Annabel Quintero was 25 and living out her dreams in New York City when she had to escape the World Trade Center on September 11th.
In the 25 years since, Quintero, who now lives in West Seattle, has had to process the unthinkable. She’s found peace in meditation, but it wasn’t until years later that she found the strength to share her story.
“I was modeling, I was b-girling, which is breakdancing, with hip-hop royalty,” Quintero said. “And I was also working on Wall Street.”
That work is what brought Quintero to the 46th floor of the North Tower that morning. She was running late when she walked in and hurried to get the office set up before the stock market bell.
“I was printing everything out, and all of a sudden I feel something fall on my building,” she said. “And I’m like, ‘what was that?’”
At first, she wondered if another building had fallen on hers. Out the window, she remembers seeing the “bluest” sky as she walked back to her desk. Then, she felt an earthquake.
“I was trying to figure out if I could go under the desk because I remember, in earthquake drills, you’re supposed to go under a desk,” she said.
There were no alarms. No announcements. Other than one other stranger she saw on the floor, Quintero was alone. The building was rumbling, and she remembered being thrown “like a rag doll.”
“I remember thinking to myself, you have to try to leave the building, even if you die trying,” she said.
On the stairs, Quintero found a rhythm: step, step, jump. A step with each foot, before jumping to the landing in the stairs below. It’s a rhythm that inspired the title of her memoir years later.
“I didn’t see anyone until about the 33rd floor,” she said. “I was going down really quick. I remember this man saying, ‘Hey, be careful. Slow down.’ I was like, ‘Okay, I’m not listening to that.”
Around the 33rd floor, Quintero recalls a line of people along the stairwell. There was a lot of empty space, and she wondered what the hold-up was.
“They said, ‘Oh, the firefighters are coming up,’” she said. “I was like why are the firefighters coming up if we’re not all out of here?”
Quintero walked down the stairs in the open part of the staircase. When a firefighter was nearby, she’d scoot to the side.
Somewhere along the way down, she ran into a facilities worker with a pager, who told her what had happened.
“He told us that the other tower was hit by a plane,” she said. “That’s when it got silent.”
Quintero still remembers seeing victims being helped down the stairs. It’s how she became aware that people in the building were burning.
At the bottom of the building, she remembers water.
“Some ladies were unable to tread through that water because they were wearing flip-flop high heels that were in style at the time,” she said. “I’m glad I had my boots on.”
Outside, a paramedic rushed Quintero across the street, where she got into a cab. A few blocks away, finally with a clear view, she looked back toward the towers. Only one was still standing.
“We just fell apart, and we’re like, ‘All the people. Like, did the people get out?” Quintero said.
In the days that followed, Quintero focused on survival. She didn’t want to leave her apartment or see anyone. When she heard fighter jets outside, she would grab her backpack and run out, thinking there was another attack.
Eventually, her father convinced her to work up the courage to get on a plane to come home to Seattle. She remembers the way she was searched getting on, something airport employees had never done before.
Quintero found strength in meditation, visiting a Vipassana meditation center in Washington. She learned how to observe and understand her thoughts and emotions and work through the trauma she had endured.
It took years, though, before she was able to share her story publicly. When Quintero ran for public office in 2018, she remembers being at an event and mentioning 9/11.
“Literally I had a flashback right on the stage,” she said. “I don’t even know what I said after that, and I got off the stage, and I’m like, what just happened?”
That moment encouraged her to find the courage to speak about what she went through. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she started writing her book, “Step Step Jump: Transforming Trauma to Triumph from the 46th Floor.”
“I ended up helping other people with their stories,” she said.
Quintero hopes one lesson in particular stands out in her memoir.
“Even on that terrible day when I had gotten to North Manhattan, I was able to go into this church called Good Shepherd Church,” she said. “Something overcame me, and I could just feel my blood flow. I could feel the oneness of the wood of the pew and the stone of the cathedral. And I felt for the first time, the oneness of everything, of all of us.”
It taught her that even on your worst day you can still find a part of yourself.
KIRO 7 asked Quintero what she hopes other people take away from the memory of September 11.
“That day changed everything,” she said. “We all have a September 11th story. Other people are still having their September 11 day. Acknowledge that wars are still happening. 25 years of war. I think I feel so blessed I was able to heal and be a whole person, a functional person, but war is so traumatic. So for us to honor those who passed and their loved ones and the survivors, but also to put an end to war for everyone so we don’t have to spend 25 years healing.”