Prospect of the Deep Clean

            One Saturday afternoon in early March, when the morning crew was almost finished swapping out the stations and the evening crew had all arrived, Tati insisted that everyone attend a staff meeting in the restaurant’s banquet annex. Despite being in the middle of investigating a strange smoky smell in the kitchen, the back of the house staff soon hung up their aprons and walked out past the bar and through the neatly-set dining room to join the bartenders and the servers who were already brimming with cynical agitation.

            “Is that everyone?” Tati asked, looking around. “What about Almo?” He looked at Concepción, but she just shook her head.

            “Almo had to leave early,” Renzo explained.

            Tati inclined his head and looked out over the top of the frames of his reading glasses. “But he needs to know this,” he said. “He’s the only one who knows how to navigate the exhaust ducts.”

            Renzo shrugged.

            “Someone will have to tell him,” Tati said, directing his eyes to the chef.

            “But first you have to tell us,” Chef Junior noted.

            Tati stared at him for a moment and then looked over at Packie, who immediately nodded and drew the curtains shut.

            Crystal rolled her eyes. “Ass-kisser,” she muttered.

            “What?” Packie replied defensively.

“There isn’t even anyone out there,” Teatree observed.

            “Right, then,” Tati said. He coughed nervously. “Almo will be told, and the other servers won’t be impacted because what I’m about to say has to do with Sunday evening and Monday, which are not reliably busy times. The restaurant will be shut down—”

            “Yes,” Jux exclaimed under his breath.

            Tati razored a look over his spectacles. “Yes,” he said. “Some of you may know that next week is university spring break, so this Sunday and Monday should be considerably slower than usual. We have the opportunity for a two-day deep clean.”

            There were some scattered groans.

            “Don’t pretend you didn’t know this was coming sooner or later,” Packie sneered.

            “Can’t we wait until Mothers’ Day to shut down?” Abuse asked.

            “He’s not going to get that joke,” Crystal said, ticking her head slightly at Tati, who was staring at the staff in confusion.

            “I don’t get it either,” Chef Junior said.

            “Mothers’ Day is the busiest day of the year,” Tati finally blurted.

            “Told you,” Crystal said.

            “Except for when Restaurant Week includes a First Friday,” Kieran corrected.

            “That doesn’t happen every year,” Lyle said.

            “Yeah, it’s like leap year,” Abuse concurred, “but more fucked-up.”

            “We’re not closing for a deep clean on a busy day,” Tati said. “That’s the whole point.”

            Jux’s eyes were wide. “What’s a deep clean?” he asked generally.

            “Just what it sounds like,” Kieran said with a chuckle. “Rip everything out so you can scrub at the nooks and crannies. Find strange and interesting things.”

            “Don’t romanticize it,” Crystal warned the bartender.

            “And it takes two days?” Jux asked.

            “Sounded to me like a day and a half,” Chef Junior said, looking at Tati. “How many nooks and crannies does this place have? I’ve seen a Denny’s do it overnight, and without shutting down.”

            “This isn’t Denny’s,” Kieran said with nostrils flared.

            “Clearly not,” Junior said.

            “At least Denny’s is always busy,” Abuse offered. “Just saying.”

            “That’s not helpful,” Tati said.

            “I mean if you just compare the size of the operation,” Junior articulated. “I’m not talking about some kind of quality judgment, or whatever.” He looked plaintively at Jux. “Can you help, Professor? What’s the word?”

            Jux’s eyes widened further. He looked at the chef and then at the owner and then around at all of the servers and kitchen staff. Then he looked back at Chef Junior. “You mean like a qualitative comparison?” he finally blurted.

            Junior nodded. “That. I’m not trying to do that,” he added.

            Tati was still staring over his glasses at them. “A qualitative comparison,” he echoed.

            Junior was nodding. “Yeah,” he said. “What I’m not doing. All I’m saying is that I’m confident a deep clean isn’t going to take that long.”

            “It’s always taken two days,” Tati said. “Besides, I’m picking up some new trees for the foyer and they’ll have to be transplanted.”

            “I don’t think you understand what Brian Tati means when he says ‘deep clean,’” Crystal observed with eyes on the chef.

            “It’s nothing unreasonable,” Tati continued. “Everything needs to be refreshed. Top to bottom.”

            “Nooks and crannies,” smiled Kieran.

            “And the exhaust ducts,” Tati added. “So Almo will have to be here.”

            “That’s fine,” Junior said, holding out his hands, “but I think we can do it on Sunday evening, especially if we shut down.”

            “I’m picking up the trees on Monday morning,” Tati explained.

            “So we’ll get someone to volunteer to help with that,” Junior said.

            Tati glared at him. “What are you proposing?”

            Junior swallowed. “That we finish on Sunday night and have Monday off if we want.”

            “I’ll be in on Monday,” Packie said.

            Tati was still looking at the chef.

            “And if you can arrange for the trees to get here tomorrow,” Chef Junior told him, “we can get them transplanted, too.”

            “It’s not just the trees,” Tati said. “The heaters need to be repainted and…” After his voice trailed off, he removed his reading glasses and his face transformed into something caustic and predatory. “Do you really think that you can have a deep clean finished on Sunday?”

            Junior considered this with pursed lips. Then he looked over at Concepción, who smiled, and Abuse, who was shaking his head.

            Tati chuckled. “It seems to me like you’re not so sure,” he said. Slipping back on his reading glasses, he continued, “Here’s what I am going to do. I am going to pick up the trees on Monday as previously arranged—”

            “You going to load them in the Prius?” Packie asked.

            “Of course not,” Tati snapped. “Someone else will bring them. I’m just picking them up.”

            Teatree snorted and then rubbed the thumb flesh of a palm across his nose.

            Tati glanced about, eyeballs reddened.

            “So what are you going to do?” Chef Junior prompted.

            Tati nodded. “I will be here early in the morning,” he said, “and I will look at everything. Everything. If it’s not a deep clean to my satisfaction, then you will all have to be called back in.”

            “I just think some of the crew would like a day off,” Junior said. “Money’s great, but some of the shifts have been back to back for weeks now, and—”

            “You write the kitchen schedule,” Tati observed.

            Chef Junior considered this. “That’s true,” he said, “but there are only a couple of ways we can put everyone together to keep it running and that means Concepción and Almo are usually working six or seven days straight.”

            Tati suddenly clenched his forehead and looked around. “I’m confused,” he said. “What does this have to do with the spring clean?”

            Jux snapped his head aside at Abuse. “Spring clean?”

            Abuse kept his eyes on Tati. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, dude,” he told Jux.

            “Top to bottom,” Tati said.

            “Scrubbing the nooks and crannies,” Kieran said.

            “Please stop saying ‘nooks and crannies,’” Abuse pleaded quietly, eyes closed.

            “And I think we have negotiated a decent wage for you all,” Tati added, looking first at the servers and then at the kitchen staff.

            Chef Junior ran thick fingers through his spiky, short hair. “It’s not about all that, man.”

            “Then what is it about?” asked Tati.

            “I think it would be nice if we could just have Monday off this week,” Junior said. “Since you’re planning to close anyway, why don’t you let people have Monday off if we get the clean done on Sunday?”

            Tati stared at him for a moment. “You’re not going to get it done to my satisfaction on just Sunday night.”

            “I think we can,” Junior said.

            Tati closed his eyes and sighed. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll make it even better. If you can get it done, to my sat—”

            “Satisfaction,” several staff members chimed.

            “If it’s done by Monday morning when I arrive with the trees,” Tati stressed, “then I will pay everyone for the shift that they would have worked, and anyone who volunteers to help with the transplanting will also get time and half for a couple hours, too.”

            Everyone was silent until, eventually, Concepción raised her hand and said, “Volunteer.”

            Tati stared at her and then looked at Chef Junior. “I thought you said that they wanted time off,” he recalled.

            “Yeah, but then you offered extra money,” Junior said.

            “It doesn’t matter, because it won’t get done,” Tati said. “I’m sure of that.”

            “I don’t know,” Teatree said, “It sounds like a pretty good incentive. I was going to be working that day, anyway.”

            Tati nodded. “That’s a good point,” he said. “You know, I think you’re right. The offer is too generous.”

            “Hold on,” Junior cried. “You can’t pull out of it now.”

            “We didn’t agree to anything,” Tati said.

            “Not true,” Abuse said. “You proposed something and Concepción already volunteered.”

            “Fine,” Tati said. “Like I said, it doesn’t matter. There’s no way it will get done.”

            Junior watched him. “So we have a deal.”

            Tati looked him in the eyes and then looked over at Packie, who hurried ahead to slide the curtains open so that the owner could walk off toward the bar.

            “All right, then,” Junior said with a nod. He scanned the staff. “Anyone who’s interested should meet back at the dumpsters in fifteen minutes to talk about strategy.”

            As the staff began shuffling out of the banquet space, Junior crossed the main dining room and passed through the bar into the server station, where he found Tati removing the pins from the printed schedule fixed to the bulletin board. As Junior approached, the owner glanced at him.

            “This will need to be edited and reprinted,” Tati explained as he pressed his fingers against the sheet of paper against the board as he removed the last pin. “The kitchen schedule, too.”

            “I’ll make sure it reflects the deal,” Junior said.

            “Packie will do the server schedule,” Tati said.

            “Happy to hear it,” Junior said.

            Tati contracted his fingers and drew the obsolete schedule off the wall and into a crumple.

            “I have a serious question, though,” Junior said.

            Tati stared frightfully at him. “What?”

            “I know I’m still pretty new around here,” Junior said, “so I’m more curious than anything else. Why does Almo flush the ductwork? I mean why is that part of the deep clean? Every kitchen I’ve ever worked in, including my grandma’s, we got someone to come in and do it who was, you know, licensed and bonded and all that.”

            “We don’t need to do that,” Tati said. “Almo is qualified.”

            “Okay,” Junior said, holding up defensive hands. “I was just wondering. I don’t know if that’s, like, some kind of liability or something, but if Almo can do it, Almo can do it.”

            “He’s done it for years,” Tati said. “I hope you’re not trying to amend the agreement.”

            “Not doing that,” Junior said.

            “Good,” Tati said. He handed the chef the crumpled old server schedule and began punching the pins back into the cork of the bulletin board.

Nooks and Crannies

A

            The next morning, some of those scheduled to work at noon arrived along with the brunch crew to get a head start on the deep clean. While Concepción and Almo turned out orders of brioche french toast and eggs benedict, Chef Junior, Renzo, and Arturo began rooting around in the storage room, methodically removing boxes and plastic-wrapped equipment like bulky mixers and juicers from the shelving one section at a time and then scouring the shelves and the wall while the stored items were dusted off and swaddled in fresh protective food service wrap before restoring everything to the shelves and moving on. By mid-morning, about two-thirds of the storage room had undergone the sweep when Tati arrived through the back with three small, lush succulents blooming purple and red in soggy, dripping disposable planters.

            “What’s going on?” the owner asked, looking around at the storage room.

            “We started the deep clean,” Junior said.

            Tati shook his head. “You can’t work off the clock,” he said. “That’s a liability.”

            “We’re volunteers,” said Renzo.

            “You’re not volunteers,” Tati said. “You’re employees, and this is working off the clock. I won’t have anyone working off the clock.”

            Junior clasped his forehead and scanned the room with a smile. “We’re making good progress.”

            “You can work all you want,” Tati observed. “I pay you a salary.”

            Junior sighed and nodded. “I presume you need someone to do something with those cactuses.”

            “Succulents,” Tati corrected.

            Renzo chuckled.

            Junior looked at him. “Are you laughing at me because I didn’t know what those were,” he asked, “or are you laughing because he said ‘succulents?’”

            “Succulents,” Renzo admitted.

            Chef Junior nodded.

            Tati held the planters out to Junior, who accepted them reluctantly and watched as soiled water dribbled onto the dark, sealed concrete.

            “Everyone else has to come back when your shifts begin,” Tati said.

            “That’s like two hours from now,” Arturo said.

            “I’m sure you can find something to do to occupy your time,” Tati said.

            “It’s a 50-minute bus trip to get here,” Arturo complained.

            Tati’s eyes were wide and blank. “I don’t see how that’s relevant,” he said. “I don’t care what you do in the meantime. There’s a public library right across the street. You can even stay here if you want. You just can’t work off the clock.”

            “This is bullshit,” Arturo exclaimed, tossing a rag into the slimy basin of the floor sink near the hanging mops.

            “That’s filthy,” Tati observed. “I hope that you don’t think the rinsing station looking like that is going to be considered satisfactory.” He looked purposefully at each of them and then exited through the kitchen to the bar.

            When he was gone, Arturo knelt and picked up the rag and started scrubbing the sides of the basin where the grime was especially thick. “Rinsing station? We don’t wash our hands over here.”

            “He doesn’t know what it’s called,” Chef Junior said.

            “Little bitch,” Arturo muttered. Then he slapped the rag against the basin and stood. “This shit is filthy. What’s it called, anyway?”

            Chef Junior shrugged. “The floor sink?” he asked. He looked at Renzo, who echoed the shrug. Then Junior stepped to the doorway into the kitchen and called out, “Hey Almo, what’s this drain called back here where we dump the buckets and rinse the mops?”

            Almo was squinting at three tickets clipped on the edge of the shelf over the hot line. He plucked one off and looked at it over his glasses. “The place where you dump the buckets and rinse the mops,” he said. He studied the ticket and then looked down at a plate of huevos rancheros in the window for a moment before looking back at the ticket. He then squinted again at the remaining tickets dangling before him as he crunched the ticket in his palm and tossed it into the tall trash can at the side of the line.

            “Floor sink,” Junior said, nodding as he turned back to Renzo and Arturo. “Which, I hate to say, you will have to ignore until noon. Anyone want a burrito? I’ll buy, but I probably should stay here with these cactuses whatever and keep working back here.”

            “Filiberto’s is ten blocks away,” Arturo grumbled.

            “Renzo,” Junior said, “you have your brother’s ride today?”

            Renzo shook his head.

            “All right,” Junior said. He collected the three planters together between his chest and a forearm and dug his free hand into a pocket of his black service pants, eventually producing a key dangling from a fat plastic fob. “Take my truck. I’m going to ask you two a question, though, and I need an honest answer. Which of you is a better driver?”

            Renzo and Arturo exchanged looks.

            “Renzo,” Arturo admitted. “I wrecked my wheels three months ago.”

            Junior tilted his head slightly. “I appreciate the honesty,” he said. He then tossed the key to Renzo, who caught it with a clap between his hands. “Here’s some cash,” he added, fumbling again in his pants until he’d produced a one-hundred-dollar bill. “Get what you want up to, like, eight bucks.”

            Renzo took the bill and immediately stuffed it into a back pocket.

            “I’m expecting change,” Junior noted. “And a receipt. And I want a California burrito.”

            “What the fuck is a California burrito?” Arturo asked.

            “Basically a carne asada burrito with fries and avocado in it,” Junior said.

            “That’s gross, cabrón,” Arturo said with a dismissive wave of the rag. “That’s not Mexican.”

            “Probably why it’s called a California burrito,” Junior posited.

            “California used to be Mexico,” Renzo noted.

            Junior stared at him. “Change, a receipt, and a California burrito.”

            Renzo nodded.

            “Take orders from Almo and Concepción, too, before you go,” Junior added, turning to the kitchen. “I have to find out what he wants me to do with these cactuses.”

B

            Forty minutes later, Junior, Renzo, Arturo, and Concepción were gathered among the heat lamps and junk furniture at the loading dock, some utilizing old crates as seats, as they munched away at the Filiberto’s. Renzo was the first to finish a burrito, plopping a last fold of beany tortilla into his mouth and rolling the paper wrapping between his palms as he chewed.

            “Fast as hell,” Arturo noted as he positioned a taco near his mouth over a small Styrofoam tray. “Eating too fast is bad for your digestion, bro.”

            Renzo shrugged. “Did what’s his name get at you yesterday?”

            Arturo delayed his bite a bit more. “Who?’”

            “Deeez nuts,” Renzo said. He tossed the wadded wrapping at the first of the two dumpsters, which was open, but the garbage just toppled against the greasy concrete and disappeared into the darkness between the dumpster’s ragged wheels.

            Shaking his head, Arturo took a bite of his taco.

            Junior manipulated his California burrito as he swallowed. “We’re going to have to clean all this up today, too.”

            “I’ll sweep,” Renzo committed.

            Junior nodded.

            Then Renzo produced a second burrito, fresh in its wrapping.

            “What?” Junior cried. “How many burritos did you get?”

            “This is just beans and rice,” Renzo said. “Two for seven.”

            “You don’t need two burritos, Renzo,” Arturo said. He took a crunchy bite of a taco.

            “I know my body,” Renzo said as he dove into the second burrito.

