Unspeakable Things

After thirty-seven years you think you know someone. Then you find a human hand in a shoebox under his side of the bed and two more in his bottom dresser drawer. So you dig around and find three fingers in a cigar box. And a nose under the bookshelf. You peek in his den, where in your haste and longing to see nothing out of the ordinary you nearly miss the two shrunken heads wincing from their tiny display stands on the mantle and the mummified ears dangling in their shadow box by the grandfather clock. When he gets home from work you have the human foot lamp you found on the top closet shelf sitting in your lap. You’ve thought this over all day, what you’ll say to him when he walks in. You’ve played the scene over in your mind so many times you feel like you’ll hardly need him in the room when you finally say it. But something—a flash of karmic clarity or mere pity, or both, or even a rare, bewildering twinge of unconditional love—something hits you and you stash the lamp in your knitting chest as he pops in through the front door.

You jump up and give him a quick peck on the cheek, ask him how his day went. Because when you stop and think about it, can you really blame him?

Perhaps he’s had a similar moment of secret forgiveness, most likely when he came across your collection of neighborhood cat pelts you keep nudged under the guest bed and only roll out when you’ve dried and cured the latest catch. Or when he stumbled upon the twenty-year’s stash of borrowed mail you never got around to giving back that lists in dusty piles in the attic. In fact, maybe you love him even more now that you’re sure he’s only human.

When he hugs you, you hold on just a little longer than usual, but certainly not long enough to arouse suspicion. There are other secrets still to be kept, and dumplings getting cold on the dinner table.