What Their Hands Did by Kathryn Silver-Hajo
At first all he can do is lie on their sofa fist-scrunching her brick-red wool blanket to his nose inhaling the lingering traces of her olive oil soap, the savory sweetness of her. He stares at the solemn gray of the idle television where they used to watch Jeopardy together—her shouting out “Who are the New York Nets!” or “What is Monrovia!” before he could open his mouth.
He gets up only for the bathroom or to open the door to well-wishers who offer enameled pans of lasagna or potatoes au gratin rich enough to turn a stomach. He shoves the casseroles into the fridge alongside all the others.
Sometimes he sits on the wooden stool in the kitchen, exhausted from so much kindness, assaulted by the sharp winter air roaring in before he can click the door shut again. He stares at his knuckled, creased hands—the ones that turned these kitchen table legs on the wood lathe in the basement, sawed and beveled and lacquered this table top where she used to chop onions so fast and fine he’d tell her that if she was a lawyer in the courtroom taking down an opponent she’d get 500 bucks an hour.
She’d eye him slyly while her palms circumnavigated the globes of twilight-purple eggplants, smacking them firmly to elicit some deep mysterious sound that told her if they were ready to be sliced spiced fried crisp and bubbled in parmigiana and sauce fragrant with basil and garlic. He smelled felt saw it all from a distance since she’d snap “Out, out” if he dared enter while she worked.
As days become weeks become a month, the memory of the soft give of her begins to elude him. He presses work-roughened hands to his cheeks, hands that plumped the heft of her—breasts, buttocks, thighs, her belly when it was round with its stowaway who flipped around like a fish.
Now he opens the rattly Frigidaire as she always called it, even though it’s really a Whirlpool. He removes each dish, coaxing the contents cold and rubbery into the garbage, the stink of grease and garlic rising. He plunges the pans into water scalding and fierce, scrubs them to gleaming, dries and sets them aside.
He pulls her apron with its neat row of orange-billed geese over his head, but it’s too crisp and clean to bear any of her scent. Still, it curves around him as it curved around her, the strings pulling tight around his girth.
His fingers tremble as he pulls out her favorite chef’s knife—the taking-down-the-defendant one, carves away the bad parts of a miserable old onion, starts chopping. Slowly at first, eyes stinging, then faster and faster, tears flowing freely. One day he’ll master that 500-buck-an hour dice but for now this will have to do. This will have to do, Gerty, he whispers, this will just have to do.
Kathryn Silver-Hajo’s flash fiction, poetry, and CNF appears or is forthcoming in Atticus Review, The Citron Review, Craft Literary, Pithead Chapel, Ruby Literary and others. She is a 2023 Pushcart Prize, Best Small Fictions, and Best American Food Writing nominee. Kathryn’s flash collection “Wolfsong” and her novel “Roots of The Banyan Tree” are both forthcoming in 2023. She’s a reader at Fractured Lit.
More at: kathrynsilverhajo.com; twitter – KSilverHajo; instagram – kathrynsilverhajo
Image – AI-Generated Illustration
MAILING LIST / COMPETITION / CRITIQUE SERVICE / BOOKSHOP / TWITTER / INSTAGRAM / DONATE
*
*
Tags:
Kathryn,
I applaud your mastery. This is an excellent, heartwarming flash story. You tell us so much about this grieving man, dealing so valiantly with his wife’s passing. I can just imagine the love and friendship of their union. Your telling details make his loving wife come so vividly alive. I feel that I know this woman and would look forward to a homecooked meal at her dining table…thank you for sharing this delightful story.