The old man sat quietly in the corner of the coffeeshop, his eyes wandering over the handful of patrons that had dared to venture from their homes on this cold winter’s day. The customers sat in pairs drinking their teas and sipping their cappuccinos and frappes, relishing the comforting warmth of their drinks. The coffeeshop offered welcome shelter from the biting wind outside, and even the lifeless expression of the barista couldn’t chase away the customers. Still, the man was glad he had chosen to wear his vest and tweed suit coat today. Even the heat of the coffeeshop couldn’t completely warm his old bones.

He sipped his coffee – black, no cream or sugar – and glanced down at his expensive watch with a sigh. The boy was running late. Or perhaps he didn’t intend to show. You could never be certain with this generation.

The door opened, its bell jangling musically as a young man walked in, his breath drifting on an icy draft. He seemed to have been blown inside by the winter wind, his hair disheveled and his face ruddy.

The boy hesitated for a moment, then caught sight of an older man sitting quietly in a corner. His white hair was disheveled, but his wrinkled face was clean-shaven and kind. The young man’s face flickered with a quick smile and he crossed the room, unknotting his knitted scarf and thrusting it into a pocket of his threadbare jacket. “Dr. Gilbert,” he said by way of greeting, extending a wind-chapped hand.

The old man shook his hand cordially, then gestured toward the counter. “Get yourself a drink.”

“I’m alright,” the young man said easily. “But thank you.”

Dr. Gilbert laid a handful of bills on the tabletop and shoved them toward the boy. “Go get yourself a drink,” he repeated. “And get me another cup of coffee while you’re there. Black, nothing added.”

The boy nodded, grabbed the money, and headed toward the counter. The man watched him go, drumming his fingers on the tabletop meditatively. I must be getting old, he thought to himself. The student looked younger than he had expected.

The boy returned to the table and set down the coffees and change. Dr. Gilbert nodded in appreciation and cradled the new cup of coffee in his large hands. “Thanks,” he grunted.

“Yeah, no problem,” the boy replied, taking a sip of his coffee. He flinched, and the man looked up, amused.

“Careful, it’s hot.”

The boy laughed. “Found that out that hard way.” He pulled a tattered envelope out from under his jacket. “This is for you. It’s just a thank you card, but…”

Dr. Gilbert took the envelope from the boy and turned it over in his hands thoughtfully before stashing it away in the pocket of his tweed jacket. He thought to himself how very right he had been about this boy. “I appreciate your gratitude,” he commented. “You don’t see much of it these days.” The boy shrugged, and the man raised his eyebrows. “You disagree?”

“You’ve got to know where to look, I guess,” the boy said, taking a cautious sip of coffee.

The man nodded. “True.” He studied the boy for a moment, then leaned back in his chair. “Mr. Peterson,” he began.

“Daniel is fine.”

“Daniel, then,” the man corrected. “Daniel, do you know why you were awarded the Dr. Keith Gilbert Scholarship for Deserving Students? It’s rarely awarded at all.”

Daniel Peterson sat up a little straighter. “Academic merit and financial need,” he recited matter-of-factly.

Dr. Gilbert smiled, shaking his head. “That was what qualified you to apply,” he corrected. “How I singled you out? That is a different matter.” He pulled a small metal sphere from his pocket and held it up to the light. “How much do you know about me, Daniel?”

“You went to school at my college, The University of St. Augustine, and then went on to become one of the greatest scientists and inventors the world has ever seen. When I was informed that I got to meet you as part of this scholarship…Well, I was pretty excited.”

“But hesitant?” the man questioned. The boy frowned. “Speak freely, son.”

“Well, yes sir. I was hesitant. I didn’t want to waste your time.”

“Since you weren’t sure if you would be continuing here at St. Augustine’s?”    

 Daniel flinched. “How did you know that?”

Dr. Gilbert rolled the metal ball between his hands. “I was born in an age that valued technical skill over all else. Knowledge was not valued for its own sake, and objective truth was mocked as old-fashioned.” He smiled over at the student. “I excelled at getting dramatic results from the physical sciences, but even still, I was ridiculed as an eccentric because my studies and experiments were guided by a moral compass. Do you follow me?”

“Most of your studies are unpublished,” Daniel recalled thoughtfully. “You wouldn’t hand over knowledge unless you knew someone would use it wisely.”

“That was part of it,” Dr. Gilbert agreed. “Men without scruples could have made many times the money I did with my inventions and discoveries. But science must be at the service of the good. Once it departs from that, disaster is never far behind.

“One of my many areas of study was our understanding of time. Ever since reading H.G. Wells, I was fascinated by the idea of journeying through time. The discovery and development of time travel could have revolutionized our public discourse, our study of history, even dismantled the flat-faced apathy of this age.” Dr. Gilbert trailed off, his eyes focusing on some distant point.

“Did you succeed?” Daniel finally asked.

The man sighed. “No,” he admitted. “At least, not as I had hoped. One cannot physically travel through time. But,” he paused, leaning forward with barely-contained pride. “One can study it.”

Dr. Gilbert leaned back again, and took a long drink. “You’re a philosophy major, aren’t you, Daniel?”

