CHAPTER SIXI remember this day well. Outside the Archer School, the scene was panic. When news of the Twin Towers collapse spread, parents descended on the school like a horde of Huns. Tires scraped against the curb on the narrow street out front. Horns squawked their urgent protests. Minivans became roadblocks. Parents struggled with calm. They sprinted on the sidewalks. They crossed the schoolyard at clumsy and unrehearsed gallops. The country was under attack! And their children might well be the targets!
But of course, as a child and a student, I was told none of this, forced by omission to relegate all panic into the hands of capable and battle-hardened grown-ups. There was little plain talk about the events in New York City. Teachers shooed us along the hallways. I heard the great u
