The Calling


The well worn page contained words that haunted her. Rachel read them every night before bed, always raising the same question, although the other ones never lagged very far behind.

Was David still alive then?

She’d pick up the little 3X5 granite frame that sat on the nightstand by the bed, the one they’d gotten visiting the quarry in Vermont on their honeymoon, and she’d kiss his picture and go over all the questions again. And then she’d cry herself to sleep.

She’d retrieve the increasingly weathered paper from the floor in the morning, or find it crumpled beneath her in the twisted sheets, borne of yet another restless night’s sleep. She could always print a new one, when necessary.

She had found the excerpt while poring through records in the months following the attack, although she hadn‘t really known the intended goal. She’d just searched online, scouring through pages of everything and anything. The posted transcript had floored her when she found it. Rachel thought it too coincidental that the dispatcher had been in radio contact with Car 4-David, and that maybe they were talking about her husband.

CAR 4-DAVID: Car 4-David to Manhattan.
DISPATCHER: Car 4-David.
CAR 4-DAVID: Car 4-David 10-84 at the World Trade Center.
DISPATCHER: Car 4 David repeat, K.
CAR 4-DAVID: 10-84.
DISPATCHER: 10-04. Car 4-David, we're getting reports from the hundred and fourth floor back room 25 to 30 people trapped. I also have the hundred and third floor, northwest room 1-0-3 with people trapped also. I have the eighty third floor with people trapped as well, car 4 David receive?
CAR 4-DAVID: Car 4 David 10-4.
DISPATCHER: All right, 10-04. Time is 0901 four sixty one.

She’d copied and pasted the following transmission below the first. It had come in a minute or two later.

DISPATCHER: Be advised, report of a second plane that crashed into the second tower. Be advised on the 83rd floor, room 8311, we have people trapped, room 8311, 83rd floor. Car 4 David acknowledge.

Had he still been alive then? Was he one of the ones trapped? What were his final moments like?

She hadn’t known which tower he’d visited that fateful morning, but she knew he was on the 83rd floor. And she knew he was never coming home now. He’d heard the calling.

David had telephoned her at 9:00 exactly. She remembers because he’d said he wanted to be at the place at nine when they opened, and when she’d glanced at the glowing numbers on the phone display when it rang, she’d thought, “Wow. That was quick! Took him less than a minute to land a job!”

And she’d laughed; her last laugh in many moons as it turned out.

The call lasted all of five seconds.

“Rachel,” his voice panic stricken, “I’m on the 83rd floor. I don’t think it‘s going to be okay this time, babe. I’m sorry that I came here to look for a job today of all days. I should have stayed home, in bed with you, like you said. I love you with all my heart!”

He’d choked the last sentence out, maybe knowing they’d be his last words, and not wanting to give them up without a fight.

She preferred to think that now; better than thinking the heavy smoke had taken its cruel toll, or worse. At least then she hadn’t known what was going on. She’d gone back to bed after seeing him off that dreaded morning.

“I love you more than anything too, baby,” she’d said, and meant it more than she‘d ever meant it before, even though she‘d meant it big time all the other times before. After all, they‘d been in love with each other and nobody else since third grade. “Whatever’s happening, it’s going to be okay,“ she’d said, trying to comfort him, not understanding the severity of the situation.

Oh, how she regretted those last words.

And he’d just cried, so she knew whatever was going on was bad. And then the phone went dead.

Dead like David.

Just like everyone else, her world changed forever that day and Rachel had struggled to survive ever since. It wasn’t easy.

She didn’t know if he suffocated to death, unable to breathe the acrid air, or whether the ceiling collapsed on him, pinning him beneath twisted steel and metal. She didn’t know if he chose to plummet to his death, like many of the other helpless people trapped in the burning buildings, flailing to their demise in favor of waiting for a rescue they knew would never come in time.

She’d watched the footage, horrified, after the phone call. Had she seen him falling on the TV screen? Would she even recognize him in the light blue dress shirt and black slacks he’d worn for the important occasion, instead of his usual blue jeans and Sox cap? Could she make out the tie she’d given him flapping in the wind over his head on the way down, the one he never wore but did that day?

