Stay-home weekend No. 2 came with new fatalities and rising cases of COVID-19 across Minnesota and the United States, which has led to a record unemployment rate and benefits requests, and more small businesses struggling to survive. There were also signs of life in shuttered storefronts and elsewhere across Minneapolis Saturday and Sunday, with many small business owners keeping a stiff upper lip for their bricks-and-mortar customers via store windows.

More stark and haunting, however, are the storefronts you won’t see here, the ones that remain dark, dusty, and all but abandoned, their owners too heartbroken to even hang a note of goodbye or “We’re all in this together” or “See you soon” to customers.

MinnPost tooled the pandemic-stunned streets of Minneapolis over the weekend, looking for signs of life during a pandemic that has brought so much death, fear, and despair: