It was the familiar noise of muffled voices and chatter, the constant whirring of the deep freezer, and the bright square screen of the computer. It was the darkness I began to know well, enveloping me as I shut the lights out to get some privacy from the constant company of strangers. The office located in the back of our family cafe allowed for some aloneness as people constantly asked for favors, or tried to get to know us better.

When my dad decided to open a cafe, there were a myriad of changes I could not yet fathom. At first, I thought it was the coolest thing ever; the night before we opened I invited some friends to have a movie night and we tested out the newly purchased popcorn machine. The thick smell of fresh butter wafted from the kitchen. And as we made the first latte, the earthy aroma of our fresh ground beans engulfed the entire space. It was a middle schooler’s dream to show off the new space to their friends.

The novelty was great, for the first month I would have given anything to skip school in order to help the place run efficiently. I loved to go in at 6 a.m. in order to brew the coffee, and bake the goodies for all the patrons to enjoy. I enjoyed the 3 a.m. Farmer’s Markets at 5th Avenue serving our most popular drinks. I even loved to clear the tables and wash the dishes as the customers left. To me, there was nothing better than watching my dad, feeling empowered, run his own business after leaving a rocky teaching career of 20 years. It was quality time I loved as college loomed in the near future.

The cafe grew, and grew, and grew. Eventually we had to hire new employees. With each hire, I would become increasingly more jealous and judgemental. Why did these people get to stay all day with my family, while I had to be at school? But, they became the best friends and family we have ever had. The personalities of Zach, Scott, Liam, Brian, Hannah, Rebecca, Danielle, and my mom, dad, and sister meshed to become the ambience of Wicked Good Cafe. As a family operated business, there was nothing to do but bond and embrace each individual; I had to swallow my jealousy for the better of the business. However, much like in life, there were always those with whom I could never work. Whether they were putting another down in front of everyone, or ordering the more experienced employees to do things in order to avoid work; I just could not stand some people. If my parents liked him/her, however, my opinions were disregarded, and the stayed a part of the “family” facade.

A cafe: portrayed in media as a warm embrace, a glowing place to enjoy cappuccinos with best friends while escaping the fiercely biting cold, and to study for the rapidly approaching final. As a patron, you don’t see the endless hours the family has to stay at the cafe. The hoops they have to jump through in order to prove every customer right. The disgruntled holidays spent with customers they barely knew but had to invite. The drama, similar to that of teenagers, induced by middle aged customers. The daughter getting scolded by a customer, as a thirteen-year-old, because she gave the gentleman a large salad (rather than a small). The endless hours spent at home alone, because the cafe was largely more important than quality time. The Sundays they spent fighting, because that was the only time they all had to communicate. Staying up until 3am on early Sunday, in order to have alone time with the parents. The lifestyle changes brought due to a lack of money. The absence of focus on family. Going weekends on end without being able to see friends. Going weeks on end without having a family dinner. A cafe: torment.

We all thought it would get better.

“Give it another week.”

“We’ll close if it doesn’t look better in a month.”

“We’re doing so well, by this time next year we’ll be flourishing.”

The debt accumulated, and the prices rose. There were always those who thought they knew better than us. One lady, dressed in a blue argyle sweater, printed out our site and corrected all of the (purposefully) incorrect grammar, and told us to hire her as an editor.

She didn’t get it.

That was the point, we weren’t perfect; we were a family. We incorporated our dysfunctional style into everything, whether it was the mismatched chairs and tables, or the t.v. continuously playing an automated fireplace. We were a family trying to do the best we could with what we had, and some people just didn’t get it.

There were those who understood. They were excited for our achievements and mourned for our losses. They did not ask anything of us when they came in, they observed. They genuinely cared about how we were doing. They helped us clean dishes when we were an hour past closing time. They came to graduations, birthdays, and festivities. They would run out on a Saturday night if we ran out of supplies. They drove my sister and I around and took us out shopping in order to spend a few hours out of the cafe. They would spend snow days with us even when the roads were horrendous. They slept over at our house. They got it.

The problems, accumulated, and eventually became unfixable. Money couldn’t fix what was taken from us. The work became unbearable, and no funds were left for extra help. The space became too small and the time too much. People began to ask for favor after favor, especially of my mom, and in this setting we could not say no for fear of losing business. We would have had to move two spots down in order to accommodate a larger store coming in a few months. The landlords did not make it easy. They did not want to keep the spirit of the local, mom and pop cafe. They wanted the money, as most people did; it was never about the business, only the semantics.

We got donations from those who could not bear to see us go. We had become their routine lunch breaks, fill in family, and Saturday night destination. My cousin painted caricatures of each of us labeling my mom as Aunt Debi, my dad as Uncle Rick, my sister as Tess, and myself; we were family. The idea of us moving, or closing was like a best friend moving across country. Unthinkable, and unfathomable.

While the gesture was nice, we never accepted. They didn’t know that it wasn’t about the money. It was about the fact that my mom couldn’t go in anymore because people would hound her the second she stepped through the door. It was about not getting any homework done, because help was constantly needed. It was about losing the tiny bit of family time we had at the cafe, because customers always came first. It was about the fact we found my dad passed out in the office due to being overtired. It was about the missed festivities. It was about us.

I don’t mean to be cynical, but truthful. Not every aspect was all that bad. We made friends with the scout from Stanford, and the one from MIT. We dubbed a man “The Professor” and kept his coffee mug for when he returned. We collected the college cups from all of the seniors who scattered around the country. We met our old neighbor from 13 years prior as he was a professor at North Central. We had movie nights after work and let the regulars in, if they knocked. We met Joe from Office Max, who would go out to fro-yo with us every Thursday. We met Sarah, who was always with us. We met Paula and John, who always had fascinating stories of a guy he met in Bora Bora. We met Katie, a DuPage Hospital nurse studying to take her Boards, who every weekend in October would take me on a ghost tour. We met Ms. Jeanette, Uncle Herman, Joreen, Chris, and countless others. We met every walk of life, and people with some incredible stories.

These relationships carried on even after we were forced to close our doors in May. They were anguished at the news, but still helped us in any way possible. We didn’t know at the moment but this closing was for the better. We were able to get our lives back, and return to a sense of normalcy.

I no longer had to wait until the early morning to see my dad. We, as a family, didn’t have to be so conscious about other people’s feelings before our own. We could finally give each other the time we deserved, instead of strangers who wanted a discount. And my favorite memory from after the close was our first family trip to Iowa for the 4th of July. I sat in the heavy heat, after a trip to House on the Rock, surrounded by an abundance of people. Our 4 person family blended in and as the finale of fireworks lit everyone’s amused faces. That was the moment I knew that everything, the long nights and time apart, was worth it. We would be more than okay.