Kathunk. That would be the sound of my husband’s body landing in the deep hole I had dug in the woods.

Kasplash. That’s what it would sound like if I shoved his body off a bridge into the storm-swelled swirling muddy waters where the alligators lay in wait.

Kasquish. That’s what it would sound like if it had rained a lot and the hole I had dug was kind of muddy.

Kafizz, his body being consumed by acid. Kacrackle, his body if I burned it, preferably in his ugly recliner.

It is really rare that I want to kill my husband. And for the record, if any law enforcement professionals happen to be reading, don’t reach for the radio to call for backup just yet. By the end of this post you’ll be willing to help me move the body.

First, there is a really profound distinction between wanting to kill someone and just wanting them dead. I don’t want my husband to actually be dead, now or ever. It would be soul-crushing to lose him. But occasionally, I do want the privilege of killing him.

Kill Him Case Study #1: The doctor was still stitching me up from giving birth to our first born (and no, as a matter of fact, I did NOT have a c-section) when his cell phone rang. It was his high school buddy, sweetly calling to ask if I’d had the baby yet and how I was doing. Dead Husband replied, “I don’t know what all the screaming is for when somebody gives birth on TV, it doesn’t hurt.”

Kill Him Case Study #2: During my labor with our second child, he LEFT ME AT THE HOSPITAL because a potential client he’d been meeting with for weeks suddenly decided to sign up with Dead Husband’s company. Now, if Dead Husband had simply said, “My wife is in labor, we’re in the hospital right now,” I’m going to bet the second born child that the client would have been mortified and agreed to meet with Dead Husband at his earliest convenience, say sometime after I’d had the baby. Nope. Left me there.

Kill Him Case Study #3: And this one’s the doozy, the absolute He-Must-Go clincher. Some time while we were still dating, Dead Husband made the comment that he would never be an organ donor on the grounds that there must be some great reason he was born with all of these squishy parts, and that whenever he should die, they were still legally his. We discussed it like calm adults, until I said, “But what about me? I could have your kidney, right?” He looked me right in the face and told me no, not even I could have an organ. And for some reason I still married him.

Fast forward to years down the road when we are both absolutely giddy, just staring at our FOUR-DAY-OLD firstborn child. Granted, I had given birth FOUR DAYS AGO so he had only been a father for FOUR DAYS. He waxed mushy poetic and teary-eyed about how he would do anything for our daughter. Right up until he said, “But you can’t have my kidney either.”

I was stunned. This man, claiming the status of FATHER simply by the biological right to the title, had just informed a baby who had only been alive for 96 hours that she could not have one of his superfluous organs if she had a medical need for it. You might think I got loud and angry, but I’ve learned that quiet threats are scarier, especially if there’s a soft Exorcist-accent to your voice when you speak.

“Hear me now, mudflap. If she ever needs your kidney, you can give her one or I can kill you and take ’em both. Mama has spoken.”

It has brought great peace to my household and my marriage relationship that I refuse to argue or nag. I simply don’t have the spare brain cells to waste on a stupid argument, so whenever he gets on a prissy tirade about how he’s told me fifteen times to check the oil in my car, I simply look at him, smile, and say, “Kathunk.”

He knows what Kathunk means, and he usually turns a little bit pale and backs up a few steps.

But recently, he had to go and do something heinously unacceptable. His company was the major underwriter of a concert in town, an elegant affair. I was handed the credit card “I Love Lucy”-style and given permission to get myself a new dress for the occasion. At the event, we were mingling with all of the beautiful people and I was pleasantly smiling at all of the company administrators he works with whom I’d never met.

Then he introduced me as his first wife. You know, because he thought it would be funny. Somehow. The only thing that kept me from ripping his throat out with my teeth like an angry puma was the knowledge that I still had his credit card and, believe it or not, there are actually some hurts that can be soothed by throwing money at them.

I continued to smile at all of the upper echelon of his company, grinning through that asinine joke time after time. Every time he said it, especially the times he enhanced the one-liner by telling people he still loved me but he had to trade me in for something shinier to go with how good he looked, I just envisioned all the ways he was going to die.

The best part was imagining the sound his head would make hitting each of the stairs as I dragged his body, still slightly warm and wrapped in the bamboo sheets he got me for Valentine’s Day, to the awaiting pit in the woods behind our house. The crime scene investigators would be really puzzled by the crazy blood trail because it would go down the stairs, then back up again, then back down again, then back up, over and over until I grew tired of the wonderful sound his head was going to make on those stairs. Thunk-thunk-thunk-thuuuunnnk (we’re missing a step)-thunk-thunk-thunk.

Dearest readers, please don’t think there is any reason for alarm. I will never actually kill my husband, because believe it or not he is still worth more alive than dead. Besides, once you go killing people you open a whole can of clean-up-the-mess worms and it’s just not worth the hassle. But that’s not to say that there aren’t a few people on Earth who wouldn’t improve this place by hurrying up and becoming organ donors.