I’ve always hated heights.
Even as a kid, I couldn’t stand being near the edge of a balcony. Glass floors made my knees buckle. Even pictures of cliffs made my stomach twist.
In my 18 years of life, I had never — not once — ridden a roller coaster. Not for birthdays. Not for friends. Not even for dares.
The idea of it didn’t seem thrilling or daring or exciting to me — it seemed like pure insanity.
So when my friends came to me with this wild idea — some new “therapy challenge” they’d seen online — I should have said no immediately.
The deal was simple, they said: ride a ferris wheel for 24 hours straight. No complaining, no whining, no quitting. Do that, and a company would pay me $10,000.
If I complained, they warned, there would be penalties. They laughed when they said it, like it was just some harmless joke. I needed the money. Desperately. So I agreed.
I didn’t read the contract carefully. I should have.
I stepped into the capsule just as the sun began to set, the city glowing golden in the distance. The capsule was bigger than I expected, more like a small glass room than a typical ferris wheel seat. Inside, a cushioned bench wrapped around the sides, and cameras blinked in each corner.
The door sealed behind me with a hiss, and a voice crackled over the speaker: “Challenge start. Good luck, Elvie.”
The wheel began to turn, slow and deliberate. My stomach flipped immediately. I clenched the edge of the bench so hard my knuckles turned white.
Fifteen minutes in, I was already miserable. Sweating. Trembling. Muttering protests into the empty air.
It didn’t take long before I heard a soft ding overhead. “Complaint registered. $1,000 penalty,” the voice said calmly. Another ding. “Complaint registered. $1,000 penaly.”
I was losing the money faster than I could even realize. I didn’t realize when it got to $0. I was too scared to care. An hour passed. Maybe two. I couldn’t keep track.
The capsule chimed again. “First penalty activating.”
Before I could react, a hidden panel opened in the wall, and a mechanical arm extended toward me — carrying something bright and shiny. A hot pink catsuit.
Another panel opened on the opposite wall, deploying heavy metal cuffs.
I scrambled backward, heart pounding, but the voice came again: “Noncompliance will result in escalation.”
The system didn’t wait for me to agree. Robotic arms seized my wrists and ankles, moving fast but strangely gentle, and dressed me in the skin-tight catsuit, sealing it shut up the back. The fabric clung to every inch of me — hot, sticky, humiliating.
The cuffs locked around my wrists and ankles with a loud click, pinning me to the bench. I barely had time to whimper before another arm pressed a thick strip of gray tape across my mouth.
I screamed behind it — a pathetic, muffled sound. Nobody answered.
The cameras blinked at me, silently recording everything. I realized then: I wasn’t getting off. Not even if I begged. I was trapped here. For twenty-four hours. No matter what.
The night dragged on. The sun set fully, leaving the city below a carpet of sparkling lights.
From up here, the streets looked so small. So beautiful.
It made it even worse, somehow — knowing how close everything was. Knowing that thousands of people bustled below me, laughing, eating, living, completely unaware that high above them, I was locked in a glass cage, gagged and helpless.
Nobody even looked up. The penalties didn’t stop. At hour six, another mechanical arm deployed.
This time, it carried a sleek chrome mount — and attached to it was a dildo, smooth and gleaming under the capsule’s lights. It bolted itself to the floor in front of me with a terrible finality.
Another soft adjustment: the bench shifted backward slightly, spreading my legs. The dildo didn’t thrust, didn’t move — it just hovered there, aimed exactly where it wanted to go. Waiting.
I cried, silently, shaking in the cuffs, but there was nothing left to fight with. I wasn’t even really angry anymore. Or scared. Just numb.
The hours blurred.
Sometimes the dildo pressed forward slightly, nudging the fabric of the catsuit between my legs, sending little electric jolts of terror through me — but it never went further. The anticipation was its own kind of torture.
The wheel turned, endlessly slow. The cameras blinked… watching…
My muscles cramped. Sweat soaked the catsuit.
I drifted in and out of a strange, broken half-sleep, rocked by the slow motion of the wheel. Every time I woke, the dildo was still there. The cameras were still watching. And the city below was still laughing, oblivious.
I lost track of everything. The smell of the suit. The bite of the cuffs. The constant dry ache in my throat from breathing through my nose.
Time melted. I became nothing.
Sometime near dawn, the dildo finally retracted. The first pink threads of morning light stretched across the sky, and the city began to stir again — early joggers, buses, the quiet rush of life beginning anew.
The wheel began to slow. One last chime sounded: “Challenge complete.”
With a hiss, the cuffs released my wrists and ankles. The gray tape was peeled from my mouth in a single long, slow pull, leaving my lips raw and trembling. The door slid open.
Cold morning air rushed into the capsule, cooling the sweat on my skin. I staggered forward, barely able to walk.
Two workers in white coats waited at the platform, impassive. They didn’t speak. hey didn’t congratulate me.
They simply watched as I stumbled away from the ride that had devoured me. I didn’t look back.
It’s been three days since I got off the wheel. I sit at my bedroom window now, knees hugged to my chest, staring out at the skyline. From a distance, it still looks beautiful. Up close, it feels poisoned.
Sometimes I wake up feeling the phantom pressure of the cuffs, the gag, the unyielding dildo pressed against me.
I never told anyone the truth. When my friends ask, I just smile weakly and say, “yeah. I’m not scared of heights anymore.” And it’s true.
Nothing so simple as height can scare me now. Only people. Only what they can do when you trust them.
I watch the sun sink behind the towers, setting the city ablaze in orange and gold. And I wonder how many other girls are out there right now — signing contracts they’ll never survive.
