Chapter 60

September 11, 2001

The landscape around the house had changed significantly over the past 21 years. It was a lawn worthy of a golf course, front and rear. The lawn ended at a gravel path that led down to the river. To one side of the house was an orchard with apples, field pears, peaches, and pecans. There was also a little garden that was still producing vegetables, including tomatoes, bell peppers, beans, squash, and corn (despite the best efforts of the raccoons).

Over 21 years, Benny had gone through three couples who served as cook and gardener. He always hired couples near retirement age, paying them a good salary that would bump up their social security. It was amazing how many people were out there who hit their late fifties wondering how they were going to retire with the pitiful savings they had, no pension, and low social security benefits. Working for Benny was what separated a nice retired life eating early bird meals at restaurants, or eating cat food out of the can. The time spent living in the provided housing allowed them to put aside a lot of money for their retirement.

The couple were hard at work. Despite being curious as to why Benny would be hosting a friend very early on a Tuesday morning, they didn’t ask any questions. They knew that Benny and Tim were both very wealthy men. They thought it was amazing that the two men weren’t pretentious in any way. Tim talked like a regular guy and Benny ... well, Benny was unique.

The husband and wife had reversed roles. The cook, the husband, was preparing a large lunch for later. He was probably the best cook Benny had ever had. The gardener, the wife, was tending to the garden harvesting tomatoes and peppers for the salad. She was definitely the best gardener in the state.

It was odd working for a man who would stare off into space for days at time, only eating what was set on the desk in front of him. They knew he didn’t taste the food, but that didn’t mean they held back from making sure that he ate the best and most nutritious food possible. It was hard coming up with meals that could sit untouched for hours before being eaten. It was always finger food because Benny would just reach over and grab whatever had been left for him to eat. As more than one cook had discovered after providing a plate of Swedish meatballs and a fork, that Benny, after grazing on the dish while lost in thought, was a sight from a nightmare. Swedish meatballs were out of the question unless they were each on its own toothpick.

For Benny, he was living in heaven. He could sit and think for days at a time. Once he had everything clear in his mind, he would write it all out and send it off to someone who would appreciate it. After that, he never even thought about what happened next to his work. What he did affected people’s lives in a positive way. He designed new devices that improved medical treatments. He wrote little articles on economics that changed national policy. He wrote programs that led to a better quality of life for a lot of people.

Benny wasn’t doing all that stuff for free, although he never really had to deal with the money side of things. He got paid for his inventions. He got credit for his papers, both practical and theoretic. His programs brought in a fortune that made the silver deal look like chump change. Everything was stamped, ‘Two Guys Working.’ He wasn’t out for fame or fortune, but received both.

It was Tim who made sure that Benny got everything that was due to him. He followed up on the patent applications. He dealt with publishers to get the articles published. He made sure that the people publishing and distributing the software were dealing honestly. More than one person went to jail for trying to cheat Benny.

Tim also made sure that no one disturbed Benny. He provided security that would chase off trespassers, gossip columnists, and kooks who would hurt him. He bought up the property around Benny’s place to provide a buffer between him and neighbors. There were also people who wanted to dig up the dirt on Benny thinking they could blackmail him for money. Even though there was nothing about Benny that could be used that way, Tim made sure all efforts to manufacture charges of that kind came to nothing.

There was one other constant in Benny’s life that was of a surprising nature. Tham continued to come over to the house once a month for a visit. She’d come over, they’d have sex, and then she would leave. There were two short periods of six months each, when she was unavailable, but she made sure that another young woman visited him during those brief times when she was unavailable. It was interesting, but she was just as protective of Benny as Tim.

Benny and Tim were seated on the patio. There was a large screen television set up with a cable back to the satellite box. It was on, but neither one of them was paying attention to it.

“It’s been a wild ride,” Tim said.

The second time through life was a very different experience than the first pass. Although the biggest difference that most people would see was that they were dirt poor before and they were billionaire rich now, that wasn’t the difference that mattered the most to them. They had worked hard to be successful, early. While other kids were looking to have fun, they were working. They were working hard and it had paid off. Now, both of them were free to be the best they could be.

It’s funny because a lot of people would have viewed Benny as a success in his first pass. He made good money, he had a wife, and he had kids. They wouldn’t have seen that the work made him miserable. The money meant nothing. His wife pitied him. His kids didn’t want anything to do with him.

Tim had been held back in life trying to get Joyce cured of her self-destructive behavior. It was a hopeless cause. As far as he could tell, she reveled in her decadency. His desire to have a family was tainted by having a daughter who came to be as decadent as her mother. It wasn’t until he had reached his forties that he had dumped her. He felt sad that Joyce had overdosed and died early in this timeline, and that his daughter had never been born. He also knew it was the for the best.

