Tower Stories Read online

  The men around me laughed politely. Nervously.

  At the 33rd floor, two black girls started to panic and broke away from the line somewhere above me. They ran down the steps and through an opened fire exit door, leaving the stairwell and entering the building.

  A man standing on the landing hollered, “You shouldn’t go there! Stay here!” But the two girls shot through the open door and looked both ways, as if they were crossing the street. Then they ran off to the left and were lost from sight.

  The man who’d called out to them muttered, “They shouldn’t have done that.”

  I looked at him and said, “Hey, it’s a woman’s prerogative to do what they did.” I gave him a “what can you do?” shrug with my shoulders.

  On the landing of the 33rd floor, people from above us started shouting, “Get to the left! To the left!” We all scooted to one side.

  I remember hearing some someone above me calling out, “Which left? Which way is left?” Then, people from below started shouting, “To the right! To the right!” That was a time of confusion. Left …? Right …?

  Someone from below shouted, “The firemen are coming, make way!”

  We were all trying to get as close to the railing as possible and I found myself unable to squeeze in so I moved three steps down to the landing, hoping to allow more room for the other people. But that landing was not a good place to be. I remember saying to myself, you’ll just be in someone’s way. Go back to where you were. And somehow I managed to get back in place just as the people immediately above me started shouting, “Get to the wall. Get against the wall!”

  Now that everyone had cleared a path on the stairwell, two, then three guys broke out of the line and started running down. I couldn’t believe it, what cowards these men were. I shouted, “Hey! We didn’t clear this just for you to come down! Stop it! Stay there.”

  Then I saw some men walking backwards down the stairs, carrying something from above. These were not emergency workers, just ordinary-looking businessmen, and they were leading a woman, a burn victim.

  I’ll never forget the look in her eyes, the skin hanging from her burnt face, her arms, her hands. It was as if her skin had been peeled off her body. She was a black woman, but her body showed the wounded pink scars that will be with her for a lifetime. Her eyes were white and opened wide, staring straight ahead. She had that look of total bewilderment. Shock and horror. I stared in disbelief.

  When she was right next to me, firemen appeared from below, hustling up the stairs. No one moved. Now we had a gridlock right in front of me. People started maneuvering around as the burn victim was led down the stairs. A split second later, the firemen were dashing past me up the stairs.

  They looked so young. Their eyes were frightened. As they passed me, I leaned over the railing and shouted down, “Get a medic, this woman needs a medic!” I was hoping there’d be some emergency medical technicians following close behind who could help the burn victim.

  Just then, two older firemen appeared on the landing below. They were totally calm and they assured everyone that the smoke was not as bad below. I immediately assumed they were more experienced because one of them had gray hair and they both seemed as if they’d seen this type of situation a hundred times before. They asked everyone to stay calm, so I did.

  I remember thinking, these brave, brave men are going up the stairs. Even then, not knowing what was about to happen, I respected their bravery. They had no idea how bad the fire was, how bad the situation might turn out to be. But they kept climbing up. And the equipment they were carrying: the hoses, the axes, the extinguishers. It was all so heavy. You could hear their breathing coming in ragged gasps. It was extremely painful for me to think they had to go up. But I realized they had a duty to do.

  We continued to descend the stairs again, slowly, very slowly. We’d stop for long moments, then descend. Stop and descend. Repeat, repeat.

  No one was saying anything. Everyone still appeared relatively calm.

  At one landing, a building maintenance worker was holding a roll of paper towels in his hand and ripping off sheets, offering them to people. As I passed him, I told him that it was really nice of him to do that and I took a paper towel because I didn’t know what I’d be facing further down. I was holding the towel in my hand and rolling it around nervously in my fingers, crumpling it into a small ball.

  I still have that piece of paper towel. It’s in the shoulder bag I was carrying that morning.

  At another landing, I glanced back at the man standing behind me. He had a gas mask on, covering his face. The gas mask was a vivid blue, not the army green you might imagine. It covered his nose and mouth. I wondered, where had that come from?

  I said to him, “Hey, that’s a pretty smart thing to have right now.”

  And he told me how he’d been in the building in 1993 when terrorists had tried to blow it up, how he thought the building officials handled that emergency all wrong. He didn’t think they were geared up to manage the situation, so he’d prepared himself to deal with something similar.

  I thought that maybe he was taking this notion to the extreme and I didn’t say anything more.

  At some point during my descent, I heard rumors trickling down the staircase that a plane had hit the building. I was used to seeing commuter planes flying past my office window, so I thought, that could be possible. Something could have happened to the pilot, something could have malfunctioned on the plane.

  At about the 4th or 5th floor, a fireman told us to start going down one by one. There was an overflow of water cascading down the staircase, and I remember hearing some women mumbling about taking their shoes off. I moved past them, thinking, why are you stopping? Just go, it’s only water.

  “There were too many people pushing onto the boat—like a bunch of people storming the stage at a rock concert to get an autograph from their favorite musician.”

  Just go, it’s only water.

  I grabbed the railing and thought, I’m so close. Now all I have to do is get out of here.

