Sincerely, Jennifer x

Nothing was the same,
but I didn’t know it yet.
I had been swimming,
and my hair was wet,
ears ringing with drips,
drips,
drips,
the screams of an eyewitness on the radio that my teacher was too shocked to switch off.

My hair was wet,
and my mind occupied with how I’d failed to swim a full length.
I was scared.
I didn’t understand how to stay afloat in the dingy, dirty pool,
or how the kick board would keep me from drowning,
or why the bus driver was sat in the car park for an extra fifteen minutes, just staring out of the windscreen.

The static stopped and the world changed.
Everything fell,
souls,
shattered glass,
the last, lingering lack of awareness.
My hair hung in wet waves over my shoulders,
dripping down onto my crinkled shirt,
and I wasn’t too sure how a building could be broken,
or how a plane could get so mislaid.

I kept hearing words.
“Casualties.”
“Towers.”
“Collapse.”
“Oh My God, no.”
No idea what it all meant,
I just kept thinking about my wet hair,
caked in chlorine,
wishing it dried as quickly as the other girls,
and that I could swim just like the other girls,
and that the adults would explain the strange sense of dread that was skulking around the bus with a snarl.

New York was a faraway fantasy,
full of pop stars,
talking dogs and hotels for children who missed their flights.
After swimming,
it became something else.