My ears perk up, and I can hear the tinny voice of the clerk. “Sir, your application says ‘holiday decor.’ That’s category 47-B.”
Mr. Tall and Well Dressed actually smacks the counter. “They photosynthesize. They have roots. Can you check with your supervisor about the proper category for nursery sales?”
I check my phone as he yells something about hydro-something not requiring soil and see I have just ten minutes before that irritated clerk puts a closed sign on her window.
She calmly tells him he only filled out a county form, and he needs a separate one for the city.
The guy tugs on his dark hair. “Is this not the city and county building? How can there be different forms? Can’t you pass it down the counter to the right person?”
The clerk blinks at him. I grip my invoice. The guy yells something about an exemption for carbon-neutral initiatives, and I lose my patience.
“Oh, get over yourself. She said you filled out the wrong form. Can you just grab a fresh one and let someone else have a turn?”
He whips his head around, glaring at me from behind a pair of thick frames. They’re probably clear lenses he’s wearing to appear smarter than he really is. I absolutely will not acknowledge that the look is working for him. I wave my hands like I’m shooing my goats.
He frowns. “You can wait your turn like everyone else, madam.”
“Madam? That’s rich. Look, you’re not going to scold her into filing the form for you. These people are bananas about crossed t’s and dotted i’s. Ask me how I know.” I rattle the invoice for emphasis.
He opens his mouth, but I elbow past him and smile at the clerk. “Hi.” I squint to read her name tag. “Myrna. I’m Eliza Storm, here to check on the status of an invoice.” I offer my sweetest smile—one my sisters tell me makes me look constipated because it’s not genuine.
Myrna seems to agree with my sisters. Her facial expression is not encouraging as she peers at the invoice and slowly shakes her head. “Vendor distributions from the previous quarter are paid at the end of the current quarter. No exceptions.”
My mouth drops and sweat pools at my lower back. This can’t be right. I’m about to plead with Myrna for a partial payment when she grabs a CLOSED sign on a chain and hooks it over the microphone on her side of the glass.
I slap the window. “No, please, give me one more minute of your time.”
Myrna shakes her head and is down a hallway before I can think of anything else to say.
Defeated, I turn to face the man, still standing there with his own form in his hand. I jab an index finger into his chest and sneer at him. “If you had just owned your mistake, I would have had more time to convince her to pay me, you pompous jerk.”
His nostrils flare, and he applies downward pressure on my hand to remove it from his chest. A zing of sensation darts along my arm, but I’m sure it’s due to heightened emotions.
“If you had gotten here earlier, you would have had more time to beg.” He sniffs at me, turns on his fancy heel, and stomps toward the revolving door. Caught up in a flurry of frustration, rage, and despair, I follow him, not sure what I’m doing but certain I need someone to absorb all these big feelings.
“Hey, asshole!”
He doesn’t turn, and I burst through the door to the crowded, rush-hour sidewalk and poke his shoulder. Okay, not his shoulder because I can’t reach it. More like his spleen. He grunts and turns to face me. I wag a finger like some old nana. “Some of us work for a living. Don’t you dare tell me to get here earlier. What were you doing all morning? Ironing your pants, or does your maid handle that?”
He stares at me for a long moment, his jaw working like he's chewing something bitter. Then, without another word, he turns and walks away, his expensive shoes clicking against the concrete with each deliberate step.
I stand there on the sidewalk, breathing hard, watching his back retreat until the city swallows him whole. My hands are still shaking—from rage or desperation or the lingering zing where our skin touched, I can't tell.
Same city. Same problems, apparently. Completely different worlds.
One thing's certain: this isn't over. Not by a long shot.
2
Reed
The pH levels in my samples are off by point-zero-three, which may as well be a death sentence. I jab at the tablet screen, adjusting the solution for the third time today, my jaw clenched tight enough to crack molars.
“Easy there, Dr. Doom,” my friend Paolo’s voice echoes through the greenhouse lab as the bay doors slide open. “You’re gonna give yourself an aneurysm.”
I don’t look up from the hydroponic data as Paolo makes his way through rows of my miniature fir trees sitting like tiny cub scouts, awaiting inspection. Each one represents months of research and more money than I care to calculate—money I don’t have to spare.
“These stupid seedlings aren’t cooperating,” I mutter, making another adjustment on the dash. “Plus, I wasted an entire afternoon getting jerked around by some clerk downtown, so now I’m behind schedule. If they’re not ready by next week?—”