            Junior looked at Arturo. “What you got there?”

            Arturo chewed and then forced the bite down. “Lengua,” he managed.

            “Is that like the anus?” Chef Junior asked. “It’s anus, isn’t it?” He immediately held his nub of burrito defensively, like a glimmering crystal against the forces of darkness. “Nothing wrong with that, but, before you say it, I know that’s racist and I’m sorry. But you all know that you can get anus tacos. Maybe not at Filiberto’s, but at… then again, maybe at Filiberto’s.”

            “Hot dogs are anus tacos,” Renzo said. He thumbed the cap off a small plastic cup of salsa verde and emptied it into the bite-shorn, open end of the burrito.

            “Tongue,” Concepción offered as she shifted the wrapper around what was left of her own burrito.

            “You got a tongue burrito?” Junior asked her.

            Concepción smiled and shook her head. “Vegetarian.”

            Junior leaned back, looking up with a smile, when, suddenly, a muffled but deep and striking crash seemed to shake the very cinderblocks of the building’s exterior wall.

            For a moment, they were all silent and unchewing.

            “Where’s Almo?” Junior finally asked.

            Concepción tucked the wrapper around her burrito as she stared at the gray bricks between the door to the storage room and the vented steel door that nobody could explain.

            Junior squeezed at his burrito and looked at Renzo and Arturo. They were busy finishing up their Filiberto’s, so, when neither responded, he looked back at Concepción. “Is Almo in the ducts?” he asked. “Please tell me that Almo is not in the ducts.”

            Concepción smiled warmly at him and motioned with her re-wrapped burrito at the door.

            “He’s in the ducts,” Junior concluded. He grimaced and shook his head. “He’s already in the ducts. I wanted to be there when he went in.”

            “Go and see,” Concepción said, motioning again with the burrito.

            Junior tossed what was left of his California burrito across the dock and squarely into the dumpster, where it settled against a thick black bag of empty wine bottles that went clink. “That’s right,” he said, rousing to a stand and shoving the crate against the wall with a swipe of a foot clad in a thick rubber clog. “I’m going to go and see.”

C

            The massive range unit had been maneuvered away from the grease-stained whitish wall, leaving a relatively clean outline around a low, dark, yawning access hatch. The unit was still plugged in, and the slatted hatch cover was leaned against the thick, gray cord and propped against the edge of one of the rancid rubber floor mats. Upon one of the range’s many burners was a medium pan in which sizzled a fragrant, meaty log in light oil.

            Chef Junior sniffed at it and then looked back at Concepción, who clicked on a flashlight as she approached.

            The hatch access to the ducts revealed only a squat section of musty ductwork before immediately turning left into a darkness of the building beyond the wall of the adjacent storage room.

            “That doesn’t need to be scrubbed?” Junior asked, pointing out the insides of the ducts.

            “Just rat shit,” Concepción offered.

            Junior smiled. “And carcasses,” he said. “Whatever they may be. So that’s how Almo’s been cleaning the exhaust ducts over the years?”

            “He is inside,” Concepción said.

            “Almo?” Junior called.

            There was no answer. Concepción directed the beam of the flashlight around the visible cavity for a moment and then shut it off.

            Junior looked at her.

            “Conserve the battery,” Concepción said.

            “Does he have a flashlight?” Junior asked.

            Concepción shook her head.

            “So he does know what he’s doing,” Junior pursued.

            “I don’t know,” Concepción said.

            Junior sighed and peered at the dark, rectangular orifice.

            “That’s the anus,” said Renzo, who was standing in the storage room doorway as Arturo interacted with someone who was arriving.

            Junior looked past the disrupted edges of the kitchen at him. “What?”

            “Anus,” Renzo repeated. “Of this place.”

            There was a muffled clanking sound from the duct access.

            “Almo?” Junior called again.

            After a brief scraping sound, a voice responded, “Yeah, yeah. Coming. Got to squeeze back through.” There were some additional muffled noises, some almost suggestive of struggle, but then the voice came again. “Hey, is Tati back?”

            Junior glanced back across the kitchen for a moment and then responded into the duct hatch, “No.” After a moment, he added, “Are you searing a pork tenderloin out here?”

            There was silence and then another brief scraping sound. “Québécoise,” eventually came a distant, strained voice.

            Junior looked up at the calendar hanging on the wall past the range and closed his eyes. “Is that supposed to be some run-up to Bastille Day?” he asked loudly. “Did Tati make you do it?”

            “I just make what I’m supposed to make,” immediately came the response.

            “If we’re going to make pea soup,” Junior continued at high volume, “I will need to know about it before we start. You need bones. We order the necessary ingredients.”

            “Hey,” came Almo’s voice. “I’m stuck right now so give me a break.”

            The humming of the various devices for heating and cooling dominated the space of the kitchen.

            “Are you sure you weren’t just making food to take home?” Junior called.

            Silence, but for the humming.

            “Nothing but turns in here, man,” Almo called back. “You have to be patient.”

            “I thought you were stuck,” Junior said.

            “You have to be patient,” Almo’s voice came.

            “We just want to know that you’re okay,” Junior called. “Isn’t it hot in there?”

            There was no response.

            “Almo,” Junior said.

            “I got it,” Almo’s voice emerged.

            “Almo,” Junior called again into the hatch. “Why does Tati think you know about the ducts when you clearly don’t?”

            “It’s not hot,” came Almo’s voice.

            “What’s this?” Ogre asked, emerging from the storage room.

            “Almo’s stuck in the ducts,” Renzo told him.

            Ogre nodded a smiling greeting to the others and then asked the chef, “Should I clock in?”

            Junior didn’t turn to look, but he did send up a waving hand. “Yes, yes,” he muttered. Then he cocked his head and listened with animation. “Did you clean out the ducts?” he called.

            “You don’t have to yell, man,” came Almo’s voice. “I’m right here.” Sure enough, the worn soles of Almo’s service boots scooted back into the access space, followed by the spiky hairs of his ankles and calves as the bottoms of his trousers collected against the scooting. Soon he was snaking his way backwards out of the access hatch. “Before you start,” Almo repeated a few times as he gathered himself up and crept out from under the hood to stand fully upright. “Before you start,” he continued, looking around sagely. “This was not a success.”

            “Have you actually been in the ducts before?” Junior asked.

            Almo cocked an eyebrow. “These ducts?”

            Junior stared at him.

            “Because there are ducts everywhere,” Almo said.

            “These, then,” Junior said.

            Almo looked back at the wall. “These ducts,” he announced, “are not cleared. There’s a whole section in there that somebody just covered up.”

            “What?” asked Junior.

            Almo turned to them all with a smile. “I know you think I’m crazy,” he began. “Crazy-ass Almo. Crazy-ass Almo who can keep this kitchen running when everyone’s fucking running away. Two runnings. Is that what it’s called? Like that movie about the Rasta dudes on skis. Where’s Abuse? He’d know.”

            “He’ll be here soon,” Ogre said as he reentered the kitchen. “I can’t speak for him, but I think you’re talking about Cool Runnings. And they’re a bobsled team.”

            Almo nodded. “You’re probably right,” he said. “We’ll see what Abuse says, though.”

            “You have to focus on what you’re trying to tell us about the ducts,” Junior insisted. “What does Abuse have anything to do with it?”

            “He doesn’t,” Almo said.

            Chef Junior touched his fingers against his forehead. “So what are you talking about Cool Runnings for? Tell us about the ducts.”

            Almo glanced about for a moment and then looked back at the wall. “There’s extra tunnels down there.”

            Junior was staring at him. “Tunnels,” he said, “that you’ve never seen before.”

            “They’re covered up,” Almo said.

            “I thought you’ve done this for years around here,” Junior said.

            Almo waggled a hand.

            “What does that mean?” Junior asked.

            “He never went,” Concepción said.

            Almo shrugged and then held up a finger. “I always wanted to, though,” he said. “And now I have been in there and, let me tell you, there are sections in there that are covered up with paneling like you’re hiding a stash, but they open into dank spaces.”

            Chef Junior suddenly looked across the kitchen to the hall corner out to the bar. He held up his hands, fingers extended. “Everyone quiet,” he commanded.

            This was respected. Almo even placed a gritty hand over his mouth.

            “Now,” Junior continued quietly, “there’s really only one thing I need to know, and I need to really know, so don’t lie.”

            “Why are you all looking at me?” Almo asked.

            Junior shook a hand in the air. “This is not the time.”

            “But you still think it’s corn hair,” Almo said. “I know it. Corn hair. Corn silk. Silky little titties you’re looking for, when, actually, it’s tree roots. When, actually, it’s a grease trap that didn’t get its proper maintenance. Proper maintenance is important.”

            “I agree with you on that,” Junior said. “Let’s get this place turned around.”

            “Good luck with that,” Almo said. “Try fighting the little cockarouches when they’re coming up from festivities in an unattended kitchen of the shadows.”

            They all stared at him.

            “So you’re saying there’s another kitchen?” Junior asked.

            Almo shrugged.

            “And where is this mystery kitchen?” asked Junior.

            Almo shrugged. “Below us, has to be,” he said, looking down. “Past the grease trap, so probably over there and under here, too.”

            Junior peered at him. “You know, I’m not afraid to send somebody else in there,” he said. “I would go myself, but, as you can see, I wouldn’t fit.”

            “Me neither,” Renzo said. He was looking down at the tiny screen of his iPod with headphones perched on the top of his head. “Tati wanted me to do it a while back, but I couldn’t get past that first turn.”

            Junior stared at him. “Are you a qualified duct technician?”

            Renzo chuckled. “I mean, sure.”

            Junior looked back at Almo. “How many years has it been since these ducts were cleaned out?” the chef asked.

            Almo laughed. “See?” he asked, moving his hand around in the air. “Here it is again. You don’t trust me, so we can’t even have a conversation.”

            “Can you answer my question?” Junior persisted. “Tat—” he began loudly and then quieted himself. “Tati,” he continued, almost at a whisper, “wants the ducts cleaned out. I’m honestly not as concerned about whether or not you’ve actually been cleaning them over the years, or whether or not Tati knows well enough to have something like the ductwork looked at by actual specialists, or even whether or not there is some closed-off basement kitchen, but, specifically, what I want to know is whether or not these ducts can be cleaned out to his satisfaction by tomorrow morning.”

            Almo turned, snatched a rough yellow towel from an oven handle, and clasped it in his grip around the metal handle of the pan on the range. A burst of controlled jerks loosened the rich sear and then repositioned the tenderloin to begin browning on another side.

            “Or if you even know that it is possible,” Junior added. “See, the deal with Tati about this deep clean involves the ducts being flushed. He started talking about that before anything else. If you’ve never done it, well, that was before my time. The problem is that now Tati expects it to be done and…” The chef trailed off. He looked back at the open access hatch for a moment and then shook his head slowly. “No… no…” he began.

            Almo stared at the flesh crackling in the pan.

            Chef Junior punctuated with a final “no” and then said, “Somebody help me out here.” He looked over at Renzo and Arturo at the door to the back room and then at Ogre at the prep table and then at Concepción. “There’s something obvious that I’m not getting,” he said, “and I think some of you know what it is. Help a guy out.”

            “Damn,” Renzo said.

            Junior looked over at him. “You’ve been here for a few years,” he said. “Can’t you tell me something about this mysterious duct cleaning that’s been going on?”

            “I just want to help with the deep clean so I can volunteer for tomorrow and get double time and a half,” Renzo said.

            Ogre glanced at him. “Double time and a half?”

            Renzo shrugged. “Easy money.”

            “Well, I’ll be god-damned,” Ogre said.

            “Not if Tati’s unhappy with the ducts,” Junior cried. He looked at them all. “That’s why you need to help me help you. Help me help you help me. Everyone a big family.”

            “Children’s songs are forbidden at the deep clean,” Abuse announced as he emerged from the storage room.

            “That’s why I got this,” Renzo said, tapping the headphones still clapped across his scalp above his ears.

            Abuse frowned and maneuvered past Renzo, around the island, toward the displaced yet operational range. As Abuse buttoned up his thick, black service shirt, he glanced at the tenderloin and then at Almo and Junior and then at the gaping hole in the wall. After a wide-eyed moment, Abuse turned and ducked to look through the island window toward the bar entrance hall.

            “Hear something, boy?” Ogre offered.

            “Shut up, you,” Abuse told him. He looked back at Almo and Junior. “What’s going on here? Does Brian know about this?”

            “Yeah,” Almo said. He manipulated the pan again so that an unseared side could crackle as it nestled into a shallow patina of oil.

            Junior clutched his forehead and then ran his palm back across his short hair. “What?” he cried quietly.

            “Has Brian seen this open?” Abuse asked.

            “We just have to clean out the ducts,” Almo said. He reached across and collected a handled five-pound container of coarse ground black pepper from where it was perched on top of the tall cooler near a stack of to-go boxes. He unscrewed the red plastic cap and carefully shook out a cascade of ground pepper over the sizzling meat, and something like a half tablespoon of the grind popped into acrid smoke upon contact with the hot oil.

            “Whoa, whoa,” Chef Junior cried. “How much pepper do you need on that tenderloin?”

            “This is how you make it,” Almo said, replacing the container.

            Junior waved a palm in front of his face. “Try not to gas us, bro,” he said. “Did you cook with pepper yesterday morning?”

            “He likes to cook with pepper,” Concepción said.

            Junior nodded. “Then I guess we know why it smelled faintly like bear spray in here yesterday.”

            “I don’t know what you’re talking about, man,” Almo insisted. “I didn’t even put that pepper up there, and I don’t know nothing about no bear spray.”

            “Okay, we get it,” Junior sang. “Just be sure that we don’t keep a habit of pepper spraying everyone in the kitchen.”

            Almo shrugged. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

            “Attention,” Abuse demanded. Once everyone was quiet and listening to him, he motioned at the grate. “If Brian hasn’t seen it open,” he said, “we should just close it up and scrub the panel. We don’t know when he’s going to randomly show up.”

            “So you’re complicit in this, too,” Junior observed.

            “Only kind of,” Abuse said. “The tradition of lying to Brian about the ducts being cleaned out started before my time here.”

            “So you were just respecting the traditions of the locals,” Junior suggested.

            “I don’t like how that sounds,” Abuse said. “Anyway, I told you at the strategy meeting yesterday that we weren’t going to need to worry about the ducts.”

            “Yeah,” Junior said, “but I thought you were just confirming what Tati told me about Almo doing it. I didn’t know he’d never even been in there.”

            “I’ve been in there,” Almo suddenly said. He shifted the tenderloin on the pan and reached across toward where a stack of Styrofoam to-go containers loomed atop the cold-side cooler. They all watched as he leaned, further than was usually necessary since the range was scooted out from the wall, and lifted a container from the stack and cupped it in his hand as he turned back and gripped the pan’s handle with the towel and dumped the seared wad of pork into the flimsy container, the flecks of hot oil from the pan burning through the foam. He immediately adjusted the container and used the towel from the pan to hold its heat-punctured bottom as he shuffled around Abuse towards Renzo at the back door.

            “Where are you going?” Junior called after him.

            “Hey, I’ll be back later to help, if that’s what you want,” Almo said as he disappeared into the storage room.       

            “Where’s he going?” Junior asked, looking first at Renzo and then at Abuse and Concepción.

            Abuse shrugged and then looked at the grate leaning against the range’s stretched cord. “Where are the screws?” he asked generally.

            “It’s a handle,” Concepción said, pointing at the grate.

            “Oh, I see,” Abuse said, “right here on the side.” He carefully lifted the grate and began lining it up with the orifice.

            Junior was staring horribly at them.

            “Is it like this?” Abuse asked as he maneuvered the grate into the grimy housing.

            “I think so,” Concepción said.

            “We just have to give this a good scrub,” Abuse said, pushing the grate back into place.

            “He specifically said the ducts were going to have to be cleaned, Almo’s way,” Junior said.

            Abuse shrugged. “Brian’s not going to check,” he said. “He never checks. The very thought of what might be in these walls, ducts included, creeps him out. So what we do is tell him that we cleaned them out and ask him if he wants us to open this up so he can check, and he always refuses. I don’t even remember him saying anything when we asked him last year. He just shuddered and walked away.”

            “And even this deal we’ve got with him isn’t going to make him want to check this time,” Junior suggested.

            “I won’t promise anything,” Abuse said.

            Junior looked over at Renzo and Arturo. “Would somebody please get Almo to come back in here?” he asked. “Tell him he’s not in trouble.”

            Arturo nodded quickly and disappeared out the back.

            “Here’s the thing,” Junior continued, looking again at Abuse. “Almo was just in the ducts. Are you telling me he hasn’t even gone in them at all before?”

            “Not that I know of,” Abuse said. “I’ve never even seen this grate removed.”

