Surely if this was a ride I didn’t want to get off, I’d have thought about what came afterward more?
My commander gave me one of his looks that said everything without saying anything, and I watched him float by me out of node 3, now feeling a little irritated with him.
I set up the video camera, attaching it to the wall in front of the ARED machine, then I pulled the harness down and belted it around my waist. Pulling the bar and attached arms of the ARED over my head, resting the bar across my shoulders to hold me down in place, I wrapped my hands around it like it was a barbell. I paused before I started to do squats. Tom’s words rang in my ears.
Forgetting for a second that the video was recording, I exhaled heavily.
“Well . . . fuck.”
THREE
Hallie
PRESENT DAY
I had my first standoff with the PR team, Darce. To be fair, I think I’ve been pretty easygoing about the social media thing, considering if this wasn’t my job, I would never be on those platforms and posting about my life. But when NASA asked me to do it, I thought, Why not? I’m experiencing things that so few humans get to experience, and I want to share that. I want to educate people about what we do up here and do it in a way that’s fun and interesting to them. So I push myself out of my comfort zone. And guess what, I even have fun with it. NASA told me I reached over two million followers this week. Two million. That’s mind-blowing. And satisfying, and it makes me want to keep going.
But NASA wanted Tom to film my first space walk. . . . Darce, I . . . for a moment I thought I might be wrong about this—making a bigger deal out of it than it is—but I want to experience that moment. I don’t want to be thinking about thousands of people watching my reaction on Instagram. I want to be thinking about what it feels like to be in space, to have nothing but my suit between me and the stars.
Thankfully, Mission Control agreed with me. Spacewalking is dangerous; they need me focused, not thinking about entertaining people. PR was disappointed but eventually agreed. And I’m conflicted, for sure. Should I deprive people of seeing a space walk? I’m not sure I should. But should I deprive myself of true immersion in the moment? It’s like how some people can’t enjoy a vacation or a day trip somewhere new because they’re so busy thinking about capturing the perfect shot or video for their social media accounts that they miss the actual experience itself. That’s crazy to me. So I’m doing this one for myself. And Mission Control is doing it this way to keep me safe. Maybe next time. I’m astronaut first, PR vehicle second. For now, saying no is the right thing to do.
—CAPTAIN CHRISTOPHER ORTIZ, VIDEO DIARY #4
As an adopted New Yorker, I took it seriously that you never meander your way on or off the subway.
However, I was so lost in my thoughts about the man on the video—whom I had identified as Captain Christopher Ortiz, bona fide NASA astronaut—as well as my mother, internet sensation, that I wasn’t quick enough at my subway stop that morning. By that I mean, I didn’t jump off the train as fast as I should have. The crowd of people pushing to get on was doing a good job of trying to keep me on there with them, and as I shoved my way through, hopping off the train, I didn’t realize they caught my trench coat between them.
It was a rainy spring morning, and I’d left my trench open. It was a designer camel trench coat I’d gotten on sale and loved because it was lightweight but had this beautiful fullness to it that set it apart from other trench coats.
That also meant there was a lot of fabric.
And one of the rude morons squeezing past me caught the right side of my coat as they got on the train, pulling it up with them. I knew I couldn’t move as I wobbled on the platform, but I couldn’t work out why until the doors to the train shut and I saw my coat stuck in between them.
Call it adrenaline, call it my body being instinctively used to bizarre things happening to me, but I dropped my large purse with my laptop in it and spun out of the coat just in time for it to whiz away with the train, the left arm of the coat yanking my shoulder with the force as it was stripped from me.
“Holy shit,” I heard behind me. “Fast reflexes!”
I turned to see a group of teenagers I was pretty sure should be in school swaggering toward me, eyes wide, grinning at me.
A boy in ripped tight jeans and a pink oversized sweater hopped toward me, staring at me in awe. “Sis, that was dope!” He high-fived me, and I laughed a little hysterically as I high-fived him back. His friends surrounded me, patting me on the shoulders, reaching for their own high fives.
“Right?” I grinned maniacally, still in shock. “So dope.” Why am I saying the word “dope”?
“Epic as fuck,” one girl said. “I so wish we caught it on film.”
“Hey,” the boy in the pink sweater picked up my bag to hand it to me. “Is that what you’re doing?” He glanced around, searching the subway. “You filmin’ a stunt show or somethin’?”
“Yeah,” I lied, my heart pounding. “Don’t do it at home, kids. I’m a professional. Gotta go do . . . more crazy-as-fuck stunts.” Oh, please stop, Hallie.
They nodded, wide-eyed, asking me if they’d be on the show. I mumbled something vague and put every ounce of energy into strutting away. Once I was out of sight, my wobbly legs gave up and I slumped into the wall.
Oh my God, I could have died. People hurrying downward ignored me because it was New York, and I forced myself upward to the light of day. Every inch of my body shook from my near-death experience.
It wasn’t until I was out of the subway, walking through the drizzly city streets and toward the office, that I realized I’d also just lost my favorite coat.
I blamed Captain Christopher Ortiz and my mother for distracting me.
* * *
“You told them you were filming a stunt show?” Althea’s lips twitched as she stood near the door to my office. “The urge I have to laugh should not undermine my sincere concern for what just happened to you.”
“You can laugh. I looked like an idiot high-fiving them.”
Althea had one of those contagious cackles so out of sync with her sophisticated good looks that I couldn’t help but laugh too.
After a little while, she straightened, wiped tears from her eyes, and forced her full mouth into a serious pinch. “Okay, the last bit was funny. But the bit where you almost died really is not. What happened to you has happened to other people and ended . . . not well. Please be more careful.”
The reminder that people had died in incidents like that made me feel mildly nauseated. I couldn’t tell George. He would lecture me for days.