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“The miraculous part about all this is that no one was killed,” Rogers says, “even though every firefighter I’ve talked to since said it’s unbelievable that no one was harmed.”

Hours later, Rogers asked a firefighter how she could get her stuff back, particularly her car keys so she could go home, and the firefighter offered to escort her back into the charred remains of the building.

“In retrospect, I’m not sure how it came about that I was allowed to go back into the just-barely-extinguished apartment, but there I was,” Rogers says, laughing.

As she made her way back up the fire escape, she saw that the first two floors were completely charred.

“You couldn’t discern anything. There was nothing, just char,” Rogers says. “And then we get to my friend’s floor and everything is almost exactly as I remember it, except for some fire, smoke and water damage.

“We go in, and the door frame is warped, but the door is still there. The computer is all warped and trippy looking, the nail polish bottle that had spilled over on the coffee table was still there, and the InStyle magazine was still open to the same page. It was just so, so strange.”

Among the stuff, her car keys hadn’t been melted, her bag was smelly but uncharred and — lo and behold — Tim’s camera had managed to make it through the ordeal unscathed.

For months after that, Rogers had nightmares, which she eventually overcame, although it was a while before she enjoyed the smell of fire or smoke again.

“But I love it again,” Rogers says. “You get over it, or at least I have. The passage of time helps with that.”

If nothing else, the experience gave her great respect for firefighters and Red Cross volunteers.

“You know when you see firefighters put their boots out on the median? Anytime those are out, you’ll see me digging around in the cushion like, ‘Here, take my money, I love you guys!’ ” Rogers says with a smile.