Extraits

And I do not feel bad about stealing all the food, because I did it for Marianne. I will do anything to save her, sacrifice anyone. That is the nature of love, and I do not regret anything that I do in her name. If necessary, I will sacrifice myself. Throw myself to the sharks.

People say nature is cruel, and humans are violent.

People say business is savage, and nice guys do not win.

People say only the strong survive.

Maybe all these things are true. I don’t know.

All I know is that in every human heart there is something stronger and, if necessary, more savage than any wild beast.

Lovers are the true barbarian. That is why love conquers.

It is hard to believe that it is less than three weeks since we came on this training course. Life before the island seems like a dream now, and just as a dream stops making sense when you wake up from it, life as we life as we lived it three weeks ago seems impossibly absurd to me now.

Low-calorie desserts? Stiletto heels? SUVs? Football matches? Swarovski crystals? Phone apps? Ritalin? Nespresso capsules, for fuck’s sake! How absurd is a world with Nespresso capsules?

“Your fridge? » she laughed, “why is the fridge so important?”

“A fridge says a lot about you, don’t you think?”

“Not mine. There’s nothing much in it!” she answered, “Does that signify that I am superficial?”

“No, it probably signifies that you don’t cook.”

I looked away from Cicero as I put a hand over my mouth to camouflage a yawn. My eyes met those of the young femele executive I saw on the beach yesterday. She was sitting a few seats away and smiling as she observed my boredom. She raised her eyebrow a fraction, questioningly, and I gestured toward Cicero, shaking my head to express my incomprehension. She laughed silently and then put two fingers in her mouth as if to vomit.

I think I am in love.

We are cannibals in Dolce & Gabanna, my colleagues and I.

That is what we do at Amelyosis: we eat up other humans as if we were foxes and they were chickens. It's a pretty good job.

That, in any case, is what I found myself thinking this afternoon as I listened to our Chief Executive, Rueben Cicero, welcome us to this tropical island where we have come for a week of intensive management training:

"Amelyosis is not an ordinary business, people!" Cicero shouted as we stood on the sand, our baggage at our feet. He was on a wooden terrace overlooking the beach as he gave his oration:

"Kellogs is a business. Coca-Cola is a business. General Motors is a business. Or... Maybe not General Motors, actually."