Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction (354 page)

(1921–2005)

Although he and his wife Elinor were involved in fandom for many years, F. M. Busby wrote very little SF until after he retired from his job as a communications engineer. Despite his late start, he wrote almost twenty novels (mostly in the space opera Demu series, which had a sort of “retro” feel) and twice that many stories.

Francis Marion Busby was a traditional name in his family, named after the famed Revolutionary War “Swamp Fox.” Busby quickly adopted the nickname “Buz.” Since his father had Parkinson’s, his mother’s high school teaching job was the family’s only financial support. Busby made it to Washington State College, but had to join the National Guard for the stipend they received. When he realized he was likely to be drafted into the Korean War, he enlisted in the Army instead, and spent his term on Amchitka Island in Alaska. After graduating with a degree in engineering, he went back to working for the Alaska Communications System in Seattle.

A longtime SF fan, Busby married Elinor Doub, whom he met at a science fiction fan club. (They had one daughter.) Hi’s first story was “A Gun for Grandfather,” published in
Future SF
in 1957, but at that point he was better known in the field for fannish activities: He and Elinor created the fanzine
Cry of the Nameless
in 1958 and while it only ran for two years, it was awarded the 1960 Hugo for Best Fanzine.

After Busby retired in 1970, with a good pension, he gave writing his full attention. He attended the Clarion West SF Writer’s Workshop in Seattle in 1972, after which he produced a steady stream of novels through 1996.

He died in 2005, of complications from half a century of smoking.

Most time travel stories are very linear, which is surprising given their basic premise. This story, probably Busby’s best-known, completely upends that premise.

First published in
Universe 5
, 1974

The ceiling was the wrong color—gray-green, not beige. Alert, well-rested but still unmoving after sleep, Larry Garth thought: It could be the Boston apartment, or possibly the one in Winnetka—or, of course, someplace new. Throwing off the covers and rolling over, he put his feet over the side of the bed and sat up. His back did not protest; cancel Boston.

The walls were gray-green also, the furniture stained walnut. Yes, Winnetka. As a final check before going into the bathroom, he raised the window shade and looked out. It had been a long time, but he recognized the details. Winnetka for sure, and he was thirty-five or thirty-six; there were only about two years of Winnetka. One question of importance remained: Judy, or Darlene?

The bathroom mirror agreed with him; he was at the time of the small mustache; he’d seen the thing in pictures. He didn’t like it much, but spared it when he shaved; it was bad policy, at beginnings, to introduce unnecessary change.

He went back to the bedroom and got his cigarettes and lighter from the bedside stand, hearing pans rattle in the kitchen. Judy, or Darlene? Either way, he’d better get out there soon. As soon as he checked his wallet—first things first.

He lit a cigarette and leafed through the cards and minutiae that constituted his identity in the outside world. Well…knowing himself, his driver’s permit would be up-to-date and all credit cards unexpired. The year was 1970. Another look outside: autumn. So he was thirty-five, and the pans clattered at the hands of Judy.

Just as well, he thought. He hadn’t had the breakup with Darlene, but he knew it was, had to be, hectic and bitter. He’d have to have it sometime, but “sufficient unto the day…” Now, his wedding with Judy was only days or weeks distant—but he didn’t know which way. The trees across the street were no help; he couldn’t remember when the leaves turned color here, or began to fall. Well, he’d listen; she’d let him know…

In a plastic cover he found an unfamiliar card, with a key taped to one side. He drew it out; the other side was more than half-filled with his own small neat printing, mostly numbers. The first line read: “1935-54, small misc. See chart. 8/75-3/76. 2/62-9/63. 10/56-12/56.” There was much more: wonder rose in him. And then excitement, for suddenly the numbers made sense. Months and years—he was looking at a listing of the times of his life, in the order he had lived them. “9/70-11/70” caught his eye—that was
now,
so he wasn’t married to Judy yet, but would be before this time ended. And the crudely dated record listed six more life-segments between this one he was beginning and the one that had ended yesterday! He scanned it, scowling with concentration. Automatically he took a ball-point from the stand and completed the final entry, so that it read: “12/68-9/70.”

He’d never kept records before, except in his head. But it was a good idea; now that his later self had thought of it, he’d continue it. No, he’d
begin it.
He laughed, and then he didn’t laugh. He’d begin it because he’d found it; when and how was the actual beginning? He grappled with the idea of circular causation, then shrugged and accepted what he couldn’t fully understand—like it or not, it was there. He looked again at the card, at the signposts on his zigzag trail.

