A/N: This story is currently being revised. Thanks a ton to TheMightyRen and PTB for the help with this story.

I do not own anything in this story. SM owns Bella and Jake. The setting and events are true.

Let me get this out before you read this story. 9/11 was a day that every American can remember and will remember for the rest of their days. I still remember exactly where I was and what went through my head that morning. I remember the patriotism and religiousness that follow in the aftermath. I remember the contraversies that followed. For anyone not from America, maybe this story, told from the POV of a New Yorker, can help you understand a piece of what we felt that morning.

I may live in Alabama now, and North Carolina at the time, and I may never have even been to the Pentagon or New York City, but I was born in NY state and trust me, the anger I felt, the hurt, sorrow and fear I felt were very real.

This is going to be a very very sad story. It may or may not end the way you like or expect. But lets face it life never does, does it? The whole of this short story will be told from Jake's POV. I might do some outtakes later from Bella's POV, but as of right now, I'm not sure.

I hope you enjoy, but I assure you, this will make you cry. Understand before you read that this may bring up what you felt that day. I know it has for me. I have struggled so much with writing this and planning it. I hope even with all the tears and such, you will enjoy this story.

Prologue

Tuesday, September 11, 2001. It was a day that would live on forever. It was the day the world literally stopped. It was, as FDR once said, "a day that would live on in infamy". It was a day for the history books.

It's funny. I never thought I would be alive to see something that would go down in history. But that day, I was. And I wish to God I hadn't.

That Tuesday started as any typical day for all of New York City. Normal people going to their normal jobs. No one would have ever anticipated what really happened that day.

It's been ten years since that fateful and tragic day, yet everyone who was old enough to remember still could tell you exactly what they were doing that morning. I know I can. I can tell you exactly how I felt that morning. I could tell you how the firehouse smelled. I could tell you exactly how the sky looked. I could tell you that I was so excited that morning for a dinner I was to have with my girlfriend that very evening. I can still hear the screaming. I can still see the blood. I can still smell the smoke and jet fuel.

I'm sure I'm not alone in this. When I think about that day, even though it's been so long, I still feel the rage and hatred build inside me. I can still feel the sorrow and sense of loss I felt that morning.

For months after the attack, there was so much patriotism. Everywhere you looked in America, there were flags hung, even on cars, flying tall and proud in the wind. "God Bless America" was written on every storefront. There was no hatred between religions. There was no politics. There was no class system. There was only patriotism. We were Americans, and that was all that mattered. It only mattered what flag you flew. For months, everywhere you turned, you saw people flying the Red, White, and Blue proudly. We knew who we were and we knew we would kick somebody's ass for what had happened to us. It didn't matter that The World Trade Center was in New York City and the Pentagon was in Washington. It had happened on American soil. Everyone felt the loss and the stab in the back.

For months, churches were packed. Everyone ran to God for answers, but once they realized answers weren't coming and the only retribution they were gonna get was the start of a very long, very drawn out war, people stopped going to church and people stopped flying the flag high and proud. People went back to their lives before the tragedy.

I still can't tell you what would compel people to do what they did aboard those planes, and I think that's what still angers me the most. It was a senseless attack and yet the man responsible still hasn't paid the price for fucking with true blood American people. I don't care if you're black, red, pale as hell, or what. Someone fucked with us and they never paid the price for killing our brothers. They ran and hid and we still have yet to find him.

As I sit here writing down what happened to me that day, I can see it as if it were happening all over again. I remember minute by minute what I saw, what I felt, what I heard. I remember moment by moment what happened. I wish I didn't. I wish I didn't because then my heart wouldn't still be hurting a decade later.

I am actually thankful Ms. Fooks made me take those typing lessons, because at this moment, I can't see what I am typing to you. I can't see because the letters on the screen have become one big blur to me. I cry for all the families who lost their loved ones that day. I cry for a country who thought it was invincible. We should have known better. If the Titanic taught us nothing, it's that nothing and no one is invincible.

So, if you are willing to read, I…well I guess I'm willing to write my point of view on what happened that day. This may be the second hardest thing I've ever done in my life. But here it goes. This is my story… …