  At some point during my descent to the lower floors, the lights had gone out. It was very dark on the last few steps leading to the fire exit, and I stopped, not knowing where to go. Suddenly, I found myself alone, looking around. Where had the men who’d been right in front of me gone? Where did the people go who were in back of me?

  I turned my head to the right and noticed a light from outside growing dimmer as a door closed. There! I ran down the hall toward the light with both arms outstretched.

  I pushed on the door lever and stumbled out onto the plaza level. This level was one floor above the lobby or street level of the Trade Center. You could walk outside from here to an enormous courtyard called the Austin J. Tobin Plaza. There was a huge sculpture representing the world in the middle of a fountain. Souvenir vendors used to set up shop out there for tourists to buy trinkets. The plaza had outdoor seating for noonday and evening concerts and sidewalk restaurants where people could enjoy their morning coffee or cigarettes, as I often did. There were cement benches where you could sit and people-watch or just listen to the water as it flowed over the side of the fountain. The Port Authority had spent an enormous amount of money landscaping that plaza. Every month they’d bring in flowers, trees, shrubs, and plants. The landscape of the plaza would actually change to reflect the seasons.

  I stood there inside the building, looking out the three-story-high windows on to the plaza. As I watched, huge chunks of glass and twisted beams of black, gray, and red steel that were the size of small cars rained all around me. Scraps of paper flew everywhere, like feathers caught in a breeze. Glass, steel, and metal were scattered everywhere on the ground.

  I was stunned by this whole scene. Still under the impression that a commuter plane had hit the building, I thought about the demise of the pilot and his passengers.

  I looked at my watch. It was 9:15 A.M.

  A voice off to my left brought me back to my senses: “Come this way, come
this way!”

  A World Trade Center security guard was standing at the far north end of the plaza level. I tried to run toward him, but my knees buckled and I stumbled. I don’t exercise regularly. That’s what did it. I didn’t think the descent down forty-four flights would have had that great an effect on my legs, but it did. I limped toward the guard.

  When I reached him, he said, “Go that way,” and pointed again to my left toward the west side of the building. He said there was a door that would lead me outside and over to the sky-bridge, the glass-enclosed walkway that used to lead to the World Financial Center.

  I walked quickly past the guard and toward the door. I paused to look back. No one was behind me, which completely disoriented me. Where had the people who’d been with me gone?

  Then I saw Daisy, the bookkeeper from my office, and I yelled to her. “Daisy!”

  I went to her and took hold of her by both arms. I asked if everyone from our office had gotten out all right and she said that yes, everyone had. But she said she thought that Wayne, our executive director, and Mary, an accountant, had gone to check the offices for other people. She said that Tara, my assistant, Mark, the A/V technician, and Maria, an administrative assistant, were with her when she’d left the office, but they’d all gotten separated while going down the stairs.

  “Great,” I said. “Everyone’s out. Let’s go.”

  She said, “Wait, I’ve got to put my shoes on.”

  I thought she was silly to have taken her damn shoes off. They’re only shoes. But I stood there, holding her up, while she put them back on her feet.

  As we started for the door, the security guard suddenly shouted, “Stop!”

  I turned around and saw a girl coming from around the corner I’d just rounded. She froze and looked up, so I looked up, too.

  The glass chandeliers were falling.

  I grabbed Daisy and placed my right hand over her head, my left hand over mine. My elbow was on her neck, and I pushed her to the side of the building.

  We were so close to the door leading out. I remember thinking, if we can just make it across the sky-bridge to World Trade Center 6! If we stand right up against the outside wall, we’ll be okay! I knew of an overhang that had been built to protect pedestrians from rain and snow. I’d often smoke my morning cigarette under it before going inside to work. Now it would protect us from the falling debris. That was my plan, at any rate.

  “Daisy, come on. Let’s go.”

  We ran out the door and started across the sky-bridge linking World Trade 6 to Tower 1. I put my right arm over Daisy’s shoulder and took hold of her left because she said her legs were unsteady and sore, and she couldn’t move fast. I didn’t really feel like it either. So we didn’t run, we walked. The bridge wasn’t crowded. Again, I wondered, where did all the people go?

  About halfway across the bridge, I spotted Leslie, a friend whom I’d met while commuting on a bus a few years back. I’d bumped into her about a month back outside the West Street entrance to the Trade Center, where people go to smoke. She had recently started working for Kemper Financial/Insurance on the 36th floor. Leslie was holding on to an older woman the same way I was holding onto Daisy. We both looked at each other and smiled nervously. We kept moving.

  On the far side of the sky-bridge, we banged up against the glass wall of Building 6. For a moment, we stood there catching our breath. We were safe, but I wondered for how long. Looking up toward the sky, I saw heavy, flaming debris falling all around us. Paper floated down like someone was throwing a ticker-tape parade.

  I looked straight ahead and saw a revolving side door about a hundred feet away from us. I said to Daisy, “Come on, we can make it!” And we ran for it.

  We went straight for the revolving doors but Daisy pulled up short and said, “Here! We can go through here.” There was an open door right before the revolving doors and we dashed inside.

