Five Candles

Five Candles

For New Year’s Eve, here is a fictional story inspired by the names of five scented candles photographed by Buonomo & Cometti. Text: Isabelle Cerboneschi

Every year on 31 December, we get together for our ritual. It was something we started when we were still at university. It goes way back… a good number of years. There’s Carla, Amber, Audrey, Marie and me. The Famous Five, as we liked to call ourselves. We never solved any mysterious case, except for the ones our criminal law teacher gave us, but we’ve always been there for each other and that’s all what matters.

On New Year’s Eve, we gather at Amber’s house because she has the biggest house. And we need plenty of space to welcome our respective families. Over the years, we have never failed to hold our famous ‘five candles dinner’.

What does it consist of? It’s simple and symbolic at the very same time. Each of us is responsible for buying a candle with a particular name or scent that we intend for one of us. The idea is to find one that evokes the person, not just one that smells good. And at midnight, we turn off the lights before lighting the candles together.

On 31 December 2025, the Amber candle naturally went to Amber. She makes the choice so easy: her name is perfect for perfumes. The flame licked the wick, hesitating at first, like a memory struggling to find its place, then more bravely. The room’s atmosphere changed instantly. The flame gently swirled in the air, giving it a warm hue, like its scent, like friendship too.

Carla received Bohemia. An excellent choice for this beautiful creature in motion, ready to go anywhere as long as it takes her far away. With its warm notes of opoponax and rum, enhanced by the freshness of geranium and rosemary, resting on a bed of vanilla and moss, this candle is a true invitation to travel.

Another easy choice: Santal Australia for our lovely Audrey, who had to leave her native Australia when she was ten years old. This candle was created to reproduce the distinctive scent of Australian sandalwood when it is transformed into a fragrant essence, that precise moment when the steam comes into contact with the heart of the ground wood. It gives off a woody, creamy and enveloping fragrance. A scent that suits Audrey perfectly.

Tuberose went to the most unpredictable of us all: Marie. Its heady, disturbing fragrance filled the room and its flame flickered more than the others. No one was surprised. Some fires demand attention. And so do some desires.

Mine is called Palimpsest. A word I love. Palimpsest is something that has been written, erased and rewritten over. It is something that keeps traces of old sentences hidden beneath new ones. It is so much like me, this unfinished work made up of layers added on top of others, while leaving the first ones visible.
When I lit the candle, the air filled with the scent of an antique rose, but a rose with a rock “n” roll spirit. I had the feeling that the flame was awakening something other than the fragrance. Ancient voices. The fire revealed what had been covered up without being erased. Perhaps it is time to do so…

Palimpseste, Celine ©Buonomo & Cometti

As the hours passed, I watched the candlelight dancing on our faces. The flames made us look beautiful. We let the fragrances intertwine, without trying to tell them apart, imagining that the coming year would be shaped by this curious blending. What would it hold for us?
Time seemed to move in slow motion, as if held back by the wax melting gently. Later, long after we had blown out the five candles together, there was an intangible scent in the air and the feeling that certain lights, like friendship, never die out, ever.