“Jake?” The nurse's face appeared again. “I'll call Jamie for you, okay?”
He rolled his head from one side to the other. He wanted to yank it from his shoulders and shake it until the pain went away. On the other side of him, someone jabbed him with a needle, and he winced. Almost immediately warmth began spreading across his body, taking the edge off his pain.
“Can you hear me, Jake?”
He was fading fast, but he had one final question that needed to be asked before another minute went by. His eyelids were heavy, but he blinked them open and searched the faces near him until he found the nurse. “Who … who's Jake?”
The woman looked alarmed. “Don't you know who you are?”
The nurse started to say something else, but it was too late. The warm feeling had spread to his brain, and he could do nothing but go with it. He had no idea why people were calling him Jake, but the nurse's last question was the most frightening of all.
If he wasn't Jake, then who was he?
Despite the speed with which he was going under, he was able to concentrate enough to consider the question. And worse, the fact that he had no answer for himself. It was one thing to not know the people at the hospital or the names they were throwing at him. But he didn't know his own name. In fact, he couldn't remember a single thing about who he was or what he did for a living, or why he'd been brought to this hospital with a head injury.
His eyes closed. Next to him he could hear several voices, but they all blended together, and gradually the sound grew quieter. Then, out of the recesses of his mind, a name suddenly came to him. The only name that meant anything at all. He opened his mouth and used all his remaining energy to say it.
“S … Sierra …”
He heard the word and felt some sense of order return. The vision of a beautiful little girl flashed in his heart, and he was certain this time. Whoever she was, he'd known her before this moment, so he said it again. “Sierra!”
The pain was gone, and he felt himself being sucked into the deepest sleep he'd ever known. He wanted to say her name one more time, but he couldn't make his mouth and brain cooperate. The last thought that filled his head before he blacked out was this: Somehow a little girl named Sierra would be part of the puzzle whenever he woke up. And maybe she could help him answer the questions.
Who was Larry and what was Engine 57? Who was he married to and for how long, and how come he couldn't remember a thing about her? And, of course, the biggest question of all.
Who in the world was he?
FOURTEEN
SEPTEMBER 11, 2001, 11:04 A.M.
For thirty-six minutes, Jamie held the receiver in her hand and stared at it.
During that time she did nothing but remind herself to breathe and will someone to call about Jake. So when the machine finally broke the silence and rang, she dropped the phone and nearly fell out of her chair in her scramble to grab it off the floor and click the talk button.
“Hello? Who is this?”
“Sergeant Riker at the FDNY. Is this Jamie Bryan?”
“Yes.” Her face felt cool and clammy against her fingers. She was certain she was floating, because she had no connection whatsoever to the woman sitting in her kitchen waiting to hear news that would change her life forever. She squeezed the phone and ordered herself to sound normal. “This is her.”
“Mrs. Bryan, your husband's been found alive. He's—”
“Jake!” Jamie let the receiver fall slowly to her lap as she screamed his name. He was alive! The relief was like a gust of air in a room where she'd been suffocating. Jake hadn't been in the south tower after all, and now he was alive! Just as he'd promised!
Suddenly, she remembered Sergeant Riker, and she jerked the phone back to her ear. “I'm sorry, I … I missed that last part.”
The man hesitated. “I was saying he's been injured, Mrs. Bryan. He's at Mount Sinai Medical Center being treated. I promised I'd call you.”
In a rush, the oxygen left the room once more, and a paralyzing fear returned to Jamie's voice. “How … how hurt is he?”
“Actually, the doctors will have to tell you that, Mrs.—”
“I don't want to talk to doctors, Sergeant!” Jamie was shouting now, on her feet and pacing the kitchen. “You must've gotten some kind of report. Please …” She forced herself to calm down. “Please tell me what you know.”
Again the man paused, and for a brief instant Jamie felt for him. How many of these phone calls had he been asked to make this morning? “Captain Hisel made the report. He said your husband had burns and a head injury. But he thought he'd make it.”