She had told him it was going to be okay, and it hadn’t been. She didn’t know the details of his death, but did it really matter? It still ate at her. Dead was dead. She still read the transcript every night. She still gazed longingly at his picture and wondered how he’d been taken from her, why he’d been taken from her.

She tried not to think about it.

She failed all too often.

She’d left their city apartment, needing to escape the constant reminders of him.

The bedroom where they’d shared so many nights together, lying in each other’s arms after making love. The kitchen, where she’d set off the smoke detector too many times to count. He’d wave the dish towel like a madman above his head, and ask her where they were ordering from tonight, laughing his adorable little laugh. The bathroom even, where his toothbrush and electric shaver still set until well after Christmas that year, the loneliest Christmas of her life.

She’d hadn’t coped well with her husband‘s sudden death. Who did? She’d finally taken the advice of her family, her friends, and even the shrink she’d resorted to seeing six months after the attacks.

They advised her to get away. Away from the city. Away from the memories. Away from the pain, supposedly.

She’d listened, moving to the little town in Vermont that she and David had visited on their honeymoon. It was beautiful here, and peaceful, and she could sit by the quaint bed and breakfast they stayed at when she missed him so much she physically ached for him. It seemed to help.

She’d been driving there every night lately.

She found that there was really nowhere you could go to escape the pain.

Except maybe to join David.

But that wasn’t her call to make, now was it? No, the Big Guy Upstairs, as Rachel referred to Him, knew The Plan. Not her. He issued the calling. She just did the best she could with what she was given, and hoped that things would turn out the way they should. It had worked up until that fateful day.

She had hoped David would miraculously survive. He hadn’t. Must be the Big Guy Upstairs needed him more than she did. Hard to imagine.

She could admit now that she hadn’t handled David’s death very well.

She hadn’t even dated yet. She’d only signed up for the dating site six months ago.

So what if she was a little slow at getting back into the game? She’d expected to be grieving for the next fifty years or more, depending on the Big Guy Upstairs’ generosity. Seemed like he’d been a little stingy with David, in her humble opinion, but maybe that was all part of His plan.

Who knew? Certainly not Rachel. She just kept on keeping on.

And she’d kept on for nearly nine years so far. Hard to believe he’d been dead that long.

She used their life savings and the survivor’s money to buy a small house. She often thought of it as David’s blood money, but the bank and the local markets accepted it nevertheless. And she’d actually found a job working at one of those small country stores. While the pay wasn’t anything like she’d made in the city, she found the pleasant easy-going atmosphere a major relief from the hustle and bustle that she and David had come to accept as just a normal part of life in the city.

Between the blood money and the job, she lived comfortably enough. The years passed slowly and without much joy, but Rachel tried to resume living the best she could under the circumstances. It hadn’t been easy, but she’d finally decided that it was time for companionship again.

And not the four-legged kind.

She’d bought a dog three months after she‘d arrived. The loneliness was just as unbearable here as it’d been in the city apartment, so she’d gone to the pound and picked out a stray named Max. She hadn’t even been remotely ready to bring a new man into her life.

The black lab puppy had been abused, with a good sized scar on its snout as proof, but he’d nuzzled into her neck and whimpered, stealing Rachel’s already broken heart in an instant.

She couldn’t save David, but she could save Max. Save him from certain death if he wasn’t adopted, or save him from one more day of abuse at the hands of an unconscionable owner. It didn’t matter. She’d see to it that he never suffered again.

He’d gone home with her that day. And they’d loved each other ever since.

Funny thing is, the dog had saved her life when it came right down to it. Whenever she thought about eating a bullet, he’d been her reason not to. “Who would take care of Max?” she’d think, and resolve to keep on keeping on.

She could buy a gun easily enough if she really wanted to join David on her own terms. Seemed like everyone in Vermont hunted. As a city slicker, Rachel never really had much experience with guns. David had said they should buy one once, to keep in the apartment in case of rapists or murderers, seems they lived in the big bad city and all. She’d laughed and told him not to worry, that it would be okay, that they didn’t need a gun.

She always told him it would be okay.

