Meet Me at Infinity

by James Tiptree Jr.

  Hey, aren’t you just crazy about the way he talks, folks? Mr. Eggars, what did your pop do when you called him?

  He made the intern let go of me, naturally, and I managed to stand up. I didn’t realize at the time that I was leaning on part of Mother. But I said, “Hello, Dad,” and we shook hands.

  You shook hands, really?

  Yes, I’d planned on that, you know. I felt rather proud of myself for working it out, what hands were and all. I was keen on doing the right thing. To show him I was a son he could be proud of. A chap feels very strongly about the right sort of Dad, you know. Which mine was.

  Say, that’s a very moving attribute. How about your mom?

  Oh, I was eager to meet her. But of course it was a bit confusing, seeing everything for the first time, and I was in a bloody great mess, sorry. I said to Dad, “If I could just wash up first?” He understood. One of the nurses washed me with a cloth. Clumsy idiot. The intern I believe had run off, and there was somebody on the floor. When I was freshened up Dad took me on his arm around to Mother—to her head end, you know.

  How about that, folks? What did she say?

  Oh, well, it was rather emotional, you realize. I thanked her, of course; I had thought for some time of what I would say. I felt I knew her already, you see. I recall I kissed her. On the cheek.

  I bet she loved that.

  She wasn’t feeling too talkative, poor dear. But she did admire my hands. “So small and yet perfectly formed,” she said. You know how mothers are.

  You better believe it. Leona, that’s my wife, she just goes ape if there’s a baby carriage around. So you didn’t have any serious problems?

  Oh, the usual adjustments, I expect. The only slight difficulty was the feeding, you know.

  How do you mean?

  Well, in view of their attitude toward natural method, of course they had planned on breast feeding.

  I don’t follow you there, Mr. Eggars. What went wrong?

  Oh, nothing, really. Just the embarrassment, you know. And the size. Imagine one’s feelings when they poke a nipple a foot wide at one! A bit awkward. But we got sorted out in no time when I told her how much I’d been looking forward to trying some of the dishes I’d been hearing about. Particularly bubble-and-squeak, I recall. Of course she was an absolutely superb cook, my mother. Pity.

  Bubble-and-squeak, I’ll have to try that some time. Well, I do thank you very much, Mr. Eggars, on behalf of the folks out there, for sharing this great Human experience with us. Wasn’t that educational, folks? And we’re proud to welcome you to wonderful Bluegill County, vacationland in the woods. And now our next guest, who is brought to you courtesy of Rudy’s Wrecker and Rescue Service, that’s Mud Lake 205 three short. Rudy wants you to know he’s put in brand new upholstery in the ambulance. And he’s solved that little problem about hunting season, folks. His wife’s mother is going to be staying with them, and she’ll be right by the phone. Remember, if you or your loved ones need help, call Mud Lake 205 three short, and good luck. Now I want you to welcome our next guest, Mr. Al Rappiola of Timberton. Great to meet you, Al. I understand you have some kind of problem with the time?

  Well, it’s not me, Dick, it’s my wife. She’s from Oshkosh.

  Oshkosh, hey? I guess they haven’t all got the word down there, ha-ha. No offense, Al. What seems to be her trouble?

  Well, I noticed it as soon as we got married. I mean, the following day, ha-ha. We went to Thousand Lakes, that’s a great spot for a honeymoon. Anyway, the very next morning. I woke up and there she was all packed up, walking out of the cabin. So I said, “Hey, Marie, where’re you off to?”

  That certainly is a natural question, Al

  Yeah. I thought I’d done something, see. But then it turned out she wasn’t mad at all, she was just leaving. Like it was the thing to do. So I said, “Marie, hon, we’re married!” But she said, “That was yesterday, Al. You mean you still want to be married today?” Well, I said, “What’s the matter with you, hon? Sure I do.” Thinking it was a joke. So she stayed and everything was a-okay. Just great. But then next morning she pulled the same thing again. And the next day after that, and so on. Every morning.

