Children of Chicago

by Cynthia Pelayo

  He continued following her. “My name’s Robert by the way. Bobby.”

  “Didn’t ask for your name, but now that I have it I can ask Bobby, why are you here so early?”

  “I can ask you the same.”

  She eyed him and then said “Running.” Motioning to her clothes, and then wiping a film of sweat from her forehead.

  “That’s very attractive,” he said. “And your name?”

  “I’m not going to give you my name. You could be a serial killer.”

  “I gave you my name. I’ll give you my full name, Roberto Garcia. I’ll even give you permission to look up if I have any tickets or outstanding warrants.”

  “Do you?”

  “Maybe a parking ticket for leaving my car double parked to pick up a pizza.”

  “Lauren. No nickname.”

  “No nickname? Everyone needs a nickname.”

  “How do you even find a nickname for Lauren?”

  “How’s Lore?”

  She liked the sound of that, but she did not want to admit it.

  “Do I have a choice?”

  “No,” he smiled.

  “I told you what I’m doing here. What are you doing here?”

  “Taking pictures,” he motioned to the SLR camera hanging from his neck.

  “I don’t know if you noticed this, but there are no animals out yet. They don’t release them until the zoo opens.”

  “I’m not taking pictures of the animals. I’m taking pictures of statues,” he motioned her over to look at the viewing window of his camera. She hesitated, but he encouraged her. Plus, she had her gun on her, so she felt comfortable enough to approach.

  “Statues?” she questioned.

  “Here,” he held out the camera. “Just look. I’m not crazy. It’s just easier to take pictures when there aren’t people swarming around them.”

  She took the camera in her hands and looked at the image. It was of Adelor, the lion. “Yup, that’s a statue, and probably the most obvious one to take a photo of here.”

  “That’s a nice attitude you have there.” He took the camera from her hands.

  “I guess I should say thank you?” She said.

  “Here, maybe you’ll like this one.”

  On the screen, there was an image of a winged statue leaning over the figures of two small children.

  “I volunteered some time to take pictures for the Statue Stories Chicago project. It’s kind of cool, really. The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation is funding the project. When completed, you’ll be able to visit any of these statues throughout the city. Scan the nearby QR code with your phone, and you’ll get a callback...”

  “From the statue?”

  He nodded. “And they’ll give you a short history lesson about themselves.”

  “This is what you do for a living?”

  He laughed. “I’m a volunteer. I just wrapped up my Ph.D. at the University of Chicago and start teaching there next term.”

  They were walking now, and she did not know why she continued to talk to him. Maybe it was because the extent of her social life beyond work involved only talking to her father. Lauren had no one else, really. After so many deaths in her family no one wanted to remain close. Yes, there were those who came around immediately afterward, with plates of food and pity. People liked to hover around times of tragedy, but no one remained around for long. She was lonely, and it felt nice to talk to someone, and for someone to genuinely want to talk to her.

  They walked past the Endangered Species Carousel, featuring forty-eight endangered animals, from elephants to rhinoceroses, hand carved by artisans. The song of the cicadas played this morning, their rhythmic chirping rising and falling. She looked down at her feet. The sun-washed the cement in an orange glow, and when Bobby told her to look up, the fairy appeared.

  “That’s the Dream Lady, Lore.”

  It was the same statue from the image he showed her just moments before. The Dream Lady was more beautiful in person.

  On the ground right at her feet were the words EUGENE FIELD. Before Lauren could ask Bobby who Eugene Field was he told her.

  “Eugene was a Chicago author and a journalist who died in 1895. He wrote a humor column for the Chicago Daily News. He was famous for writing poems for children. He was called the poet of childhood. This monument was erected in 1922. It was funded mostly by kids. They collected money, pennies, whatever they could at school to build this.”

  “Funny,” she said. “it’s been here this entire time, and I never noticed it.”

  “Sometimes you can’t see something unless you’re looking for it, you know?”

