Tomorrow Will Be Better

6:47 AM. Outlook. “You around?”

You answer yes. Coffee. Shower. Uber. Comments. Client call. More comments. Lunch at your desk. Someone says tonight should be light. At 9:14 PM the client sends a new request. At 11:38 PM your associate says it should be quick. At 1:52 AM you get in an Uber and tell yourself tomorrow will be better.

6:47 AM. Outlook. “You around?”

At first you think you’re losing your mind. Then you realize the day is identical. Same market moves. Same client call. Same comments. Same typo on page 37. Same associate saying “should be quick” at 11:38. By the twentieth loop you start preparing for things before they happen. You fix page 37 at 8:06. You build the sensitivity before the VP asks. You send the client the answer to a question they have not asked yet. People notice. “Great instincts.” “Strong attention to detail.” “Really mature for your level.”

By loop 50, you are the best analyst in the group. That feels incredible, for about a day. Then it feels normal.

So you aim higher. You know every market move before it happens. You know which stock gaps up at 10:17, which company announces at 7:30, which CEO panics at 3:12 and which buyer comes back at 5:41. You start trading. Small at first, then bigger. By loop 200, you have enough money to quit, so you do.

6:47 AM. Outlook. “You around?”

The resignation does not survive the reset.

You stop trying to escape and start trying to win. You learn every model, every sector, every client, every person. You know what the MD is going to say before he says it. You know which VP hates the group head, which client is bluffing, which deal dies and which one signs. You start telling senior people what is going to happen. At first they think you are smart. Then brilliant. Then terrifying. By loop 700, you are running deals. By loop 1,400, you are effectively running the group. By loop 2,100, the group head asks how you keep getting everything right.

You realize promotions are just another puzzle. You know what every senior banker wants to hear. You know which client needs to be called first, which board member will cave, which deal makes the firm look good. You become MD. That one feels incredible, but then normal again.

So you keep going. You source deals nobody sees coming. You pitch transactions before the companies know they want them. CNBC starts calling you a genius and the CEO invites you upstairs. By loop 5,000 you are on the management committee and by loop 7,300 you are CEO.

You sit in the corner office and look out over Midtown, this has to be it.

Everyone who used to send you comments now waits for your approval. People laugh harder at your jokes. Your old associate asks if you have five minutes. You make him wait.

That feels incredible, but then normal again.

So you buy the bank.

You already know what every stock will do. You know every announcement, every rumor, every spread move. By loop 12,000 you own 20%. By loop 15,000, 38%. By loop 18,406, 51.2%.

The board works for you. The CEO title is ceremonial. The bank is yours.

You buy competitors. Merge divisions. Fire the MD who once made you redo page 37 and hire him back because it's funnier. At 9:14 PM you announce the largest acquisition in the firm’s history. At 10:30 PM the stock rallies exactly as you knew it would. At 11:38 PM CNBC calls you the most important banker of your generation. At 12:07 AM your net worth crosses $40 billion.

At 1:21 AM you are alone in the executive dining room.

No comments. No calls. No one above you and nothing left to win.

Your phone is full of messages from people congratulating you, you do not answer any of them.

There is no point.

At 1:52 AM you get into the same Uber. The driver asks if you had a good day.

You look back at the building (you own it).

Then the title disappears. The money disappears. The bank disappears. Every deal disappears. Every person forgets your name. Every conversation you had is erased. Every relationship resets to whatever it was before you became important.

No one remembers that you won, but you do.

The driver asks if tomorrow will be easier.

You stare out the window.

You have spent eighteen thousand days becoming the most powerful man on Wall Street, and not one of them counted.

“Yeah,” you say.

“Tomorrow will be better.”

6:47 AM.

Outlook.

“You around?”

You answer yes.