Gwendy’s Final Task

“That’s quite a story.” He glances over at the closet where the LockMaster 3000 is busy doing its thing. “But since we have time, why not?” He props his feet up on the coffee table and crosses his arms behind his head, like he’s back home in his MetLife Stadium skybox watching the Giants and the Eagles square off on a Sunday afternoon. “In October of 2024 I was in St. Louis for my father’s funeral …”

40

THE NAME OF THE funeral home is Broadview & Sons, and once he signs off on the bill, Gareth Winston beats feet out of there. Winston hates funeral homes. Almost as much as he hated his father.

It was the oldest story in the book—nothing the devoted son accomplished was ever enough to please the overly critical father with the razor-sharp tongue, so at some point, the son simply stopped trying.

Lawrence Winston III, also known as dear old Dad, made his piddling fortune selling commercial real estate and collecting rent checks on almost five hundred two- and three-bedroom apartments in a string of downtown high-rises. In the late ‘80s, a reporter from The St. Louis Post-Dispatch referred to the senior Winston as “a parttime slumlord and full-time scumbag.” When Gareth banked his first billion at age 33, the first thing he did was Fed-Ex his father a photocopy of that newspaper article and a handwritten note on company stationary:

I still can’t hit a curveball or a two iron. I still don’t have an Ivy League diploma. I’m overweight. And I’m still not married to a beautiful Catholic virgin from across the river. But I’m filthy-ass rich and you’re not. Have a miserable fucking life.

Gareth

And then he never spoke to the man again.

Not even when his father called to make amends from his deathbed.

The hard truth of the matter is if it weren’t for his mother—whom Winston still adores and makes a point of calling every Sunday night, no matter where he is in the world; a tradition that first began after Winston left home for college—he wouldn’t have even come home for the funeral, much less footed the bill. But she begged him over the telephone, and if there is one person in this world Winston can’t refuse, it’s his mother. Corny but true.