  “It’s lovely, but I honestly am not one for fairy tales.”

  “Really?” His eyes met hers. “Everyone likes fairy tales.”

  “Not me, or anyone over ten.”

  “Not true. I know a lot of adults who love fairy tales.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “What makes you an expert on fairy tales?” She crossed her arms in front of her chest.

  He looked from side to side and then pointed to himself.

  She laughed. “Wait, is that what you studied at your fancy school?”

  “I have a Ph.D. in folklore, and yes, my dissertation was on fairy tales,” he gave her an exaggerated bow. “I teach comparative fairy tales, my queen.”

  “Wow,” she covered her mouth, genuinely shocked and a little bit flattered, and for the first time, self-conscious that she was covered in sweat and grime.

  “Not everyone can save lives. Some of us save stories, making sure they are loved, studied, and never forgotten.”

  “I don’t save lives,” she said. “I’m a homicide detective.”

  “Oh,” his face grew serious. “That must be really hard. It’s great, but it must be hard. Things that you see that is.”

  Lauren did not answer, because it was hard, and there was nothing more to say about that.

  They approached the bronze statue. The winged fairy held a flowered wand above the heads of two small sculptures of children, a girl and a boy leaning on one another asleep.

  On the front left-hand side of the base it read:

  Have you ever heard of the sugar plum tree

  Tis a marvel of great renown

  It blooms in the lollipop sea

  In the garden of shut-eye town

  On the right-hand side of the base it read:

  Wynken, Blinken, and Nod one night

  Sailed off in a wooden shoe

  Sailed on a river of crystal light

  Into a sea of dew

  “You know fairy tales are in our blood as Chicagoans.”

  “Go on.” She wanted to hear more.

  He continued. “L. Frank Baum wrote parts of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz in Chicago. Walt Disney was born in a house in Hermosa, and he went on to create an empire based on fairy tales. Ray Bradbury is from the Chicago area, and he created his own fairy tales with stories like The Halloween Tree and Something Wicked This Way Comes, Carl Sandburg wrote the Rootabaga stories here beyond his adult fiction works, Gwendolyn Brooks wrote Bronzeville Boys and Girls here, a collection of poems for and about children, Shel Silverstein who wrote The Giving Tree and more, and then there’s Mo Willems with his stories of Elephant and Piggie, and more. Chicago has a long history of being the home of people who create whimsical and legendary stories. It’s part of this city’s history.”

  Lauren moved behind the sculpture. “Why is she called the Dream Lady?”

  “She appears in a poem that Eugene Field wrote, ‘The Rock-A-By-Lady.’”

  Would you dream all these dreams that are tiny and fleet?

  They’ll come to you sleeping;

  So shut the two eyes that are weary, my sweet,

  For the Rock-a-By Lady from Hushaby street,

  With poppies that hang from her head to her feet,

  Comes stealing; comes creeping

  “I’m impr
essed. Chicago authors. Obscure children’s writers. Fairy tales. This sounds like it means a lot to you.”

  “What’s wrong?” He asked.

  “Isn’t it sad, how there are people who lived and died and built this city and made magic here, and they’re forgotten today? I didn’t know anything about Eugene Field. That’s what surprises me about Chicago, I’m always uncovering its history.”

  “I try not to think of it that way, that they’ve been forgotten. Their influences are still here. Their stories have evolved, adapted, Lore. Chicago’s always going to be full of magic and mystery. It’s just that kind of place.”

  “Is there anything else on the back?” Lauren asked as she walked behind the statue.

  There she found an engraved image of a woman in bed with a hag hovering over her. Bobby stood closely behind Lauren.

  “The folklore of the Germanic hag, the wise old woman and fairy goddess or witch of fairy tales,” he pointed at the engraving of the hag and the woman asleep in bed. “This tells us a story of restless sleep. A woman who is being tormented by something unseen.

