Chapter 21

Dan 1.0’s turn:

The little impromptu sidebar basically left us knowing that Mister Dukes is not entirely satisfied with his kids’ (daughter and her husband?) intent if they inherit his land. He did us a napkin sketch. “This is what you already bought. This part to the south of it, it’s mine, too. Plus I’ve got a section way south of here. It’s almost useless – too far out for the real estate developers to be interested in yet, we’re leasing to a guy who’s running cattle.” His eyes squinted. “I sell it to you guys WITH mineral rights. I’m tellin’ you, that’s a bingo. Old seismic surveys show something. Wasn’t economical to develop thirty years ago. Some people have been askin’...”

“Don’t you need the money?” Bill asked.

“Son, I’m third-generation tightwad. Grand-dad, I don’t know how he did it, but he had the money to buy up a bunch of land, cheap. Dad was the only one of Pawpaw’s kids to reach maturity and get married, and I’m the happy result of that. I GOT money. I GOT land, and if I was a greedy bastard, I could have a LOT more money. But you know, I came out here today and saw all this, you guys doing something just for the pure joy of it, and dammit, I don’t need MORE money. You folks INVITED me. Let me be part of it. And I think you guys’d do a better job of caring for that land than my daughter would.”

“Uh, this is Louisiana ... Forced heirship...”

“Believe me, I know. I’ve talked with my lawyers. They had a solid claim on everything when I die. But if I don’t own it then ... they get diddly...” His old eyes scanned us. “Oh, I’m not totally evil. Whatever’s in the bank, the house I live in now, all that crap, they get it. But that land is gonna be long gone. And forced heirship goes away when they turn twenty-four. She’s way past that.”

“We’ll honor that,” Bill said.

“Hell, boy, I was almost serious. I’ll adopt these two girls.” He looked up, saw Cindy standing behind me, her hands on my shoulders. He grinned. “Cindy, too.” He snorted. “Engineers. Pfuh. Physicist. Haw. MY daughter’s an authority on mass communications. Works for some non-profit. All kinds of karma, she tells me. Her husband’s in marketing. A flippin’ SALESMAN! And neither one of ‘em gives a shit... ‘scuse me, neither one of ‘em’s interested in flying.”

“No grandkids?” Cindy asked.

“Oh, nobody who’s right-thinking would bring kids into THIS world. Least that’s what they tell me. I’ve talked. Betty’s talked.”

“You gotta come visit us,” Cindy blurted. “Serious.” She looked at me. “I’ll come down here in one of the magic carpets and get you and your wife. Y’all come spend a weekend with us - family, food, flying, music...”

“You tell me when that’s gonna happen, darlin’,” he said.

“Soon. Next couple of weeks?”

“I’ll tell Betty to keep her options open. Folks, I have had a truly great day. I’m serious. Great ... I need to be getting home before I star in one of those ‘have you seen this geezer’ spots.”

“We’ve enjoyed having you,” I said to general agreement. We walked him to his car.

The girls kissed his cheek. “Seriously, Mister Dukes. I’ll fly down and get you,” Cindy said.

He didn’t make it there. Got turned around. Followed Cindy back to sit with us.

“Hey, namesake,” I said, catching Dan Gleason’s attention. “Come on and sit...”

“Thought y’all were discussing business.”

“Nope, discussing life. Business is in there sometimes.”

“Whaddaya think?” Bill asked him.

“Combination rock concert, fly-in and family reunion,” he said.

“Your girls get to fly?”

Cindy giggled. “I infected both of ‘em.”

Nina came over, stuffing her cellphone into her back pocket.

“Problem, punkin?” Dan 3.0 asked.

“Yeah, ever since I turned in my two weeks’ notice, all of a sudden they care about what I’ve been doing. Saturday. Somebody’s there on Saturday and they’re looking for a bundle on some control panels we ordered.”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder,” my namesake said.

Nina snorted. “Didn’t make ‘em fond enough to counter-offer.”

I looked to her.

“Not that I would’ve taken it, anyway. I gave 3Sigma my word. I finally get to work with my Dan.”

Cindy tittered. “Not all it’s cracked up to be, doll.”

“Oh, come on. Name ONE instance where we had friction on the job.”

She smirked. “You wanted me to go through those tables by hand. I wanted to scan ‘em and write a program...” she paused, a cute pseudo-glare in her look. “Who was right?”

“You were,” I admitted.

“Nina, you’re gonna have to face the fact that now you’ll be exposed to the idea that the man you love most in life is actually NOT as perfect as you once thought.” Cindy smirked, green eyes ... Good lord, how I love those eyes...

“Oh, he has his moments,” Nina said. “His shroud of perfection has long been in shreds.” She fixed Cindy in her eye. “You. I want YOU to teach us to fly.”