“The Big Guy Upstairs has our backs, David!” she’d said to him when he was pacing back and forth, stressing over the issue.

“I’d feel better with a .32 in my hand instead of the bible if I have to protect your honor, baby!” he’d said, dead serious.

She’d laughed so hard she peed her pants. And then they’d both laughed even harder because she had to go change.

God, she missed him.

But she couldn’t live like this forever. She was going to have to try to find someone to share her life with from here on out. David would want that. She’d talked to him about it when she sat in the Ranger across from the bed and breakfast each night.

She told him that she’d be with him if she could, but that the Big Guy Upstairs hadn’t seen fit to reunite them just yet. She said that she missed being held and touched, and that she longed to laugh and love again, that she wanted to feel like she‘d felt with him.

He told her he understood, there in the quiet Vermont night, while she cried with only Max beside her, and nothing but the sound of the wind rustling in the trees outside her window. And that he’d forgive her. That being with another man wasn’t cheating. That he was gone and she was here.

He told her to live, and that it’d be okay.

So she’d signed up for the dating site. She’d taken the next needed step, although it wasn’t exactly jumping off the bench into a starting position for the Sox. The site was more like being on the team, with an outside chance of maybe getting some action someday. She had been on the DL a damn long time though, no sense in pushing herself.

It was a start.

She’d been honest in her profile, listing widowed and explaining that she lost her husband in the World Trade Center attacks, and that she wasn’t sure about this dating thing. She’d described herself the best she could, although figuring out what to write had been daunting, to say the least.

How do you come up with an honest appraisal of yourself that’s completely positive? She’d posted an actual picture, taken by one of the girls at work, and she’d tried to stay upbeat, but it was hard to do without sounding like all the other profiles.

What should she say?

I like to spend time with my dog. I watch TV and read books. I like nature and long walks. I’m nice and honest and loyal. Didn’t everybody say the same stuff? From what she’d seen, it kind of seemed like that.

Or then you had the most overused phrase on dating site profiles: “I don’t know what to write here, just ask.” She’d loved that one! If they couldn’t take the time to write a little something about themselves, they probably wouldn’t make very good partners in life. No, she certainly wasn’t going to write that!

So she’d composed a brief excerpt describing her likes and dislikes, her desire to find a man that could be patient with her, that’d be willing to take things slowly. She wrote about missing a man’s touch and voice and smell, and seeing his toothbrush next to hers in the morning. Kissing him goodbye when he went to work, hopefully destined to return later that day. Sappy stuff like that.

It was the truth at least.

She’d gotten a few emails, and even seemed to hit it off pretty well with one nice gentleman that lived less than a hundred miles away, but he‘d disappeared suddenly after she‘d declined his unexpected offer to cam. They’d talked for a few weeks prior to that, and she’d actually been a bit hopeful that maybe finding a new man might be easier than she thought. Maybe the Big Guy Upstairs wasn’t going to make her go through a thousand guys to find the next David. If that was even possible.

Rachel didn’t think it was, but she refused to quit searching. However, she might as well have been looking for a needle in a Vermont haystack! It’s not like that many local folks from around here used the site. She had hit the Vermont button once, when she’d first been exploring her newfound arena, and was surprised when only eighty-three men popped up.

“One for each floor he fell,” Rachel had thought.

None had really struck her fancy. They weren’t David.

But she’d kept on keeping on.

She joined in the forums, responding to the various topics that inspired her to participate. She stayed out of the ones that wanted to know if you’d do this or that to the person above you, something which was usually sexual in nature. It seemed ridiculous, especially since everyone said sure, and you knew damn well the hot chick wouldn’t really let the nerdy guy go down on her. Or vice versa.

She avoided the religion and politics threads, too. She had her opinions, but didn’t see the point in engaging in battles over them. Everyone was entitled to their own beliefs, and she’d just assume spend time discussing how to start dating again after suffering a broken heart than debating who caused the attacks that took her husband from her far too soon.

She’d gleaned lots of great advice from well-meaning strangers, many being regulars on the site, quick to offer advice and hope for those struggling for either. She lost her newbie status before long and soon enjoyed light hearted conversation with a few dozen people on a regular basis. Mostly women, but a few men. None local though. Yet.

