A man with a hat sat in the blank, white waiting room, clutching the small piece of paper in his fist. The room itself was small, only containing a few blue chairs, a coffee table and a single picture on the yellowed walls. It was all so generic; boring.

The man’s knee bounced up and down in this waiting room as he sat. How long had he been there, ten, fifteen minutes? He couldn’t be sure. He hadn’t seen many people in the building when he entered, just one old receptionist in the front. He had shown her the letter he had received in the mail from this particular building. She took it, her hand shaking slightly -as most elderly people’s hands do, and gave it a long look. Handing it back to him, she said that they would receive him shortly, and ushered him into the, small, dank, white room. He was still sitting, and waiting. He took off his hat, and began to twirl it around between his fingers.

When he was by himself, he tended to think. At this moment, he thought about home, and how he might not have a home soon. He thought about all the debts he had looming over him. He cleared his throat, and shook his head, for he felt as if they were suffocating him.

He swayed back and forth in his chair. Why was it taking them so long to see him? For some odd reason he began to regret coming here, the whole place made him feel uneasy.

The second he concluded he was going to leave, the door tore open, with a man standing behind it. He looked stern, and quiet. The two stared at each other for a moment, and the stern man gestured for him to follow.
The man with the hat stood, still clutching the paper tightly, and walked behind him. He was led through a plain white hallway, slightly yellowed with age. Above them a light flickered and danced with its last moments of life. The stern man stopped in front of a door, opened it, and gestured for him to go in. The man with the hat stood there a moment, weighing his options. He could still leave if he wanted, he didn’t have to go into that room. He didn’t even understand why he was feeling so uneasy about all of it anyway. Something just didn’t feel right. The man with the hat gave a short, resolute sigh, and walked into the room. The door shut behind him, and he felt as if that solidified his decision, as if there was no going back.


The room was flawless, the walls and floors were pure white, except for the wall to the left, for it had some sort of long darkened window on it. In front of him was a long, black desk, where there was nothing upon it, and looked newly cleaned. Behind the desk was a tall, black desk chair, facing backwards. The room seemed far too big to have far too few things inside it.

“Well, are you going to sit down?” A cold, unforgiving voice said from behind the chair.

This made the man with the hat jump, and he quickly walked up to the desk, his footsteps echoing on the walls, and sat down in the chair in front of the desk.

The tall chair behind the desk swiveled around, and sitting upon it was a clean looking man. He had severely pale skin, dark eyes, and grey, sleeked back hair. He had high cheek bones, making his thin face look sharp and predatory.

“Do you have the paper?” He asked his face expressionless.

The man with the hat nodded, seeming to have forgotten his voice, and handed the man the paper. He had kept it in his fist for so long, he felt as if something was missing. The clean man took it from him and glanced at it for a moment. Once satisfied, he placed the paper on his perfect desk.

“Well,” the far too clean man said, “just as the letter says, all you must do is one simple thing. Just one thing for me and you’ll have the money you need.”

The man with the hat felt his neck grow hot. He always began to sweat when he was nervous. What was this clean man going to make him do?

“I will keep it plain and simple. I won’t answer any of your questions, save only one. You may ask only one. But, I would save that for a later time. Now,” he leaned down and grabbed something from under his desk,” all I want you to do,” he reveals what looks like a remote. It had five buttons, each numbered, “is press the buttons. One at a time, press them all, and the money will be yours.”

A thousand questions burned in the man with the hat’s mind. “What did that button do?”

“That is your question, and the answer is,” the clean man said, pointing to the button with a 1 on it, “it turns on a light.”


The man with the hat wasted his only question by thinking out loud. If that was the truth, what could a light do? There had to be something more to this little remote. He couldn’t ask any more questions, so there was only one way to find out. The clean man watched as the man with the hat lifted his hand to the button. Thousands of possibilities came to the man’s mind as his hand met the sleek, square secret.


In fact, a light did turn on. The long darkened window illuminated, revealing an almost empty room. Inside the room was a metal table, and upon that table was a young woman. Her hands and feet were bound, and she looked around the room, terrified. She couldn’t see them, and the man with the hat discovered that the window must’ve been one sided.


