It seems necessary

I remember being in Music Theory, and Mrs. Dupra came in all quiet-like and spoke to the theory teacher-her name escapes me at the moment.

We could tell something was up, and our teacher gave us brief information~"Something has happened in NYC, the twin towers are on fire."

But the principal came over the PA and pretty much told the teachers to NOT turn on the TVs. That really pissed me off, because some major shit was happening, and we weren't being allowed to know what.

I remember after that class, going up to Mrs. Thomas' room instead of advisory, and bless her heart, she had put black paper over the windows and turned her classroom TV on. She let me in and I was able to see what had happened. It seemed so surreal to me~the concept that it was INTENTIONAL just hadn't processed, and I just remember thinking, "How the hell do you crash into the buildings?"

It was my senior year, and I had Early Dismissal because I had fewer classes than our day had blocks, so I was able to go home at noon~Early Dismissal kids weren't actually supposed to leave, but the aide at the door to the senior parking lot was my neighbor, and she let me out.

Taryn and I drove home~she dropped me at my house, then went to hers, and I kind of wish we had stuck together. Anyway, my mom was at work still, so I walked down the road to Scott and Leah's because I couldn't stand to be alone. I sat with Scott and Leah watching the TV until my mom got off work and picked me up.

It was only then that I learned that a couple of my cousins were usually in the towers for work. I think one of them didn't have to go in that day and the other one was late for some reason.

I also learned that my godmother's nephew's wife was there. I met Bill and Sara when my godmother married Alex, I guess I was in 11th grade? or 10th. They weren't yet married, but Bill is nice, and Sara was nice~a lot of "grownups" won't really talk to a "kid", but she and I had a real conversation at the wedding, and I remember thinking how cool it was that she talked to me~considering I was one of the youngest people there, not counting Alex's grandkids, who were small children at the time.

Sara worked on the 93rd floor of the first tower to be hit~Carole said she's comforted by the fact that the plane went in so close to Sara's office that she must have died quickly. I was so afraid for a while, until I accepted that idea, that she was somehow still alive under all of that rubble.

I was caught between hoping she had survived and was just waitig to be found and praying that she died quickly and relatively painlessly; not scared.

I remember going to school the next (?) day~it might have been the day after that~and how in every class, it was all that we would talk about. Ms. Kritz (english class) was really pushing the whole "let' talk about how everyone is FEELING about this" thing, and I just couldn't stand it. I remember asking if we could talk about something else, or get back to whatever book it was we were doing, and she starting saying how we were going to talk abot it in school because some people weren't talking about it with their kids at home, and I kind of spazzed and told her about how we hadn't really heard anything about Sara and I really couldn't handle talking about it ANY MORE and could I please have a pass to the office.

So she let me go to the office, and I called my mom, and she got me calmed down. It just seemed like no one else in my classes, or that I knew at school at all, had known someone involved. I don't mean to say that none of them had a personal connection, because it was intensely personal to us. We didn't grow up near the city, but it was OUR CITY. Those were OUR people. We were still New Yorkers. It was still our state, our country, our SAFETY that was threatened, and we all felt it deep inside, that fear that everything it changed, nothing is safe, and nothing will ever be the same.

But none of them had a face to put on it. A voice, a personality, a memory. I have pictures of a visit my family took there when I was a kid~some trip to grandpa's in New Jersey, and we took the ferry over, and we went to Ellis Island and the towers. But everytime I think about it, that's not what I see. I see Sara, chatting with me. I see Bill, at Candeia's wedding 2 or 3 years alter, still a shell of himself.

Bill and Sara got married August 11th, 2001. And exactly one month later, he was a widower with a cause.

Bill was a very loud voice in the fight to get justice. Once he learned about the fact that the government did have an inkling that this was going to occur, he was relentless in his pursuit of inquiries and reforms and just wanting to make it KNOWN. He didn't want Sara to have died without an explanation; without people knowing who she was or the amazing things she did.

There's now a 4 year scholarship to Georgetown in her name for students studying economics. She quickly rose the ranks at Fred Alger Management to become a vice president and senior security analyst by the time she was 31. She was the founding member of Fabretto Night for Ninos, which works to raise money for the Fabretto Foundation in Nicaragua. They educate children and provide meals while the children are in their school. Her picture now hangs in a lunch hall at the school in Somoto, Nicaragua, which has been dedicated to her.