David Gerrold - The Man Who Folded Himself

Did I still exist?

Was I about to wink out?

Was it just a matter of time?

Yes — of course it was a matter of time. Ha, ha. The joke’s on me.

No, this couldn’t be right; I was thinking in paradoxes again. After all, I was here and alive — I was me. I hadn’t eliminated Don at all. I had become him and done things differently, that’s all.

Sure — but I still couldn’t stop asking myself what had become of my Don who had done things the other way and the Don who had given me the newspaper and told me not to be so greedy. ("Forget about them — you simply won’t become them, that’s all,” I told myself. “How would you know?” I answered.)

Let’s see… there must be a way to figure this out.

Danny had to go back in time and become Don to his Dan.

If he takes his check back with him, I won’t have it to cash. On the other hand, if I take it forward with me, he won’t have a check to show his Danny. (He’ll be changing the timestream, just like me. Unless — )

What if I gave Danny the false check to take back with him? Would that undo the damage? Or would it just make it worse?

My mind began to boggle.

But it was the answer, of course. This Danny would become my Don! That’s why his check would match mine when he went back to meet me — (and he’d test to see if he could change the past too! He’d try wearing different clothes than me: the slacks and sweater!)

And I’d still end up with the money!

Yes, of course. It had to be the answer.

I’d been sitting and staring at the checks for the past ten miles. Now I handed Danny the false one and he slipped it into his pocket without even looking at it.

(Ha-ha! I cackled gleefully to myself.)

I realized Danny was saying something: ” — what happens now? Do you go back to your time?

I grinned at him. “Not yet. First we go out to celebrate. Like rich people.”

This time, I won the argument over who was “gating to use the bathroom first. I don’t mind sharing my razor, but at least I ought to get the first shave off a new blade. Danny seemed a little bothered by the pseudo-intimacy of us both dressing out of the same closet, so I compromised and let him wear the red sports jacket. While he showered, I reset my belt and flipped back to morning, phoned The Restaurant and made reservations for two, then flashed forward again, appearing at the exact instant I had disappeared and in the same spot. The air hadn’t even had time to rush in. (That was one way to minimize the jump-shock.)

It was at The Restaurant that I began to realize what Don had meant the night before and why he had said what he did. Danny looked so … innocent. So unprotected. He needed someone. And I could be that someone — I was that someone; I knew Danny better than anyone.

He was my “little brother” — I would watch out for him; and that would make him feel as secure as I felt when my “ big brother” Don was around. It was a strange feeling — exciting.

“You’ll never have to be alone again,” I told him. (I knew how lonely he was; I knew how much he hated it.) “You’ll always have me. I’ll always have you. It makes more sense this way.” (I would keep him from falling into those bitter, empty moods, those gritty moments of aching frustration. It would be good for both of us.) “I don’t like being alone either. This way I can share the things I like with somebody I know likes them too.” (No, I would never be lonely again; I would have my Danny to take care of. And my Don to take care of me. Oh, it was such a wonderful feeling to have — how could I make him see?) “I don’t have to try and impress you, you don’t have to try to impress me. There’s perfect understanding between us. There’ll never be any of those destructive little head games that people play on each other, because there can’t be.” It all came spilling out, a flood of emotion. (I wanted to reach out and touch him. I wanted to hold him.) “I like me, Danny; that’s why I like you. You’ll feel the same way, you’ll see.

“And I guarantee, there are no two people in this world who understand each other as well as we do.”

Life is full of little surprises.

Time travel is full of big ones.

My worrying about paradoxes and canceled checks had been needless. If I had thought to read the timebelt instructions completely before I went gallivanting off to the past and the future, I would have known.

I was right that paradoxes were impossible, but I was wrong in thinking that the timestream had to be protected from them. After all, they were impossible. It wouldn’t have mattered whether I had given Danny a check or not; changes in the timestream are cumulative, not variable.

What this means is that you can change the past as many times as you want. You can’t eliminate yourself. I could go back in time nineteen years and strangle myself in my crib, but I wouldn’t cease to exist. (I’d have a dead baby on my hands though… )

Look, you can change the future, right? The future is exactly the same as the past, only it hasn’t happened yet. You haven’t perceived it. The real difference between the two — the only difference — is your point of view. If the future can be altered, so can the past.

Every change you make is cumulative; it goes on top of every other change you’ve already made, and every change you add later will go on top of that. You can go back in time and talk yourself out of winning a million and a half dollars, but the resultant world is not one where you didn’t win a million and a half dollars; it’s a world where you talked yourself out of it. See the difference?

It’s subtle — but it’s important.

Think of an artist drawing a picture. But he’s using indelible ink and he doesn’t have an eraser. If he wants to make a change, he has to paint over a line with white. The line hasn’t ceased to exist; it’s just been painted over and a new line drawn on top.

On the surface, it doesn’t seem to make much difference. The finished picture will look the same whether the artist uses an eraser or a gallon of white paint, but it’s important to the artist. He’s aware of the process he used to obtain the final result and it affects his consciousness. He’s aware of all the lines and drawings beneath the final one, the layer upon layer of images, each one not quite the one — all those discarded pieces; they haven’t ceased to exist, they’ve just been painted out of view.

Subjectively, time travel is like that.

I can lay down one timeline and then go back and do things differently the second time around. I can go back a third time and talk myself out of something, and I can go back a fourth time and change it yet again. And in the end, the timestream is exactly what I’ve made it — it is the cumulative product of my changes. The closest I can get to the original is to go back and talk myself out of something. It won’t be the same world, but the difference will be undetectable. The difference will be in me. I — like the artist with his painting — will be conscious of all the other alternatives that did exist, do exist, and can exist again.

The world I came from is like my innocence. I can never recapture it. At best, I can only simulate it. ,

You can’t be a virgin twice.

(Not that I would, of course. Virginity seems like a nice state of existence only to a virgin, only to someone who doesn’t know any better. From this side of the fence, it seems like such a waste. I remember my first time, and how I had reacted: Why, this was nothing to be scared of at all — in fact, it’s wonderful! Why had I taken so long to discover it? Afterward, all the time beforehand looked so … empty.)