“They do background checks, remember. He’s not a sex predator. And if he turns out to be something other than who he says he is, you can just leave and never talk to him again. But if he is who he says he is and he travelled all the way from . . . where did he say he was from?”
“He didn’t. When he suggested meeting, I suggested meeting somewhere in between our two locations and he just said to pick the time, date, and place and he’d be there.”
“Maybe he’s homeless.”
“Homeless guys have computer access?”
“Everyone has computer access, hon.”
“Arrgh!” Ella growled in frustration. “Why am I standing outside in the cold having this ridiculous conversation with you?”
“I have no idea. Get in there and meet him already! Call me later and let me know how it goes. I want details!”
Ella disconnected, stowed her phone in her purse and took a deep breath, smoothing out an invisible wrinkle in her dress. This was it. She was finally going to meet Herman, who liked coffee but not tea, loved action movies and had never seen an episode ofGrey’s Anatomy,and who agreed with her that Duke Ellington was not only the greatest jazz musician, but the greatest musician ever, period.
Ella gave her name to the maître d’ at the door, who whisked her to a table towards the back of the restaurant where a very familiar-looking man sat, looking just as nervous as she felt. “Thank God it’s actually him,” she whispered under her breath.
Seeing her approach, he smiled and stood up, revealing a tuxedo shirt, jacket and tie with jeans. Her smile quavered slightly. So he had offbeat fashion sense, so what? At least he didn’t show up for her date with food-stained clothes or cut-off jean shorts, which two of her previous dates had done.
“You’re even lovelier in person,” he said, taking her hand in his for an awkward shake, and then giving her an even more awkward kiss on the cheek. His voice was warm and comfortable, with a hint of familiarity.
“Thank you. It’s so nice to finally meet you in person,” she said, taking the seat he held out for her.
“So I’ve been dying to ask, did you solve the case of the missing lunches?” he asked as they looked over the menu.
She laughed, thinking of the student she had told him about. “Yes. Apparently he didn’t like what his mom was packing for him in the morning, so he kept ‘losing’ them at schoolin order to have hot lunch instead. He’d been throwing away the lunches in the boys’ restroom before schoolor giving them to other kids.”
“You’ve got to admire that kind of ingenuity,” he said with a dazzling smile and the two of them lapsed into easy conversation that lasted throughout the meal.
Ella was enjoying herself, enjoying the ease with which she related to him, as if he was an old friend. It was almost inconceivable that they had never met face to face until today, and even more strangeto think they’d met on some kooky website, which was just what she was about to say to him until he interrupted her with a guilty look, saying, “I’ve been avoiding the subject, but I think we need to talk about the future.”
She blinked. “The future of us? We just met.”
“No. I mean, yes, we probably should talk about that too, but no, I meant the future. I need to explain to you about the website.”
“Oh, that.” She waved her hand. “I know it’s silly. My friend and I were just being crazy one night and joined up. Was it a similar thing with you too?”
“I figured as much, which is why I’ve been avoiding the subject. I don’t want to upset you, but we can’t build on a relationship when the whole truth isn’t out there.” He took a deep breath. “This is the thing. It’s true. I am from the future.”
Ella stared at him, her heart dropping into her stomach. Her worst fears were coming true. He was crazy.
“In the decade in which I was born, there was a huge overpopulation problem on Earth. The government finally had to declare a limit on births.”
So crazy. “That’s not possible,” she said gently. “The government couldn’t do that. They couldn’t take away people’s rights like that.”
“They can and they did. They were concerned the planet couldn’t sustain the amount of people being born, so families could only carry one child to term. And when given the choice, many families wanted a boy over a girl. So boys were overwhelmingly carried to term over girls.”
Even though she didn’t believe a word of this, she was horrified at the story. “Any child is a blessing, why would they care?”
He shrugged. “I’m definitely not saying it was right. Because, now, the male population outnumbers the female overwhelmingly. The birth rates have dropped dramatically because there aren’t enough women to, pardon the expression, go around. Now the governments of the world are concerned that there aren’t going to be enough workers in the future to sustain society. They’ve still kept the limit on births, but they’ve stopped all owing any scans for the sex of unborn babies so people have to take what nature gives them.”
Ella shook her head. “That is a crazy story.”
He continued. “We’ve perfected time travel . It was originally a way for the very wealthy to vacation, so long as they foll ow specificrules so as not to upset the time line, and only for a specific amount of time. See?” He showed her his watch, a complicated-looking thing that seemed to combine a cellphone, watch and computer in one and was, indeed, timing something. “It’s a lot easier to manipulate emails to go back in time than it is to send people. It was decided to set up the website as a way for men to find wives in the past.”
Her mouth dropped open. “What, like a mail-order bride?”
He looked sheepish. “I guess you could say that.”
