Then she stalked from the house.

“Mandelbrot,” Derec said after the reverberations of her exit had stopped echoing through the house. “You should be glad that you don’t have to deal with emotions.”

“It has been my observation that human feelings are much like fruit.”

“Hmm? I’m not sure I understand.”

“If handled roughly, both feelings and fruit are easily bruised.”

To that, Derec didn’t have a reply.