Shot Toast Quotes

You don't have to shoot me," says the young lion. "I will be your rug and I will lie in front of your fireplace and I won't move a muscle and you can sit on me and toast all the marshmallows you want. I love marshmallows.

The inside is packed with people. Lots of them crowding the bar, passing drinks back for people to carry to tables. A bunch of guys are pouring shots of vodka. "To Zacharov!" one toasts. "To open hearts and open bars!" calls another. "And open legs," says Anton.

Cupid, that chubby cherub love dispenser, is dead. But before he died, he appointed me his apprentice in love. I loved Cupid, and that was precisely why I killed him. I strangled him. Then I shot him 17 times with his heart-shaped arrows. Then I burned his body while I roasted and toasted marshmallows and toasted to the good times he brought to the world. Then I took his ashes and mixed them in cake batter and literally consumed him. Mark it down: I have officially taken over as the foremost authority on love. I can't fly around like he could, but I have other endearing qualities. I can’t think of any at the moment, but I must have some.

[excerpt] The usual I say. Essence. Spirit. Medicine. A taste. I say top shelf. Straight up. A shot. A sip. A nip. I say another round. I say brace yourself. Lift a few. Hoist a few. Work the elbow. Bottoms up. Belly up. Set ‘em up. What’ll it be. Name your poison. I say same again. I say all around. I say my good man. I say my drinking buddy. I say git that in ya. Then a quick one. Then a nightcap. Then throw one back. Then knock one down. Fast & furious I say. Could savage a drink I say. Chug. Chug-a-lug. Gulp. Sauce. Mother’s milk. Everclear. Moonshine. White lightning. Firewater. Hootch. Relief. Now you’re talking I say. Live a little I say. Drain it I say. Kill it I say. Feeling it I say. Wobbly. Breakfast of champions I say. I say candy is dandy but liquor is quicker. I say Houston, we have a drinking problem. I say the cause of, and solution to, all of life’s problems. I say god only knows what I’d be without you. I say thirsty. I say parched. I say wet my whistle. Dying of thirst. Lap it up. Hook me up. Watering hole. Knock a few back. Pound a few down. My office. Out with the boys I say. Unwind I say. Nurse one I say. Apply myself I say. Toasted. Glow. A cold one a tall one a frosty I say. One for the road I say. Two-fisted I say. Never trust a man who doesn’t drink I say. Drink any man under the table I say. Then a binge then a spree then a jag then a bout. Coming home on all fours. Could use a drink I say. A shot of confidence I say. Steady my nerves I say. Drown my sorrows. I say kill for a drink. I say keep ‘em comin’. I say a stiff one. Drink deep drink hard hit the bottle. Two sheets to the wind then. Knackered then. Under the influence then. Half in the bag then. Out of my skull I say. Liquored up. Rip-roaring. Slammed. Fucking jacked. The booze talking. The room spinning. Feeling no pain. Buzzed. Giddy. Silly. Impaired. Intoxicated. Stewed. Juiced. Plotzed. Inebriated. Laminated. Swimming. Elated. Exalted. Debauched. Rock on. Drunk on. Bring it on. Pissed. Then bleary. Then bloodshot. Glassy-eyed. Red-nosed. Dizzy then. Groggy. On a bender I say. On a spree. I say off the wagon. I say on a slip. I say the drink. I say the bottle. I say drinkie-poo. A drink a drunk a drunkard. Swill. Swig. Shitfaced. Fucked up. Stupefied. Incapacitated. Raging. Seeing double. Shitty. Take the edge off I say. That’s better I say. Loaded I say. Wasted. Off my ass. Befuddled. Reeling. Tanked. Punch-drunk. Mean drunk. Maintenance drunk. Sloppy drunk happy drunk weepy drunk blind drunk dead drunk. Serious drinker. Hard drinker. Lush. Drink like a fish. Boozer. Booze hound. Alkie. Sponge. Then muddled. Then woozy. Then clouded. What day is it? Do you know me? Have you seen me? When did I start? Did I ever stop? Slurring. Reeling. Staggering. Overserved they say. Drunk as a skunk they say. Falling down drunk. Crawling down drunk. Drunk & disorderly. I say high tolerance. I say high capacity. They say protective custody. Blitzed. Shattered. Zonked. Annihilated. Blotto. Smashed. Soaked. Screwed. Pickled. Bombed. Stiff. Frazzled. Blasted. Plastered. Hammered. Tore up. Ripped up. Destroyed. Whittled. Plowed. Overcome. Overtaken. Comatose. Dead to the world. The old K.O. The horrors I say. The heebie-jeebies I say. The beast I say. The dt’s. B’jesus & pink elephants. A mindbender. Hittin’ it kinda hard they say. Go easy they say. Last call they say. Quitting time they say. They say shut off. They say dry out. Pass out. Lights out. Blackout. The bottom. The walking wounded. Cross-eyed & painless. Gone to the world. Gone. Gonzo. Wrecked. Sleep it off. Wake up on the floor. End up in the gutter. Off the stuff. Dry. Dry heaves. Gag. White knuckle. Lightweight I say. Hair of the dog I say. Eye-opener I say. A drop I say. A slug. A taste. A swallow. Down the hatch I say. I wouldn’t say no I say. I say whatever he’s having. I say next one’s on me. I say bottoms up. Put it on my tab. I say one more. I say same again

Nicky knew when he was being ignored, and he had no problem interpreting Roland's searching stare. He interrupted his own story to demand, "Don't you dare tell me you knew about them before I did! Oh my god," he said at Roland's startled, guilty look. "Oh my god, you did. How the hell? We just figured it out a couple weeks ago. How long have you known Andrew was gay?" "Are they a 'them' now?" Roland asked instead of answering. His smile was back, wide and pleased, and he stopped filling their tray to pour them shots. ... Roland plucked his own shot up and tipped it in a toast. "I'll drink to that. It's about damned time.

Penn replied that surely bin Laden had provided quite a number of his very own broadcasts and videos. I was again impressed by the way that Chávez rejected this proffered lucid-interval lifeline. All of this so-called evidence, too, was a mere product of imperialist television. After all, “there is film of the Americans landing on the moon,” he scoffed. “Does that mean the moon shot really happened? In the film, the Yanqui flag is flying straight out. So, is there wind on the moon?” As Chávez beamed with triumph at this logic, an awkwardness descended on my comrades, and on the conversation. Chávez, in other words, is very close to the climactic moment when he will announce that he is a poached egg and that he requires a very large piece of buttered toast so that he can lie down and take a soothing nap.

And I'll tell you another thing, Patrick Michael Thomas Cunnane, if you think you can come and go at all hours as you damn please just because you're going off to college, you'd best get that thick head of yours examined in a hurry. I'll be happy to do it myself, with the skillet I have in my hand, just as soon as I'm done with it." "Yes,ma'am." At the table Patrick say with his shoulders hunched, wincing at this mother's back. "But since you're using it, maybe I could have some more French toast.Nobody makes it like you do." "You won't get around me that way." "Maybe I will." She shot a look over her shoulder that Brian recognized as one only a mother could conjure to wither a child. "And maybe I won't," Patrick muttered, then brightened when he saw Brian at the door. "Ma,we've got company. Have a seat,Brian. Had breakfast? My mother makes world-famous French toast." "Witnessess won't save you," Adelia said mildly, but turned to smile at Brian.

Hanna. Her middle child. The difficult one. The tiring one. The one she wouldn't want to be stranded on a desert island with. And a terrible thought shot through her, so fast she barely registered it. 'It should be you missing and Ellie eating beans on toast.

Leslie Marmon Silko whispers the story is long. No, longer. Longer than that even. Longer than anything. With Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath drink at the bar. Laugh the dark laughter in the dark light. Sing a dark drunken song of men. Make a slurry toast. Rock back and forth, and drink the dark, and bask in the wallow of women knowing what women know. Just for a night. When you need to feel the ground of your life and the heart of the world, there will be a bonfire at the edge of a canyon under a night sky where Joy Harjo will sing your bonesong. Go ahead-with Anne Carson - rebuild the wreckage of a life a word at a time, ignoring grammar and the forms that keep culture humming. Make word war and have it out and settle it, scattering old meanings like hacked to pieces paper doll confetti. The lines that are left … they are awake and growling. With Virginia Woolf there will perhaps be a long walk in a garden or along a shore, perhaps a walk that will last all day. She will put her arm in yours and gaze out. At your backs will be history. In front of you, just the ordinary day, which is of course your entire life. Like language. The small backs of words. Stretching out horizonless. I am in a midnight blue room. A writing room. With a blood red desk. A room with rituals and sanctuaries. I made it for myself. It took me years. I reach down below my desk and pull up a bottle of scotch. Balvenie. 30 year. I pour myself an amber shot. I drink. Warm lips, throat. I close my eyes. I am not Virginia Woolf. But there is a line of hers that keeps me well: Arrange whatever pieces come your way. I am not alone. Whatever else there was or is, writing is with me.

