Someone had written “DANGER!” in large black letters on the box of my HP Officejet 5610 All-in-One Printer, Fax, Scanner, Copier. I paid it no mind. I told myself that the worst the HP Officejet 5610 All-in-One Printer, Fax, Scanner, Copier could do is make me buy more paper. It printed up to 20 black and white pages a minute, and up to 13 color pages in a different minute that was just as long, but occurred much later. I was happy to put it on the shelf near my copy of Strunk and White and my bust of Clive Barker. The printer, that is. Not the minute. Minutes don’t go on the shelf.

Anway, that first week, it was nothing special. I drank my coffee and enjoyed the ease of the 25 sheet document feeder. My faxes were going at 33.6 kbps, with or without a PC connection. Imagine my thrill when I first sent a fax through a normal phone line! I called my wife in, and she rolled her eyes and walked out, telling me not to bother her with things like that again.

By the weekend I was comfortable with the One Touch buttons to fax, copy and scan. I even started enjoying the High Quality Document Scanning with the 1200×2400 dpi optical resolution and 48 bit color depth. I found how to automatically block junk fax numbers to save me on ink and paper. I began taking the manual to bed at night, even as my wife covered her head with a pillow and told me harshly to turn off the lamp.

The next week, though, I lost control. I began to scan all my old documents, my diplomas, even, briefly, our cat. My wife came in to find it pressed against the flatbed, meowing with wide, helpless eyes. She said there was a look on my face that she’d never seen before, and she rushed over to pull me away. The cat ran into the living room and I assured her it had just been a moment’s mistake. She told me that she’d had the cat since college, longer than I’d known her, and that I was to never do such a thing again. I told her I would make it up to her by making her a nightcap.

A few hours later I primed the scanner resolution, going from the Optical up to 1200 dpi to the Enhanced up to 19200 dpi. It was simple after studying the manual. My wife was fast asleep, thanks to the crushed pills I had slipped into her drink. I carried her from her bedroom to the computer room and undressed her, then, slowly, I dragged her limp body across the scanner. When I was done, I went to the bag I had filled that day at the computer store. A bag full of HP 22 Tri-color, HP 27 Black, HP 56 Black, and HP 58 Photo. They were not included, you see. And I would need them all.

By morning, I had printed her dopplegangers, one in color, one black and white, one photo quality. My old wife awoke and looked at the reams spread out before her and I could see in her eyes that she feared for her life. But why? For was I not granting her immortality? Was her memory not forever secure, like a Vulgate, or a copy of Truly Tasteless Jokes? I drew the letter opener from the empty tomato paste can in which it was usually kept and advanced toward where she lay. But then, I met her eyes.

You see, the woman I had just printed was limp and asleep and full of dreams and perfection. But the woman before me now had none of that. She called me names that would have made a sailor run for a dictionary and made it clear that I should kill her quickly because, if she lived, I would spend the rest of my life in an agony no human could truly comprehend. And suddenly my mind was cleared. This was the woman I had married. This was real life.

My wife helped me seal up the HP Officejet 5610 All-in-One Printer, Fax, Scanner, Copier and we took it out to the curb. Before we left, I took a black pen and wrote “DANGER!” in large letters. Maybe some single man would find use in its magic. For me, though, there was no hope. My soul was already lost.

Back to top