Honestly, he had never thought about any inheritance he might get from his grandfather.

Jason wasn’t expecting his grandfather, an old timer who didn’t even own a cellphone, to show up at his apartment. The old guy hardly even knew what a text was, and Jason was sure that his grandfather had never sent one, so Gramps always showed up out of the blue. For crying out loud, the old fart still had a rotary dial phone sitting on his desk. Nevertheless, his grandfather was a kind man, who had always brought him treats as a child, arriving at the house with the oddest candy he could find, like the Japanese rice candy with the edible “cellophane” wrapper, gummi pizzas and lizards, or Sour Flush candy in a little plastic toilet.

So when he opened the door and saw his grandfather standing outside, Jason was at least expecting some candy, even if he was 23 years old.

“Gramps! Come in.” Jason waved toward the interior of his apartment.

His grandfather removed his Panama hat, and Jason noted the old man was wearing his usual Tommy Bahama shirt and Dockers, coupled with penny loafers holding genuine silver Mercury dimes. The old guy smiled and took his customary seat on the couch, setting his straw hat on one side of him and a small black gym bag on the other.

“Can I get you something to drink? Jason asked.

“Sure. I’ll have a Keystone Lite if you’ve got one. Or a rum and soda.” Gramps’ voice rose up hopefully at the latter request.

“Sorry, Gramps, but I do have Keystone Lite.” Jason went to the kitchen and grabbed two tall beers from the fridge. He saw that he had nothing to eat that he could offer his grandfather, other than a stale quarter pizza. While he set the next two beers in the freezer to cool, a quick look inside revealed half a bag of frozen chile verde burritos and a box of pizza rolls. He shouted from the edge of the freezer door, “Are you going to work out? Want some pizza rolls?”

“No thanks, I’m on a diet,” Gramps hollered back. “I did my workout this morning.”

Jason came back into the living room and handed his grandfather a beer in a Boise State Broncos insulator, the old man’s favorite team, especially after he refused to watch professional sports. “What’s in the bag?”

“Your inheritance.” Gramps picked up the bag and held it in his lap.

Jason was taken aback, and focused on the gym bag. His grandfather had some money, sure, but not a lot. After all, the guy’s car was twelve years old, at least. Gramps hadn’t tried to stuff several thousand dollars in cash into a gym bag, had he? Jason struggled to tamp down his hopes.

“You’re not ill or anything, are you?” Jason asked, fearing the worst.

“No, I’m fine, but I wanted to give this to you while I can, while it can benefit you.” His grandfather set his beer on the table next to the couch and unzipped the vinyl bag. He pulled out a headband with wires attached to it, and a fitness watch.

Jason thought maybe Gramps needed to remove those items first so he could get to the bundles of cash, but then he noted like the bag looked like it was otherwise empty. What the holy hell? “What’s that?”

“It’s a video game.” Gramps expression was sincere, and not the look of someone playing a prank. “I call it The Midas Game.”

Jason’s beer slipped out his grip and nearly tumbled to the floor, but he caught it between his knees. He was right to tamp down his hopes. Sure, he liked video games as much as anyone, but he hardly expected one as his inheritance. “Where’s the joystick? Control panel? Screen? You hook it up to a TV or a computer?” Jason wasn’t asking questions so much as trying to make sense out of insanity.

“I see that look. I know, I know, a video game isn’t what you wanted.” Gramps held up the headband with the wires ending in what looked like a phone jack, in one hand, and the fitness watch in the other.

Dementia, that was it. The old guy was losing his mind. Sadly, Gramps must have stumbled into a thrift store and bought some junk items, thinking they were part of a video game, and the clerk took advantage of his obvious senility to rip him off for several hundred dollars. Jason opened his beer with a crack and a hiss. He ignored the foam pouring out and took several long, deep gulps.

Gramps continued. “I realize that like any 22-year-old guy…”

“23,” Jason interjected.

“…you want cash, and I can’t blame you.” The old man set down the junk items and popped open his beer. He took a sip before going on. “But studies show that people who inherit money tend to blow it. If you don’t earn the money yourself, you don’t appreciate it. If you don’t know how to earn it, you won’t know how to keep it. This video game will make you rich.”

Jason let out a deep breath. “Gramps, I know you mean well, but somebody’s taken you for a ride.” He hated to have to be the one to break the news to the old man. The good news was that Gramps had become so senile that he wouldn’t realize what a sucker he was.