The relief offered only enough room to breathe. If Jake had a head injury, anything was possible. She needed to get to the hospital right away, be with him, talk to him. Assure him that everything was being done to get him better.
“Thank you, Sergeant. That means a lot.” She was about to hang up when she remembered Sue's request. That Jamie call the moment she heard anything. “What about Larry Henning? Is he with Jake at the hospital?”
“Larry's part of Engine 57, right?”
“Yes. Same as Jake.”
“No,” the sergeant sighed. “I'm afraid we haven't heard anything from any of the others.”
The emotional extremes from the past few minutes were taking their toll on Jamie. She dropped to the chair near the phone and hung her head. “Nothing?”
“Mrs. Bryan, your husband was the only one they've found from Engine 57.” He paused, and there was something defeated in his tone as well. “They were headed for the sixty-first floor of the south tower when the building collapsed.”
Jamie gripped her stomach and gritted her teeth. The whole day had been nothing but a series of nightmares. The only reason she had survived at all was the hope that Jake was somehow alive. But now that he … what would she tell Sue? And how had Jake lived if his entire unit was missing? She found her voice once more. “Th—thank you for calling.”
She hung up and stared at the receiver. She should call Sue. The woman was her friend, and she was probably sitting by the phone the same way Jamie had been. But what could she say? That Larry was trapped somewhere in the middle of a hundred floors of a collapsed building? That none of the men from Engine 57 had been found except Jake?
They could still find him, after all. There was no point worrying her if the information the sergeant had was wrong. No, the call to Sue could wait. For now she needed to get to the hospital and find Jake. He was hurt and alone, and he needed her by his side. She made a quick call to the neighbor before she left.
“They found him.” Grateful tears spilled from Jamie's eyes, and she sobbed twice before composing herself. “He's … he's alive.”
“Oh, Jamie, I'm so glad.” The woman's voice was shaky. “Sierra's fine. She's watching a movie with the other kids.” The woman hesitated. “Should I say anything to her?”
“No.” Jamie's answer was quick. “She doesn't know about any of it.” Another jolt of nausea shook her. “Listen, Jake's hurt, but he'll be okay. If you can keep Sierra for a while longer, I'll go see him at the hospital.”
“Take your time. We'll be here.”
Jamie thanked the woman, hung up the phone, and grabbed her keys. Before she left the house, another call came in, this one from the hospital. A nurse confirmed what Sergeant Riker had already said. Jake had a head injury and was unconscious. Jamie should come right down.
“What if the police won't let me on the ferry?”
“They're taking people on a limited basis.” The nurse sounded confident. “Explain the situation. They'll let you on.”
She was right. This time when Jamie pulled up to the ferry docks she had information that convinced the officer to let her aboard. Her firefighter husband was being treated at Mount Sinai Medical Center, and doctors on staff had asked her to come.
Jamie parked, walked aboard, crossed the ferry to the far side, and found a quiet corner near the railing. In a matter of minutes the fer
ry pushed off, and Jamie could only stare at the Manhattan skyline. It was like watching the end of the world. The closer she got, the more awful the devastation appeared. The Twin Towers were gone, but the pile of rubble was still sending up clouds of smoke, still glowing red from the flames buried beneath. Other buildings were on fire also, buildings that were part of the World Trade Center. Emergency vehicles were everywhere, and it took Jamie nearly an hour to reach the hospital parking lot by cab. The place was packed, and Jamie wondered how many other hospitals had received victims from the attacks.
She rushed through the doors of the emergency room and made her way through a sea of people. Finally, she found the front desk and gave her name to the woman behind the counter. “I'm here for Jake Bryan. He's my husband.”
“Stand over there.” The woman had a stack of files on her desk. “Someone will be right with you.”
Jamie did as she was told. In less than a minute an older nurse appeared. “Mrs. Bryan?”
