8
Jack
“We have to get moving on the new greenhouse,” Jack said when he barged into Greta’s office, fresh offanotherrun-in with Tansy.
He was rougher around his edges since Amy’s bombshell three nights ago. A baby. Ababy, when he’d only just stopped having nightmares about her surgery. He hadn’t thought of Sophie in a while, but all weekend, his body had transported back to the hyperalert cage he’d lived in at the end of his marriage, when every sigh and extended beat of silence were pieces of a puzzle he couldn’t figure out how to put together, only to discover, finally, thathewas the piece that didn’t fit.
Jack grudgingly did the coping techniques that had once been necessary just to function—breathing patterns, exercising to exhaustion, visualizing calm—but the more effort he had to throw at it, the more he resented this part of himself that was as prone to catastrophic malfunction as thedamn greenhouse circulation system. The techniques helped in pockets, but all weekend he had battled adrenaline that couldn’t be mentally sandbagged, only sweated out, physically exhausted, and worn down.
It was a relief to come to work today, to direct all that energy into something useful, but it had been one problem after another since he’d arrived, and Tansy’s latest outburst whileherpatrons wrecked the courtyard ferns had nearly pushed him over the edge.
Greta gave him an assessing up-and-down, her eyebrows pinching together in concern, before pulling off her glasses. “The greenhouse?”
“Found a whole damn rabbit family in there feasting on our sale stock. Know how they got in? I’d give you three guesses, but that’s not even half as many entry points as I just found. Plus, the exhaust fans aren’t working again.”
Greta clasped her hands on her desk. “You should sit.”
“Why?” he asked, wary.
“Because you look exhausted. And because I have news.”
Jack reluctantly slouched into the chair facing her across the desk. People didn’t usually need to sit forgoodnews.
“I’ve finally reached an agreement with Commissioner Burke. He will commit to funding the flood-mitigation projects in full, with some conditions.”
“You mean he’ll deign to fund essential work?” Jack muttered sarcastically. Shit, he really was a grumpy asshole lately.
Greta ignored his interjection. “He wants the plant sale back on in April.”
Jack scoffed. “The plants currently being devoured by rabbits?”
“Also, he wants it to be a big event. A family festival. Andhe’d like to revisit the Japanese friendship garden idea, preferably have it open by then.”
“No.”
“Jack.”
“No, Greta. That’s not possible.”
She opened her hands helplessly on the desk, then re-clasped them. “You and I both agree that the flood-mitigation work is nonnegotiable. That was my last card to play before I leave.”
“Yeah,nonnegotiable. But you’re giving in on everything he wants.”
She raised a stern eyebrow. She’d pushed back on proposed staff cuts and on the soil-rebalancing efforts that the commissioner had initially refused to sign off on. Jack scratched his beard, chastened.
“He wants good press,” she continued evenly. “It’s an election year for him. A festival celebrating the recovery of the park would—”
“Would be a damn lie, is what. Come on, Greta. We’re slapping cosmetic improvements wherever he wants while the real work doesn’t get done because it’s not flashy enough for him.”
She sighed. “I’ve called in every favor I’ve banked. Sometimes you have to compromise in the end, give more than what feels fair, to get the most important things.”
“Great system.”
She lifted one shoulder, which was as effusive of an agreement as he would get from her. “You know I hoped to retire with the expansionandthe new greenhouse well underway, not like this.”
Jack swallowed his anger, aware that he was preaching to the choir, that she’d lobbied hard for this tiny victory.
“And on that note,” she sighed, “I’m afraid there’s one more thing. The money for the flood mitigation will come from the expansion fund, and the work won’t start for a few months. He intends for the festival to raise some money to offset that cost, but of course a plant sale won’t bring in the kind of numbers we’re talking about, especially with our compromised inventory.”
