Page 61 of Levi

And somewhere in the middle of the brisket, I notice the thing I’ve been not-noticing all night. I’m hungry. Actually hungry, not the low gnaw I’ve been running the engine on. A week ago, I ate a chunk of staging cheese with my fingers because food was a thing that needed to happen for me to function. Now there’s a fork in my hand and I want what’s on the plate and I want the next one coming too. The part of me that got powered down is coming back on, one light at a time. The appetite is just the switch I can see from this stool.

The ribs are course ten. Half a rack, glistening, and behind the plate comes Stormy himself, who sets it down and stands there.

“Use your hands,” he says. That’s the instruction.

The ribs summon Tex. “Stormy means don’t you dare use the fork. The fork insults the rib. The rib was smoked to be held.”

I pick one up and pull the meat off the bone, and it comes away like it had been waiting on me. They’re even better than the ones Dante put in my refrigerator.

“I’ve had these ribs before,” I tell him. “Cold. Out of a refrigerator, standing up.”

Tex throws me a shocked look. “The ribs made it to you?”

“You know about those ribs?”

“Know about them? Levi, I bagged those ribs personally. You want the story? Don’t tell him I told you. Dante came in here on a full rant. He didn’t want you at the Roadhouse, he didn’t want you in his listing, and he especially didn’t want to talk about the six sub sandwiches you apparently ordered from a deli counter, which he brought up without anyone asking. Dante was scandalized to the bone. While he’s ranting, I went back to the kitchen, bagged up a rack, double-wrapped it, extra sauce. Stormy added the corn bread. I put it in Dante’s hands on his way out the door. I said, ‘Take these to the sub sandwich guy.’ He looked at the bag like I’d handed him a live raccoon to deliver. But he took it.”

Tex shakes his head slowly, savoring every word of it. “And he never said one more word about it. Not one. He let me believe those ribs died in his refrigerator, and all the while he’d run them straight over to you. I swear, that Miami man does a kind thing the way other men hide a body. Silently, secretly, denying everything.”

“I ate every bite of those ribs.”

“Well. Now you’ve had them hot, in the building, with the man who smoked them standing right there. We’ll call the refrigerator version a rehearsal.”

Stormy watches me eat the rib from the kitchen door. When I finish it and set the bone down, he gives one small nod, the kind an inspector gives a weld, and disappears back to the kitchen.

“You just passed a test,” Tex says. “I don’t know exactly what, but I’ve lived with him long enough to know a certification when I see one.”

Course eleven is the sides, delivered as their own event. Coleslaw, a paper boat of hushpuppies, an ear of corn rolled in butter. Tex provides guidance on a fly-by.

“The hushpuppies are hotter inside than the outside admits. That’s not a flaw, that’s their nature. The corn has no story behind it. The corn is corn. I respect it too much to decorate it. Now the slaw.” He drops low. “The slaw is Sheila’s baby. The recipe predates me. Two people in thirty years have asked her what’s in it, and neither of them is welcome in this building anymore. I’m not saying those things are connected. I’m saying eat the slaw and mind yourself.”

I eat all the slaw. It’s sharp and cold against all that smoke, and I understand immediately why the recipe has casualties.

Sheila comes back around while I’m finishing the corn. “How were the sides, baby?”

“The coleslaw’s the best I’ve ever had,” I say, and it’s true.

Sheila stops moving. First time all night. Her eyes go from me to the empty slaw dish to the far end of the bar, where Tex has suddenly become fascinated by the neon sign hanging on the wall.

“Tex tell you to say that?”

“No, ma’am. He only told me not to ask what’s in it.”

“Okay.” She takes the dish. She’s fighting a smile. “Course he did. That damn fool couldn’t keep a secret in a locked safe.” She sets a fresh sweet tea in front of me.

The fish tacos arrive as the sky outside the doors goes full dark. Course twelve. Three of them, small, lined up on a board, and Stormy sets it down and produces a golf pencil from behind his ear and lays it next to the plate. Then he waits.

“Grouper, mahi-mahi, redfish,” Tex says. “You eat all three and you vote. Everyone votes. It’s mandatory. There’s a tally on the kitchen wall, been running since spring. Grouper leads, forty-one to thirty-three, with redfish trailing, which is a crime against this coast that I will not accept. Take your time. This matters.”

I eat all three. I take it seriously, because the two men watching me are taking it seriously, and because they’re the best three bites of fish I’ve had in years and the ranking is honestly hard. Then I pick up the golf pencil and write REDFISH on the corner of the card.

Tex slaps the bar with his hand. Glasses jump. “REDFISH,” he hollers toward the kitchen, like a verdict. “Mark it!”

Through the door I watch Stormy cross to the wall and make one small stroke on a board.

Course thirteen is celery sticks and ranch dressing. Sheila sets it down and keeps walking without commentary. I look at it and try not to frown. Tex, mid-orbit, catches my face and pulls up.

“You don’t have to eat those sticks. Nobody eats those. Nobody has ever eaten those. Stormy wanted twelve courses. Sheila wanted fourteen, because thirteen is bad luck and she wasn’t ending your night on it. So, course thirteen is celery, which exists for two reasons. One, nobody has to eat the unlucky course. And two, the bill gets a line on it that says ‘celery and ranch.’ Dante is going to read that bill like a man reading his own obituary, and somewhere down that column he’s going to hit the celery, and he’s going to know exactly what it means.”