Husband Cubes

Annie Elizabeth Kreiser

I needed to clear off the shelves in the living room. If I was one of those violent women I would have taken my arms and pushed all the framed pictures onto the floor in one destructive sweep. I would have walked over the glass, letting my feet bleed and not cared. I was not one of those violent women. I took each picture from the shelf one at a time. I folded its stand closed and laid the whole thing in the garbage face down. I did this with each picture and I did not look at me in a wedding dress thirty pounds lighter, I did not look at my husband’s grin or at his son in a graduation cap and gown. When the pictures were all away, I dusted, making sure to get the corners. 

I used the sharpest knife we had, a wedding gift from all those years ago. When I was young and beautiful, fresh out of high school. My friends went off to college, but I had stayed behind, secretly proud of myself for not giving in to the temptations of the world, for making my own choices. I had dedicated all of my most beautiful years to Ray, to our home. When he wanted, I sacrificed my taut belly button for his child. But still, as my mother had warned me, it was not enough. 

I started with the fingers, thinking them the easiest. I sliced through them like gouda, remembering the many charcuterie boards I made for parties in our home. I had learned, with time, to cut nicely, evenly. Olives, grapes, dried fruits, crackers, cured meats like chips of marble, and perfectly sliced cheeses. I spent hours on those boards, cutting, arranging, stepping back, adjusting. Deciding the placements of complimentary colors and tastes. And then at the company parties I hosted because I was the only housewife so of course I had the time. I would smile at the compliments, chase away the child from eating too much cheese. There would be no more of these parties to clean for. Each little piece of finger came out a perfect cube. I cubed his hands, which had reached for some plumper fruit the moment I began to show signs of age. We had the same hair, the same eyes. She was simply, to the untrained eye of a man, the newer model. Having finished the fingers and toes, I began to feel more confident and moved on to the appendages, lest they wander off even now. 

I began the torso and thought about that story from the news a few years back. The woman had cut off the man’s penis, but the man had gone and gotten it sewn back on in the hospital, a modern medical miracle. After that I think they both ended up in the adult entertainment industry. Ray made a joke about it once. People always left out the part from before, the part where he raped her and beat her. What was her name again? I sliced through my own husband. I couldn’t remember her name at the moment. It would come to me later. 

My husband had balded early; this was the first time he had betrayed me. His hair was once so dark with beautiful waves. There was never a good way to tell which men would stay fresh the longest. Still, I had stayed with him, enduring his balding to press each Oxford shirt, smoothing out each wrinkle. I cut through his face last, shaving off parts as necessary to keep all of my little cubes exactly even. The blade slid through his skull, his nose, his teeth, parting them smoothly and satisfyingly, just the right amount of resistance. After the baby was born I stood in the bathroom for hours sliding a paring knife through bar soap to feel it glide and watch all the smooth little pieces fall into the garbage. Practice, I guess. 

I picked up the husband cubes and carried them to the shelf, neatly arranging them. 

Each cube was straight, centered, in its line. One by one, I arranged these cubes, so small you couldn’t tell which part of the body they came from. Like soft little pixels, each filled a small spot on the shelves. My breathing was slow and calm. It had been a long time since cleaning relaxed me. Hours later, each little cube was arranged in its own row on the shelves. I stepped back to admire my work, and drew in a satisfied breath at a job well done and an organized shelf. 

I brought out the mop to clean away the blood from the hardwood floors. I moved the mop in clean even strokes, up and down, watching the blood disappear in its path. That done and everything put away, I sat down on my couch, looking again at my shelf. It was too painful to allow my memory to recall the thousand sacrifices I had made, the experiences I might have had. Instead of remembering, I contented myself with the thought that I had done my best and now it was over. I could put the pieces of my life back together, rearrange things. Sort out my belongings and dispose of the clutter. The living room wouldn’t get so dirty. The bathroom seat wouldn’t be left up. Sitting there on the couch I felt the unbreakable bonds of marriage slipping from my wrists and ankles. Freedom wrapped itself around me like a blanket and I fell asleep on the couch and no husband ever came to call me to bed. 

Annie Elizabeth Kreiser (’23) is a double major in English and secondary education who dreams of moving someplace warmer. On campus, she serves as a writing consultant and the junior editor of Pitch, Cedar Crest College’s journal of art and literature. After graduation, she plans to attend graduate school before returning to the classroom to teach secondary English.