            “You were standing right here only two minutes ago when Almo said he’d been in there,” Junior noted.

            “I don’t pay attention to much of what Almo says,” Abuse said. “Haven’t you figured that out by now?”

            Arturo rushed into the kitchen and came to a halt before the ice machine. “He’s getting on his bike, Chef.”

            Junior slumped for a moment and then inhaled deeply before rushing out the back, through the storage room and into the dock to where, past the dumpsters, Almo was maneuvering his bike through the loading gates. “Bro, you can’t just take off like this,” the chef told him.

            Almo turned. “You want this fucking pork, man?” he hollered. “Here, have it.” He flicked open the to-go box and used it to shovel the seared meat log out toward the dumpster, but it missed and rolled into a mire of grime along the base of the brick wall.

            “Well, why’d you go and do that?” Junior asked.

            “I just didn’t want you to think I was stealing,” Almo said. “I’m not stealing.”

            “Nobody said you were stealing,” Junior said.

            “That’s not true,” Almo said.

            “Well,” Junior said, “nobody said it today.”

            Almo stared at him.

            “That said,” Junior continued, “you did just sear off an entire pork tenderloin and box it and take it with you to your bike.”

            “See?” Almo asked. “There it is again.”

            “All I’m saying is that we should probably get out of the habit of preparing a pound and half of protein for our individual staff meals,” Junior explained. “The new inventory system is going to catch that kind of shrink.”

            “Ah,” Almo said, waving a finger, “but mistakes happen. People fuck up sometimes. This tenderloin isn’t going to waste because someone stole it but because I dropped it on the ground while I was making the Québécoise.”

            Junior’s eyes widened. “I just saw you throw it,” he said. “Come on.”

            “Maybe I was just about to come back in and give it to you,” Almo proposed, “and I only had it out here because it slipped my mind that I was carrying it around. Did you ever think of that? You didn’t.”

            “That’s true,” Junior said. “I definitely didn’t suspect that, especially since we don’t use to-go boxes to store prepared food. Look, I get that things are tough, and taking some food back to the fam is nice even when things aren’t tough, so I get it. Just don’t do it, like, that often, because otherwise Brian might start cracking down.”

            “I wasn’t going to eat it,” Almo insisted. “It was for the Québécoise.”

            “That’s not on the menu,” Junior said. “We’re also closed until Tuesday, so we shouldn’t be making soup.”

            “Brian said he was going to be back tonight to take some of it home,” Almo said. “I just do what I’m told.”

            “We never really did resolve that, did we?” Junior reflected. “Listen, do you think you can just tell me the truth this one time? It seems to me that the only actual problem, maybe, is whether or not Brian’s going to check to see if we cleaned the ducts out. Also how important this pea soup is.”

            There was a quick, fluttering whistle from the storage room.

            “You can come out here,” Junior called.

            There were footsteps from the storage room. Abuse emerged first, followed by Arturo and Renzo and Concepción and Ogre.

            “Tati’s here,” Abuse whispered as he approached Junior and Almo, “and he’s coming this way, but then I think he’s going back to his car.”

            Almo quickly began backing his bike through the gate. “We shouldn’t be out here,” he said, leaning his bike against the wall so that the tires framed the tenderloin at rest in the shade. “We have to do the deep clean.”

            “Oh,” Junior said. “So you’re going to stay.”

            “Good luck, everyone,” Tati boomed as he appeared from the storage room. “You have a big task ahead of you, and I don’t know why you’d all be out here just standing around.” He smiled condescendingly at them all as he walked to the gate, where he stopped briefly and looked at Almo, who quickly stood in front of his bike to hide the tenderloin. Tati stared at him and nodded. “Good work getting the ducts cleared out so early in the process.”

            Junior eyed the owner.

            “I mean it,” Tati said, looking around at the others for a moment and then back to Almo, who was looking over at the gate and smiling. “I didn’t have to remind him or anything. He just took the initiative and got it done, and I know he was already busy with kitchen things, so it was all the more industrious.”

            “Just doing my job,” Almo said.

            “I’m afraid to admit that if you’re all able to muster that energy, I’ll probably end up losing out on our deal,” Tati said. He gave the dock a quick scan. “Then again,” he began, but he squinted for a moment while looking over past Almo’s bike at the tenderloin log in the shade. “Is that a dead rat against the wall there? Please tell me we don’t have a dead rat out here.”

            “What?” Almo asked, feigning surprise. “Oh, that? That’s a, uh, pigeon. They get back here to eat the garbage sometimes and eat so much their stomachs explode.”

            “Disgusting,” Tati said with a shudder. “Well, get it cleaned out.” He gave Almo and Junior each a final nod and walked through the gate and into the parking lot.

            The staff was quiet as the sun beamed down through the slats of the dock’s shelter.

            Then Tati suddenly leaned back for a last look at Junior through the space between the gates. “I’ll be back around eight for the Québécoise.” His head then withdrew and there was once again stillness.

            After a moment, Almo crept over to the gate and peered out at the parking lot, holding a finger up back at the others. Then he turned to them and nodded.

            The low hum of a hybrid engine suddenly sounded from the lot, followed by the engagement of the brakes and then the hum waned and vanished.

            “He’s gone,” Junior announced.

            There were cheers.

            “And he’s already signed off on the ducts,” Junior said.

            Almo gripped the bike’s handles.

            “Where are you going?” Junior asked.

            Almo looked at him with wide eyes. “I told you I was going to come back later if you want,” he said, “but I got to go make dinner for my kids.” He shifted the bike and rolled it to the gate.

            “Wait,” Junior said.

            Almo paused.

            “How do you come up with this bullshit?” Junior asked. “I’m serious.”

            “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Almo said. “I got three kids and my wife is at work right now, so I got to make some mac and cheese or something. I’ll be back.”

            “I’m not talking about your family, Almo,” Junior said. “I’m talking about French soup and the hidden kitchen you found in the ducts.”

            “Oh no,” wailed Almo. “You just can’t help it!”

            “I mean, at this point I think it’s pretty obvious that Tati caught you searing off that pig shlong and you were coming up with excuses,” Junior continued, glancing at the others as he spoke. “We’re all going to avoid abusing the availability of meat around here, but, just remember, that’s not really what I still want to know. Where’d you come up with this Québécoise bullshit?”

            “I want to know about the kitchen in the basement,” Abuse demanded.

            “These are real questions,” Almo said. “I’ll give you that.”

            “Give us answers,” Junior insisted.

            “Al,” Renzo pleaded. “We just want to know.”

            Almo looked at Concepción, who shrugged.       

            “Me, too,” she said.

            Almo tapped fingers against his pursed lips for a moment and then said, “Québécoise is not French. It’s French Canadian.”

            Junior nodded, watching him carefully. “Now we’re getting somewhere,” he said. “Did you, like, look up ‘pork soup french’ on your phone real quick when he confronted you about the tenderloin, or did you already know how to make Québécoise?”

            “What’s with all the questions?” Almo asked. “Why does everyone always want to know what I’m doing because they suspect me of doing something?”

            “Asking questions is part of conversation,” Junior explained. “We talk about interesting things and we want to know more.”

            “And you are interesting, Al,” Concepción said.

            “That is the most correct statement I’ve heard in a long, long while,” Abuse said.

            “I got to go make mac and cheese,” Almo whined.

            “Go, then,” Junior said.

            “No,” Abuse said. “First tell me, and look me in the eyes, you fucker, whether or not you actually did discover some secret kitchen underneath us.”

            Almo looked at the wall by the locked, impassible, slatted door. “It’s nasty in there.”

            “That doesn’t answer my question,” Abuse noted.

            “Just this one time,” Junior urged. “Tell us the truth, just as you know it, just this one time.”

            Almo thought about it for a few seconds. Eventually, he started nodding. “You know what I think?” he asked. “I think somebody needs to get a licensed professional to deal with what’s going on in there. And that somebody is going to be Brian, who’s going to have to pay for it.”

            “I see,” Junior said. “You’re worried that now that you’ve actually been in there after all these years of lying and we know you’ve been in there and that you also claimed that you found some closed-off old kitchen and… and you’re worried that now, after all of that, the fact that you hadn’t been cleaning out the ducts all along is guaranteed to be revealed, and instead of just being honest about it, even just with us, you’re keeping it up. Sorry, but that’s… that’s… Professor, help me out,” Junior said, looking up through the slats of the shelter.

            “Jux isn’t here, yet,” Ogre informed the chef.

            Junior looked down at the concrete.

            “Maybe it’s hubris,” Ogre said.

            “You’re no professor,” Abuse told him.

            “One does not need to be a professor in order to make the suggestion,” Ogre said.

            “He’s right,” Renzo said. “It was Cool Runnings, too.”

            Abuse cocked an eyebrow at Ogre. “May I alert everyone to the fact that we’re now more than half an hour past noon and we have a deep clean to do?” he asked. He looked around for a moment and then directed his attention to Almo. “Tell it to us quickly,” he insisted. “Is there actually some kind of hidden space down there that you discovered in the ducts, or did you just manufacture that idea to justify finally bringing in the professionals?”

            Almo raised a hand, his other still gripping the handlebar. “I didn’t go that far in there,” he told Abuse. “Okay? I’m sure there’s still lots for us to discover. For now, though, I have to go make mac and cheese cause I know they’ll already be bitching.” He walked his bike through the opening between the gates and rode off through the parking lot toward the wide alleys to the west.

            “Should I sear another tenderloin?” Concepción asked.

            “Just use that one,” Junior suggested. “Rinse it off well and sear it a little bit more on all sides and it should be fine.”

            Concepción scrunched her nose.

            Abuse shook his head. “That’s not serious,” he said. “Not even if the only person who’d be eating it was Tati. Listen, if Tati wants a Québécoise, Tati gets a Québécoise. And it will be clean or else I walk out. As much as I hate it.”

            Renzo held up a fist.

            “Fine, fine,” Junior said, crouching down to scoop the tenderloin up from its rest at the base of the wall. “I’ll take it as my staff meal.”

            Concepción shook her head.

            “It kills the germs, trust me,” Junior said, cradling the meaty log in his palms and walking toward the storage room. “Don’t worry about the Québécoise,” he called out as he passed. “Unless anyone insists on walking out because of it, once I get this big guy revived I’m going to head to Food City and buy a bucket of split-pea soup with ham.” He exited the dock into the storage room.

            Renzo nodded and slipped his headphones down over his ears and followed the chef inside.

            “What’d I miss?” Jux asked, suddenly appearing through the gate.

            “Dude,” Abuse said. “It’s almost one.”

            Jux shrugged. “Whatever,” he said. “I’m supposed to be grading right now. Brian changes the schedule at the last minute, that’s fine, I’ll deal, but I got forty-eight annotated bibliographies to look at by tomorrow morning. What did I miss?”

The Kitchen of the Shadows

A

            All afternoon, the crew was focused on the kitchen itself, processing a methodical deep clean counterclockwise, starting from the corner to the left of the door to the storage area where the massive ice machine hummed as the grimy binders of old laminated menus and recipes in protected sleeves were removed and refreshed and the walls and flooring behind it were scoured. Next came the long prep area, where the steel tables lining the wall were pulled out and the paneling scrubbed. Then, still moving counter-clockwise, the racks around and above the rinsing station and hallway access were unloaded and removed and cleaned and their contents also cleaned and everything restored until they were all dedicated to various levels of crouching while they used their arms to protect their faces from the corrosive spray they used to coat the wall around the dishpit.

            When Chef Junior and Ogre rolled the tall, stainless steel cooler away so that Jux and Abuse could deep clean the area to the left of the dishpit, the rectangular section that remained was much brighter than the wall surrounding, which had suffered many years of careless nightly swabs over the grease and grime generated by the nearby ranges. The distinction of that section of the wall was such that it almost seemed forged of a different material, smoother, and if it weren’t for the somewhat fuzzy border, one might have thought it was a door.

            “That’s not a door,” Abuse said as he knelt near the metal sink with a wad of steel wool in his fist.

            “Wait,” Jux said.

            Abuse stared at him.

            “I thought you were aching to get out of here,” Ogre said.

            “Tell me that doesn’t look like a door,” Jux persisted. “That weird room is right on the other side of this wall, too.”

            “What room?” Chef Junior asked as he poked around in the unplugged cooler.

            “It’s not important,” Abuse said. He clicked his tongue at Jux and began scrubbing at the fringe of the rectangular section near the base on the right side by the sink. “That room wouldn’t come in this far from the dock unless it turned like we thought it might,” he muttered.

            “This is still just too weird, man,” Jux said, shaking his head and staring at the section of the wall before which the cooler had always stood. “You know that whole thing about how sometimes there might be hidden areas of some buildings?”

            Abuse stopped scrubbing and repositioned his squat to look up at Jux. “Of course I do,” he said. “Camera obscura.”

            “This reminds me of that,” Jux said, staring at the bright rectangle on the wall. “Some David Lynch shit.”

            “All right,” Junior called from the doorway to the back storage room, where he was munching on a hunk of raw pink tuna. “Let’s hear it.”

            “Hear what?” Jux asked.

            “You have something you want to explain, so explain it,” Junior said. He popped the rest of the tuna into his mouth and resumed chomping.

            Abuse stood and tossed the rough, distended wad of steel wool into the dry basin of the left sink. “I agree,” he announced.

            “Well, then,” Ogre noted, “by all means.”

            Jux glanced about at them and then looked back at the bright section of the wall. “You remember my parents’ house? When you walk in the front door, the kitchen is on the left, then you got the living room, etc., and the hall right in front of you turns to the right and that’s where the bedrooms and bathrooms are. Remember?”

            “I remember,” Abuse confirmed. “All those times you woke up your dad to get him to drive us home at eleven o’clock at night.”

            “And don’t forget about pancake breakfast,” Ogre added.

            “Pancake breakfast?” Chef Junior asked.

            “In high school,” Abuse explained, “Wednesdays were late start days, and Jux lived close enough to school that we could gather for festivities for a couple of hours before heading over to make the third period bell.”

            “Festivities?” Junior asked, again poking into the unplugged, warming cooler.

            “Nothing illicit,” Abuse clarified. “Usually it was just hate-watching Batman and Robin or playing Golden Eye on the Nintendo 64.”

            “WCW vs. NWO,” Ogre said. “Goddamn Rey Mysterio, Jr.”

“And in Golden Eye you always picked Oddball because his hitbox was smaller than any of the other characters,” Jux said to Abuse.

            “‘Oddjob,’” Abuse corrected. “The character from Goldfinger that is also playable in Golden Eye on the sixty-four is called ‘Oddjob.’”

            “Whatever,” Jux said. “You knew what you were doing.”

            “We’re the ones who enabled him by putting up with it,” Ogre noted.

            “I don’t like where this conversation is going,” Abuse said.

            “And don’t forget,” Ogre persisted, “you dropped your precious Tamagotchi into a glass of milk while we were listing to Beck.”

            “Jackass,” Jux interjected.

            “We will not speak of that again,” Abuse decreed with eyes at the ceiling. He then looked at Ogre. “I’ll remind you that I was able to revive it by taking it apart and allowing its circuits to dry.” After a moment, he looked at Jux. “And you, sir, are the jackass.”

            “That’s the name of the song, dipshit,” Jux said. “‘Jackass,’ on Odelay. Wait.” He scratched his stubbly chin. “No, it’s not ‘Jackass.’ That’s a different track. ‘Lord Only Knows.’ The one that starts out with a yell that made Top Dollar think Beck was pissed off. Like all Beavis and Butthead, ‘uh-huh, huh, Beck is pissed.’”

            “Ah,” Ogre said, glancing wistfully away. “I wonder what old Sire Yeznik is up to these days.”

            “Last I heard,” Abuse said, “he and Doily had a little Tamagotchi of their own.”

            Chef Junior was staring wildly at them. “Okay, what the fuck is a Tamagotchi?” he asked as he shut the cooler door.

            Abuse’s jaw dropped. He then pushed it back up with the top of a hand and said, “Egg friend.”

            Junior cocked an eyebrow. “Is that part of the pancake breakfast?”

            Jux snorted. “Tamagotchi means ‘egg friend’ in Japanese,” he said. “‘Tamago’ is ‘egg’ and ‘tomodachi’ is ‘friend.’ Egg friend.”

            “Huh,” Junior grunted.

            “That’s actually not accurate,” Ogre posited.

            “What?” cried Jux. “What’s not accurate?”

            “‘Tamagotchi’ sounding like ‘tomodachi’ is just a pleasant coincidence,” Ogre said. “The egg part is right, but the ending refers to a watch, like ‘outchi’ or something.”

            “‘Ouchie or something?’” echoed Jux.

            “I don’t remember the exact word,” Ogre said, “but, I assure you, it is ‘egg watch.’”

