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THE THIRD CHAPTER OF A SEVEN PART STORY

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We didn’t so much arrive in Santa Rosa as we slipped into it.

One minute the road out of Tucumcari still carried that neon echo, that soft electric hum that clung to your bones like cigarette smoke in a closed car. The next minute—just like that—it was gone.

No fade.
No warning.
Just… gone.

“What time you got?” I asked.

Hairless didn’t look at a watch.
Didn’t look at anything else.

“Wrong question,” he said.

That had become his favorite answer.

We didn’t notice the radio at first.

That’s the thing about modern vehicles—they’re always trying to impress you. Screens glowing, menus layered like a diner breakfast, buttons that feel like they’re waiting for instructions.

The Expedition had all of it.

What it didn’t have—anymore—was control.

I reached over and tapped the screen, pulling up the audio. It flickered once, like it was deciding whether to cooperate.

Then—

Static.

Not digital.
Not clean.

Old static. The kind that sounds like dust has a voice.

Then it cleared.

🎵 “If you’re going to San Francisco… be sure to wear some flowers in your hair…” 🎵

I looked at Hairless.

“That’s not right,” I said.

He didn’t even glance over.

“Keep listening.”

The station drifted.

🎵 The Eagles — “Take It Easy” came in next, smooth as a highway at sunrise. 🎵

Then a pop, a shift—

🎵 “The night Chicago died…” — Paper Lace 🎵

I laughed once.

“Alright, somebody’s got a sense of humor.”

Another twist of the dial—except I wasn’t twisting anything.

🎵 “Come and get your love…” — Redbone 🎵

The sound filled the cabin, warm and analog, like it had weight to it.

No commercials.
No station ID.
Just… music.

“You notice something?” Hairless asked.

“What?”

“No new songs.”

I sat back.

He was right.

Nothing past a certain point.
Nothing even pretending to be modern.

“This thing cost eighty grand,” I said. “And it’s stuck in 1974.”

Hairless shrugged.

“Could be worse.”

“How?”

He nodded toward the windshield.

“Could be us.”

By the time we rolled past the edge of town again, the radio had settled into a rhythm that didn’t belong to us.

🎵 “Sweet Home Alabama…” — Lynyrd Skynyrd 🎵

That one stuck for a while.

Long enough that I stopped fighting it.

Santa Rosa sat low and quiet in the morning light, the kind of town that looked like it had been built with intention and then left to negotiate the rest on its own terms.

Except it wasn’t quiet.

Not really.

Not today.

We rolled past the first few businesses, and something didn’t line up.

Too many cars.
Too many people.
Too much… energy.

“You seeing this?” I said.

Hairless nodded once.

“Yeah,” he said. “We ain’t alone in this one.”

The Expedition felt different now. Not wrong—just… too new. Too composed. That Stone Blue Metallic paint didn’t belong in a world that still believed in carburetors—and handshakes that meant something.

I caught our reflection in a storefront window.

It looked like we were visiting.

The rest of the town looked like it was living.

We found the Sun ’n Sand Motel without trying.

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You don’t have to look hard for places like that when they’re in their prime. The sign stood tall, bright, unapologetic. The rooms were full. Curtains moved. Doors opened and shut like punctuation.

“Lot busier than last time,” I said.

Hairless stepped out of the truck, scanning the lot.

“Last time for you,” he said.

I let that go.

For now.

We didn’t check in.

Not yet.

Something in the air told me we needed to see the town first. Get our bearings. Figure out what version of Santa Rosa we’d landed in.

We headed toward the Blue Hole.

That seemed like the kind of place that didn’t care what year it was.

Turns out, it cared more than anything.

If you’ve never seen the Blue Hole, it doesn’t make sense at first.

A perfect circle of deep, impossibly blue water in the middle of New Mexico like somebody punched a hole straight down and hit something sacred.

Cold. Clear. Constant.

It doesn’t change.

Everything around it does.

And on that day?

It was alive.

Kids diving off the sides. Grown men pretending they weren’t scared. Women in swimsuits that hadn’t decided what decade they belonged to yet. Laughter. Shouting. Splashing.

No ropes.
No lifeguards worth mentioning.
No signs telling you what not to do.

“Good Lord,” I said.

Hairless just watched.

“They let folks do this?” I asked.

“They didn’t ‘let’ anything,” he said. “People just did.”

A kid launched himself from the edge, hit the water wrong, came up laughing anyway.

Another followed.

Then another.

Like the place was daring them to try.

“You fall wrong in there…” I started.

“You learn,” Hairless said.

“Or you don’t.”

He didn’t argue that.

We moved along the edge, taking it in.

That’s when I saw him.

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Rusty.

He wasn’t Rusty yet.

Not the version we knew.

No gray in the beard. Just straight red, thick and stubborn like it had something to prove. Maybe early twenties. Leaner. Meaner around the edges. Wearing a shirt that looked like it had been through a few arguments already.

And talking.

Of course he was talking.

Hands moving. Voice carrying. Telling a couple of guys exactly how the Blue Hole worked, why it mattered, and how everybody else in the country was doing it wrong.

I smiled despite myself.

“Some things don’t change,” I said.

Hairless nodded.

“Some things get louder,” he said.

We didn’t interrupt him.

Didn’t feel right.

Instead, we let him be what he was—mid-formation, already fully himself.

That’s when we heard it.

An engine.

Not just any engine.

