rrrriiip) which were a feature of my grade school existence. Mixed in with the wet pulpy, earthy scent is the promise of summer coming soon, and a faint remnant of some kind of cleanser they used on the tiles and mirrors of the 4th grade girls’ bathroom. We’d thoroughly wet the paper towels in the sink and then press them against the walls so that we could make little origami boxes, scratching a hole in the middle of the sheet before folding so that we’d have a place to blow into the finished product to inflate it. We’d hold out as long as we could, but I doubt any of those little boxes lasted more than a minute before we’d slam our hands down to pop them before going back out to recess.