He also questioned whether it was fair to target restaurants with such a rule.

“It seems mildly perverse that the smallest of the small businesses have to front-run the government and front-run the experts. And then somehow we’re (still) allowing hundreds of thousands of people to fly in the air and exchange this disease we’re trying to knock down,” he said.

Qui Tran, co-owner of Nudo House near Creve Coeur and in the Delmar Loop, said, “I’ve never been scared in my life. I’ve always felt like we can push through, and stuff like that. I’m really (expletive) scared.”

Tran is also not certain a shift to takeout can support the restaurant while the dining room is closed.

“If carry-out’s 20% of my business, and all we do is carry-out, I’ve lost 80% of my revenue,” he said. “How am I going to function? How are we going to pay rent?”

Tran’s prediction for the other side of the closure is dire.

“For the last twenty years, I’ve been on the forefront of helping build this community of restaurants,” he said, “and now when this is all said and done, half of what we’ve built together in St. Louis will no longer exist.”