Benny said, “You’ve been the one who has had to deal with the rough waters. I’ve just been sitting back here doing nothing.”

“The deal was, you do the thinking and I handle the people. That’s was the plan from from the beginning and it’s still the plan. It’s been a perfectly good plan.”

“I just feel like I’ve burdened you with assholes and jerks.”

“Benny, don’t ever feel that way. I don’t mind them, and I know how to deal with them.”

“Still...”

“This life has been great. Lily and I have been married for 21 glorious years. We’ve got a dog, two cats ... well three cats, and two kids. Lily has been everything I’ve ever wanted. The kids ... they’re great. As a parent I couldn’t have asked for better kids. They still like me.”

“Your parents liked you. They didn’t abandon you like mine did. They didn’t turn on you like mine did.”

“Your parents didn’t really turn on you. They just took Lana’s side in everything.”

“Your parents managed to be fair.”

“I know. Still, it was pretty ugly there for a while.”

Benny said, “As far as your brother and sister were concerned, the wrong child was successful. Her marriage was shit. Your brother was just a nowhere man.”

“I know. They hate me for my success.”

Tim and Benny had managed to hide the fact that they were rich for three years. They were each worth more then 150 million at the time their economic standing was made public. Robert had managed to double their money on the second bounce in silver prices and that was using only a quarter of the money they had made from the rise to almost $50 an ounce. He had played the markets on the way up, then down, then on the way up, and on the way down again. Tim and Benny were a lot less confident about the high point so he had played it a lot safer for them, but they still made a ton of money.

Their families had been clueless until a charity leaked who an ‘anonymous’ donor was. Lana, true to form, was firmly convinced that she deserved a major portion of that money for having had to put with her brother all those years while growing up. If he wouldn’t give her the money out of a sense of obligation, then she was willing to force the matter. It was Bobby Joe Mills who saved Benny from getting a beating. Lana had no clue that Benny had friends who would watch out for him.

His parents thought that he should have given her something just to keep the peace. Benny was disappointed, although he wasn’t surprised. That had been their way of dealing with the conflict between brother and sister for years. Be a good boy and let her have what she wants, Benny. He wasn’t going to let her get her way.

Tim’s brother and sister were jealous of his success. His sister had made a bad decision in her marriage, had been abused, and divorced within period of two years. Tim had helped her get away from her abusive husband. It bothered her that her ‘slow’ brother had had to bail her out of trouble. Tim’s brother worked a job where he went in to work in the morning and left in the late afternoon, while doing as little as possible during the time spent on the job. He never was promoted beyond what was required of his seniority. He did marry, did have kids, and lived in house with a mortgage, but life was just blah. However, if you asked him he would tell you that he was the hardest worker on the job and that he been unlucky. He’d talk about how his time in Iran had really kept him from succeeding.

One thing that Tim had to admit was that his parents didn’t let his siblings act too much like jerks. His father recognized that Tim had worked hard for his success, and it wasn’t just handed him. The only downside was that he gave Benny most of the credit. His mother was a mother and thought all of the kids did well, but she was privately a little more proud of Tim than the others. She also thought the friendship between Tim and Benny was the best thing that ever happened to both of them.

Still, family gatherings had been rather strained for a long time. With his brother living in South Carolina now, his sister in Oregon, and his parents getting up in age, the family gatherings were few and far between. Tim, Lily, and the kids did visit his parents on most holidays.

Lily’s parents were shocked to discover just how rich Tim and Benny were. Her father had always thought highly of Tim and was convinced that Benny was a genius. He was pleased to discover that he was right. The news didn’t change the relationship at all. Tim and Lily were still invited over for dinner at least once a month, and they were happy to come. Conversations were about what was going on in the city rather than about money, which pleased Tim.

“Do you think I could hire a touring bus and a driver?” asked Benny.

“Why?”

“I’d like to see Cathy.”

At the same time as when the news came out about Tim and Benny, the news also leaked out about how wealthy Sandra and Cathy were. The two girls solved all of their problems by moving off to San Francisco, and getting a nice condominium in a gated community. They didn’t even wait for Cathy’s parents to show up and cause problems. They sold their houses to Two Guys Working, packed up, and left. Sandra’s parents, on the other hand, were quite supportive and visited them frequently.

“So you got the announcement of their marriage?”

“Yes. I think I should go.”

“Why a bus?”

“You know why we’re here, today.”

“Yes. 9-11.”