The True Father (5 page)

  
   When the burial service was over Jodie gave me a rose from the spray along with the photograph that stood on top the casket. She gave me a hug and told me how glad she was that I came, and to finally meet me after all these years. Jeremiah shook my hand firmly. His eyes were glassy, but for the most part any emotions he had he kept to himself.

   “Nephew, you being here means a lot.”

   “I'm glad I came.”

   “I see that you got to meet Bella.”

   “Yes, I did.”

   “How is she holding up?”

   “I can tell it's hard for her.”

   “That's understandable.”

   We walked out into the crowd and Jeremiah introduced me to several people. Most were friends and fans from the community, some associates from the world of rodeo, all offering their sympathy. One man in particular, who wore a gray felt cowboy hat and a long-sleeved white western shirt and bolo tie, seemed like an interesting character.

   “This is Denny Rose,” Jeremiah said, “a rodeo announcer who lives up in Checotah. He and Jettie were friends for years.”

   Denny shook my hand with a firm grip and spoke in a vibrant, baritone voice. “Yes, sir,” he said. “I thought a lot of your old man. One of the best bull riders I ever laid eyes on.”

   “Pleased to meet you.”

   “Likewise, son. If you're ever down this way again, look me up and we'll have a cup of coffee, or maybe something a little stronger.” He chuckled and patted my arm with his other hand.

   “I'd like that.”

   “Any time, son.”

   After sharing a bottle with Jeremiah, I quickly wondered if I'd made a mistake agreeing to drink liquor with this man.

   Another man approached and shook Jeremiah's hand. His lower jaw quivered and his eyes were red. He was a lanky older man with a wrinkled face and steel gray hair, wearing a short-sleeved plaid western shirt and blue jeans.

   “You doing all right?” he said to Jeremiah.

   “It'll take a while. How about you?”

   “I'm gonna miss that old rip.”

   “Me, too.”

   Jeremiah turned to me. “Trevor, this is Buddy Wells. He used to be a rodeo clown and was one of Jettie's best pals.”

   We shook hands. “Nice to meet you.”

   “Buddy,” Jeremiah said, “This is Jettie's boy.”

   The old man found a smile beneath all his sorrow. “I'll be damned. Jettie's boy?”

   “That's what they tell me,” I said.

   “I've sure heard a lot about you,” Buddy said.

   “You have?”

   “Man oh man. Come and see me some time. I'll show you Jettie's favorite fishin' hole.”

   “That would be fun.”

   He turned and walked away, shaking hands with several people as he made his way through the crowd. 

   What a day, I thought. Jettie Hodge, the nicest man Bella ever knew. The best bull rider Denny Rose ever saw. And me, Jettie's boy, who Buddy Wells had heard a lot about.

   After lunch, Jeremiah and I slipped away from the post-funeral gathering at his house and drove to a law office on Spiro's Main Street. The attorney invited us in to his office—a plush and stylish room, with the vintage remains of natural oak woodwork stripped and refinished, and on every wall, burgundy and gray velvet flocked wallpaper above wainscoting that matched the trim. We sat near his desk in overstuffed black leather chairs. A matching black leather sofa resided against a wall across from us. 

   The door to the office opened and the attorney invited the visitor in. “Come on in, Bella.”

   She was as surprised to see me as I was her, and from the subtle look on Jeremiah's face, I assumed he expected to see her.

   I stood to greet her and Jeremiah followed.

   “Hi,” I said.

   “Hi,” she said shyly to both of us then looked away.

   She sat in the center of the sofa, crossed her legs and arms. She had changed into blue jeans and a red sleeveless shirt, with a belt studded with conchos around her waist and laced boots on her feet.    She watched the attorney shuffle papers around on his desk. 

   “You mind if I smoke, Larry?” she asked.

   He handed her an ashtray from his desktop and she quickly lit up. In a matter of seconds a large cloud of white smoke hovered above her and scented the room.

   “Let's get started,” Larry said. 

   The executor's duty, to contact all the inheritors and read and execute the will. The situation made me very nervous, to sit among two people who were closest to Jettie and know that my name is somewhere in that will—the name of a person that neither of them, nor Jettie, ever knew.

