Page 20 of Death of the Author

20 Interview Hugo

There was a conversation I had with Zelu one night, back when she was learning to use her exos. It gave me a glimpse into

what made her tick. We’d finished a long day of training. It was just me, because Marcy needed the day off and Uchenna had

to run home for something. We went late that night, to nearly 8 p.m., because Zelu wanted to beat her ten-minute record of

standing unassisted.

When we were done, neither of us had anywhere to be that evening, so we went to the balcony to gaze at the stars. It was a

cool, clear night, and we both put on jackets. I pushed Zelu in her wheelchair toward the railing and then sat beside her

at the patio table. She pulled a small joint out of her jacket’s pocket. “I’m always prepared,” she said, then produced a

lighter from inside her jacket, too. “Join me?”

“Sure,” I said. My wife is more of a pothead than I am, but sometimes, during quiet times like this, I will indulge. Zelu

lit up, took a puff, and handed the blunt to me.

I inhaled, held it, and waited. The high rolled over me like a soft wave of sparkles. “Smooth,” I said, exhaling the smoke. I took another puff.

She held her hand out to take the joint back from me. “Today was tough,” she said.

“You did good, though.”

She slowly exhaled smoke through her nose. “I can do better.”

“And you will.”

We sat there quietly for a while, passing the joint between us. The stars looked brighter now. The cold air felt amazing.

I leaned back farther in my chair so I could look down at myself, my prosthetics, my own creations. I chuckled. “I am awesome.”

“Yep,” Zelu said. She cocked her head toward me. “So how did... how did it happen to you?”

“How did what?” I asked.

“It.”

I frowned. It wasn’t that I hate the question. It’s a crazy story, and I never get tired of telling the tale. It was just

that at this moment, I was feeling so open. I was tired from a long but good day, proud that the technology I’d invented was

working; it was a beautiful night; and I was high.

“You don’t know?” I asked her. “You never read up on me?”

“Of course I did, Hugo,” she said. “But I’ve never heard the story from you .”

Her question traveled deep into my mind, and the answer that bubbled up was super vivid, way more detailed than the version I’ve become so practiced at delivering to investors, students, and those who use the exos. I told her about that day in Colorado when I was eighteen. High up in the Rockies. When I’d jumped off a cliff in a beautiful yellow hang glider on a beautiful yellow day after hiking up there solo. How I was confident, how I moved with the ease of the athlete I was, with a stomach that was mostly empty because that’s when I felt the greatest. In the open sky, I saw a large owl flying beside me, and it stared right at me with a glowing yellow eye as I passed it. I thought nothing of it then. If I’d been with my climbing buddy Pat, he’d have called it a bad omen. He was superstitious like that and thought the sighting of an owl meant something was about to die.

I told Zelu about how I’d constructed my hang glider up on that cliff, a spot I’d launched from so many times before. And

how, the first few moments after I went airborne, I felt a joy so potent that I think I blacked out for a moment. That when

I finally came back to myself, the quiet I experienced was like God had placed his hands over my eyes. Two minutes later,

as I flew over the forest canopy, the strangest gust of wind slammed into me. I told Zelu that I would never know what the

hell it was. It knocked me right into the side of a mountain, where I would remain for four days, caught in the bent remains

of my glider, legs shattered.

I told her about those dark, terrifying days when I met death, got to know her, negotiated with her, fought with her, and

eventually submitted to her. I didn’t tell Zelu that a crow kept coming and pecking at my decaying legs. The wet red strand of flesh it managed to eat. How I barely

had the strength to wave it away and how it kept getting bolder. I didn’t tell her that I tried to kill myself with a stick.

But I told her enough that she started crying. “But you know what, Zelu?” I asked. “If I had a chance to go back, to never

have it happen, I wouldn’t take it. This is me. This is my path. I’m better for it all. I’ve climbed higher, seen more, traveled

farther, created more than I ever could have with my legs. My ultimate boon.”

Zelu was looking at me hard. I was glad. She was hearing me. My words hurt her, but I hoped they would heal her, too. People

like us have a hard time speaking to ourselves, beyond our basic programming and thinking about our own insecurities.

Next, I asked how “it” happened to her. She took a deep pull from her joint and slowly exhaled a giant cloud of smoke. About

a minute passed. I waited. She took three more puffs and handed the joint to me. Her eyes were red now, and she was smirking.

She watched me as I finished it off.

Then she told me about climbing a beautiful tree that was dead inside. She said she had been arrogant. I caught that, even through my high. I wish I’d been recording her words; there was so much in what she was telling me, how she told it, how free she felt to just speak it. Such a storyteller. I know Zelu. She’s not a quiet person, but she always holds back. She’s a creative, impulsive, kind, fun girl. She has that wild discipline that I recognize because I have it, too. She can take the pain. But that wall of hers is solid and thick. But this night, the wall was down.

“When I fell... ,” she said. Her eyes grew wide, her jaw slack, like she couldn’t even believe she was saying this. “I...

I... All I kept thinking was that whatever would come next, it was all my fault. It wasn’t the tree, it wasn’t the ash

borer beetle who ate it away, the boys, bad luck, fate, destiny, none of it, none of them... It was my fault. I wanted

to win and I lost my grip. Maybe I wasn’t fast enough. I should have flown. I should have...” She tapered off, tears falling

from her eyes. Then she smiled. “Wham! Then blackness. End of act one.” She giggled.

I patted her on the shoulder. She wiped her eyes. “You gotta ease up on yourself, Zelu,” I said.

“I know,” she acknowledged. “I never could have known. Plus, I was a dumb kid.” She wheeled her chair back from the railing.

“We should probably get inside. It’s cold as fuck out here.”

“Yep,” I said, getting up as well.

I drove her back to the hotel, and on the way we stopped for some hot chocolate at a Starbucks. We said good night. The next

day, and the days after that, we met up in the gym and continued as if we’d never gotten deep with each other like that. But

I’d heard Zelu loud and clear. She blamed herself and her arrogance for all that had happened, no matter what anyone said

or what her logical brain knew. She couldn’t help it. It was how she’d been able to accept what she was. She had to own it.

But the problem is, blame comes with guilt, and guilt is heavy, and that pressure just keeps building.

You asked me if I agree with the choices Zelu made. Well, I’m a scientist, and I’m her friend. Zelu and I have shared the kind of experiences few could ever comprehend. I understand what led her down her path. Still, in that moment when she had to make a pivotal choice, I don’t know if I could have done the same.