August 15, 2007

On August 15, 2007, I was awakened at 5 in the morning (maybe it was 4) to loud sirens and flashing lights right outside my house. I wondered if there was a criminal chase going on, but the sirens were sticking around and I could tell that the lights weren't going anywhere. So I got up in my baggy Snoopy pajamas that my mom made for me and got up and went to the living room. I was shocked to see the house of my across-the-street neighbors' house engulfed in flames! I think I let out an audible exhale of awe. The whole house wasn't on fire, it was just the bedroom windows on the left side (the left side when you look at the front). I sat on the lawn in my pajamas, and many other neighbors were also outside dressed similarly. I watched the policemen knock on the door of the neighboring house and watched those residents get into a car and drive away. I wondered why they didn't stay and just stay outside their house. I watched sheets of siding fall off the burning house. The sun rose and the fire was extinguished, and we all went inside. I was in the kitchen and feeling terrible about what had happened to them. At one point (I don't remember when), Suzanne Jones knocked on the door with Mrs. Calquin (the neighbor). I answered in a bathrobe, and they asked if she could use our bathroom. I said yes but was embarrassed because I didn't think the bathroom was that clean. I was in the kitchen, and I thought, "If my mom were here, we could make them breakfast." My parents were camping. But then I realized that I was just being lazy and making excuses and that I could make breakfast myself. So I pulled out the waffle iron and some pancake mix and made a batter and made several waffles. I tried to make some fried eggs. But I burned them and they tasted like ashes. So I took waffles over (I think I was dressed at this point), along with syrups and chocolate sauce. I felt a little embarrassed because there was already food set up on a table over there--I was too late to be a hero. Lots of people were standing around talking, discussing things like how the Joneses had lent the Calquins some clothes (some of which didn't fit right or were girl clothes), how one college-age Calquin described himself as being naked when he came out of the house (I don't know just how "naked" he was), and how the Calquins' dog had run back inside the house and died from smoke inhalation. I just stood around too. At some point in the day someone from the Davis County Clipper was taking pictures. We learned that an early-morning paper boy had discovered a fire in the garage and rang the doorbell to wake everyone up, and their smoke alarms went off after he had alerted them. Mr. Calquin started talking to me but shortly I felt awkward and went back inside. I went back to bed and my parents came home from camping. My mom was calling for me and telling me I was really nice--they had gone across the street and someone told them I brought food over. Later someone--I think Cheri Greenburg--brought back all the toppings I had brought over. I felt embarrassed I had taken chocolate syrup, because only a weird fat person like me would put ice cream sauce on a waffle.

Then I went to work. I told some of my coworkers how my neighbors' house was on fire at 5 a.m. I told my coworker Alice (who had the same shift) that I had to take my dinner break at exactly 6:00 because my brother was in town. Later she asked about how I had previously told her I didn't have any friends but that I was going to have dinner with a friend. I retold her that it was my brother, not a friend.

When it was 6:00, I drove to my grandparents' condo where the family was gathered. I came inside, dressed in my blue and tan Walmart apparel, and was excited to see my nephew Preston (who was 2), but he wasn't too excited to see me and was mostly playing with my cousins. We were eating pizza--I think from Pizza Hut--and some of the pizza was thin-crust. I don't remember this picture being taken, but at some point someone took this hilarious picture of my dad:


 Eventually I reluctantly had to leave to go back to work.

When my shift was over--quite late, as usual--I got in my car and left. But on this night, I noted that traffic wasn't busy, and I wasn't in the mood for my long drive down 300 W. So I decided to drive on the freeway. That was the first time I had ever driven on the freeway by myself. It was a successful and uneventful drive, and I took the freeway every night after that.

When I got home, my family was all gone camping, except for my sister-in-law Ya-ping (and maybe my sister), but she was (or maybe they were) already asleep. It was really eerie to come home to an almost empty and unlit house, with an empty, charred, and unlit house across the street, which I had seen on fire earlier in the day.