The Games at Ingpin Island

Nicole had just started going through this process, but already she was troubled. Mainly because of the memory—or the hazy impression that passed for a memory—that swept her like an odorous breeze as Mr. Nickerson asked her the question again.

"Nicole, has a man ever touched your pussy?" He sized her up with unreadable eyes. "Obviously, I don't mean your dad bathing you when you were a baby. I mean sexually."

The first time he'd asked, Nicole had browsed the library of her childhood and recalled something heavy and callous on her sex, like an oven mitt, a sense that she knew her uncle's sandpaper palm, coarse from years of labor, too well. He'd always had a penchant for playing games, and some of them, like The Pit and the Pendulum, had seemed strange to her.

"I think," she began, meaning to say I think so. But she stopped. "I'm not sure."

Mr. Nickerson wrote something and twirled his pen. "You hesitated. Did you recall something you're not sure what to do with?"

Nicole balked. They'd said she needed to be honest. "Yeah, I suppose. Maybe it's just my imagination. I think something happened with one of my older relatives when I was very young. I mean, too young."

"I see." Mr. Nickerson scanned her paperwork. "Your results verify you're as virginal as you claim. Vaginally and anally." She blushed. "So if something did happen, it didn't get as far as that."

Avoiding his stare, Nicole looked around the conference room. The long table. The flat-screen mounted on the far wall.

The air-conditioning hummed.

"That's a relief. It's new to me, I'd not recalled before you'd asked."

"A lot of people have what they think are memories like that. Usually they're not real. And if they are, so what? The past is dead and gone, and if it had been too bad, don't you think you'd recall more vividly? I wouldn't worry about it."

"But if I was . . ." She struggled for the word. They told her to be honest. "If I was molested, maybe that's why I'm here."

"It says on your application you're here to pay for college."

"Well yeah. That's true. But maybe there's more than one reason."

"You can get turned on by a lot of strange things. I used to get hot in a moving car when I stuck my hand out the window. Something about the wind on my fingers. Maybe these games you played with your uncle just turned you on for some reason, even when they were perfectly innocent. Maybe they turned you on because they were perfectly innocent."

Mr. Nickerson tipped his pen on her paperwork. He leaned back, empty-handed. "The thing is, Nicole, and I don't mean to fess us up, but . . ." He chuckled. "Virgin talent. Certified virgin talent. We've never seen anything like that here. Green volunteers, sure, they cycle in and out all day long. But a first-timer on the paid side? I mean," he mimed checks on her paperwork with his pen. "That'll grease the rails. Trust me."

"Well, I hope I make it. And to be clear, when you say 'paid employee' . . ."

"One dollar." Mr. Nickerson said this with great firmness and confidence. It was the best part of the pitch. "As long as you follow the few simple rules we insist on, you will receive one dollar every. Second. That you are in the East Wing."

"A dollar a second. That's thirty-six hundred an hour."

Mr. Nickerson nodded. "Assuming a forty-hour work week—which, to be fair, is a big assumption—it's seven point two million per year. Million." Mr. Nickerson sussurated, bringing the bad news. "The pro-ration is important. You'll be fitted with an RFID chip around your ankle."

"Like a prisoner under home arrest."

"We prefer not to think of it that way, but the mechanics are like that, yeah. The second you walk out of the East Wing—which, I add, you are always perfectly welcome to do—you stop getting paid."

"And if I do the time I've committed to . . ."

"You get a bonus, by the hour. Fourteen hundred per, for an even five. Seven point two million per annum becomes an even ten."

"Real dollars?"

"Cash money. Or cashier's check. Direct deposit. Wampum bucks. However you want it."

Nicole choked, wondering if she should share the rumor she'd heard. The interview did seem to be going well, but she wanted to see his response.

"I've heard something about counterfeit or fake money getting in here."

"Yes, it can be confusing. The kingpins are for the volunteers. The talent gets U.S. dollars. Mr. Kingpin is stunningly wealthy, and he has made it quite clear that he wants to be generous to the talent."

