Happy Birthday: A Novel

As she kept her eyes glued to the screen, April quickly dialed her stepmother and told her what had happened. She told her to turn on her TV, and five minutes later, her father called her, in tears. He was as frightened as April was. It reminded them all of 9/11. This wasn’t as dramatic, but the potential risk was huge. It had occurred to everyone that they might blow up part of the building in a suicide bombing and take hundreds of people with them, in a major public statement. Or there was also the possibility that they wanted to use the network to disseminate their message. No one knew yet. But everyone feared that the hostage-takers were extremists of some kind to attempt such a desperate act.

Within five minutes, responsible Middle Eastern governments and religious groups had denied all association with the attack. Their assessment was that it was possibly a fundamentalist splinter group, and there was no question, the risk factor was major to everyone in that building and possibly within blocks around if they had enough explosives on them to do major damage. No one knew for sure if that was the case. April was sitting with her eyes riveted to the screen, her heart pounding as she listened to the broadcast, and she turned when she felt a hand on her shoulder, not sure who it was. She was stunned to find herself looking at Mike. He had come to the restaurant to be with her. Their vigil lasted all day, as crisis teams tried to make contact with the hostage-takers. By six o’clock that night, the building was still under siege. A few people had trickled out from one of the two floors, when the gunmen moved everyone to a single floor so they could control them better. The SWAT teams had since taken over the abandoned floor, to get closer to where the hostages were being held on the floor above. And those who had escaped said that several people had been shot. There were two bodies in the corridors on the floor that the SWAT team reclaimed, but their identities had not been announced. April prayed her mother wasn’t one of the victims.

There were SWAT teams on the roof, on the floor below, and the lobby and none dared make a move so far, for fear of endangering the hostages further. Neighboring buildings had been evacuated, as the street below swarmed with crisis teams, equipment, firefighters, and police, waiting for something to happen.

And through it all, Mike sat with April and held her hand. The restaurant opened for business, and she never left the kitchen. She had sat in the same spot for hours, praying for her mother, while Mike sat with her in silence, and once in a while he tried to get her to eat something or handed her a glass of water. He felt desperately sorry for her. April’s face was deathly white, and he wondered if she’d lose the baby from the shock, but he didn’t dare think about that now. He just wanted to be there for April. Whatever disagreement they had about their accidental child paled in comparison to this major drama. It seemed inevitable that more people were about to be killed, when the SWAT teams moved in to liberate the hostages. And the hostage-takers were threatening to shoot their victims.

April had no idea how her mother was faring. There was no communication with anyone on the floor where the attackers were holding them captive. Helicopters were whirring overhead, and several had already landed on the roof. No one dared to rush the floor in question for fear that the hostage-takers would kill them all.

Their first clear message came just after seven o’clock that night. They were a desperate group of Palestinian extremists, willing to die themselves and kill Americans, in protest of recent Israeli commando attacks on the Palestinian-Israeli border. They said they wanted Americans to know how it felt. The Palestinian government denied any association with them, and knew nothing of them. They were protesting the ongoing plight of their people and seeking world attention, even if it meant killing innocent people to do it. Their willingness to die made it difficult for negotiators on the scene to reason with them. By then, all of the responsible Middle Eastern governments were outraged by their actions, and offered any help that was needed. Several delegates came over from the UN to try to assist with the negotiations, and translations if nothing else. They came as a gesture of their good faith, and explained that the group was acting on their own without their own government’s knowledge or blessing, and was being severely criticized by them as well. No one in any government wanted the hostages to get hurt, while the hostage-takers frantically insisted that they were prepared to die for their cause, and take as many victims as possible with them. They appeared to be beyond reason. Their attack on the network had been disorganized but frighteningly effective.