Here's A Present For You, Dear Readers

Here's an excerpt from the novel. In this section, Simon has just collected his wife from the hospital, where she was taken after an episode of what appeared to be psychosis. Enjoy! (And remember, comments/criticisms are welcome!)
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When I came to collect Ada, there was no trace of the anxiety they claimed had come over her during certain parts of the examination. She seemed perfectly healthy, if a little dazed from her ordeal, and demanded to know why the whole hospitalization thing had been necessary in the first place. “Honestly, Simon, I’m fine,” she told me huffily, as I tried to get her to accept the lawsuit-prevention wheelchair on her way out. “Every time I do something just a little bit nutty, you people act as though I’ve got the consumption or something. I can walk just fine, thank you. Luckily, being crazy doesn’t affect my legs.”

During her short stay in the hospital, they had managed to get her to take a shower, and the black marks on her skin had faded significantly, although they were still faintly visible. You could see the discoloration, although you couldn’t make out what was written there anymore, so that when she turned or reached up, it seemed as though gray clouds moved under her skin. I wished I had listened to the doctors and gone home for a little while during her examination, so that I could have brought her some jeans and a long-sleeved sweater.

Lucy was waiting for us when we got home, meowing piteously. We hadn’t been home since that morning and now it was late at night, and she thought we owed it to her to open up a can of cat food. The whole house seemed strange, as though we’d been gone for months instead of less than a day. It was as though the entire surreal experience— the service, Ada’s episode, the hospital, the evaluation, my conversation with Dr. Rabasaki— were events that should have taken an epic amount of time, but instead had been packed into only a few hours.

I flopped down onto the couch, exhausted. Lucy jumped up and walked delicately across my chest to stick her cold nose into my ear.

“What are you doing, goofy kitty?” Ada crooned at the cat, standing over me and scratching Lucy’s head. “It is catfood time?”

She disappeared, and a few moments later, I heard the creak of a can lid opening.

Suddenly I remembered: no sharp objects. I imagined a long silence, then a thud as Ada hit the ground, her throat slit or her wrists cut by a can lid.

“Dammit!” I roared, heaving myself up and sprinting into the kitchen. “Stop it! Let me do that! Don’t touch it!”

Ada was holding the can in midair, a spoon half inside already. One of Lucy’s food plates, a small saucer with little blue paw print designs on it, stood on the counter. There was no blood.

The look Ada gave me made me feel like I was the crazy one. “What’s wrong with you? Why am I not allowed to feed the cat, Simon?”

“Because…” I swallowed. There was no way this was going to come out sounding even remotely kind. “Because the doctor said no sharp objects.”

“I know how to open a can of cat food. I’m not stupid. It’s kind of hard to screw that up.” She scooped out the remaining food angrily, placed the plate on the floor, and practically threw the can into the sink, rinsing it out with hot water.

“It’s not about screwing up.”

She looked at me, and there were tears in her eyes. “You can’t be serious.”

“It’s what the doctor said, Ada—”

“So now I’m not just crazy, I’m suicidal?” She began to cry in earnest. “Jesus, Simon, when did I ever give you that impression? Why would you even say that?”

I reached out, intending to pull her against my chest and hold her, but she backed away, nearly stepping on Lucy, who was gorging herself on her dinner. “Don’t touch me,” she cried. “I might kill you or something. I’m a fucking psychopath, remember?”

She ran into the bedroom and slammed the door, and I couldn’t even follow her. I told myself that I wasn’t up for fighting right now, that it had been a long day, but honestly, I just didn’t know whether or not I agreed with her. I just stood in the kitchen, while the cat gave me a reproachful look.

At some point that night, in between fragments of a confusing dream about scarecrows in a field, I felt the couch shift and a warm body climb in next to mine. Ada and I lay there, not speaking, not moving, just feeling the contact between our bodies, the way we fit together like pieces of a broken plate. When morning came, she smiled sleepily, and I kissed her quietly, and we said nothing. There really was nothing more to say.