Virginia McCullough - Love, Unexpected

Zeke glanced at his dad and then studied the papers he held. “The original letter is dated in March, Dad.” He pointed to a date in the body of the letter. “There it is, right there at the end, the estimated delivery date in June. Today .”

Frowning, Art Donovan said, “I meant to tell you about that letter from the law firm. But I must have stuck it in the drawer in my nightstand.”

Out of sight, out of mind, Zeke thought. This shouldn’t have surprised him, but it did. His dad often forgot day-to-day events, but typically remembered details of his dealings with a customer from years ago. Unfortunately, stashing the March letter in a drawer in his room was like him, too. Zeke worked with his dad every day, but at no time in these last few months had the letter from the law firm surfaced.

The letter was addressed to his dad, Arthur Donovan. The facts confirmed that a man named Terrance Smyth had died and bequeathed this very old, but classic yacht to his dad to settle that debt. Zeke slapped the sheaf of legal documents against his thigh. “Do you remember the guy who stiffed you, Dad?”

“You bet I remember him.” Art flapped his hand toward the boat. “I spent a couple of months trying to track him down to pay for the hardware I sold him to outfit his boat—about two grand worth of top-of-the-line stainless steel. I almost found him, but he disappeared again. I finally gave up. Wrote it off as a bad debt and moved on.”

Art shook his head and jabbed his finger in the air toward the run-down boat. “But it wasn’t this boat he was outfitting, not Drifting Dreamer . What I sold him was hardware for his fiberglass sailboat.”

None of that really mattered. “We might as well have a closer look.” Zeke stepped from the dock to the deck of Drifting Dreamer. He bounced a few times to test its strength before glancing over his shoulder and nodding to his dad. “Come on aboard. Seems sturdy enough to support us. At least it’s teak and probably cleans up pretty easily. The deck might be newer than everything else topside.”

From the aft deck, Zeke quickly scanned the boat from bow to stern. “Since you own this baby, such as she is, free and clear, we might as well see what we can salvage. Or...”

“Or what?” Art asked.

“Beats me.” Zeke grinned at his dad, his mood softening enough to bring back his sense of humor.

For the next few minutes, Zeke pushed away worrying thoughts of his dad’s odd memory lapses. Were they really happening more frequently, or did it only seem that way sometimes? Like now, when a fifty-foot boat showed up unannounced. The one bright spot was that unlike some of his dad’s other mistakes, this one wouldn’t hurt their marine supply business, except in lost time spent ridding themselves of the run-down yacht. But still, how could anyone, even a forgetful person like his dad, let an unexpected inheritance this substantial slip his mind?

Thinking back twenty years, Zeke had been away at college and had no memory of this bad debt. Dad obviously had handled it by himself, as he had everything connected with the family business.

“Hey, Zeke,” Art called from the wheelhouse, “ Drifting Dreamer must have been a beauty in her day. Not everything’s old, either. She’s got electronics they didn’t make back in 1939.”

“I can see that,” Zeke said honestly, looking at the spec sheet. Even the diesel engine was only six years old and showed its good condition with a healthy hum when the two guys hired to deliver Drifting Dreamer had maneuvered between the pilings on the dock. Newer equipment aside, on closer inspection, the overall condition of the boat was every bit as sad as it appeared at first glance. The remaining traces of varnish on the mahogany trim and wheelhouse were only reminders of the yacht’s better days. Zeke grimaced at the sight of blackening wood and cracked joints and seams.

“All the hardware is bronze,” Zeke called, trying to insert a positive note. “That’s worth something.” If they scrapped the boat parts, they’d recoup the original two thousand dollars—with interest. Zeke gently kicked the toe of his shoe against the row of wooden bins under the rail of the aft deck. They rarely saw that high-quality mahogany anymore, except on the luxury custom boats very few people could afford.

When Zeke went into the main cabin, his dad was peering inside the oven of the newish stove, another item on the spec sheet that puzzled Zeke. Someone had a plan to bring back Drifting Dreamer. But who? Zeke shook off the question. It intrigued him, like a mystery, but it didn’t matter. He and his dad needed a new plan. Now.

To start, Zeke supposed they could ask Nelson White, their old friend who owned the marina and boatyard next door, to haul the boat out of the water, so they could begin salvaging whatever was valuable and get rid of the rest. But then he muttered, “A little sweat and sandpaper could help. To get her ready to sell, I mean. Maybe there’s life in the boat yet. We don’t need to junk her.”

His dad grinned and cupped his ear, acknowledging the groan of the pump that ran for a few seconds before coming to a halt with a clunk. “The bilge pump works.”

“See? Another selling point. Besides, we know for sure she’s seaworthy enough to make the trip from Kenosha.”

According to the paperwork, the nearly eighty-year-old yacht had been built in Duluth, Minnesota, and launched in 1939. It was a Bergstrom 50, a legendary design. That alone made her a classic, Zeke thought. From the attorney’s letter, Zeke learned Smyth bought the boat four years before he died. It had been sitting under a tarp in a boatyard, the victim of years of neglect.

He’d added a note in his will about it being better late than never to make restitution.

“Man, oh, man, you don’t have this much storage in your house,” Art called from the forward cabin.

“That big, huh?” Zeke was amused by his dad’s remark, even knowing it was his responsibility to resolve this result of a twenty-year-old problem. As a kid, he and his dad had been referred to as Art and his boy, Zeke. Even when he’d been almost thirty years old he was still Art’s boy. But over these last years, the situation reversed. Now people around town called them Zeke and his dad, Art. The shift was subtle at first, and really shouldn’t have mattered. But it did, mainly because Art had changed over the years, and Zeke had all but forced his dad to leave the apartment over their store and move into his house down the street.

“Must have cost a small fortune,” Art said as he came out of the cabin. “But there’s a lot of pride in this old yacht.”

Standing in the galley, Zeke agreed with his dad. It was built to be a showpiece and was made with the best materials available in the 1930s. In his mind’s eye, Zeke could take himself back to the day Drifting Dreamer was launched. The original owner, whoever it was, had chosen that name for a reason. Maybe a couple had her built, or it could have been a family. What kinds of dreams did they have mind?

“Kinda musty in here,” Art said, wrinkling his nose. “I can hardly smell anything anymore, but I got a whiff of old-boat odor. Maybe a little mildew mixed in. But it’s probably just the smell of a boat that’s been closed up too long.”

His train of thought interrupted, Zeke reached up and opened the porthole above the sink to let in a little fresh air on the sunny day.

“I suppose we better get back to the store,” Zeke said. “We won’t solve this problem today. But who knows? Someone might come along with money to burn and make you an offer, Dad.”

“Yep, and we left Teddy alone,” Art said, “not that the little mutt gets himself into too much trouble. I’ll take him for a walk.”