It’s served on a bed of arugula at exactly 36 degrees. It is arranged with lemongrass foam and one radish shaving. Exquisite, they call it and he hates it. Crab, deconstructed – he corrects.

Each crab is killed by him and only him. It is disassembled with care and once cooked, patched back together – an atonement for his shellfish sins.

He knows they take pictures of the carcass like a prize from a battle they didn’t fight. They pay; he takes apart. They demand; he reassembles.

And he, like the crab, is trapped in a device of his own creation.