“Whoa, there, cowgirl,” Dan 3.0 said. She’s five hundred miles away ... The guy Bill’s using...”

“Use the local guy,” Mister Dukes said. “His dad used to fly for me years ago.”

Nina’s eyes twinkled. “Yessir, but I bet he isn’t going to check us out on the Stearman.”

The old man smiled. “True, true ... The days when EVERY pilot was tail-dragger qualified, those are long gone.”

“You got that right,” I said. “People think you’re some kind of cross between Charles Lindbergh and a dinosaur.”

“We got a stable-full back in Alabama,” Cindy said. “Everybody’s checked out. Some of ‘em are less comfortable than others, but they’re checked out.”

“Our 180 was the company pick-up truck when we first started.”

“Comes up kinda short on cargo space, don’t it?” Mister Dukes asked.

“It did, but we didn’t need it much. Then we got the twin Cessna, and now the Pilatus,” Cindy said. “Sandy’s been in the Pilatus...”

She smiled. “Luxury. I could get spoiled to that. Maybe I need to marry a football player ... One of those NFL incomes’d put me in that kind of transportation.”

“Gee,” her dad said, “I’ve never shot a football player before...”

Bill commiserated. “The perils of fathers of girls.”

“Yeah,” Haley tittered. “I saw you watching Matt following Deena around all day.”

“Ewwww,” Deena said. “The boy was sooo obvious ... I mean, I was the ONLY girl his age here...”

“Baby,” Bill said to his daughter, “If there’d been thirty of ‘em, you would’ve been the pick of the bunch.”

“Thanks Dad,” she said. “I hope the drool washes out of my T-shirt.”

Haley snickered. “Did you notice the green shade his face was, when Mizz Hanna brought him back?”

“There’s your excuse,” Cindy said. She feigned a southern belle, “Alas, Matthew, I could NEVER fall for a man who couldn’t stomach aerobatics...”

“Speaking of,” Haley interrupted, “Mizz Hanna says that any time we can get to HER airport, she’ll take us up and show us some. Couldn’t do it today because the plane’s restricted from aerobatics with fuel in the wing tanks.”

“And aerobatics require parachutes. We need to get some for the Stearman.”

“Yes,” I said. “Stoney’s got a couple of them for their Micco. And thank you for noting that requirement, Miss Let’s show my sister a loop.”

“Just one. And I made sure she was buckled in good, and I kept positive Gs. She’d’ve had to CLIMB out.”

Mister Dukes announced it was time for him to go, waved and left.

“Nice old guy,” Cindy said. “Reminds me of Mister Charlie, kinda. But you shoulda seen ‘im change when we got off the ground. I bet he was something when he was young.”

“Still is,” Bill said. “Not being selfish or mercenary, but he’s a God-send. We’re sitting in the middle of proof.”

“Wonder what his daughter did to upset him?” Haley said.

“Guy built his life, the success of his family, on things that she turned her back on.” I could think of other examples that I’d run across. One of the things that was so endearing about the relationship between Terri and Alan and Tina was the way that Terri dove right into what they loved. The fact that in some ways, she passed them up, well, that’s another story.

The meeting broke up, encouraged by the mosquitoes showing up as the sun got low in the skies.

We rode home with the Gleasons. They have a guest room. Well, everybody’s got a guest room, but Dan 3.0 asked first.

And in the morning, they brought us back to the airfield. We cranked up the old 180 and headed back to Alabama.

I got the left seat this time.

“I’m just about flied out,” Cindy said after we were on course for home.

“Seriously?”

“Well, almost. I keep wanting to sort of back off, get back to real work, but...”

“Darlin’,” I said, meaning it with every fiber of my being, “you just sort of grew into what you are today. Who’d’ve guessed...”

“Yeah, that day at the park when you came in with the keys dangling on your finger...”

I smiled. I thought at the time I was gonna give a girl a joy ride, a little side jaunt on a developing relationship. I never thought...

“Your fault.”

She’s reading my mind.

“I’d’ve never done any of this without you...”

“I can’t imagine you keeping that potential all bottled up,” I said.

“Makes me wonder. Mom has some of this ... She’s smart. I see it now. We ALL see it now. But when you first met ‘er ... she was doing a good job of hiding it.”

“Sad, really,” I said. “I look at her and Bill and the kids...”

Giggle. “I’m ONE of the kids...”

“Yeah, but Bill ran into her at the right time.”

She smiled serenely. “I’m glad YOU didn’t run into this version. Otherwise you’d be my step-dad and I’d be very tempted to partake in some unconventional relationship situations.”

“Yeah ... you’re damned hard to resist.”