He could remember hearing his neck snap. In fact, Cody could remember every long minute after the accident, crumpled in a limp ball against the van’s roof. He remembered the immediate numbing sensation, as if everything from his Adam’s apple down had gone to sleep. He wondered if this was what death was like and felt cheated.

Another story about the will to live, and a story about memory and identity. We see Cody adjust to life with tetraplegia over seven years or so, and we see a fully fleshed-out and specific life, one that’s his. When Cody has a hope of a chance to give up this life to get his body back, it’s a relief to remember that it’s his choice, not ours.

First published in Analog in Mid-December 1985. Collected in The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Third Annual Collection, Bluejay, 1986