            Jux was massaging his temples. “You’re telling me,” he said, “after all these years, that ‘tamagotchi’ means ‘egg watch’ and not ‘egg friend?’”

            Ogre shrugged. “Hate to break it to you,” he said, “but, yeah.”

            “Son of a bitch,” Jux swore.

            Junior rubbed his nose and stared at them. “I still don’t know what it is,” he admitted.

            “Some professor you are,” Ogre told Jux.

            “It’s a digital pet you can carry around in your pocket,” Abuse said.

            Junior nodded. “So it’s like a Pokémon?” he asked, opening the cooler back up to peek inside for a moment before shutting it up again.

            Abuse narrowed his eyes. “That is an astute observation,” he said, “but, ultimately, the comparisons are few.”

            Junior shrugged. “Weren’t we talking about Jux’s house?” he asked. “What was the point of that? I’m just asking because we’ll have to get this cooler plugged back in soon so that it doesn’t warm up.”

            “Yeah,” Ogre said, looking at Jux. “What’s all this about?”

            Jux looked back at the cooler’s bright negative space against the wall. “David Lynch.”

            Abuse raised a finger and smacked his lips together.

            “Hold on,” Junior said. “Twin Peaks. I know who David Lynch is. Weirdness with a lot of wood. We don’t need to go into it. Let’s just hear what Jux has to say so we can get on with deep sweep.” These last two words he delivered with a grotesque pantomime of two crosswise snaps.

            Abuse inclined his head and, after a quick glance at Ogre, looked at Jux. “It’s all yours,” he said. He took a step back and clasped obsequious hands together over the chest of his black apron.

            Ogre was shaking his head. “Ham of the year.”

            “Shut up,” Abuse whimpered, relaxing his hands at his sides.

            Junior pointed at them. “So you guys know each other?”

            “All right,” Ogre said, clasping his palm across his forehead. “I’m done.”

            Junior eyed Abuse for a moment and then winked at Jux.

            Jux sighed and looked again at the straight fuzzy borders of the rectangular section of the wall. “When you walk through the front door of my parents’ house,” he continued, “there’s the kitchen on the left, the living room, and the hall that turns, like I said. There is also a coat closet on the right, which you may or may not have ever noticed because it is immediately adjacent, and the front door opens over it so that you can’t really tell that it’s there if the front door is open. But it’s there, and if people happen to come over with coats it’s not like it was ever used to store them because we’d usually just hang them on one of the racks in the hall around the old portrait of Elizabeth, who was like a great-great-great aunt or something—”

            “I’m going to stop you right there,” Abuse interrupted, again with a forefinger up. “I do not specifically remember this closet.” He looked at Ogre.

            Ogre shook his head. “I hid in a bunch of closets at Jux’s house,” he said with a stare, “but I don’t specifically remember it, either.”

            “It was there the whole time,” Jux said. “We didn’t open it up very often. The heavy coats were in there, sure, but those we didn’t hardly ever use, so anytime you happened to open that closet you were met with the scent of stillness like a wave, a wave that wasn’t really coming from the five coats that we might in the present use at any given moment if we were going to go to the snow or something, which, you know, was a pretty rare thing, but a wave that was coming from the other coats hanging packed on the racks in that closet, old coats, some my mom or dad’s but some of them I am sure belonged to my grandfather. It all smelled old, but not dusty. And it wasn’t just coats. There were shelves built into the walls and a pretty deep stow space above the garment rods. Up in the nooks were all kinds of containers, from old carboard boxes to hatboxes to little suitcase-like-things, like fucking valises or something from the 1940s, you know, grandfather stuff mixed in with a little bit of old mom and dad stuff. Two full sets of historical anthologies, multi-volume hardcovers, like ‘the world as of’ a couple of years in the sixties or seventies. I still have those volumes, but I’d have to check again to tell you the exact years. I think there might have also been an old complete set of Winston Churchill’s history of the Second World War, that is before I stupidly sold a couple of the volumes on Amoebius. There was a bunch of old shit in there, and it didn’t matter if it was 1990 or 1999 or 2009, that fucking closet smelled pretty much the same. I could go over there right this very moment—which, don’t worry, I am not going to do—but I could go over there and find that smell right now.”

            “Why are you telling us about what a closet it in your parents’ house smells like?” Junior asked, more curious than irritated.

            “The past is in there,” Jux told him. “I know it sounds stupid, but it’s sometimes like a split-second feeling of belonging to something deep in there, past the coats, where, on occasion when we were young, we might have pressed ourselves back against the closet wall and swept the coats around us to conceal our bodies from discovery by whoever was ‘it’ in hide and seek.”

            “I do remember,” Ogre suddenly said. “There were two other closets along the hall, one with a heater or something past the hanging clothes and the other more like a cupboard with access to the bathrooms, but this is the one right by the door.”

            “That’s accurate,” Jux said with a nod. He looked at Ogre. “What do you remember about hiding in the coat closet?”

            Ogre inhaled deeply. “I couldn’t push hard enough against that wall,” he said. “Even behind the coats, I knew it was only a matter of time before your sisters found me. They were relentless.”

            Junior grinned. “Festivities.”

            “We were kids,” Ogre said.

            “First grade,” Jux said.

            “It would have been later,” Ogre said.

            “Right,” Jux said. “I just meant that we’ve…” He looked at Junior. “Ogre and I have been hanging out since first grade. We’ve got our independent stories, but in high school we met Abuse and, you know, there was the Horde, and so that’s what you’re into now.”

            Junior shrugged. “That’s great, man,” he said. “I totally know what you mean. My buddy Remy back in Ventura welded me a kick-ass nacho cheese fountain.”

            Abuse stared at him. “Are you serious?” he asked. “Nacho cheese?”

            “I only fire it up for the most important games,” Junior said, “but, yeah, I’m serious. It’s cool. There are like these little skull faces carved into the rim around the molten cheese.”

            “That is amazing,” Jux said, eyes gaping no longer at the wall but now focused on the chef. “What kind of cheese do you use?”

            Junior smiled. “The kind that comes in a bucket.”

            “Huh,” Jux said with a glance at the floor.

            “So,” Chef Junior said, plucking a clipboard from the wall, “you do know each other. Tell me more about the coat closet.”

            “Are you taking notes?” Jux asked.

            Junior’s eyes widened as he uncapped a black felt pen. “What makes you think that?”

            “Okay,” Jux said, nodding. “Maybe that’s better. Promise to let me see them once it’s finished.”

            Junior sniffed at the pungent tip. “Are there any other packs of tuna in the freezer out at the old retail counter?”

            “I understand your meaning,” Jux told him. “You’re still listening, though, right?”

            Junior nodded. “Just working on Tuesday’s order to get it out of the way,” he said. “Keep going.”

            Jux then looked back at Ogre. “Were you backed against the wall across from the door or the wall along the front of the house?”

            “I don’t know,” Ogre said. “Across, I think. Like looking straight at the inside of the closet door.”

            “That’s it,” Jux said. “In reality, just a few centimeters away through the wall, it’s the plumbing access, right in from the front yard, ground level, little more than a cubic meter, or maybe less, like half in some ways, and anyway in some fantasy of mine it’s the concealed entrance to a mirror kitchen—a shadow kitchen, really, not a mirror, or maybe it is, depending on the vision which is often a dream. Secret kitchen, tucked in the earth where we always thought there was just a little shady crevice of the house that was too small to be called a crawlspace. At the back of the coat closet, I have sometimes seen, this kitchen may be revealed if you remove the panel which does not appear at first to be a panel because it is crossed by the wooden shafts of long-unused umbrellas.”

            Chef Junior, Ogre, and Abuse were all staring at Jux.

            “I think you’re talking about The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, dude,” Abuse finally suggested.

            Jux clutched his forehead. “I didn’t say I thought fucking Narnia was in there,” he said, “just, like, another kitchen. Recessed like a basement, and the plumbing access panels on the front of the house behind that bushy tree were actually windows, so it even got natural light. I know it’s impossible, and not real, but it was a moment where it felt like it was possible and real. Know what I mean? It happened more than once, and it’s happened with other places as well.”

            “Other places?” Junior asked. He frowned. “Is this like Fallout: New Vegas?”

            “I’m not sure what you mean by that,” Jux said. “Deep and complicated, is that what you’re getting at?”

            “More like why can’t I just kill all of these Goodspringers and move on,” Junior said.

            “You can do that, though,” Jux said.

            “So that guy in the armor by the New Vegas sign,” Junior said. “That’s your guy?”

            “Me?” asked Jux.

            “Whoever plays it,” Junior said. “Is that who you are when you play it?”

            “You make your character,” Jux explained. “There’s attributes and skills and perks—”

            Abuse waved his hands. “I’m calling bullshit,” he said, securing eye contact with them all individually. “Look. It’s quite possible that this place has a basement. I mean, come on, let’s cut to the chase here. Whether this particular glowing section of wall is a magical door or not, we know that exploring the uncomfortable fringes of our perceived perceptions usually pays off, even if it’s just for a moment of novelty.”

            “Pure novelty,” Jux said.

            “Don’t be dogmatic,” Abuse said.

            “You don’t be dogmatic,” Jux said.

            “No,” Abuse said. “You.” He scrunched his face.

            “Well would you look at that,” Ogre said.

            Chef Junior sighed and moved around the cooler to approach the wall, holding up his hands as Jux and Abuse stepped away. “This,” the chef said as he tapped the fingertips of both hands against the wall, “is a wall panel that I don’t think any of us should want to remove. I’ve seen terrible infestations in places newer than this. Did you see Almo’s face earlier? He looked like he was about to shit his pants. I don’t know about you, but I think maybe he just finally got a sense of how nasty it is in there because, for him, it’s his past in there. Does that make sense?”

            Jux suddenly stepped toward the mouth of the rectangular space, holding out a hand until fingers touched gently against the relatively-clean textured wall paneling.

            “Did you hear that?” Arturo called from the storage room. “I think someone just pulled up.”

            “Well, go check,” Junior said. He flipped on a couple burners and kicked open the squat sauté-side cooler and crouched down to collect a long, deep third that was only loosely covered by a layer of food service wrap which he stripped off and crumpled into a fist as he set the container onto the heating burners. “I know,” he preempted. “This is only just for a moment. Did anyone see any plastic soup containers when we were going through the storage room?”

            A general shaking of heads.

            “I didn’t see any, either,” Junior said, whisking tongs into the slop. “This Québécoise is either going to be delivered in this pan or in a few cups. Somebody go get a fucking long one of cups from the server station and bring it back here so that I have an appropriate prop ready to use when Tati walks into his restaurant for a fancy French soup on the very night that we’re closed to do a deep clean with especially high stakes.”

            Ogre hurried out of the kitchen through the short hall to the bar.

            “Shit,” Junior said, ducking as he glanced over at the storage room door. “I think he’s here,” he said, stirring the Québécoise with the tongs clinking against the interior sides of the steel hotel pan on the range.

            “I’m not going to comment on your progress,” Tati announced as he emerged from the storage room with a thin, folded hemp bag held before him. “I’m sure that you have all made the right decisions in the meantime, so I’m happy to collect the soup and get back.”

            They were all staring at the owner.

            Chef Junior gripped the sides of the third pan. “You want all of this,” he asked, “or just a few cups?”

            Tati looked at the offered pan and then glanced around the room. “I can’t take it like that.”

            Ogre emerged from the hall with a sheaf of Styrofoam cups as long as his arm and a handful of folded drink containers and plastic lids.

            “Perfect timing,” Junior said. “How many cups do you want?”

            “Is it good?” the owner asked.

            Junior nodded. “We could sell it,” he said. “It’s not as good as it could be, though.”

            Tati frowned. “And why is that?”

            Junior looked over at the others for a moment and then back at the owner. “Because we don’t stock ham bones,” he said. “If we want to do something like this for service, we have to know in advance so that we can make sure to order everything we need. It’s still got ham in it, though.”

            Ogre set the stack of cups on the prep table and dumped the lids and trays nearby. In the process, one of the lids toppled over the side and hit the floor rolling toward Tati. Ogre groaned.

            “Accidents happen,” Junior cautioned.

            “I’ve got it,” Tati said, leaning down to collect the lid and turn and drop it in the hot side trash can. “What’s this?” Tati suddenly asked, poking with horror down into the trash. “Why is there a can—two cans—more—Why are there cans of Congresso organic split pea with ham soup in the trash?”

            Everyone froze.

            “Taste test,” Junior said quickly. “Scientific. You know, quality-testing. We compare what we made with, uh, standard fare.”

            “That’s smart,” Tati said, nodding and staring still into the garbage. “But why would you need several cans?”

            Junior looked around the room. “Everyone wanted to have some.”

            Tati stared at him. “I presume that Almo’s recipe is better than something from a can,” he continued.

            “You have the chance to taste for yourself,” Chef Junior said.

            Brian Tati looked at him. “I know I do,” the owner said. “You don’t have to remind me of that.”

            Ogre constructed one of the cardboard beverage carriers. “So how many do you want?” he asked the owner.

            Tati looked at the cups and then at the third pan of soup. “I’ll take about half of that,” he told Junior.

            “Comin’ right up,” Junior said. He collected an offered cup from Ogre through the island window and immediately began ladling up the brownish-gray slop. When the cup was nearing full, Junior set it on the window and took another cup to fill.

            Ogre reached out to place a lid on the first tall Styrofoam beverage cup of soup, but Tati got to it first.

            “I’ll take this one,” Tati said. He took a little sniff and made a subtle noise in the back of his throat and then looked up and around at the empty racks. “Where are the tasting spoons?”

            Junior leaned his head against his shoulder to scratch his ear against the fabric of his jacket. “Oh, we’re, uh,” he said as he continued the ladling, “in the middle of a deep clean.”

            Tati held out a hand towards Ogre.

            Ogre looked at his hand. “Do you want me to get you a spoon, or—”

            “I’ll just take a lid,” Tati said. He looked back at Junior. “I know I’m earlier than I said I’d be,” he said, “but don’t think I’m purposefully trying to delay your work on the deep clean.” He accepted a lid from Ogre and then set the cup on the window counter and placed the lid loosely at first, and then he pressed down around the rim to seal it, but, as he moved his thumbs around, other sections popped back up and he thumbed around the rim again and even after a few tries he couldn’t get it completely secured.

            “I can get it,” Ogre offered, taking over. He sealed it up quickly and added it to the carrier with three other cups.

            “Where is Almo?” Tati suddenly asked. “Isn’t he helping you with the deep clean?”

            “He had to go make his kids dinner,” Junior told him. “He should be back pretty soon.”

            Tati nodded and watched as the cups were filled and sealed and his carriers loaded with the Québécoise.

            “Don’t you worry,” Junior encouraged, “we’ll get it done tonight.”

            “You’ll hear from me if you don’t,” Tati warned.

            “Oh,” Junior said, “I want to be here tomorrow morning when you take a look around.”

            Tati eyed him. “Not that confident?”

            “What?” Junior asked.

            “Why would you need to come in on your day off unless you felt you needed to advocate?” Tati asked.

            “Let’s just say,” Junior clarified, “that I want to be here when you take a look around. I intend to do my best to make sure that this is done tonight, so, if you were to happen to find something objectionable about the state of the deep clean tomorrow morning, I want to be here to see exactly and in the moment what it is that you don’t like. Concepción and Renzo are going to be here, too, because they volunteered to help you with the trees.”

            Tati was staring out generally. “So be it,” he said with a quick nod. “That’s fair. See you tomorrow.” He picked up the two six-slot beverage containers, fully loaded. He paused for a moment to smile and nod at Concepción and Renzo. “Thank you both for offering to help,” he said.

            “You’re going to pay us,” Renzo said.

            “Don’t I know that I will,” Tati said, “either way.”

B

            It was well past eleven by the time Chef Junior and Renzo moved the appliances back into place and installed the freshly-scoured, bright steel fixtures. Jux, Arturo, and Ogre were busily restocking the similarly-scoured shelving units with service plates and nested containers while Concepción filled another mop bucket with hot water and floor cleaner.

            Junior slipped a towel from over his shoulder and used it to buff the poles of the island frame. He looked back through the storage room, past Concepción attending to the mop bucket, toward the door to the dock. “Bring in the mats,” he called.

            Soon Arturo and Duke began hauling in the large, heavy rubber mats, which had been so thoroughly scrubbed that the black of the rubber almost looked new except for the frayed edges of its dozens of circular holes.

            “I think we’re done in here,” Junior announced. “All that’s left to do is swab up after ourselves on the way out—”

            A stack of small bowls suddenly slid off the top of the island and crashed near the rinsing station, sending chunks and shatters of off-white ceramic skittering everywhere.

            “What the fuck was that?” Junior cried.

            “Again?” Concepción asked, peering in through the door to the storage room.