“Look, kid, I get it. I don’t have a cellphone or a tattoo, so I’m hopelessly out of it.” He took another sip of beer and shrugged his shoulders. “The technology is cutting edge, so by contract I pay nothing until they deliver a working prototype.”

“Oh, no, please Lord, no,” Jason pleaded silently, as a feeling of dread built in the pit of his stomach. “How, I mean, how much, exactly, did you agree to pay for…that?”

“37,000 dollars,” his grandfather replied matter-of-factly.

This time Jason’s beer slipped from his grasp and he failed to catch it as he stared slack-jawed at the old man. The blue Keystone Lite can lay on its side, oozing foam and beer at his feet while Jason’s mind reeled, stumbling down a long, winding corridor of stupefaction. He suddenly realized he had dropped his beer, which he could smell as it poured out over the carpet. Grabbing a towel from the armrest of his recliner, he fell to his knees and began sopping up the mess.

Jason got up and dashed to the kitchen sink, where he wrung out the towel before returning to work on the puddle on the floor in front of his chair.

“You think I’ve lost my mind. It’s okay—you don’t have to say anything; just hear me out.” Gramps held up what looked like a sweatband out of the 70’s. “You download an app from the site, and slip the headband over your head as you sleep. The connections monitor your brainwaves via Bluetooth. As you lapse into alpha rhythm sleep, the program displays in your dreams.”

Jason focused on scrubbing the floor so that the old guy wouldn’t see the look of incredulity on his face.

“What is novel is that your bank account and your physical health…” At this point Gramps held up the fitness watch, which Jason saw from his peripheral vision. “…are connected to the game. As you grow stronger in real life, you grow stronger in the game. As you grow wealthier in real life, you grow wealthier in the game.”

“Excuse me,” Jason mumbled and rushed to the kitchen with the wet towel. He tossed the towel into the sink and reached up into the cabinet. Seizing the bottle of Jim Beam, he nearly wrenched off the cap and began guzzling straight from the bottle. THIRTY-SEVEN THOUSAND FUCKING DOLLARS! He waited for his heartrate to return to normal and the look of sheer disillusionment to disappear from his face, but then realized that he would be waiting until sometime next week, so he returned to the living room with two cold Keystone Lites, one of which he rubbed against his forehead to dull the headache.

“You know, Gramps, if you wanted to get that 37 thousand dollars in cash, I can guarantee you I’ll spend it responsibly.” For the second time in as many minutes, Jason was making a desperate plea.

“Sorry, but it has to be like this, son.” Grandpa declined the Keystone Lite Jason offered him, raising the still unfinished beer in his hand. “There are just three stipulations.”

Jason wasn’t in the least worried about stipulations, because the whole video game was a farce, a cruel joke played on a helpless old man who had lost his faculties. What were the stipulations? No playing polo while riding a sea horse? No narwhals in his aquarium? That he must not break Michael Jordan’s scoring record, nor walk on the surface of the sun with a stick of butter in each hand?

The old man continued, oblivious to the feeling of numbness spreading across Jason’s face. “Number one, the app has access to your bank account. The program can neither deposit nor withdraw anything, but merely monitors activity and your current balance. Number two, all your purchases must be electronic, no cash, so they can be tracked. Number three, you can’t get married.”

“Uh, you see, I uh…” Jason didn’t want to offend the old man, so he tried to figure out how to tell the old fart that he was a senile dipshit, only without hurting the old codger’s feelings.

“Let’s cut the bullshit. You think I’m crazy. Try the game for a week. If it doesn’t work, I pay them nothing, and you get the 37 thousand deposited into your bank account. I may be crazy, but I’m not walking around with that much cash.” The old guy stood up and drained the last of his beer before setting the empty can onto an issue of Guns and Ammo lying on the end table. He put his hat on his gray head and reached into his breast pocket to fish out a business card, which he handed to Jason. “The website is here on this card, as well as the access code. Download the app and try it tonight. Just humor me, okay?”

Jason took the business card and tried to look appreciative. “Sure thing, Gramps. No problem.”

“Thanks for the beer,” Gramps said, tipping his hat as he turned to walk to his beat-up car.

Jason smiled and waved to the old man getting into his car, then he closed the front door. Sighing heavily, he slumped forward and knocked his forehead against the wall in the entryway. Sonofabitch. He was going to have to wait until tomorrow to get his money.

