Through the Window

 I got up in the morning like any other day—slow, groggy, and unsure if I’d dreamed the alarm or it had actually gone off. The flat was quiet. The kettle gurgled to life as I fumbled in the cupboard for the last decent tea bag.

It was a dull, grey Thursday. I remember because I had no plans. No appointments. Just me, the quiet hum of the fridge, and a view out my window of the sleepy town below. I lived on the 8th floor—high enough that the town looked like a miniature version of itself, toy cars crawling, trees like broccoli, and the sky an endless ceiling of cloud.

I stood by the window, half-drinking, half-daydreaming. And that’s when I saw it.

A shadow first. Then a roar. And then—too fast to fully comprehend—an airoplane.

An actual airplane.

Low. Way too low.

It burst through the clouds like a bullet. I thought I was imagining it. Maybe a weird reflection, or a dream I hadn’t shaken off yet. But no—there it was, trembling the very glass I leaned against.

The plane was coming in from the east, nose tilted wrong. I could see the fuselage—a commercial passenger jet, white with blue markings. One engine was trailing smoke. Not the dramatic movie kind, but real—slow and sickly, like something wounded. I couldn’t see the pilot. I couldn’t see passengers. I couldn’t see anything except inevitability.

It clipped the top of the building across from me—floor 20 just sheared off like paper—and then it was gone.

There was a boom. A sound so deep and raw I felt it in my spine. Glass shattered somewhere. A car alarm wailed.

I didn’t move. Not at first.

I stood there, tea forgotten, heart stuttering in my chest, staring out at the sudden smoke, the sudden fire, the sudden black crater where calm had been.

It wasn’t until I heard screaming—far away, rising from below—that I finally turned from the window.

That moment split my life in two: before I saw the plane, and after.

And I still ask myself every morning, when I stand by the same window—

Why me?

Why did I see it first?

And why did I feel like it was meant for me?