Another Day, But More Dollars

Since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, I start each workday being groggily awoken by my alarm clock that goes off two hours later than “normal,” but still feels like a slap in the face. Once I’m awoken I always depressingly mutter “another day, another dollar.” Since I’m only waking up to work so I don’t get fired and to get those rent and fancy sweatsuit dollars.

This bleak Monday started off like any other: roll out of bed, shower, boil some water, get right to the coffee. Usually my partner takes the dog out after he wakes up a few hours after me, but today our pup was antsy. She would pace, sit, lay down, pace, sit, lay down. “Are you ok?” I asked. She responded with a shake, a sneeze, a sit, and pleading eyes looking up at me. “Ok, ok, I’ll take you out...” I muttered.

Armed with my face mask, poop bags and keys, we stepped out of our building into another cold and gray Chicago winter day. There’s an empty lot next to our apartment that our dog likes to sniff and poop in, so we started there. She was much more into sniffing around today, and started digging into the pile of plywood that’s always at the back of the lot. “What is it girl?” I asked. After pawing a few planks of wood aside, she found what she was looking for: a freshly opened jar of peanut butter. There’s no stopping our dog once she gets into peanut butter, so I let her have a few licks before stooping down to take the jar away from her. It wasn’t until I picked up the jar that I noticed it was on top of a small black notebook. Putting the jar aside, I opened the notebook to the inside cover to see if someone had written their name or email address to be contacted if their notebook got lost. There was no contact info, but there were two $100 bills in the inside cover. I turned the page, and was met with another pair of $100 bills. Another page turn, another pair of $100 bills. I flipped through all 100 pages and found a pair of $100 bills nestled into each page. After struggling through some mental math I realized I was holding $20,000. I stared, wide-eyed, at my dog, but she still had her eyes on the discarded peanut butter. “I’m sorry, but we need to head back inside and figure this out, girl,” I said to her. “There’s a lot of money here!” I tucked the notebook into my coat as I turned to walk back towards the house. But with my eyes on my coat pocket, I didn’t notice that I was stepping right into a large hole that was not usually to the side of the plywood. “What the...AHH!” The hole I hadn’t seen was some kind of slide! And now my dog and I were sliding down through a dark tunnel under our street.

After sliding around for what felt like an hour or so, we started sliding up, and were eventually shot back up into the same abandoned lot. But the alley next to the lot looked different than the alley we had left. Instead of four SUVs parked in the parking spots, there were four Model T Fords covered in snow. “Pssst!” A sound was coming from behind one of the cars. “Pssssst!” “Who’s there?” I asked. “You won’t need that face mask anymore,” said a voice from behind one of the cars. The voice belonged to a modern-looking man in a puffy down jacket. “You must’ve come through that hole too?” he said. “Yeah. The hole wasn’t there yesterday and I wasn’t watching where I was going. I just fell in!” “That hole brought us both back here then. Way back.” “What are you two doing out by my car?” another voice yelled at us. A woman in a long fur coat was striding over to us from the entrance to the alley. “And why are you dressed in such a strange sack, young man?” “Umm...” “He’s an engineer,” I chimed in. “He invented this new coat to keep out the cold.” “Well fancy coat or not, I don’t like strangers loitering around my automobile,” she said. “We’re lost,” I lied. “Would we be able to come inside and get some directions?” The woman eyed me up and down, but must have thought I didn’t look as crazy in my vintage wool coat from the 40s. “Alright,” she said. “You can come inside, but have your husband stay outside with the dog.” I eyed the man I’d just met, but decided I could trust him with my dog for a few minutes and handed him her leash.

The woman in the fur coat led me up the back steps of her building, which would be the back steps of my building in the future. I let out a little gasp when she led me into what would be my apartment many years in the future. “You alright?” she asked. “Splinter,” I lied, sucking on my index finger. “You shouldn’t lean in the doorway like that, this building’s cheap.” I was shocked that someone was able to bring life back into this building into the future. There was a hole in the floor where our gas stove would eventually be, and pieces of floorboards were missing in places. The woman kept her fur coat on as she led me down the hall into the main room, where a fireplace warmed the room where our flat screen would hang in 2021. “Where you from?” the woman asked. “Minnesota,” I said. Not exactly a lie since I did grow up there in the 90s. “You’re a long way from home,” the woman said. “How’d you end up in my alley?” “My, um, husband has family here, and we’re looking to buy a house,” my mind shifted to all the cash still in my pocket, “on Drexel Boulevard.” “Your husband must be a great engineer to be able to afford a house on Drexel,” the woman said. “A black engineer, who knew?” “Do you know of any place for sale?” I asked. “You know what,” she said, “The folks at 4512 just moved out a little while ago, but they still own the place. I could call Mr. Meade for you. I’ll tell him your husband is an engineer so he knows you can afford it.”

One long phone call later, I walked down the back steps back to the alley, where the mystery man and my dog were waiting for me. “What’s your name?” I asked. “That’s all you want to know? Not how we got here or how we can get back?” “Yes, that’s what I want to know,” I said. “It’s Jordan.” “I’m Michelle,” I said. “Full disclosure, I think I found your notebook right before I fell into that hole. But before we think about going back through the hole, could we take a look at this house for sale on Drexel? It’s only $8,000 in this decade, and I can’t leave without seeing what it looks like inside.” Jordan stared back at me with wide-eyes and an incredulous expression. I assumed he’d tell me to bug off and try to take his notebook back, but instead he said “I suppose I can take a few minutes to walk through 1920.”

The house, the mansion really, was beautiful; with all the trimmings you expect from an old South Side estate. Stained glass, hand-carved woodworking, a marble fireplace in every room. “Can you give us a moment alone please?” I asked Mr. Meade, who was showing us around. Once Mr. Meade was out of earshot I turned to Jordan. “I know this might sound crazy,” I began, “but I kind of want to buy this house. The pandemic world we came from sucks. I hate my job, and I hate being stuck in my apartment everyday with nowhere to go. I could live here for a while, and when or if I get tired of it, I’ll come back to 2021 and return the $10,000 I hope you’re willing to lend me. I’d need $2000 to get on my feet and buy some furniture and firewood.” Jordan looked at me wide-eyed again, then walked to the window and looked down at Drexel Boulevard. “We live in the same neighborhood, so I think you know how I got that $20,000…” he said. “I wouldn’t mind taking a break from that life for a while.” Now I was the one who was wide-eyed and incredulous. “You’d want to live here with me?” I asked. “Yeah why not?” Jordan said. “It may be a different time, but I still don’t think it’s smart to leave you out here all alone.” “I have a boyfriend, you know,” I said, eyeing Jordan suspiciously. “I think there’s enough space for us to have our own rooms,” Jordan said, chuckling. I smiled, reaching into my coat to pull out the black notebook. “In this decade 47th Street is like a Black Wall Street. I think it’s time to do some shopping.”