Jamie rushed forward. “Yes?”
“This way, please.”
“How … how is he?” Jamie was out of breath and weak at the knees as she walked alongside the woman.
The nurse's tone was businesslike. “Critical but stable at this point.” She led them down a hallway into what looked like a makeshift trauma ward. Partitions had been set up dividing rooms and hall space into treatment areas. The nurse kept walking. “The doctor will give you the full report.”
Jamie nodded, and suddenly the nurse stopped and directed Jamie into a room on their right. “Here he is. You can stay as long as you like. Talk quietly to him, watch TV, or touch his hands. But if he starts to stir push the call button. We don't want to agitate him. We have him sedated. Any excessive stimulation could cause his brain to swell.”
“Okay.” Anxiety made Jamie's legs wobbly. Brain swelling? He must have been hurt worse than she thought. Or maybe it was only a precaution. If Captain Hisel had said he'd be okay, then why were they worried about brain swelling? She entered the room and stopped short, covering her mouth so she wouldn't gasp out loud.
“Jake, honey … no.” Her voice was a whisper, and behind her, the nurse left to give her privacy.
He looked awful.
With the exception of his eyes, Jake's head was wrapped completely in gauze. There were more bandages on both his arms, and a splint along his lower left leg. The rest of him was covered by sheets, so the only part showing at all was his neck and fingers. The simple gold band he'd worn since their wedding date was still on his left hand. But otherwise, he looked nothing like the strong, vibrant man she'd kissed good-bye that morning. Machines were hooked to his mouth and nose; tubes ran into both arms; monitors beeped and whirred.
But Jake didn't move, didn't make a single sound.
She walked to his side and took hold of the bed rail. Her heart raced within her, fast and hard, and she was afraid her movements would wake him, or worse, that her presence would stimulate him and make his brain swell. She swallowed as quietly as she could. Calm down, Jamie … calm. He's here … he's alive. He's not that fragile … everything's going to be okay.
She stared at his bandaged face and willed him to breathe, to survive. Take … honey. It's me. Her breath hovered in the back of her throat. Don't die, baby … please.
Jake lay motionless, and Jamie leaned over the bed rail, studying the subtle rise and fall of his chest. He was breathing, wasn't he? He was drawing breath and letting it out again, but she couldn't hear him. The monitors around the bed hummed in a way that seemed louder with every heartbeat. She shot a glance at them and clenched her teeth.
Be quiet!
She wanted to hear Jake … was that too much to ask? Ten seconds of silence so she could hear the slow and gentle inhale, the familiar exhale … proof that he was really alive beneath all the gauze and bandages. But the machines were constant, relentless. She straightened and studied his chest again.
It was moving. Of course it was moving.
The monitors would scream a warning if he stopped breathing. Jamie took a step backwards and then another, inching toward the chair behind her without ever taking her eyes off Jake. When she reached the chair, she lifted it from its place near the door, brought it silently across the room, and set it next to Jake's bed. When he woke up, she would be there, no matter how long it took. She sat down and took hold of his fingertips. Just the feel of them against the palm of her hand was familiar and intoxicating. Tangible proof that he'd lived, that somehow, someway, he'd been able to escape the building in its final minutes.
Jamie stared at her husband's fingers and realized the hair had been burned off them. They were scraped and lightly burned, but they were warm and alive. And right now they were all she needed to feel connected with him.
She found the television on the wall above the foot of Jake's bed. The coverage of the disaster that day was not something she wanted to watch. But she needed to know about the rest of Jake's unit. Where were they? Had any firefighters been found alive in the rubble?
On the bedside table was a TV remote. Jamie took it, flicked the power button, and immediately turned down the volume. Live pictures from Manhattan came into focus. Carefully, so Jake wouldn't be disturbed, she made the sound loud enough so she could hear it.
