Borders fell into a decade-long depression after the attack, and reported symptoms consistent with PTSD. Her life spiraled downward, and she turned to alcohol and drugs to alleviate her mental anguish. In the years to come, her life came apart at the seams. She lost her job, her two children were taken from her, and she separated from her partner of 14 years. It's not often a terrorist attack is considered "uphill," but for Borders, it may have been. It took her 10 years to turn things around. In 2011, she managed it. She checked herself into rehab, and while there, she found out Osama bin Laden had been killed -- always a picker-upper. Having found a new lease on life, Borders began to pull her life back together. She reconnected with her children and her partner, and began volunteering in the community.

Facebook

Then in 2014, her doctor informed her she had stomach cancer. Clearly, she had upset a witch of some sort. No, wait. Remember that dust from earlier? There's a good possibility that it was actually a carcinogenic cocktail -- one that screwed hundreds of people who had already experienced quite enough misery.

Reena Rose Sibayan/The Jersey Journal

By November 2014, Borders had racked up $190,000 in medical bills, and was unable to afford her medications. See, while some cancers are covered under the Sept. 11 compensation fund, it was unclear whether her illness was one of them. Without help, she succumbed to the disease in 2015.

Uh ... we mean, she flew away on a rainbow! Y-yeah. That's how it went down. Now she's best friends with a cloud. They sing songs. Everything is fine.

Yet, somehow, that's exactly what happened.

The public reaction to the photo was beyond negative, bordering on ferocious. Tree was mocked and insulted by a broad range of people, who accused him of various shenanigans, including but not limited to setting the photo up, abandoning the koala immediately after the picture was taken, and even flat-out neglecting his firefighting duties to mess around with some stupid animal.

Museums Victoria

Sure, Tree got positive attention too. He was honored in a multitude of ways, and even received a bronze sculpture of the photo from his hometown. However, humanity being reliably, awfully human, the statue was promptly vandalized, as was Tree's car. The stress of the constant negative attention turned Tree into an anxious wreck. He even quit his job when his boss started to give him crap about his "koala man" status.

He is presumably at home right now, grimly sewing a koala suit, plotting his revenge.

Museums Victoria

First, notice we put quotes around "nurse." The woman was 21-year-old Greta Friedman, a dental assistant who worked in an office down the road from Times Square. She had heard rumors that Japan had surrendered and the war was over, but since Facebook trending news stories were 70 years away from existing, she went outside to find out what was going on. That's when George Mendonsa, excited by the news, grabbed her and gave her a big ol' wet one.

However, ecstatic as Mendonsa was, Friedman had a lot more riding on the end of the war. She originally hailed from Austria, and back in 1938, she took her two younger sisters and fled the rapidly escalating high-octane Nazi bullshittery to the United States. Her parents were supposed to follow, but they never got the chance. The person really, truly celebrating the end of the war up there is the one bent painfully backwards, and wearing heels.

Joshua Friedman

Also, in case you were wondering: No, she never held any ill will toward her mysterious kisser. After their identities were revealed in the 1980s, Friedman and Mendonsa reconnected, became friends, and exchanged Christmas cards for years. Presumably their favorite holiday song is "Baby, It's Cold Outside."

CBS

She happened to be standing next to Miller when the soldiers started shooting, and a photography major happened to capture her reaction to the batshit insane situation. If you had to Google the phrase "being in the wrong place at the wrong time," this is the photo you should get.

Howard Ruffner/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

And things weren't about to get better for Vecchio. She was eventually returned to her family, who promptly proceeded to capitalize on her fame by selling T-shirts with her photo on it. When she went back to school, many wanted her to act as a spokesperson for student unrest, despite the fact that she had little understanding of politics -- because she continued to be a 14-year-old. She didn't stop that for like, a whole year. And right when she thought things couldn't get any worse, she became a target for thousands of hate letters, thanks to the hawkish governor of Florida, who decided to label her a communist plant and accuse her of being responsible for the deaths of the students at the protest.

Again, 14.

Badagnani/Wiki Commons

Her fame and anti-authoritarian status caused her trouble with the law several times, and she refers to it as "life-destroying."

She ... also got to ride away on a rainbow!

The Cockettes featured actors high on LSD wearing bedazzled costumes and singing show tunes, and performances usually ended with most of the cast naked on stage. Inevitably, the shows started gaining a cult following, and Hibiscus' fame grew.

LastAddress.org

He eventually brought his act to New York, where he was the darling of Manhattan's artist circles. He dated Allen Ginsberg, John Lennon was known to jump onstage to sprinkle glitter on him, and the Osmonds used his shows as inspiration for their TV skits. Truman Capote called his show "the only true theater."

Yes, that friendly kid in the bitchin' cable-knit went on to do all that.

via Wiki Commons

And then, in 1982, Hibiscus became one of the first victims of a new illness called GRID, aka Gay-Related Immunodeficiency. That's what we called AIDS before we had any sort of clue, both scientifically and culturally. He passed away at 33.

And god damn it all, he better fly away on a rainbow at the end of this entry.

Yep, there he goes: majestic, dignified, pupils the size of dinner plates and now ... naked? Oh yeah, totally naked.

It's exactly how it should be.

Follow Alyssa on Twitter for significantly less exciting but also less depressing photos. Blow your mind further by checking out Markos' Twitter. Luke Miller used to keep America's skies safe as an air traffic controller, but now he writes fart jokes for Cracked.

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