  “Sleep disturbance seems like a common occurrence in fairy tales, Snow White, Briar Rose...other than that, I haven’t been able to find much information about why they are included with this sculpture,” he said. “’The Rock-A-By Lady’ is a poem about a sweet fairy who put children to sleep.”

  “Because those wonderful things from your childhood can sometimes become monstrous in adulthood,” Lauren said.

  He knit his eyebrows together, reading into the engraving, forcing himself to see what Lauren saw. She stepped to the other side of the statue and found another engraving. This image was of the same girl from the hag scene. This time there was no hag hanging over her. She was seated on a horse, charging upward on onward.

  “I like this one the most. It’s hidden out of the way, and it feels like it’s about a victory. Her conquering that darkness. She beat the hag, escaped it, and she can finally move on.”

  “I think you know more about fairy tales than you like to let on,” he said.

  “Maybe there are a few I know a little too much about.”

  CHAPTER 8

  As the detectives drew closer, they could see the flashing lights of police cruisers. One ambulance remained of the three that had been called.

  “Which hospital did they take her to?” Lauren asked.

  “Masonic,” Van said as he placed the car in park.

  “Why not Lurie’s?”

  The sun was setting, a burst of orange dipping below the horizon, to slink off to other continents to make room for a new moon here, where nothing was really new. Nights came quicker this time of year, and tragedy had taken a liking to this park.

  “Masonic is closer. They didn’t have time to get her to the children’s hospital.” Van said. “Lots of bleeding.”

  He looked over to her and then back to the wheel. “Are you sure you’re okay? I can handle this.”

  “I don’t want to be home,” she thought of the bullet holes in the dry wall she had started spackling before she received the call. A runner had found a bleeding girl in Humboldt Park.

  “You buried your dad this morning, Medina.”

  “I did. “Lauren could feel her face growing cold as they drove closer to the lagoon. The pulsating emergency lights, red and blue illuminating the trees, and a single bright beacon marking their spot. Police cars were parked on the sidewalk. Yellow tape sectioned off the area. It was early enough that no media was present, but they, and Alderman Rosa, would be here soon demanding answers to questions none of them would know how to answer. Van parked behind a cruiser and both exited the car without a word. The trail of blood was easy to follow. It started in the prairie grass, and stretched down to the beach, which had closed weeks ago at the end of summer. Even with the thin sheet of frost on the ground, they could see the blood-soaked sand.

  At the foot of the lagoon, Lauren scanned the dark water. She looked behind her and saw a backpack on the ground. A few inches away there was a clump of hair, with a flap of pink bloodied skin still attached. Torn from the scalp. Then, there was the book. It lay on the sidewalk, its pages open, begging someone to read it.

  Van knelt, reached for a plastic glove in his back pocket, slipped it on and closed the cover. He shook grains of sand off the book. He read the cover to himself and then held it up to Lauren. “Look familiar?”

  She did not know what to say. Van faced the lagoon. Several divers could be seen bobbing in and out of the dark and murky water. “I heard the city pumped hundreds of gallons of fresh water into the lagoon each day over the summer. They hoped it would bring down the bacteria level and make it safe for swimmers.”

  “It doesn’t matter how much water they pump into the lagoon,” Lauren said. “The water is stagnant. There’s really no way to keep it clean with the constant flow of people.”

  “Grimm’s Fairy Tales,” he said slowly. “You read these as a kid, right?” He looked to the book in his hand.

  “Some of them,” she said. Inside she was screaming, screaming because here it was again. The questions and the accusations.

  “Your dad said you majored in literature, undergrad and grad school, and then got into law enforcement? That’s interesting.”

  Lauren pulled out gloves from her messenger bag and slipped them on. “What’s interesting is that you’re trying to say something without saying it and I’m going to call you out on your bullshit, Van, because I’m tired of it.”

  Van sighed, heavily. “Bag this up,” he waved over to an officer passing him by carrying a small box.

