Mr. Peanut by Adam Ross Read Free Book Online

again, and when she opened her eyes she opened them wide, looking calmly around at the light-flooded room, blinking once at her husband, recognizing him, then looked away.
    “I’m going to change my life,” she said.
    David didn’t know what she meant by this or how to react. But at the same time unutterably relieved to see her alive, he simply said, “Yes.” She’d been unconscious for hours but seemed to have spent this time reflecting, having made this decision somewhere in the back of her mind. She was so unwilling to talk to him that morning and for the rest of the day that by evening David gave up trying. She’d been so sick he couldn’t begrudge her anything, yet the longer this went on the more anxious he became. She was angry with him, angry, he knew, for the things he’d said, and every time he recalled their fight, he felt more and more ashamed.
    “Alice,” he said the next morning, “I’m so sorry.”
    She was watching the television above his head. She lay with her arms crossed, and every time she jabbed the remote at the screen he felt sure the set would fall down on him.
    “Sorry for what?”
    “For the things I said. For upsetting you so much.”
    “Is that what you think?” Alice said.
    It
was
what he thought, but the look of disgust and amazement on her face was so intense that he strongly considered lying.
    “You think this happened to me because of our fight? Because of something you might have
said?”
    “Well,” David answered, “yes.”
    She jabbed the remote one, two, three times. “Then you’d be wrong.”
    He waited for an explanation, but none came.
    “Then why does it seem like you’re angry with me?” he asked.
    “Because I’m
trapped
here, David. And because I am trapped here, I can’t get on with changing my life. Does that make sense to you? Does it make things clear?”
    “No,” he said, “it doesn’t.”
    “Well,” Alice said, “that’s just the way it’s going to be for now.”
    Her doctor came by on rounds later that evening. When he entered the room, Alice was cordial and talkative, and that she seemed capable of treating this stranger with more decency and kindness than her own husband left David feeling more hurt and confused than before. The doctor checked her heart rate and blood pressure, shined a light in her eyes and examined her tongue. He was Indian, and with his long, delicate fingers—his palms were as pink as smoked chicken—he thumped Alice’s back. And though it was completely irrational, the fact that he was touching her made David horribly jealous.
    “Your blood tests came in,” the doctor said. “You’re anemic. You also have acute hyperthyroidism. Were you aware of this condition?”
    Alice shook her head.
    “When you diet in the future, you must monitor your nutrition more carefully.”
    “I will,” she said. “Doctor, may we speak privately for a moment?”
    “Certainly.”
    Both the doctor and Alice looked over at David and waited. David pointed to himself, then got up and left the room, closed the door behind him, and stood tapping his foot in the hallway.
    Within a few minutes, the door opened.
    “Thank you so much,” Alice told the doctor.
    “Of course,” he said at the door. “You don’t have to suffer like you do.”
    They both glanced at David.
    “You’ll be discharged tomorrow.”
    “That’s wonderful,” Alice said.
    “Rest is the best thing for you now,” the doctor said, and after David stepped past him he gently closed the door.
    As soon as David took his seat, Alice turned over onto her side and faced away from him.
    “Are you going to sleep now?” he asked.
    “Yes,” Alice said.
    “Is there anything I can do?”
    “Can you make tomorrow come faster?”
    “I don’t think so.”
    “Then the answer is no.”
    He sat in the dark for a few minutes, feeling another terrible wave of anxiety come over him. In the next room, a man coughed violently. “Alice?” he said.
    She refused to