Summary

Chapter 1 starts on “the night Ralph’s mother flayed her forearms,” in the ICU waiting room, as Ralph describes to the first-person narrator a “woman in a red dress” that came up to him with a business card (3). Ralph and the narrator chat, and it is stated that Ralph’s mother, Laura, is “currently dying” in the hospital (5). A flashback fills in that she has tried to commit suicide by cutting her wrists (7). At the hospital, Ralph and the narrator, who seems to be his wife, look at the business card, which is evidently for a psychic. The narrator shares that Laura refused to give her an engagement ring that she had promised to give Ralph when he was ready to propose. The narrator, whose name is Abby, apparently “sidled the ring up off Laura’s bloody finger” when they found her dying...