Jake sat at the kitchen table with our dad. It was lunchtime, and they each had a sandwich and a bottle of beer in front of them. An open bag of cheap white bread, a plastic package of bologna, and a bottle of store-brand yellow mustard covered most of the scarred Formica between them.

My smile was carefully measured, bright enough to let them know I was definitely happy to see them, but not so enthusiastic as to be unbelievable. I offered a generic greeting and bent to kiss my father's wrinkled cheek. "Happy birthday, Dad."

"Ain't my birthday today."

I shrugged out of my coat and hung it on the utilitarian hook next to the door. Running the heat cost money Dad wasn't willing to spend, so the temperature in the kitchen hovered somewhere just north of freezing and south of what any reasonable human would consider comfortable. Thankfully, memory had served me well and I'd wrapped myself in multiple layers that morning. "I'm here to celebrate your birthday. I refuse to waste a single moment."

"Suit yourself. You always been good at that."

Jake met my eyes and pulled a face that almost made me laugh before I caught myself. "And you, Mister Big, when are we going to celebrate your big win?"

My brother studied his sandwich as if it held some fantastic interest. "I haven't won yet."

The protective plastic on the bottoms of the chair legs had long since worn down and crumbled to dust, so the metal scraped against the floor in a way that made my molars ache dully. Dim overhead light supplemented the pathetic attempts of the sun to brighten the day. Their combined efforts lit the kitchen with a dirty yellowish hue that made everything look slightly grubby, though I know Dad kept house meticulously. I lowered myself carefully, making sure the miserable old furniture would hold my weight and crossed my right leg over my left.

"At the very least, for the rest of your life, everyone is going to introduce you as Oscar Nominee Jake Kellerman."

Shaking his head caused the shaggy hair tucked behind his ear to fall loose and hide his face.

"Set design." Our father hmphed. "You could be building something useful with that fancy education—buildings, bridges, but you decided to play pretend."

"It's not pretend," Jake mumbled just loud enough to hear. "I told you all about it."

Our father hmphed again.

Words bust like fireworks across the top of my mind.

I love the world of pretend.

Art allows us to work out real world problems in a safe 'pretend' context.

Beauty doesn't need to serve any purpose beyond existing.

I pushed away from the table and poured myself a cup of coffee from the always-there pot on the counter without saying any of that. Through the window over the kitchen sink, I could see the neighboring farmhouse. Two upper-story windows and a wide garage door 'mouth' turned it into a cold, expressionless face staring back at me. "Does Chuck Jimson still farm?"

"Chuck Jimson's been dead two years."

"What? How?" Usually news like that reached me through childhood connections, tenuously maintained on social media.

"Combine caught on fire. He couldn't get out."

Jake pushed his empty plate away and took a swig from his beer bottle. "How does that even happen?"

Dad shrugged. "Can't harvest the wheat unless it's dry. It only takes a spark to set a field burning. I smelled it before I saw it. Called it in to the fire department."

I couldn't help but search the field, but of course there was nothing to see. A field fire, two seasons past would leave no more trace than a ghost of carbon in the soil, and the soil was frozen solid and buried under half a foot of snow. In my mind, I saw Chuck, an old man in dirty overalls, clawing at the glass and metal sides of his tractor. He must have shrieked for help. Did he manage to get out and find himself trapped in a burning sea of dry wheat? Or did the massive harvester turn into an oven? My stomach rolled and I considered joining the men for a beer rather than sticking with my more conventional choice.

"Jesus, Dad." Jake slumped off toward the bathroom, abandoning me.

Dad chortled, amused by our reaction to his gruesome announcement.

Biting back what I wanted to say, as I'd done my whole life, I asked, "So, who's living there now?" White smoke puffed up from the chimney of the other house.

"One of the Yoder boys and his wife."

Figures. There were as many Yoders in the county as there were cornstalks. I sipped the coffee. It tasted bitter and burnt and the smell bore little resemblance to the hazelnut infused fair-trade stuff I bought from the market around the corner from my house in California. "You know, this award nomination is a really big deal for Jake. It's a big personal achievement, something he's always wanted, but it also means he'll have his pick of the best jobs for years. Maybe for the rest of his life. I don't think success is really a destination that a person reaches, but if it were, this would be it."

He drained his beer. "Success is a shiny gold statue, eh? Guess that'll put food on America's table. Never heard of a successful farmer, but I'd like to know what all your Los Angles friends would eat if we stopped doing what we do."

"I won't be baited into an argument with you on your birthday, Dad."

Without looking at me, he got up and walked away. "Make yourself useful and clean up in there."

