I had to write this. The stories I heard today, the things I saw at school were too much to ignore. I might elaborate further on my blog, findingmaddieland(dot)blogspot(dot)com.
Never forget, okay you guys? Just never forget.
Your mother wakes you up early that morning in your spacious, four-room apartment in Queens, New York. She helps you change into your school uniform, cheerily pointy out how blue and cloudless the sunny sky is today; she bribes you with magic words like 'Central Park' and 'gelato' and 'outdoor café' as long as you go to school today and be a good little girl for your teacher, Ms. Segraves. She promises you won't be at St. Grace School for much longer, that you won't be in this apartment for much longer, because next week the family will be moving to a nice, big mansion in Westchester County, New York. You'll be going to Octavian County Day School, where there are only girls and no uniforms at all.
You pretend to sulk and pout and whine (after all, you're only 7 years old), but secretly, you are glad that you'll get to spend more quality time with your mother today. Once your family moves to Westchester, your mom will have to get up much, much earlier in order to make the commute to her studio in the heart of New York City. You will be placed in the care of a nanny, most likely one that will teach you how to speak French while carpooling you around town.
You and your mother kiss your daddy goodbye (he's taking your self-centered older sisters to school) and hail a taxi to drive you over to St. Grace's. You happily bounce around the back of the seat, chattering away, but your mother seems busy and impatient. She must have something very important to do today, you guess. She leads you into the building, drops you off at your second grade classroom, and hugs you goodbye.
It's only a week or two into the school year, much too early for you to be learning anything interesting. You try to follow along with the lesson, you try to scribble the right answers into this brightly coloured worksheet, but it's all to no avail. You end up staring out the classroom window instead.
Something odd is happening outside.
There are ambulances outside. Wailing, flashing ambulances, skidding down the pavement as fast as they can without totaling a taxi or knocking over a trendy pedestrian with their Starbucks in hand. You figure that somebody has thrown themselves off a bridge—you and your daddy had a talk about the meaning of 'suicide' the other day. It happened. You would adjust to it. You let the thought pass, and continue to count the ambulances.
By the time you reach twenty-five, you figure that it couldn't be just one person hopping off a bridge. There must have been at least eight.
You glance back at your teacher, and notice her peering curiously out the window with you. You see apprehension in her eyes, but she doesn't say anything, so you figure nothing must be wrong.
At least, nothing was wrong until the fog started blowing in. The air outside that window is hazy, foggy, like it's snowing. But it can't be snowing. Winter wasn't here for at least another two months.
Suddenly, the loudspeaker dings and your principal begins to speak. He informs you that the World Trade Center's Twin Towers had collapsed. The school is now on lockdown.
Ms. Segraves scrambles over herself to turn on the TV located in the corner of your classroom. She jabs the 'Channel' button, desperately trying to find a news station. The picture focuses, and you see a tall, burning building on the TV. Anger meets shock and collides with grief on Ms. Segrave's face. You have never seen her, nor anybody, for that matter, look this way. You are so used to the calm friendliness on her young, pretty face that it hits you like a slap to the cheek to see her expression.
The other sticky children in your class are murmuring, trying to figure out what the heck is going on. You ignore them, attempting to listen to what the rushed, frantic TV reporter is saying. The only words you can make out are 'World Trade Center' and 'Twin Towers'. A thought strikes you, and you wonder why those phrases sound so familiar.
The principal comes over the loudspeaker again and tells the whole school to gather in the auditorium. He announces that school has been let out for the day and that all parents have been notified to come pick up their children. Several rowdy boys in your class yell and clap eagerly, excited to get out of school early. Ms. Segraves angrily shushes them, telling the whole class that this is serious and to line up for a trip to the auditorium. One girl asks who will be line leader and door holder. Ms. Segraves says it doesn't matter right now, just to line up and not argue. You still take your spot at the back of the line anyways, because you love being caboose.
You don't have to wait long for your mother to come pick you up. She's in one of her studio's cars, shaking in the backseat and hugging your sisters. You stare quizzically at your mother, and she gently explains that some very bad, black-hearted people purposely crashed planes into the World Trade Center's Twin Towers. Many people died, burned by the fires or crushed by the rubble. But you are going to be okay, she says. You're safe now. You won't be going back to St. Grace's either, that school is too easy for your bright young mind and now full of bad memories. Octavian County Day won't mind if you missed a week of your old school, they would understand. You're a little miffed that your mother is using such baby words with you. You also can't help but be disappointed that you didn't get any gelato after school like she promised this morning.
The studio car drops you, your sisters, and your mother off at your apartment, and you all crowd into the den, perching on cushy black leather chairs. One of your sisters turns on the TV and you try to watch it like your family is: mouth gaping, eyes glued to the screen. But you can't. It's just the same, terrible burning pictures and monotone words, over and over and over again.
You idly wonder where your daddy is. Shouldn't he be home with you, comforting you, watching the news with you? Shouldn't he be appearing out of the concrete dust that clogged the streets, happy and healthy? You hear those words again, the World Trade Center's Twin Towers, and you realize why the words sound so familiar.
Your daddy works there.
--
It is seven years to the date of September 11, 2001. It is the day that is said to have changed your country forever. It is a day that was commemorated by wearing red, white, and blue in elementary school. It is a day that has been overlooked in middle school. It's a day that has faded into a bleak memory in your mind, a day your friends know not to mention, not only because you don't like to talk about it, but because they don't care much themselves.
It's just another day for you, a day with blue skies and no clouds and pleasant weather as you head to your ninth grade Pre-AP Biology class at BOCD. You figure that since your homeroom, Algebra, and Journalism classes have barely mentioned September 11th, this class won't either. You are dead wrong.
There is a slideshow.
The first slide is the standard question: Where were you when the Twin Towers collapsed? You say you can't remember, but in reality, you don't want to remember. There are pictures of dead, burned out shells of buildings, of the white fog you so clearly remember, of the burning buildings.
The teacher clicks around some more. She pauses on another picture that looks seemingly serene: a sliver of a building, still intact on the left side, and a clear blue sky as the background. But there's something in the middle of the picture that draws you in and leaves your mouth hanging.
It's a black body, a person suspended in midair. Their arms and legs hang above them, grasping for the heavens, while their back faces the ground they haven't yet reached. Your teacher explains how there was no other choice but to jump if you didn't want to be burned alive by the flames. You silently wonder what that person was thinking as he—or she—fell. Were they praying? Were they enjoying the ride? Did they feel free? Did they have a family?
Your biology teacher clicks to the next slide. More people standing in their broken windows, contemplating whether to jump. How could people be able to take these pictures, yet were unable to save the victims themselves? You thank God for waterproof mascara.
Your teacher pulls up another picture and explains that when the plane hit the second tower, the force of the crash and the impending fire immediately vaporized anybody in the plane or that floor. One minute you were there, the next minute you weren't. No pain involved. You simply can't put your mind around the idea.
The slideshow ends, and you wipe away your tears as discreetly as you can. Your teacher faces the class and speaks in a wavering voice, telling you that your group, your grade level is one of the last few classes that she will teach that will remember September 11th. After that, it will be only first graders who remember. Then kindergarteners. Then children who were born after it happened. She says that you must never forget, and you know that you will not forget, that you will never forget, because you are Dylan Marvil, and your daddy never did come out of the concrete dust that day.