Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations

The chapter opens with a picture of a box of random items; Mira is moving to Jed’s apartment in Chelsea. He has very little furniture, but it takes three days to move Mira’s things. Again, their shared humor helps ease the tension of this big change. The very next day, two planes crash into the World Trade Center. Mira is on the street and watches the whole event as it takes place. She notes that “no one on the street seemed too worried” (160), including herself; people are more in shock and awe. Mira calls her father from a pay phone, and he starts telling her to “get out of there” (161). He is watching the coverage on TV and lets Mira know that it is a terrorist attack. As wireless communications go down, Mira relays information her father feeds her from the television reports. People start jumping from windows, and the building is enveloped in smoke before collapsing to the ground.

Mira creates a collage out of Missing Persons posters in the shape of the now destroyed Twin Towers. She describes the scene as a paper city in which walls, subways, and buildings are all covered with these signs.