a deafening explosion rocks the building and many of her co-workers fall to the floor, stunned. she is knocked off her feet and the side of her head comes down hard on the side of a desk. as she falls, there is the roaring sound, punctuated by shattering glass and screaming. the glass sounds stop, but the the chorus of screams grows. as she picks herself up off the linoleum, she feels heat radiating from above, and acrid smell of smoke begins to pierce her nose. the lights are now out, but hazy light filters in through the broken windows. it is not until her supervisor appears before her, his white oxford shirt stained with blood and sprinkled with white powder from the ceilings, that she realizes that she has been staring blankly.

“you all right?” he asks, but it is as much a command as a question. without waiting for a reply, he shouts, “get out! there’s been an explosion. i’ll help out here.” she slowly begins to realize that there are people groaning, lying on the office floor.

she nods, still dazed, and begins moving towards the elevators.

“no, you idiot,” he yells. “take the stairs.”

the smoke is beginning to penetrate the stairwell. she stares, horrified, at the burned faces and hands–macabre masks and gloves–worn by those who work on the upper floors. they press past her, zombie-like, some stumbling on their own, others helped on their way by their less injured colleagues.

as she reaches the final floor, she feels the building begin to tremble slightly. she runs out the building, and runs further, until she collapses.

a fireman is wiping her head with a wet cloth, red with her blood. she sits up, in spite of his protests, and she turns to look back. through the dusty haze, she sees only a pile of rubble. later she will learn that buried beneath that rubble are many from her company who she knew and loved: a young father, struggling to support his sick wife and their three children, a young lawyer and his beautiful fiance, the wrinkled old man who emptied the waste bins and scrubbed the bathrooms on their floor.

she turns back to the fireman, and he is still staring at the rock-strewn mass grave, but not seeing it.

“the americans,” he says, the words dropping like stones from his shell-shocked face. “they have begun their invasion of iraq.”