While Unbeknownst to the Rest the Woman in the Yellow Dress Was Also a Time Traveler

By Stephen Saperstein Frug

In 1979, a group goes out to dinner at a Chinese Restaurant in Ithaca, New York. Some of them are time travelers. Actually, there is one more time traveler there than anyone expects. Mind the fortune cookies.

This is the fourth story in the Retcon story mosaic, a series about a secret research program into time travel at Cornell University. This story, like all the rest, can be read independently of the others, although it is enriched by the larger context.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stephen Saperstein Frug
• Release date: Jun 9, 2023
• ISBN: 9781960745033

Stephen Saperstein Frug

Stephen Saperstein Frug is the author and illustrator of Happenstance: A Photographic Novel, and the author of the essay series Attempts, and of Retcon: A Mosaic Story in Three Movements. He lives with his family in Ithaca, New York, where he commits occasional acts of illeism.

Book preview

While Unbeknownst to the Rest the Woman in the Yellow Dress Was Also a Time Traveler

movement 1, installment 4 of

Retcon

A Mosaic Story in Three Movements

by

Stephen Saperstein Frug

Copyright © 2023 by Stephen Saperstein Frug

All rights reserved.

Published by Snark & Boojum Press

Ithaca, New York

https://stephenfrug.com/snark-and-boojum-press/

First edition

June, 2023

ISBN: 978-1-960745-03-3

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, incidents, footnotes, minerals, and mysterious physics are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Except for the throwing of the salt and pepper shakers, which is either real, or at the very least is a real family legend.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher. But he's an easygoing fellow, so feel free to email him and ask.

Table of Contents

Start Reading

Cover

Title Page

Table of Contents

While Unbeknownst to the Rest the Woman in the Yellow Dress Was Also a Time Traveler

Epigraph

Fortune, No Cookie

Simply Marvelous

Don't Mention It

Things Run Out

Pick Your Poison

Late That Evening, As the Two Women Walked Back to the Car

But We Had Gathered Here To Talk About

Of Course She Was Really a Monkey

A Quite Sudden Rock

After the Flood

Rene's Tale

Two Down

An Impressive Resume

Hinged Speculation

Beyond the News of the Week

What Do You Think the World Will Be Like in The Year 2000?

The Importance of Noticing Time Travelers

The ABC Affair

Cherchez La Femme

While Larry Said 'Why Do Women Always Go to the Bathroom Together?' and Cornelius, Embarrassed for His Gender, Said 'Oh Come Now', and the Remaining Women Rolled Theirs Eyes

Once More Into the Breach

Do Not Open Until 2014

The Bill

The Fortune Cookies

Something to Remember This By

Exeunt Omnes

Tikvah Had Forgotten Her Hat

But She Never Ever Would

Je ne peux plus continuer comme ça

Dreams of the Farmer at Rest

Trust, But Verify

Fait Accompli

I Probably Shouldn't Go Into Details

Origins

The Relation Between Expectations and Understanding

In a Way

They Rose To Go, But Lingered at the Door

But Let Us Give the Woman in the Yellow Dress the Last Word

About Retcon

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Previous Stories in Retcon

Also From Snark & Boojum Press

While Unbeknownst to the Rest the Woman in the Yellow Dress Was Also a Time Traveler

At two in the afternoon, if you still your running and listen,

You can hear the hiss of the wind that is blowing away the sun.

And the trees in the harsh glare wither, and the eyes of the predators glisten,

And though it is hot and bright, you feel that the night has come.

— Corollary to Kipling

Fortune, No Cookie

W ould you want to know your future, if you could? asked the woman who had also arrived early, batting her eyelashes. Her tone was jocular, but her gaze intense, and sitting directly beside each other at the large round table laid for six felt oddly intimate, even though he hadn't caught her name.

The man, perhaps because he was smitten with her, considered the matter seriously. Well, I would have Scrooge's question, he said.

Are there no prisons or workhouses? she cooed.

He rolled his eyes. "When he sees his gravestone. He asks if what he sees are things that will be or may be."

Oh no, said she, with mock dismay, "if you were told your future, it would be your future. Not some flimsy possible or maybe. We're talking knowledge, not— she waved as if shooing a fly. insubstantialities."

The man frowned. That's a harder question.

Which is precisely what makes it worth asking.

He paused. Would my hearing it be the thing which fixes it, or would it already be set?

Oooo, she said. "Tricky. Tricky tricky tricky. Not sure I can answer that. You see, from an outside point of view it's all fixed— not only what happens but whether you decide to hear it in advance or not. Of course a different situation would result in a different outcome. But a different situation would have to go all the way back, you know— She mimed the universe's creation. Bang. Each moment causes the next. To get a different ending you need a different beginning. Maybe some parts are separate, so you could change a bit here and a bit there, but who knows? And picking one thread out of the pattern and saying this caused that— well, that's beyond me. I'm not even entirely