Just north of the Chicago River, the river that was reversed -- the river that's more of an urban canal than a true river like the ebullient, island-studded Susquehanna -- there's a door.
Down along the river, below street level, but above the waterline, like the holes where the groundhogs dig in along real rivers, are the waterfront cafes and restaurants.
The steel bridges cross the river at a thousand points. These bridges are the truth of Chicago, their top arches of sinuous steel, not the pure triangles of the Rust Belt. They are straining towards respectability, and that straining imparts the arches with a rough beauty. Elegant but naked, they stretch across the reversed river.
Clark Street walks on the back of one of these bridges, north, out of the Loop. On the western side, between a bakery and a CVS drugstore, the big brown door could almost be overlooked.
Like the bridges, it strains. It wants to evoke hiddenness, so it must hide, at least halfheartedly. The hiding, however, is a ruse; it wants to be noticed. It is the door to a speakeasy.
Inside, the long black staircase is exposed to the rooms beneath, at the level of the cafes: below the street, above the waterline, though the waterline is two blocks south.
The room is cavernous: large and dark, yes, but also like a cavern in that its size contains small nooks with tables and booths. They have curtains drawn across them and those curtains leak light onto the main floor. Dapper servers appear and disappear. Around every corner, it seems that there is a different bar, with different bartenders all dressed in black vests and starched white shirts. At the deep end of the cavern, a jazz quintet tuned up.
Not quite well-dressed, well-spoken, or well-funded enough to secure a table, we found some deep armchairs, forgotten in a corner. We watched the light from the outside as the doorman opened that large, straining door. At the top of the steps, everyone assessed the plunge, and the staff assessed everyone. We ourselves had been so assessed, and that was why we were sitting in the corner in red armchairs, the waitstaff passing back and forth in front of us.
It was what we wanted. We didn't want the expensive food, and we didn't want to drink more once the drinks were gone. We, too, were straining.
The staff's caps and suspenders, their somber airs, enhanced the illusion of hiddenness, but the patrons undid it. They, too, were straining. They gave off the forced air of "this is a good time." Their sidelong glances at each other, at the staff, at the man or woman down the bar, undid them.
At the end of our glasses, having taken too many sips of melting ice, having visited the bathroom, having waited for the right tempo, we stood up. We walked the length of the room, dodging those noticing and being noticed and remaining ourselves unnoticed until we stepped up by the band. They overshadowed the dance floor, the trumpet player occasionally leaning over a railing to blast a figure out of the cavern, towards the stairs.
We hadn't danced in a few months, not to a live band, not with so many people noticing. We two-stepped, swung out, and remembered. We only watched each other, and we took up half the floor until a few others got up to dance. Then we danced close, following the traditional Lindyhop "slot" back and forth on the floor. From the hidden alcoves, a woman watched us, smiling. When we stopped between dances for water, the bartender shook hands.
We danced once more and then left. We had stopped straining, and had let the river flow in us. We stopped on the bridge on our way back south.
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