Page 58 of Death of the Author
She scoffed. “As if you don’t fuck other women.”
“I’m not like you.”
“But youlikeme.” She laughed, and he sighed.
He moved in weeks later. He didn’t bring much more than some clothes and a few South African masks and statuettes that Zelu would have stolen from his place in South Africa the first chance she got, anyway. He bought a new kitchen table made of glass and four acrylic chairs. They matched the aesthetic so perfectly that she knew she’d made the right choice in letting him move in with her. None of her family knew they were cohabitating. Msizi had already been a frequent visitor, so when he came by the house with her, no one raised an eyebrow. She supposed they all assumed he simply flew back out to LA afterward.
Msiziwasgone quite a lot, though. Often for weeks at a time. So Zelu had her space. But she always knew he’d be back. And not once from the time he moved in did she sleep with another man. It wasn’t because of some label or agreement between them, or a conscious decision; she didn’t even notice the change until Msizi had been there for a few months. The realization bothered her at first.Am I conforming?she’d wondered. She just didn’t feel like answering calls from male friends. She wasn’t interested in the looks she got when she was out and about. After a while, she just let it be what it was. If it felt good, then she would go with that. And she felt good as she was. She was content. She was relaxed. She’d even begun thinking about book two.
Zelu enjoyed brainstorming, but she knew she wasn’t ready to start writing in earnest yet. She had to wait for it, just as she’d done with book one. But a year had passed sinceRusted Robots’s publication, and her publisher, agent, and even her fans were beginning to pressure her more and more. She’d tried pushing it a bit, scribbling down notes, writing character profiles, kicking around possible plots. One thing that she did know for sure was that terrible, dynamic, insane things were always happening in the automation future.
That pressure started to ease, though, when an official release date dropped for the feature film adaptation ofRusted Robots. All the intereststarted to circle around the star-studded cast, early shots of the set, possible changes to the storyline. Her readers kept tagging her on social media, begging for more details, but she didn’t have any. All this time, Zelu had been aware that a film studio was adapting her book, but she’d had nothing to do with the process, and no one had asked her to be involved. It didn’t matter, did it? However the film performed at the box office, her book had already made her a multimillionaire. How many multis? She’d stopped counting and let her accountant handle it.
But when her agent sent her an early link to the teaser trailer the night before it went live on YouTube, Zelu’s indifference came to an abrupt end.
“What the fuck?” she whispered, staring at the film’s title card and premiere date. “What the fuck is going on? What is this?!”
She clicked the Reply button to email her agent, then thought better and called him.
“Zelu!” he answered. “Have you watched it? It’s amazing!”
Zelu bristled, still staring at her laptop screen. “About that...” she started, as delicately as she could manage. “Well, I have a question. The names of Ankara and Ijele, why have they been changed to Yankee and Dot? And the book is set in Nigeria, so why—”
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” her agent said quickly. “There are always cosmetic changes involved in bringing a story into another medium. The studio wants to keep the spirit of the book everyone knows and loves.”
“Right...” Zelu said, not at all reassured but also not sure if she was overreacting. Maybe her agent was right. The teaser was only thirty seconds long, after all.
In the weeks that followed, she tried to avoid the continuing hype. She didn’t know what the fuck they had done to her book, and she didn’t want to. Even glimpsing images from the film made her feel ill.
Her family was no solace. They felt more distant than ever. None of them visited, though they called often. Her parents made excuses; her siblings simply didn’t bother. She saw them only when she made the effort to go home on Saturday family nights. And even then, everyone talked abouteverythingbutwhat she was up to, which was fine until she noticed she was the only one no one asked about.
Zelu felt restless. She needed a change of scenery. So she decided to use her money to travel. Not long after her book release, when she had a few days to rest, she’d visited Durban with Msizi and that had been a joy. She loved Durban, and everyone in his family loved her book. Then she’d invited Hugo, Uchenna, and Marcy on a series of getaways, as thanks for everything they’d done for her. She took them to Morocco and treated them to lavish dinners. It was amazingly fun, and Zelu felt immensely grateful for their friendship. Her only true friends, really... other than Msizi.
When Zelu returned and brought a bag of Moroccan sweets to the next family night, she felt even more like an alien. Everyone was talking about the latest drama at Tolu’s law firm or the football game Chinyere’s twelve-year-old son, Emeka, was playing in. She was having amazing experiences, but no one in her family wanted to hear about them. Even when the full-length trailer for theRusted Robotsmovie started playing on the TV, no one mentioned the forthcoming movie.
No matter how hard Zelu tried to just enjoy her success, her new home, and all the opportunities she could now afford, that film kept creeping in. She’d received an official invite to the premiere in Hollywood. This thing was real, tangible, about to be thrust into the world. The chickens had come home to roost.What anidiotI was for just doing nothing, she kept thinking. Putting her head in the sand, turning the other way, hoping it would just go away. When did bad things ever just go away in her life?
She’d been obsessing about this while walking through the hall of her parents’ house, toward the kitchen, where her mother was frying some plantain. For just a moment, her focus drifted. And in that moment, she turned the corner too fast.
Her exos got tangled and down she went. She’d fallen a few times while learning to use them—falling was an inevitability of the process, and she knew how to catch herself without much injury. But this day, in her parents’ house, it was an epic fall. She hit her head against the wall onher way down. Right before she landed on the floor, she heard the crunch of the branch, saw the grassy lawn flying toward her. “Oof!” She lay there, stunned, mentally scanning her body. She started weeping.I’m broken. I’m broken again. I’m broken.And then her mother was there, cradling her and asking if she was all right.
“I... fell,” she said.
Her father appeared above her. “Anything paining you?” he asked urgently. He was frantically touching her all over, squeezing her arms and midsection in a panic.
“Check her legs!” her mother shouted.
Her father did. “These things seem to have protected them. At least there’s that.”
Her mother waved a hand. “She stillfell!”
“I’m okay,” Zelu insisted. Her eyes were wet. Her chest ached, but only a bit.
“Oh, Zelu,” her mother whispered.
“Let’s get her up,” her father said.
“No, get her chair,” her mother insisted. “These things are dangerous. As I’ve been saying formonths!”
