Escape from the Twin Towers Page 3

  Risha stopped. If the second tower falls?

  Risha knew she shouldn’t look up, but she couldn’t help it. She had to see for herself. She turned and looked, but there was only an empty space in the sky where the South Tower should have been. She understood now what had made that awful explosion of wind and dust back in the shopping mall.

  It was gone. The South Tower was gone.

  The North Tower — the one they’d just climbed down — stood alone, and it was on fire, with angry black smoke pouring from a gash near the top of the building.

  As Risha stared, the top of the tower began to sink. For a second, it looked as if the whole tower were melting into the ground. Then it buckled. The antenna toppled, and the whole sky roared as the building collapsed on itself. One floor after another came crashing down, steel on steel, crushing everything below.

  Risha stared as the tower disappeared. It vanished into an enormous cloud of gray dust that raced out from its base. Then someone grabbed her hand and shouted.

  “Run!”

  Risha took Max’s hand and pulled him up the street. She glanced back for just a second. The roaring cloud of dust looked like a tornado churning toward them. It was moving fast. Too fast for Max to outrun. They had to find shelter. But where?

  Risha tried the door to an apartment building. It was locked. But next door, there was a little shop with snacks and souvenirs. Risha yanked open the door and pulled Max inside.

  Ranger pushed in behind them, nudging them farther into the store. He could feel the earth shaking under his paws. It wasn’t safe to be near the door.

  A second later, the cloud of dust and debris blasted up the street, and everything went dark. Something slammed into the shop’s door, and the glass shattered. Risha huddled with Max and Ranger. Someone screamed, and she realized they weren’t the only ones who’d taken shelter there.

  When the wind stopped and the dust began to clear, Risha opened her eyes. Half a dozen office workers huddled in the back of the store. Their suits and dresses were caked with dust.

  “Were you in the North Tower?” a woman asked Risha.

  Risha nodded. “You too?”

  “Sixty-eighth floor.”

  Risha’s heart sped up. That was Port Authority, where her mother’s friend worked. Where her mother had taken the muffins. “Do you know a woman named Sudha Scott?”

  The woman shook her head. “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay,” Risha said. But it wasn’t. Nothing was okay.

  Max stood up and tugged on Risha’s arm. “Come on,” he said. His breathing had gotten better, but his voice was ragged and hoarse. “If they were on the same floor as your mom, they would have evacuated around the same time. I bet she’s close by.”

  Risha stood up and started for the door.

  “Wait,” the woman said. “Your mother works at Port Authority?”

  “No.” Risha turned. “She works on the ninety-first floor. We were at her office, but she went down to bring her friend a muffin and then …” Risha stopped.

  The morning flashed through her mind. The plane and the crash. The dust and the stairs and the darkness. She swallowed hard. “And then we had to evacuate and we don’t know where she is.”

  The woman looked at her coworkers. “That must have been Cindy’s friend. With the bakery box.” She looked back at Risha. “I saw her.”

  “You did?” Risha’s heart filled with hope. Finally, someone could help them! “Do you know where she was going? Was she ahead of you or behind you when you left?”

  “I don’t know where she is now,” the woman said. “She didn’t evacuate with us. As soon as the explosion happened — we didn’t know then it was an airplane — she said she had to get back upstairs.”

  “No,” Risha whispered. Mom had gone back upstairs to find Risha and Max. Of course she had. She would never leave without them. But they’d left without her. And now she was …

  Risha squeezed her eyes closed against the thought. She felt all the bitter dust that had filled the air settle in her stomach. She sank to the floor in the middle of a heap of Empire State Building souvenirs that had fallen from the shelves, and she cried.

  She felt Max’s hand on her shoulder. “Risha,” he said. “It’s gonna be okay. She probably got back right after we left. She’d have found the office empty and gone downstairs. I bet she was right behind us. She made it out, too. I know she did.”

  Risha forced herself to listen. She wiped her tear-streaked face with her scarf. Her mother’s scarf.