"And the catch? I mean, I know, but explain it to me again."

"The catch: Outside of violence, anything asked of you, you have to comply. Anything done to you, you have to allow."

Nicole breathed in through her teeth.

"Sounds tough, maybe. What sorts of things do 'volunteers' ask for? What do they do?"

"Use your imagination. God knows they do." Mr. Nickerson sized her up. He said his next words carefully. "You think you'll be fucked?"

"I . . ." A lump rose in Nicole's throat. "I mean, I guess so."

"There's no 'I guess so.' You will be fucked. Probably by someone you wouldn't fuck out there in the real world. In fact, getting fucked will probably be about the least complicated thing that happens to you here." He got in Nicole's face, not confrontational, but confronting. Providing emphasis. Nicole settled in her seat. "It won't be easy. If it were easy, there'd be no money in it."

"I was afraid it would be something like that."

He gave her back her space.

"Think of it this way. You want to pay for college? Do six hours. Grin and bear it. Wanna retire at the ripe old age of twenty-one? Do two weeks, you've got four hundred grand. Do five, you're a millionaire."

He sat up and whispered. "I have talent who love it. They stay in the East Wing all day long. They don't even care about the money. We have one girl, worth more than the CEO of Ford Motor Company. She doesn't even know it, doesn't ever check with her bank. She just stays in the East Wing all day, getting whirled around like on a merry-go-ride." He twirled his fingers. "Caught up in the swirl of humanity. It's like a dream."

"But that's reckless. Doesn't she worry about getting hurt?"

"It's safer than being strapped into a rollercoaster. Safer than flying. You're never more than two seconds away from an elite security expert, highly paid to guarantee your physical integrity. We've got better screening than an Israeli airport. No one will ever enter the East Wing with so much as a butter knife. Anyone who stays on this estate—and this includes you; you've been briefed—will have to submit to a daily full-spectrum STD examination, performed by the most talented medical specialists in the world. The paperwork's all in the legal office. I'll show you. I want you go in knowing you'll be safe, knowing you can stop it anytime you want. Mr. Kingpin is the second most wealthy man in the world, and his business model spares no expense to ensure the absolute safety of anyone who participates in the festivities of the East Wing."

Nicole put up a halting palm.

"Okay, okay, you've convinced me. I mean, I've read articles about this place; I knew you were safe going in. What I'm wondering is, what's it like emotionally? I understand it's inspired some people. What if I'm not one of them?"

"We've got part-timers, we've got suck-it-up types. Don't really care about the experience, they just love the money. You know what, though? Looking at your paperwork and talking to you, I don't think you're a washout or a grin-and-bear-it. I think you're a lifer."

Nicole looked at Nickerson sideways.

"I've been at this a while, and they pay me—though not quite as well as you'll be paid—for being good at my job. Let me put it this way. Have you ever had what they call a lucid dream? A dream where you halfway remember you're awake?"

"Once. Right around when that thing with Uncle happened, actually."

"I've been told going in as talent can be like having a lucid dream, only better. You don't even have to do any work. When you had your lucid dream, what's the first thing you remember doing?"

Nicole thought back, realized the answer was obvious.

"Trying to fly."

"And what did you have to do, to fly? To keep yourself up above the Earth?"

"I, um. I had to flap my arms."

Mr. Nickerson snapped his fingers in reward.

"You had to flap your arms. You had to work. You had to suspend yourself. You had to fight the planet's mass."

For some reason he'd belabored this part of his spiel instead of simply saying, "You fought gravity."

"Yeah. It's invigorating but frightening."

"This is what a previous talent girl said." Mr. Nickerson got a vertical plaque off his desk to read. "I want to get it right. 'Being talent is like lucid dreaming, but without the fight.'" He wagged the plaque. "I liked what she said so much, I got it engraved." He put the plaque back down on his immaculate desk. On entering his office she'd realized it was the only thing on it.

Mr. Nickerson zeroed in on Nicole one last time.

"So," he summed up, getting to yes. "What's it going to be?"