            “This happened before,” Jux said, staring at the floor while others rushed to collect the detritus. “Right here, too. Concepción’s seen it a bunch of times. Everything is quiet and calm, and then a stack of plates just up and falls off the shelf right there.”

            Junior stared at him. “Hold on,” he began. “If they’re always falling from the same place, why do we keep putting things there?”

            Jux looked over at Concepción and then at the others for a moment. “I mean,” he said, “it’s just a freak occurrence that happens to happen in that same spot every time. It’s not like something’s knocking them over. I think the island’s just bent or something.”

            “Professor Jux didn’t go to engineering school,” Arturo said. “Come on, homes, a big old stack of bowls? That’s too much friction to have it just slide off, even if it’s a little bent.”

            “The surface could be slick with dust,” Jux offered.

            “We just cleaned it,” Junior said.

            “Well, I meant all those other times before,” Jux said.

            Arturo was staring up at the island’s top shelf and scanning the area around it. “It’s the HVAC,” he said, pointing to the vent in the ceiling. “See how that grate is positioned? It’s probably just pumping out a big burst of air anytime it comes on.”

            “The AC is on like all the time,” Junior said.

            “Not at night, necessarily,” Arturo said. “And surfaces act differently when the residual temperature is high, so that would explain why it doesn’t happen when it’s cooking in here.”

            Junior was staring at him. “Are you a certified duct technician?”

            “Naw,” Arturo said. “My cousin just has a lot of contracts and sometimes I help him out. I’m still going to refrigeration school.”

            “Good for you, man,” Jux said with an inclined head.

            “Thanks, bro,” Arturo said. “I’m not trying to be some professor or anything, though.”

            Jux shrugged. “That’s fine,” he said. “The purpose of an education isn’t necessarily to become a professor in your discip—”

            “No, I mean like I don’t want to be a professor,” Arturo continued. “No offense, but that shit sounds boring as hell.”

            Jux stared at him with an aura of pity that slowly transitioned, by stages, into reflective wisdom.  “Well,” he saged, “you’ll probably make more money as a refrigeration technician than you would as an adjunct teaching refrigeration at a community college.” Jux scratched his forehead and sniffled nostrils stuffed with the residue of hours of cleaning. “You could do that on the side, though,” he offered.

            Arturo considered this with a skeptical sideward glance. “I want to play with my kids, bro,” he said. “They’re only going to be this age one time, and I can’t be ignoring that.”

            Jux was trembling as he looked upon Arturo.

            “Well isn’t this a charming after school special?” Junior asked. He shook his head and then looked across the kitchen to where Abuse and Renzo were hauling the range away from the wall. The chef’s eyes widened. “What’s that all about?” he cried. “Why is that coming away from the wall again?”

            “A couple pieces got back here,” Renzo said.

            “Two, specifically,” Abuse confirmed as he gave the range a final tug, scooting it against the buckling rubber mat and shimmying through the space opened from the cooler to crouch and scan the floor near the exhaust hatch.

            Junior stared horribly at the grate. “Can we get that closed up as soon as possible?” he asked. “I don’t like seeing it again.”

            Arturo suddenly clambered up onto the island’s cold side workstation.

            “What are you doing?” Junior cried.

            “Adjusting the vent,” Arturo said, reaching up to manipulate the slats with his fingers. “You’ll get the same airflow, but if I can shift the positioning of the fins, maybe it won’t keep blowing things off the shelf up here.”

            “Just do it quickly,” Junior said. “We were pretty much done here.”

            “This shouldn’t take too long,” Abuse said as he clutched the handle of the hatch panel and wrenched the duct grate from the wall.

            “What is that?” Junior cried. “Why are you doing that?”

            Abuse crouched and peered into the exhaust space. “Just taking a look.”

            “Don’t go in there,” Junior pleaded. “We already doing the final mop.”

            Abuse, for his part, was already in the duct up to his waist, so his response was slightly muffled. “I’m not.”

            “You look like you’re going in there,” Junior observed.

            Arturo hopped off the counter and swept his palms together.

            “You do it?” Junior asked.

            Arturo shook his head. “It’s stuck on the inside,” he said. “I have to take it off or go up and around to get the other side so I can loosen it.”

            Junior clutched his head with both hands. “Why are we talking about opening up all the vents again?” he asked. “We’re done here.”

            “You want me to ask my cousin to come in tomorrow to take a look?” Arturo asked.

            Junior held up his hands. “This,” he announced, “is a deep clean situation. Maybe Tati wants the vents cleaned as usual, and that means not cleaning them, but I’m pretty sure he’s not going to care one way or another about the direction of the airflow from that vent up there.”

            Abuse slinked back out from the duct and began replacing the grate.

            “Get what you were looking for?” Junior asked.

            “I can’t see anything,” Abuse said. “Too dark, and there are immediate turns. Smells terrible, too. Like an Oktoberfest dinner repurposed for a Mother’s Day Brunch.”

            “Did that happen?” Jux asked with horror.

            Abuse shook his head as he edged the grate in place with a click. “No,” he said. “It’s all I could think of.”

            “Jesse let me eat old Oktoberfest pork,” Jux said.

            “I know,” Abuse said. “I know. But that’s behind us now.”

            “All right,” Chef Junior said. “Move the oven back and we can get out of here. And get that tub of pepper off the cooler. I thought we already moved that.”

The Transplants

A       

            When Chef Junior arrived at early dawn, Concepción, Almo, and Renzo were already there, busy stripping labels from containers, applying fresh labels, writing content descriptions, and then tearing the labels off again. The guitar riffs and drumbeats from some music playing in the front of the house reverberated through the short corner to the bar and dissipated into the kitchen.

            “Maximizing the bonus, I see,” Junior said.

            Almo held up his hands. “What is that?” he cried. “These labels all have to be perfect. You don’t know how Tati is about these labels.”

            Junior looked at Concepción and Renzo. “Nobody said anything about that when we were doing the deep clean,” he recalled.

            Concepción shrugged and Renzo picked a fingernail at the rounded corner of a service label on the plastic wrap cocoon around a stainless-steel deep sixth of sliced roasted fennel.

            “Better safe than sorry,” Almo added.

            Junior held up his hands. “I don’t blame you,” he said. “I hope you all get a nice, fat payout at the end of this.” He looked around at them until his eyes caught the gargoyle container of coarse ground black pepper again peeking out from atop the cooler. “Have you been cooking already?”

            Almo scribbled something on a label and then immediately tore the label from the waxy backing and plucked at its sticky side with his fingertips. He chuckled. “Too busy,” he said.

            “No cooking,” Concepción told the chef.

            Junior nodded. “Then why is that handle of pepper up there?”

            Nobody responded.

            After a moment, Junior sighed. “Let’s stop wasting labels and do a legitimate run-through,” he said. “I want to make sure we didn’t forget anything else.”

            Renzo and Concepción both began collecting the label rolls and permanent black markers. Almo slowly wrote “ngochy” on a label and then looked at the label presently on a container and then crumpled up the new label and tossed it in the trash can.

            “Who’s out front?” Junior asked, ticking his head toward the entrance to the bar from which emanated the low, unidentifiable music.

            “Teatree,” Concepción said.

            Junior grabbed the container of pepper from atop the cooler, cornered the central island, and stowed the tub with the other seasonings on the shelf above the stainless steel prep table. “Pretend you’re Tati.”

            “You mean act like a scrooge?” Almo asked.

            “I mean look at everything,” Junior said. “Yes, like a scrooge. He’s probably going to find whatever reason he can to deny us our victory.”

            Almo held up a waggling finger and beamed a smile.

            “Okay, okay,” Junior said calmingly. “I’m going to double-check the front storage.” He shot a wink at Renzo and then left the kitchen to the bar, where Teatree was in full service garb, polishing a bottle of passion fruit vodka with a rag while a chill and somehow ominous track was playing at relatively low volume from the front-of-the-house speakers housed in the rafters. When Junior approached, Teatree turned and then cocked his head slightly upward in greeting. Junior pointed up at the source of the music. “What is this?”

            Teatree scoffed and rubbed a bottle. “Best of Bowie,” he said. “‘Sound and Vision.’”

            Junior made a point to appreciate it. “Sounds pretty cool,” he admitted.

            Teatree tilted his head. “The best,” he said, “of Bowie.”

            “So were you here first?” asked Junior.

            Teatree nodded. “Tati hasn’t been here, yet,” he said. “If that’s what you’re asking.”

            “That’s it,” Junior said. He glanced at the racks of bottles shimmering under the bar lights. “Enjoy your polishing.”

            “For sure,” Teatree said, swabbing now at a thick bottle of leather-infused gin.

            Past the dim server station, the front storage row was dark until Junior pulled open the glass-windowed freezer and began adjusting toward perfection stacks of boxes of parbaked baguette and sacks of dual-packed ahi tuna portions. When he got to the middle shelf, he found that a plastic bag of frozen blueberries had been folded into storage between bags of strawberries and mango in such a way that if one tried to remove just one of the bags, the blueberries would potentially topple out from an opening. As he was correcting this mistake by retucking the plastic cold and damp with condensation, there was a dull knocking sound from the front the dining room, but he only responded with a shake of the head and then, after more rooting around in the freezer, shut the door and turned and opened the dry goods cabinet. The light was so bad that he quickly shut the cabinet and walked back toward the server station, where the switches of the house lights were housed in a console near the shift schedule and bulletin board.

            There was another knocking sound, but this time it was more like a banging, and the music quickly cut out and Teatree’s footsteps could be heard rushing toward the front door. When Junior emerged from the server station, Teatree was kneeling before the tall glass front door, fiddling with the floor lock while Tati stood outside, body dark against the lightening morning sky, holding up a key of his own, and staring blindly inside. When Teatree finally managed to put sufficient pressure on the base of the door and wrenched the lock with the key with a screech that was followed by the slight scraping of the brass coupling at the glass door’s lower corner against the floor.

            “Is that clean?” Tati asked, pointing down at the minimal orifice where the deadbolts descended to lock the place.

            “Let’s not start like that,” Junior cautioned. “We both know that is a problem with the door, not cleanliness.”

            “I refuse to believe it,” Tati said, looking around at the quiet dining area. “This is very valuable property.”

            “Everything’s clean,” Junior promised.

            Tati shook out a hand at the chef’s face. “Fine,” he said, glancing about into the little dark corners of the gloomy space. “I’ll take a look. They’re going to arrive with the trees soon, so get ready.” He backed out through the opened front door and walked briskly out of sight into the parking lot.

            Teatree was crouched nearby, looking up while he gripped the key in the deadbolt lock. “Are the trees coming through here?”

            Junior shrugged. “I have no idea,” he admitted.

            Teatree looked down at the floor receptacle.

            “I also have no idea why he has to go pick the trees up when he’s not even delivering them himself,” Junior said.

            Teatree glanced up at him. “Should I lock it open or not?”

            Chef Junior shrugged. “He’s probably going to come back in this way one way or another.”

            Teatree nodded and secured the bolt and stood up and brushed his hands together.

            “Sentry,” Chef Junior told him.

            Teatree shot him a wink. “With Bowie.”

            Junior eyed him. “Low.”

            Teatree’s eyes widened. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about,” he said. “Sound and vision.”

            There was a screeching of brakes and Junior and Teatree both walked out onto the front patio to watch as a rig with a long flatbed stopped and backed up beepingly to execute a multi-point turn in the slim passage of roadway between the patio and the rail tracks so that it could eventually back into the parking lot presently empty except for Tati’s pale hybrid unevenly parked in the accessible space directly opposite the entrance. Tati was standing nearby, his bewildered visage momentarily eclipsed by the slim, leafy trunks of the two planter-belted trees that comprised the entire cargo of the truck. Soon it halted and three young men hopped out of the cabin, the driver from one side and the two others from the other. They quickly went about loosening the straps securing the wooden planters to the flatbed.

            “They go back there by the gate,” Tati announced, leaning against his car. “That’s fine, there.”

            The men hefted the trees one by one down the ramp from the flatbed and settled them side by side before the yawning gates of the back dock. Two of the men then loaded back into the rig while the driver collected a clipboard from the dash and walked over to offer it to Tati, who took it and stared blankly down at the paper fixed to its surface.

            “What’s this?” Tati asked, reaching into a trouser pocket.

            “You have to sign for the assisted delivery,” the driver said.

            Tati froze for a moment and then looked over at the trees by the dock gate, which was opening as Almo and Renzo and Concepción emerged. “But they’ve already been delivered.”

            The driver executed a perfunctory half-shrug. “I need the signature.”

            Tati took his empty hand out of the pocket and pointed across the driveway at Junior and Teatree watching from the patio. “Take it over there and they’ll sign it,” he said. “I don’t have my reading glasses.”

            The driver repeated the gesture, this time almost fully performing the shrug before turning and crossing to the patio with the clipboard.

            Tati called to Junior and Teatree, “I don’t have my reading glasses.” He was pointing at his face.

            Chef Junior accepted the clipboard and, after a brief look down at it, he squinted back across the driveway to Tati by his Prius. “What does he want me to do,” Junior muttered, “read it to him?”

            “Someone has to sign for the assisted delivery,” the driver explained.

            Junior and Teatree both looked down at the document on the clipboard, which contained, among the language typical of delivery invoices, a statutory definition of “assisted delivery” as pursuant to ADA and a total due box filled with a big, fat zero.

            Chef Junior hummed. Then he looked at the driver. “I’m going to go get a pen,” he said, turning.

            “I have one,” the driver said. He dug into a pouch on his belt.

            “That’s fine,” Junior said as he crossed into the restaurant. “Teatree, come help me get a pen from the bar.”

            The driver shrugged and Teatree followed Junior inside. The Chef was already at the bar by the computer nook.

            “What is it?” Teatree asked.

            “Do you see what this is?” Junior asked him.

            “A delivery receipt,” Teatree said.

            “It’s an invoice,” Junior corrected. “And it’s for special delivery that’s free because of a disability.”

            Teatree stared at him, nodding slowly. “Yeah,” he said. “Tati always parks in the handicapped spot.”

            “That doesn’t mean he has a legal disability,” Junior said. “I think he’s defrauding this nursery.”

            “Whoa, that’s crazy,” Teatree said, eyes dilated behind his glasses. He was grinning, too.

            “I don’t want to sign this,” Junior said. “He doesn’t want to sign it because he knows he’s lying and they could sue him or something. So he wants one of us to sign it, because then, if they find out, he can say that it was a mix-up and basically blame whoever signed it. I’m not signing this. It’s a trap.”

            Teatree’s grin melted into ecstatic horror. “Who’s going to sign it, then?”

            Junior scratched his scalp with a thick forefinger through his short, black hair. He suddenly unclipped the invoice and slid it under the lid of the scanner unit which was situation against the corner column of the bar. He pressed a button on the little console and after a momentary low whirring a thin bright light swept across the side under the lid. The monitor woke and flashed briefly and then the scanned invoice popped up on the slightly-curved surface of the CRT screen. Junior plucked the invoice from the scanner and secured it to the clipboard. “I’m going to go talk to him,” he announced. “I’ve had enough of this kind of thing around here.” He reached over and took two pens from the small black plastic container of writing instruments near the keyboard.

            “Maybe we could just sign it with the right hand,” Teatree suggested. “Make the origin impossible to detect. You know, mold it, you and me.”

            Junior looked at him. “What does that even mean?” he asked. “How would ‘we’ sign it? You think we’re going to be like Patrick Stewart and Demi Moore making a pot?”

            “Patrick Swayze,” Teatree said. He sniffled and rubbed his nose and adjusted his glasses.

            “What?” Junior asked.

            “You’re talking about Ghost,” Teatree said. “Right? That was Patrick Swayze.”

            Junior pressed a palm into an eye. “What did I say?”

            Teatree coughed lightly. “Patrick Stewart.”

            “I didn’t say that,” Junior insisted as he worked his palm into the other eye. “I know Captain Picard wasn’t in that movie.”

            “I don’t mean that,” Teatree stammered. He held up a palm. “It doesn’t matter. I’m just…” The last syllable lingered into a cough and then he looked red-eyed at Teatree and then they both lifted their collars up over their faces. “The kitchen,” Teatree observed.

            They walked around the bar with their faces partially-covered and Junior put on his metallic wraparounds to protect his eyes before peering around the short transition corner into the kitchen, which was flooded with wisps of acrid gas drifting up from an unattended saucepan on the range.

            Junior thrust the clipboard and pens to Teatree. “Go out and tell Tati that he needs to sign it because it is in his name,” he commanded. “Tell him I told you to tell him that. I’ll take the wrath.”