  Slowly, Risha stood up. Her mother had to be all right. She had to be. Risha wouldn’t let herself imagine anything else.

  The woman from the sixty-eighth floor took Risha’s hand. “You should stay with us for now. We’ll help you find her.” She pulled a cell phone from her pocket. “Have you tried calling already?”

  Risha nodded. “It wouldn’t go through.” But she took the phone and dialed her mother’s number. This time, the phone rang.

  Please. Please. Please! Risha thought.

  It rang four more times, and then Risha heard her mother’s cheery voice mail message. “Hi, this is Sudha. I’m not available right now …” Risha waited for it to finish and then said, “Mom, it’s me. We’re safe. We’re out of the building, and I … I hope you’re okay.” Risha’s throat tightened. She didn’t know what else to say. But she remembered her family’s safety plan at home. If there were ever a fire in their apartment, they’d meet at the coffee shop on the corner. “If you get this message, you should meet us at the bakery where we got the muffins this morning.” She handed the phone back.

  “Is there someone else we can call?” the woman asked. “To come get you?”

  “My dad,” Max said, and they dialed his number. This time, they got the fast busy signal again.

  “Would you like me to take you to the police?” the woman asked. “They might be able to get through to someone.”

  Risha shook her head. She needed her mom. She needed to know that her mom was okay. Her mom would check her phone and she’d be proud of Risha for thinking of a meeting place, just like their emergency plan. “We’re going to go wait for my mom where I told her.” She looked at Max, who nodded.

  “But thank you,” Risha told the woman. She brushed the broken glass off her knees and walked out the door.

  Ranger walked between Risha and Max as they made their way up the street. The air smelled like fire and dust and metal. And people! There were so many people, crying and shouting in all different languages. The one thing all their voices had in common was fear. Some people were running. Some walked in a daze as if they were lost. Some had their arms around friends who were hurt.

  Max was doing better now, but Risha still listened to his breathing as they walked. She looked up at the sky, and the papers that fluttered down to the sidewalk, some of them charred or even in flames. Was her drawing of the city skyline up there somewhere, swirling through the smoke?

  Risha tripped over a briefcase and remembered to watch her step. They were walking through soot up to their ankles, past twisted fire trucks and smoldering cars. The air was full of coughing and crying and sirens. People hurried along with neckties and paper towels pressed to their faces. Risha searched the crowd for her mother’s purple dress. A woman in a polka-dot shirt was helping a man with burns on his arms. An older woman in a flowered dress limped down the sidewalk with one shoe on and one off. Two men — one young and one older — walked side by side, holding hands. But her mother was nowhere in the crowd.

  Someone grabbed Risha’s arm from behind. She jumped and turned.

  “What floor were you on?” a woman asked. Her dress was burned at the hem, and her eyes were wild.

  “Ninety-one,” Risha said, and the woman ran off in tears. Risha looked at Max, confused.

  Max understood. “She’s looking for someone who was up higher than that.”

  Risha’s heart sank for the woman, for everyone who’d been on the floors above
them. It broke for everyone who was searching for those people now, hoping the way she was. Risha put a hand on Ranger’s head.

  Ranger felt the sadness in her touch. He didn’t stop walking, but he leaned into her a little more. When she took her hand away, he nuzzled her fingers until she looked down at him. She smiled just a little and stroked his fur.

  Risha took a shaky breath. She had to keep hoping. She had to keep telling herself that Mom would get her message. They’d wait at the bakery, and she would come. Maybe she was already there.

  Risha tried to move a little faster, but she tripped again. The pavement was covered with smoking pieces of metal and jagged chunks of broken glass. Risha’s eyes fell on a pair of reading glasses. They had black frames — not red like her mother’s. There were charred file folders and papers with singed edges. A hairbrush. A suitcase.

  And shoes. So many high-heeled shoes, all covered in the awful gray dust. Risha hoped the women wearing them had kicked them off on purpose. There were lots of black shoes, but none of them had bows on the front.

