*************

    “It must be here somewhere,” I said, opening cupboard doors and looking under rugs.  “He would not have put that in the will unless he thought you would know where to find it.”

    “I can’t think of anywhere else to look,” Bo said, the frustration obvious in his voice.  “We’ve opened everything in this room, we’ve looked in every container, we’ve moved every piece of furniture.  I don’t know where else to look.”  His eyes filled with tears.  “He thought I’d know what he meant, and I have failed him...”  He sank down onto one of the hides on the floor.  A tear rolled down his cheek and dropped onto the fur beneath him.  “I just don’t know what he meant.  I feel so dumb.”

    I sat down beside him and put an arm around his shoulders.  “It’s OK.  A lot of times what seems crystal clear to one person is clear as mud to another.  Shoot, my students prove that to me every day!  If we don’t find the key, we’ll find another way to open the safe deposit box.”

    “ ‘I’ll find it if I use my head.’   I’m thinking as hard as I can, and I just don’t get what he was talking about.”

    It was nearing noon, and the hogan was hot.  “Can we get some more air through here?” I asked.

    “Yeah, sure.  There’s a window over there, but it’s shuttered from the outside.  I’ll open it.”  He got up and went outside.  After a couple of thuds and grunts and “shit!’s,” light appeared, and Bo’s face.  “This thing is such a pain, and it’s heavy.”  He held up a top-hinged wooden shutter, and then ducked his head under and used it to support the thing while he struggled to place a couple of boards underneath as props. 

    I laughed at his awkward efforts.  “That’s using the old noggin!”  I said.

    He froze, and his mouth dropped open.  “That’s what he meant!  Yes!  He always used to say that to me when I opened this shutter.  ‘That’s using your head, Bo!’ he’d always say.  It was our private joke.”  He started checking out the window frame, and in moments yelled, “Here it is!  I found it!!”  He raced back inside with the key, “563” engraved on it.

    “Uncle would be proud of you,” I told him

   

    At the bank, we waited while the clerk matched our key with his, and then he gave us the box.  We entered the privacy cubicle and set it on the counter.

    “I’m afraid to open it,” Bo said.  “You do it.”

    “OK,” I said.  “Here goes.”  I opened the lid, and we looked at a couple rolls of coins on top of several layers of folded documents.

    “He put two rolls of quarters in here?” Bo asked, puzzled.  “Why would he do that?”

    “Not quarters, Bo.  Gold pieces.  I think each one of these is probably worth about four hundred dollars, and it looks like these are both rolls of twenty-five.  So that’s, what...  Holy shit, Bo!  That’s twenty thousand dollars!”

    “No way!  Lemme see.”  He counted and multiplied, and agreed with me.

    “What else is in here?”  I moved the coins and lifted the first document out.  “Deed” proclaimed the cover of the blue folder.  Inside, I found an address of property on the most historic street in Boulder.  “Bo, your uncle owned property in town.”

    And not just one, but many.  We lifted deed after deed out of the box, and slowly it dawned on us that Uncle had owned a lot of property.  We dug down further, and found stock certificates and tax-free bonds.  The latter had long ago matured and were worth a small fortune now.

    “Bo, your uncle was rich.  And now, so are you,” I told him.  “Are you gonna be able to associate with us poor folks?”

    He looked at me as if I’d struck him, and his eyes filled.  “Do you think I’d let money get between you and me?” he demanded, insult in his words.

    “Bo, I was teasing,” I told him.  “Come on now, you know how much I love you.  Don’t you?”

    “I’m sorry, Doc.  I guess I was just overwhelmed by all this.  I’m sorry I got mad.”

    “And I’m sorry I upset you,” I said.  “Are we OK?”  He responded with a bear hug.

    We took the contents of the box back to Lyn, and after she had done a rough inventory and value assessment, it appeared that Bo was worth about 2.3 million dollars, give or take a few hundred thousand.  Of course, he could not touch it, except for a living allowance, until he was 21.  I was actually pleased with the last, for I was worried that his inheritance might make it appear that I wanted to adopt him for because of the money.   Lyn assured me that that would not be a consideration.  “The court will set up a trust fund, from which Bo’s guardian will be able to draw specific living expenses, but will not be available for any other purpose,” she told me.  “So it should not impact on your eventual adoption.”

    We left the lock box contents in her office safe and returned home.  Bo was unusually quiet on the drive home.  Something was bothering him.

