9/11/01: A Sequel to Stephen King's 11/22/63

Chapter One: 9/11/01

          It was a clear September morning, not a cloud in the sky, when 30-year-old Atticus Thomas's black alarm clock blasted the Top 40 FM station at exactly 6:00am that morning.  Atticus felt refreshed, that had been a good, much needed sleep.  His wife of 6 years, Hazel, lay, still sleeping soundly on her side, turned away from Atticus.  He knew that she must have been exhausted.  Not only did Hazel run and own one of the most successful daycare centers in downtown New York City, she was also eight and a half months pregnant with the couple's third and fourth children, fraternal twins, one boy, one girl.  They had settled on the names Cohen Hayes and Calypso Laine for the newest additions.  Hazel had reached that uncomfortable point in her pregnancy and seemed to be irritated by most things.  Atticus rubbed Hazel's upper back, extra gently, running his right hand down her spine, an effort to wake her up.  Hazel flinched slightly, turning on to her back.  She blinked her eyes open, multiple times, adjusting to the blinding natural light beaming through the window a few feet from the bed.  Within minutes, Hazel was fully awake.  She and her husband got out of bed and got ready for another day's work.  Atticus wore a nicely fitting pastel blue button-up that his younger sister Sansa had given him for Christmas the year before.  It was fitted, outlining his muscular physique, a product of a daily trip to the health club combined with good genetics.  It was not too fitted though, just right.  Atticus, who had a decent sense of style for a newly married straight man, had paired the shirt with freshly ironed, crisp khakis and navy blue felt dress shoes.  He stood in front of the full length mirror, surveying this look, next to his wife.  She wore minimal makeup, pink eyeshadow and maybe some light mascara, and an oversized cranberry red tee with her business's name, Skyline Child Care Center, embroidered on the breast.  Now that they were ready for the day, Hazel went into the kitchen to prepare breakfast, and Atticus made his way to the condo's other bedroom where his two daughters, 7-year-old Margot and 3-year-old Shiloh, were sleeping peacefully.  Atticus, woke his daughters, lovingly and gently as he had with Hazel, and led them out into the kitchen for a breakfast of orange juice and brightly colored Sugar Loops drenched in milk.  Once the family was nearly finished with breakfast, Atticus heard a knock at the door.  He got up from his seat at the head of the small modern table and let in the young college student, Skye Cunningham, an art major, also the nanny who watched young Shiloh and drove Margot to school while Hazel and Atticus were at work.  The children finished breakfast, and Margot helped Shiloh place her empty plastic bowl in the dishwasher.  The girls then went into the living area and got settled in with Skye.  Atticus slipped into his room, grabbed his briefcase and kissed each of his children goodbye.  Hazel bent down to the floor and she too gave both children a light kiss on the forehead.  Shiloh, who was over-the-moon excited to become a big sister anyday, gently kissed Hazel's stretched belly and said in her high-pitched voice that had only learned to speak less that 6 months ago, "I wove you Cawypthso, wove you Cohen, can't wait'a meet yous." 

          Hazel smiled and ruffled Shiloh's kinky dark brown bob cut.  She then got up, grabbed her de of house keys of the kitchen counter, and followed Atticus out the front door of condo number 723 at 7:48am.  Like any typical day, Hazel and Atticus took the subway to the famous World Trade Center where they both happened to work, Atticus as a real estate agent in the North Tower, and Hazel at Skyline in the nearly identical South Tower.  Before parting ways, Atticus and Hazel shared a long, passionate kiss just after getting of the subway.  They then hurried in their separate directions just as they had every weekday since they'd began working at the Trade Center more than three years prior.  Hazel took the crowded elevator up to the 88th floor where the daycare center was located.  She felt excited when she remembered that this would be one of the last times in a while that she'd have to ride that cramped, slow elevator.  At the end of that week, she'd be released for four months of maternity leave.  A couple of minutes later, Hazel arrived at the daycare center, unlocked the front door and flicked on the lights.  It would be about fifteen minutes before the children and Hazel's two employees, Penelope and Gwenyth, would arrive.  This didn't bother Hazel, she had always arrived early, this gave her time to get things in perfect order. 

          Meanwhile, in the North Tower, things were already in full swing at the Lennox Real Estate Agency when Atticus arrived.  He reported to his boss, Mrs. Paige Lennox, and then settled down at his desk to check his emails.  His desk was covered in picture frames, holding photos of his wife and daughters, their smiling faces always seemed to make tough days better.  Next to a photo of Shiloh's messy cake face from her first birthday, Atticus's plastic clock read 8:26am.  He had a bit over an hour to check his emails before he was scheduled to meet in the conference room for another boring PowerPoint presentation.  Some time later, while Atticus was looking intently at the heartwarming photograph of Shiloh's first birthday, he heard a loud noise, like a jet, seemingly overheard.  It was extremely loud, almost too loud for comfort.  Then all of a sudden, an ear splitting noise, crashing, and then, everything went black.  The last thing he saw was Shiloh's cake covered grin, glancing happily up at him.

          Hazel watched out the window in horror as a jumbo jet collided with the North Tower.  Her whole body jerked in terror.  She immediately expected that the worst had become of her husband, and felt as if she were about to begin sobbing intensely.  However, she managed to convince herself to keep her composure so that she could comfort the children, many of whom were crying in fear.  The most shaken of all seemed to be a little ginger haired six/year-old named Autumn Tennyson, whose father worked with Hazel's husband in the North Tower.  Autumn seemed to know all too well what had happened.  She was curled up in a ball, head buried in her knees, on the rainbow hued rug by the wooden dollhouse that Hazel had purchased for the daycare center at a garage sale the month before.  Between terrified sobs and chattering teeth, Autumn repeated in a shaking voice, "Daddy, no!  Daddy, please be okay!" 

          Hazel squatted down beside Autumn, put her arm around her, and whispered comforting words into her left ear, brushing aside a bright red Pippy Longstocking style braid, while trying to reassure herself that things really were "gonna be okay." 

          But sadly, things weren't.  At 9:03am another hijacked plane would collide with the South Tower, obliterating the 75-85 floors of the complex and leaving everyone above them trapped over rising flames.  Hazel would helplessly watch many of the children she had cared for for so long die of smoke inhalation all around her.  Through it all Hazel would try not to lose hope.  She knew that she had to live, not just for herself, but also for her unborn twins, for Shiloh and Margot, and for her husband who might still be alive, even if the odds were so slim.  She took her flip cellphone out of her pocket and dialed her own home phone, hoping to speak to her daughters one last time if she did not making it out alive.  She could feel it becoming harder and harder to breath as the smoke and fire rose.  The call went to the answering machine, Hazel's heart sank.  On the other end of the line, Hazel heard the familiar, "Please leave a message after the beep." 

           Struggling to speak, Hazel held the speaker to up to her mouth, "Atticus, Margot and Shiloh.  There's been an incident at the World Trade Center.  I'm going to try everything to make it home.  I just wanted to say, I love you." 

           Within moments the smoke became to much to bare.  Just as many others that terrible day had, Hazel instinctively seemed to know that she would rather die quickly than burn to death.  She whispered a prayer and half consciously stepped, almost effortlessly, out of a gaping hole that had been torn into the side of the remains South Tower...