“Concrete flowers?” says Cote. “I’d think they’d get heavy.”

“Not like wet-sand concrete,” Ballard says impatiently. “Concrete as opposed to hypothetical. The kind of flowers you can touch.”

“You mean real, then.”

Ballard shakes his head. “No, hypothetical flowers can be real. They just have to be either whole or partial, or both, to qualify for that.”

“But–but if a flower is hypothetical, it’s imaginary!” Cote’s eyes are starting to bulge. “By definition!”

“There’s only one imaginary flower! That I know of,” Ballard says, then squints at her across the checked plastic tablecloth. “Look, have you been listening at all?”