The men toasted their bottles, as they did when Mouse was mentioned. The part of their tattoo that no longer existed. The man had died on the job, protecting Blake because he was loyal to Beckett. “And…” Cole shot Beckett a look. “You’re unofficially known as Sparkles and Jesus.” Beckett squinted as Cole pretended to be offended. “I think it’s only fair if we give you a nickname, Blake?” Cole asked. Blake stood and added a log to the fire. It’d been burning steady since right after dinner. Being with his brothers like this was Beckett’s favorite. It his wildest dreams he never pictured getting to sit with them in a Blake’s backyard.

As he ran, he thought about everything and anything, about the life he’d led, the children, the snatches of time frozen in his mind: a moment when he’d gotten shot in an alley, and the flash of the man who’d shot him; the first sight of a newborn daughter; his mother’s face, crabby with an early morning slice of toast in her hand, her image as clear in his mind as it had been twenty-five years earlier, on the day she died…. They all came up like portraits and landscapes hanging on the wall of his memory, flashes of color in the black-and-white night.

You son of a Carelian slimehog! I didn't realize what was happening before, that you KNEW that many shots would kill you. Well, listen to this, my fine flashbow warrior. Committing suiside on your own is one thing, but if you think I'm going to knowingly HELP you do it, you are demented." Dax blinked. "I went through your dying once; I'll be damned to Hades if I'll do it again. So you can just get yourself moving, oh infamous skypirate. And you'd better do it soon, or I'll toast your ass with a disrupter for encouragement!" There was a long silent moment. Then, incredibly, Dax laughed. "You would, would'nt you?" "Push me to it," she offered, still glaring at him. He looked suddenly thoughful. "I supposse a comment along the lines of how incredible you are when you're furious would get me toasted that much sooner?

You break her heart, and you’ll have to deal with me and her three brothers, and if you survive that, Her Grace will ensure your social ruin unto the nineteenth generation. I remind you, all of my boys are crack shots and more than competent with a sword.” “It is not my intention to break her heart.” “Oh, it’s never our intention.” His Grace’s brows drew down in thought, and he was once again the affable paterfamilias. “Maggie is different. I hope that’s from being the oldest daughter, but her unfortunate origins are too obvious a factor to be dismissed. She’s in want of… dreams, I think. My other girls have dreams. Sophie dreamed of her own family, Jenny loves to paint, Louisa has her literary scribbling, and Evie must racket about the property as her brothers used to, but Maggie has never been a dreamer. Not about her first pony nor her first waltz nor her first… beau.” Nor her first lover. The words hung unspoken in the air while the fire crackled and hissed and a log fell amid a shower of sparks. It wasn’t what Ben would have expected any papa to say of his daughter, but then, marrying into a family meant details like this would be shared—Esther Windham misplaced her everyday jewels, and Percy thought his daughters should be entitled to dream. In a different way, it felt as if Ben were still lurking in doorways and climbing through windows, but this window was called marriage, and Maggie was trying to lock it shut with Ben on the outside. “I’m not sure Maggie wants to marry me.” It was as close as he’d come to touching on the circumstances of the betrothal. His Grace regarded him for a long moment. “I’m her papa, but I was a young man once, Hazelton. Maggie is only a bit younger than Devlin and a few months older than Bart would have been. When I married, I had no idea either of my two oldest progeny existed. I’d no sooner started filling my nursery when—before my heir was out of dresses—both women came forward, hurling accusations and threats. If my marriage can survive that onslaught, surely you can overcome a little stubbornness in my daughter?” It was, again, an insight into the Windham family Ben gained only because he was engaged to marry Maggie. Such confidences prompted a rare inclination toward direct speech. “I think Maggie’s dream is to be left alone. If she jilts me, she’ll have one more excuse to retire from life, to hide and tell herself she’s content.” “Content.” His Grace spat the word. “Bother content. Content is milk toast and pap when life is supposed to be a banquet. Make Maggie’s dreams come true, young Hazelton, and show her contentment is shoddy goods compared to happiness.” “You make it sound simple.” “We’re speaking of women and that particular subspecies of the genre referred to as wives. It is simple—devote yourself to her happiness, and you will be rewarded tenfold. I do not, however, say the undertaking will ever be easy.

