Things that go bump...in the day.

Mohammed Atta leaves Germany for periods of time, spending some time in Afghanistan, including several months in late 1999 and early 2000 when he meets Osama bin Laden and other top al-Qaeda leaders. Atta and the other Hamburg cell members are recruited by Bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed for the "planes operation" in the United States. Atta returnes to Hamburg in February 2000, and begins inquiring about flight training in the United States...in broad daylight.

Meantime in New Jersey, John wakes up this morning to an empty house with the sun shining through the Irish lace curtains. He gets up from bed and gazes out at an empty, stark, winter white beach and neighborhood. Even  the window pane feels cold and dead. This time of year, Seaside Park is dead. You can gaze outside all day and not see a single car or person walking. Just sand blowing across empty Ocean Boulevard.

Even up in his third, floor bedroom, he can hear his great, grandfather's grandfather clock chime, ominously down in the livingroom. Funny how a sound that is so comforting when your surrounded by your family, can be down-right creepy as it echos off victorian furniture and heavy, oak stairs. It sounds like someone is coming up the stairs towards John. But he thought his Aunt said they were going to Atlantic City. John walks across the room and peaks out his door. The hall is empty and shadowy. That's the thing about Victorians: there's always shadows. And with every ocean breeze, the house creaks and moans about every life that's passed through it.

As John enters the shower, he could swear he hears the door downstairs slam. He gets out of the shower and unlocks the bathroom door. The trouble with living in a beach town year-round, there are break-ins because everyone knows there's few witnesses down here in the winter. That would be the worst, John thinks as he unlocks the door to the hall: to come in on someone robbing a room. He sticks his head out the door almost afraid to look. Did someone just jump back in to tht last bedroom before the stairs? Or did I make a shadow move by turning my head fast, John wonders. He grabs his electric toothbrush and makes his way slowly down the hall bathed in pertual twilight. Suddenly, he has to stifle a nervous laugh. You grab an electric toothbrush for protection, he thinks. Should have been a cop...stop or I'll brush your teeth. He moves to the right side of the hall. Hell jump into that last bedroom and surprise whoever. He can see his fingers grab the dark brown molding on the bedroom doorway. This is how it happens...before something happens. Everything goes in slow motion. One, two, three John jumps into the bedroom and land on the huge pink hippo his Uncle won for his Aunt on the boardwalk and wrestles it to the floor. John bursts out laughing in relief. He remembers his Aunt asking his Uncle why he picked out a hippo for her? As John stops laughing, the house grows silent again...except for the unmistakable slam of the kitchen door to the deck downstairs.