The five minutes lingered like they were trying to flex on the clock, dragging themselves out with the smug ease of an '82 Lafite that knows you paid too much for it and still wants you to savor every molecule.
The whole room breathed in sync. Velvet chairs exhaled tiny, bougie sighs every time someone shifted. Whispers threaded the air in a dozen dialects, each one carrying its own flavor: Gulf Arabic rumbling like velvet thunder, Oxbridge chopping the air clean and cold, Portuguese rolling warm like sunlit sidewalks, Japanese slicing through the atmosphere with that quiet blade confidence. Laughter flickered in pockets, that billionaire-class kind you hear right before someone signs away a country or a marriage.