I thought of my favourite saying, the one that I tell myself when things get very, very dark – which, in my dramatic and somewhat chequered life, they have frequently done! I call it the Toast of the Unrepentant Cowgirl. I came up with it while sitting on a gravestone, back in California, after a very bad day. It’s best accompanied by a shot of straight tequila, and it goes something like this: ‘One day, the world will knock me down and I will not get up again. But that day is not today you sons-a-bitches. Not today!

February 5: Marilyn is photographed in a two-shot with Carson McCullers, kissing her at McCullers’s home in Nyack, New York, and later with McCullers and Isak Dinesen, with the threesome seated and looking over a manuscript in Dinesen’s hands. In another shot, Miller is at the table with Marilyn and McCullers. He toasts Dinesen. They dine on oysters, white grapes, champagne, and a soufflé. Marilyn attends a screening of Some Like It Hot at Loews on Lexington Avenue in New York. The capacity audience laughs with approval. Arthur Miller loves the picture, but Marilyn is upset because she looks like a “fat pig.” She is photographed in the audience putting her hands to her face.

As she pulled the freezer door open to get more ice, something fell from the top of the refrigerator and landed on Deanna’s head. She touched her hair and was horrified to discover something was stuck in it! Deanna screamed and tore at her hair. Along with a hank of blonde locks, she yanked out a black, palm-sized spider. “Aargh!” Deanna yelled, flinging it away. The spider bounced against the refrigerator door and fell to the ground. It was a rubber tarantula. Deanna growled, then nearly came to tears. Hiding spiders around the house had been a favorite prank of her mother’s. She’d done it as long as Deanna could remember. And now, even from the grave, Melody had gotten her once again. “Good one, Mom,” Deanna hissed, and stomped the spider. She kicked it under the refrigerator and grabbed a handful of ice. She poured herself a double shot of vodka, drank it down, and poured herself another. She raised a toast to her mother’s ghost. “Cheers, Melody.

we were having such a good time and getting along so well, he said that he was going to create a new cabinet position for me.” “What, Secretary of Stupid?” Feller asked. “Is that a real thing?” Rhymer asked. Rook ignored them both. “Legs promised that if he’s elected, he’s going to appoint me as the United States’s first-ever”—he paused to give the moment its due gravitas—“minister of magic.” Heat couldn’t stop her eyes from rolling. “We hashed out my budget and everything. Admittedly, this was after about the sixth shot. Then we toasted Dumbledore with the seventh. So I’m a little fuzzy on some of the details this morning. But there’s no question he’s giving me broad latitude to run the ministry as I see fit.” Rook went over and clapped Rhymer on the shoulder. “You know, I’m going to need someone to head my Muggle Relations Office. I could use a good man for the job.” “Just as long as you don’t want me to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts,” Rhymer said. “Oh, God, Opie,” Heat muttered. “Not you, too.” “What?” Rhymer said. “That job is like a death sentence.

these being the heavy-bottomed small glasses known as shot glasses, as they made a sound strongly resembling a pistol shot when slammed on the table following a toast.

I’ll tell you what not everyone does,” said Charm, hastily diverting. “Not everyone is shot through the lungs and gets back up.” She looked pointedly at the Duchess. Nathair lifted their shoulders. “That’s my gift. I am persistent. I bled out in childbirth when I was sixteen, and since then I’ve always reanimated. I’ve been shot, stabbed, burned, beheaded, disemboweled, and dismembered. None of it has been pleasant, but more crucially none of it was permanent.” “Not poisoned?” asked Charm, teasing with some care. “If anyone’s tried it, it didn’t do anything to me.” They lifted the brandy snifter in a toast and smiled before they sipped again. “And what will you do now, Duchess?” The Empress seemed eager to get away from the ghoulish subject, and as Charm had just done the same thing, Charn couldn’t really object. “It will depend on what Emperor Oram…I presume they’ll make him emperor. It’s the obvious thing, and the Assembly does tend to leap to the obvious. What I will do depends on what Oram decides to do with any of the army who are in Boren and who might have survived. They’re welcome to execute me a few times if it makes anyone feel better, but if I can supply a sufficiently talented, low-power, high-manipulation telekinetic for Boren, I can probably do whatever I’d like.