    “What’s on your mind,” I asked him as we got dinner together.  “You’ve been very quiet since we left Lyn’s.”

    “Yeah,”  he said.  “I guess.”

    “So, are you gonna let me in on it, or do I have to pry it out of you?”

    “Well, I dunno.  I just don’t feel good about all this money.”

    “What don’t you feel good about?”

    “Well, if Uncle had all that money, why did he live the way he did? Why didn’t he fix the roof where it leaked?  Why didn’t he buy himself a decent air conditioner?  Why didn’t he ever tell me?  And how did he get all that money in the first place?  I don’t know.  It just bothers me.”

    “Bo,” I said, putting down the chopping knife and turning to him.  “Your uncle’s money and how he got it and how much there is should not be your concern now.  We’ll let the lawyers figure all that out.  What’s important is that you and I are together now legally.  What’s important is that your uncle loved you enough to provide for you after he was gone.  What’s important is that you and Cory and I are going to build a new life together.  Don’t bother your brain with things that you have no control over.”  I pulled him to me and hugged him fiercely.  “And if anyone ever tries to take you away from me, they’ll have a major fight on their hands.  Do you understand?”

    Bo shuddered a bit in my arms, and I could feel a few sobs returning.  I pushed him briefly away and looked into his face.  Tears glistened on his cheeks, but he was again beaming.  I looked into his eyes.  “I love you, Bo.  That’s all that matters.  I love you.”  And I pulled him close again.

    “I love you too, Doc, “ he said into my chest.  “Almost as much as I love Uncle.”

    No greater compliment could he have given me.

    After dinner, Bo watched some TV while I read some student papers.  He soon lost interest in the inane sitcoms and clicked off the set.  He looked at the papers on my lap.  “Can I read too?” he asked.

    “Sure, why not?  Some of these are actually good.”  He read the top one for awhile, and then pointed out an error I had not marked.  “I’m not marking these for technical errors; I’m just looking at content and organization.  But you’re right.  She used the wrong word there.”

    “And there, and there, and there,” he added.  “This one is pretty sad, isn’t it?”

    “Yeah, it is.  She’s not likely to win the Nobel Prize for literature.  Hopefully, we’ll get her up to semi-OK, and she’ll meet the minimums.  Everybody has their talents, and writing is not hers.  Let’s look at another one.”  And so we passed the evening, Bo helping me mark papers, making insightful and accurate observations about the drafts.  It surely made the generally irksome task more tolerable.

    I put the papers aside.  “You’ve got quite an eye for writing.  You said once that you liked to write.  Would you like to show me some of your stuff?”  He blushed and dropped his head and shook it.  “Why not?  I’ll bet you’re pretty good.  I’ll help you, if you want.”

    “Nah, you’d probably laugh.”

    “I promise not to laugh,” I said.

    “Promise?”

    “Promise.” 

    “OK.  They’re on my hard drive.”  We went  into his room and he booted up his computer.  “I guess you can read this one,” he said.  “I think it’s about my best.”

    I read the first line and was immediately impressed.  “Ricardo’s Story” was the title, and the first paragraph grabbed my attention:

It seemed like I was always hard when I was 13.  I woke up hard in the morning  I usually got hard again during first period.  During the day, if I had to give an oral report in class, I got a hard-on.  If I had to take a shower after PE class, I was hard.  If I was sitting down listening to instructions in the gym, when I got up I had a boner poking out of my jock strap.  But especially, when I went to Mr. J’s class, I ALWAYS got hard. 

“Bo, this is a great start!  Show me more.”  So he scrolled through the rest of the story for me, a boarding school fantasy told through a 13-year old’s eyes.  It was an excellent story, and it was hot.  “Your dialogues sound like real people, and your sex scenes are dynamite.  You've got a real talent for writing.  This is better than most of my college students.”

    “You mean it? Really?  You’re not just saying it to make me feel good?”

    “I really mean it.  And I think we should think about developing your talent.  Maybe you could sit in on some of the college writing classes.  I’ve been thinking that I’d like you to come to campus with me on school days anyway.  What do you think?”

