Eleven

The story shifts to an hour earlier when an adult man in a white shirt is in the mall beneath the World Trade Center, waiting for his morning coffee and bagel. Moments later, as he hits the elevator button, the entire building shakes. Moving away, the man overhears everyone’s questions and concerns. Chaos ensues when the elevator doors explode in a fireball, the lights go out, and sprinklers shoot water everywhere. Rumors fly as the crowd of people surges to the exits. As he leaves, the man learns the truth from a security guard: A plane just flew into the tower.

Alex and Nunu arrive at the hospital where their mother works. She enfolds them in a tight embrace. Despite Alex’s questions, she instructs the kids to sit in the waiting area. Alex tries to puzzle everything together but cannot make sense of why school was canceled, why the bus was so quiet, and why his mother is acting strange. Her hands are shaking, and when she sees him staring, she smiles. This strange behavior scares him.

After her supervisor insists that she stay at work, Alex’s mom directs Alex to take Nunu home. Explaining that there has been an emergency, she tries to call Alex’s dad, but there is no answer. Changing the subject, she promises a birthday cake later, and he wonders why his birthday is so awful. His mother warns him not to turn on the television and adds that he needs to be a grown-up.

After the explosion, the Man in the White Shirt runs up the stairs into the World Trade Center lobby, which looks like a war zone with smoke and debris everywhere. The street outside is also littered with metal, glass, and furniture. Inside, firemen race up the stairs, and a policeman ushers people out of the building. Once outside, the man runs, hoping nothing falls on him. Once a safe distance away, he turns and sees a hole in the North Tower with flames and black smoke spewing out. He thinks of the people inside and wonders how such a beautiful day could produce such accidental destruction. Then, as a second plane hits the South Tower, he realizes that this is no accident.

On the bus home, Alex thinks about his ruined birthday. The eerie silence overwhelms him, and all he can hear is a woman praying on her rosary beads. Then, he realizes the bus is where the stray dog was earlier. Alex closes his eyes and counts to 10, thinking the dog will be there when he opens them again. Opening his eyes, Alex sees the dog and imagines that the animal nods at him. Alex grabs his sister and exits the bus. The dog, muddy and with trash on its paws, waits for him to approach. Alex crouches down and tells Nunu that he found his birthday present. After a few tentative moments, the dog bounds onto Alex, pushing the boy to the ground and licking his face.

When Alex and Nunu begin walking home, the dog drops a stick at their feet. The boy heaves it far, and the dog fetches it, returning for more. Later, at a playground, Alex gives the dog one end of his belt, and the animal takes off, pulling the boy on his Heelys. Feeling like he is flying, Alex forgets the strange events of the day and believes that his “deals” with the universe have brought him good luck. Alex tries out different names for the dog, but it does not respond to any of them.

As they continue walking, they pass a bakery with a window display of cupcakes. Alex promises one to his sister, but when they enter the shop, it is empty. Peering into the kitchen, Alex sees flour and dough everywhere as if someone left in a hurry. Alex snags two cupcakes and candles, but when Nunu accuses him of stealing, he leaves money on the counter. Lighting the candles, he and Nunu sing “Happy Birthday.” Once he makes his wish, he blows out the candles, which leave two distinct trails of smoke, much like the Twin Towers that Alex and Nunu know nothing about.

The narrative shifts back to Manhattan where the unnamed man does not see, but feels and hears, the first tower fall. Looking back, he watches the entire building—110 floors—collapse. A huge piece of metal crashes in front of him, the impact exploding store windows and throwing him to the ground. His phone skitters into the gutter. After he helps a woman to her feet, a cloud of dust hurtles toward them. They run but are quickly overwhelmed by the dust.

When Alex and Nunu reach the park near their house, they run into Doug and Kwan, whose parents made them go outside so they would not watch television. Doug and Kwan spot a dog rolling in the outfield grass of the baseball field, where a group of older boys are playing. Alex proclaims that it is his dog, a birthday gift. When the dog catches a ball from the older boys’ baseball game and brings it to Alex, the boys invite Alex, Doug, and Kwan to play too. In the bottom of the ninth, Alex hits what looks to be a home run, except that the dog, whom Alex calls Rex, goes bounding after it. As Alex speeds around the bases, Rex retrieves the ball and sprints toward the boy. Alex slides into home plate just as Rex gets there. The cloud of dust is so big that they disappear.

In a different cloud of dust, the unnamed man is unable to see anything, bumping into others and bouncing off a tire from one of the planes. Hearing others running, the man follows the sound until the dust dissipates. Once in the sunlight, he sees fire trucks race by and policemen helping everyone to safety. The man pauses to look back at where the towers of the World Trade Center once stood, and there is a gaping hole.