            As Teatree hurried out through the restaurant, Junior swiftly navigated his bulk past the dishpit and between the line island and the cooler and ovens to the stovetop, where a mound of coarse ground pepper was dry smoldering in a medium saucepan. Crumbly black and white tidbits were also cast across the other, cool burners and over onto the floor where the pepper tub sat upright with its red plastic cap nearby on the rubber floor mat. Junior winced and coughed and stepped over toward the switch panel on the wall near the service-side bulletin board and flipped on the ventilation hood. Then he turned back to the range and went for the bare handle of the pan but stopped himself just before touching the hot steel. His eyes hurt, but he managed to see well enough to navigate back around past the dishpit to grab a service towel from the stack. This he used upon returning to the smoking pan of pepper to grip the handle and spirit it out through the back room, hollering as he went, “Hot hot hot hot hot hot.”

            Almo, Concepción, and Renzo were all still standing by the open back gate near the two new trees and they watched with curious and concerned amusement as Junior scurried past the dumpsters toward the rusty ten can in the corner three-quarters full of rancid cigarette butts and carefully upended the pan, the charred pepper sluicing down into the spaces between the butts.

            “What the fuck, guys?” Junior cried. He then pivoted and quickstepped to the hose installed on the wall past the unopening door and cranked the spigot open and the sudden rush of water made the mouth of the hose strike out like a snake before lying limp and gushing against the relatively-clean cement.

            “What the fuck us?” Almo asked. “What the fuck you.” His eyes widened.

            Chef Junior took up the hose, directing its flow toward the base of the wall as he approached the can and the pan. He thumbed the end of the hose to control the water into a gentle, narrow spray. “Move,” he told them.

            All three immediately backed out into the lot and Junior directed the water first at the pan, upon contact with the rough black surface of which the water hissed for a moment into steam. Then he sprayed inside the ten can, muting whatever fiery propositions might be growing within, and then tossed the hose down at the dumpsters and returned to the spigot to shut off the water. He looked at the three at the gate. “I thought we understood there was no cooking.”

            Renzo cocked an eyebrow. “Nobody’s been cooking.”

            “That smells like shit, man,” Almo said. “What was it?”

            Junior gaped at him. “Black pepper,” he finally said. “Are you trying to tell me that none of you put a pan on a burner and loaded it with black pepper?”

            Concepción stared horribly. “Why would you do that?” she wondered.

            Junior held up a palm. “That’s what I’m saying,” he said. “None of you did this?”

            They all shrugged or shook a head or both.

            Junior clasped the front of his face, working fingers against the residual tears. “It’s not like it could have fallen,” he began. “I put the pepper back on the spice rack like half an hour ago. Tati hasn’t been in here, and, besides, whatever caused pepper gas to be deployed in the kitchen happened recently, because we all know those burners don’t take very long to get blazing. Teatree was with me out front. Did someone else get here? Do you not see what I’m saying? Even if was just that the pepper got placed on top of the cooler again, for convenience, and I don’t want to go back there to some references to this whole corn silk fiasco in the drains—”

            “You’re bringing that up,” Almo interrupted. “I’m just making an observation.”

            Junior held up his hands. “All right, all right,” he pleaded. “All I am saying, and I mean this like as real and honest as I can be, is that somebody had to turn on that one burner and put a pan there. It’s possible, maybe, that’s what I’m saying, that if that handle of pepper was up on the cooler again for some reason and there was a—” His eyes widened. “Where’s Tati?”

            Concepción nodded out at the lot. “He still has the clipboard,” she said. “Now he’s coming.”

            Junior inhaled deeply and lowered his head. “Why did I use his name?” he whimpered. “Abuse is right. Never utter his name, or else he might appear.”

            Tati poked his torso around the opening of the gate and immediately fixated on the wet pan on the ground. As he looked around the delivery flatbed was maneuvered slowly out onto the one-way road and down and away in the opposite direction it needed to go.

            “What happened?” Tati asked.

            Teatree appeared from the lot and collected the invoice clipboard and pens from the owner.

            “I’m going to sign that later,” Tati told them, “Once I have a chance to read it.”

            “I’ll keep it at the bar,” Teatree assured him.

            “So?” Tati bellowed. “Which of these is the beginning of my inspection of the deep clean, the jammed lock at the front door or this disgusting skillet by your ashtray?”

            “This just barely happened,” Junior explained. “Ignore this and we’ll take a look at the back room.”

            Tati was admiring the state of the stained concrete beneath the dumpsters. “I see evidence of work,” he admitted, fingering first into a trouser pocket and then thrusting his hand within and yanking out his reading glasses. “You cleared out the wheels,” he said, peering through with the reading glasses into the clarity of the work beyond the recent pan incident. He looked from one face to another. “One of you did it. I don’t know and I don’t care, but this cleaning was done, and I respect that.”

            Renzo, Concepción, and Almo all were staring at him.

            “So,” Junior called out, sending pairs of fingers about like darts for a moment before engaging in eye contact with the owner, “let’s take a good look around out here before we head into the kitchen, which is spotless. But, out here, we even rinsed the dumpsters without spattering the lamps, which have also been cleaned.”

            Concepción crossed the dock with a demure nod directed generally about and, after a brief pause at the doorway, looked back with a determined smile and went into the kitchen.

            “Indeed they have,” Tati said, studying the warm angles of the dumpsters. Then he sniffed a couple of times. “Is that… Do I smell pepper spray?”

            Junior chuckled. “Hey, the deep clean was a riot,” he said, “but not that kind of riot.”

            Tati walked toward the back door.

            “Oh, did you notice that Arturo repainted the heaters?” Junior offered, hustling over to display the arrangement of shining black heating mechanisms like a game show host. “Eh?”

            “Very nice,” Tati said, leaning forward to examine the heaters. “He did an excellent job of making sure the paint didn’t bead up like last time.” He glanced over at Almo.

            “I told you,” Almo whined. “It was bad paint. You can’t use ten-year-old paint and expect it not to bead up.”

            Junior clicked his tongue. “Let’s leave the past behind us,” he proposed. “Arturo also insisted on stripping the old coat before adding the new one so that it would last longer.”

            Tati was nodding. “Very promising,” he said. Then he pointed at the back door. “Why did Conception just rush into the kitchen?”

            “She wasn’t rushing,” Almo blurted.

            Tati stared at him. “I know Conception,” Tati said. “I know what it looks like when she’s rushing.”

            “Concepción,” Renzo corrected.

            Tati now stared at him. “What?”

            “Her name is ‘Concepción,’” Renzo said.

            Tati blinked three times. “That’s what I said.”

            Renzo held up a peace sign, but with the outside of his hand facing the owner.

            “Yes,” Tati said awkwardly.

            “Well,” Junior interrupted, “how was your Quebecoise?”

            Tati inhaled and turned to Almo. “The consistency was exceptional,” he said, “but it was far too salty. I also didn’t detect the extra black pepper that I requested.”

            Junior’s eyes bulged.

            “Ah,” Almo exclaimed, “that’s because, uh, you know, pork has a really strong flavor and it washes the pepper right out. I used a whole bunch of it. Junior saw.”

            “I did, indeed,” Junior said. “Lots of pepper in this kitchen recently.”

            Tati was frowning. “I distinctly remember my grandmother’s Quebecoise having a distinct peppery flavor,” he said. “That was when I was growing up, in France.”

            “Right, right,” Junior said, nodding.

            “It’s probably the pork,” Almo continued. “Stuff you can get here in the States is nothing like what you can get outside the country. They probably gave the pig too many antibiotics so it doesn’t have that pepper taste.”

            Tati made a low groan in the back of his throat. “I don’t know,” he said. “She used to make pork chops, too, with apples. I recall the meat being subtle and nutty, not peppery. I agree with you on principle with respect to the quality of our food, however.”

            Almo was scratching his chin.

            “Tell me, Almo,” Tati continued, “when you make the Quebecoise, do you pepper the meat when you sear it or add it to the soup later? Or to the vegetables?”

            Teatree suddenly poked his head out from the back door, and, because of the way that they were standing on the dock, only Renzo and Junior noticed him frantically beckoning to them with a waving hand. While Almo stammered out some bullshit and Tati closely considered every word, Renzo just averted his eyes and Junior stared intensely at Teatree and even jerked his hand about a couple of times as if to make him go away.

            “What is it?” Tati asked the chef.

            Junior swatted around his head. “No matter how deep the clean,” he said, “there’s always the flies.”

            “Flies?” Tati asked, glancing about. “I don’t see any flies.”

            “Almo,” Junior said, “tell Brian about your process for making the Quebecoise. Top to bottom, so he can figure out what we’re missing when we do it next time.”

            Almo stared dumbly at him.

            “What?” Junior cried, moving to the back door. “Just tell him how you made it.”

            “But I don’t know what else to say,” Almo complained. He grinned nervously at Tati.

            “Maybe it would have been better if we had soup bones,” Renzo finally offered. He’d wandered off toward the gate, as far away from the back door as possible, so that’s where the owner’s attention was drawn.

            “Again?” Tati asked. “You know, I thought about it. I am certain that my grandmother never made her Quebecoise with ham bones. She used the tenderloin. I remember that clearly.”

            “How old were you?” Renzo asked.

            Tati blinked. “I don’t see how that’s important.”

            Renzo shrugged.

            “I think we’ve covered it enough,” Tati concluded with a quick look around the dock. “If the kitchen looks as nice as this, you’ll have surprised me with your victory.” He started toward the back door.

            “Wait,” Almo blurted, holding out his hands.

            Tati turned back and, seeing Almo so desperately positioned, glanced about worriedly as if something might be lurking just beyond the edge of the dumpsters. “Is it a rat?” he asked. “A pigeon?”

            Almo was smiling widely and trembling. “Naw,” he said. “It’s, uh, I, uh, I forgot to tell you… I got a new bike.”

            Tati cocked an eyebrow and looked over toward the bike in the corner. “How could you afford—” he started, but stopped and started again, “That one? That’s not a new bike.”

            Almo’s eyes widened. “My new bike’s still back at home,” he said. “You didn’t think I’d ride it to work, did you?”

            Tati chuckled. “Why not?” he managed.

            “I mean,” Almo continued, “I would, maybe.”

             “I don’t understand,” Tati said. “If you would, then why didn’t you?”

            Almo shrugged.

            “Gangsters,” Renzo offered.

            Tati eyed him. “Gangsters,” he echoed. He looked back at Almo. “You’re worried that gangsters will steal your new bike from back here?”

            “I wouldn’t put it past them,” Almo said.

            Tati shook his head. “All right,” he said. “That’s enough. I need to take a look at the kitchen.”

            “Wait,” Almo said. “You didn’t even look at the heaters yet.”

            “Yes, I did,” Tati said. “Not two minutes ago.”

            Almo held up a finger. “Ah, but did you really see them?”

            Tati frowned and went into the back room. When he got into the kitchen, he found that the ranges were pulled out from the wall and the ventilation grate was detached and leaning against the paneling near the exposed maw of the duct, from which Concepción’s service no-slips protruded like infected teeth. Chef Junior was leaning against the tall cooler, massaging his eyes with fingers of both hands.

            “What’s happening here?” Tati asked, grimacing at the duct. “Why is that open? Wasn’t it already cleaned?”

            Junior didn’t stop massaging his eyes, but he responded morosely, “Everything was spotless, and then someone knocked over the pepper.”

            Tati forced himself to look away from the duct, instead directing his gaze toward the chef. “That doesn’t answer my question.”

            Junior peered at the owner between fingers. “Teatree went back in,” he muttered.

            “Back in,” Tati said flatly. “He went back in?”

            Junior was nodding. “Now he says he’s lost.”

            Tati shivered. “Why,” he began, “was Teatree in there in the first place?”

            Junior sighed and craned his neck so that he could squint at the ceiling lights. “Because he’s on drugs? I don’t know.”

            “We’ll have to have a staff meeting about this,” Tati said.

            Concepción’s shoes were disappearing into the duct.

            “Are you sure she should be going in there?” Tati asked after hazarding a glance. “Almo knows the ducts. He should go.”

            Junior shrugged.

            Tati turned and went to the door to the back room and was startled to find Almo and Renzo creeping quietly just past the threshold. Tati gripped his chest and exhaled and then composed himself. “Almo, you have to help them get out of the ventilation system.”

            Almo grinned. “Get who?”

            “Teatree and Concepción,” he said, pronouncing the second name with special attention and a quick look at Renzo, who stared blankly at him.

            “Why are they in there?” Almo asked, leaning to have a look past the doorway. “I already, uh, cleaned the ducts.”

            “That was my understanding, too,” Tati said. “You know I don’t like that panel being off there.”

            Almo tapped two fingers several times against his lips. “Here’s what I can do,” he began. “I’ll get a spool of that packing twine and bring it in with me, and I’ll leave the end of it with you so that they can just follow the twine back out.”

            Tati was frowning again. “Is that really necessary?”

            Almo’s eyes widened.

            “This isn’t a fairy tale,” Tati added.

            “Aha,” Almo said, leaning back a bit. “That we know. It isn’t a fairy tale, that we know.”

            Tati glanced at the floor sink, which was heavily worn with age but had clearly been scoured. “Nice work on the drain here.”

            “Arturo did that, too,” Renzo said.

            Tati glanced out through the back door into the dock. “Where is he?” he asked. “Is he here?”

            Renzo shook his head. “He doesn’t need the money, boss.”

            “Huh,” Tati said. He looked back at Almo, but Almo wasn’t there. “Where’d he go?” he asked Renzo.

            Renzo ticked his head at the door to the kitchen.

            In the kitchen, Junior was still brooding by the cooler.

            “Where’s Almo?” Tati asked.

            Junior looked up and stared at the owner for a few silent seconds. Then he said, “You got to admit we did a good job on this deep clean.”

            Tati’s eyes widened. He slipped his glasses on and then immediately inclined his head so that he could look at the chef over the rims. “Are you serious?”

            Junior held out open palms. “Look around,” he said. “The vent’s open and there are now three people in there, but everything is clean. Clean. Deep.”

            Tati breathed slowly as he scanned the chef. “I have to agree with you,” he said. “I haven’t completely reviewed the results, but, it seems to me at this point that you managed to do in only one day what, in the past, has always taken two days, at least. I’ll tell you what. Even if I do find something unsatisfactory, something small, I’ll consider your end of the bargain fulfilled.”

            Junior studied him. “So we won?”

            “Unless I find something major,” Tati warned.

            “You won’t,” Junior said. “We scrubbed this place like it was going on a third date.”

            Tati frowned. “I don’t know what that means,” he said. “Was that a sexual joke?”

            “No,” Junior said. “Just, you know, trying to stay clean.”

            Tati was staring at him again. “Can we focus on the staff members who are presently crawling around in the ductwork?”

            “Yeah,” Junior said. He looked over at the opening of the vent, just a big dark rectangle. After a moment, he stepped closer and crouched by the vent and called in, cupping a palm by his mouth in some fantasy of magnifying the sound, “You guys on your way back or what?”

            There was no answer.

            “Tell me,” Tati said as he kept his gaze locked on the glimmering stainless stainless steel surface of the cooler, “is there twine leading into the vent?”

            “Twine?” Junior asked.

            “Like a lead,” Tati said.

            Junior looked at him. “What?”

            “Is there a length of twine leading into the vent?” Tati asked.

            “No,” Junior said. “You know, you can look yourself. There will probably not be any gremlins or elves coming out of there. Just employees, hopefully.”

            “Probably?” Tati asked warily. “Hopefully? Did Almo go in?”

            Junior shook his head. “I didn’t even see him in here.”

            “But he came through here, at least,” Tati suggested.

            “I didn’t see him,” Junior said.

            Tati exhaled monstrously. “This is a serious liability issue.”

            “Hey!” Junior hollered into the orifice of the vent. “Can anybody hear me? What’s the situation?” There was no response, so he threw up his hands and looked over at Tati, who was still staring at the cooler door.

            Then Almo emerged from the front of the house gripping a fat bundle of twine. “Finally found it,” he said. “You know, when we do a deep clean, you got to keep an eye on the new hires because they don’t always put stuff back where it’s supposed to be.”

            “Are you certain that’s necessary?” Tati asked.

            “You think I want to get lost in there, too?” Almo cried. “Not me.” He offered Brian the end.

            “I’m confused,” Tati said as he looped the twine around a finger. “Why would you of all people get lost in there? You clean the ducts every year.”

            Almo breathed heavily and stared at the owner.

            “Can’t you just guide them out?” Tati continued.

            Almo shrugged. “Hey, I just want to be careful, you know,” he said. “I saw some weird things when I went in there.”

            “What do you mean by ‘weird things?’” Tati asked with a frown. “That is vague and disconcerting.”

            “Well,” Almo began, “let me disconcert you with this. There’s a whole nother kitchen all abandoned down there. Big one, too, like twice the size of this one.”

