My husband is not dead, but he is close to it. He drops things, abutting his feet—they nearly destroy what keeps him standing. Hammer and auger, flat sewer rod, plunger, plumber’s torch, pipe wrench, hacksaw. 

He squeezes his 6-foot, 200-pound frame in a cupboard, under our sink. The drain is clogged.

“It’s your hair,” he says. “It sits here until I dump it.”

He takes the trap out—covered in black z-shaped strands that hang with grime. It looks like an abandoned motel, stuck in the rain. He holds it out to me, too close and long for my liking. I look but don’t touch—so much of it piled there.

“I probably need a new shampoo. Too many drying agents.”

He nods and pulls out the strands—tossing them like broken wires. The sight of this makes me itch.

When we first talked about love his mouth was spicy. We passed Glenfiddich back and forth like hot potato and dressed her up. “Love is complicated and sweet and good to you when you’re good to her,” he said. “I wasn’t always—men take longer to understand things, often after the damage is done.”

I asked if it was still love after so much time, if he thought love was strong enough to survive or does she become something else? The cows mooed over top of his words, and I took it all in.

 The chair rails, the mismatched wooden floors, the daisy yellow walls, the windchimes. Anytime I was over he kept the back door open and let summer fill the house. Right then, a shadow had come and cut through the heat—balled the feeling up into coal.

The second time we talked about love he shot a plantain at me. My hands were dry from breaking down boxes and putting my things away. We sat in veldts of crabgrass and clover and creeping buttercups, spilling memories both live and dormant. He was soft, but covert. Lifelong disease. Good days and bad days. Gradual decline. Did what we could.

He wound the root around the base of the head like rope and popped it off in one motion. The speed of this was a journey of its own— slow and choppy, almost boring, until the repetition turned to rhythm.

“The lungs hold almost 2 liters of air after death. Ghost air.”

I pulled one from the ground, pinching as close to the root as I could get, soiling my fingers.

The third time, I propped my phone up like a TV. A lady with an Afro-Caribbean accent yelled confidently about the benefits of hibiscus flowers—ginkgo biloba and fenugreek. I turned the volume down when he apologized. He didn’t know how our names could be nigh with so many years between us. I spread the thick plum colored paste all over, combing it through to coat my hair evenly. I cut the strands with too much space between them and turned the faucet on.

The fourth time she was in the closet. I folded his socks like lasagna and stacked them neatly in the drawer. The toe of one stuck out over the corner of it. A photograph of her slightly bent over a counter in deep concentration, the cornmeal crust of a pie peaking beneath her fingertips. My valentine, Boo ’95 scribbled on the back… swooping and wonted.

I took it to the very kitchen she stood in, and tore it to pieces. I put them in a bowl with a glob of peanut butter, and spooned her into my mouth in half moons. I could feel her in my belly after the third, but I made sure to consume her. Short brown curls, bulbous nose, small hands, and brownie colored skin, sweet and sticky like the batter.

The fifth time I laid my head in the middle of his chest. I could tell by his shallow breathing that it hurt a little. His voice was buried deep inside, a hum so low I could barely make out the words.

“I like it— it looks good on you.”

He picked at the lace hem hanging several inches above my knees and pulled at the silky bow that kept the slip closed in the back. A green dry cleaning tag was still fastened. The pin scraped my shoulder pulling it down and over bumps and lines unfamiliar to it.

I pushed my head further into his chest until he used his hands to try and stop me. I kept going, with more and more force . . . more desire . . . more fusion. I would break him open and get inside.

He grunted against me the harder I pushed. All his might came in rapid blinks and a small cry. The sixth was the same as the seventh and the eighth, love beneath the obduracy.