Fire!!
By ninjakiller 15 Comments
I'm in the envious or unenvious position (depending on your point of view) that I work the weekends with the rest of the week off. Given that, I spend a lot of time traveling, visiting family, plugging around my house, and being a general bum. This last week I visited my parents and stayed a few days there. My brother has been living with them for a couple years since getting divorced (but that's another story) and has his own room.
On Thursday morning I was awoken @ 2:40 am to a pop pop ....pop pop pop sound. My immediate thought was that my parent's beagle had gotten into some bubble wrap or something similar. I laid in bed half awake/half asleep trying to figure out if this beagle popping bubble wrap was enough to get me up and put her outside as punishment. The popping continued and I was slipping in and out of sleep when I heard my brother in the room next mine get up. "Good" I thought, "he'll put that little bitch outside." I heard him scream "HOLY FUCK!!" and I jumped out of bed as he burst into my room and rapidly told me that the garage was on fire. "Fuck fuck fuck fuck" was the only thing running through my head. I ran downstairs and the next few minutes were/are still a blur.
My brother shouting "WAKE THE PARENTS!" Running into my parents room to wake them, my brother coming back inside the house. (He went outside to try to get the garden hose on the fire but after seeing the inferno ran right back in) Running into their room and saying "the garage it's on fire!" My mother immediately trying to call 911, and the phone being dead, having to shake my dad awake(extremely heavy sleeper) and telling him. The smoke detectors went off at this point. I ran back upstairs to try to find my cat, but she was gone. I grabbed my computer bag, and ran downstairs. I went outside, threw the bag into my car and moved it. I ran back inside, my brother was on the phone with the police, my mom told me to grab my wallet ( I did), and I ran back upstairs to again look for my cat. The house was now rapidly filling with smoke even though it wasn't on fire. It was getting very smoky upstairs I couldn't see a fucking thing even with the lights on.
I ran back downstairs, grabbed a flashlight to look for my cat, and went back upstairs. I was looking for her when my brother ran back upstairs.
Brother, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"
Me, "Looking for my cat!"
My brother, "FUCK THE CAT!"
I knew he was right so I gave up the search as the smoke was going from hazy upstairs to pitch black, and I was beginning to cough.
We all ran outside at this point as the smoke was pouring inside even though I still don't believe the house was actually on fire. I stood there helpless as I watched the vinyl siding curled and fire started on the front eve of the house facing the garage.
The fire department began arriving with 10 minutes, and I thought that they would be able to save the house at this point.
I was wrong.
I stood outside with the rest of my family as I watched my childhood home/their home and everything inside go up in smoke. It took about 4 hours for them to get the fire out. Half of the house was just gone and the rest was a gutted mess. The fire department ended up bringing in a backhoe to collapse the walls that were left to try to put out the fire which was now smoldering inside the basement.
The house was over a 100 years old, and my parents lost everything, and I mean EVERYTHING that they've acquired over the years except for the clothes of their backs. All of their vehicles, a boat, tools, household items photos everything from their life together. I lost stuff from childhood but more painfully my cat who I've had for over 10 years. I keep thinking maybe I could have saved her, but maybe then I wouldn't be here writing this now.
I stayed at a hotel room on Thursday night and thought I would sleep like a rock after only getting roughly 4 hours of sleep and going through that exhausting ordeal. I went to bed @ 11 and woke up and 2:30am and didn't fall back asleep. My dreams/nightmares were only of fire.
I'm at work right now only because my parents insisted. "What can you do?" Other than support, they're right of course. Others are there now for that. I'm going back up next week to help out, but what can you do?
This is a rather strange thing, writing about this experience to mostly strangers, but I felt that If I didn't get it all out and some sort of record the memories would quickly fade and I want to remember this. There are more photos mostly of the demolition in my gallery. I captured some video of the fire on my phone and will probably upload some other time as I am "supposed" to be working right now.