A news anchor was giving a recap of the day's events, and Jamie wondered about her sanity. But somehow, with Jake breathing beside her, she felt strong enough to hear the latest details. The reporter droned on. All federal office buildings in Washington had been evacuated; another plane, United Flight 93 from Newark—headed possibly for the White House—had crashed in rural Pennsylvania. In all, some three hundred people were feared dead in what was now a total of four hijacked plane crashes.
“In addition, New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani has urged all New Yorkers to stay home and any residents south of Canal Street to evacuate to emergency centers set up by local officials.”
The list of mind-boggling details continued.
The airports in Los Angeles and San Francisco had been shut down, and experts from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention were sending an emergency response team to New York City as a precautionary move. Only fifty planes remained flying over U.S. airspace, but none were reporting any problems.
When the station ran out of old news, it switched back to live shots of Manhattan and Washington, D.C. Flames could still be seen in both locations, but there wasn't much to say. The terrorists had made a complete and utterly accurate hit.
“Reports coming in show that very few survivors are being found in the rubble of the collapsed Twin Towers, a place law and fire officials are now calling Ground Zero.”
Ground Zero? Jamie tightened the grip she had on Jake's fingers. Wasn't that the term used at atomic bomb sites? Jamie stared at the TV and wondered again if the whole crazy day wasn't some type of bad dream. How could terrorists have taken over four passenger planes on the same morning?
She focused once more on the news pouring from the television. Come on, people, tell me about the firefighters … where are they? Who's getting them out of the rubble? How many are missing?
A live shot of President George Bush came into view. Speaking from Barksdale Air Force Base, he explained that the country had been attacked by terrorists. Appropriate security measures were being taken to preclude any further attacks, and the U.S. military was on high alert worldwide. He asked for prayers for those killed or wounded, and then he bit his lip. For a moment, Jamie thought the president might actually break down.
Instead, he gritted his teeth and said, “Make no mistake … the United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts.”
The camera cut to a different reporter in a studio. Images from the smoldering pile of rubble took up a portion of the right side of the screen. “The news in from fire officials is grim this afternoon. It is feared now that of the hundreds of firefighters who responded to the disaster at the Twin Towers, nearly two hundred are dead. I
repeat, nearly two hundred FDNY firefighters are feared dead at this hour. And there is great concern that the actual number of fatalities within the fire department may be much higher.”
They cut to a picture of Deputy Chief Bob Atwell, a man Jamie had spoken with at a department softball game last June. Bob was a clown at FDNY functions, routinely dumping watercoolers down the backs of co-workers and running the bases backwards when he'd hit a ball over the fence.
But now Atwell's eyes were grim, deeply set in an ashen face marked with weariness. “Right now, rescue crews are using search dogs to comb the mountain of debris.” He ran the back of his hand over his forehead. “We're making every attempt to locate anyone who survived the collapse of the buildings and get them out of there.”
A reporter stood up. “Has your department found anyone yet?”
“A few people.” Bob sighed and the muscles in his jaw flexed. “Not nearly the numbers we'd like to be finding at this point.”
The reporter was persistent. “How many men are missing?”
“Well …” Bob pursed his lips and let his gaze fall to the ground for a moment before looking up again. “I can't give you a specific number, but we'd estimate more than three hundred are missing.”
“Were they all in the buildings at the time of the collapse?”
Bob sucked in a breath, and Jamie wanted to hug him. The man was kind and patient, but these questions had to be the hardest he'd ever had to answer.
“Most of them were in the south tower. It went first and with virtually no warning. The missing men were either in the tower or on the ground. A smaller number were in or near the north tower, as many of our people had time to evacuate that building in anticipation of a collapse.”
The image changed, and the screen was filled with a live shot of the burning Pentagon. Jamie lifted the remote and clicked off the TV. She couldn't stand to watch another minute. Bob Atwell's words had said it all, really. They'd only found a few firefighters. A few out of more than three hundred who'd gone into the buildings.