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There are few moments in a man’s life when he can reasonably expect his family to come running out of the house simply because he has arrived.

Roy Wells believed Thursday, July 24, 1975, was going to be one of them.

Seven weeks earlier, Roy had walked into Frontier Ford-Lincoln-Mercury, Home of the Straight Shootin’ Deal, and ordered what he regarded as the culmination of eighteen years of responsible adulthood: a brand-new 1975 Ford LTD six-passenger station wagon.

Not a Country Squire.

Roy had been quite firm about that.

He had nothing against simulated woodgrain personally, but he did not believe a man ought to pay Ford Motor Company several hundred dollars to make a perfectly good automobile resemble the den at his brother-in-law’s house.

The LTD wagon was dignity enough.

It was also enormous.

This was 1975, when Detroit had not yet received word that the automobile might someday be expected to fit inside a garage. The LTD stretched more than eighteen feet from its chrome front bumper to its three-way Magic Doorgate and weighed enough that Roy suspected the Texas Highway Department ought to have been consulted before he brought it home.

Underneath the hood was Ford’s 400-cubic-inch V8, which in one of the great mysteries of the Malaise Era managed to turn nearly seven liters of displacement into 170 horsepower.

Roy did not care.

Horsepower was for people who did not have children.

Roy had three.

What he needed was acreage.

The LTD had it.

Front bench seat. Rear bench seat. A cargo compartment behind that large enough to accommodate groceries, Little League equipment, suitcases, sleeping bags, a Coleman stove, two ice chests and whatever object one of the Wells children had insisted upon bringing along despite Rhonda specifically telling them not to.

Beneath the cargo floor was even a lockable storage compartment.

Roy wasn’t sure what he intended to lock in there.

He simply liked knowing he could.

The final price was $6,280, which Roy had stared at for several seconds before signing the papers because that was more money than his father had paid for the house Roy grew up in. Frontier Ford gave him $1,481 for the family’s 1968 Chevrolet, leaving a figure Roy preferred not to contemplate in its entirety.

But he had ordered the Ford exactly the way he wanted it.

Almost.

Roy was color-blind.

Consequently, the final color consultation had taken place at the Wells kitchen table with Rhonda, a Ford sales brochure and the sort of marital diplomacy normally reserved for deciding whether relatives would be allowed to stay more than three nights.

“That one,” Roy had said.

“That’s brown.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.”

Eventually Rhonda selected Dark Yellow Green Metallic, color code 4V, over a Medium Green vinyl interior. Roy liked what he could see of it, Rhonda assured him the combination looked handsome, and the order was placed.

After that, only Roy and Rhonda knew.

That was the important part.

The children weren’t told. The neighbors weren’t told. Roy didn’t mention it at work. Rhonda was sworn to secrecy under marital oath, and for seven weeks the Wells family continued driving the Chevrolet while somewhere in Ford’s enormous manufacturing machinery their last great family station wagon was being assembled.

Roy had imagined the homecoming at least fifty times.

He would turn onto RoadRunner Estates.

One of the children would spot him.

The screen door would fly open.

Rhonda would come outside.

Then the neighbors would begin appearing.

That was simply what happened when somebody brought home a new car in 1975.

People came outside.

They didn’t need invitations.

A new automobile in the neighborhood was public business.

Men inspected the engine. Women inspected the upholstery. Children climbed into every available seating position. Somebody asked what it cost. Somebody else asked what they gave you for your trade. At least one neighbor immediately told you about somebody he knew who owned the same model and had transmission trouble.

It was ceremony.

Roy intended to enjoy every minute of it.

The call from Roger at Frontier Ford came Thursday morning.

“She’s here.”

Roy left work early.

He found the LTD gleaming beneath the dealership awning, and for several seconds simply stood there looking at it.

It was magnificent.

Dark Yellow Green Metallic stretched over an expanse of sheet metal roughly equivalent to a municipal park. Chrome surrounded the windows and traced the body. The rear quarter panels extended toward that huge tailgate with the quiet confidence of an aircraft carrier.

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Roger opened the driver’s door.

Medium Green vinyl.

Roy slid behind the wheel.

Air conditioning.

Power rear window.

C6 automatic.

Front disc brakes.

Three-way Magic Doorgate.

“Opens like a tailgate,” Roger explained, “or swings open like a door.”

Roy nodded.

He had known this for seven weeks.

He had nevertheless been waiting seven weeks for someone to demonstrate it.

Roger lowered the power rear window.

Then he opened the tailgate downward.

Then he closed it, operated the handle differently, and swung the entire thing sideways.

Roy smiled.

“Do that again.”

Roger did.

There were technological advances that changed civilization. Electricity. Penicillin. Flight.

And there was Ford’s three-way Magic Doorgate.

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Roy wasn’t prepared to rank them.

The only disagreement concerned the wheels.

The wagon had been delivered with polished full wheel covers, which Roy had immediately ordered removed.

Roger looked puzzled.

“You paid for those.”

“I know.”

“And you don’t want them?”

“I want the dog dishes.”

Roger glanced toward the service department.

