ALL YOU CAN EAT

“So, Mr. Hitchens, what would you say started it all? What turning point in your
life led you to where you are today?”

“Oh, Mr. Journalist,” he said, with a tired look on his face. “Being successful is about more than any one single event.” He leaned forward onto the table. “It’s about an attitude.”

“Ah I see,” nodding with dramatic approval.

“But, if I had to distill it to a single moment,” he said, rolling his thick head to one side, raising his big hands into the air, rings shining under the dim, hazy light. “It would be my first job when I was a young…Well, when I was your age, running a small newspaper in Scranton. My Father was a stern, secular man, even in his later years, and the fountainhead of a prosperous oil business, as you know…Here’s the point: He gave me sage advice when I was struggling to find even an obituary worth publishing; before I sought out my fortune. He said, ‘Son, work is its own reward and the only way a man can ever clearly see his own worth. Knowing the cost of things is itself the most valuable information; the path to power.’”

“Very interesting,” I said, taking down the quote.

A pretty brunette waitress approached our table in the smoky restaurant, but took a half-step back when Mr. Hitchens’ large black eyes landed on her body. “Ahem…Have you made up your minds yet, gentlemen. Could I suggest our…”

“No thanks. We’ve decided,” Mr. Hitchens interjected. “I’ll have the cocktail
shrimp for an appetizer…” The waitress didn’t need to jot down the rest of his order, one I’m sure she had seen a dozen times tonight. “I’ll have the Caesar salad and coffee, easy on the dressing,” I said, smugly.

His suave, blond comb-over was nearly attractive. His crisp, pinstriped suit
probably cost more than I paid for my car. Looking over Mr. Hitchins and listening to his objectivist spiel was like witnessing the last vapors of a Golden Era dissipate with the smoke of his cigar. Everything about him was an anachronism, yet I couldn’t look away.

“What kind of meal is that?” he said, now intensely eyeing me.

“Well, uh,” I stuttered. “I eat meat occasionally. I’m trying something new.” I
suddenly regretted my new diet.

“Egh…You and a million other lifeless runts,” he grunted, blowing the smoke of
a Cuban into my face. I inhaled its odor as it drifted across the oak table. I started to feel a little sick.

“So, back to my questions. What advice would you give to a young entrepreneur just starting out?”

The waitress brought out our wine, an 82’ Byron, and the appetizers. His cocktail looked like 12 beautiful swimmers dangling on the edge of a pool. He picked one of the nubile beauties up between his thick fingers and crunched. Red cocktail sauce hung on his lip. He leaned back against the leather cushion and projected operatically, “Not every businessman can start his own company, I know that. But each suit doesn’t need to lose his identity, like every fresh face coming out of Yale. Too many wimps I see today, these philanthropic ass-holes, they are always looking at their feet to make sure they don’t step on an ant. Bullshit.”

“Bullshit?” I echoed, taking a sip of wine.

“Bullshit. They have lost what it means to be human.” He dropped another
swimmer down his gullet. The brunette bounced back over to our corner table. “Are you ready for the next course, gentleman?”

“If you look under the table you’ll see how hungry I am,” Hitchens said, laughing heartily, revealing a perfect set of pearly whites. He took another swig of the Byron. “I…uh…see,” she said, flustered, but regaining her perfect posture more quickly than I had assumed. “I’ll bring the entrees.”

“Let me ask you a question, Mr. Woodward.” The dim lamp on our table made his tanned skin glow and his black eyes pierce.

“You seem like a ‘nice guy.’ If another newspaper broke a juicy story that you
were after, wouldn’t you be angry?” He lifted his wine glass an inch from the table,
swirling the liquid in perfect, concentric circles. “Wouldn’t you…hate them for getting ahead?” The way he said that four-letter word made my brow sweat. I took another deep drink of the wine, feeling its warmth slide down my throat. A buzz was coming on, but I maintained my cool. “I wouldn’t want them to have it, no. But I understand the business. We can’t get the top story all the time.”

“Bullshit!” He slammed his meaty fist on the table, jarring the plates. The lamp
flickered. His words boomed through my ears and down deep inside me. Other swank people in the restaurant stopped their conversation to witness the fury of one of New York’s most powerful, self-made businessmen.

“That is why you are down there, looking up to me, like an ant. That, my friend, is why you lose.” As the last syllable slid off his tongue in a venomous hiss, he regained his composure. Two more shrimp drowned in a flood of wine.

“Here is the second course, gentlemen. Mr. Hitchens, your filet mignon and New Zealand lobster,” she said, the plates shaking so furiously I thought they would shatter any moment. “The chef prepared these especially for you.”

“Fine. Tell him to quit kissing ass. And, bring us a bottle of the 99’ Latour, then leave us be.” He handed her a note and puffed smoke up into the air. I watched it swirl dreamily around the waitress, as though she too were caught in his seductive web.

“Yes sir,” she said, scurrying off with her tip.

“I want to ask you about the latest building project in North Manhattan,” I said,
finishing off the Byron.

“Mr. Woodward, that is not why you are here.” A smirk formed out of his golden cheeks.

“Oh, Okay. Why…why am I here?” I looked down at my shaking notebook, but
it was too blurry to read.

“Mr. Woodward, you want to be me.” He licked the cocktail sauce off of his thick finger and pointed it straight at my face. “You are here so you can become me,” he said, each syllable inflected with the power of a 10-digit bankroll.

“Well…our readership has expressed great interest…”

“Don’t give me that bullshit.”

In my spinning field of vision, in what seemed like a dream happening far away
from me, Mr. Hitchens picked up the entire New Zealand lobster with his cleaver like
hands and snapped the head off in one disgusting bite. Cocktail sauce dripped off his giant lip. The maitre de uncorked the Latour, refreshed both of our glasses and placed the bottle on the table.

A jazz singer crooned “Come Fly With Me” from a distant stage, into a numbed
audience. “Uh, we’ll take the check,” I mouthed to the blurry waitress.

“Mr. Woodward, this world is a jungle, a survival of the fittest,” he said, his voice now reverberating deeper and more seductive than the singer’s. “If you are not fit, if you are not prepared like Dante to take the plunge into the depths of Hell, you will not win, my friend.” He grabbed my plate from across the table and slurped the tofu stir-fry clean, draining it down with an entire bottle of Latour.

The waitress brought out the check on a gold plate. “Thank you so much, and
The Garden welcomes you back anytime. And it’s an honor to serve you Mr. Hitchens.”In my weary state, I only heard a deep, revolting snort in reply. A strange smell was coming from the creature across from me, like a tart decay.

His hands, now like massive claws, grabbed the skinny waitress by the hips as she walked away. After a thick slurp, he spat her high-heels across the table into my lap. My Dockers were now stained with The Garden’s special cocktail sauce.

The singer was next; then the maitre de; then the other patrons that sat in
perpetual gloom, not even noticing the Apocalypse around them. Finally, there was
nothing left of anything. Only me and Mr. Hitchens, my notepad, and an empty bottle of 99’ Latour. We rested in a dimly lit Universe.

“You know what’s next, don’t you Mr. Woodward.” His words were now only
snorts and burps, and his mouth was like a black hole, sucking me in. I made one last wobbly scribble onto my pad, but it was unreadable. “Yes,” I replied, numb from the alcohol. “It’s all I’ve ever wanted.”