Authority.

We turned.

And there it was.

The 1973 Mercury Montego MX rolled into view like it owned not just the road, but the idea of the road.

Medium Copper Metallic, sun-faded just enough to tell you it had seen things. Arizona Highway Patrol markings sharp against the body like they’d been applied yesterday—or thirty years ago.

TwinSonic light bar on top. Push bumper up front. Spotlights, antennas—the whole outfit.

It idled with purpose.

Not loud.

Confident.

“That,” I said quietly, “is not from around here.”

Hairless didn’t answer.

The driver stepped out.

He had the look.

Every small-town cop from every era shares it. Part authority. Part boredom. Part curiosity about things that don’t quite fit.

Which, at that moment, included us.

He walked over slow.

Measured.

Eyes on Hairless first.

Then me.

Then the Expedition.

“Morning,” he said.

“Morning,” I replied.

“You boys lost?”

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Hairless smiled just enough to make it unclear whether it was friendly.

“Depends,” he said.

The cop shifted his weight.

“This vehicle,” he said, nodding toward the Expedition, “doesn’t match anything I got on file.”

“That a problem?” I asked.

“It might be.”

Hairless stepped forward.

Not aggressive.
Not passive.
Just… forward.

“You got a lot of things that don’t match right now,” he said.

The cop frowned.

“Excuse me?”

Hairless leaned in just enough.

“Not only are you from the wrong time period,” he said, calm as a man ordering coffee, “you’re from the wrong state.”

The cop blinked.

“This is New Mexico,” Hairless continued. “Not Arizona.”

A beat.

Two.

Then—

The cop looked around.

Really looked.

At the Blue Hole.
At the crowd.
At the sky.

And something shifted.

“…My bad,” he said, almost to himself. “I missed my exit and wound up in the wrong story.”

I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding.

The cop straightened, tipped his hat, and walked back to the Montego like none of it needed explaining.

He got in.

The engine idled once more.

Then the car pulled away.

Just like that.

No ticket.
No report.
No record.

“Did that just happen?” I asked.

Hairless nodded.

“Yeah,” he said. “Happens more than you’d think.”

We stood there a moment longer.

The Blue Hole carried on like nothing had interrupted it.

Rusty was still talking.

Kids were still diving.

The world hadn’t noticed.

But something had shifted.

Again.

“Let’s get something to eat,” I said.

Hairless didn’t argue.

We passed the drive-in on the way back toward the motel.

Not one of those sad, half-dead ones you see now with weeds growing through memory.

This one was alive.

Packed.

Cars lined up like they had somewhere better to be but had decided this was good enough.

The marquee stood tall, letters uneven but proud:

NOW SHOWING
THE GODFATHER PART II
CHINATOWN
YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN

I slowed the Expedition.

“Now that,” I said, “is a lineup.”

Hairless leaned forward, squinting.

“You ever see Godfather II in a drive-in?” he asked.

“No.”

“Different experience.”

“How?”

“You don’t hear everything.”

“That seems like a problem.”

He shook his head.

“Not if you already know what matters.”

We idled there a second longer.

Families unloading lawn chairs. Teenagers pretending they weren’t there for the movie. Kids already half-asleep in back seats.

A speaker box hung off the driver’s window of a ’72 Chevy Impala like it had been doing that job since birth.

No Bluetooth.
No streaming.
Just wires and intention.

“Think about that,” I said. “Three movies like that… same night.”

“People had attention spans back then,” Hairless said.

“Or fewer options.”

“Same thing.”

Joseph’s Bar & Grill didn’t advertise itself.

Didn’t need to.

It sat there like it had always been there and always would be, serving whoever walked through the door with enough appetite and not too many questions.

We stepped inside.

Cooler air.
Dimmer light.
The smell of food that didn’t try to impress you.

Just fed you.

We took a booth.

Ordered without much discussion.

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“Feels real,” I said.

Hairless nodded.

“Most things do,” he said. “Until they don’t.”

“You ever gonna explain any of this?”

He looked at me.

Really looked.

“You want an explanation,” he said, “or you want the truth?”

I leaned back.

“Those different things?”

“Usually.”

I let that sit.

The food came.

We ate.

Outside, the world kept moving.

Inside, time felt like it had decided to take a seat and watch us for a while.

On the way back to the motel, we passed the Blue Hole again.

Still full.
Still loud.
Still dangerous.

Exactly the way it was supposed to be.

At the Sun ’n Sand, the Expedition looked like it had been waiting for us.

Patient.
Unchanged.
Unbothered.

I ran a hand along the hood.

“Funny thing,” I said. “We’re the ones moving… and somehow we’re the ones staying the same.”

Hairless opened his door.

“Speak for yourself,” he said.

That night, Santa Rosa settled into something quieter.

Not calm.

Just… less loud about what it was doing.

I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening to the faint sounds of a town that didn’t belong to me.

Or maybe it did.

Just not yet.

Hairless was right about one thing.

Some people don’t change.

Rusty was Rusty.

Even then.

Same fire. Same certainty.

Just fewer miles on him.

Others…

They get older around the edges.

Wear their time like a coat that doesn’t quite fit anymore.

And some—

Some end up in the wrong story altogether.

Somewhere out there, that Mercury Montego was still running.

Still looking for the right road.

Or the right year.

Or the right version of itself.

Because the road didn’t care.
It never did.
It just kept going.

And now—

So did we.

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