Everything Inside

“Seven Stories” begins as Kim, a Brooklyn-based writer, arrives on an unnamed Caribbean island at the invitation of her friend Callie Morrissette, the prime minister’s wife. Callie’s father, Charles Morrissette, had been the island’s most famous prime minister before he was assassinated when Kim and Callie were seven years old. Callie and her mother fled the island and moved to Brooklyn, where they were taken in by a family member, who happened to be Kim’s neighbor. Callie and her mother returned to the island after a month, when the assassins were tried and jailed. As an adult, Kim wrote an essay for an online magazine about the month she and Callie spent together; excerpts from this essay are included in the story. Callie invited Kim to the island after reading the essay.

While on the island, Kim stays with Callie and her husband, Greg, in the prime minister’s residence, and attends a New Year’s Eve gala where she socializes with the island’s most prominent citizens, including a finance minister and Olympic runner who she calls Finance and Runner. She accompanies Callie and Greg on a highly-sanitized public relations tour of a hospital; Callie also arranges for Kim to tour the island privately, with a security guard.