She logged on to find a message in her mailbox. It was from Chameleon, her disappearing friend from six months ago. He’d reactivated, apparently, after his sudden departure.

She opened it, thinking he’d be apologizing for the rude request and was surprised to find a hostile message instead.

She read the words with her mouth agape.

“You think you can lead a guy on and then just tell him “No thank you. I don’t want you to see me naked”? Who in the hell do you think you are? I don’t care if you lost your husband when the planes crashed into the towers. I don’t care if it took you a long time to get over him. He’s dead. I’m not. I was willing to love you. To take you into my life and share my every waking moment with you. You might not have said you loved me yet, but you would have. You flirted back, and you said that I stood a chance. I took it slow just like you said. I only emailed once a day. I didn’t freak when you didn’t want to talk on the phone. I bet you didn’t want me to have your number. Well, I got news for you, sweetheart. If I wanted to know your phone number, or where you lived, or what you ****ing had for breakfast this morning, I’d know! And don’t you think otherwise!”

Rachel realized she hadn’t taken a breath since she started reading. She gasped a lungful of air into her tightening chest through the hand that had somehow found its way to her mouth.

“This guy is absolutely crazy!” she thought.

And continued reading his rant.

She wanted to stop, but couldn’t. It was like when you went by an accident; you had to look, curiosity mandated it. Or when you were glued to watching people fall from the upper floors of a skyscraper. You didn’t want to be seeing what you were seeing, but you couldn’t look away. Especially if you might recognize the tie you gave your husband hurtling towards the ground.

She returned to the vicious email.

“You should have just showed me your boobs. Would it have really been that bad? We could have taken it slowly. Once you got comfortable with the cam, we could have moved onto real life. That’s how it works, and don’t tell me you don’t know how it works. Everyone knows how it works! You started this!”

She felt an unease settle over her, and glanced at David’s picture on the nightstand.

“We got a real nutcase here, honey,” she muttered to her dead husband.

“It’s going to be okay, baby,” he replied, because that’s what he always said now when she heard him.

She went back to finish the rest of the childish rant, thinking that she’d been way off on her impression of this Chameleon fellow. Tom. That was his name. She’d thought he seemed a bit mysterious, like a Tom Clancy novel, after reading his profile. Added to the interesting screen name, she’d thought he’d be fun to get to know, so she‘d sent him an email.

Nothing provocative, mind ya; just… “Hi. Do you change green when you sit on the grass for a picnic?”

She thought it clever.

He’d responded, “No, but I turned red getting an email from someone as lovely as yourself. I’m astonished by your beauty and would very much like to get to know you better. Maybe we can be friends? Or lovers someday perhaps?”

They sent a dozen or so cordial emails over the next few weeks, but it hadn’t progressed much past some minor flirting on his part. She’d informed him right up front that she wasn’t interested in meaningless sex. He’d said he wasn’t either.

And then she’d gotten the cam request to let him see her boobs. She’d responded that maybe this whole thing had been a bad idea, perhaps he should find someone else, and then she wished him well in his search for the perfect girl. He was certainly no David.

She’d checked his profile the next day and he’d deactivated. Now here he was going off on her. The nerve! When she was done reading this, she’d send him a little piece of her mind, and The Big Guy Upstairs could punish her as He saw fit for the curse words.

She went back to reading…

“But let me tell you, Rachel. I’m going to finish it. Nobody, and I mean nobody, gets away with leading me on. You think I don’t see you across from the bed and breakfast, crying in your truck with that stupid old dog beside you. I see the way you have to lift his *** end up to help him in the truck every night. Well, he won’t put up much of a fight, Rachel, and neither will you!”

She read the last line again, dread filling her entire body now. Her hands quaked. This wasn’t funny anymore. He’d crossed the line.

“Max, c’mon boy, come here,” she’d pleaded, her voice barely above a whisper. She cleared her throat and yelled louder this time, “MAX! COME BOY!”

Silence.

Rachel didn’t like this. He always came when called.

