Author's Note:
This is my sixth semi-annual "invitational." The initial one was based on the Statler Brother's song, "This Bed of Rose's." The second used the Marty Robbins El Paso trilogy: "El Paso" "El Paso City " and "Faleena." The third had stories based on the various versions of "Maggie May" or "Maggie Mae." The fourth invitational was based on any Country & Western song and the fifth on songs by Merle Haggard.
The current invitational is based on any song written or performed by Willie Nelson. I've chosen, "Within Your Crowd".
"Do you remember how they warned you once before?
They made it clear you weren't to see me anymore.
Within your world of riches poor boys aren't allowed,
And you must learn to love someone within your crowd."
I've always liked Garth Brook's rendition of "Friends in Low Places" (written by Dewayne Blackwell & Bud Lee). This story also gives a nod to that song:
"Blame it all on my roots, I showed up in boots,
And ruined your black tie affair.
The last one to know, the last one to show,
I was the last one you thought you'd see there.
And I'll be okay.
I'm not big on social graces.
Think I'll slip on down to the oasis.
Oh, I've got friends in low places"
*
Chapter One
She was Madison Townsend and I'm Billy Ray Lamar.
She lived in the best part of town. I lived … to hell and gone way west of town – so far out that even bothering to give it an RFD address was optimistic. The town was Austin but to be honest she didn't actually live there. Madison lived in a mansion on Lake Travis a way's west of Austin. Her dad, Bradford, had a number of patents for computer processor chips and the chips put him in the chips … so to speak.
Now let's be clear about this: Bradford was in no way some cultured descendant of antebellum Georgia whose ancestors lived in some white mansions surrounded by moss draped Live oak trees. And maybe those non-existent, cultured southern gentlemen had non-paid workers (think slaves) to keep the cotton coming so the south could have fancy carriages and debutante balls.
Well, to be honest (I could be nothing less!) he did come from a cotton background. However, his antecedents as far back as anyone could tell were sharecroppers making a hand-to-mouth existence in the Pine Barrens of East Texas. Now ole Bradford's dad did one smart thing – he just hated fightin' off those damn boll weevils to get a cotton crop in that could new shoes for the winter. Therefore, when Uncle Sam said he needed some help for a little Police Action in Korea, he joined right up. Somehow he kept his ass from being shot off during the retreat from "Frozen Chosin" and got out to an updated GI Bill that gave him twenty-six dollars of unemployment payment for twenty-six weeks.
That plus a nice hundred and ten bucks a month for college did him right fine to get a degree at the college nearby in Beaumont that led to a scholarship at University of Texas in Austin where he eventually wound up as a professor in their Electrical Engineering department. As the electronic industry eventually got started Bradford very kindly (for small sums and founder's stock options) helped fledgling companies get started. Now I really do have to Mr. Townsend dad his due, he is one smart SOB. He helped design a processor chip called the 4004 for Texas Instruments which Intel very reluctantly picked up and turned it into the 8008 which led to the x86 processor series and made a whole bunch of people filthy rich. One of those nouveau rich was a sassy kid named Bill Gates, who eventually redefined the term rich.
Bradford's dad invested well, and when he up and left to meet his maker, good ole Bradford inherited a bundle of money he had done absolutely nothing to earn. And that lead him to feel certain that he was one important SOB. It didn't hurt his ego to have married an oil heiress from Dallas with her inherited millions.
Well, you get the idea. When a sharecropper (or his get) becomes rich you would swear that in an alternate universe, he would have been knighted by the queen. Since that didn't happen, he just acts like it and expects his daughter to marry a Prince. The Prince in this case was Thomas Martin Kendall whose lucky father was an early sales manager for Ross Perot's EDS. He was never Tom, or Tommy or even Thomas but always Thomas Martin. Thomas Martin lived in Dallas in his family's mansion. I always thought he was a pretentious jerk (I'm being kind) but then that's just me.
Anyway Madison (always Madison except for me – somehow I got away with Maddie) lived on Lake Travis. My folks lived out a few miles from LBJ's place; fact is my granddad knew him well. We had a good sized ranch on the Perdernales River northeast of Johnson City. Where we were located was on the south side of the river inside a funny loop which looks from the air just like Snoopy in profile, facing left.
We have about 2200 acres and mostly breed thoroughbred horses and registered Black Angus bulls. Lately, dad has taken about half the northern side of the property and set up a hunting business. I love to hunt but I hate to be around when other people are hunting ... they don't always know what they are doing. Therefore, we worked it for me to take over the ranching part and dad the hunting. I did okay and dad was making tons of money.
So we weren't poor and somewhere back in history lurked Mirabeau Lamar, the third president of the Republic of Texas. He was noted for wanting to keep Texas as an independent country. His vision was to expel all the Native American tribes and expand Texas to the Pacific Ocean. If he had gotten his way maybe I
would
be a high-muck-a-muck like Bradford Townsend pretended to be.
