Happy Birthday, Mimi
Note- Digimon aren't exactly in here; I'm giving this a more
realistic spin
--------------------------------------------
September 11, 2001-
"Tai," Kari says, drying the last dish from the sink, "What
are you sending Mimi?" she asks suspiciously.
"Her birthday card," I reply, knowing what was coming next.
"Tai!" She yells, "You know her birthday's today!"
"I know, I kinda forgot." I admit, "but I'm gonna have it
sent express. Besides, it's only the 10th
in America."
"Tai, it's the 11th in America." Kari says, "It's 6:00 in
the morning over there, you know."
"Oh." I say.
"Don't worry, I put your name on my card." She says, throwing a dishrag in my
face. "I had an idea you'd to this."
She giggles. I'd be glad about that and
not worry about that, but I really wanted to send this card; I had some stuff I
wrote in here that I doubt Kari would've written. Then the phone rings.
"Hello?" I say into the receiver.
"Hey Tai!" Izzy says.
"Hey Izzy," I say, "What are you up to?"
"Davis is throwing a party for us over at his uncle's house
to watch a movie. You and Kari wanna
come?"
"Sure, we'll be down there in a bit." I say.
-----------------------------------------
We're in Davis's uncle's house- a very big studio
apartment. We just finished watching
Armageddon, I gave it one-and-a-half thumbs up. "So do you guys wanna watch another movie? Uncle Shigeru's got a dozen of these DVD
things."
"Sure," Yolei says, "Just don't put in a Rocky movie!"
"Hey, Rocky is THE man!" Davis says, turning off the DVD
player. Then we see it- a Special
Report on the TV. "Wow, something's
going on in America." We all sit up in
our seats when we see New York.
A Boeing 767 jet has crashed into the World Trade center
towers. Emergency crews are scrambling
to the scene. Debris is raining in the
streets…
"Oh my god…" TK says.
"Where does Mimi live?"
"She lives more uptown," Sora says, holding onto Matt, "and
her schools not near there. She should
be safe." Then we see another plane
flying. "Wait a sec, what's going on
now?"
Oh God! Another plane hit the tower!- A translator
says for a woman near the scene.
"What the hell's going on!" Yolei yells. "Planes don't just
accidentally run into buildings!"
"Could this be a terrorist thing?" Cody asks.
"Looks like it." Ken says.
"I'm gonna go e-mail Mimi and see how she's doing." Izzy
says, pulling out his laptop. The rest
of us stared at the TV screen, trying to figure out who could do this.
---------------------------
"This is one rough night," I say, unlocking the door to our
apartment.
"I know," Kari says, "I'm real worried about Mimi. With all this chaos going on in Manhatten,
she's probably panicked." We walk into
our house, and the tell-tale beeping of the answering machine. "Hmm…somebody called." Kari pushes the button, and the machine
starts up.
1 new message at- 8:04 PM (a/n- 8:00 AM in New York- I
think)- Hey Tai! Hey Kari! It's Mimi.
Thanks for y'alls card; I wasn't exactly expecting anything mailed to me
with everyone online. I really appreciate
it, and I had to call you as soon as I could.
My parent's will kill me for the cell phone bill, but they'll get over
it. Anyways, I bet you won't guess
where I am right now. I'll give you a
hint- it's not the school or the mall; it's about 70 stories in the air. Okay, I'll stop being all vague and stuff-
I'm in the World Trade Center! We're
taking a class trip. Can you believe
it, I've been in New York for a year and a half, but I haven't even been in
here yet. Go figure, eh? Anyways, I'm headed up the stairs. The rest of my class got into the elevator
and are probably at the top floor by now.
I got distracted, and the stupid door closed right in my face! Talk about nerve, huh? I've climbed about 70 floors so far, so I'm
taking a little rest. I'm really
excited about coming to visit y'all next week, and I…
End of message
I stare at the machine for a while, Kari's crying right
now. "Tai! Mimi…was there!" I look
at the pink envelope on the table. It's
too late…I can never mail it to her now.
---------------------
It's been days since all this happened. The world has basically went to hell in a
handbasket. The Japanese government is
backing America; America is on the brink of war with whomever they find out did
this; and nobody here's been the same.
Sora and Yolei have been crying ever since me and Kari told everybody
about the message. Davis is angry- he
says that if Japan gets involved with this he's joining the army. Joe and his brothers are on their way over
there to help with the rescue effort.
All of us haven't been able to pick up the pieces of all of this. It's kind of ironic- it's not even our
country, yet we've felt a hard blow to ourselves. I'm looking through a magazine, when I see a single picture,
captioned "a young woman guarding a child from dust and debris as first tower
collapses behind them." She was wearing
a white skirt, now gray from the dust.
Her shirt is stained with blood, and blood is running down the side of
her face. Her skin is covered with
dust, and she is huddling the small boy away from the wave of clouds. I know who that is- it's Mimi. The caption continues, "later the boy was
found alive; the girl died." I couldn't
help but cry. Whoever did this, I
wonder if they even cared that they took an angel away from us.
Message from DigiGuy:
It's a real sad time in America. It's unfathomable the way people think that taking other people's
lives is necessary. I don't know if
there are any political or religious beliefs behind this, but are they even
worth it. Will your country be better
off because tens of thousands of people- innocent people- died today. Whoever you worship, is he pleased that
people have died at your hands. We
won't know for some time who is behind this, but whoever they are, they'll have
billions of people to answer to. . And
if not, they have someone higher to answer to.
I wrote this to show how this disaster has affected
everyone. I pray for those who've
experienced loss, and I pray for America itself.
To readers of "Digimon USA": My other story, which had been postponed due to school, won't be
finished for a while. I'll try to
upload the rest ASAP. But for now, with
all of this going on, it'll be a while.
DigiGuy
