* * * * *
It was 1956 when we arrived in old New York. We were met by others who
had pioneered the way before us and they looked after our group until we
learned the ropes.
There was nothing easy about getting used to the era. I wished often
that I could get back to my own time, Grundy Projector or no Grundy
Projector. Still, Marge didn't complain; she was prepared to endure
anything just because she thought her life had been saved. Occasionally,
bothered by my blunders in adjusting to this past century, I'd start to
reason with her, explain that her life hadn't been in danger at all. But
then, luckily, I would realize that convincing her would leave an angry,
dissatisfied wife on my hands and I always managed to stop in time.
I got a job working as a night janitor in a bank and studied accounting
in the daytime until I was able to get a steady job. We've been here a
few years now and I guess you could say we're pretty well assimilated.
We have a house and two small sons and I'm doing well at my job. We
still see some of our friends from the 21st century and they've also
managed to make the change successfully.
We get together now and then, and talk over old times, and laugh at some
things and get nostalgic over other things. Now that there aren't any
Grundy Projectors around, we've started feeling once more that our fates
are in our own hands.
Rog Owens has an interesting viewpoint. He said one night, "It wasn't
the future that was fixed; it was the Grundy Projectors that fixed the
future! Whatever people saw would happen, they just let happen ... or
even worked to make it happen. No matter what it was, including their
own deaths. Hell, how's that any different than voodoo?"
That was pretty much how each of us had felt, only we hadn't figured it
out so clearly. But Rog Owens has a special reason for thinking
particularly hard about the problem. Mr. Atkins and his syndicate hadn't
send us back for purely altruistic reasons; they learned that Rog's
daughter Ann would marry a fellow (not one of us) named Jack Grundy and
that they'd have a son named Bilbo, who would invent the Grundy
Projector. Our assignment was to keep that from happening.
Well, we couldn't prevent the marriage, but we could--and did--make sure
their son would have a good, plain American name. It's William Grundy.
But today my younger boy told me their kindergarten teacher calls
William "Billy Boy."
And one little girl can't pronounce it. She calls him Bilbo.