Head of the table

I’m sitting in a pink conference room. In front of me are ten bottles of spring water, arranged in two, neat rows of five. Behind the bottles, strawberries and bananas hang out of a crystal bowl, set in a thoughtful, deliberate arrangement. A box of oolong organic tea cozies up next to a whistling kettle. The CEO stands at the head of the mahogany table, his manicured finger tips brushing the top. The navy blue pin stripe suit contours his fitness club-toned body like a bone-crushing hug.

‘Please’ he says, opening wide his arms to the ten industry journalists who stand before him, tired, weathered, hungry for something other than a freaking banana and in dire need of caffeine that only comes from coffee taken black. ‘Welcome to Virginia. Welcome to my company. Sit. Eat.’

We do as we are told. Caps are whipped off pens, tape recorders are set, papers fly. Alec introduces us to his company, the history of which traces well back to the late 1800s in Manhattan, when his grandfather came from Russia with a good idea. The business was then passed onto his father and then with his retirement, subsequently landed in his own hands. Pictures of models wearing Revlon, Chanel, Estee Lauder, and Elizabeth Arden frame the walls. Women dancing with flimsy pieces of gauzy material and spritzing themselves with Clinique mock us from their frames. Alec glances up at one particular woman, who smiles down at him with purple lips and wide, silvery eyes. She makes me think of a fish.

‘And now, I am sole shareholder.’


‘Jesus H Christ’ whispers one of the male journalists sitting to my left. ‘He even bought out his dad.’

Alec’s laugh is warm, but confusing. It bubbles in a way that lets you know there is something additionally funny about whatever has just occurred that you will never understand. In his presence you become immediately and acutely aware that the mascara you’re wearing was bought on sale and that because you forgot to pack enough socks, you’re wearing yesterday’s nylons. And you’re even more aware that he somehow can sense this. Suddenly, all of your flaws seem magnificent and huge, and so do everyone else’s, to the point where there is in fact no one in the room but him, just an overwhelming and messy pile of split ends, fleshy thighs and unbalanced chequebooks.

‘So,’ he bellows. ‘Shall we head over to the facility’?

We shuffle out. As he walks, the sleeves of his custom-made suit fall to just the right length, covering powerful wrists. Each step and swing of his arms punches through the air, making me almost want to shield it from him. He smiles and says hello to the overweight secretary, who coddles a bottle of Diet Coke, tucks a stray lock of hair behind her ear and looks at her swollen feet, whispering a barely audible ‘hi there’ in return.

We enter the manufacturing facility. Alec pauses to clap a man named Steve on the back, asking him how his newborn son is doing. Steve’s eyes glimmer with something beyond happiness.

‘Oh, he’s just a beauty mister Alec. You wouldn’t believe!’

‘Children truly are a joy,’ Alec smiles into his face. ‘Truly a joy.’

We move on. A young girl wearing Jordache, stonewash jeans and a faded Guns n’ Roses t-shirt quickens her pace as she passes us and does not return my smile, or Alec’s nod.

The plant is full of workers scurrying about, rushing through the room with fluorescent earplugs and safety glasses, running from one workstation to the other in their Walmart running shoes, and all of a sudden it hit me, that all these employees, every single one, is working for Alec. That Steve is away from his newborn son so that he can help pay for Alec’s suit, for his brownstone in upper Manhattan, for the jewelry his wife wears. That the young girl with the chipped nail polish and the November Rain t-shirt didn’t go to college, but instead is working in a plant whose profits pay for Mediterranean vacations she will never go on, to pay for cars she will never drive.

Now, of course this isn’t Alec’s fault. Given that he only spends one week a month in Virginia, and still manages to know all his employees by name, all 120 of them, is impressive. It’s the nature of the system that’s at fault. But it’s the system I’m starting to really, intensely dislike.

And, starving though I was, I politely declined the offer of a perfectly ripe banana on my way out.