   Larry read through all the legal jargon, and before long got to the meat of the will. Having studied finance, it all sounded very interesting to me, and I was surprised to learn that Jettie was an investor. In the early eighties he had put some money into stock, a couple thousand, and left it all to me. He also left me his house, a tiny three-room shack on the outskirts of Spiro, including all its contents, which I assumed was furniture and various household items. He also owned a piece of Jeremiah's ranch, some livestock which consisted of a few cattle and horses, a Massy Ferguson tractor, and a 1971 Ford pickup, all which he left to me. Plus, the remains of his bank account, a grand total of $6,132.56. I was dumbfounded.

   Larry looked at me and smiled. “Trevor, I'm sure this all comes to a great surprise to you.”

   “I don't know what to say.”

   I looked at Jeremiah, who smiled back at me.

   “This is what Jettie wanted,” Jeremiah said.

   “That's right,” Larry said. “Your father came to me several years ago and we put together this will. Every so often he'd update it, and that's why Bella is here.”

   I looked over at her. She put out the cigarette in the ashtray and began to cry.

   Larry continued. “Trevor, about three years ago Jettie came to me and added Bella to this will. He said to divide everything he had between you and her. He also said to make sure she was taken care of.”

   I looked at Bella again, who by her tears was obviously having a tough time hearing all this. I looked back at Larry.

   “I can understand Bella, but why me?”

   “I can't really explain that,” Larry said. “But for one thing, you are Jettie's son, and to me that makes a lot of sense.”

   “But we never knew each other. He may not have even liked me.”

   Jeremiah laughed and put a hand on my shoulder. “That's not the point, Trevor. He never got to be a father to you and this was his way of making it up to you.”

   I didn't know what else to say. Two days ago I was a college graduate about to enter the working world to pay off all my student loans and the remaining balance of the debt on my 1997 Honda Accord.   Now I'm an heir to a cowboy's fortune—a small balance of a bank account, a few shares of stock, an interest in a ranching operation, and to make sure half of all of it went to a grieving girlfriend.

   Larry opened up another folder on his desk. “There's something that will also come to a bit of a surprise.” 

   “Oh, more surprises?” I said laughingly.

   “That stock that Jettie bought back in the eighties, it was five hundred shares of Wal-Mart stock. I've been watching that stock for Jettie and the whole time he knew what it was worth, but left it alone.”

   All of the sudden I felt a rush of blood flow through the main arteries of my neck and into my head, making me feel hot and near faint. My college class had performed a case study on Wal-Mart a couple of years ago, and five hundred shares of stock had to be worth a bundle of cash.

   I held my breath as Larry continued.

   “Trevor, when Jettie stopped buying that stock it was twenty-eight dollars a share … ”

   A quick calculation in my head came up with $14,000. But then there were dividends, price increases, and splits!

   “After twelve years,” Larry said, “five two-for-one splits, and dividend payments, and yesterday that stock closed at 56.7/8.” He smiled, “Are you doing the math, son?”

   I was, and so far, not knowing the dividend payments, I came up with sixteen thousand shares, and at fifty-six dollars was somewhere in the vicinity of—oh, man—$900,000!

   He continued. “Trevor, that little portfolio is now worth over 1.2 million dollars.”

   I let out a large breath and sunk into my chair. Bella cried into her hands and Jeremiah laughed out loud and put his arm around me. 

   I felt numb, but suddenly pieces of the puzzle were starting to fit. Now I knew why Jeremiah contacted me. If I didn't come to the funeral, at least he knew where I was. He knew all about the will and he wanted to make sure Jettie got his wish.

   Then there was Bella. A woman who loved Jettie, but he couldn't give her the kind of love she wanted in return. This was the only way he could give it back to her. I was amazed at how suddenly we had so much in common.

  
   Jeremiah handed me a ring of keys and pointed a hand toward Jettie's former home. It was the smallest house I had ever seen; rectangular shaped with white, weathered siding. The front door stood behind a single cement step, and centered between two windows. A box-shaped air conditioner hung outside the window on the right, and to the same side of the house was a matching garage just big enough for one vehicle, with hinged double doors on the end. I looked at Bella, whose eyes still bore the remnants of drying tears.