An indigo bottle is placed in front of us. "First rule of sake." Yoshi picks up the flask and one of the matching ceramic cups. "Never pour for yourself." He pours a shot for Taka and me. I reciprocate, pouring one for Yoshi. We hold the cups close to our faces and sniff. Sweet notes rise up and we toast. "Kanpai!" Then we sip. The rice wine goes down cold but warms my belly. A few more sips and my limbs are warm, too. Scallops and yellowtail sashimi are served. We sip more sake. By the time the yakitori arrives, our bottle is empty and my cheeks are hot. The group of salarymen have grown rowdy, their ties loosened. Yoshi winks at the pink-haired girls and they collapse into a fit of giggles. My God, to have such power over the opposite sex. Gyoza is next. The fried pork dumplings dipped in chili oil burn my mouth but soak up some of the sake, and I sober a little, just in time for the group of salarymen to send us a round of shōchū, starchier than the sake but delicious all the same. We toast to them, to the bar, to the night, to Tokyo. My stomach is near bursting when the chef places agedashi---fried tofu---in front of us. Finally, Taka orders fermented squid guts. I don't try it, but I laugh as he slurps them up.

Kenny. You've got the Moroccan carrot salad done, but where are we with the brussels sprouts?" "Everything is prepped. We just need the sprouts." "Good. Go ahead and start caramelizing the onions for the goat-cheese toasts, and then get the bacon going---just be sure to undercook the bacon. It'll cook the rest of the way in the oven." "Yes, chef." "Clementine, can you take over the grilled crudités? We need to get them chilled by five." She nodded. "Yes, chef." "Excellent. I'll start prepping the butternut-squash fritters," I said, rolling up my sleeves. "And then the mozzarella poppers. Let's get to work." I was elbows deep in fried mozzarella and crispy-edged butternut-squash fritters when my brother and boyfriend finally arrived, wet and bedraggled, at the kitchen door. "I have dates," Nico said, holding the crate aloft. "Dates and brussels sprouts." "It's about time," I shot back. "You've been single far too long." "I'm going to get cleaned up," he said, "and then I can relieve you." "Take your time," I replied honestly. "I've got everything under control." And I did. The fritters were done and in the warming oven with a cake pan full of water in the rack below to keep them from drying out. I'd made up the mozzarella poppers by breading the rounds of buffalo-milk mozzarella with batter and panko crumbs before deep-frying them in batches. It had felt good to work with my hands again, good to do something other than managerial work. I cast a longing eye at Clementine's pavlovas, the baked egg whites topped with quartered figs. There was something soothing about working with egg whites, the frothy pure-white shade they became when whisked.

Sam,” said Charlie, “I’ve been watching you this week. I know what’s going on. Have you actually told Stacey how you feel about her? Or have you just whistled at her and shot Cheerios onto her toast?

Quite suddenly, he is moved. And he sees that the son is moved, too. To keep their emotions alive, the father pours them both another shot. He doesn't want to make the son drunk. He just wants to make him beautiful. And anyone who is moved is beautiful. He is already beautiful. He has beautiful moist eyes. His cheeks are flushed, and his lips are silky. And when they toasted the fourth time, he is even gentler. And when he speaks, he speaks so beautifully.

And Samuel is your father. Is that going to stop you from putting a bullet between his eyes the second he steps foot into our wedding in five and a half weeks?" Archer gave me a knowing look, before he snagged my last piece of toast. I frowned, considering that perspective. "Well, no. But he tried to fucking sell me on a human black market. He deserves to die." "Didn't try, baby girl. He did sell you. It's just fate that your Prince Charming swooped in and saved the day." He shot me a teasing wink.

A few moments later, I had a pungent mound of searingly hot sautéed wild mushrooms in front of me, crispy, golden brown, black and yellow, with a single raw egg yolk slowly losing its shape in the center. After a toast of red wine, I ran my fork around the plate, mingling yolk and fungi, then put a big forkful in my mouth. I can only describe the experience as ‘ready to die’ – one of those times when if suddenly and unexpectedly shot, at that precise moment you would, in your last moments of consciousness, know that you had had a full and satisfying life, that in your final moments, at least you had eaten well, truly well, that you could hardly have eaten better. You’d be ready to die. This state of gustatory rapture was interrupted by more wine, a tiny plate of tantalizing baby octopus, and a few sexy-looking anchovies. I was at first confused by an offer of what looked to be a plate of fried zucchini sticks, but when I bit inside and found tender white asparagus, I nearly swooned.

