Page 54 of Sunny Undone

“I have.” And I’m cautious because it’s the first time the dean has paid any real attention to my research. “Recently, I⁠—”

“I admire that.” His words cut me off. “Your dedication has never been in question.”

Little spidery fireworks fizz inside me. That sounded like a negative. But I don’t always interpret social situations correctly and sometimes lay a meaning on words that doesn’t exist.

I fold my arms. “So, what is in question?”

Dean Whitaker senses my frustration and smiles as if I’ve made a joke. “I wanted to speak with you before the donation becomes unnecessarily complicated by certain things.”

“Things?”

“Your work in the Everglades.”

My heart starts to beat quickly in my chest.

He lowers his voice, though not enough to make the conversation completely private. “The university is entering a delicate period,” he says. “There are opportunities ahead, significant opportunities. As I mentioned previously, a partner has expressed interest in investing in the college.”

I say nothing.

“Lab upgrades,” he continues. “Scholarship funds. A new coastal resilience initiative with our name on it. This could transform departments like yours. And your departmental chair seems to think you have the ability to be right at the center of it.”

These all sound like good things. Great things. If he means what he says about departments like ours, underfunded ones, tired ones, ones held together with tape, favors, and graduate students who deserve better, then it’s a positive.

“You only need to look around your lab, Dr. Hart, to see just how much your department needs funding.”

“You won’t hear any disagreement from me, given it feels as though equipment is breaking down every day. What I don’t understand is why I’m here with you, with a sense of doom that this conversation is going to end with something you don’t want to tell me or I don’t want to hear. Surely, this is a conversation for more tenured staff than me.”

The muscle in the side of his jaw twitches and he sighs. "Unfortunately, your current line of inquiry has become politically sensitive, and it was decided it would be best for us to discuss it directly."

“Since when did contamination of our most valuable water sources become political? Since when did over a decade’s worth of research and monitoring of an environment that, quite frankly, is more important than the oceans but doesn’t get the attention it deserves because it doesn’t have sharks, become political?”

“Della, they may be more important than, for example, tropical forests, given they can sequester far more carbon. But it’s a stretch to say they are more important than the ocean, however, I’m not here to debate your…hyperbole.” The dean leans back in his chair. “Everything is political when public accusations are involved.”

“I haven’t made any accusations.”

“Not yet. But there is a growing sense that you will, should you find any evidence of who is behind the contamination of the waterways. No one is asking you to abandon your research. We would simply like you to pause any and all external communications and allow the university to review the matter internally before you publish any findings.”

“You want to throttle my work? And what do you mean by ‘external communications’? Do you mean regulators?”

And how is he talking about waterway contamination when even I’m not totally certain about what is happening?

He rubs a hand over his chin. “I mean any party outside the appropriate administrative channels: white papers, news interviews, social media posts, all of it.”

“And what if that means the wetlands are deliberately being contaminated while the appropriate administrative channels drag their heels in reviewing the matter?”

His smile thins. "That is exactly the kind of language I would caution you against using."

I think about Mina and Evan in the lab, my other students, my failing equipment, all of it gathered behind the dean like evidence for the prosecution.

How many scholarships would that developer fund? How many freezers? How many students could stay in science because someone with dirty money wants a clean plaque on the wall downstairs?

Dean Whitaker leans towards me. “Be reasonable, Della. You are brilliant, everyone knows that, but brilliance needs support. It needs protection and funding. I would hate to see your future damaged because you mistook speediness for integrity.”

Embarrassment rises hot and vicious. I’m not pretty enough for Sunny’s world. I’m not obedient enough for this one.

I lift my chin. "Science is timing, Dean. If you delay data until it’s convenient, you’re not reviewing it. You’re burying it, and by burying it, you’re complicit."

His cordial expression does not change but something behind it cools. "I hope you’ll think carefully for your sake, and for the sake of the people who depend on this institution. The Velaro Coastal Group is offering an exceptional amount of money, Della. It will change the reputation and standing of this university forever. Wetland ecology is such a small portion of the university’s academic endeavors that, should it have to end to get the donation for the benefit of everyone else, it is a decision I will make easily. The only rule the developer has in place is that none of the work we produce will be critical of the construction industry, nor will any of the work we complete be used for anything other than the support of their good name."