---

By the fall of 1975, Scott Williams had outgrown the Cotton Picker, outgrown the Freewheelers, and—if you asked him—outgrown just about everything that didn’t come with an ignition key. His friends called him Scooter now, though some said it with respect and others with a smirk. The name stuck, whether he liked it or not.

The white Schwinn was retired to the garage, resting against a cracked plastic bin filled with deflated basketballs and old holiday lights. He wouldn’t be caught dead riding it to school. Being driven in the new Ford Country Squire his dad had bought back in June was worse. The faux-wood panels, oversized nose, and tailgate that never opened right earned it the nickname “The County Square.” Scott used it only as a last resort, climbing into the back with exaggerated reluctance, headphones on, muttering something about freedom and dignity.

He had let his hair grow longer than his parents were comfortable with. His mom called it shaggy. His dad called it ridiculous. But neither pushed too hard. They’d learned to pick their battles. They didn’t yet know the war was almost over.

Ricky Ledbetter had changed. They didn’t talk much anymore. Ricky started hanging around a group of older kids who smoked in the drainage ditch behind the middle school and always seemed just one stare away from a fight. Scooter never asked what had happened to Ricky’s Pea Picker. He figured it didn’t matter.

Puberty hit like a slow-motion haymaker. Scooter didn’t understand half of what was going on in his body, his brain, or his locker. He tried football, mostly to find his place. His parents came to every game, sat through every quarter, even though Scooter never played a single down. He stood on the sidelines, helmet crooked, watching dust hang in the stadium lights. Every whistle sounded like a warning.

Bondo had been slowing for years. By Thanksgiving, he was mostly deaf, fully gray, and slept more than he walked. The vet gave them the talk. Scooter sat in the back of the clinic when it happened, staring at the chart on the wall that showed the skeletal system of a golden retriever. Bondo wasn’t even purebred, but the bones were close enough. They buried him under the mesquite tree in the backyard. Scooter carved his name into a flat stone with a screwdriver.

He didn’t cry that day. He just didn’t talk much for the next three.

The Mustang arrived like a lifeline.

It came from a used car lot outside of Odessa, listed in the Stockton Telegram-Dispatch classifieds. His dad spotted the ad and asked if he wanted to go take a look. Scooter tried to play it cool, but his heart felt like a loose spark plug.

What they found wasn’t much to look at.

A 1967 Ford Mustang GT convertible, once proud, now baked by sun and time. It wore what was left of its Acapulco Blue paint like an old man wears a faded denim jacket—tired but familiar. The hood was green, a mismatched replacement. The convertible top was missing, leaving only the frame like a forgotten ribcage. Rust bloomed on the floor pans, and corrosion peeked through at the corners of the fenders. Still, it sat low and lean, wheels trimmed in chrome, Shelby center caps just cocky enough to make Scooter’s pulse jump.

The interior smelled like mice and motor oil. The bucket seats had been re-trimmed in two-tone blue vinyl, still soft in the center. The dash pad was cracked like a riverbed. The carpet was worn down to threads. But the Hurst shifter stood tall and sure in the center console, like a sword waiting to be drawn.

The Mustang had left Dearborn with an S-code 390ci V8, but the one under the hood now had come from a ’68 Mercury Cougar GT. The air conditioning was long gone. The speedometer was stuck at 36 mph, the tach needle forever hovering just above 1,000. It wasn’t showroom. It wasn’t even street-ready. But it was his.

His dad covered the balance after Scooter handed over every dime he’d earned working weekends at Rusty Hammer Hardware. Rusty paid in crumpled bills and advice Scooter didn’t ask for, but sometimes needed.

They trailered the Mustang home, parked it in the garage, and opened the hood before they even went inside. His dad looked ten years younger holding a socket wrench.

“It’s rough,” he said.

Scooter nodded. “So am I.”

They worked through the winter.

Weeknights were for cleaning, cataloging, sanding. Saturdays were for real wrench work. Rusty dropped off parts, old shop manuals, and one time, a headlight switch from a 1970 Torino that he claimed was “close enough.” Scooter started to learn by doing. Replacing hoses, brushing out corrosion, learning the intimate patience of bolt threads.

There were arguments. Plenty. But more often there were long silences that didn’t feel empty. They weren’t just building a car. They were patching something between them that had started to fray. It wasn’t sudden. It wasn’t spoken. But it was real.

In those long hours, elbow-deep in rust and grease, they began to understand each other again. His dad would share stories—about rebuilding his first carburetor, about chasing his mom in a ’58 Chevy Biscayne, about the first time he spun out on bald tires. Scooter listened, surprised by how much he liked hearing it. By how much he liked him.

Music played in the garage constantly. Sometimes it was his dad’s Merle or Willie. Other times, it was Zeppelin, Boston, or Bad Company—Scooter’s cassettes, always playing too loud. The little transistor radio on the bench buzzed with news: Carter was campaigning, Saigon had fallen, gas prices were going up again. Nobody knew what to believe anymore. Except maybe in the healing power of a V8.

In Life Science class, he sat next to Janice Jones.

She had braces and dimples and called him “Scoot,” which he pretended to hate but secretly liked. She lived a few streets over in RoadRunner Estates and had known him since second grade, though they’d never talked much until that semester.

Now they talked all the time. Janice was funny, sharp, always ready with a comeback. She could out-answer him in science class and out-argue him at lunch. She didn’t just like the Mustang—she understood why he liked it.

She asked about his car. He told her everything.

One day she showed up while he was sanding the rear quarter panel and handed him a cherry Slush Puppie from the Eggs & Ammo. She sat on the garage step while he worked, and after a while, she didn’t talk much either. Sometimes she brought cookies from her mom’s kitchen, or old cassettes she thought he’d like. He played them, pretending to evaluate the music, while mostly watching her tap her foot.

By spring, he asked her out. She said yes like it was obvious.

They became inseparable. She brought him mixtapes. He walked her home from school. They spent Saturday afternoons in the Mustang—still gutted and half-rusted—talking about everything and nothing.

She was the first person to call him out when he was being dumb. The first person to say he had talent. The first person to kiss him, slow and unsure, under the soft light of the street light out front.

He couldn’t tell which changed him more: the car or the girl.

Maybe it didn’t matter.

They got the Mustang running two weeks before the school year ended. It wasn’t pretty. The top was still missing. The dash lights didn’t work. But the 390 roared like it had something to prove.

Scooter eased it down the block with his dad riding shotgun. The gears caught. The engine pulled. The wind rolled over them like a wave. They laughed when the brakes squeaked. They didn’t talk much, but the silence was the good kind.

Janice was waiting at the corner. Scooter dropped his dad off at the driveway and headed down to the corner.

He pulled up, leaned over the gearshift, and said, “You ready?”

She climbed in without asking where they were going.

As the Mustang turned the corner, Scooter glanced in the rearview.

His dad stood in the driveway, hands on hips, smiling like he knew how far they’d both just traveled.

For the first time in a long time, Scooter smiled back.

The Cotton Picker still leaned in the garage, dust-covered but not forgotten.

It had gotten him started.

But this?

This was the ride forward.

And he wasn’t about to look back.

---

---