Character assasination: The deluded egomaniac

He was large. A big man dripping in Versace. Every which you looked he was bearing down on you or coming around a corner at you, his Versace belt glistening under the flourescent light.

He used to make me shiver as he strode towards me, doughnut in hand, sugar and jam around his mouth. I knew what I was in for. A session on his fabulousness, intelligence, wit, sex appeal, wealth, financial acumen and his overall superitority to me and everyone else in the office.

"My house is worth over a million dollars," he would say, humbly.
"I invested so well at such a young age and made over $600,000 in one of my many portfolios."
"You should have seen me when I was young, I'll bring you in a photo, I was irrestible to women," he would say, looking lasciviously, saliva dripping from his fat lips, at all the female team members' bouncing breasts.

He brought in his photo for us to ooh and aah over. I did. All the while looking at the skinnier, younger version of the obese monstrosity that sat across from me, thinking, "oh look, there's a fat man in there just waiting to get out."

We would go to client meetings together and I would sit shame-faced at some of the ridiculous things he would say, about himself, his wealth, his intelligence, his sex appeal and his sex life.

"My wife can hardly keep her hands off me," he said one day to a room filled with men, "As soon as I get in the house, she pounces, like a super flexible, aroused cat. I've had to buy her a vibrator as I just can't keep up," he guffawed.

I thought, for a second, I was in a men's only club, surrounded by cigar smoke and the smell of old, expensive Scotch. But when I looked around, the other men were just as horrified as I was.
How we walked out of there with a client relationship intact, I don't know.

It would go on. He'd meet people, his fat fingers gripping theirs, a moment of fear flickering in their eyes - will I get my hand back? He would bore them with his inane conversation about himself. Never pausing to ask a question about them or their reactions to his stories. The only responses he wanted were "wow, that's amazing, how amazing are you?" "I can't believe you're so young and so successful,".

Finally, when I left the company I listened to a 45 minute rant about his being poached by a company in Sydney who wanted to pay him $500,000 per year and he just wouldn't go.
"No, I wont move. What would I do with $500,00 a year? I am comfortable here. My wife likes it here. My family is here. They say I am the best in the industry. I am the best at every single function within a business. I can understand why they want me, but I just wont go, but they keep asking. What can I do?"

Puhlease, pass the brown. Paper. Bag.