She looked at David’s picture, and rose from the bed where she’d been stretched out with her laptop after getting home from their honeymoon locale.

“MAX!” she tried again. No scratching nails on the linoleum floor in the kitchen where his water dish and food bowl sat. She’d heard him go out there when they got home.

Oh, why hadn’t she listened to David and gotten a gun?

She braved herself against the overwhelming panic setting in. “Call 9-1-1!” she thought. The numbers flashed back and forth in her brain. 911...9/11...911...9/11. “It’s going to be okay, baby,” she’d lied that day.

But the phone was in her purse out by the front door. She froze, paralyzed in the bedroom, terror as thick as the coat on her old dog that wasn‘t coming to her now.

She grabbed the little granite picture frame with David’s picture in it. She needed him with her right now. She didn’t have Max, and she couldn’t do this alone. She’d snatch up her purse, and run for the car. She’d go to the police and tell them about the psycho that had sent her a disturbing message and maybe done something awful to her beloved dog.

Rachel’s eyes darted left, then right quickly, as she exited the safety of the bedroom. She half expected Tom, or Chameleon, or whoever the sick pervert was, to be standing there with a grin on his face. He wasn’t, thank God, but she’d been so busy looking around in terror that she hadn’t bothered to look down as she ran towards the purse containing her cell.

She felt the rough fur rub against her shin as she tripped over Max just down the little hall, halfway to the front door. She reached out for him and felt the wetness on her hands as soon as she touched his unmoving body. She yelled out in misery, the guttural noise escaping into the terror filled night, as the strength drained from numbing extremities like a wide open spigot.

She heard him laughing behind her, a twisted version like the ones you’d hear in the fun house at a carnival. Or something straight out of a Stephen King novel, where the bizarre madman cackles his sinister sound just before slaughtering his victim.

Rachel lie sprawled on the floor, frozen in fear, not knowing what to do. Tom approached like a hunter to its prey, confident and deadly.

“Told you old Max wouldn’t be able to help you here, Rachel. Bet you’d wished you’d shown me your **** now, huh? Look, here’s your second chance. What do you say, baby? You gonna let me have a taste of that sweet meat? Turn over, darling. Let me get an up close look at your pretty face.”

Rachel turned around and stared up at the crazy man looming over her. She had nowhere to run, and she had nothing left to lose now.

Max was dead. David was dead. She might as well be too.

For the first time ever, Rachel sensed she finally knew what David had felt like in his last moments. Her questions had finally been answered.

“It’s going to be okay,” he whispered to her, there in the hallway with Max dead beside her, and a monster hulking above her.

But she wasn’t going without a fight.

She’d never been with any man except for David, and she’d be damned if she was going to let this ******* defile her before sending her off to meet her husband. David had said he’d kill to protect her honor, so why shouldn’t she? She didn’t have a gun, but maybe…

The Big Guy Upstairs didn’t seem to be anywhere in sight. Not that she knew The Plan, but she thought He might want her to try to get out of this.

Survival instinct kicked in.

She wondered if David had felt it just before he suffocated. Or got crushed. Or plummeted to his death.

She knew he had. He’d called Rachel so he could hear her tell him it was going to be okay one last time.

She had one shot here. She gripped the granite picture frame. It was as heavy in her hand as the pain of missing David was in her heart.

“Tom, right?” she said, sounding pretty calm given the situation. “Listen, I’m sorry…”

“Shut up, *****!” he screamed. “You think you can talk your way out of this? You think you can get on the computer and lead guys on? You think you can flirt and then just say no and go on your merry little way? It doesn’t work like that! Now shut your mouth or I’ll slit your ****ing throat like I did your mangy old mutt.”

“Max. His name was Max, and I loved him very much,” Rachel offered, not caring whether he followed through with his threat. It’d bring him within reach.

“I said shut up, whore, or I’ll shut you up. I got something to put in that mouth, baby,” he crooned, grabbing his crotch with the hand not holding the knife. “What do you think of that, sweetheart?”

Her head swam. She felt like she was going to pass out.

“I can’t do this, David!” she thought.

“It’s going to be okay, baby,” he whispered back softly.

