Dressed for Disaster

The restroom was unoccupied, and he went into the handicapped stall and started to work. First, he scrubbed the makeup off his face with several of the towelettes. Next, he unbuttoned his dress and stepped out of it. Using the dress as a rag, he doused a corner of it with nail polish remover, and began stripping off the coat of quick dry polish, which he had applied the night before. When he was through, he slid off his white slip, pulled off his bloody pantyhose, and unhooked his padded bra.

Dressed only in his satin panties, Pat rummaged through the sack from the drugstore and found the white cotton sox. Next, the tee shirt and sweatpants. As he bent down to put on his sneakers, for the first time in over an hour, Pat allowed himself to relax a bit. He fished through his purse, and salvaged the remaining bills and coins. Now all he had to do was wait until the coast was clear, have a quick look at himself in the mirror, and duck out of the ladies room. He heard someone moving about by one of the sinks, so he settled in to wait.

Suddenly, the lights went dark, and there was a terrible roar. The whole building seemed to rock, and the cacophony of noises was deafening. For a moment, it seemed like the end of the world. Pat fell to his knees and waited for the floor to stop quaking.

Finally, the noise stopped, replaced by a sensation that Pat had never experienced. He could feel the grit in the air as it went into his lungs, bringing about a drowning sensation that sent him gagging and choking to his feet. Pat staggered out of the restroom and into the wreckage of the hotel lobby. The sight before him was unbelievable.

Broken glass was all over the place, and the assistant manager he had spoken to a few minutes before lay unconscious on the floor, a deep gash in his forehead. Dust was everywhere, on everything, and the bright September sun had been replaced by deep gray gloom. Sirens, screams, and garbled transmissions from police and fire department radios filled the air.