In Over Her Head by Elsie Russell - Parnasse.com

It is an honor to lose!"
"Yeah, conceptual art's cool as long as it's funny, like
Duchamps, or like when it blows your mind," Penny said.
"Oh? And when is it, dear girl, that something blows your
mind?"
They moved into a narrow room with a long table made from a
lengthwise tree trunk plank polished on top but with uneven natural
edges, very Japanese. Origami princess hats stood in each plate.
Glasses, or beakers, one narrow, one tall and wide, stood with a carafe
that looked like a Klein bottle, full of water.
The aesthetic was pure Ula, but she was absent, and Dick had
other things on his mind.
Inez brought in a plate of that peasant bread and another fizzy
drink for Dick. Then a plate of paté with slices of ham and a big fat
salami, more of those little pickles, a pot of mustard in the middle. A
meal for alcoholic bachelors. Then she brought in a bottle of wine.
Alessandro nodded and tore off the foil, twisted in the
corkscrew, stuck the bottle between his legs, and wrenched out the
cork with a boink. He finished his whiskey and poured some wine in
the bottom of his beaker, sniffed it, stuck it under Dick's nose, but he
shooed him away. Alessandro filled Penny's beaker, not thinking to ask
her, then his. He placed his hand above her glass.
"It must breathe a moment."
He poured water into all of the tall beakers, even though it
looked like Dick never touched the stuff.
So this is where he'd gotten the waiter routine, waiting on Dick.
Who did the brother serve? Nobody, he was the jester, flittering
around. And Ula? She could see them both being waited on at table by
him, a picture forming in her head.
She took a slice of bread and a slab of ham, a dollop of
mustard.
Alessandro cut a big chunk of truffle paté, slammed it on his
plate and smeared half of that on his bread. He cut some slices of the
salami, arranged them on Dick's plate, sprinkling a few cornichons on
the side, then sat down and began eating his paté. All this was done in
the existential silence of the windowless room. Beckett moments or was
this Sartre?
"I took Penny to Musique and she found this fantastic book, on
Xenakis, all about his designs for spaces and monuments."
"Yeah, he introduced a whole new concept of spatial design,
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