AUTHOR'S NOTES: I wrote this fic the day after the World Trade Center crisis in New York City. I kept it as non-gory as I possibly could, but if you were or someone you know was in this, you might not want to read.

RATED: PG mostly for references to death and so on.

A DAY LIKE ANY OTHER

I bang away on my computer from my office in the World Trade Center. It is a day like any other.

My cell phone rings. I pick it up. It is my husband.

"Hi, honey, how are you?" He asks me.

"Oh, it's a day like any other." I respond.

"I got Elara to school and baby Riley in daycare." My husband says.

"Good." I say. "See you tonight."

"See you then, babe." My husband hangs up.

I continue to pound at my computer. I take orders for customers, yell at my boss, field phone calls from angry salesmen. It is a day like any other.

The building shakes. The lights flicker. "Shoot!" I yell as my computer loses just enough power to dump what I've been working on. It is a day like any other.

A few minutes later, I hear someone calling my name. It is my boss.

"We have to leave the building." He says.

"Why?" I ask.

"An airplane just hit us." My boss grabs my arm. "Hurry. They're evacuating all of us."

"An airplane?" I ask as my boss pulls me down a flight of stairs. "It's a clear day, Boss. Was the pilot blind or something?"

"I don't know." He continues to drag me down the stairs. I have never seen someone as large as my boss move so fast in my life.

The building shakes again. My boss and I take a second to regain our balance and then continue running.

My boss and I run, run, and run. We hear people crying for help, but we cannot reach a single one of them. This day is not like any other.

"The building could collapse." I hear someone saying.

"Do you really think it will?" I ask my boss.

"What will?" He pants.

"The building." I say. "Do you think it will collapse?"

"No." My boss rounds the corner to another flight of stairs. "Not even a commercial aircraft could do that much damage."

I'm not so sure about that as the building shakes again, this time harder. My boss and I fall down the next flight of stairs. We get up and continue to run. This day is not like any other.

We run down flight after flight of stairs. My heart is beating in my throat. The building shakes again and sends my boss flying. He falls down two flights of stairs.

"Boss!" I yell. He had blood pouring from his forehead. There is no pulse. I leave him and continue running. It seems cold, I know, but this day is not like any other.

I'm almost there now. I'm two flights away from the door to the outside. The building gives a violent sway to the right. My survival instinct on full throttle, I dive out the door and keep running.

Hundreds of people are with me, running as the proud one hundred seventeen story skyscraper implodes on itself, sending smoke and rubble into the streets of New York City. This day is not like any other.

When I can run no more, I stop and look at the space where the World Trade Center once stood. America is changed. My boss' wife will now have to raise their children without her husband. Thousands of children are without parents, parents without children, husbands without wives, wives without husbands. All because those people happened to be here, today, on a day like any other.