Tuesday {The Manhattan Trilogy #1}

Running (J)

The explosion sounds like it's coming from a nuclear bomb. Where could it be coming from? It sure doesn't sound like there is another plane coming for us. Instead, it sounds like something is falling directly on top of my café. My customers are whispering worriedly amongst each other, wondering what the possible source of the strange sound could be.

"Valeria, can you please man the shop for me for just a few minutes, please? I'm going to go check on how the twins are doing," I ask one of my best employees. She turns around and smiles at the request.

"Sure, James, I can do that for you," Valeria replies, running to my normal place near the cash register, where another customer is waiting to be served.

I clap her on the back as a quick gesture of gratitude and leave the shop to go check on my two daughters.

As soon as the door closes behind me, I have to quickly cover my nose and mouth with my apron. The ash is everywhere, and it's suffocating. Why is there so much dust all of a sudden? What in the world just happened over here to cause this massive dust storm?

I see a completely ash-covered man coming towards me. "What just happened, mister? Do you know anything about it?" I ask him desperately.

"The South Tower is down, sir! It just came down on itself!" He responds in a frantic voice, coughing and trying to expel dust from his lungs. If this were any normal day, I'd assume he was a lunatic from the mental asylum based on his physical appearance. His wrinkled skin was as pale as snow, and his hair was sticking up at several different angles.

"What?" My two eyes almost pop out of my head. That's my young kid that the man is talking about! I sprint towards the WTC as fast as I've ever run in my life, wondering if he just told me the actual truth, if the second tower actually had fallen.

I skid to a sudden stop when I see her lying still on the ground, blanketed with a thick layer of ash from her own fallen building self.

Curled up in a tight fetal position, a gaping plane wound in her side, is my younger twin daughter, South Tower Staten. Her eyes and mouth are closed tightly, and she isn't breathing.

"Oh my God!" I run over to South Tower and kneel next to her. "My baby girl, your father is here, please wake up for him, please wake up for your Dad on his fortieth birthday...I want to celebrate, not cry over your death...please, honey, please..."

She obviously doesn't move in response to my panicky begging, nor does she open her two silver eyes in the slightest. Her mouth is shut in a dismayed frown, and her whole body is limp in my arms. I put my ear to her chest and listen, hopeful for at least one last heartbeat.

Nothing. Not even half a flimsy beat. She is gone.

I hold my small, lifeless daughter to my body, cradling her like a baby. I kiss the top of her head and hug it to my chest. I cry so hard that I retch, which makes me momentarily stop to take a breath. My daughter is dead, and there is no way to bring her back. I will never read another classic book like Wuthering Heights to her, never let her beat me at another video game, never celebrate another one of her hockey saves, telling her she was just as good as Martin Brodeur. No more silly made-up songs, no more trips to the ice cream store, no more catching home run balls for her at Yankees games.

Without thinking, I begin singing a nursery rhyme to my dead daughter.

Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are.
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are.

When the blazing sun is gone,
When he nothing shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are.

Then the traveler in the dark,
Thanks you for your tiny spark;
He could not see which way to go,
If you did not twinkle so.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are.

"You always were my little shining star," I hug South Tower, rocking her back and forth as the tears run down my cheeks. "In school and sports. Constantly scoring nearly straight A's in every class on your report cards while also winning games and occasionally championships on the ice."

A dusty rose blows past in the wind created by the falling of the tower. I grab it from the air with one quick arm movement. Opening my daughter's hand, I place the rose inside of it for her to hold forever. I place both her hands on the part of her waist that has not been opened by the plane and straighten her body out. Laying my daughter back on the ground, I prepare to depart.

"Goodbye for now, baby girl," I kiss my daughter's forehead and stand up. "We will organize the most beautiful funeral for you. You would love it if you could be there to see it. I will miss you."

Walking back towards my café on Washington Street, I wipe my face. What a coincidence that the flower happened to pass by me just as I was crying over the collapse of one of my Twin Tower daughters. Its beauty represented the beauty of the few years I had with her. Now, as I make my way back to the café that I own. I think. Will people come back to my café after this is over, or will I have to shut it down? How much will I have to pay for the possible damage to the building? How does my wife feel about the premature death of one of our two daughters?

Most importantly, will my other daughter survive, or will my fortieth birthday deliver the gift of two dead daughters?