Bonding Beyond the Grave

Bonding Beyond the Grave

It sure as hell wasn’t going to be an average day when my father, whose been dead for five years, e-transferred me one million bucks. This was soon followed by a small black Moleskine (express delivery, nice) with the first page reading in bold magic marker, THIS MONEY IS NOT FOR YOU, BUDDY.

Buddy?! Yeah, that didn’t sweeten anything. This all should have pissed me off, to put it very, very lightly. It was the adjacent page that caught my attention, causing that anger to dissipate like a spoon of Nescafe instant when the hot water hits.

But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. Let’s go back a bit and explain what prompted my deceased father to send me a mill and a Moleskine one week after my 27th birthday.

Jesus, one million dollars. Compensation maybe for pops never being around all that often during my childhood? Nah, the money’s meant for three women, whom I have never met and know nothing about. Complete and utter bullshit, I think. But I got to give the old man credit, he caught my attention with that next page:

HATE ME LATER. I OWE A DEBT. That’s right, he owed a debt, and apparently, I was going to pay it. So, who were these three women? Exes the old man wronged way back in the day? I wouldn’t be surprised, but turns out I was wrong. If it wasn’t for these women, I never would have met your mom.

Son of a bitch, he had me. He had to bring mom into it, the one person he knew I’d do anything for, the one person who made his neglect bearable.

Lady one was Audrey, dad’s senior high school fling and divorced single mother of two. Audrey and her children are to receive $350,000. Her kids deserve the best education money can buy. She can use the leftovers (if there are any, depends on the school they go to, let’s be honest) as she pleases.

Audrey and dad had a little fun in their youth but she didn’t like the company dad kept and she didn’t think he could commit for the long haul. But Audrey managed to convince him to get a job at the local grocery store where he became a bag boy. Mom’s told me pieces of this, but the book was filling in all the gaps. It was a funny feeling as I sat there flicking the pages, the scent of ink and paper wafting into my nostrils. I felt like dad was finally taking the time to sit down and talk to me, man-to-man. Shame it had to happen after he died.

Anyways, he got a job as a bag boy. This drew him away from the defectives, as Audrey called them, and before long he was an assistant store manager. Later that year I hear through the grapevine that they’re building a new store in New York, dad writes. So, I think why not apply for the manager position?

Dad tells Audrey the big apple awaits, but Audrey needs to stay home to look after her parents. What can I say? I was young and in love. I decided then and there to stay so I can be with her.

Audrey, however, isn’t having that and breaks up with him on the spot. No matter how much he pleads with her she stands steady. He even goes to her home and reads her a love poem he wrote. Like I said, young… and stupid. She comes out and my pops thinks he’s got her and boom, her foot connects with his crown jewels. That’s right folks. She gets me square in the baby maker and says, “get lost.” But with that testicular tribulation came realization. Audrey was right. I needed to take on this new challenge in life.

She agrees to one last smooch and a lay. Details were spared, thank Christ, although dad does mention that there was this magically feral quality to it. Yuck.

Dad arrives in the big apple wide-eyed and giddy with dreams. He starts his job and has a knack for it. He’s a commanding but fair boss. He makes friends and meets many interesting people. Then he met Dolores.

No, Dolores wasn’t another fling. She was the store’s sixty-year-old baker. She and dad talked almost every lunch break because, like my dad, she’s from a small town. Dolores learned my dad was not only quick on his feet and witty, but loved cars. Did he ever, mom still has his beloved ’81 Pontiac Firebird. Still won’t let me drive the damn thing.

Dolores suggests dad should think about being a salesman. Dolores said it would be a stepping stone to opening my own car dealership. Dad’s flattered, but brushes the idea off, because he doesn’t know where to start nor does he have the money.

A year goes by and dad gets word that Dolores has passed. Devastating, buddy. She was some kind of wonderful. He gets a call a week after the funeral and is informed that he is needed at the reading of the will. He thinks this saint of a woman gave him a couch or something. He finds out she bequeathed him a loan in order to start his dealership. Did I mention Dolores was loaded? Turns out the sweet baker spent her twenties and thirties on Wall Street, and she knew how to play the game. It not only gave her a fortune beyond anyone’s wildest dreams, but it also left her jaded and in need of something simpler, something kinder. Dad made one hell of an impression on her it seems. She left me a six-figure sum! Who in god’s name does that? Why me bud? I asked myself that every day. But dad doesn’t think twice. He quits the next day and rents a place, kicking off his new business. $300,000 is to go to Dolores’ daughter, but you’re going to save that for the end, dad says.