   Jeremiah said, “I better let you two talk things over.” In his typical bowlegged style, he walked to his GMC, got in and drove away. 

   Bella and I went inside the house. It was hotter inside than out, and the air seemed stale and humid. The only light came from a window covered with sheer white curtains. Bella quickly opened one of the windows and turned on a white metal ceiling fan. 

   The front room was barely big enough for the old green davenport that stretched along the inside wall. One of the legs was missing, with two faded and cobwebby J.C. Penney catalogs in its place.   Behind the davenport and on the wall hung a wide wooden-framed painting of a red-orange desert butte. A gold tension rod stretched from floor to ceiling beside it, and hanging near the top of the rod were three cone-shaped lamps that pointed in different directions. Across from the davenport, rabbit ear antennas sprouted from the top of a black Sony TV, and next to the TV was the window that held the air conditioner. Under it all was a hardwood floor, and an oval rug covered most of the area between the davenport and TV.

   Out of the front room a short hallway led to a kitchen, a bathroom, and a single bedroom. The kitchen smelled of grease and stale propane gas, and consisted of a single row of varnished plywood cabinets with a laminated countertop, a four-burner gas range, a refrigerator with a rounded top that looked ancient and too big for the room, and a double white porcelain sink mounted in the countertop and below a small window that looked out into the back yard.

   The bathroom wasn't much bigger than a closet, with just enough room for the rusty white toilet, a single washbasin that hung on the wall below a cracked mirrored cabinet, and a bathtub with legs that looked like eagle claws.

   Inside the bedroom was a full-size wrought iron bed with unmade bedclothes, wadded up and hanging to the floor. A walnut wardrobe stood at the end of the bed with its doors hanging open. Inside several western shirts hung on wire hangers, and below the shirts, a shelf and two drawers that expanded the width of the wardrobe. On top of the wardrobe, several straw and felt cowboy hats stacked atop one another. But the most interesting of all were a series of shelves that hung on one wall of the room and completely filled with trophies and photographs from rodeo events. I walked along and studied several of them, pulled one of the trophies off and, with my thumb, wiped the dust off the engraved brass plate. It read “Second Place, 1985 Staked Plains Rodeo”. Then I studied the gold statuette; a man in a cowboy hat with one arm in the air, riding a bull with its front feet on the ground and its back feet kicked high in the air.

   “Those are nothing,” Bella said, standing in the bedroom doorway with her arms crossed. She walked over to the wardrobe and opened up a drawer and pulled out a black shoebox. After she removed the lid I looked inside at several items wrapped in white tissue paper.

   “What's in here?” I asked.

   “Buckles.”

   “I don't understand.”

   “Come sit down.” She sat on the bed and I sat beside her. She took one of the tissue-wrapped bundles out of the box, removed the tissue and handed the buckle to me. It was shiny with gold banners zigzagging on a silver background, the outside border simulated a golden rope, and engraved on the banners were “1988 Mesquite Championship Rodeo”, “Bull Rider” and “1st Place”.

   “He was very proud of these,” Bella said.

   “I can see why. They're beautiful.”

   She pulled another buckle out of the box and removed the tissue. “He won this one for qualifying for the 1994 Bud Light Cup tour.”

   “Qualifying?”

   “Only the top forty-five riders every year can qualify for the tour.”

   “Top forty-five, in Oklahoma?”

   “No, in the world.”

   I studied the buckle again. “Wow.”

   She stood from the bed and walked over to the shelves. She took down a photo and brought it to me. It appeared to be Jettie when he was younger, standing in front of a metal gate next to another cowboy, and a black ink autograph was scribbled across the photo.”

   “Who's this?”

   “That's Jettie with Don Gay, famous bull rider and old Rodeo buddy who's now a famous TV announcer.”

   “No kidding?”

   She grabbed another photo and brought it to me. “This is one of his favorites, with Casey Tibbs.”

   The photo was black and white; the cowboy squatted on one knee with his arm around a little boy wearing a cowboy hat.

