ADVISER’S NOTE: Rylie Kannard is a senior at PHS and a student in Mrs. Nan O’Neill’s Creative Writing class. The following work of fiction was composed in response to the prompt, “What is the worst thing that could happen on your way to work?”

It seemed normal, just like any other second Tuesday of the month.

I was in New York for some meetings and as usual I was out the door by 8:15 a.m. But this morning was different; no this morning was beyond different…this one morning changed so many lives in the most colossal way.

I was walking down Vesey Street when it happened. I raised my arm and glanced at my watch. It was 8:44 a.m. For some reason I was compelled to look up when people started screaming. I was right next to the North Tower. If I could I would go back in time and shut my eyes so I could erase the image that had been burned into my head, an image so horrifying it shook the devil himself.

Everyone began running … the clock hit 8:45 a.m, BAM. It was unlike any sound I had ever heard before. It was more than an explosion, the sound of chaos, the sound of souls being ripped from the earth. The sound of families never being the same again, but the sight was even worse. The Twin Towers were no longer twins, but siblings with one more dysfunctional than the other.

I began to run, running in some unknown direction I let my instincts take over. Then the dust began to fall. Limbs were scattered about. I froze in my tracks when I saw her. She was hanging from a tree, a body lifeless, leaves painted red around her. I stared for what seemed like hours, people scurrying left and right. I looked at my watch: 8:53 a.m. I began to run in the other direction. The dust was heavy … it hurt my lungs, but I couldn’t stop. I had no control over my body, my primal self-decided it needed to escape no matter what the cost.

So I kept running, until I was trapped; debris from the tower, what seemed to be a few stories’ worth, was laying in front of me, too dangerous to climb. I looked around to see if there were any holes to fit through; there were none. I looked up to see fire spitting out from the tower, blowing out windows and the blackest smoke seeping through the cracks of the building.

I looked down at my watch again: 9:01 a.m. I started to cry and felt like a little girl lost in the supermarket waiting for my mother to come find me; but instead of a supermarket … a war zone and instead of my mother…God. 9:03 a.m. BAM. The same sound as before, but this time, it kept ringing in my head. I collapsed to the ground, hands over my ears. I didn’t want to hear it anymore, see it anymore … feel it anymore.

I lay there and let the dust cover me, let people run by me, listened to the screams of spectators watching bodies hit the ground, some dead by catastrophe, others by choice.

After 102 minutes of burning, the North Tower collapsed to ground, and the South Tower following shortly after. The Twins came crumbling down to rest, both silenced and still forever. I was never the same after that day … I see it always, it never goes away, it’s imprinted on history and its imprinted on my soul. I was one of the lucky ones that day, while thousands died around me … I survived. I’ll never take that for granted. I’ll live my life in remembrance of those whose lives were taken to early on that unforgettable 11th day of September in 2001.