Tonight, Again, He Wipes My Skin Clean
A single red lamp. Suds sliding down the stainless-steel sink. He comes up behind me, skims my waist, and whispers:
“Delicious again tonight.”
I can’t tell if the compliment is for me or for the soup his tongue had just scraped from the bowl. His fingertips pass my ribcage. A nail, sharpened by a man’s clipper, grazes my bra strap; I let a spoon clatter. A mistake. He’s only here to clear the dishes.
I submerge my arms and hold my breath. Hot water tickles the backs of my hands. He stacks plates behind me—one, two, three. I lie arranged on them more artfully than any chef’s sauce. Not porcelain: my body. My shoulder becomes the rim of a plate beneath his caress.
“Let’s get you spotless,” he says. I take it as a kiss on my earlobe. But the thigh he intends to polish is the saucepan I just scoured.
Mother Said Never Hide My Body
“Marry into a good house and you’ll be comfortable for life.” At twenty, Mother’s sentences were short. Good house. Good man. Good night. Good body.
The first time we slept together, twenty-five and trembling, he fondled my breast and murmured, “Did you really make these yourself?” He scraped a nipple with his nail; I laughed. The next day I enrolled in a cooking class. Mother was delighted. “Your husband will love you even more.”
On my wedding day I was trapped inside white lace. I had to smile whenever the groom entered. “She’s so warm,” the guests said. Warm temperature, warm plate, warm body. I lay in that vacancy—not under a quilt but on a tablecloth.
On our wedding night he unhooked my bra and said, “I’m tired tonight.” I couldn’t tell if the word tomorrow was implied. He didn’t touch my breasts; he held my hand and whispered, “Tomorrow I want your kimchi stew.”
Forty-Seven Plates, Twenty-Three Spoons, Twelve Pots—And Me
March 12. I washed forty-seven plates again. Twenty-three spoons. Twelve pots. My husband lay on the bed drinking beer. As I plunged my hands into scalding water I asked, Who exactly am I in this house?
He approached in his underwear. His hand skimmed my waist; I bent reflexively, as if scrubbing a dish. “You worked hard again today,” he murmured. He turned me toward him. I felt his hand moving toward my breast—but he only wiped the dish soap from my fingers. “Do your hands hurt?” he asked. I nodded. He rubbed cream into them. “This is my job,” he said.
I closed my eyes while his palm crossed my knuckles. Is this love? Or merely maintenance to make my body usable again?
Kwon Mi-jung, 38, Former Copywriter, Now a Dishwasher
Mi-jung was the most beautiful woman I knew. In advertising she was praised for “capturing millennial women’s desire.” After marriage she quit, thinking she’d finally have time for herself. Instead she met the stains on her husband’s underwear—too deep for any washboard.
Several times a day she handled those briefs, rubbing at the stains to erase or to confirm them. In a café she whispered, “I’ll die here.” She showed me the calluses on her palms. “I didn’t make these. They’re the tracks of him scouring my body every night.”
Raising her teacup, she said, “We didn’t walk down the aisle; we walked into the dishwasher.”
The Night He Undressed Me
May 5. At last he led me to the bed. I shivered as I removed my underwear. He caressed my breast. “Why is this so hard?”
I laughed. That’s a ladle mark. He stroked my thigh. “And this?” A pot-handle bruise. He climbed on top of me and whispered, “Tonight I want to eat you.”
I couldn’t tell if he meant me or my cooking. He took a nipple into his mouth. “This is the tastiest part.”
He touched my body. “You’re so warm.” I didn’t know if he meant I love you. He turned me over. “So soft here.” I never learned the real meaning of any of it.
Who Am I in This House?
Tonight I stand at the sink again. Spring drizzle taps the window. My husband lounges on the sofa with his beer. As I wash the forty-seven plates I ask, Who am I in this house? Wife? Dishwasher? At least a dishwasher moves when you press a button.
I look down at my body. Calluses. Tracks of his nightly scouring. I lie on top of them like another plate set on the table.
So I ask: Tonight, have you looked at your own body? Are there calluses embedded in it? If the thing you do best is to oil the life of the person who uses you most, is that your life—or merely a replaceable body?
And that house you live in—could it last a single day without you? Do you truly want to watch it fall?
And if it did—would you really want to see it crumble?