The man with the hat felt his throat go dry. What was going on? What was this man going to make him do? He looked up at the cold, clean man. He stared at him, expectantly, his cold, dark eyes telling him to do something. The man with the hat swallowed hard, and looked back into the window. Her bright red hair was a tangled mess; she looked so weak and helpless. What was he supposed to do? Without thinking he pressed the second button.


The girl’s piercing scream broke the oppressive silence. It lasted only a few seconds, but it sounded so full of pain, that it made the man with the hat shiver. He wished this was all a bad dream and he could just wake up from it. It wasn’t, and he needed to press the next button. He closed his eyes, reliving her screams. He couldn’t do it; he couldn’t press the next button. Who knew what it would do? The dark, clean man did, but the man with the hat knew he wouldn’t be of any help. Why did he choose to go through that door? He knew he had a bad feeling the moment he entered the building. Why couldn’t he have listened to himself?


His mind switched to another topic, something he did when he was in uncomfortable situations, and he thought about home again. Small, almost empty, and he thought about how he no longer had a beautiful little girl in his house. They took her away. Now they wanted to take his house too. Then he remembered why he was here in the first place. He was there to get the money he was promised.

He held his breath and pressed the third button. Her agonized screams filled the room. This time it seemed an eternity had passed before her screams ceased. Her head dropped and she breathed heavily.

The man with the hat didn’t want to do this anymore. His heart raced a thousand miles per hour, and her screams still rang in his ears. Why did he come here? He thought of his home and his debts once again, he had nothing but misery waiting for him back at home, unless he was able to get the money.

The man with the hat wanted this all to end. He didn’t want to make these decisions. Only two more buttons, he only had to press two more. Could he honestly do this? Cause this poor girl more pain unknown to him, just so he could get whatever poor sum they were to give him? The more he thought about it, the more grotesque it became, and then a flash of her popped into his head. Her short, dark curls, chubby fingers, and innocent green eyes sitting in a room shared with other children like her. They took her from him, his only light. He had to do this.

He sucked in a breath, and pressed the fourth button. He blocked out the screams. Once she stopped, he looked up at her. One more button, only one more, and he could leave with the money. She was so pathetic, her body limp, but she was still breathing.

“”Is she going to die?” He asked the cold, clean man. Of course, he didn’t respond, he wouldn’t answer any more of his questions.

The man with the hat placed his finger over the fifth button. As he watched, the girl lifted her head. She seemed to stare at him, as if she could see the both of them. She looked directly into the man with the hat’s eyes, begging him not to press the last button.

He did.

She stared at him with the last moments of her life, a seemingly pitying expression on her face, as if she felt bad for him.

There was a long silence after she had let go of her last breath. The window darkened again, and it was just the two of them. The clean man finally moved, and pulled out a pen and paper, keeping his face expressionless. Just as he had said, he wrote the man a check, it contained much more than the man had hoped for.

That night the man with the hat has very unpleasant and disturbing dreams.
…
When he awoke, he was cold, and darkness was all around him. He felt so uncomfortable, and when he tried to move, he found that his hands and feet were bound. Suddenly, a light tuned on. His heart skipped a beat as he looked around furiously. He was in an almost empty room. Across from him was a darkened window. His throat became clogged with dread.

Suddenly, an electric shock coursed through his body. He felt as of every inch of him had been caught on fire. It stopped as suddenly as it had started. There was a long pause, and it happened again, this time it felt worse and it lasted twice as long. He let out a pained scream, and it finally came to an end.

In the intermission, he let his head drop, and he thought of the girl that had the same thing happen to her. He let guilt wash over him and silently begged for the third onslaught of pain. He deserved it and it came to him. Agony washed over his every nerve and he couldn’t help himself from screaming. When it finally ended, he came to a realization. He lifted his head to see that the window was no longer dark. He saw the cold, clean man and a young girl on the other side of it. He wondered what her story was, she looked no older than sixteen, what could she need the money for?

His voice gone, there was nothing more that he could do but stare into her eyes, begging her not to press the last button. He didn’t care for his life anymore; he just wanted to stop this girl from ending hers. He stared at her and saw her lips move. They formed the words that he himself had asked, “Is he going to die if I press the last button?”

The girl must not have wasted her question, because the cold, clean man gave a short nod.

The girl turned and looked at the man with the hat, and he saw in her eyes that she had made her decision.