Thus, it had come to this. The sky had fallen, just as they had predicted. History rewrites itself, they say, and we are the pages, being stamped upon by the solid press of the typewriter.

You watch as the children scream, as the women cry, as the men wander. None of us were trained for this kind of tragedy: we had always assumed that what is always will be. It just so happens that what is was never supposed to be, and what was supposed to be has decided to take what is back. A glass shatters. You hear the crack. You wonder for a moment if the sound was from within or without.

A building collapses somewhere. It tumbles down, as if it were a house of cards, kissed by a gust of wind. A tear slips from the sky, and the rains begin. Good, you think, rain to drench the flames. You feel a wetness on your cheeks, and you wonder if it is the heavens warning you of the end, or your knowledge of an an end.

A man crashes into you, looks just as distraught as you.

Collapse, he says.

Relapse, you say.