capitalism.txt

Ivan

Moscow, Russian Federation

Income: $114,342 p.a

Debt: $654,000 (secured on real estate)

Ivan Fedorovich Karpov missed his old chair. Five years plus the geologically constant pressure of his trim backside had softened the fake leather to the texture of fresh baby hide, the castors were steadfast and never rolled around unless he made an effort, and the very atoms of the springy hinge in the back had obediently adjusted themselves till the strain constant, his weight and the position of his lower back had all converged at an ideal intersection of comfort.

The new one was a gift from his mother, and like most gifts from his mother he resented it. He had to pay her back in interminable phone calls. "You pay her too much, that old slut who cleans your apartment." she'd just informed him, her voice crackling over the Skype connection.

"Don't call Anna Pavlova that." he said. She was in the other room ironing his shirts, and he worried she'd hear.

"Why not? She ought to put up with worse, for eight thousand a week. I pay my woman four and call her anything I like. She's glad to get it. You're such a gentle boy, Vanya, people are eating you alive."

"I can afford it. She has her granddaughter to look after, anyway."

"Ah, yes. That. Where's the mother, I'd like to know. You're not a charity. You think you make big money now? I met someone whose son is just your age, big shot in an oil company, chauffeur and everything. And you're trading bananas and pork bellies all day, and you have to drive yourself around." He let her continue her story about the well-heeled scion. There was no need to mention that Anna's daughter had died of AIDS in San Francisco. Poor woman. You had to give a little back.

He changed the subject. "How's Sochi?"

"Boring. I should have gone back to Mauritius, but I thought I'd see my own country this year. Serve me right."

"Sorry to hear that."

"Such low-class people everywhere. Nothing like in the old days. Oh, wait, I met the most perfect girl out here. She has lovely style, and she's single. I told her all about you."

"Mama! You what? And what about Galya?"

"I've nothing against Galya, I like her a lot. Very intelligent, the intellectual type. But you can't expect to make a family with her. No feminine elegance to speak of. She'll go off to her job somewhere and leave you with your dick in your hand, pardon me."

He turned red. She'd clearly been drinking, and it was only one in the afternoon. "How do you like your iPad?" he asked, grasping for another diversion.

"Oh, it's fine. Thank you. But that is not the issue. I'd like to see some grandchildren before I die, that's all. Galina Andreyvna is no good to me. Think of me once in a while. I wish I'd raised you better." She coughed, ostentatiously.

"You raised me fine. You'll get grandchildren when you get them. You're as strong as an ox. Besides, I've got something in the works, you'll see. If it all goes well, your son won't be driving himself around much longer."

"If, if, if. How long have you been betting on the price of melons in wherever? Your best years are going by...." Her voice cut out, and her picture froze. Ivan, reaching out with an athletic foot, had slipped his prehensile toes around the router's power cord and tugged it out of the wall. Oh dear, network problems, nothing to do. Run along Mother, see if anyone in Sochi knows how to make a daiquiri.

He slipped his phone out of his pocket, praying she wouldn't have the presence if mind to call it. It was the Windows one this time; one luxury he afforded himself was to have a cellphone for each of the major operating systems. Blackberry for business, Apple for pleasure, Android for interesting apps, and the Windows one just because. He occasionally used it to contact call girls when Galya was away for too long; they were independent and broad minded. He execrated human traffickers like the criminals who had killed Anna's daughter, but a man still had needs that an uptight society would scarcely acknowledge. He wished she would consent to an open relationship; polyamory was practically a given among the young bohemians he longed to emulate. But now was not the time.

He logged into the Moscow Commodity Exchange's website and took a quick look. This was a rare day off, but he couldn't help being curious. The graph flashed up, with numbers rolling underneath it and the end of its red line continuing its downward dip from the recent peak. He smiled. The controlled dump was working. And so and a gang of speculators across the world, taking advantage of the newly liberalized Indian oilseed market, had bought up a not insignificant portion of the world's peanut supply over the last few months and were now in the wake of the harvest season industriously dumping it at well below par.

The natural dip would be amplified; other speculators, middlemen, Peanut Marketing Boards of varying sizes would panic and turn the decline into a collapse. And the short positions he and his colleagues had taken care to arrange, which were massively leveraged thanks ultimately to stimulus capital loaned on generous terms by the Kremlin, would pay royally.

And he thought of the good he would do with it. The consumers he would enrich! The lowest peanut prices for a decade! Health insurance, the best money could buy, for Anna and her grandchild! His generosity would give his mother a fit. He'd marry Galya, give her the lavish wedding she claimed not to want but, he was sure, secretly dreamed of. And yes, some would lose. Some always lost. But that was life! And in this bright new world, life would never stop giving you new chances.