Her dreams had been full of drama. The Tower had been smoking, and cries came from inside it. But someone stood between her and her need to go help. Someone blanketed in shadow who wouldn’t let her pass. All she could do was standthere, helpless, as the Tower burned, along with the people inside.
Irritated at the images that wouldn’t leave her mind, she flipped the shower to cold and forced herself to stand under it for thirty seconds. It helped shock away the looping thoughts, and she felt better by the time she got out.
The walk to her shop was quiet. The sun was out and the leaves had turned yet another shade of orange. A Cup of Joe was dark, as Billy had decided to take a day off, and she turned down toward Tasa instead. The family-run coffee place was an established community center of sorts and always bustling with neighborhood gossip. For some reason, River felt compelled to head that direction instead of just making coffee at her shop.
“Mi bruja especial!” Estelle raised a silver milk jug from behind the giant espresso machine. “Qué pasa? And why has it taken you so long to get here? We have news.”
River smiled at the warmth that spread through her. This place always felt like she was walking into her family’s living room. Unfortunately, it was a big family, and they had more than a few spirits hanging around. River sometimes got overwhelmed by them wanting her to tell the living everything from how proud they were of someone to their opinions about who was dating who. That meant she kept her distance if she had other things going on in her life. But so far, none of the departed were around this morning. Maybe they were having a ghostly brunch together somewhere else. “I had a feeling. What’s up?” She nodded to Estelle’s daughter, Megan, when she asked if it was the usual.
“Another animal wants to run the zoo.” Estelle tossed her hand towel over Megan’s shoulder and motioned toward a table. She sat across from River, her expression unusually serious. “But this time, it isn’t just a lion. We’ve got a mean old dinosaur on the hunt.”
River frowned, trying to follow Estelle’s typically odd metaphors. “Break it down for me?”
Estelle tapped the table. “A few of the others on the street have gotten letters from some giant real estate company on the East Coast. They want to buy up the properties and are offering big money.”
River’s dream passed like smoke over her senses. “They’ve already taken over Logan Square. They’re never satisfied.” She gave Megan a quick smile when she set down her horchata. “Have you been asked yet? Have the others made any decisions?”
Estelle shook her head, her gaze moving around the café the way it always did, like she was cataloging everything that needed to be done. “I doubt they’ll come here. We’ve never been interested in selling to any of the other animals that have come sniffing around. Why would we now? And as for the others?” She sighed and waved her hand. “It’s a tough economy. So many didn’t recover from the pandemic, and they’ve been struggling. I wouldn’t be surprised if they say yes. But there’s going to be a community meeting on Thursday at the Attic. Will you come?” She wiggled her fingers. “We could use some good ju-ju, eh?”
“Of course. I’ll let the other businesses in the building know too.” One thing their community was good at was communication. As the neighborhoods in Chicago became more and more gentrified, it got harder and harder to fight back. Displacement was commonplace, and communities fractured.
She left with her coffee and a demand to come by more often. Even if she and Estelle didn’t sell, if the others did, they’d be stuck in construction hell for however long it took for the real estate company to tear down the buildings and replace them with glass and steel, places without soul. Then rents would go up in the buildings around them and their normal clientele would be swept away in the tide of capitalism. River owned herbuilding and her home, so she didn’t need to worry about her rent going up. But all the people she cared about didn’t have that luxury.
The shop was already open when she arrived. Audrey ducked out of the back room, saw the coffee in River’s hand, nodded, and ducked back into the back room without a word. River set her stuff down in her office and then checked the calendar.
The bell on the door chimed and Mrs. Crabtree came in, her staccato cane tapping the tile with a little more venom today.
“River Rigel, you tell me the truth right now.” She tapped the cane for emphasis, her wrinkled face so pinched it was hard to see her eyes.
“What truth would you like today, Mrs. Crabtree?”
“Don’t you sass me.” Canetap tap tap. “Are you one of the ones selling out? Are you leaving your folks behind?”
“What’s this?” Audrey shot out of the back. “What do you mean, selling out?”
River held up her hands. “Hold on. No, Mrs. Crabtree. We’re not going to sell to anyone. Audrey, there’s a developer sniffing around again, but this one is making big offers and some of the shopkeepers down the way are considering it. There’s a town meeting at the Attic on Thursday.”
Mrs. Crabtree’s face relaxed, the wrinkles settling down like water losing some of its ripple. “Well then. That’s good. Get Mr. Crabtree for me now, please.”
River kept the sigh from escaping and motioned toward the little table. “I can try, but you know what answer we’ll get.”
She huffed and tapped her way over to the table, then sat primly, her hands folded in her lap.
“Better you than me,” Audrey murmured and headed behind the counter.
River sat opposite Mrs. Crabtree and held her gnarled hand, the sandpapery skin thin under her fingers. She placed her otherhand on the clear crystal ball in the center of the table. She didn’t need it, really, but it worked as a focal point and made people feel like they could see some of the mystical process in motion. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, opening that part of her that connected to the spirits who’d departed but decided not to actually leave.
The gray, open space appeared to her mind’s eye, and she stood alone. She called to Mr. Crabtree only because she felt like she had to for Mrs. Crabtree’s sake. She knew full well he wasn’t there.
She opened her eyes and gave Mrs. Crabtree a rueful smile. “Still gone on to the next world. I’m sorry.”
Instead of getting surly as she usually did, Mrs. Crabtree sighed. “I know. I do. I just hate it. Without him, I have no purpose. No meaning. He was my world, and I was his. Without him, I’m just…” She moved her hand slowly. “I’m just a cloud drifting alone in the sky.”
That was a feeling River knew well. “Maybe it’s time to find a new purpose. Something else to give your time left some meaning.”
Mrs. Crabtree’s eyes snapped to River’s. “What do you mean ‘my time left’? Do you know something you haven’t told me?”
River swore silently. “No, ma’am. We should all do what we can with whatever time we have left. And we never know how much time that is.”