A short time, this one, ending a few days after the wedding. Then about seven months of being twenty and back in college; probably it would be when he found the sense to quit that farcical situation, in which he knew more of many things than his instructors did, but very little of what his exams would cover. He looked forward to seeing his parents again, not only alive but in good health. They’d nag him for quitting school, but he could jolly them out of that.

And next—no, he’d look at it again later; Judy would be getting impatient. A quick look at the other side. Below the key was printed
First Mutual Savings
and the bank’s address. The key was numbered: 1028. So there was more information in a safety-deposit box. He’d look at it, first chance he got.

He put on a robe and slippers; the last time with Judy, in 1972-73, her freedom from the nudity taboo was still new and strange to her. Shuffling along the hall toward breakfast, he wondered how the record he’d just seen was lost, wiped out, between now and that time. Did he later, in some time between, change his mind—decide the knowledge was more harm than help? He came to the kitchen and to Judy, with whom he’d lived twice as husband, but never met.

“Morning, honey,” He moved to kiss her. The kiss was brief; she stepped back.

“Your eggs are getting cold. I put them on when I heard the water stop running. There’s a cover on them, but still…what took you so long, Larry?”

“It took awhile to think myself awake, I guess.” Looking at her, he ate with little heed to temperature or flavor. She hadn’t changed much, going the other way. Red-gold hair was pinned up loosely into a swaying, curly mass instead of hanging straight, and of course she was bundled in a bulky robe rather than moving lithely unencumbered. But she had the same face, the same ways, so different from his first time with her. That was in the late, quarreling stages, five years away, when she drank heavily and was fat and divorce was not far off. He did not know what went so wrong in so short a time between. Now at the start, or close to it, he wished he could somehow rescue the fat drunk.

“More coffee, Larry? And you haven’t even looked at the paper.”

“Yes. Thanks. I will, now.” Damn! He had to get on track better, and fast. “Well…what’s new today?”

He didn’t care, really. He couldn’t; he knew, in large, how the crises and calamities of 1970 looked in diminishing perspective. The paper’s only use was to orient him—to tell him where in the middle of the movie he was, what he should and should not know. And today, as on the first day of any time, he looked first for the exact date. September 16, 1970. His wedding was six weeks and three days ahead of him, on Halloween. And this day was Wednesday; the bank would be open.

As if on cue, she asked, “Anything special you need to do today?”

“Not much. I want to drop in at the bank, though. Something I want to check on.” That was safe; she’d know about the bank. He kept only essential secrets. “Anything you’d like me to pick up at the groshry?” He remembered to use their joke-pronunciation.

“I’ll look. I have a couple of things on the list, but they’re not urgent.”

“Okay. Come here a minute first, though.” Short and still slim, she fit well on his lap, as she had two years later. The kisses became longer.

Then she pulled back. “Larry. Are you sure?”

“Sure of what?” He tried to bring her to him but she resisted, so he relaxed his grip. “Something on your mind, Judy?”

“Yes. Are you sure you want to get married again, so soon after…?”

“Darlene?”

“I know you had a hideous time, Larry, and—well, don’t get on that horse again just to prove you’re not afraid to.”

He laughed and tightened his hold; this time she came close to him. “Proving things isn’t my bag, Judy. To myself, or to anybody.”

“Then why do you want to marry me, when you have me already? You don’t have to—all you have to do is not change, stay the same for me. So why, Larry?”

“Just old-fashioned, I guess.” It was hard to kiss and laugh at the same time, carrying her to the bedroom. But he managed, and so did she, her part.

She got up first; the “groshry” list was ready when he was dressed to leave. Their goodbye kiss was soft.

Downstairs, he recognized the car with pleasure—a year-old Volvo he knew from two and five years later; it was even more agile and responsive now. The drive to the bank gave him time to think.

* * * *

In his early time-years the skips were small, a day or two, and his young consciousness took them for bad dreams—to wake with unfamiliar sensations, body changed and everything out of size. Much later, waking in a hospital, he learned they were real.

“Do you use drugs, Mr. Garth?”

“No, I don’t.” A little grass now and then wasn’t “drugs.” “I’d like to know why I’m here.”

“So would we. You were found lying helpless, unable to talk or coordinate your movements. Like a baby, Mr. Garth. Do you have any explanation, any pertinent medical history?”

So this is where I was, he thought. “No. I’ve been under a lot of pressure.” That was probably safe to say, though he didn’t know his body-age or circumstances. But in some thirty consciousness-years he’d learned to keep cover while he got his bearings in a new time. And eventually, as he hoped and expected, they told him most of what he needed to know about himself, and let him go. As sometimes happened, his research into the parameters of now was largely wasted; the time lasted only a dozen or so days. But the waste was not total, for when the following time came to him, he would still remember.