* * *

Jason hardly slept last night, despite several generous helpings of Jim Beam. He just needed to get in touch with Gramps, and the 37,000 dollars were his, but the old codger didn’t have a cellphone. Maybe his grandfather was expecting Jason to send him a message by carrier pigeon, telegraph, or the bat signal. Jason spent all night tossing and turning, thinking how he would spend the money, but eventually he decided that it was unfair of him to profit from the old man’s deteriorating mind, so he vowed that at least some portion of that money was going toward his grandfather’s treatment. Yes, Parkinson’s disease was incurable, but its progress could be slowed, and if the old guy had schizophrenia, there were all kinds of promising new drugs—Jason had researched it himself last night.

Someone knocked at the door. Yes! Payday! Jason caught himself, and tried his best to look disappointed. He needed to adopt an inner script that he’d tried and tried, but was so dejected that Gramps’ “video game” didn’t work.

He opened the door and put on his sad face. “Gramps, what a bummer. I hate telling you this, but the thing didn’t work at all. What a shame! I figure we can take my car to the bank, and you can do either a direct deposit or a...”

“Cut the bullshit, son.” Gramps wasn’t angry, but he wasn’t in a happy mood, either. “You didn’t go to the website and load the app, did you?”

Sonofabitch. How did the old fart know? “Well, I was going to, but I realized that if I gave them my account information, I was wide open for a phishing scam. I mean, they could clean me out.” Jason was proud of himself for making that up on the spot.

“As long as we’re cutting the bullshit, how much money do you have in your bank account right now?” Gramps crossed his arms over each other and regarded him evenly.

“Uh, let’s see, it could be, oh, if we count that last check, it’s right around, give or take several hundred dollars, I’d have to go online to check my account, but…”

“Do you even have anything?” The old man’s arms remained crossed, and his expression was firm.

“Uh, actually…no.” Jason felt his cheeks become flush with embarrassment. “I’ve got forty bucks, tops.”

“What do you have to lose?” Gramps asked sternly. “Why do you think I had a game developed that would make you rich? Why is it called ‘The Midas Game’? If they take even one cent, one damn cent of your money, the 37 thousand dollars is yours.”

Jason’s shoulders slumped in resignation. He was busted. “Okay, Gramps. I’ll give it a try.”

“Bye.” Gramps was definitely less cheerful than yesterday. He didn’t bother waving as he turned and walked to his car.

Jason closed the front door and knocked his forehead against the wall. Dammit. He was going to have to wait two days to get his money.

* * *

So there was a website, and it was real: themidasgame.com. Jason felt saddened at the lengths that scammers would go to in order to defraud feeble-minded old timers, practically shrouded in dust, out of their money. So he logged in, providing his “access code.” Sure enough, just as he figured, they asked for his bank account information, but he didn’t panic. Yes, there was $32.17 in his checking account, but after they cleaned that out, the 37 thousand dollars would more than cover that. Let’s see, what was 37,000 minus 32.17? Thirty-six thousand and nine hundred something. That was a year’s teacher’s salary for him.

Once again, he spent the night churning restlessly in his bed, thinking what he would do with all that money. Maybe 37 thousand wasn’t a fortune, but it was more money than he’d ever had in his life. That money would go to treatment for his grandfather, first of all, and no matter how forcefully the doctors might insist, electroshock therapy or a prefrontal lobotomy were out of the question.

Jason sipped his coffee while staring at the front door. He could smell the beer from yesterday’s spill at the foot of his recliner. Despite the fact that he was expecting it, he jumped when he heard a knock. He fought to dampen his elation, because it was show time, so he briefly rehearsed his lines like a nervous actor pacing in the wings. “Oh, darn it all! I logged into the site but the whole dream thing didn’t work. It’s so frustrating! After two whole nights of trying to make the thing work, I’ve been robbed again. Curses!”

The opening of the front door was like the stage curtain parting, sweeping back into the wings. “Gramps! Oh, darn it all! I logged into the site but the whole dream thing didn’t work…”

His grandfather looked pissed. He glowered at Jason under his hairy eyebrows. “How many days are we going to go through this bullshit? You logged in last night, but the device didn’t register any alpha waves, nor any brainwaves, for that matter. Try putting the headband on. If you really did put the headband on last night, you’re officially brain dead. You decide how long you want to be a broke jerkoff.”

Without another word, the old man turned on his heels and stomped off to his car.

Jason closed the front door and butted his forehead against the wall. This sucked ass. He was going to have to wait three damn days to get his money.