28 January 2007 | Vol. 6, No. 4

To My Husband

by KAREN CHIEN

Darling, please do not touch me. Every time you do I throw up and lose my fat belly. During our first year of marriage I understood you touched me so often because you hadn't been married before. In our third year of marriage I tolerated it and whenever my voluptuous girlfriends asked how I kept so thin I joked around saying, "Yero's my diet." But by the fifth year I had to banish you to a separate bedroom since you were always kissing me when I least expected it and rubbing your foot against my inner calf in restaurants. This worked for a while and by the sixth month in the fifth year I was very fat until I was washing dishes one day and you touched my hip from behind. This made me run to the bathroom and now I am skinny again and it is the doctor's belief I always will be.

That is when I went to the market in the morning and delivered home one ripe pear and one warm peach, and in the evening I put on the white dress you like so much and painted on a face. I came downstairs but then I saw you sitting in the kitchen, halfway through my pear and peach. "How could you!" I kept screaming and you stared at me with deer eyes as the paint melted off. You swallowed first before you said, "Chill, baby. The grocery store is right around the corner." But this did not comfort me so you kissed me and kissed me and kissed me. You did this for eighteen years as we forgot about the peach and pear, which rotted and disappeared, and darling, please, please help me find them again.