Rachel gripped the cold granite tighter.

“Tom, please, I’ll give you whatever you want,” she lied, “just don’t hurt me, alright? I swear, I never meant to lead you on. I can see that you’re upset. It’s going to be okay.”

He laughed. “Okay? You think it’s going to be okay? Is dead okay, Rachel? Do you think I’m going to let you go after I’m done ****ing you? Are you ****ing crazy?”

“No,” she thought, “you are!” But she didn’t say it. She didn’t say anything.

“Are you deaf? Nothing to say? That’s okay. I’m not in the mood for talking anymore anyways. What do you say we get down to the fun stuff, huh, Rach? How ‘bout that?”

He started to undo his belt buckle and she looked away. She heard his zipper unzip, the sound unmistakable, and panic again threatened to seize her, leaving her unable to move a muscle. The hair on the back of her neck stood up.

He laughed again. That sick sound louder now, as he stood with his pants around his ankles and his member sticking straight out, ready for its unwilling prize. She couldn’t fathom that any man could have a hard-on when getting ready to rape a woman, but here he stood, erect as a skyscraper jutting into the cloudless sky.

“You going to cooperate, or am I going to have to rough you up a bit first?” he queried. “On your knees, *****,” he spat at her.

“It’s going to be okay, David,” she whispered to her dead husband.

“What’d ya say?” Tom said, bending down closer so he could hear her. She’d counted on it.

She’d swung the little granite picture frame with David’s picture in it with all her might. She caught him off guard, connecting her solidly reinforced right hand with his left temple. Blood sprayed from the gash, and Tom crumpled to the floor beside her, screaming in agony. She raised the picture frame over her head and brought it down with all the force she could muster. Every ounce of rage and pain that she’d felt at losing David exploded from within. The blow landed squarely on the stunned attacker’s forehead, shattering the bone beneath the now splitting skin, and caving a nice sized V-shaped indentation there.

The Chameleon stopped moving. He wouldn’t be changing colors to green to match the grass now. He was going to stay blood red until the coroner washed it down the sink.

Rachel continued raining head crushing blows anyways though, using both hands wrapped tightly around the tiny, murderous picture frame, David gazing out from between the ghastly streaks as she struck her previously walking nightmare over and over again.

She didn’t know how many times she hit him. Until she couldn’t lift her arms anymore.

She didn’t care. She thought The Big Guy Upstairs would forgive her; and David would.

“Thou shalt not kill“, but it’d be okay in this case. After all, He’d seen fit to issue David’s calling. Maybe this had been hers. To rid the world of this monster. To face death and find the answers to the questions that had haunted her all these years. So she could learn to live and love again.

She was sure of it. As sure as she’d known that David had gotten her through this.

She’d wanted to give up. To be with him again. To just let Tom kill her.

But David had told her it was going to be okay. She’d always been the one to tell him that. And the last time she’d lied.

But he wouldn’t lie to her. He forgave her.

Now maybe she could forgive herself and get on with her life. Maybe she could put the past behind her, store the transcript in a safe place with David’s other things, and let it go. Let him go. Maybe this was all part of The Big Guy Upstairs’ Plan.

Rachel didn’t know. Her plan was to just keep on keeping on.

David would let her know when the time came. She’d hear him calling, except this time it wouldn‘t be on the phone to tell her goodbye and that he loved her with all his heart. This time he’d be calling her to him. And she’d go willingly, when the time was right.

Until then, she thought everything was going to be okay now, for the first time in a very long time.

“Yes, baby, you‘re right. It’s going to be okay,” David whispered in her ear, as if to confirm the fact. Rachel clutched the bloody frame to her chest and just cried.

I should add a little disclaimer here that the transcript I used did indeed come from the internet. I can't verify whether it's an actual verified transmission from that day or not, but it looked legitimate, and it worked with my idea.

My prayers have always gone out to the people that lost their lives that tragic day and the ones they left behind, and it was important to me to try and express that pain in this one. I hope I did at least a somewhat adequate job.

That was really good. I definitley got lost in that story!!

Thank you ms...

I love getting lost in stories and books...it's one of my favorite things to do.