Once as a four-year-old he woke to middle age and panicked, screaming for his mother. He remembered being taken to the hospital that time, and did not look forward with pleasure to waking in it. But what had been would be. And he was certain there was at least one more infancy skip to be lived down someday.

At first he did not talk of these things in “home” time because he had no speech. Then he remained silent because he thought it was the same for everyone. And finally he kept his counsel because he realized no one could help or understand, or even believe.

Once in his seventh consciousness-year he woke with a throbbing joy at his groin; the woman beside him overrode his bewilderment and fulfilled his unrealized need. It was a time of a single day, and he hadn’t seen her again. He didn’t know the time-year or where he was, but he knew enough to say very little. He kept the situation as simple as possible by saying he was tired and didn’t feel well, remembering just in time that grownups say they’re not going to work today—he almost said school. He got away with it, and his confidence improved.

There were other dislocations from his early time-years, but none major until he went to sleep aged nineteen and woke to spend seven months as a forty-year-old man, twice-divorced. He wondered what was wrong, that twice he had failed in marriage. His unattached state simplified his adjustment, but after a time he became convinced that he’d lost twenty years and was cheated. But the next skip was to an earlier time, and then he began to know the way of his life.

The changes came always during sleep, except for the one that came at death. He didn’t know how old he died; his brain’s constricted arteries would not maintain an attention-span of any useful length. Inside him, his brief thoughts were lucid, but still the effect was of senility. How old, though? Well, he’d once had a year that included his seventieth birthday and golf, an operation for cataracts, a lawsuit successfully defended and a reasonably satisfying state of potency. So when he came to the last, he knew he was
damned
old.

Having died, he still feared death. It would be merely a different way of ending. For he had no clear idea how much of his life had been lived, back and forth in bits and pieces. One day he would use up the last unlived segment, and then…he supposed he simply wouldn’t wake up. At his best estimate, he had lived something less than half his allotted time-years. He couldn’t be sure, for much of his earlier conscious time was unmeasured.

Dying itself was not terrible; even his senile brain knew he had not yet filled all the blank spaces of his life. The pain was bad, as his heart fought and for a time would neither function nor gracefully succumb, but he had felt worse pain. His mind lost focus, and came clear only for a few seconds at the end. He died curious, wondering what might come next.

It was the other book end; the circle closed. He was trapped, constricted, pushed. Pressured and convulsed, slowly and painfully. Finally cold air reached his head and bright light stabbed at his eyes; at the consciousness-age of perhaps thirty, he was born. Except for the forgotten instinctive rapture of feeding, he found the newborn state unpleasant.

Filling early skips involuntarily, he dipped twice again into infancy. The first time bored him almost to apathy; he could neither see clearly nor move well. The second time, better-learned, he concentrated on his wide-open senses, trying to understand the infant condition. He found the experience instructive, but still was glad when next he woke adult.

Relationships with others were ever difficult; always he came in at the middle of the second feature, unsure of what had gone before and of correct responses to people he was supposed to know. He learned to simulate a passive streak that was not his by nature so that his friends would accept the quiet necessary to each new learning period. He cheated no one by this small deceit; it was as much for their benefit as his. And while he stayed in one time, at rest between zigzag flights, his friends and lovers—and their feelings—were real to him, of genuine concern. When he met them again, before or afterward, it pained him that they could not also know and rejoice in the reunion.

Early in his experience he sometimes fumbled such reunions. Now he knew how to place the time and adjust his mental files to produce only acceptable knowledge for
the year.

There was no way he could pursue a conventional career with organizational status and seniority, and at the end of it a pension. Hell, he couldn’t even finish college. Luckily, at his first major change, when he skipped from nineteen to forty, he found himself a published author of fiction. He read several of his works and enjoyed them. In later times, half-remembering, he wrote them, and then others that he had not read. His writings never hinted at the way of his own life, but a reviewer said of them: “Garth presents a unique viewpoint, as though he saw life from a different angle.”

It was a strange life, he thought. How did they manage it? Living and seeing solely from one view that plodded along a line and saw only one consecutive past.

So that they could never, ever understand him. Or he, them.

* * * *

He had attuned so easily to the car and the locality, hands and feet automatically adjusting to four-on-the-floor and quick brakes and steering, that, daydreaming, he nearly drove past the turnoff to First Mutual Savings. But from the right-hand lane, braking and signaling quickly, he made his turn without difficulty. He found a slot at the end of a parking row, well away from the adjacent car in case its driver was a door-crasher.