  “Sure thing, Detective.”

  “Thank you, Officer Torres,” Lauren said

  “I’ll be over there at the bench getting some notes together.”

  “All kids read fairy tales,” Lauren said as Officer Torres walked away. “Plus, we don’t know who the book belongs to.”

  “If I had to bet,” Van said. “I’d say it’s the girl with multiple stab wounds in her body.”

  An officer walked past whom Lauren quickly recognized as Officer Pagan.

  “Officer Pagan, any weapons found?” Lauren asked.

  “Nothing,” he shrugged. “Could be in the water. Officer Torres is going to go through the backpack also and check,” he pointed toward a nearby bench where Officer Torres sat, hidden in the shadows of a nearby tree, jotting down notes.

  “Witnesses?”

  As she scanned the ground, she spotted the sprays of blood that led them all here like bloody breadcrumbs.

  “Guy walking his dog. He said he’d give a statement but had to take his dog back home.”

  “You got his name and number?”

  “Right here,” Officer Pagan handed her the contact information. “Said to call him.”

  “And you just let him go?”

  “The guy literally lives across the street, Medina,” Officer Pagan pointed to a Greystone building. “He ain’t going anywhere.”

  Lauren approached Office Torres and said she needed to review the contents of the backpack. “I haven’t gotten to it yet, but here you go.” Officer Torres did not ask any questions and left her to review the materials. Lauren took a deep breath, trying to control her anxiety and fear. This place held too many bad memories, and it continued to add to its history of tragedy. Lights flashed in the darkness. Shadows stretched across the sidewalk. Officers in uniform, detectives in street clothes, and paramedics all gathered here, trying to piece together a puzzle of tragedy, but none of them could comprehend what really happened here. Lauren’s memory cut back to her past. Images appeared in her mind like pictures scattered across the floor, all ripped in two, and Lauren had to pull all of them together to make out a coherent scene, a coherent memory of what happened here because she knew that whatever had happened so long ago, no matter what it was, was happening again.

  A horn blared. The fire department had just packed up and driven off, t
heir taillights no longer visible.

  She searched the bag’s contents: two notebooks, the first blank and the second with clean, orderly writing in black ink. The owner of the notebook had written their name on the first page, Evie Baez. Lauren also found a couple of pens, a hair tie, and a cell phone. There was no knife or other instrument in the backpack that could stab a person. Lauren tapped on the phone. The screen came to life. A message appeared on screen from Mom.

  “This isn’t funny. Where are you? Call me now, or I’m calling the police.”

  The phone went into sleep mode. When Lauren tapped the screen again, the red battery indicator told her there was just a few seconds of life left.

  “Ah! Dear shepherd, you are blowing your horn. With one of my bones, which night and morn. Lie still unburied, beneath the way. Where I was thrown in a sandy grave. I killed the wild boar, and my brother slew me. And gained the princess by pretending ‘twas he.”

  “Detective...”

  Lauren heard the crunch of frozen leaves underfoot. “You okay, Detective?”

  “Yeah, Officer Torres. Just...singing a song. It was in my head.”

  He looked at her strangely, and she was not surprised.

  “It’s nothing…”

  He was holding an evidence box in his hands, still gathering items as they were found. “A song?”

  “Yes, it’s umm…” she gazed at the phone in her hands and wished it could tell her what happened here, like the words she had just recited from “The Singing Bone.” The Grimm’s tale about how a man was murdered by his brother. A shepherd, years later, found a singing bone, one from the murdered man. The shepherd rushed it to the king. When the king learned from the singing bone that the man who sought to marry his daughter was the killer he ordered the man drowned as punishment. All of the dead brother’s bones were recovered and then buried in a beautiful grave. “It’s a song...from a silly story.”

  “Can we get this charged?” She handed the phone to Officer Torres. “Have we contacted the parents yet?”

  “We’re about to.” He placed the phone in the box. “She had her high school ID on her,” he said.