   “The little boy, is that Jettie?” I asked.

   “Cute, huh.”

   “Who is Casey Tibbs?”

   “Jettie's boyhood hero. He holds the world record for the most Saddle Bronc titles.”

   This was all so interesting. A world I had never been exposed to, but the man that gave me life knew it like nothing else.

   “Explain something to me,” I said, looking around the room. “If he was so good, why did he live this way?”

   “For the most part, rodeo is an expensive career. Some cowboys don't break even after the travel expenses and entry fees are paid. Jettie did all right, his best year he cleared about sixty thousand.   But he put most of that back into the ranch. He cared less for material things.”

   “Makes sense. He owned over a million dollars worth of stock and never cashed it in.”

   This comment sparked a bit of emotion within Bella and tears filled her eyes.

   “Are you okay?” I asked.

   She wiped at her tears and gazed up at the pictures and trophies. “I want you to know that I knew nothing about the money.”

   “Of course you didn't.”

   “I wouldn't want you to think I was some kind of gold digger or something.”

    I stood from the bed. “Jettie wanted you to have it, so apparently you deserved it.”

   She cried harder and came to me and wrapped her arms around my waist. She laid her head against my chest and wept. I was slow to return the comfort she desired, but when I finally held her it was firm and strangely perfect.

   “I miss him so much,” she said.

   “I'm sure you do.”

   She eventually let loose of me, took a deep breath and wiped her cheeks with the palms of her hands. “I'm sorry.”

   “Don't be.”

   “Why don't we go outside?”

   “Sure.”

   We walked out the back door and into the yard. Next to the door was a rusty barbecue grill and two foldable lawn chairs. We walked around to the garage and opened the double doors. The daylight exposed the tailgate of the 1971 Ford Pickup mentioned in the will. It was two toned—turquoise on bottom and white on top, with a rectangular bale of hay in the back.

   “Well, how do we divide the truck?” I asked.

   She laughed. “You can have that old bucket of bolts. I'll stick with my Mustang.”

   I walked further into the garage; the dirt floor dispelled dampness and made the air smell musty. I opened the driver side door and gazed inside. The dash was cracked badly in several places and the seat was torn in the driver area, exposing the beige stuffing and iron seat springs. Before stepping inside, I instinctively looked down below the door and checked for cattle manure. I sat in front of the steering wheel, found a square-ended Ford key, put it in the ignition and started the engine, which roared and sputtered. I pressed the gas pedal and smoothed it out, and when I let off, the exhaust pipes rapped and popped.

   I laughed to myself, thinking that this was Jettie's only transportation and the guy could have afforded anything he wanted. I shut it off and climbed out. Bella still stood at the opening of the garage.

   “Neat old truck, huh?” she said.

   “Yeah, very neat,” I said sarcastically.

   “That was another one of Jettie's pride and joys.”

   “This old truck?”

   “His father bought it new when Jettie was in high school, and he later gave it to him. It's part of the family.”

   “I see.”

   I shut the garage doors and we walked to the front step of the house, where we sat next to each other and stared out into the yard.

   “So what do we do now?” I asked.

   “Larry said he'd handle the details for us. Now, I guess we have to try and get back to our normal routines.”

   “Yeah, you're right.”

   “So what are you going to do?”

   “Go back to Kansas City. Start my job.”

   “Do you think you'll like being an accountant?”

   “I hope so. It's all I know.”

   “You could do like my mother did.”

   “What's that?”

   “She's a beautician, and once she developed a clientele, she opened up her own beauty parlor.”

   “Are you saying I should open up my own accounting office?”

   “Why not? You got the money now to do it.”

   “Yeah, I guess I do.”

   The thought of having over a half-million dollars in net worth still hadn't quite soaked in. And to make it seem right, I had to keep telling myself the same thing I told Bella, that it was what Jettie wanted. Suddenly I wondered how I would explain my sudden riches to Mom. How ironic, I thought, that she would leave her husband in search of a life of vanity and wealth, and for him to one day become a millionaire. Telling her would not be easy, and the more I thought about it, probably not a very good idea at all.