Read American Innovations: Stories for Free Online Page B

ass, but also my beloved child.” Jacob ate a dumpling in one bite. “A bit too much of a moralist, though. Not a good business partner, in that sense.”
    I no longer felt intimidated by Jacob. How could I? He had looped the loop. “If Ilan was from the future, that means he could tell you about your future,” I said.
    “Sure, yes. A little.” Jacob blushed like a schoolgirl. “It’s not important. But certain things he did know. Yes. Being my son and all.”
    “Ah, so.” I, too, ate a dumpling whole. Which isn’t the kind of thing I normally do. “What about my future? Did he know anything about my future?”
    Jacob shook his head. I couldn’t tell if he was answering my question or just disapproving of it. “Right now we have my career to save,” he said. I saw that he was sweating, even along his exposed collarbone. “Can I tell you what I’m thinking? What I’m thinking is that we perform the impossibility of my dying before fathering Ilan. A little stunt show of sorts, but for real. With real guns and rope and poison and maybe some blindfolded throwing of knives. Real life. And this can drum up a bit of publicity for my work.” I felt myself getting sleepy during this speech of his, getting sleepy and thinking of circuses and of childhood trips to Las Vegas and of Ilan’s mattress and of the time a small binder clip landed on my head when I was walking outside. “I mean, it’s a bit lowbrow, but lowbrow is the new highbrow, of course, or maybe the old highbrow. It’ll be fantastic. Maybe we can go on Letterman. I bet we’ll make loads of money in addition to getting me my job back. Let’s be careful, though. Just because I can’t die doesn’t mean I can’t be pretty seriously injured. But I’ve been doing some calculations and we’ve got some real showstoppers—”
    “I’m not much of a showgirl,” I said, suppressing a yawn. “You can find someone better than me for the job.”
    Jacob looked at me intently. “We’re meant to have this future together,” he said. “My wife—she really will want to kill me when she finds out the situation I’m in. She won’t cooperate.”
    “I know people who can help you, Jacob,” I said, in the monotone of the half-asleep. “But I can’t help you. I like you, though. I really do.”
    “What’s wrong with you? Have you ever seen a marble roll up like that? I mean, these are just little anomalies, I didn’t want to frighten you, but there are many others. Right here in this room even. We have the symptoms of leaning up against time here.”
    I thought of Jacob’s blathering on about Augustine and meaningful motion and yearning. I also felt convinced I’d been drugged. Not just because of my fatigue but because I was beginning to find Jacob vaguely attractive. His sweaty collarbone was pretty. The room around me—the futon, the Chinese food, the porcelain teacup, the rusty laboratory, the piles of papers, Ilan’s note in my back pocket, Jacob’s cheap dress socks, the dust, Jacob’s ringed hand on his knee—these all seemed like players in a life of mine that had not yet become real, a life I was coursing toward. “Do you think,” I found myself asking, maybe because I’d had this feeling just once before in my life, “that Ilan was a rare and tragic genius?”
    Jacob laughed.
    I shrugged. I leaned my sleepy head against his shoulder. I put my hand to his collarbone.
    “I can tell you this about your future,” Jacob said quietly. “I didn’t not hear that question. So let me soothsay this. You’ll never get over Ilan. And that will one day horrify you. But soon enough you’ll settle on a replacement object for all that love of yours, which does you about as much good as a life jacket in a train wreck. Your present, if you’ll excuse my saying so, is a pretty sorry one. But your future looks great. Your work will amount to nothing. But you’ll have a brilliant child. And a brilliant husband. And great love.”
    He was