The next morning, Damita was happy to find Neal was still asleep. He was on yet another bender and there were empty bottles and drug paraphernalia scattered throughout the apartment. She had no intention of waking him, as he instructed and was sure to dress quickly. She packed a small bag to take with her to work, so she wouldn’t have to come back. She would stay with her mother until she found her own apartment.
Before she left, she heard the click of the answering machine and walked over to it to listen to the message more closely. She wondered if it might be her mother or Carmella but knew that they had stopped calling her on anything but her cell phone. The voice she heard chilled her to the bone. It was the same voice she recognized the night she was attacked.
“I’m outside waiting whenever you’re ready, Mr. Westman,” the voice said.
Damita stared at the machine in horror. Suddenly everything clicked. It was the driver. He was the one who had attacked her along with three other men. This time she would be going to the police. She was going to tell them everything. She removed the tape from the answering machine. It occurred to her that at some point she might need it.
Damita didn’t want the driver to see her when she left from the front of the building, so she decided she would ride down to the laundry room. She believed there was an exit there that led out to the back. She picked up her suitcase and got on the elevator and pushed the button to head down to the laundry room. Once inside the laundry room, she found the door to the street. As she opened the door, her cell phone began to ring. She didn’t immediately recognize the number and then remembered she had seen the same number once before. One night she was meeting Neal for dinner and she was still at work and running late. Neal had sent the driver to pick her up and given him her number. Very often drivers were unable to park near the busy World Trade Center location where she worked.
She looked at the phone, nervously, wondering if she should answer it or not. She decided it was an ideal opportunity to buy her some time to get to work and eventually contact the police, before Neal had an opportunity to interfere. She answered the phone.
“Hello.”
“Hello, Mrs. Westman, this is the driver. Mr. Westman asked me to pick him up this morning. I’ve been calling both his cell and the home phone number and there’s no answer.”
“He must have forgotten to let you know. He decided to do a conference call from home rather than go into the office for his meeting. He’s not feeling very well.”
“Oh. Okay. Did he mention whether either of you would need me this afternoon? I have some other jobs I need to do, if he’s all set for now.”
“I doubt he’ll need you to drive him anywhere today. And I certainly won’t. I’m pretty sure he’s going to be in bed all day.”
“Great,” he said.
Damita hoped her voice didn’t give her away. She tried her very best to remain as nonchalant as possible, but it was difficult under the circumstances.
She arrived at work sometime around eight-twenty a.m., in the hopes that she would have an opportunity to decompress before everyone else started filtering in. She saw Mr. Underhill immediately and noted the look of shock on his face. She realized she was usually so impeccably dressed. However, today, her clothing was bordering on disheveled, her face was bruised, yet again, and this time she hadn’t even taken the time to cover it with makeup. Instead of the tastefully coordinated pumps she typically wore on her feet, she was wearing a pair of running shoes.
“Damita, once you get settled, could you stop by my office?” Mr. Underhill said, before walking away.
Throughout her entire ordeal, Damita kept anticipating the moment when Mr. Underhill became fed up with her personal drama filtering into the office. She was sure today would be that moment.
Emotionless, she went into the closet in her office and retrieved a suit and a pair of shoes that she kept there in case of emergency. She shut the door and changed. She used her compact mirror and applied some makeup to the multiple bruises on her face.
She considered calling her mother to let her know she would be coming to stay with her as soon as she left work, but didn’t want to keep Mr. Underhill waiting.
As soon as she left her office to head to Mr. Underhill’s, there was a loud noise. She stopped at Wendy’s office first.
Wendy looked shocked. “Did you hear that? What the hell was it?” Wendy asked.
“I don’t know. It sounded like an explosion,” Damita responded.
Wendy’s face seemed to drain of color as she pointed out the window. “Oh my God! That was an explosion. Look at that hole. There’s a huge hole on the side of North Tower.”
Everyone at the firm began to gather and Wendy and Damita joined them near the break room. They were all discussing the fact that a plane had hit North Tower.
“What kind of a plane?” Wendy asked.
“It must have been a private plane. It can’t possibly be a commercial jet. Can they even fly that low?” an employee from the mailroom mentioned.
“Maybe it crashed,” someone else speculated.
“Do you see all that smoke?” Damita said.
As they all watched, helpless from South Tower, they could see that people inside North Tower, desperate to escape the fire and smoke, were jumping to their deaths.
Damita looked over at a woman from their Legal Department. She suddenly went deathly pale, right before she started screaming. “Did you see that, they’re jumping? They’re all dying!”
“What should we do?” someone asked.
“We should stay put,” Damita said.
“Where is Mr. Underhill?” someone else asked.
“I don’t think he’s in yet. It’s still early,” said another.
“He’s here. I saw him this morning when I arrived,” Damita said.
Suddenly, Damita’s cell phone rang. She was surprised. Everyone had been attempting to use their cell phones and they all had gotten the same message that all circuits were busy. When she answered, the connection was weak, but it was clearly her mother.
“Baby, are you okay?” she asked.
“I’m fine, Mom. I’m okay.”
“I heard a report that a plane hit the World Trade Center.”
“It did, but it’s not our building. I’m in the South Tower. The plane hit the North Tower.”
“Is it bad?” her mother asked.
“It’s pretty bad.”
“You need to get out of there, now.”
“Maybe you’re right.”
“Damita, please get out of there.”
“I will, Mom. I promise I will.”
“Damita, I love you.”
“I love you, too, Mom. Don’t worry. I’m going to be fine.”
Within minutes of Damita hanging up, there was an announcement over the PA system.
“May I have your attention, please? This is not a test. I repeat, this is not a test. There has been an incident in The North Tower. The incident has been isolated in Building 1. There is no fire danger to Building 2. Building 2 is secure. I repeat Building 2 is secure. Please return to your offices. We will continue to keep you updated with any further instructions.”
Wendy’s expression was one of utter terror. “Return to our offices? They have got to be fucking kidding me. We need to evacuate now,” Wendy said.
“Are you telling me we have to walk down seventy-seven flights of stairs? I’m sure the elevators aren’t working. They immediately disable them in an emergency situation. Isn’t this building secure?” one young woman asked.
“Maybe we should go up to the roof,” suggested another woman.
Suddenly, there was a violent jolt and Damita felt like she was in an elevator that was quickly plummeting. The building began to sway heavily and then almost as quickly, stopped. Above them the ceiling was gone and the windows were blown out.
Damita looked around to find everyone was covered in dust and particles and the air was full of debris and smoke, and a strong chemical odor filled the air. Just as everyone was approaching full panic mode, Mr. Underhill entered, covered in dirt and soot from head to foot. He was bleeding from a wound to his head and he appeared to be in shock. His stark paleness could be seen, even beneath the dirt that covered his face.
“Mr. Underhill, are you okay?” Damita asked.
“I got out just in time. One minute longer and I would be gone. They’re all dead,” he said.
“Who?”
“Everyone on the seventy-eighth floor is dead.”