“Yes sir,” the boy replied. “Double-major in philosophy and literature.”

 “And how do you find your classes?”

Daniel hesitated, and Dr. Gilbert waved his hand dismissively. “I promise not to tell your professors.”

Daniel laughed nervously. “Classes are alright. I mean…” He sighed. “They’re bad. Really bad. I didn’t realize the extent to which nonsense passed for intelligence at a university.”

Dr. Gilbert smiled. “Go on.”

“It’s almost all garbage,” Daniel said heatedly. “We were having a class discussion the other day, and my professor actually said that it was possible there were times when the truth wasn’t true! I thought that my philosophy classes would teach me how to reason, that we would read Socrates and Aristotle. Instead, all I get is a load of relativistic nonsense.”

“And your literature classes?”

“Are just as bad! Are we reading the classics? Beowulf or Crime and Punishment or Les Misérables? Dickens or Austen or Chesterton or Chaucer or Shakespeare? No!” Daniel’s face was red, and he was breathing hard. It seemed that he was finally giving voice to ideas that he had kept buried for too long. “All we read is 21^st century post-modernist garbage.”

“And this is why you are considering leaving the college,” Dr. Gilbert said sympathetically.

“Of course. I wanted to take Latin for my foreign language requirement. St. Augustine’s doesn’t offer it. None of the colleges in the area offer it.” The boy glanced down at his hands, avoiding Dr. Gilbert’s gaze. “Even though you are paying for my college, even though it’s a free education…I sometimes wonder if I wouldn’t be better off going to a trade school, getting a job, and pursuing real knowledge in my free time.”

Dr. Gilbert scratched thoughtfully at his white hair. “Your situation is not ideal,” he admitted. “You feel alone in your thirst for the truth. Fair enough. We live in a deceitful age.” He leaned forward, squeezing the metal sphere tight in one hand. “What this college will give you is not an education. You can do that on your own with a library card and the desire to learn. This college will give you a trial. A difficulty to overcome. Greatness is forged in the flames of adversity.”

The man held up the metal ball. “I have studied time. I have looked down the paths of possibility and seen potential. That is why I chose you to receive this scholarship.”

The boy blinked, unnerved, but the great scientist wasn’t finished talking. “Your future is not certain, Daniel. Every day we make a thousand decisions, and each decision shoots us forward, defining our future. When we take a step in one direction, we decide against the thousand other directions we may have gone. I cannot promise you success, and certainly not happiness. But I will tell you this.” He looked into Daniel’s eyes, and the boy swallowed hard. “If you leave this college, you could become a very well-read plumber, live a happy life, and be a good man. But if you stay, you have the potential to change the world.”

Daniel took a deep breath and rubbed his head. “You’ve seen my future?” he said weakly. Then he smiled half-heartedly. “What will happen if I ask Marissa Fields out on a date?”

Dr. Gilbert chuckled. “That would depend on the million decisions that you both still have to make. I don’t comment on romantic endeavors. It tends to backfire, and then people come crying to me.”

“You can’t give me a hint?”

Dr. Gilbert shook his head and held out the metal ball toward Daniel. “It’s not that simple. Touch the sphere. You’ll see what I mean.”

Daniel hesitantly placed a finger on the metal ball. It was cold at first, but then with a whirring noise it began to warm up, a pale glow flicking across its surface. Daniel blinked. In an instant he was lost, as possibility after possibility played out in front of his closed eyelids. His mind had drifted to Marissa as he touched the sphere, and all at once, he saw a million possible futures for their relationship. Acceptance, rejection, friendship, enmity, dates, breakups, marriage, divorce – it all spun through his mind’s eye, each scenario dependent upon decisions he and Marissa had made and had yet to make. He saw scenes of poignant beauty – his newborn son cradled in his arms, afternoon walks with his family, an elderly Marissa smiling across the table at him. But he also saw images that would haunt him – tears shed at the grave of his daughter, stumbling drunk around his living room, storming away from Marissa with a harsh word, never to return.

Daniel shuddered, jerking his hand away from the sphere. He looked up at Dr. Gilbert and found that there were tears in the old man’s eyes.

“I’m sorry you had to experience that,” he whispered. “But now perhaps you understand. I’ve seen your potential, Daniel. Don’t waste it.”

The student took several deep breaths, shaken by what he had witnessed. “You say I’m not wasting my time at this university.”

Dr. Gilbert stood, throwing on his coat and pocketing the metal ball. “Not in the least,” he said with a reassuring smile. “But whether it will help you or not in the long run is up to you to decide.” He shook hands with the boy, who had struggled up from his chair with a bewildered, grateful expression.

“Thank…thank you, sir…for everything.”

“It was my pleasure. We will meet again. Godspeed, young Daniel.”

Dr. Gilbert crossed the room, left a kind word and a generous tip with the barista, then opened the door. A sharp wind blasted into the room, and the man glanced back toward the boy whose life he had just irrevocably changed. Daniel was staring after him, awe and determination glowing in his eyes.

Dr. Gilbert smiled, nodded, and stepped outside. 

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This story first appeared in 2022, in vol. 11 of The Nemadji Review.