  Wow, that is weird, isn’t it folks? How’d you handle it?

  Well, I tell you, I had a time. It was like she couldn’t believe that anything that happened the day before carried over into next day, see. Like everything all got washed out every night. Everything. I had to keep convincing her she was still married to me. She was real nice about it, I’ll say that. I could see she was glad to stay. To tell the truth I thought it was an act, until we had the anniversary.

  Was that your first anniversary?

  Yeah, we invited our folks and a lot of the older crowd for a big dinner. I mean, I was pretty busy with my job all year, we’d kind of postponed the celebrations. So this was a big event. And then the day of the party I got home from work and there she was in her jeans, cleaning the oil-burner. And no food, nothing.

  Golly, Al, that’s really frightening.

  Yeah. Oh, we had a real go-round, I tell you. I recall she said, “You mean all those people are getting into cars and buses and traveling from all over to come here tonight—just because of what we said three weeks ago? I don’t believe it!” She was so sincere, man, I started wondering. Well, that party was pretty crazy. When they all showed up that really began to shake her, you know? Like she was seeing ghosts. But I could see she was glad to see them, after she got over the shock.

  Say, didn’t you fear for her mental health, Al?

  Oh no, she’s just as sane as I am except for this one little quirk. Marie’s fine. Well, after the party she was kind of dazed for a while. She got me to write her down a list, every day. All the things she should remember, especially doctor appointments, stuff like that. She carries it clipped to our marriage certificate, ha-ha. Anything I put on that list she does. Of course now she’s expecting, I really have to watch it. She more or less blames me for that.

  You mean for the baby, Al, ha-ha?

  You better believe it. No, what I mean is she blames me for things carrying over from one day to the next. She claims up until she got married everything—I mean the whole world, like you and me and all except her—it would just flush out at midnight. Every day started fresh, she says. So she thinks it’s my fault. I guess she’s still expecting it to wear off. I catch her trying little tricks.

  Can you tell the folks about those little tricks, Al? I know they’re finding this tremendously interesting.

  Oh, you know, kid stuff. Sticking leaves in her shoes, foolishness like that. I don’t want to give you the wrong impression, Dick. We all have our little quirks. Outside of that you couldn’t ask for a better wife. I mean, Marie is tops, she really is. Hi, hon! I’m a lucky guy.

  Beautiful, Al, did you catch that, folks? Oh, oh. Speaking of midnight, I see we have only a couple seconds to go. So from our studio in beautiful Porcupine Crossing, here’s the voice of the Near North Woodlands saying goo—

  Alii didn’t try real hard to sell this Raccoona Sheldon story. She sent it to Ed Ferman on August 28, 1972, with the note: “By the way, what’s herein is scarcely fantasy. Florence County was settled by refugees from a skink famine on Arcturus. They only vote for Nixon because they think he’s one of them.”

  The story was rejected without comment, and retired. This is its first publication.

  Trey of Hearts

  “Dear Bolingbroke, dear Loomis,” she says to the letter-writer. “Do you remember the Terran woman you met at Centaurus Junction, while you were waiting for the shuttle?”

  No, that won’t do. By this time they might have trouble recalling where Terra is, or what “woman” means. And she should relax her throat, let her voice be more alluring.

  She reverses and starts over, putting “Human female” instead. Humans are known all over the galaxy.

  “Well,” she goes on, “she remembers you. Poignantly. And this is just to say—” Here she ha
lts the writer to think. What exactly does she want to say to them, after all these years? Really, just what she’s already said—that she remembers, indeed can’t forget, can’t forget at all. Though her life is certainly rich and varied enough to let her forget most anything in the way of casual sex. Why not forget these two, this Loomis and Bolingbroke? Why not? It’s something about the whole thing, about what they did to her and she to them, about what they tried to do through her.

  She sighs luxuriously, letting it all come back; while outside the windows of her beautiful office the lights of Luna City are coming on, far below…

  It had started as the most ordinary of encounters, in this age of star travel and shape-changing. She can see herself back then as if it were today, standing in Centaurus Junction in her best white travel-jumper, a mantilla on her long black hair, and her best jeweled belt and slippers—a typical high-class junior sales rep.

