027 Bakery

Mirrored from brigidkeely.com/wordpress.

There is a bakery in Albany Park, nestled between a linen store and a children’s clothing store. It has a closed sign hanging in the door, but the lights are on. If you try the door, you’ll find it unlocked and will be able to enter.

The baked goods are reason enough to visit this particular bakery: the eclairs and cream puffs are excellent, as are the red bean buns and slices of tres leches cake. The real draw, however, is “the special.” It is not advertised in any way, and you must wait at the counter for someone to come out from the back room. After asking for it, they will retreat to the back and stay there for five or ten minutes. When they come out again, they will hand you a small white box tied with string and name a price. Do not open the box in the bakery.

The box contains a tart, slightly smaller than the palm of your hand. The crust is buttery and contains ground nuts. The filling seems to be chopped red seeded grapes in a thick, overly sweet sauce. Eat the entire tart. You may need a glass of water to rinse the sweetness out of your mouth.

After eating the tart, any chronic illness will be alleviated or healed. However, once the tart has been eaten, you will find yourself filled with the longing for a child. You will find that you have been rendered entirely sterile, however, and unable to conceive or cause conception.

• 

028 Intaglio

Mirrored from brigidkeely.com/wordpress.

There is a ring that floats from thrift store to resale shop to antique store, made of iron, with an amethyst intaglio about the size of a quarter. The intaglio, or cameo, is not a crisp carving. The edges are soft, blurred. However, it seems to depict a woman from the bust up. She has a complicated hair style and her hand, visible near her chest, holds a bundle of something… reeds, perhaps, or arrows.

One who obtains this ring, by purchase, trade, or theft, may wash it in a mixture of almond oil and rose water on the 1st or the 8th of the month. Applying this mixture of almond oil and rose water to the eyes will result in prophetic dreams.

The ring will soon slip away from its owner, to find someone else.

It is rumored that should the intaglio be removed from the iron setting, it will become much stronger, and possible to take permanent possession of it.

• 

029 Father

Mirrored from brigidkeely.com/wordpress.

One of the most well known ghosts in Chicago, or the world, the apparition known as “Resurrection Mary” has frequently been seen in dance halls and along road sides. People, primarily men, have reported dancing with her, speaking with her, and giving her a lift “home,” although she invariably vanishes from the car before any destination has been reached. “Mary,” who most likely died, young, in a car crash, seems desperate to reach “home,” which more and more seems to be the cometary she is buried in.

Less well known is an apparition that seems to be an adult male. Descriptions of him and “Mary” share common features: hair color, nose shape, a curl to the lip. He is seen on nights when “Mary” is active, pacing along the iron fence of Resurrection Cemetery on Archer Avenue, or standing near the main gates. He acts much like a father, waiting up for his child who has missed curfew; or a pimp waiting for one of his prodigal hookers to return with his money.

• 

030 Laurel

Mirrored from brigidkeely.com/wordpress.

In late November of 1941, Myrna Mitchell finished feeding her 8 month old son, Laurel, breakfast. She left him in his high chair with an arrowroot teething biscuit and a spoon “to keep him occupied” while she went into the kitchen to wash up from breakfast. Halfway through her last load, she heard a small sound. She turned the water off, and heard Larry laughing and jabbering to himself. She went back to her dish washing, wiped down the counters, and swept the floor.

When she returned to the dining room, she found a gnawed-on, still damp teething biscuit on the floor next to the high chair. His bib had been removed and placed on the seat of the high chair. The child was gone.

Myrna called the police, who found all the windows closed and the front and back doors both locked. No one in the neighborhood had seen any strangers in the area at the time of the abduction. No ransom note was forthcoming.

One sensationalist newspaper reported that a strange foot print was found beneath one of the dining room windows, and that it was shaped like a goat hoof. It’s true that a foot print was found, and casts were made of it. The police report denotes it as a shoe print, although the cast has been lost.

In December of 1941, one month after Larry’s disappearance, Myrna thought she heard a child’s voice over the speaking tube leading up from the lobby of the two flat she and her husband lived in. She ran downstairs, finding no child. The spoon Larry had been playing with was neatly laid on the bottom step, however; shining gently. Snow had fallen a few hours previously and not yet been cleared away. There were no foot prints.

In January of 1942, again on the anniversary of the child’s disappearance, Myrna discovered the shoes and romper he had been wearing stuffed into the mailbox.

In February, on that fateful date, Myrna discovered a small white envelope slipped in the morning newspaper. It contained a lock of Larry’s hair.

In March, near what would have been his first birthday, Myrna received a package in the mail; it was wrapped in brown paper and tied with string, and had no return address. Herbert Mitchell, her husband, reports that she went very pale upon receiving it and rushed out of the house. She was later found dead in an alley. The package was never recovered; neither was Larry’s body.

• 

y halo thr

Mirrored from brigidkeely.com/wordpress.

I missed some Secret Chicago posts, so I went and posted a lump of them. I was going to backdate them and pretend that nothing had happened, but then I got lazy. Hurrr.

I’m going to try and work on a buffer so this doesn’t happen again. I considered easing back on daily posts for Secret Chicago, but then decided that I need the exercise and the discipline so I’m going to try and keep doing it.

In other news, we’re still unpacking (but finally have a kitchen that looks like a kitchen), we have a baby who thinks sleep is for loser assholes tyvm, and the cookies I made for Thanksgiving were a super huge hit.

•