  The Winter Garden was right in front of us, an indoor atrium that used to house very tall palm trees. You could almost have described it as an indoor version of the Austin J. Tobin Plaza.

  Daisy and I were standing at the top of the marble staircase that grandly cascaded down to the main floor. I thought about the many brides I’d seen being photographed from those sweeping steps. It was a beautiful staircase, a beautiful setting.

  I heard a voice from below saying, “Go toward the exit! Keep moving down, go toward the far exit!” Now that I was oriented, I knew which way we were heading. The far exit they were talking about would put us on the water side of the World Financial Center.

  Daisy and I headed down the marble staircase. I looked to my right and Leslie was there again. She and I gave each other a “here we go again” kind of shrug. We smiled weakly and got on our way. Leslie and the other woman she was leading walked off to the right, toward an escalator; Daisy and I took the stairs. At this point, I lost sight of Leslie.

  Once outside the World Financial Center, Daisy and I stopped, turned around, and looked toward the sky. Both Towers were in flames and smoking.

  There were wrought-iron tables and chairs set outside under the trees for patrons of the dockside restaurants at the World Financial Center. I told Daisy, “Let’s sit here, we can rest for a while and watch what’s going on.”

  I remembered how, back in ’93 when a bomb went off in the underground garage of the Trade Center, I’d walked casually from my office on Broadway to the corner of West and Liberty Streets and stood there watching the chaos of firefighters, policemen, and rescue workers. Now I wanted to watch the Towers and take in history while it happened.

  I took a seat and looked through my purse for a cigarette. I pulled one from the pack and looked up, realizing I couldn’t see anything because of the trees. I said to Daisy, “Let’s move to another table for a better view.” Daisy and I moved out from under the trees and looked up.

  I said, “My God …”

  The hole in the Tower was huge. It was only at this point that I realized it couldn’t have been a commuter plane that hit; it had to have been something bigger. Now we could see the destruction of it all, the enormous amount of smoke pouring from both Towers.

  Leslie appeared beside me and nudged my arm. “There you are,” she said. She was relieved.

  I looked at her and smiled nervously. Then I introduced Daisy to Leslie. The three of us were standing there, staring, as we watched the first body fall from the sky on the left side of Tower 1.

  The body dropped out from the curtain of smoke and tumbled down in a cartwheel motion. I’ll never forget that. Cartwheeling down from the sky toward the ground.

  I was horrified by the thought that someone was jumping from the Trade Center. Horrified. I said something like, “I can’t believe someone would jump.”

  Leslie looked at me and said, “There’s already been ten people. I’ve seen at least ten.”

  I looked at her, dumbfounded.

  When we looked up at the Towers again, more people were jumping. I don’t know how many people I saw … but I do remember seeing someone who looked as if he were trying to fly from the right side of 1 World Trade Center to the top of the Marriott Hotel, his arms outstretched like Superman.

  The images of those people falling from the sky … my God. What about their families?

  At some point, a large black woman appeared beside us and joined our little group of silent watchers. Then, suddenly, she spoke out loud to no one in particular. “It was two planes hit the buildings.”

  I said, “No way.”

  She repeated defiantly, “It was two planes.”

  I looked up at the buildings again and thought, this woman is crazy. No way could two planes hit those buildings. One plane must have hit. Maybe the way it impacted Tower 1, high up, it plunged and ricocheted into Tower 2. That made sense to me at the time.

  But this woman, whoever she was, said, “It was terrorists.”

  This time I turned and looked her in the eye. “What? No way.”

  She
screwed her face up. Her eyes got real narrow, as if she were shooting arrows from them. In a very flat and odious voice, she said, “It was terrorists.” This gave me a very eerie feeling. It was spooky.

  In a soft voice, I said to Daisy and Leslie, “Let’s move away from here, we don’t need to hear this.” I was thinking, why is this woman standing here trying to incite a panic?

  The three of us backed away, closer to the edge of the Hudson River.

  We all had cell phones and we started pulling them out to make calls. I wanted to talk to my mom in Florida; we talk every day, but usually in the early evening while I was coming home from work. She was scheduled to fly up to New York that afternoon so she could visit relatives throughout the week and meet with me over the weekend. Now I didn’t know if she’d still be coming.

  My call didn’t go through. Daisy and Leslie couldn’t get through to anyone, either. I looked around and saw some men with cell phones held to their ears so I walked over to one and asked, “Are you getting a signal?”

  He said, “No.”

  I asked another. This man also said no.

  Leslie stopped in her tracks and said, “Hey, weren’t the cell towers on top of 1 World Trade Center?”

  Of course they were. That’s why our calls weren’t getting through.

  I thought, well, there’s no reason to stand around. There’s nothing to see that I won’t be able to watch on the evening news. And there’s no way that anyone’s going back to work today, not after this.

  I turned around and couldn’t believe how close we’d come to the commuter ferryboats going over the Hudson River to New Jersey; we were right next to the railing leading down to the docks. Over to my right, masses of people were pushing their way toward the docks and the boats beyond. I told Daisy and Leslie, “Follow me.”