            Tati blinked several times and then removed his glasses, huffed a patina of moisture onto the lenses one by one, and then gently cleaned them on his shirtsleeve before slipping them back on only to incline his head and stare at Almo over the frame. “I don’t know anything about that.”

            “That’s why I’m telling you about it right now,” Almo cried. “I know you’re thinking, ‘oh, it’s just crazy ass Almo making up stories again.’ But I’m not making this up.”

            “I refuse to believe that there is an abandoned kitchen in the basement,” Tati said. “The concept is preposterous.”

            “Concepción?” Junior called into the vent. “Teatree?”

            Almo was shaking his head at the owner. “I saw it with my own eyes,” he said.

            “If there is a kitchen down there,” Tati pressed as he picked distastefully at the rough twine around his finger, “why didn’t you tell me about it years ago when you started going in there to flush out the system? I don’t understand.”

            Almo was grinning.

            “Yeah,” Junior said with a sigh. “About that.”

            Almo shook his head. “Don’t do it,” he pleaded. “Don’t you do it.”

            “Do what?” Tati asked, ceasing to fidget with the twine to stare quizzically at the chef.

            Junior ruffled his hair and then jiggled his jowls, blabbering a moment of nonsense.

            “What is going on here?” Tati continued, his look now transitioning into skepticism as he directed it back at Almo. “Was this your first time going into the ducts? Have you been lying to me about cleaning them out each year?”

            Almo rubbed his nose and then looked down at the steel counter of the cold side and took great interest in something. “What’s this?” he asked, crouching to collect a sani towel from the red bucket on the bottom shelf. “How’d we miss this smear of grease?”

            “I think I deserve a straight answer,” Tati said. “No more distractions.”

            “Probably needs some of that stainless cleaner,” Almo said as he swabbed the counter. “This kind of steel feels really smooth, but it’s actually just mostly empty space and stains can get right in there if you’re not careful. They only call it ‘stainless steel’ because it sounds good for advertising.”

            “Can I remind you that there are two employees in the ventilation system right now?” Junior asked. “Also that they aren’t responding when we call their names?”

            Almo wadded the towel and dropped it back into the bucket before glancing around. “Where’s that steel cleaner?”

            “I would really like to know the truth,” Tati said. “If these ducts haven’t been cleaned out regularly, there could be serious implications.”

            “Yeah, site inspection,” Junior agreed.

            Tati blinked at him. “I’m not concerned about that,” he said. “Why do you think I would be concerned about that?”
            Junior threw up his hands. “Here’s what I propose,” he said. “Almo goes in there and gets Concepción and Teatree out, and I tell you the truth, as I know it, in the meantime.”

            “I already told him the truth,” Almo said. “You just going to tell him the same thing I already told him.”

            “You didn’t even answer his question,” Junior said. “Look, I’d go in there myself and get them out, but there’s no way I’m fitting through that hole.”

            “Fine,” Almo said, walking over to the orifice. He turned back. “You should know that I cleaned these ducts every time. It’s just that, this time, I went in deeper than before and found the other kitchen down there.”

            Tati was frowning.

            As Almo crouched down and prepared himself to wiggle into the ventilation duct, Jux appeared from the back room wearing flowery green garden gloves and holding a plastic trowel.

            “You want me to transplant those trees?” Jux asked.

            Tati looked at Junior and then turned and looked at Jux. Then he looked back at Junior. “How many people will I be paying double time and half today?”

            Junior shrugged.

            Tati looked back over at Jux, who was peering curiously at the opened vent out of which Almo’s trousers and scuffed service boots wriggled like the forked black tongue of an industrial demon. “Jux,” the owner said.

            “Yeah,” Jux responded.

            “Can you do them quickly?” Tati asked.

            Jux shrugged. “Just a couple of trees,” he said. “Shouldn’t be more than an hour.”

            “Good,” Tati said.

            “Maybe two,” Jux added.

            “Why not one?” Tati asked.

            Jux shrugged again. “Never know,” he said. “It won’t be long, though. My class isn’t until this evening, but I still have to do the prep. I’m thinking a scavenger hunt involving library resources, since they’re learning about research methodology right now.”

            “I’m glad I’m not in your class,” Junior said.

            “Oh, come on,” Jux protested. “It’s boring shit, I know, but that’s why I want to try to make it fun. You know, gamify it.”

            “Make it more like Call of Duty and less like Fallout: New Vegas,” Junior suggested.

            Jux eyed him. “I’m going to ignore the fact that there aren’t scavenger hunts in either of those games,” he said, “and just get straight to explaining why the first-person shooter genre isn’t going to work for an assignment about locating scholarly sources and—”

            “Jux,” Tati interrupted.

            “Yes?” Jux asked.

            “Are you on the clock?” Tati asked.

            Jux shrugged. “Yeah,” he said.

            Tati stared at him.

“I’ll go transplant those trees,” Jux said.

            “Thank you,” Tati said.

            “What do you want me to do with the old ones?” Jux asked.

            “I don’t care,” Tati said.

            “Like,” Jux said, visibly thinking, “I could just toss them in the storm drain, maybe?”

            “Just transplant the trees,” Tati said.

            “Aye, aye, captain,” Jux said.

            “This isn’t Moby-Dick,” Tati said.

            Jux shrugged and went back out to the dock.

            Tati turned back to find Junior staring at the vent with wide eyes. “What is it now?” the owner asked.

            “Wasn’t there a string or something you were going to hold so that Almo didn’t get lost in there, too?” Junior asked.

            Tati shot a look at his twineless fingers and then looked over at the vent. He swallowed thickly.

            Junior crouched by the vent. “Almo?” he called. “Hey, Almo? How far in are you? We lost grip on the string.”

            There was no answer.

            “Shit,” Junior swore.

            Tati brushed his hands across each other as if trying to remove some irritating grit. “Is there more twine around?”

            Junior watched him for a moment. “I don’t know,” he said. “Why do you want more twine? You plan on going in after them?”

            Tati shook his head. “In case someone else does.”

            Junior clasped his forehead. “I think it’s time you learned the truth,” he said. “Almo’s never cleaned the ducts. He never even went in there before yesterday. And I don’t think he cleaned the ducts this time, either.”

            Tati was silent for a moment. “So what does this mean?”

            Junior beheld the maw of the ventilation system once more. “Well,” he hazarded, “it probably means you got some dirty-ass ducts in there. Who knows what kind of blockage we’re talking about.”

            “Ugh,” Tati grunted. “That’s disgusting.”

            Then the wall thumped. Both Junior and Tati swung around to stare at the paneling. They were silent for a few moments, listening carefully to the subtle humming of the coolers. The faint sound of something heavy being dragged across concrete seemed to come from outside. They waited like this for some time, but the sound didn’t repeat.

            Junior crouched again and leaned down so that his bulky shoulders pressed against opposite sides of the vent opening. “Almo!” he called, cupping a palm to the side of his mouth. “Concepción! Teatree! Anybody? What the fuck is going on in there?”

            “I don’t think yelling is going to help anything,” Tati said.

            Junior shook his head and stood back up, slamming a fist sideways into the wall in the process. “Goddamnit,” he spat.

            Then the wall thumped back.

            For probably a full minute, the chef and the owner were once again staring in silence at the wall. The dragging sound from outside continued, increasing in volume until, just when it almost seemed that whatever it was was about to infringe upon the kitchen itself, it stopped. Then it was just the humming of the coolers.

            “These walls look very clean,” Tati blurted.

            “You should have seen Arturo going at them with the steel wool,” Junior said.

            “It sounds like Arturo did a lot of the work,” Tati said.

            “That’s because he did,” Junior said. “Everyone did a fair share, but Arturo is like a hurricane of efficiency when you set him to a timed task.”

            Tati was nodding. He looked back at the wall. “So the wall just shook,” he said. “Twice, am I right?”

            Junior nodded. “Walls around here shake like that all the time,” he said, “but it’s usually on the other side over there since the bathrooms, you know. The pipes or something.”

            Tati was frowning again. “It sounded to me,” he began, “like this wall shook the second time after you punched it.”

            Then Jux was back in the kitchen, scattering crumbly bits of soil over the floor as he made a straight line toward the ventilation duct and granting a cryptic smile and nod to both the chef and the owner as he went.

            “What are you doing?” Junior asked.

            Jux got down onto his knees by the duct opening. “Transplanting the new trees.” He ducked into the shaft.

            “Get out of there,” Junior told him. He shook his head at Tati.

            “Why is he going in there?” Tati asked, eyes locked onto Junior.

            Jux was already halfway in.

            “Why are you going in there?” Junior asked.

            Jux’s response was muffled, and, seconds later, the last sight of his chunky black no-slips was swallowed into the darkness of the vent.

            Junior felt his forehead with the back of his hand. “This is unreal,” he said. “I think I have a fever.”

            Tati was still unable to look at the vent. “Did he go in there?”

            Sounds of conversation emerged from the bar hallway and then Packie and Arturo entered the kitchen.

            “That’s all the oceans, bro,” Arturo said. “Arctic, Atlantic, Pacific, Indian. Four oceans.”

            “But I’m telling you there’s five,” Packie said.

            “Stop right there,” Junior called out.
            Packie looked over at him. “How many oceans are there?”

            “Don’t come any further,” Junior said.

            “Why not?” asked Arturo.

            “He thinks there’s only four,” Packie said as he rounded the island.

            “Fucking first graders know there are only four oceans,” Arturo said.

            “We’ll talk about the oceans later,” Junior said. He held out a hand to keep Packie from passing him, but Packie walked right into it. “Hey, come on. Go around the other way if you have to go out back.”

            “There are five oceans,” Packie said as he managed to slip by the chef. “He’s forgetting about the Southern Ocean.”

            Junior grabbed at Packie’s shirt and pulled at him. “Stop,” he said. “Where are you going?”

            They wrestled like sumos for a moment. In the meantime, Arturo walked the long way around the island and cornered the range and immediately crouched down to investigate the duct.

            “Southern Ocean,” he muttered. He clicked his tongue. “That’s some bullshit.” Then he got inside.

            “Hey, get out of there,” Junior called, straining as he kept Packie stationary.

            “Why is everyone going into the vent?” Tati asked blankly. “Why are you hugging Packie?”

            “This is not a hug,” Junior said, shifting his grapple so that he could start working Packie into a half-nelson.

            “Five oceans,” Packie said through his teeth as he struggled to free himself. “Arctic, Atlantic, Indian, Pacific, Southern.”

            “I wasn’t aware that the Southern Ocean was officially recognized,” Tati said.

            “It happened about ten years ago,” Packie said. He wriggled out of the chef’s grip, but Junior was quick to snag his wrist and pin it behind his back. “Ow.”

            “Stop trying to get into the vent and I’ll let you go,” Junior said. “I promise.”

            “You promise?” Packie said through a wince.

            “I literally just said I promise,” Junior said.

            “Okay,” Packie said.

            Junior released him. For a moment, Packie felt around at his pompadour to ensure that everything was in order. It was just as douchey as usual. Then he feigned a step toward the cold side and, finding the chef off his guard, made the gap like a halfback and immediately sat down on the floor and began shuffling feet-first into the vent.

            “The fuck is wrong with you?” Junior cried. “It’s not a water slide.” He hurried forward and yanked at the collar of Packie’s shirt.

            “I have to go,” Tati said with a look up at the clock on the wall. “I’ll be back, but I have to go.”

            “You’re leaving?” Junior cried. “Now?”

            Tati exhaled loudly. “I have to go.” He walked out the back.

            Junior snarled and then reached down and tugged again at Packie’s collar and it tore just enough for Packie to build a bit of momentum and slide into the vent as far as his waist.

            “You know what?” Junior said, relinquishing. “Fine. Go in. But I’m not spending my entire morning fishing fools out of the walls.”

            “My shirt’s ripped,” Packie complained.

            Junior opened up the hot side cooler and removed a plastic-wrapped steel ninth. He plopped it down onto the counter, jabbed it open, and fingered out a big hunk of sushi-grade, color-added raw ahi tuna, which he promptly crammed into his mouth.

            “I’m not sure I can actually get in any further than this,” Packie said, one of his hands probing ahead in the vent. “Too tall.”

            Junior was chomping away.

            “Isn’t it interesting that hardly anybody but me knows that there are five oceans?” Packie asked.

            Junior’s chewing was slowing a bit, so he fished out another meaty angle of tuna and stuffed it into his mouth.

            “Huh,” Packie muttered.

            Junior looked at him. Chewing.

            “Yeah,” Packie said. “I’m stuck.”

            Junior swallowed with some difficulty and then wiped his lips with the back of a hand. “What.”

            “It’s my left foot,” Packie said. “It’s like hooked on something in there.”

            Junior picked up the ninth pan and removed all the plastic wrap and then walked over to the prep table to rewrap it properly before stowing it back in the cooler. When he turned to have a look at Packie’s progress, he found that the tall server was now almost completely inside the vent, and his body was flipped now so that he was facing the floor and the tip of his pompadour practically dangling against the faux tile. “So now you’re going in again,” he observed.

            “I can’t get out,” Packie said as he inched further and further into the vent.

            Junior glanced purposelessly around the kitchen. “I know the feeling,” he said. When he looked back at the vent, Packie was gone. Junior stared at the dark opening and pulled at his spiky hair for a moment before vaulting himself up into a seat on the hot side counter, which groaned at his weight.

            He sat quietly, staring at the opening, for about twenty minutes. The appliances were humming and the air conditioning whirred from the grates in the ceiling. At one point he was startled by the sudden crash of a batch of ice from the ice machine in the corner, but, other than that, it was just looking at the dark rectangular void into which everyone seemed to be compelled to go. He even kind of wanted to get in there himself, not out of curiosity but because he was sure he’d be able to get everyone out. The problem was that he was just too large. So he sat there and waited, and waited, and waited, until, finally, he slid off the counter and walked out to the bar and picked up the phone. He navigated to the phone’s stored numbers and located what appeared to be an air conditioning servicer. The number was no longer operational, but he tried a second time anyway. The second time it connected.

            “Cold Fingers AC,” said the voice on the other end.

            “Hey, it’s Tati’s Wine and Cheese in downtown,” Junior said. “We have a, I would say, issue with our ventilation system. Can you send a technician down like as soon as possible?”

            “What kind of emergency is it?”

            “You’re not going to believe this,” Junior said, “but some of our staff are—I don’t know—stuck in the ventilation.”

            There was silence.

            “Stu—”

            “Stuck?” asked the voice. “They’re in the vents?”

            “Yeah,” Junior said. “It’s a long story, but, yeah, there are four people who’ve now gone in and none of them are responding when I call into the vent.”

            Silence again.

            “So, I don—”

            “You should call 911,” the voice said. “We service air conditioning and ventilation systems, but we don’t do rescues of unlicensed spelunkers.”

            “Spelunkers?” Junior cried. “Did you just say ‘unlicensed spelunkers?’”

            “It’s an industry term for amateurs who are so fascinated by duct networks that they explore them,” the voice said.

            “Are you serious?” Junior asked. “This is a thing?”

            “You’d be surprised,” said the voice. “Happens all the time. Unfortunately, though, rescue is outside our scope of work. You’ll have to get the fire department.”

            Junior sighed. “All right,” he said. “Thanks. Sorry to waste your time.”

            “It’s no problem at all,” the voice said. “I’m used to it. I got a call just like this two hours ago. Wasn’t four people, but, you know, pretty much the same situation.”

            “Was it a restaurant?” asked Junior.

            Silence.

            “Sorry, are you ther—”

            “I’m not permitted to disclose specific client information,” the voice said, “but I can confirm that it was a restaurant, yes.”

            Junior considered this. “Was it this restaurant?”

            “If it was your restaurant,” the voice said, “I wouldn’t be unable to tell you.”

            “Huh,” Junior said. “So it wasn’t this restaurant.”

            “Like I said, I wouldn’t be not permitted to say in that scenario.”

            “Okay,” Junior said. “Thanks again.”

            “Good luck getting them out,” the voice said.

            “Thanks,” Junior said.

            A few minutes of contemplative silence later, Junior dialed 911.

            “911 emergency,” the operator said. “What is the address of the emergency?”

            Junior looked over at the tall windows and the bright light rail stop in the middle of the street. “Uh, I don’t know,” he said. “It’s Tati’s Wine and Spirits. I can get the addre—”

            “What is the nature of the emergency?”

            “It’s not really an emergency emergency,” he said. “We just need help getting some of our staff out of the, uh, ventilation system.”

            “Your staff is stuck in the ventilation system,” confirmed the voice. “924 North Central Avenue? Tati’s Wine and Spirits, LLC?”

            “That’s right,” Junior said.

            “Emergency rescue has been alerted and they should arrive shortly,” the operator said. “Are you able to communicate with the staff members who are stuck?”

