“Best of all, you don’t have to pay tax on options when they’re granted, assuming the strike price is near the stock value. They’re worthless until the stock goes up and you exercise them.”

There was more to the contract: a non-disclosure and a non-compete. Wallace walked him through it all.

“Sometimes we see clawback provisions or a buy-sell agreement,” he said. “You don’t have that here. This contract looks pretty good. I’d sign it.”

Desmond thanked the man, and asked him to send him a bill. He wrote out his address at the RV park.

Wallace studied the address and said, “Forget it, Desmond. Just keep me in mind if you start a company or have more substantial legal work.”

Desmond liked that. It meant the lawyer recognized his potential, was willing to bet that Desmond would one day be a bigger fish.

He called xTV back that night and said he could start the next day if they provided more stock and a lower salary. He wanted just enough to live on. They agreed.

Desmond found startup life to his liking. It was strangely similar to working on the rigs: long hours, deadlines, stressed-out people keyed up on coffee and energy drinks, and wild parties at regular intervals. But where his and Orville’s release had taken place in honky-tonk bars, strip clubs, and casinos, the startup parties were thrown at swanky restaurants and hotel ballrooms. Desmond couldn’t imagine the cost. It was perhaps the only thing that worried him about the company.

He wasn’t the only one concerned. The guys in finance were constantly obsessing about their burn rate—the amount of money the company spent every month. The CEO, however, seemed completely unconcerned.

At a hotel ballroom on a Friday night, their visionary founder stood before his employees and guests and announced that xTV had just registered its one millionth user.

Cheers went up.

He paced the stage, microphone in hand.

“We’re democratizing TV. With the video cameras we provide, our users can capture what viewers really want to see: real life. And they can upload that footage directly to the xTV website, where they earn money from it.”

The screen behind him began playing a montage of clips, all muted.

“We’ve got a farmer in South Dakota giving people a look at what that harsh life is like. A teen mom in Atlanta struggling to make ends meet. An artist in Brooklyn selling his paintings in the subway and coffee shops. A singer in Seattle. A fishing competition in Alabama. A drag strip in North Carolina. A firefighter in Chicago.

“This is real life. These are the stories we crave.