She would sometimes not leave her computer for hours. It was extremely important that she remain in her chair, eyes trained on the screen, finger hovering over the mouse buttons, because at any moment she might need to act quickly and outbid the previous person in order to win the online auction. Ebay was a strong need for Q Evans.
In order to fuel her need for more camera accessories and support herself in her small one-bedroom apartment, the young woman of 25 had found that her part-time job as a receptionist was simply not enough income. She had even chosen a small place near the outskirts of town, the cheapest place she could find, but the overall expenses were still too high for her to invest much in her photography needs. Q had taken to buying and reselling from items she won from Ebay auctions, and found that it was enough for her to save up some spending money for her hobby and passion: photography. Her latest purchase had cost her a few hundred dollars, but she found that it was worth it for the pictures she had wanted to capture. An Ikelite underwater housing system now enabled her to take more interesting pictures, more pictures of sea life, and more pictures. She was excited. It was a great buy, too.
Her Nikon rests next to her, enveloped in the new case. Thinking on the last buy compels her to leave her computer and go out to take picture. There’s six hours and twenty-nine minutes and twelve seconds left on the auction. She has time. It’ll be great fun to test out the camera again, she reasons. Even if she misses an auction, it’ll be worth it if she gets some great shots.
Q pushes herself up from her chair and stretches. Already bundled in a thick sweater so she won’t have to spend money on heat, all she needs is a scarf, her boots, and her camera to go out. It’s November and, in her town of Monterey, it’s been around 5 or 6 degrees – Celsius, of course. Many people around her prefer to use Fahrenheit, but she never acquired a taste for that. It was so imprecise.
Her feet lead her to her closet where she puts on her footwear and selects a soft brown scarf to snugly wrap around her neck. As an afterthought, she remembers to grab some gloves. There’s nothing else she feels she needs, so Q returns to her desk to grab the Nikon and hang it around her neck, put her keys in her sweater pocket, and then she leaves her room. She isn’t prepared for what she sees outside.
Instead of the small family-run bakery shop across the street, or the snowy trees lining sidewalks, or parents walking their children to stores, she sees a fog-like smoke consuming the neighborhood. The wind is blowing it in her direction, and she pulls her scarf up to cover her nose and mouth. There’s a problem with this, she concludes quickly. With this much smoke, there must be a fire close by, and it must be very large. Despite the obvious danger, she can’t help but take a picture of her last sight of Emilo’s Bakery being curtained with dark clouds. It’ll be a great shot – if she makes it out alive.
As smoke falls into the street, Q quickly assesses her situation. There’s nothing she really needs in her house. People are taught to leave their things behind and move to safety in the event of a fire, she knows, but she can’t really help double-checking. Her mental inventory still draws a blank on lack.
Q begins to jog down the street away from the fire, toward where she knows a river is. She halts mid-step and looks back. The smoke is rolling in thicker, and she can see an increasing glow behind it; yet she thinks to go back – not for things forgotten or wanted, but for warning the neighborhood. She had been oblivious to the impending danger outside of her door, and no one had rang her doorbell or knocked on her door. It seemed like no one was out and about in this neighborhood. But how had they known to leave? Why weren’t they telling other people?
In the faint distance, she finally heard some signs of distress. The wail of ambulances and shrill police sirens echoed somewhere else in town. Q wanted to leave it up to them. “Let the authorities do their job,” she remembered telling people so often. This time, there was a slim possibility that they’d even make it to this part of town before it was up in flames. That cemented her decision. She was going to have to go to as many neighbors as possible before the fire reached them. She was going to help evacuate.