“The little hubcaps?”

“All the way around.”

“Roy, those full covers look nice.”

“They’ll look nice until Rhonda parks it.”

Roger wisely recognized the boundary between automobile sales and marriage counseling.

The dog dish hubcaps went on.

Roy walked around the Ford again.

Perfect.

He checked his watch.

He had expected to be home twenty minutes ago.

Then the finance manager asked whether he had considered undercoating.

Roy had not.

The finance manager believed he should.

Roy pointed out that Fort Stockton averaged about eleven inches of rainfall annually and that if the bottom of his new Ford rusted away, he expected to have considerably larger concerns involving the Book of Genesis.

The finance manager explained that undercoating also reduced road noise.

Roy explained that he had three children.

Road noise was not currently among the ten loudest things in his automobile.

Eventually Roy escaped.

He pulled onto Dickinson Boulevard with the air conditioner blowing cold enough to preserve meat and the 400 V8 moving all that Dark Yellow Green Metallic toward RoadRunner Estates.

Roy was late.

So he drove faster.

Not recklessly, exactly.

Purposefully.

There is a distinction understood primarily by men driving brand-new automobiles home to people who don’t know they’re coming.

At one point Roy looked down and discovered the LTD was traveling at a speed inconsistent with both local ordinances and the amount of chrome attached to the front of it.

He eased off.

Then accelerated again.

He imagined the scene waiting for him.

Rhonda on the lawn.

The kids shouting.

Mrs. Harkins next door coming over.

Probably the Millers.

Maybe the Tomlinsons.

Someone would call somebody else.

By supper, half of RoadRunner Estates would know the Wellses had a new Ford.

Roy turned onto his street.

He slowed.

Nothing.

He approached the house.

Nobody.

The lawn was empty.

The porch was empty.

Not even a bicycle lay in the driveway.

Roy pulled the LTD to a stop directly in front of the house.

He waited.

Nothing.

He honked.

Not an angry honk.

A ceremonial honk.

The sort of cheerful double-tap announcing that something worth seeing had just arrived.

Nothing.

Roy frowned.

He honked again.

Still nothing.

Inside the Wells house, approximately fourteen people were gathered around the kitchen table.

The new Sears Fall/Winter catalog had arrived that afternoon.

All 1,492 pages of it.

Ordinarily this would have been an event in itself. The Sears catalog was less a publication than an inventory of American aspiration. It contained clothing, appliances, tools, toys, furniture, sporting goods and several thousand objects you had not known existed until Sears informed you that you needed them.

But nobody in the Wells house was interested in appliances.

They were interested in page 602.

The rumors had started at Jim Bowie High School.

Nobody could establish exactly who discovered it first, although by lunch period at least thirty-seven students claimed to know the person who had.

From there, news reached several mothers.

Then the Sewing Circle at Second Baptist.

By three o’clock, Fort Stockton had achieved complete information saturation.

Something was visible in the men’s underwear section of the Sears catalog.

Something that, according to Sears, absolutely was not what everybody in America had immediately concluded it was.

The photograph showed a handsome young male model wearing a white V-neck T-shirt and patterned boxer shorts, described by Sears as a luxurious blend of 50 percent Kodel polyester and 50 percent combed cotton with a no-roll elastic waist.

Nobody in the Wells kitchen cared about Kodel polyester.

They cared about what appeared to be peeking from beneath the left leg of the man’s boxer shorts.

Rhonda had the catalog.

Mrs. Harkins leaned over her left shoulder.

Mrs. Miller leaned over her right.

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The Wells children had been repeatedly ordered out of the room, which naturally meant they were standing six feet away pretending not to listen.

“That’s not what it looks like,” Rhonda said.

“Then what is it?” Mrs. Harkins asked.

Rhonda moved the catalog closer.

“I don’t know.”

Mrs. Miller moved it farther away.

“Looks worse from here.”

Somebody laughed.

The doorbell rang.

Nobody moved.

It was another neighbor.

She let herself in.

“Y’all got the Sears catalog?”

Rhonda pointed toward the kitchen.

Five minutes later, another woman arrived carrying her own copy.

This permitted side-by-side comparison.

The blemish was in both.

That settled absolutely nothing.

By the time Roy Wells honked his brand-new Ford outside, the kitchen had become a forensic laboratory.

Mrs. Harkins had produced a magnifying glass.

Nobody later admitted where she got it.

Roy honked a third time.

One of the children glanced toward the front window.

“Dad’s home.”

“Okay,” Rhonda said.

Nobody moved.

The boy looked again.

“He’s got a different car.”

That got Rhonda’s attention.

For approximately two seconds.

Then Mrs. Miller said, “Wait. Turn it sideways.”

Rhonda turned the catalog.

Outside, Roy got out of the LTD.

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He stood beside eighteen feet of Dark Yellow Green Metallic splendor and stared at his own house.

Nothing.

He opened the driver’s door and slammed it slightly harder than necessary.

Nothing.

He walked around to the rear.

Maybe they were watching.

Fine.

He would demonstrate the Magic Doorgate.

