On Friday night we went to the pub, it was like any other time at the pub, really, but we had a friend from out of town with us. And the pub actually had okay bands.
We got home, watched Nacho Libre (well, I watched the first ten minutes and then went to bed at 1:30ish). A normal night…
At 4:30 I woke up to sirens, yelling, and the smell of smoke–then a knock on the door. We had to evacuate the building because it was filling up with smoke. We were all very confused and just went where we were told, to the methodist church across the street. Once outside, we realized it was the other building that is part of our complex right next door that was burning. I’ve never seen anything so bad. Everyone was accounted for except two tenants, and unfortunately, they didn’t make it out.
Brandon Kaut was one of them. He was only 22. I didn’t know him that well, but have talked and partied with him on occasion over the past four years. It was so funny when we’d see him out because we always joked about being neighbors but never seeing each other. He always said, “hi neighbor.” We saw him about three hours before the fire happened at the bar. I didn’t get to talk to him, but he sat in our corner for awhile.
The first night we met, in 2003 at a house party, we talked about how our names together were Tina Brandon or Brandon Tina (or Teena), the person who the movie Boys Don’t Cry was based on. We both remembered that silly conversation and still brought it up every once in awhile. He was a good guy, and didn’t deserve what happened to him.
The fire was started by someone who started cooking with grease and then fell asleep. He got out fine, and I feel really sorry for him. How many times have any of us gotten home after the bar or a party and decided to cook? I know people who’ve left things in the oven… Nobody means to do something like this.
We were allowed back into our apartment building Saturday night. They had already started to demolish the building. The smell wasn’t too bad. We were shocked, though, that there weren’t firefighters outside still. We called them a few times, and they came back a few times, but always left the building unattended. On Sunday morning, it started up again. We were woken up at 7:30 by our maintenence man, just in case, and told to evacuate at 8:30 by the firefighters. We weren’t allowed back in until around 5pm.
It’s still smoking next door, and we can still smell it. Bryan and I can’t stop thinking about it, and neither of us has been able to sleep more than a couple hours at a time. I’m just scared–still really shaken up. We are very fortunate, though. We didn’t lose anything like everyone else in the building. There’s nothing left there.
We dug through some of our storage space today for appliances and things we don’t need anymore and added it to a pile of donations for the displaced tenants.
The community has been wonderful. Those that lost their homes have already been placed in new apartments with their first month’s rent paid by the Red Cross.
Hopefully, tonight we can actually get some rest.
