On my first day I told my supervisor we were on Undercover Boss. I wasn’t a barista but in fact the boss of Starbucks. I said I’d told him because I didn’t want us embarrassing Starbucks on TV. Starbucks needed to be cool. That’s why I’d be drinking a lot, like Johnny Depp. Maybe I was also addicted to coke, I added. If I behaved erratically, the staff shouldn’t be alarmed.

I’d make coffees, I explained, “But only sometimes and they might be terrible. Do not criticise me.” I nodded at a plant. I said Undercover Boss had cameras everywhere.

Yoel Noorali is the author of The Kingdom.