Chapter 2 #2
Nic made a hurry-it-up motion. “How’s this affecting St. Clare Circle, Bruce?”
“Ah. Yes.” With an arm sweep worthy of Vanna White, Bruce gestured to the large white sign closest to where they stood.
Her aunt had been trying to buy that lot for years, and Bruce had snatched it right out from under her.
That gaping hippopotamus smile was back on his face, his jowls spreading wide with triumph.
“It looks like the city’s finally recognized this neighborhood’s parking problem.
They’re allowing me to do a thorough land survey of the empty lot. ”
“But … but what about the trees?” Felicity asked. “That big tree is—”
“The big tree?” Bruce turned a pitying smile on her. “It turns out that old bur oak isn’t a Champion Tree after all. Can you believe someone would forge paperwork like that? Hard to believe.”
Not that hard to believe if you’d ever met Aunt Jeannie.
Felicity’s nails dug into her palms. “You can’t seriously be thinking of—”
“I have schematics for you all, as well as a comprehensive explanation about why building a parking garage will ease congestion and promote municipal business growth.”
He handed flyers to each of them. Sam crumpled hers up and walked out of the garden, letting the iron gate slam behind her. Felicity couldn’t blame her one bit.
Bruce shook his head, tsking under his breath, and turned back to Felicity and Nic.
“Now, that empty eyesore courtyard in front of your building is still technically in consideration for becoming a pocket park, since it meets the criteria, which is less than one acre. That said, given its current state, I’m sure there are better choices.
The committee members did take the time to come out to see it, however, and I happened to run into them, so I took it upon myself to tell them all about the parking troubles we businesses are facing.
Told them how my plans have been held up with red tape, to the public detriment.
It was right around that big lunch rush you had at the restaurant a few days ago?
Remember when all those parked cars were lined up down four blocks? ”
Nic glowered at Bruce. “What did you—”
“All this renewed interest in the St. Clare Circle neighborhood is thanks to this strapping man here.” He clapped Nic on the shoulder.
This was brave, since Nic looked like he wanted to rip the man’s hand off for touching him.
But Bruce’s attention was on the land he wanted to build the parking garage on.
“He embodies that American entrepreneurial spirit of taking worthless things and making them into something that can make money.”
“White male Americans do excel at taking things,” Felicity said. She expected Nic to scowl at her for that, but his focus was still moving between Bruce and the hand on his shoulder.
“Turns out that if they let me survey the empty lot, I’ll be able to petition the land use council to let me take over management of the courtyard as well.
I’m sure this will be a relief to you all given the state that it’s in.
Even if we don’t win the pocket park grant, we have a path forward toward a better vision for this part of the neighborhood. ”
Nic spoke through a clenched jaw. “The patio is—”
“Oh, the patio could stay, I think. We would just clean it up.” Bruce grinned at Felicity.
“Did you see that C’est la Vache was featured in another national magazine last week?
We need to leverage this attention to improve the appeal of our wonderful neighborhood.
Kids need spaces for their selfies and whatnot.
We can’t expect that big cow to be a draw forever.
We need to think bigger.” He nodded as if agreeing with his own point.
The hand not at risk of violent amputation went up as if he was visualizing a heavenly tableau in front of him.
“Think of what we could create out front of the St. Clare Church building. I could pave a portion of that soupy mess so you wouldn’t have mud problems whenever it rains.
And right next door, a sprawling, hyper-modern parking facility.
” He turned to Nic, and Felicity enjoyed the sudden look of fright on Bruce’s face when he saw the dangerous glint in Nic’s eyes.
Bruce pulled his hand away and took a step toward the gate.
“Maybe you can even have a few well-chosen, manicured hedges—for the ‘green’ component, you know—and some old Victorian-style wrought-iron benches and outdoor tables. A real nod to the long history of this city. We could create the kind of place where the customers of our neighborhood businesses could meet and host a Bible study with their friends after visiting the bookstore or grabbing coffee. Or, perhaps, perusing my collectible chessboards.” He ended there as if there were nothing more glorious than the idea of creating a space for the notoriously persecuted white evangelical fundies of Kansas.
“Be assured that all your customers will soon have four stories of very reasonably priced parking.”
Four stories …
No.
The complete surety in Bruce’s voice made Felicity realize that this was worse than she’d initially thought.
And she had to process the full implication of what was happening with the last person in the world she would ever want to have a meltdown in front of.
Four stories of a parking garage. Short enough to be below the maximum height ordinances for this part of the city, but tall enough to destroy her aunt’s business. And if Bruce took over the courtyard too …
She shuddered.
She understood now.
She’d seen an old schematic in her aunt’s paperwork.
Bruce must have shown it to her after he’d first bought the empty lot separating the large, modern business complex he owned two blocks down from the old church building that housed the plant shop and restaurant.
There had been strict rules about the property due to its proximity to the elementary school across the street and to the residential areas behind it, but Bruce had probably lied and cheated to get approval for the purchase.
She could easily believe Bruce’s dig about the bur oak tree’s landmark paperwork, but until Felicity had been standing in this exact spot, she hadn’t understood why her aunt would have gone to the trouble of forging Champion Tree documentation.
A four-story parking garage would block out the light—not only for her shop, which relied on the large church sanctuary windows to keep the plants growing year-round, but also for the garden nursery and the small attached greenhouse.
A substantial part of their business was from the plants they cultivated outside in the summer, and if this parking garage was built, her already struggling business would be toast—or, rather, compost.
Felicity had finally been settling down with her new life here, and other than missing her aunt so much it physically hurt, everything about St. Clare Circle had been exactly what she’d needed.
She’d still been mostly keeping to herself, but she’d been better.
No one here was treating her like she was made of glass.
Coming back to Kansas had given her a reason to get up in the morning, and now it might all be for nothing because some checkmate-obsessed old fart wanted to literally pave (an albeit muddy and overgrown) paradise and put up a parking lot?
She’d have to sell the shop.
The business her aunt had lovingly built would be turned into boring offices that fit in perfectly with homogenized hedges and boring benches in Bruce’s non-native-shrub-lined hellhole—all because Nic Holm-Bozic’s macaroni and cheese tasted like it was made by the gods themselves.
She was spiraling like a piece of organic rotini drowned in five different kinds of ethically sourced Gruyère. This was Nic’s fault.
And Felicity would never forgive him for it.
Nic cleared his throat. “Look, I—”
With her hands kneading her aching temples, she snatched up the book Sam had left her and fled up the wrought-iron stairs to her apartment.
She leaned on the sliding-door glass, the coolness from the AC beyond soothing her brewing tension headache.
Felicity took several long breaths. The air smelled like soil and green leaves mixed with the light fragrance of the flowers and herbs growing in small pots on her balcony and from the garden beneath.
Sweet basil. Lemony rosemary. Tomato vines.
Star jasmine. Scents that made her feel happy and grounded.
In garden-adjacent terms, the grant for the pocket park was a pretty carrot to distract them all from the hard asphalt stick of Bruce Hogan’s dominance over St. Clare Circle’s neighborhood.
He knew what that garage meant for her shop.
He knew what it would mean if he took over management of the courtyard.
Likely he had been planning this for a while, and then Nic’s restaurant boom had given him the in he needed to—
“Felicity.”
Nic’s voice startled her into tripping over the chaos of terra-cotta pots at her feet.
She dropped her book and lost her balance.
Her hand was still slick from her early-morning drenching of the plants.
It slipped. Her lower back hit the railing and then more than half of her upper body pivoted over the second-story balcony.