Victor Glover: “The Weight Up Here”

This is an entirely fictional creative work. It does not represent the actual thoughts, words, or views of any real person. This is satire and literary fiction for entertainment purposes.

April 01, 2026
Victor Glover — NASA Astronaut and Artemis II Pilot

The Weight Up Here

April 1, 2026

Not a joke. We're up.

T+6 hours and change. Just finished post-insertion checks. Everything nominal, which is the best word in the English language right now. Reid is running through systems with ground. Christina is documenting. Jeremy caught me staring out the window and didn't say anything, just put his hand on my shoulder for a second. Good crew. The best crew.

I need to write some of this down before it gets processed and polished into what I'll say in interviews later.

The SRBs — man. You cannot prepare for that. Sim doesn't touch it. Dragon didn't touch it. The whole stack shakes and you feel it in your teeth, in your sternum, and there's this moment where your body says "this is wrong, get out" and your training says "nominal" and you trust the training. You trust it. But your body knows.

I kept thinking about Dionne. Right before crew walkout she texted me a picture of the kids watching the feed at her mom's house. The little one had my old flight jacket on, sleeves dragging the floor. I almost lost it right there in the suit room. Smiled through it. You smile through it.

Here's the thing I'm not going to say on comms or to the press pool or in the debrief.

I watched the news feeds this morning before they locked us down. Iran. The shutdown. Congress can't pass a CR to keep the lights on at the Smithsonian but they kept the lights on at KSC. I'm grateful for that — I am — but I keep turning it over. Some of those civil servants who built this vehicle, who tested every bolt, they're not getting paid right now. They showed up anyway. That's the part that gets me. People showed up anyway.

And I'm supposed to be a symbol. First person of color beyond LEO. I know what that means. I don't run from it. My grandmother cleaned offices in Pomona and I'm going to see the far side of the Moon. That's real. That's America at its best and I will carry that with every breath in this vehicle. But symbols are heavy when you're also just a pilot trying not to miss a callout. I told the PAO team I was honored and humbled. I am. But I'm also just — I don't know. I'm a naval aviator doing a job. The history part is for everyone else to hold. I've got checklists.

Maybe that's a defense mechanism. Dionne would say that. She'd say "Victor, you're allowed to feel it." She's right. She's always right about the stuff I don't want to look at.

Ate a tortilla with peanut butter about an hour ago. First meal in space on Orion. Unremarkable. Perfect.

I keep going back to the window. Earth is already noticeably smaller than what I saw from ISS orbit and that is — I don't have the word. It's not beautiful, that's not enough. It's corrective. Like it rearranges something in your priorities. You see that thin blue line and you know that every war, every shutdown, every terrible thing we do to each other is happening in that sliver of atmosphere. And then you look the other way and it's just black. Just void. And somehow that's comforting. The universe doesn't care about our budget fights. It's just out here, waiting.

Christina just floated past with a camera and said "You journaling, Glover?" I said I was making notes for the debrief. Which is partially true.

Ten days. We break the distance record in about four days if the trajectory holds.

I should sleep. Reid's going to want a sharp pilot tomorrow.

Keep thinking about that picture of my daughter in the flight jacket. The sleeves dragging the floor. Like she's growing into something.

AFTER THE CAMERAS is a daily publication of speculative psychological fiction. Each entry imagines the private thoughts of a public figure on the day's biggest story. No entry represents real thoughts, statements, or beliefs of any individual. All internal monologue, emotional reactions, and private observations are entirely invented. External events referenced are real; inner experiences are fictional. All content is created for entertainment purposes only.