  She has come to Centaurus Junction on the shuttle from Terra; as usual, it took longer to get to the Deep Space jump-port than it’ll take her to get to the Deneb system, where she will try to sell the ruling life-form a lot of the new macrocelluar devices her company makes.

  She finds she has twenty-six standard hours to wait.

  After seeing that her precious sample cases are stowed in the Deneb destination-chute, she wanders out to take a stim-drink under the huge wall of clocks that show the local times all over known space. Might as well get used to Deneb time—although of course she will travel in cold-sleep, which will reset all her physiological cycles.

  As she looks for Deneb she becomes aware of a pleasant tightness in her crotch, the tingle and tickle of arousal. She’s been too busy lately to think of sex—and cold-sleep won’t cure that. Yes, and this is about her last chance to be among many Humans. She can put the wait to good use, if she can spot a suitable partner.

  Forgetting Deneb, she glances around, but the tables and bar display no other Humans who interest her. There are a few nice aliens whom she knows are keen on Human sex, but these all seem to be in groups with young—family parties on vacation, no doubt. The few lone aliens she can see are strange to her; she wouldn’t chance a sexual encounter with any except as a last resort. And of course there is the usual Ovidian or so, who are always about, and whose sex habits don’t interest anybody. Well, maybe someone will turn up.

  She goes back to studying the clock wall, and has just found that it’s midnight on Deneb IV, when someone bumps her drink-holding arm.

  “Excuse me,” the stranger says. He’s a Human. She blinks and looks again—he’s outrageously handsome, a tall tanned youth with curly red hair, usually a disastrous combination, but on him, great. And nicely dressed.

  “Excuse me,” he says again in quite a strange accent. And repeats it. “Excuse me, please.”

  “Oh, it’s nothing.” She smiles. She has just noticed that he has an unmistakable erection pushing up the corner of his sports tabard, which he is making no effort to conceal. And another young man is with him, a dark-haired type who would have been attractive in his own right had he not been eclipsed by the spectacular redhead. And he too has a highly visible tent-shaped bulge in his well-cut panters.

  “Excuse me,” the redhead says for the fourth time. She’s about to become irritated, when she realizes he’s having trouble with Galactic, trying to say something further.

  “Excuse me, I may ask a personal question? Yes?”

  “Why, yes.”

  “You are naturally in this form? And of Terra, right?”

  “That’s right. I’m naturally a Human female, a woman of Terra. Do I guess correctly that you’ve just recently shape-changed?”

  “Ah! Yes! You understand well!” He throws a gratified glance at his companion, and they both accept her gestured invitation to sit down. “It was all done in a great hurry, you see, the appointment to take the diplomatic post on Terra just opened. We had to take whatever was available, with almost no information. We are by profession diplomats of Thumnor, but we have not been Human before. We seem to be having trouble with the biology”—he points to his lap—“and the instruction manual was stupidly packed in our check-through bags. Even the most rudimentary formals we don’t know.”

  “I see. Well! Well, first, my expression is a smile, indicating good will.” Both the strangers immediately grin winningly. “And on meeting, it is customary to exchange names—not necessarily your full name, just something to be called by. For example, I am Sheila. And often we shake hands as we do that. Your right hand, please. Oh! My goodness, you’re hot! Is that normal, or do you feel ill?”

  “Oh, no,” he says as she gingerly regrasps his hand and demonstrates shaking. “It must be that some of our natural metabolism comes through. The changemaster said it would not injure the bodies. But is it unpleasing?”

  “No, just impressive. And in strict politeness I shouldn’t have mentioned it—but perhaps you might make a little joke to warn people. And your names?” As she speaks, she’s wondering if his whole body is hot like that. Interesting…

  “I am Bolingbroke,” he tells her. “And my colleague superior is Loomis.”