I may as well have been fourteen years old again, small, frightened, unsure of who I was, and trapped by my father's demands and the crushing weight of the promise I'd made long before I understood what it would cost me. Like that lonely teenaged girl I was caught in an emotional cataclysm between being devastated that nothing I ever did would earn my father's love, or even his grudging respect, and relieved that he'd walked away and left me alone. Solitude could be a heavy burden, but it was predictable and understandable. When there was no one to count on but me, I knew exactly what to expect from myself.

Thumps rose up from beneath my feet, movement in the cellar. He was fixing the furnace or putting away one obscure object or another. Soon, he'd come back up, stomp through the kitchen, and head outside where he'd spend the next few hours in the barn. He had a little office out there, a small cold space with a metal desk and exposed lightbulbs where he ordered seeds and terrorized customer service representatives who dared call and try to sell him anything that had been invented in his own lifetime.

Jake returned looking sheepish. "I had to pee."

"Hmm." I tied the bread bag shut with a twist and tucked it in the wooden box on the counter.

"Jess."

I stopped fiddling with the dishes long enough to meet his eye and I saw a twinkle there, a little spark of excitement. The corner of his mouth twitched.

"Asshole."

"Jealous?"

"Yes."

Having Jake wrap his arms around me and squeeze was like being attacked by a bear. I returned his hug and held on tight. "I'm proud of you, and I hate you just a little bit."

"I've felt that way my whole life," he confessed. This was as close to mushy as it was likely to get between us, and I was okay with that. I pulled back and demanded he wash the lunch dishes, since he ate off them and I didn't, and he agreed without argument.

"Tell me about it. I spent two days on Google and all I found was a bunch of rumor and speculation."

Heavy footsteps thumped up the stairs. Our father passed through the kitchen and into the frigid winter afternoon without speaking to us. The cold air swirled into the house and raked our skin with its hateful claws.

Jake waited until he was gone before answering me. "It's epic."

"Yes, so says People Magazine. I'd hoped the great creator himself could be a little more specific." It didn't take a long time to clean up after bologna sandwiches. I boosted myself onto the counter and let my feet dangle, let my heels tap against the antique cabinet doors.

After hanging the dish towel over the oven door handle and carefully lining up the edges, he faced me with one hip propped against the counter. "Okay, so you know what a regular sound stage looks like, right?"

"No. I've filmed nine feature films in barns and backyards. We used an iPhone for a camera."

He rolled his eyes at me. "This is bigger than any soundstage you've ever seen."

"You could park side-by-side seven forty sevens in the building where we filmed the Abrams thing."

"This is bigger."

There's stage fifteen in Germany."

He grinned like the proud father of a newborn. "Bigger. Significantly."

My brother wasn't a guy prone to exaggeration. He liked exact measurements and specific numbers. I stopped swinging my feet and leaned forward, my fingers wrapped around the edge of the countertop. "How big?"

"We are measuring in square miles at this point, and we'll keep building as we go."

"Counting the backlot?" Studios often used the space behind a stage to film outdoor shots.

"No backlot. It's a contained environment." Pointing upward with a conspiratorial wink he added, "Eyes in the skies these days. Privacy is everything."

That seemed more than a little paranoid and I said as much.

"It's not paranoia if they really are after you."

"Why would they be after you?"

"Because this is something that's never been done before. It's revolutionary. It's not just entertainment. It's experimental, metaphysical. This will change humanity."

Maybe he'd grown prone to exaggeration after all.

"You don't believe me?" he asked.

"Let's say I'm skeptical."

He inched closer. "Come and see. We'll spend a few days here, bake a cake for Dad, let him tell us what a couple of worthless disappointments we are, and then we'll leave here together."

For the second time in a few minutes I was a teenager again, conspiring with my big brother to run away.

"I have to get back to LA," I told him.

"Yeah, you're in such a hurry you drove?"

"Don't just me. You drove, too."

He held my shoulders in his strong hands. "I'm not judging you. I'm telling you I want you to be a part of my new project. It will change your life. It'll be the biggest thing you've ever done."

I laughed. "But what is it?"

"It's impossible to tell you. Let me show you. Come on. I'm not going to let you be in breach of contract or anything. Haven't I always looked out for you?"

Something cold and strong and feral work up deep in my gut. Not always, no.

"Come with me, Jess. If you really are proud of me, at least let me show you what I've built. What I'm still building." He let go of me and grinned. "What I'll be building maybe for the rest of my life."

"Fine, but we have to get through the birthday thing first."

His smile faded when he looked out the window toward the barn. "Yeah, but we'll manage. Two days and we're out of here." When he met my eye again, there was no joy in his face. "This is the last time, Jess. I'm not doing this again after this visit."

Hearing him say that, I realized I'd come to the same conclusion, I just hadn't admitted it to myself. I would wish my father a happy birthday. I would say goodbye, and I would never come back to this hell on earth as long as the old man lived.