One week ago today my cousin Jim, his wife, Jodi, and their children Austin, Cody, and Jessica all died in a house fire.

This morning my parents and I woke up early for our cab pickup at 5:15AM. We took Southwest through Oakland and then on to Columbus. We picked up our rental car and started north. It would take almost two hours to get to Tiffin. We called my Great Aunt Sue to tell her we figured we’d just go straight to our hotel, since it would be so late by the time we arrived.

“Oh that’s alright,” Sue said. “Mike and Erin and Matt and Michelle are all here, and we’ll be up pretty late. Don’t eat anything though, cause we got lots of food.”

Aunt Sue asked if we had GPS to help us find our hotel. We told her we did, but either she didn’t hear us or didn’t trust it, because she proceeded to explain in detail how to get there from Columbus. She said after we checked in we could call her if we needed directions to the house as well. We told her we’d be fine.

We checked in, spent a few minutes freshening up, then got back in the car to drive over to Bob and Sue’s house. Dad had their address in his phone, and he handed it to me as navigator in the front seat. Looking at the map it didn’t seem right. It’s been eight years since I was in Ohio, but I thought they lived farther out of town, and on the other side of the main road. The numbers in the address seemed wrong, too. I’d spoken with my grandmother in California right after we found out about the deaths, and she’d given me Bob and Sue’s address in case I wanted to send a card. I thought I remembered it being different, but since it was still on a post-it note on my desk at home, I had no way to check.

Dad’s phone directed us to a set of dark buildings. Dad commented that there didn’t appear to be anyone home. I said with certainty that this wasn’t the right place. The closer we got to Bob and Sue the more I remembered those two weeks I spent with them back in 2009. I texted my boyfriend to see if he could send me the address from my desk, but he wasn’t at home. So we called my grandmother, told her we’d landed safely, and asked if she had her address book handy. As soon as I put the corrected address into my phone it made more sense. As we approached the cross streets it all looked familiar, even in the incredible dark of rural farmland. I pointed at the house lights up ahead. “Yes, that’s it. That’s their house.” It was exactly as I remembered it.

I said hello to my cousin Mike in the driveway. Him and his family were about to drive down to pick up more people from the airport. Inside my other cousin Matt and his wife and baby were about to head out, but stayed for a few minutes to say hello. Sue and Bob and I sat in the kitchen for the next 45 minutes. Easily 35 of those minutes were spent just listening to Sue, which is exactly what I wanted. She told us what we’d learned about the fire, the trouble with the arrangements, how things were going.

We went over the plan for tomorrow, and how there were five ministers helping with the funeral service. One was from the UCC church the family attended, one was from the local Catholic Church (Jodi was raised Catholic), one worked with Cody in the community, another had taught Jessica, and as I understand it the fifth minister was there to help with the sound system and the slideshow. Sue explained how they’d been given $2500 from the Red Cross to help with arrangements, but they had trouble spending it at first. They assumed it would go towards caskets, but since Austin was in training to be a firefighter much of the casket arrangements had already been paid for by the fire department. Another donor had taken care of the plots, someone had donated money for the cemetery tent and sound equipment. The Red Cross money went to the headstone carving, and eventually Bob and Sue had to set up an account at the bank just to accept the donations. Sue says they’ll turn it into a scholarship fund later.

It’s very late, I’m very tired. I’m very glad I came back to Ohio.