A housewife has a chance encounter with a time-traveler who deals in ancient artifacts, after which the two of them have time-to-time encounters.
I had not realised how important the Time Traveler’s visits had become in my pleasant, prosperous, humdrum existence.

Variants

(1)
  1. “Time’s Revenge” by Pauline Ashwell, in Analog, June 1995.
  2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . written by Pauline Ashwell