My hand flies to my mouth to cover my gasp. “Are they having a zhua zhou ceremony? It’s a Chinese tradition for children’s first birthday parties.”
Jack shakes his head. “It could be? Bennett said to bring an object for the ceremony.”
“It sounds like it is!” I squeal. “That’s a very fate-itious tradition.”
“If objects are there, I’m sure we can think of something for Fate Test 3. There should be a good number of guests. Bennett and his wife, Olivia, are well connected in the city.”
“Sounds great. I’m excited to meet them,” I say.
“I know it’s on a weekend. But this is work. We have to get you inspired.”
I laugh. “Jack, I’ve already said yes.”
“Okay, now that that’s settled, is anything inspiring you in here?” he asks. “That’s the whole point of this. What about these?” He holds a pair of opera glasses against his face and looks in my direction. “Wow, that’s close. Your eyes are even lighter when magnified.”
I open my eyes wider and step closer to him. “Okay, now they’re terrifying,” he says with a laugh.
I make a silly face, and he laughs harder.
“Jackson!” a deep voice calls out.
Jack jumps back and sets the opera glasses down on the table a bit too hard, sending a stack of jeweled bracelets scattering. I lunge forward to help Jack restack them, but there’s nothing to be done about the loud noise the bracelets make against the wood.
“Dusty, hello,” Jack says, his professional tone of voice on full display. He clears his throat. “We were just… We were early.”
Dusty looks between the two of us, amused. “Well then, shall we? The team’s outside,” he says, waving us along. “We have cacti to get to.”
The Huntington Desert Garden looks like a dry, magical fairyland with hundreds of golden barrel cacti sprawling across the ground among thousands of other desert plants and succulents. They practically glow with their yellow spikes uniformly protruding from their short and round bodies. Like poky watermelon. We’re definitely not in New York City anymore.
In every corner of the landscaped beds, thousands of species of desert plants and succulents multiply and expand. Even in all of my travels with Mom, I’ve never seen anything like it.
Jack looks equally enchanted as he crouches to get a closer look at the smaller cacti growing in front of the golden barrels.
Not all of Jack’s team could make it to today’s outing. I formally met Maria, but Toby, Brian, and Nell are new to me. They’re the team’s verification and validation systems engineer, project manager, and mission assurance manager, respectively.
“Thanks for setting this up, Jackson,” Dusty says. “I’ll be rambling on about cacti, but please chat with each other along this tour. That’s the point of this.”
“You set up a walking tour about cacti… as a way to get to know the team?” I turn to ask Jack, who’s trailing behind the group.
“What would’ve been better?” he asks.
“I don’t know. I’ve never worked in a corporate setting before. The typical things people do in team bonding. Bowling? Dinner? Paintballing? Definitely not cactus tours.”
“Bowling is loud. You’re just watching people roll balls down a lane. At dinner you have to eat in front of people, and you’re stuck talking to whoever happens to sit next to you. When you’re paintballing, how do people get closer when they’re running around trying to hide? With a cactus tour, there’s movement but in an interactive way. And where else do you get to talk about cacti that look like old men?” he says, sweeping his hand toward what Dusty called the Old Man Cactus.
My gaze lingers on the grouping of stick-straight cacti covered fully in white fuzz that Jack’s gesturing to.
“That one looks particularly grumpy,” I comment.
“That one’s probably a hundred and five years old. Of course he’s grumpy,” Jack retorts.
I laugh and then take a photo of the bunny ear succulents, which look exactly like what they’re called.
I nudge Jack. “It’s time to start bonding. Honestly, this team meet-and-greet is more for you than it is for me.”
Jack speed-walks to catch up to his colleagues. While Dusty scribbles something in his notebook, I hear Jack ask Nell, “Do you come here often? To the desert garden, I mean.”
It’s not the worst start, I guess.
