Yellowstone - John Duttons daughter

Freight trains and monsters

"I overslept." Tate exclaimed coming out the tent, Tessa and John sat by the fire

"Yeah, well... you...  You slept. That's what matters." John tells him, Tessa on the other hand was a different story. He and John had been sitting by the fire since 3:30 that morning, Tessa finally managing to get a bit of shut eye.

Tate looked towards Tessa; "Happy Birthday!"

"Thanks Tater." Tessa smiled, unable to think of a better way to spend her day.

"14?" Tate double checks, Tessa nods

"I'm getting old, hey."

"Not as old as my." John chuckled

"Is it too late to go fishing now?" Tate asks

"Trout are like... they're like bankers." Tessa chuckled looking towards the boy, "They don't do a damn thing in the morning." John stood up taking a sip of his coffee.

"Can I try some?" Tate asks

"Nah. It'll stunt your growth." John tells him

"What does that mean?" The boy asks confused

"Means it'll make you short." Tessa replies heading towards the tent grabbing the rods.

"I'm already short." Tate shrugs

"Yeah, well, not as short as you'll be if you drink coffee." John chuckled, "Why don't you bring the net if you're planning on a big one."

"Why can't we live right here?" Tate asks grabbing the net before following them down to the creek. "Like this. All the time."

"You know, I ask myself the same thing, grandson, every day." John tells him, "Every day."

***

"Well, it doesn't matter, then, does it?" John said into the phone as he emerged from the tent. "Just get it done, okay?"

John hung up walking over to Tessa and Tate, the two of them were bobbed down by the fire, squeezing lemon into there fish.

"That's exactly how you do it. Look at you. Don't even need a chuck wagon." John smiled

"We need lemon." Tate tells his grandpa

"There's a big bag of them on the wagon."

"I'll get it." Tate says jumping up and running off.

"Aye. goddamn it." John muttered as his phone began ringing again, "Yeah? No. Not what I said. Mm-mm. Can you hear me? Hello?" John shrugged and hung up, walking back over to Tessa

"Grandpa." Tate called, "One slice or two?"

"I'd go two." John tells him

"Okay." Tate nods him and Tessa brining out a lemon to out into there fish.

"goddamn it." John shook his head his phone ringing yet again. "Yeah." He picked up

"Work follows you wherever you go, Daddy." Tessa called out, expecting him to have a break while they were out here, he definitely could use it.

"Truer words were never spoken." John agreed, "Yeah? No, the BLM transfers with the sale. They have to reapply. That's right. Hello? goddamn it." He muttered as he lost service again, working on there was no internet onto of the hill.

"Hey." John calls looking to all the wranglers, "Everything moves up here. I want everything up here. The tents. The fire. The whole goddamn everything."

Everyone quickly moves everything up the hill, The three Duttons sitting down by their tents once it was all done.

"Is this a better camp?" Tate asks

"Let's see." John pulls out his phone, no service written across the screen. "Yep, this camp is much better." He says causing Tessa to chuckle.

***

"I want my birthday like this every year." Tessa tells her dad the two of them sat by the fire, Monica had come out for the weekend as well.

"I think that can be arranged." John nods, "didn't think today would be too exciting for you."

"This is what I want my life to be like." The girl replies, "the ranch, no worries, horses, this is the way I'm raising my kids." John smiled.

"No better way to do it."

"Any more biscuits?" Tate interrupted them as he came over.

"Yeah, well, I think there's plenty." John nodded taking off the pot lid and placing one on his plate. "There you go."

"I'm gonna need more than that." Tate tells him.

"All right." John nods giving him another.

"Another one." Tate tells him, John shakes his head chuckling.

"You're just... You're just like your father." John chuckled, as Kayce sat down besides Tessa, Monica and the wranglers also came and sat around the fire with them.

"You know my wife... she used to make two Dutch ovens full of biscuits: one for your father and one for the rest of us. He'd stand right by the fire and ask his mother, "How long?" John begins to tell everyone, "And she'd say, "Five more minutes." Which just meant "soon" to my wife. It didn't mean five minutes. Didn't mean thirty minutes sometimes..."

"He'd stomp off and pout and walk away and come back and ask again and that shit would go on for an hour... And when they were finally ready, he'd take a plate of biscuits, nothing else, and he'd just go sit at the edge of the firelight with his back to us and he'd just go at it with both his hands."

"They were really good." Kayce said embarrassed as everyone laughed at the story, "Why is that funny? They were really good."

"Like a wild dog." John chuckled

After an hour of standing over that Dutch oven, she'd sit beside me, her hair a mess, smelling like smoke, madder than hell because she hated cooking those damn biscuits. And I looked at her and said, "Sweetheart, he'll eat anything you put in front of him. Just make him something else that doesn't take all night." Your mum looked at me and she said: "I know. But if I don't make 'em, I can't watch him eat them." Then she went to the tent, laid down and fell asleep."

John paused looking down, Tessa lent on his shoulder, she'd heard this story before and knew exactly what was coming up next.

"We were branding so I was up before her.
That was the last thing she ever said to me. Branding cattle on her goddamn birthday." John shook his head before standing up, walking over to his tent. Kayce stood up and followed.

Tessa let out a sigh, she couldn't recall a thing about her mum. She's seen a few photos of them together, but there wasn't one photo of all 7 Duttons together.