Look Away

         Hours passed since the second tower collapsed. The dust nearly settled, but a horrid smell lingered in the air. The smell could hardly compare to the disturbing noises that melted together and poured over the entire city, making it as impossible to think as it was to breathe. Sirens, horns, yells, screams, cries. Hundreds of people pushed against the barricades, unable to enter the emergency room. We were all there for different reasons. Some came to help, many came to pray, others came for news. I came for assurance that this was all just a bad dream. Determined, clutching the photograph against my chest, I pushed forward. Somehow, I managed to get to the front of the line. Most of the crowd seemed to stand in a daze, watching the scene that unfolded in front of the hospital. Ambulance after ambulance pulled into and out of the emergency room parking lot.
Dozens upon dozens of hospital personnel waited at the entrance to the emergency room, frantically receiving the incoming casualties. One of the hospital workers walked along the line of the crowd, shouting directions. “If you’re donating blood,” called out a tall man in a green hospital uniform, “Please move to the left end of the parking lot. Please,” He continued to repeat this instruction as he moved along the line of the crowd, which was held back by barricades from swarming the emergency room. There was a shift in the crowd; countless of people began shuffling towards the left. The next thing I knew the hospital worker was right in front of me, walking past. Before I could align my thoughts, I reached over the barricade and grabbed his arm. I held it tight, desperate for his attention. His eyes grew wide as they met mine. “Please,” I whimpered, thrusting the photograph in front of his face, “My fiancé, I don’t know if he’s ok. Please.” I held his eyes for only an instant, and in them I saw pity I had never seen before in my entire life. The intensity of his pity shook something inside of me. I felt my grip loosen. He quickly looked away from me as he said, “I’m sorry, I don’t have any information on victims at this time.” He walked off, but I would never forget his expression. He looked...ashamed.
It wasn’t until months later that I realized that the hospital worker was shamed at not being able to look at me.  The eyes are the only organs capable of reflecting the full intensity our emotions. I suppose my own eyes held pain too intense for him to bear. He could not bear my agony.
That reaction, that shame, I would see for months to come. My friends, my family, even strangers, seemed unable to meet my eyes without huge effort. That is the side of grief no one talks about. The shame. It’s what everyone around you feels when they realize your pain is so horrifying, so penetrating, that words could never begin to mediate it. My fiancé, James, was lost that day, taken by evilness and misguided souls. A part of me, pieces I can’t begin to describe, was ripped from me. Now I’m incomplete, hollow. I do not wish to burden anyone with my pain. But every year, I see it again. Those shameful eyes, carefully glancing towards me, secretly wishing they didn’t have to face the agony in my own. What shame.

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Fiction. I wrote this in Sept 2011. But I was inspired by an unfortunate moment I experienced recently. I felt uncomfortable in facing someone who had lost a loved one in an accident. My reaction--my selfish desire to turn away from their pain because it was too much for me, left me ashamed and terrified that the person would notice. Also made me wonder if this is something victims experience often.