Sandi Davis works Tuesday to empty her store, Sandi's Attic. The fire downtown on November 30 resulted in smoke and water damage to the business. The city has given her a week to vacate the building.

When the fire started, Sandi Davis shoved Emerald into a cardboard box and fled her downtown store.

Then she watched as firefighters fought the blaze in the building to the west of her place, Sandi’s Attic.

On Tuesday, she sorted through what was left of her retail consignment shop. Water had soaked through the building and into everything made of fabric. Two flatbed truck loads of furniture had already been taken to the Hamilton County Landfill. Most of those loads were upholstered furniture.

The good news was that anything that could be saved would be saved. By that afternoon, piles of children’s playthings were sorted, awaiting a trip to a storage unit she would now pay for.

The bad news was that Davis didn’t have renter’s insurance. She figures that between inventory loss, lost revenue and emergency expenses she is out $8,000.

The city gave her a week to vacate the building, she said.

The fire that destroyed 608 Second Street in Webster City on November 29 almost halted the downtown Christmas shopping experience.

On Monday, Anna Woodward, Webster City Area Chamber of Commerce director, and Mark Ferguson, the Chamber’s board president, asked the city to expedite reopening the 600 block downtown so that merchants that had already taken a financial blow could begin to recover some of their holiday revenue.

It is hoped that perhaps as early as today at least a portion of the street will be reopened to traffic.

In the meantime, the Chamber has pushed to let people know the businesses not directly affected by the fire are open for business. That includes pretty much everyone except the Webster Theater, on the west side of the burned-out building, and Sandi’s.

“I think if I had support, if I could find a place that probably wouldn’t have to be as big as this, right? I’m pretty good at putting things together,” Davis said.

For 13 ½ years, Sandi’s Attic has drawn shoppers to Webster City. Now she needs this town’s help. She needs a place to re-establish her business, some financial help to get back on her feet, and this community’s support so that she can regroup.

“The city has lost a place to go to find things that they can’t find anywhere else,” she said.

On the day of the fire, when it was safe to go back into her store, firefighters slogged through a shower of water still pouring down from rooftops to rescue Emerald’s cage.

Days after she took the 29-year-old orange-winged Amazon home to Fort Dodge, the parrot still wouldn’t talk. Davis called veterinarians and she Googled. They all said the bird, which was known to be seriously chatty with the kids and customers who frequented Sandi’s Attic, was in shock.

That he would eventually get over it.

And he did.

The first word out of his beak was: “Really?”

Jane Curtis is interim editor of the Daily Freeman-Journal.