My problem wasn't that we were poor (we were actually doing quite well, thank you), but that I had no pretensions whatever. It's just that my idea of a good time was a few (well, more than a few) beers with my buddies at the nearest tavern or honky-tonk place. I wore jeans and flannel or tee shirts depending on the season and always wore Justin boots, usually either Justin's work boot or their rancher with an extra pair of their black Westerns for when I wanted to kick my heels up.
I did go to school at the prestigious Texas A&M in College Station … oh, wait, that was West Texas A&M in Canyon, Texas a few miles south of Amarillo. I majored in their Equine Industry Program, since I liked working with thoroughbreds more than bulls. It was actually a great major and supplemented nicely the years of hands-on work I had while growing up. After college, I bummed around on the professional rodeo circuit for a couple of years but finally grew out of it.
Chapter Two
I met Maddie when her dad bought four horses from us. He wanted gentle horses for Madison and her friends to ride around his ranchette – he had about twelve acres surrounding his admittedly nice mansion. I'd picked out two mares and two geldings. I was sure the two wannabe stallions had been gelded because when they were about twelve months old I'd personally watched the vet take his emasculator and … well, maybe that's too much information.
Anyway these were horses I'd personally trained and knew they would be great for anyone with even a basic level of experience. The mares were both bays, one almost brown. One of the geldings was gray and the other a glossy black. I delivered the horses myself, taking the side road around the mansion as directed. There was a large barn with stables attached on each side. There were eight stalls in each section of the stable.
Madison was waiting for me; I'd called ahead to let her know when I was down the road a piece. When I pulled up, I have to confess I sat and stared at her for a minute. She looked tall, though just how tall was hard to tell because of the expensive looking western straw hat she had on (I later found out she was a couple of inches under my six foot). Long curls of strawberry blonde hair leaked out of the hat swirling down around her shoulders (some months after that I found out she wasn't dying her hair – I mean she was naturally a strawberry blonde … in other words, oh, hell, you know what I mean).
She had a sleeveless white blouse knotted under her … well, somewhere around her navel – with a pair of very short raggedy jean shorts (in this case, there was no question why they call them
shorts
). This was all topped off –
bottomed off?
– with what looked like a pair Dan Post Genuine Deer cowgirl boots. Taken altogether it should have looked tacky, but she looked nothing short of spectacular.
I sorta fell out of the truck and almost on my face but saved my pride with a gracious introduction, "Hi. I'm Billy Ray here with the horses."
Damn, that sounded like the punch line for a very lame joke.
She smiled and answered, "Yeah, I figured that horse trailer might have some horses in it. Let's put them in this corral." She was standing in front of an open gate in the corral to the side of the stables.
I backed the trailer up and led the horses into the corral. I saw her looking at the logo on the horse trailer, "Lamar Ranch" with my folks' names underneath, "Dell & Angie Lamar". Looking at me with a funny expression on her face, she asked, "Is that your mom, Angie Lamar?"
That was about the last thing I expected her to ask. "Yeah, do you know her?"
She didn't really answer, just a short, "Mmmm." She put out her hand, and added, "I'm Madison, by the way."
I took her hand, holding it in mine for a couple of hours. Well, maybe a few seconds. I was surprised to feel the calluses on her palms. Now that I was closer I could see that she had emerald green eyes that seemed to suck the life right out of me. On the other hand, maybe I just needed a beer. "Great," I said as I walked back to open up the trailer. "Can I call you Maddie?"
Those bright green eyes turned to that pale icy green sometimes seen in glaciers, and I debated crawling under a large pile of the odoriferous stuff shoveled out of the stalls. Just in time her face lit up with a smirk, and her almond shaped eyes widened a little. "No one calls me anything but Madison, not even my parents. Why should I let you?"
Then, answering her own question, she murmured with a soft, lazy drawl, "It does have a nice ring to it. Go ahead and call me Maddie until I decide whether I like you or not. I probably won't, but we'll see."
From the look she gave me, I wasn't sure whether she was going to kiss me or kill me. I wondered whether I should press my luck and ask her to show me her hay loft … maybe not. We got the horses out of the trailer and into the corral where they romped around, loosening up after the drive. I spent a good half hour telling her about each of the horses. I carried a bitless bridle that I liked to use in training horses. One at a time I put it on one of the horses – these were all around two years old – and led them around the corral, so she could look at them.
When I finished, I said, "They are all really first rate riding horses." Out of curiosity, I added, "Which one do you like?"
She looked them over again, and answered, "The lighter colored mare is really pretty." She looked at it judiciously for a moment, adding, "Yeah, she's real pretty."