  Finally, Max and Risha turned down the street with the little bakery. It was closed and locked, but that didn’t matter. There were other people standing around at the corner, as if they were looking for someone, too. Risha searched the crowd. Her mother wasn’t there.

  “What do you want to do?” Max asked.

  “We have to wait,” Risha said. “She’ll come. As soon as she gets the message, she’ll come.” Risha tried to sound certain when she said it, like there was no way anything else could happen. Like there was no other way the day could end.

  She and Max sat down on the sidewalk. They leaned against the cool bricks of the bakery wall. A man was passing out water bottles from an abandoned bagel cart in the street. Risha and Max shared one. They rinsed the gray dust from their mouths and each had a long drink. Risha gave Ranger a drink, too. She wet her scarf and used it to wipe the ash from Ranger’s eyes and nose. “There,” she said. “Is that better?”

  Ranger leaned against her and let her stroke his matted fur. He was glad Risha and Max were safe for now. But when would Risha’s mother come to find them? And when would he get to go home?

  Mom will be here soon, Risha told herself as she watched the stream of people on the street. She’ll be here soon.

  “Do you kids need a phone?” a man in an apron asked, holding out his.

  “Thank you.” Risha took it and tried her mother. The call went through, but then went to voice mail — again. She didn’t leave another message. She handed the phone to Max. He dialed and waited.

  “Dad?” he said, and his face lit up. “I’m okay. We’re both fine. We’re at this bakery waiting for Risha’s mom.” He listened. Then he said, “No …” and “We don’t know.” Max swallowed hard. He listened for a long time and then said, “Okay … yeah. Okay … We’ll find you there. Love you, too.” He handed the phone to the man in the apron. “Thanks.” Then he turned to Risha. “Dad says they just issued an evacuation order for Lower Manhattan. So … we can’t stay here. And he can’t get to us. They’ve blocked off the streets. But he says there are boats taking people across the river. He’ll meet us down there.”

  Max stood up and held out his hand. Risha didn’t take it. She shook her head. “I have to wait here for my mom.” She stared into the empty sky where the towers used to be. Smoke still rose from the ruins, but otherwise there were no clouds at all. How could the sky still be blue? Didn’t it know what had happened?

  Risha couldn’t leave. As long as she stayed here, she could believe her mom was about to walk down the street. Walking to the river with Max felt like giving up. It felt like accepting that her worst fears might be true, even if she didn’t say them aloud.

  Risha shook her head again. “You go ahead. I’m staying. I have to.”

  The man in the apron knelt down beside them. “An evacuation order means that the police will be here soon. They’ll clear everybody out. Your mom, too. Best to go now with your friend. You can find his dad, and then you can all meet up later on.”

  Someone blew a whistle, and Risha looked up. Two police officers were walking down the street. They were talking with people and pointing toward the Hudson River. The man was right. Risha didn’t have a choice. But she still felt like she was leaving her mother behind.

  Risha buried her face in her mother’s scarf. Even with everything that had happened — the evacuation and the smoke and the dust — she could smell her mother’s perfume.

  Ranger leaned against Risha and put his paw on her knee. He sniffed at the scarf, too. It smelled like smoke and sweat, like flowers and Risha and like someone else, too.

  Risha looked up at him, her eyes wide. The dog had found Max in the dark after the dust storm in the shopping mall just by sniffing his tie. Risha took off the scarf and held it out to Ranger. He sniffed it again and looked up at her.

  “That’s Mom’s scarf,” she said. “My mom. Can you find her like you did Max? Can you find my mom?”

  “The mayor has issued an evacuation order for Lower Manhattan!” an approaching officer called out. “Everybody needs to head for the river!” He stopped beside Risha and Max and the man in the apron. “Are you their father?”

  The man shook his head. “But they can come with me.”

  “My dad is meeting us at the river,” Max said.

  A woman in a green dress and dusty sneakers stepped up to them. She looked like somebody’s mom. She must have been listening, too. “We can all go together. Come on now.” She reached down. Risha took her hand and stood up. She was going to have to evacuate with everyone else. She’d have to leave now. But the dog could stay.

