2010 was supposed to be so different.

Rubble continued to fall around Graham as the building groaned and settled. Dust filled the air, choking him and blurring his vision.

He reached down towards the searing pain in his left leg. His hand felt the rough metal of a length of rebar. The end of it was wet with something. He suddenly realized what that something was as he felt the spot where the rebar intersected with his leg.

A coughing sound broke through his pain. “John, that you?” he asked into the dusty black void surrounding him.

Another terrible cough. “I’m here,” John responded weakly.

“Remember when this was supposed to be a great year?” Graham asked. “That lasted for all of what, a month?”

John coughed violently in response.

“You ok, John?”

Nothing.

“John?”

Graham reached for the rebar again and pulled on it. He screamed in agony as the pain threatened to take his consciousness. Slowly he rested his head on the debris behind him, resigned to the fact that 2010 was not a great year.