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and served to customers who, depending upon their skill, might be able to extract every sliver of flesh from every tiny tentacle on the lobster’s complex body.
    If John had ever seen what Nate was doing, he’d have embarked upon a homicidal rampage to make the Trojan War seem but a brief interlude from true bloodlust. But there was no sign of him. And so, Jessica thought to herself, he must be either absent, or he was securely ensconced at the dishwashing station that stood on the opposite diagonal of the Yolk, immediately behind the swinging doors leading to the dining room. And if John was at the dishwashing station, as he indeed was, then there he’d stay, all night, no matter what, and this despite the fact that Fabergé Restaurant was his empire, his egg, and, moreover, despite the fact that he was, arguably, the greatest chef of his generation. Jessica’s experience dictated that once exiled to the steaming Hobart washing station, it was impossible for John to leave that area until the kitchen was not only washed, but sterilized, prepared in case some intricate surgery had to be performed on the floor, in one of the sinks, in the walk-in, or on the stove, in case, in short, the future of the world depended on this Yolk being impeccable, untarnished by the outside world, a vault against the destruction of teeming life.
    “Here’s the theory,” said Nate to Jessica, staring at her approach as though she were his pupil, or at least connected thereto, in search of his apprenticeship down upon the floor. “If the lobsters can figure it out, they aren’t actually insect-like mindless beings responding solely to the whims of their immediate environment, and therefore they deserve to live.” Having proclaimed this utterance, Nate rose to his feet, for full effect. “But if they can’t, they’ll be gently and softly anaesthetized, vaporized with the finest distilled but rather steamy water, and then boiled to death before being ripped apart and then prodded for each morsel of glistening flesh by a bespectacled, compulsive, conversationally distracted stockbroker or stockbroker’s mistress-turned-pathologist. Or . . .”—he rubbed his hands together and beamed—“they’ll be decorticated millimeter by millimeter by a little, old lady who actually doesn’t know whether she is in her bedroom or on the top stair of the Eiffel Tower, and in her actions is unaware of whether she is undressing herself after a long day of knitting, or doing the world’s most intricate crossword puzzle, impeded by the obvious handicap of having both hands sawed off and piled in a neat, little heap beside her.” Having finished his oration, Nate resumed his former position on the floor, adjusting the metal implements in advance of the forthcoming event.
    Jessica crouched down beside him, at a respectable but intimate distance. Nate, who looked deeply into her visage with his grey, sparkling, bespectacled eyes, ceased to speak, and instead projected dancing images that flowed through his eyes and into her imagination. There was a sense of urgency whenever Jessica and Nate interacted, and it had been observed on various occasions that the frenetic and sometimes synergetic relationship must have had some kind of history.
    It did.
    The tie that bound and tore asunder this culinary couple was the product of an encounter that had happened to them once upon a time, a long time ago, on a chilly January day in the even chillier walk-in. Jessica’s bountiful body lay before Nate that fateful day, for she had finally given in to his constant overtures, and generously bent over a crate of eggs, embracing the impersonal cardboard and the cold stainless steel with her warmth. Her grey chef’s pants and tiny panties were yanked until they were half way down her silken legs, her apron was hoisted up, and now the body that had occupied every sultry dream since he’d first seen her gorgeous face was now open to his, as he, from behind where she