            “No,” Junior said. “I’ve called into the vent a bunch of times and nobody’s answered.”

            “Is this vent system connected to hazardous temperatures or fumes?”

            “I’m pretty sure it just sucks extra heat from the kitchen because it’s right behind the ovens,” he said, “but they’re all moved away and turned off. We’re not operating today.”

            “I see,” said the operator. “How long has it been since these staff members went into the vents?”

            “Well, they just kind of trickled in,” Junior said. “I don’t know exactly when the first one went in, but it was probably about an hour or two ago. Since then, others have been crawling in there for some reason I don’t understand up until about half an hour ago.”

            “And how many total are missing?”

            “Four,” Junior said. “Wait. No. Five.”

            “Five,” said the operator. “You have five people in your ventilation system.”

            “Yeah,” Junior said. “Wait. Oh, man. It’s six. Six people.”

            “Are you sure?”

            “Yes,” Junior said. “Jesus. What were they thinking?”

            “While we wait for the extraction team to arrive,” the operator said, “I’m going to need to get some of your information.”

            “Shoot,” Junior said. He crossed the dining room to peer through the windows at the street. While he gave his name and telephone number to the operator, he walked back toward the bar and then into the kitchen and found that the ranges were moved back against the wall. “What the fuck?”

            “Sir?”

            “What the fuck?” Junior cried, setting the phone on the cold-side line and dashing to the ranges to look behind them at the duct opening. The grate was fixed back into place. The ovens and ranges were also on at maximum and the radiating heat was so intense that he had to close his eyes and cover his face while he stumbled backward and grappled blindly for the phone. In this moment of confusion, he accidentally knocked the phone off the line and it skittered across the floor and underneath the dishpit. Before collecting it, he turned back to the appliances and shut them all off. Then he went over to the dishpit and crouched underneath the sink to look for the receiver. For some reason, the refuse tray over the drain was missing. The receiver was nowhere to be seen, so he adjusted the position of his leg so that he could get his cellphone from his pants and use its light to investigate. Sure enough, he discovered, the receiver had fallen into the drain and was precariously wedged down into a turn of the pipe about a foot down. He grunted and then plunged his hand down to grasp it, but it was slimy and sluiced down a few more inches. He leaned in to get better distance with his arm but, in the process, banged his head against the drain pipe connected to the bottom of the sink. As he felt at the sore spot on the top of his head, there was a sudden clunking noise from the dishwasher unit to his right.

            “Oh shit,” he mumbled.

            As the dishwasher pushed through its noisy cycle, Junior frantically probed deep into the drain, feeling out amid the slime and goo the positioning and retractability of the receiver. Once he was able to get a relatively secure grip on the keypad between his fingers, he yanked the phone out and fell backwards, banging his head again, this time on the sink’s support rod. Then the dishwasher jolted again and a torrent of sudsy water began spewing out of a tube into the drain.

            “Are you hurt?” called one of several kitted-out first responders who were rushing into the kitchen and assessing things with quick, purposeful looks.

            “No,” Junior said, trying to get up. “It’s just this drain. I… I banged my head.”

            One of them hurried over to him to see about the head.

            “No, I’m fine,” Junior stressed. “I just dropped the phone into the drain.”

            The first responders exchanged skeptical looks.

            “We were called because some people are stuck,” the first one said, “but we were told it was a ventilation system, not a drain.”

            “I don’t see how anyone could be stuck down there,” said one of them as she peered into the murk under the dishpit. “Is there another access point?”

            “They’re not in the drain,” Junior said. “I was just crawling down there to get the phone.”

            “Where’s the vent?” asked another of them.

            Junior got up and brushed himself off and walked over to the ranges, which were still nice and hot. He double checked that they were still off and then began pulling them from the wall.

            “Back there?” one of them asked.

            “Yeah,” Junior said. “That grate right there.”

            “Why is it blocked?”

            Junior shrugged. “I honestly don’t know how this happened,” he said as he yanked one of the bulky units from the wall. “They were out, and the grate was open, all morning, and then I went into the bar to call you guys and when I came back they were all put back and turned on.”

            “Turned on?” one of them asked.

            “They’re off now,” he said, “and unplugged.”

            There were a few more suspicious looks among the first responders, but a couple of them went straight for the vent and started getting it open.

            “So you say there are six of your employees who’ve gone in here?” one asked.

            Junior nodded.

            The grate came off and one of them got down and began shining a small flashlight into the vent. “Yeah,” she said, “I can see a potential problem. This forks right off into three directions.”

            “Place tracks,” another suggested.

            The first responder in the vent was already fixing a touch-operated LED light to the side of the vent. “On it,” she said.

            One of the others looked at Junior. “It’s going to be fine,” he said. “We always get them out.”

            Junior sighed. “I can’t believe this is a regular thing.”

            “We get a call like this at least once a week,” said another. He shook his head. “There’s something about restaurant staff and ventilation systems.”

            “I’ve worked in eight restaurants over fifteen years,” Junior said, “and this is the first I’ve ever heard of something like this.”
            The one in the vent called back, “Send Carl in with the lead.”

            One of the others, a small muscular man whose name was apparently Carl, unfastened a coil of thin rope from his pack and slipped into the vent.

            Then through the back room came the sound of squealing tires in the parking lot, followed by the slamming of car doors. Moments later, a flurry of footsteps approached.

            “Phoenix Police Department!” somebody hollered from the dock.

            “What?” Junior cried. “Why are they here?”

            Two officers entered with hands readied near their sidearms. Their holsters were unsnapped.

            “Junior One Cay,” one of the officers said.

            “Present,” Junior said, holding up his hands.

            “No need to hold up your hands, sir,” said the other officer.

            Two more officers then entered through the back room as well, similarly ready.

            “We’re here in response to a 911 call that was disrupted by potential violence,” said one of the first officers as he nodded at the lingering members of the fire department.

            “No, I just accidentally dropped the phone in the drain,” Junior said, “and then the dishwasher cycled and, I don’t know, it probably sounded crazy to the operator.”

            “We’re going to need to ask you a few questions anyway,” the officer said.

            Junior nodded and then glanced over at the vent, out of which one of the first responders was emerging. “Did you find them?”

            “We did, indeed,” Carl said. “Are you the owner?”

            Junior shook his head. “Not even close.”

            “We’ll need to speak with the owner,” Carl said.

            “I’ll call him, then,” Junior said. He pulled out his cellphone and dialed Brian Tati.

            “What?” Tati’s voice asked.

            “Can you come back to the restaurant?” Junior asked.

            “I’m here,” Tati said.

            Junior looked around the kitchen. “Where?”

            “In the parking lot,” Tati said. “Why are there emergency vehicles out here?”

            “They’re getting everyone out of the vent system,” Junior said.

            “The fire department and the police?” Tati asked. “This is going to cost way too much money.”

            “Well,” Junior said as he eyed one of the police officers who was listening intently nearby, “they had to be rescued. I wasn’t going to just leave them in there. Can you come in? The fire department wants to talk to the owner.”

            Tati’s end was silent for a moment. In the meantime, Junior cupped the receiver and delivered an eye-roll around the kitchen.

            “I’m in Michigan,” Tati suddenly said. “Tell them I’m in Michigan.”

            “Why would I do that?” Junior cried. “I’m not saying that. Listen, it looks like they’re pulling one of them out right now, so I’ll meet you in the parking lot in five.”

            “I don’t want to—”

            Junior ended the call. “The owner’s parked out front,” he said to Carl. “Should be a Prius, probably temporarily parked in the handicapped spot.”

            First Responder Carl nodded and ticked his head at one of the other members of the fire department and they left the kitchen through the back after smirking at the police officers, who were standing around dumbly.

            Then Packie was helped out of the vent by one of the other firefighters. The server’s pompadour was flaccid and greasy with sweat, and he was squinting around at the light fixtures as if he’d just been rescued from months of captivity in the hands of an end-times fundamentalist cult.

            “It’s so bright,” Packie muttered.

            “Everything will be fine,” said one of the first responders as she blanketed Packie’s shoulders with a copious section of thermal foil.

B

            Since it had been made clear that the restaurant was inoperational that day, the emergency vehicles remained in their convenient spots blocking rows of parking while everyone was rescued from the ducts and the follow-up conversations played out. The authorities insisted that no one left before everyone had been asked a few basic identifying questions, but, since the fire department was so keen on relaying observations about the state of the ductwork to the owner, those who’d been lost in there were obliged to wait. They were presently gathered under the slatted shades of the dock, either smoking cigarettes or smelling the smoke of the cigarettes of others, waiting in more or less silent contemplation while Tati and Junior dealt with an assistant fire marshal, who had just arrived. One of the police patrol vehicles had left, but the other lingered, its engine idling near the entrance to the lot by the street and its two officers standing in lame conversation at the hood. The sun was bright and the sky clear, but it was only slightly uncomfortable in the warm sun of early spring. There was a breeze, even, and it was actually still cool, something like a final day of pleasantness before the terrible heat of spring and summer set in.

            Eventually, by early afternoon, the official interviews were finished and the authorities left the premises. As the last of the fire trucks backed out into the street and sped off, Tati left Junior to watch and stomped over to the dock, where the staff was still waiting like neglected refugees.

            “Almo,” Tati said, scanning them. “Where’s Almo?”

            “I’m right here,” Almo said from behind the dumpster, where he had been sitting on a crate for some reason.

            “Almo,” Tati said again.

            “Man, I heard you the first six times,” Almo said. He got up and brushed off his pants and walked out to the center of the dock. “What do you want?”

            Packie’s eyebrows were bouncing. Nearby, Jux was staring with fatigue at the smoldering butt of a cigarette along with Teatree, except that Teatree’s eyes were closed. Concepción was a few yards away by the wall adjacent to the door to the back room, eating a pear and humming quietly.

            “What do you want?” Almo asked again.

            “I want you to admit that you’ve never cleaned out the vents,” Tati said. “No, wait. You’ll have to sign something.”

            “I ain’t signing shit,” Almo said. “This is a hazardous work environment. There’s an abandoned kitchen down there. We all saw it. You should be signing something.”

            “I’m not signing anything,” Tati said.

            “Well you should be,” Almo said. “We almost didn’t come back.”

            “You lied to me for years about cleaning out the vents,” Tati said. “Now that our public defenders, or, what are they called, public responders have responded, we’ve only got forty-eight hours to have a full clean done of the vents, and we can’t open until it’s done. This is very costly.”

            “That’s not my fault,” Almo said.

            Tati gripped his forehead. “It is,” he said, “because you said you cleaned them. For years you’ve said that you cleaned them.”

            “Ah,” Almo exclaimed, “but you only wanted me to clean them because you were too cheap to get them cleaned by licensed professionals.”

            Tati stuck up his nose and looked at the wall beyond the dumpsters. “I don’t appreciate these ad nauseum attacks,” he grumbled.

            “I think you mean ‘ad hominem,’” Jux said. He jiggled his butt for a moment and then flicked it across the dock in an arc that somehow managed to land it straight into the ten-can of ashes. “Boom.”

            “We’re not supposed to be smoking back here,” Tati told him.

            Jux eyed him. “But this is where we smoke.”

            Tati frowned. “At least it didn’t land on the floor,” he said. “There has just been too much of that.”

            “Look,” Jux said, “go on about your ad nauseum ad hominems all day. But can we just go home now? Leave you to it?”

            Tati looked back over at Almo.

            Junior emerged from the parking lot. “All is good,” he announced.

            “That is not true,” Jux said.

            “What do you mean?” asked Tati. “This is going to cost thousands of dollars, and all because Almo didn’t follow through.”

            “I never told you I knew how to clean out the vents,” Almo cried. “You just assumed I did because I’m brown and I didn’t want to argue with you because then my ass would get fired. Don’t pretend you ever thought I was cleaning them ducts, because you never even checked. Not one time. Fuck you.”

            Tati was practically vibrating. Eventually, he said in a kind of tremulous whimper, “That is not acceptable.”

            “I ain’t going to be your whipping boy any longer,” Almo hollered. “I fucking quit. You’re not going have old Almo to kick around any more, oh no.”

            “You’re not quitting,” Junior said skeptically.

            “I’m quitting right now,” Almo said. “I just quit. And now I can’t quit, because I already quit.”

            “Is that supposed to be like Catch-22 or something?” Jux asked.

            “I doubt he knows what Catch-22 is,” Tati muttered.

            “I know that since I don’t work here no more,” Almo said, “I can tell you to fuck off.”

            “Let’s all just settle down now,” Junior urged. “Almo, we all know you don’t really want to quit. And, Brian, give him his venting time. Besides, like I said, all is good.”

            “I don’t understand why you keep saying that,” Tati said.

            Almo was already on his bike. “I’m going to get a job at Pasta Works,” he announced. “See you all on payday when I come to get my check.” He coasted off across the parking lot toward the nearby chain restaurant.

            “You signed a non-compete!” Tati yelled after him. “Don’t forget that!”

            “He wouldn’t be able to get them to change their recipes if he tried,” Junior said, shaking his head. “Half the shit they shill over there is cooked in a factory in New Jersey, and the other half is Brazilian pasta.”

            Tati looked aside at the chef. “Is that right?” he asked. “Brazilian pasta.”

            Junior nodded.

            Tati squinted out past the fences at the pasta restaurant. “I wonder if we should get in on that,” he said. “It could save us quite a bit.”

            “We don’t go through that much pasta,” Junior said. “I think we should just stick with our distributor.”

            “I’ll do some research,” Tati insisted.

            Junior rubbed his face. “Well,” he said. “This has been a real treasure. So, what do you say, have everyone clock out and call it a day?”

            “Clock out?” Tati asked. “Why would they clock out?”

            Junior looked over at the remaining staff. “Because they’re on the clock right now.”

            “Why?” Tati asked. “Nobody’s done any work all day. The trees didn’t even get transplanted.”

            Jux clutched his forehead. “Crap,” he muttered. “I’ll get it done real quick, but then I have to go. Looks like tonight’s class is just going to be open lab.”

            “Clock out first,” Tati said.

            Jux stared at him. “But then I can’t transplant the trees.”

            “You said you’d do it hours ago,” Tati said.

            “Yeah,” Jux said, “but then I got stuck in the vent.”

            Junior snapped his fingers. “That’s it,” he said. “I knew there was something I was forgetting. Why was it, exactly, that you all decided to crawl in there?”

            “Let them all clock out first before you have that conversation,” Tati urged.

            “Did you find the abandoned kitchen?” Junior asked.

            “I couldn’t see anything,” Teatree whined.

            “Yeah,” Packie added. “It’s really dark in there. That’s why we got lost.”

            “That’s disappointing,” Junior said. “But I still don’t get why you all went in there in the first place. Was it just curiosity?”

            Teatree nodded sheepishly.
            “I went because he went,” Concepción admitted.

            “All right,” Junior said, nodding. “Teatree, we all know about your, uh, condition, so you going in there and Concepción going in after you to help you get out almost—almost—makes sense. But Jux? Packie? Arturo? You all went right into that thing like you didn’t even know what you were doing.”

            None of them responded.

            “Nothing, huh?” Junior asked. He shook his head and looked at Tati. “I think you have to pay them anyway.”

            “That’s not going to happen,” Tati said.

            “Then why did you want us to clock out first?” Jux asked. “If you weren’t concerned about this extra five minutes, then there’d have been no reason to have us clock out in the first place. Specifically if you planned to rip us off for the last five hours.”

            “Of double time and a half,” Concepción added.

            “All this emergency rescue business was completely unsanctioned,” Tati said. “If anything, you should all be written up for unnecessarily endangering yourselves on the job.”

            “I hate to say it,” Junior said, “but I think Brian Tati has a point. The only reason why we’re all still here is because you decided to go on some unlicensed spelunking expedition.”

            Almo suddenly rolled up to the gate on his bike. “How’d you like that store-bought pea soup, Brian?”

            Tati frowned. “What?”

            “Haha!” Almo cried, pedaling off.

            “What did he mean?” Tati asked.

            “Aw, Almo’s just crazy,” Junior said. “You know that.”

            Tati narrowed his eyes. “You told me that those cans were for quality control,” he said. “Am I to understand that—”

            “Oh, the fire marshal said that you probably shouldn’t be on the hook for cleaning the ventilation system or for the neglect,” Junior blurted.

            Tati’s lips moved in several stunted attempts at speech while he stared at the slatted door that didn’t open.

            “He clarified that he wasn’t a lawyer,” Junior continued, “but he was pretty sure that since you’re leasing this place from Amoebius PhLoft that they’re ultimately the, uh, culpable party. Something like that.”

            Tati inhaled deeply. “That’s pleasant to hear,” he said, “but, nonetheless, troubling.”

            “So no worries, right?” Junior continued. “All is well!”

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