  Risha knelt down, put an arm around Ranger, and hugged him tight. She held the scarf out once more. Ranger sniffed it again and barked.

  “Please, dog,” Risha whispered. “Find my mom.”

  Ranger watched as Risha and Max walked away with the man in the apron and the woman in the green dress. They’d be safe now. Ranger understood that. But his first aid kit was still in Risha’s backpack. It hadn’t made a sound. That meant his job wasn’t done.

  Ranger sniffed the air as he walked back up the street. He smelled dust and smoke and lots of people. But there was no mom scent from the scarf. Not yet.

  As people in business suits streamed past him in one direction, firefighters rushed by in the other. Ranger followed them back into the smoke. They were gathering at the edge of an enormous mountain of beams and concrete and shattered glass. Ranger stood in the middle of the rescue workers and stared out at the pile.

  He didn’t know where Risha’s mom was, but he was good at finding people. In his search-and-rescue training with Luke and Dad, he’d practiced finding people in all kinds of places. He’d found Luke when Luke was hiding behind dead trees. He’d found him when Luke was crouched in barrels and half-buried in the snow. Ranger had searched wide open meadows and tangly woods. He’d searched old buildings and warehouses full of crates and boxes. But he’d never seen anything like this.

  “Here, dog!” one of the firefighters called quietly, slapping his knee. Ranger trotted over to him. The man reached down and pulled Ranger close, stroking his fur as he listened to an officer call out orders.

  “Is that dog part of a K-9 search team?” someone asked. “Where’s his handler, Tom?”

  Tom the firefighter shrugged and looked down at Ranger. “No clue. He doesn’t even have a harness. Seems ready to go, though. I can take him onto the pile.” He gave Ranger a scratch on the neck, and his eyes teared up. “Come on, boy. I’ve got a lot of friends down in this mess. Let’s find ’em.”

  Find! Ranger looked up at Tom and wagged his tail.

  “You’re ready, aren’t you?” For a second, Tom almost smiled. “Come on, boy,” he said, and together they headed toward the massive pile of rubble.

  The whole block was buried in crumbled slabs of concrete and twisted steel. When the towers came down, everything was mangled and packed together
. But there were still spaces in between. Ranger had learned that in his search-and-rescue training with Luke and Dad. There were always spaces. And where there were spaces, there might be survivors.

  The rescue workers walked slowly through the ruins. They carried hoses to fight the flames that occasionally licked up from the pile. They carried axes in case they found someone trapped.

  Tom took a careful step onto a beam that shifted under his boots. “Watch this spot, Joe!” he shouted. “We don’t want to set off a new slide of debris.” He turned to Ranger and pointed up the mountain of rubble. “Go find!”

  Find! Ranger went on ahead. He could move over the heaps of steel and cinder blocks more quickly than Tom. Ranger had done lots of agility training with Luke and Dad when he was practicing to be a search-and-rescue dog. They’d gone to a junkyard kind of place, with planks and barrels and wooden spools. Ranger had learned to climb slanted boards. He’d learned to relax his feet and spread his toes so he wouldn’t slip. He’d practiced climbing up playground slides, through tangled rolls of fencing, and over slippery car hoods. He’d walked over seesaws and swaying bridges. He’d learned what to do when something moved under his paws — not to jump but to slow down, get low, and wait for it to stop.

  This field of rubble was much bigger than the practice place. Here, every step felt dangerous and hot and unsteady, but Ranger knew he could do it. He could go where he was needed.

  “Search here!” Tom called, pointing to an area where smoke rose up from the pile.

  Ranger walked along a narrow beam until he got to the spot. With every careful step, he sniffed the air. Mostly, he smelled smoke. But when he stepped off the beam onto a pile of cement and twisted furniture, there was something else, too. It wasn’t what he was supposed to find, though.

  Ranger had only trained to find people who were alive. But here, he caught a different, sad scent. People who hadn’t survived.