    “I think... I think I’ll think about that tomorrow.”  He yawned, and shifted himself onto my lap.  “Let’s see if my story is physically possible.”  He lifted my hand to his crotch, and I felt his slender hard-on under his new shorts.  I slipped my hand inside and felt his velvet hardness.  His hand was wandering into mine as well.   I stood up with him in my arms, and moved us to the bed.  “Did I do anything bad today, Daddy?  I mean, was what we did in school all right?” he asked, shifting into the story he had written, sitting in my lap again. 

    “Oh, you were very bad.  Horrible, in fact,” I answered gravely, following the script from his story as best as I could.  “I think I am going to have to punish you.  How about ten lashes with a wet noodle?”

    “We ran out of noodles,” he said.

    “Oh, yeah, I forgot.  So I guess I’ll have to spank you instead.  Turn over.”

    He lay across my knees, and I started to pull his shorts down.  He raised his hips so I could pull the crisp new shorts down.  His erect prick pressed against my thigh.  I ran my hands over his skinny little butt, and he squirmed a little.  I gave him a gentle tap, and then another, and then returned to exploring his cheeks.  I followed his cleft to his balls, and played with them for awhile, and then gave him a slap, a bit sharper this time.  I returned to his thighs, and delivered another slap on his butt, firm but not hard.  I continued alternating gentle caressing with not-too-serious spanking.  His cheeks were a little red, and Bo was beginning to make spasmodic thrusts against me.  I told him to sit up and helped him turn around.  “Have you learned your lesson, young man?” I asked.

    “I’ll take lessons from you any time,” he replied, sticking close to his story line.

    “Would you like to learn how to do something nice for me?”

“Anything,” he said.

“OK, first unzip me,” I instructed him.  He did so and immediately took my own hard-on in his hand; I had no underwear on to deal with either.  “Now help me get these shorts off.”  Then I leaned back against the headboard and maneuvered his head down so he was resting on my stomach.  “Do you know what a ‘blow job’ is?” I asked him.

“I’ve heard some of the boys talk about getting them from the sixth graders , but I’m not sure what they are,” he answered, playing his story out perfectly.

“Blow jobs are one of the nicest things guys can do for each other,” I told him, guiding his head towards mine.  “Take my penis and lick it, just like you’re eating an ice cream cone...”    He explored my rock hard prick with his delicate tongue, leaving no nerve unstimulated.  He moved from the tip all the way down the shaft and licked every square centimeter of my balls, and then returned to the throbbing head.  He took it fully in his mouth, his wet lips eagerly encasing the head like his mouth was made for my dick.  I held his head in both hands, guiding him up and down as I began to thrust into his face.  He was sucking hard, and licking me at the same time, and then suddenly I was shooting the cum I had been building up all day for him into his waiting mouth.  It was an incredible orgasm.  Wave after wave shot into his perfect lips;  it was too much for him to swallow it all, and some of it leaked out and dribbled down his chin.  I wiped a blob of it off his face and showed it to him.  “Do you know what this is?”  I asked him, pulling him up to the pillow.

“No,” he replied, “but I sure like it!  That was awesome -- can we do it again?”  And he took my hand and licked it clean.

I laughed and said, “Not so fast -- I need time to recuperate!  You were pretty awesome yourself.  Besides, it’s your turn now.”  I turned him onto his back, his stiff prick ramrod straight above his smooth tummy.  “I suspect it’s time for your first time.”  And with that, I turned my attention to unleashing his manhood.  It didn’t take long; he had been building up all day too, and his pubescent body was ready.  I took his young rod in my mouth, relishing his sweet taste.  My tongue caressed his solid shaft, moving from tip to base, flicking lightly over his bulging balls, and then back to the top.  As I licked and sucked and took his five inches into my mouth, he began almost involuntary pelvic thrusts.  I rode his enthusiasm like a bucking horse, synchronizing my own motions with his.  His slender body gave a sudden jerk, and I could feel him trembling beneath me as his pelvis arched upward again and again, moving in total submission to instinct.  He came, shooting strong streams of boycum into my waiting mouth.  I  sucked him dry, and he lay panting, still trembling a bit, shiny with sweat. 

“You are one incredible kid,” I told him, stroking his hair gently.  

“You’re the best teacher in the world,” he answered, and then after a pause, added,  “I wish you could be my father.”

    “I can be, soon,” I told him, returning from his story to reality.  “In the meantime, we’ll just have to pretend.”  I pulled the cover from his bed up from where it had been pushed aside, and covered us both.

     We slept that night in his bed, secure in each other’s arms.