Marcy Me

You may have seen a famous picture of me. On America’s darkest day, I just wanted to lend my legal expertise to my bank on the 81st floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center. In the photograph, I am covered in ash and dust in my business formal suit. They called me the “Dust Lady.” Rightfully so. My face looked like it had seen a battlefield of corpses. Barely some pieces of my brown skin could be viewed through the white particles that look yellow in some copies, covering the entire area and me. All I knew was that some boom had occurred over a dozen floors above my head and that a horrendous cloud of dust from the South Tower collapse blanketed me with debris.

After the photographer Stan Honda snapped the famous photo, he did something. It was something I’ll never forget. He said, “We’re getting out of here.” He then offered a hand.

We stepped forth with firefighters racing past us going upward, upward. We descended the stairs and the ash began to snow from my person, painting the stairs with more and more dust. Every step was like a pounding into the liberation licking at my consciousness. We took no time going down the stairs, our hearts pounding as if a sledgehammer slammed into our chests.

More firefighters streaked past us. This whole affair seemed like a sense of a vicious bite into our thoughts. Men and women with injuries haunted me for years. We kept pressing on to the lower level of the place. I felt my face and wanted to know if it felt scratchy or like it was melting. I guess it was a bit of both.

“Just keep holding my hand,” Mr. Honda replied to my screams that rang out through the stairwell. My mind remained active and I could still see in front of me with the stinging in my eyes. Tears of frustration and carcinogenic traces from the dust appeared to be absorbed by my skin.

“No matter what, just keep holding my hand.” Mr. Honda was from France and had a sharp accent and said little English. I understood him nonetheless. My skin began to burn with the mixture of carcinogens seeping through my lungs and pores. But I continued. I knew it had to be something that we could do to get to the final portion of the plaza and walk outside into the day. We had about forty more floors to go. Mr. Honda began to lag and I pushed him. I kept saying, “You motivated me, now the roles have shifted. I’m going to make sure you get out of here.”

We kept stepping closer and closer with the precision of stair descenders knocking off pounds. We were in this together. We knew we had to show our powers and the sense that we could survive. The discipline to keep going did not reveal some survival instinct. Humans don’t have such. I learned that when I figured the slamming sounds were my fellow workers. I didn’t want to commit suicide and if I had the chance to breathe fresh air again, I would grasp at the chance. I would seize it, capture it and make sure all of this ash covering me would be shuffled off and I could just taste water and let it cascade against my body. We had twenty more floors to go. Lights flickered and darkness then flooded the lower levels. The desertion of the plaza and the smokiness created a landscape that looked desolate and foreboding. We finally got out of the building. We kept going until we escaped danger. In the moments of uncertainty and shock and utter stress, we prevailed. It all started from that small act of kindness. Mr. Honda could’ve just taken a famous photo and fled. Rather, he valued my life as much as my image.

I’ve only met up with him a few times but I’ll always remember what he did for me. His rational and selfish act will always resonate. I credit Mr. Honda for saving my life. In the years since, I had contracted cancer that I suspected happened because of all those carcinogens that comprised that dust that horrific day.

When I turned to drinking and drugging and lost custody of my children, I recalled Mr. Honda. He had found it worthy to preserve my life and I damaged it. I wondered if he knew about the trials and tribulations that occurred later on in my life. That iconic image of me just standing bereft of all vigor, understanding, and love could’ve been just that. We both could’ve been among the fallen. I know he wanted us out of there and we found a life where so many had been cut short in just a few moments.

That photograph that the world has seen I hope is a reminder of the trauma and bravery and disgust and honor the day carried. It depicts me at my absolute lowest but still standing. Beams from the building did the same. I noticed how some steel frames reached towards the sky like metal fingers tantalized by the sun. It’s more than the photograph. It’s Mr. Honda who knew that we would put death in check that day. He probably never thought about my well-being after that day. That’s alright with me. He brushed his camera aside like a warrior holstering his pistol. He had a bit of ash on him as well but his hand was clean. I dropped my own in his and we kept moving downward. Upon knowing that we had finally touched safety, there seemed to be a moment where we’d never see each other again. Though my life turned out rather tragic, I know Mr. Honda went on with his life as a lover of the stars. There’s justice in the fact that he likes to gaze upward still. He had to do so to look at where I worked. The idea of the power of telescopes is vital. While I descended in my life, he achieved and continues to go on despite the predicament in which we found ourselves.

The one thing that gave me some sense of solace was the killing of Osama bin Laden. For the US to destroy a destroyer of so many, that felt like kindness through infinite justice. If one death could register as getting what one deserves, then his expiration allowed me some modicum of peace. It was like the hand that Mr. Honda extended.