Dad’s a whiz with the car dealership. The man is selling cars faster than they’re coming in. But something’s missing from his life and he realizes he wants to start a family. He was going on dates, a lot of dates, but nothing came from it because, as he writes it, most of the women just didn’t cut it.

Then one morning, Jess, his secretary, tells him that that she knows a girl. She works as a waitress at Dizzy’s Club. She’s not just a waitress, she’s doing it to be a nurse and I guarantee she can outsmart you any day of the week, Jess says. My father sees it as a little bit of a challenge and he agrees to meet this nursing student that moonlights at Dizzy’s.

Oh boy, she was something, a complete tour de force. She took no shit that was thrown at her. She scared a lot of men, I can tell you, dad says. It wasn’t the first date per se, but dad knew that he wanted to be with her, wanted to father children with her. What can I say? She made me feel something I could never convey in the right words. It was like a switch flipped, and I realized what I’d been missing all this time.

Hate to admit it, but mom has said similar things to me. Huh, it’s like they’re in sync or something. Dad never told me any of this when he was around. Damn, I wish he did. But there was something, I don’t know, nice I guess, hearing from dad’s side after all these years.

Then, as if the Moleskine is reading my god damn mind, dad says, I’m sorry I never did this when I was alive. I wasn’t the father I should have been. I got lost in my work, lost in trying to give you and your mom the best possible life. It came at the expense of having me around. I’m sorry for that. But maybe, we can do something together as father and son. Maybe I can give you a little life lesson. I’m not too thrilled about giving away all this money, but I am touched by all of this.

Audrey’s over in Jersey. She’s been divorced five years and her boys are high school seniors with their eyes set on a college education. Hopefully this sum will help a little with those pesky tuition fees and whatever other expenses that come along the way.

Audrey can’t believe it when I knock on her door with the news. For a moment I think she’s gonna punt me in the gems too, but instead she cries. “God, you look so much like him.”

Next on the list was Jess, the secretary who set dad up with mom. She too will get $350,000. This took me to Brooklyn. Jess wrote plays in her spare time, had dreams of Broadway, dad explains. She gave it up a few years back, her closet’s probably a treasure trove of unproduced scripts. I’m not saying a six-figure sum would reignite the flame, get her to finance and produce a play like she always dreamed, but I’m sure it couldn’t hurt.

I found out that Jess had gone into debt and was struggling to make rent. You try being a single struggling artist in New York. She fainted when I gave her the news. She and mom had lost touch, but I’m happy to say that friendship has since been rekindled. I wonder if that was part of the old man’s plan.

That left the late Dolores’ sum. Gonna have to make a trek for this one, bud. Dolores’ daughter has a seasonal home in Sun Valley, Idaho. Filthy rich, as expected. And she’s married to some hot shot surgeon apparently. I’m thinking it too, what the hell does she need with 300k?

Dolores died of pancreatic cancer. Her daughter manages a fund in her mother’s name for cancer research. The final $300,000 is to go to the fund but you MUST deliver it to her daughter.

Her daughter, a middle-age woman named Rachel, is surprised to see me at first. “Oh my god, you made it,” she says.

“What do you mean?” I say with a raise of the eyebrow.

“You’re here to give $280,000.” She then adds, “For the fund.”

“What?” Damn these riddles, I never knew a cadaver could give me this much trouble. “No, the leftover sum is $300,000,” I say.

She smiles, making me blush in the process and invites me into her mansion overlooking the mountainside. “Turn to the end of the book.”

I take out dad’s Moleskine and flip to the back. The last page is ripped out.

“Here.”

It’s the final page:

Okay, so it’s not a cool mill, but it is a grand for every birthday I’ve missed, whether I was alive or dead. I want to try and make things right. I hope this is a little kick in the right direction. The RIGHT kind of kick.

“I always thought mom was crazy for giving him that loan,” Rachel says. “Then I found out what kind of man he was. She says she saw it instantly.”

I’m sure I look ridiculous as I stand there with my jaw dangling like a cartoon. I thank her, because what else can I do? I want to thank my dad, for the first time in my life.

“There’s more on the back love,” she says gesturing to the final page.

I turn it over: The adventure ain’t over yet, buddy. Stay tuned.