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the sauté station. Tommy moved over to the grill and scrutinized a long row of fluttering tickets hanging from clothespins over the outgoing food orders.
    "Pick up snapper!" yelled Tommy, leaning on the call buttons. Cheryl's chin and breasts appeared under the stacks of plates. She leaned into the narrow opening over the shelf.
    "She doesn't want the head," she said. "She says she doesn't want it looking at her."
    "Cheryl," said the chef. "I'm lookin' at the ticket right here and I don't see anything where it says 'head off.' "
    Cheryl gave him a sheepish smile. "I'm sorry, I vegged out. I forgot. Can't you just whack the head off for me now? This woman is a bitch on wheels. She'll just send it back."
    "Take the head off," said the chef, turning to Tommy. Tommy slid the cooked red snapper off the plate and onto the cutting board. He reached to his right and came over with a wide, carbon-steel blade, severing the head from the body in one motion.
    "Not with my knife!" howled the chef too late. "Not with my fuckin' knife!"
    "Shit," said Tommy. "Sorry. I wasn't thinking."
    The chef ignored the orders on the board and picked up his knife. He held it at eye level and examined the blade. There was a tiny indentation in the soft metal at the heel. "Shit!" he exclaimed.
    "Shit," said Tommy.
    "My baby," said the chef. "You fuckin' mutilated my baby."
    "Can't you work that out with a stone?" asked Tommy.
    "Where's my snapper?" said Cheryl.
    Tommy coated the bottom of a clean plate with beurre blanc and gently lowered the headless snapper on top. Using two plastic squeeze bottles, he drew quick abstract flowers on the plate around the fish, then pulled the tip of a paring knife through the design, making artful swirls through the beurre. He spooned a dot of red pepper relish onto the fish and put the plate up on the shelf for Cheryl.
    "You can fix it, right?" he asked the chef, who was still brooding over his knife.
    "Yeah, yeah, I can fix it," said the chef. "Please, please don't fuck with my knife unless I tell you, okay? Please?"
    "Sorry," said Tommy.
    "Where's Stephanie?" shouted the chef, to nobody in particular. "This food is getting cold! Pick it up! It's piling up back here!"
    "She just took out a cold order," said Tommy.
    "So send it with somebody else," said the chef. "The shits dyin ." He pounded on the call button. A new waitress with a nose ring arrived.
    "What do you want?" she said.
    "What I want," said the chef, "is for somebody to pick up this fuckin' food for me. This. Will you take this out to A-seven for me? If you would be so kind?" He mopped his brow. His nose was running.
    "And can you bring me a Heineken when you come back?" asked Tommy.
    "I'll get it for you," said Cheryl, back at the shelf. "Chef? You want something?"
    "Gimme a Coke," said the chef.
    "Ricky?" asked Cheryl.
    Ricky put down a basket of gaufrette potatoes filled with pommes soufflees and pushed a few sweaty strands of blond hair off his face. "Rockin Roll," he said.
    "One Heineken, one Coke, one Rolling Rock," said Cheryl. "How about the dishwashers?"
    "Yeah," said the chef, "Bring 'em a couple a Cokes and a few packets of sugar. They like extra sugar in it."
    "That's fuckin' disgusting," said Cheryl. She turned and headed out the kitchen doors.
    "Man," said the chef, "I'd like to suck on her ass till her head caves in."
    Tommy gave him a sour look and laid two pieces of center-cut swordfish on the grill, brushing them with garlic and pepper oil. A few minutes later, Cheryl returned with the drinks. She handed Tommy his Heineken first. "There's a call for you on oh-two-two-seven," she said.
    "Me?" asked Tommy.
    "Yeah. Barry says it's for you," she said.
    "I'll get it in the office," said Tommy. He stepped out from behind the line and jogged back to the chef's cramped office. He sat down on an upended milk crate, picked up the phone, and pressed the blinking button for 0227.
    "Hello," he said.
    "It's me," said Sally. "No names."
    "What is it? I'm