Then I saw that the birds were a flock of pauw or bustards, and that they would pass within fifty yards of my head. Taking one of the repeating Winchesters, I waited till they were nearly over us, and then jumped to my feet. On seeing me the pauw bunched up together, as I expected that they would, and I fired two shots straight into the thick of them, and, as luck would have it, brought one down, a fine fellow, that weighed about twenty pounds. In half an hour we had a fire made of dry melon stalks, and he was toasting over it, and we made such a feed as we had not tasted for a week. We ate that pauw; nothing was left of him but his leg-bones and his beak, and we felt not a little the better afterwards.

Martinis and Champagne were passed, along with a selection of Bobby's best hors d'oeuvres: potato pillows dotted with crème fraîche and caviar, crawfish spread served in toast cups, miniature crab cakes topped with rémoulade, tiny tuna burgers with fresh grated ginger, served on homemade brioche (Alice's recipe, which I discovered was virtually indistinguishable from what my father used to bake for our family). There were all sorts of desserts, too, mostly southern. But the hit of the evening was, as always, Bobby's banana pudding, made with pound cake instead of Nilla wafers. For the party Bobby fixed individual puddings, served in shot glasses, topped with whipped cream instead of meringue.

we also have a few bottles of sixteen-year Lagavulin we keep aside.” “You mean, like, actual scotch from Scotland?” “From the island of Islay, to be precise,” the waiter replied. “It’s twelve hundred a bottle.” “I want that.” “Yes sir, and four glasses.” The waiter tipped his head and headed off to the bar. “We’re going to play blackjack now,” Naomi said, laughing. Amos was pulling a stack of chips out of his tray and pushing them across the table to her. “Want to come?” The band in the next room stopped playing, and the background noise dropped to an almost tolerable level for a few seconds before someone started piping Muzak across the casino PA. “Guys, wait a few minutes,” Holden said. “I’ve bought a bottle of something nice, and I want to have one last toast before we go our separate ways for the night.” Amos looked impatient right up until the bottle arrived, and then spent several seconds cooing over the label. “Yeah, okay, this was worth waiting for.” Holden poured out a shot for each of them, then held his glass up. “To the best ship and crew anyone has ever had the privilege of serving with, and to getting paid.” “To getting paid!” Amos echoed, and then the shots disappeared

Representing the apogee of human rights and humanitarian sentiments among post-war U.S. presidents, Carter also rebuffed Iranian demands for an apology from the U.S. for installing the Shah in power since 1953 and the subsequent decades of the S.A.V.A.K. torture that continued well into this ‘soft’ Democrat’s administration: ‘I don’t think we have anything to apologize for,’ assured Henry Kissinger. Ruminating about the United States of Amnesia, Carter’s principal White House aide for Iran throughout the crisis, Mr. Gary Sick, admitted that from the standpoint of U.S. policy-makers ‘anything that happened more than a quarter century before—even an event of singular importance—assumes the pale and distant appearance of ancient history. In Washington, by 1978, the events of 1953 had all the relevance of a pressed flower.’ Barely over a year before the Iranian people toppled this modernizing despot, Carter toasted the Shah’s Iran as ‘an island of stability,’ which he called a ‘great tribute to the respect, admiration and love of your people for you’. A defiant George H.W. Bush announced, after the U.S. shot down a large Iranian airliner filled with 290 civilians, ‘I will never apologize for the United States of America. I don’t care what the facts are.’25

Now that you have the menu, tell me what this is." "Tuna, vanilla brioche crumbs, and a bruléed disk of monkfish liver." "Ah, monkfish liver! Foie gras of the sea!" Michael Saltz said, lifting his cup in a toast. I refused to join him and just tipped the bite backlit a shot, letting the mouthful take shape all at once. Michael Saltz squinted at me while I set the cup down. If he disregarded me, then I'd disregard him. Next, Hugo brought out a single octopus tentacle, roasted to bring out the burgundy speckles in its skin, painted with sweet, sea-infused balsamic squid ink and framed by two quarters of a ruddy pear. We stayed silent as I ate. Skate came wading in a chorizo broth, a cap of seaweed poking through the surface like an island paradise.

Hanna. Her middle child. The difficult one. The tiring one. The one she wouldn’t want to be stranded on a desert island with. And a terrible thought shot through her, so fast she barely registered it. It should be you missing and Ellie eating beans on toast.