Brother Bob of Second Baptist Church, Fort Stockton, Texas, had always believed the Good Lord worked in mysterious ways. But he didn’t expect Him to come roaring back into his life in the form of a chopped, low-slung, barely legal 1951 Mercury Eight Coupe that looked like it belonged at a moonshine derby more than a church picnic.
“Surprise!” Deacon Wally called out as the flatbed trailer pulled into the church lot one sunny Sunday after service. The Mercury rolled off the ramps with a defiant growl that rattled the stained glass and made three widows cross themselves out of habit. “Your flock’s been busy. We took up a collection. Even Miss Francine gave up her Mary Kay commission.”
Brother Bob just stood there in his pressed khakis and Rockport loafers, jaw slack. “I—I don’t know what to say.”
“Well, you can start with ‘hallelujah,’” Wally grinned. “Flathead V8 rebuilt, transmission’s tight, brakes stop when asked—most of the time. Earl at Salvage and Formalwear found the body, patched up the cancer, and threw a Mexican blanket over the seat. Needs a little TLC, but hey, so do we all.”
Bob ran his hand along the matte black fender, fingers trailing over the ripples like a man tracing old regrets. “She’s chopped?”
“Three inches. Just like your old one back in the day. And we know about the girl at the drive-in. Cheryl Lynn.”
Brother Bob turned beet red. “How in the name of holy biscuits do you—”
“Lucinda told us,” Wally shrugged. “She’s got a memory like an elephant with a phone book.”
Three days later, Brother Bob pulled into the Grounds for Divorce like he was late to his own sermon. The Mercury let out a raspy idle as he parked it between Delgado’s van and Hairless B29’s Impala. He strolled in, aviator shades on, collar starched, and the smug grin of a man who’d just test-drove his youth.
Angus looked up from his scrambled eggs. “Well I’ll be dipped in diesel and baptized backwards. If it ain’t Brother Bob in a bulletproof bad idea.”
Lucinda cocked a hip, pouring him a mug of Sumatra dark roast. “You better not be coming in here to confess, ‘cause I ain’t listening till I finish this crossword.”
“I’m not here to confess,” Bob said, settling in. “I’m here to testify. She runs like a blessing and corners like temptation.”
“That seat still smell like sin?” Angus asked.
“Only when the windows fog up.”
That weekend, Brother Bob had the inspired—if slightly misguided—notion to drive the Mercury up on the lawn of Second Baptist during the youth revival. The band was tuning up, the fog machine borrowed from the high school theater department was wheezing, and the inflatable bounce castle had already claimed a toddler and a deacon’s dignity.
He parked it front and center, climbed up on the hood like he was at a tent revival in Lubbock, and raised his arms.
“This here’s a story,” he shouted. “Not just steel and rubber and rust—but the story of a man lost, and found. Rebuilt. Redeemed!”
Half the crowd clapped.
The other half reached for their phones, convinced this might be the moment their preacher lost his salvation and his medical coverage.
But just as he was about to roll into the altar call, a low voice cut through the air like a razor on a balloon.
“Well, well. If it isn’t Robert Gene Miller.”
He froze. That voice could only belong to one woman.
She stepped out from the crowd, red lipstick, cat-eye shades, and a Virginia Slim burning like a fuse. Cheryl Lynn. Forty years older, none the wiser, and still dressed like rebellion in high heels.
“I figured this was your doing,” she said, tapping ash onto the church lawn. “No one else would put a pulpit on a Mercury.”
Lucinda, from the snack table, muttered, “This is about to get good.”
Brother Bob cleared his throat. “Cheryl Lynn… this is a youth rally.”
“Then you better pray these kids learn what not to do by watching you.”
She sauntered up to the Mercury and patted the roof. “You remember what we did in the back seat of this car?”
“I was hoping you didn’t.”
“Well, I do. And so does this car. It creaks the same way when you lean on it.”
The kids stared. A few cheered. One girl whispered, “This is better than TikTok.”
Pastor Peterson arrived from the Almost United Methodist tent and stared at the scene. “Do y’all need a second opinion? Or maybe an exorcism?”
Back at the Grounds that night, Brother Bob nursed a root beer and his pride while Lucinda passed him a warm brownie.
“Don’t worry, preacher,” she said. “We all got a Cheryl Lynn. Some of us just didn’t try to preach on the hood while she was still in town.”
Bob chuckled. “She said the Mercury still creaks the same way.”
“Well,” Lucinda winked, “so do most of us.”
Angus raised his mug. “To the ghosts of good times. May they never find your address.”
And Brother Bob, still flushed, still smiling, leaned back and looked out at the Mercury under the café lights. Maybe he didn’t need to outrun his past. Maybe just parking it right where he could see it was enough.
6 responses to “THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MERCURY”
First, his tax avoidance scheme involving The Scuttlebutt, now this.
Why am I begging to think that Brother Bob and Mayor Goodman may be related?
Is this Fort Stockton’s vague analogy to Jimmy Swaggart and Jerry Lee Lewis?
I am reminded of two of my favorite deep thinking philosophers. First, James Madison, who said, “I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.”
And George Carlin, who noted, “I’m completely in favor of the separation of Church and State. My idea is that these two institutions screw us up enough on their own, so both of them together is certain death.”
Madison had the best interests of the country in mind. Carlin was foretelling Brother Bob and Mayor Goodman. Or, maybe Jimmy and Jerry Lee. I’m not sure.
Recalling my long since passed along ride, the sound of my 1950 Mercury Monterey (James Dean) coupe, bone stock except for a pair of “Glass-Pak” mufflers, either accelerating – or backing down in 2nd gear –
that flathead V-8 sound was, and still is a reminder of times too long gone, and best not to be revealed.
Thanks for the ride and the memories, Captain-my-Captain.
By the way, the photo of Brother Bob standing on the fender – he really seems to have put his foot in it (especially his left?).
I figured that it was the Captain’s way of letting us know that Brother Bob is still light on his feet.
Or, more likely, had one foot in his mouth, as is often the case.
Ahhh, Captain. You so often give us a peep hole into the real Texas. And I don’t mean Plano or River Oaks. I used to call it the State of Hypocrisy. Bro Bob is iconic. Thank you!