Ground Zero(32)

“No! The explosives!” Reshmina cried.

“Help me put the fire out!” Pasoon yelled.

Together they kicked dirt at it, and Reshmina used her headscarf to beat out the last of the flames. She was still scared that one of the weapons might go off, and now it was pitch-dark in the cave again.

“Get out—we have to get out!” Pasoon told her.

Pasoon scrambled out first, then helped Reshmina through the hole. When she was back on her feet, she shoved her brother, hard.

“You idiot!” she cried. “You could have killed us both in there!”

“You’re the one who dropped the lantern!” he told her.

“Because you popped up like some evil spirit and scared me to death!” Reshmina yelled.

They were both shaking so much they had to sit down on the ground.

When Reshmina could breathe again, she turned to her brother. “How did you even know that place was there?”

Pasoon looked away. “Darwesh and Amaan showed it to me.”

Reshmina blew out a laugh. Darwesh and Amaan. Of course.

Pasoon got up angrily and stalked off up the path.

“Pasoon, wait,” Reshmina called. She got to her feet and followed him again. “I’m sorry. Please, stop this foolishness and come home. Mor and Baba need you. I need you.”

But Pasoon was done talking. Reshmina glared at her twin brother’s back as he walked away. Why couldn’t he see there was another path? Another future? Why did he have to follow so doggedly in the footsteps of all the other boys who had left home for the Taliban before him?

High up on a ridge, Reshmina spied a familiar rock with a phone number painted on it—the same one she and Pasoon had passed a couple of years ago. The spot she had guessed he was going to all along.

“The rifle’s not going to be there,” she told Pasoon. “It can’t be.”

But it was. They passed the painted rock and came to the small plateau again, and there, right where Pasoon had left it, was the same Soviet rifle he had used to shoot at the American army base.

Pasoon picked up the rifle and checked to see if it was still loaded. Apparently it was.

“Pasoon, what are you doing?” Reshmina asked.

Chik-chik. Pasoon slid the bolt back in place and took aim over the side of the mountain.

“I’m going to call the Taliban,” he said.





Brandon dialed the office number for Windows on the World from memory, his heart racing.

The line buzzed with a busy signal.

No, Brandon thought. No no no no no. Please tell me their phones aren’t out.

Maybe he’d dialed the number wrong. His hands were shaking as he hung up and dialed again. He just needed to know his dad was alive. That he was okay.

The phone was ringing. It was ringing! Someone was answering!

“Hello! Hello, this is Brandon Chavez!” Brandon said, practically shouting into the phone. “Is my dad there? Is he all right?”

There was silence on the line for just a moment, and Brandon held his breath.

“Leo!” the person on the other line called. “Your kid’s on the phone!”

Brandon waited breathlessly for what felt like minutes. Hours. And then, at last—

“Brandon?”

“Dad!”

It was such a relief to hear his father’s voice. To know, after everything Brandon had been through today, after everything he’d seen, that his dad was still alive. Tears streamed from Brandon’s eyes, but he laughed at the same time.

“Oh, Brandon! Thank God you’re okay!” his dad was saying. “There was this sudden crash, and the smoke, and I couldn’t find you anywhere! I didn’t know if you were alive or dead!”

Brandon sobbed. “I’m so sorry, Dad. I was going down to the mall to buy those Wolverine gloves for Cedric. I should never have left you. I was in an elevator when the plane hit, and I was trapped. I got out and I tried to get back up to you. But I can’t. There’s a fire, and the stairs are blocked.”

“I’m just so glad to know you’re okay,” his dad told him. “I went down looking for you, but we can’t get past the 100th floor.”

The 100th floor? Brandon frowned. If Brandon and Richard couldn’t get up past the 93rd floor, and the people up top couldn’t go down any farther than the 100th floor, that meant there wasn’t just one floor where the plane had hit. It had taken out seven whole floors. Were all those floors on fire like the 93rd was? How would the fire department ever be able to put something like that out?

“But that means all those people from the 100th floor up,” Brandon said out loud as he realized it. “That means they’re all trapped!” His breath caught, and he started to cry again. “That means you’re trapped!”

“It’s okay, Brandon. We’re okay,” his dad said. He sounded so calm it calmed Brandon down too. A little.

“There’s about seventy of us up here,” his dad went on. “There was a big event happening on the 106th floor, but we’re all together now. It’s really smoky, but we’re going to be okay, all right? It was just an accident. This old building is tough. It can take whatever the world throws at it, just like me and you, right? You’re all right now. That’s all that matters, Brandon. Madre de Dios. I thought I would never hear your voice again.”