Roy lowered the power window.

He dropped the tailgate.

He raised it.

Then he swung the entire gate sideways.

Nobody came out.

Seven weeks.

Six thousand two hundred eighty dollars.

Four hundred cubic inches.

Air conditioning.

Power rear window.

Three-way Magic Doorgate.

Dog dish hubcaps selected specifically because of his wife’s relationship with curbs.

And somewhere inside his house, apparently, civilization had ended.

Roy walked to the front door.

He opened it.

He heard laughter.

A lot of laughter.

He followed it into the kitchen.

Fourteen people looked up.

Rhonda smiled.

“You’re home.”

Roy stared at her.

“Been home.”

“Did you honk?”

“Three times.”

“Oh.”

Roy looked around the kitchen.

“What is everybody doing?”

Silence.

Then Mrs. Harkins began laughing again.

Rhonda closed the catalog.

Too late.

Roy saw the cover.

“Sears?”

Nobody answered.

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Roy looked toward the window, where the new Ford was plainly visible in the driveway.

“I bought a car.”

Rhonda brightened.

“I know.”

“You knew.”

“Well, yes.”

“The children didn’t.”

One of the children spoke from the hallway.

“We know now.”

Roy looked back at Rhonda.

“I thought maybe everybody’d want to come outside.”

“We do.”

Nobody moved.

Roy stared at the catalog.

“What page?”

That was the moment the room lost it.

Even Rhonda.

Roy Wells stood in his own kitchen while his wife and neighbors laughed until Mrs. Miller had to sit down.

Finally Rhonda opened the catalog.

“Six-oh-two.”

Roy looked.

He leaned closer.

Then farther away.

Then closer again.

Nobody said anything.

Roy studied the photograph for perhaps ten seconds.

“That’s a printing spot.”

Four women shouted at once.

Roy raised both hands.

“I’m just saying.”

Mrs. Harkins handed him the magnifying glass.

Roy took it.

That was how the new Ford lost.

By six o’clock, most of the neighborhood eventually made it outside.

The LTD received the proper inspection.

The children climbed through it.

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Roger’s beloved Magic Doorgate was demonstrated approximately seventeen times. Men admired the 400. Women complimented Rhonda on the green interior. Mr. Tomlinson asked what Roy got for the Chevrolet. Mr. Harkins thought the dog dish hubcaps looked cheap. Roy explained the curb situation. Rhonda heard him.

The usual ceremony eventually happened.

Just two hours late.

But every ten or fifteen minutes somebody new arrived at the Wells house and asked the same question.

“Y’all got page 602?”

And everybody went back inside.

Months later, Sears would insist the mysterious object was nothing more than a printing defect caused by water, grease or dirt on the printing plate. The same photograph had appeared previously without controversy. Fifteen million copies of the Fall/Winter catalog had been printed with the blemish, and Sears had no intention of recalling any of them.

That explanation satisfied almost nobody.

By September, newspapers were reporting on it.

Before the year was over, somebody had even recorded a novelty country song about the Man on Page 602.

Roy never understood the fascination.

Or at least he claimed not to.

The Sears catalog remained in the Wells house for years, although page 602 became increasingly worn and eventually separated from the binding. Rhonda kept insisting this was simply because so many people had handled it.

Roy didn’t argue.

He had learned something that afternoon about marriage.

And printing defects.

The Ford stayed much longer.

It hauled the Wells children to school and church and Little League games. It carried groceries home from Piggly Wiggly and luggage across Texas. It survived family vacations, teenage drivers, spilled Cokes, melted crayons, curb encounters Rhonda denied and one memorable trip during which the below-deck storage compartment finally proved useful when Roy discovered it would hold several things he had specifically told the children they weren’t bringing.

Years passed.

The children grew.

One by one, they left home.

And somewhere along the way, without anybody noticing exactly when it happened, the great green LTD stopped being the Wells family’s new car and became simply the family car.

Then it became the old family car.

That happens faster than anyone expects.

Roy would own other automobiles.

Some were better built. Some got better gas mileage. One had more horsepower from an engine half the size. None ever arrived at quite the same moment in his life.

Because that big green Ford had been the last new car Roy Wells ever bought while all three children still lived under his roof.

That was what he remembered.

Not the $6,280.

Not the undercoating argument.

Not even the three-way Magic Doorgate, although Roy remained convinced until the day he died that Ford should have received considerably more credit for that.

He remembered pulling into the driveway expecting his whole family to come running.

And nobody did.

They were all inside.

Together.

Crowded around the kitchen table, laughing themselves sick over something so harmlessly scandalous that an entire country once whispered about it.

Roy had been disappointed that afternoon.

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Years later, he would have given almost anything to pull into that driveway again and find every one of them still inside.

The children still young.

Rhonda still laughing.

The neighbors wandering through the front door without knocking.

The Sears catalog spread open on the kitchen table.

And that enormous Dark Yellow Green Metallic Ford waiting outside to take all of them somewhere.

Even if, for one afternoon in July 1975, it had been the second most interesting thing in the Wells house.

After page 602.

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