Already I know the eggs aren’t enough.

I root around the fridge for something thicker. Something juicy but not runny. Something that’ll stuff me to satisfaction. Milk? No. I open the freezer. Veggie sausage fingers? That’s a joke. I Google “what to eat when craving steak” and Google’s AI assistant suggests tempeh. Ffs.

I Google “What happens if you eat steak after eight years of not eating meat” and the AI assistant —  her? their? it’s probably her? name is Gemini — says I may experience some of the following: digestion, gas, and energy. But the words appear on my screen neutrally, smooth and delicate without serifs and the letter stems petite and slender, exquisitely feminine, as if Lady Gemini is urging me towards and not away from the life-affirming tryptic of digestion, gas, energy. Live laugh love.

I lie in bed and open my running “wants” list, where I keep track of everything I’ve ever wanted. Things like: a 200-dollar coat with an asymmetrical zipper; Botox in my forehead; a 20-dollar figurine of a crying clown that spins in a slow circle when you wind it; a husband; a 50-dollar candle shaped like an heirloom tomato.

I pull up a saved link to an expensive skincare website and purchase all six products in my cart. My total is 268 dollars. The website asks me if I want expedited shipping and I figure this website knows me best so what the hell, sure. My total is more like 300.

The eggs in my stomach have digested and now I’m wide open. 300 dollars isn’t enough to stitch me together. If anything, it’s undone me a little more. I go back to the fridge and pull out a beer, and then another. I drink them quickly, barely breaking for a burp between them. Instead of filling up, I’m losing my bottom. I’m not sure where I stop and I start.

I get back in bed and make myself come six times. I’m going for a seventh when my imagination gets tired. I watch a little porn but I can’t stop thinking about how the labia on my screen resemble a filet — mauve and burgundy wrinkles swollen in butter. With my camera on selfie mode, I hold my phone between my legs to see if my labia also look like steak and to investigate whether this makes me want to eat myself. I get too distracted by how bloated my belly is from the beer to be disappointed that my labia are unremarkable.

I take a photo of myself in bed and send it to two people who I think would make me a steak if I play my cards right. “Make me a steak?” I type out, adding the emoji that’s wearing a cowboy hat. One asks if I meant the photo for someone else and the other just ha-ha reacts.

Ha! So I walk to the meat store down the street.

I ask the man behind the counter for a filet mignon, as those are the only words for steak I know, and he responds with a question about the meat that I don’t know how to answer so I just say yeah sure, assuming he will take care of me. He doesn’t look at me as he deposits the packaged steak in my palms, his fingers brushing against mine in latex gloves. I remember I haven’t washed my hands since masturbating six (sort of seven) times, so if I don’t wash them before I prepare my steak, I can eat both his hands and my hands and also my own labia and finally the meat. How could I have any space left after that?

At home, I gently unwrap the brown paper as if I’m removing the diaper from a baby, quietly sliding it out from under the meat so as to not upset it. I set the paper aside in case I want to save it as a memento. 

I paint oil into the flesh with my hands, tracing the rivers of fat and pressing the tips of my fingers into the body like I’m packing down wet sand. I’m so excited I could cry.

I set the meat in a pan like I’m resting a fetus in a hot crib. The whole system erupts in tiny screams. Now I’m actually crying, my tears plunking into the meat, releasing a static note with each drop. This is the most beautiful I have ever felt.

After four minutes on each side, I intuit that the steak is perfect.

I place my perfect steak on my favorite plate and I sit down slowly before it, genuflecting because I’ve just consecrated something.

The meat looks so flawless I’m scared to touch it, worried if I puncture it with something real it’ll stop existing.

But my knife maneuvers gracefully through the flesh. I hold a full fork up to my face, and the chunk of meat is quivering as I bring it to my lips. I chew and chew and chew. I hold the meat in the back of my mouth. I want to stay right here forever.

When I finally swallow, it feels like an admission of failure.

The steak is fine. I don’t think I’ve done it enough.