  “Really? Like old-fashioned Terran names?”

  “Are they unsuitable? It is as close as we could come, in what Terran literature we have. At home in Thumnor I am Bol—” He utters a tangled skein of syllables. “And he is Low-—” Another unpronounceability.

  “No, quite suitable. And picturesque. And very sensible—Terrans would have had trouble with those. Now, you mentioned biology. On Terra you will find it customary to make an effort to suppress or conceal such obvious sexual reactions.” Discreetly, she points at the bulge, which quivers. “Or perhaps you didn’t know that’s what it is?”

  “Oh!” He looks down and slaps at the offending member, jumping a little. “The changemaster said that the bodies were extra young and vigorous, and that part might inflate if we became in reproductive mode. But we didn’t expect—is it offensive to you?”

  The dark lad he called Loomis, his “superior colleague,” speaks up suddenly. “Boley, it is something about her proximity. Our proximity to you.” His voice is soft and low and pleasing. Smiling intently, he asks, “May we draw the conclusion that you too are in reproductive mode?”

  Sheila laughs. “Well, it’s not a safe general rule because such young bodies as yours may, ah, inflate spontaneously. But yes, as it happens, I was thinking about some such way of passing the waiting time.”

  “How splendid!” exclaims Bolingbroke. “When we learned that we must wait here for so long, twenty-four standards, we determined to experience some major Terran activity. So we decided on sex. Would you say it is a major Terran activity?”

  She laughs again. “I certainly would say so, yes. But tell me, are matters on our two planets roughly similar? I mean, do you have different sex types or genders who must couple to reproduce? And who also do it when they don’t intend to make young, but just for the pleasure? And the pleasure of Contact culminates in a sort of spasm, or body sneeze, which is most pleasing of all?”

  “Yes, indeed. That describes it well, and the changemaster told us these male bodies emit fluid. But with us, so many people are incomplete. Is it not so with you? We were assured these bodies are complete. But are you?”

  “Yes. In fact, on Terra, except for a few medical oddities, everyone is sexually complete.”

  “But,” says Loomis in his soft voice, “how in the stars do you keep from making young whenever you meet and having frightful overpopulation?”

  “Oh, we did have trouble for a time. Then we invented good chemical preventions.”

  “Ah, the famous Terran technical ingenuity!” laughs Bolingbroke. “So, then, there is no impediment. But as I said, our manual is unavailable. Would you care to assist us in doing sex? Judging from our reactions—” He pauses to look down and cuff the obstinately upright organ, then winces. “Ow! This is more tender than I thought!”

  “Yes, Myr Bolingbroke, you must
be more careful. I’m told that a blow in the male genital region can be very painful.”

  “Yes. Well, as I was saying, it appears from our reactions that you are very compatible to us. Right, Loomis? But are we compatible to you, Myr Sheila? I can see no signs.” They are both looking her over anxiously.

  “No, nothing at all,” agrees Loomis. “Except perhaps a faint reddening around your ears?”

  Sheila is almost overcome by laughter. The idea of instructing these two Thumnorians appears quite delightful. There is a little danger, of course, because those male bodies are a lot stronger than hers, and if the Thumnorians’ sex habits turn out to be unpleasant she would regret it. But surely diplomats can be expected to be safe? Meanwhile she is saying:

  “Myr Loomis is very perceptive. Any blushing or reddening in the female is a favorable sign—unless it comes from anger. No, Myr Bolingbroke, with women the signs are far less obvious. You see, our sexually responsive tissue is mostly hidden between our legs. So you simply have to judge as you go along. In fact, sometimes the woman’s reaction isn’t clear until you actually initiate contact.”

  “Confusing,” mutters the redhead. “But maybe the manual will help. Now, what do we do first?”

  They both look at her expectantly.

  “Well, there are a few preliminaries. And I should warn you that in general the female is slower to arrive at complete arousal. Of course, it is physically possible to have sex with an unready or even unwilling female, but I believe most males agree that in the best experience both partners are highly aroused.”