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Something looked
wrong and not just the smoke. Thick and black, it was odd enough, more like the
offal of burning tires than from a building. Though visible for several miles,
I heard no sirens, saw no fire trucks.
But the troubling thing was the
disheveled man in front, dazed, barefoot, wearing only pants. He looked newly
awakened, reasonable enough at 6:30 a.m. except that the building was a business
on one of Yuba City’s busiest streets, not a residence.
I watched as flames flared
through one window, then another and another, like someone flicking on
streetlights. Fire jetting from a window had ignited a nearby pine and was
racing to the crown. When the signal in front of me turned green I drove
straight, forgetting my office on the left.
Then I saw the rest of them.
Another man dressed in pants wrestled with a garden hose while two women in
sweat suits, also barefoot, stood crying. The younger woman held a baby; two
pajama-clad youngsters clung to her side.
“Is anyone in there?” I shouted
to the first man.
“No. We’re all out.”
I don’t know what
I’d have done if someone were trapped in that hopeless, blazing furnace, but I’m
certain any heroics would not have been for personal glory. I was scared silly.
As the fire trucks arrived I
went to the women and children, who were distraught but unhurt. Two young men
in orange safety vests pulled up in a truck; one gently handed his heavy shirt
to the shivering girl. Having no clothes to give I invited the family to sit in
my van, likely a welcome medium between the morning chill and the inferno they
had fled.
The stack of projects on my desk
occurred to me, each with a deadline screaming as loud as the sirens around me.
I glanced to my van and the family huddled inside, warm but weeping, then gave
the bare-chested man my card and asked if I could take his family from the
scene.
We must have been quite a sight
in the Wal-Mart, me in corporate casual attire, the bewildered family in pajamas
and bare feet. The five-year-old quietly grabbed my hand while I pushed a cart
with the other. His sister, 10, calmed by the familiar ritual of shopping,
chatted amiably.
Completely unruffled was the
youngest, 18 months. His mother’s struggle with him while inspecting clothes
gave me an excuse to hold the baby, something I haven’t done in a long while.
Head on my shoulder, he slept as if we’d been friends forever.
The family operated the small
business that was now cinders for about a year, moving in just a week before to
stem the endless burglaries. All they owned was inside. Over their objections
I had brought them to shop for clothing; any money they possessed had been
hidden in the building and was now ashes like the rest of it. But our curious
little parade didn’t escape the store’s manager, who had also seen the fire.
The clothes were on the house.
Well, I could still feed them.
The women weren’t hungry, but I have yet to meet the child who’d pass up a meal
at McDonald’s under any circumstances. The McDonald’s staff inside Wal-Mart
wouldn’t hear of it – no charge.
I wish life’s biggest complaint
was how hard it is to be a good Samaritan. But these folk’s needs wouldn’t end
with a set of clothes and a full stomach, so as they waited for breakfast I went
to the ATM and put some cash in an envelope. Even if others again pitched in, I
figured it’d be hard to have too much.
When we returned to the store
the fire was out. I prayed with them an offering of praise for their safety
and faith for the future. After making sure they had a place to stay with
relatives I headed to work, hopelessly late and gratefully hopeful.
Grateful for the good folks of
Yuba City, but also with the knowledge that as a people we are not always so
hardened as it might seem.
© 1997 – 2002 Brent Morrison
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