Lake-Effect Coffee, Epilogue
The end.
We hear birds chirping a gentle “good morning” as the curtain rises on Work Park—still full of tall oaks and rock garden, still not a gas station. Four people wear aprons as they mill about a coffee van.
Dew sticks to the sneaker of a female customer as they step forward in line.
Morgan greets them, “Hi there! Can I get ya a small coffee or a large coffee?”
When she hands her the small cup, we hear, “These handles are so cute!” Another new convert.
Matthew chats to the others in line, one by one. He asks about grandchildren, swim meets, and next year’s Jamboree. He even tells Morgan to slow down on serving because he wasn’t getting to know people to his liking.
“Maybe steam a cup of milk and dump it out the back before handing a customer their coffee? Just an idea on how to make this slower!”
“I get it. You hated Mr Marzocco.”
“It was a he?!”
“You didn’t think his first name was ‘the’ did you?”
Robin’s days have opened up now that we only have one menu item to feature—on the actual chalkboard and the one that is social media. While I floated laying her off, she ultimately created her own artist-in-residency program. After years of creating for someone else, she’s using the van to build something of her own.
While lacking the traditional residency amenities such as a staff or a roof, Robin’s program gives a few local artists each quarter space to promote their work—online and in the physical world—and free coffee. All she asks in exchange are for Lake-Effect to be the sole beverage provider at their gallery nights. Besides being the only night I am out past dusk, the jaunts have provided a steady flow of new faces into our ecosystem.
Her program was featured in A-Bomb and she didn’t let Matthew anywhere near the interviewer.
For me, I’m still on my laptop cooking the books. Physically. I left a novella—about some sad sack who opens a coffeeshop to escape corporate drudgery—in my freezer, and I’m thawing it atop our brewer.
On the spreadsheets, our numbers are creeping in a positive direction. Up and to the right. Next stop: Sovereignty Central.
Finishing my last data entry for the week, I announce to the team, “Good news! We didn’t lose money!”
A chorus responds, “Awesome!”
“Also, good news! I’m alive!”
And for once, that felt like enough.