New Guy arrived at the Grounds for Divorce at 7:18 on Tuesday morning driving a six-wheeled Ford EcoSport.
This was unusual even by Fort Stockton standards.
Not unprecedented, necessarily. Earl once registered a forklift because he wanted to drive it to lunch. Jimmy Don Ventura had spent the better part of one summer trying to convince people that a car with T-tops was legally a convertible. And Hairless B29 had maintained for years that anything with enough horsepower could eventually be made street legal provided the county clerk liked you.
But unusual.
The vehicle was black, considerably longer than any Ford EcoSport had been when it departed the nurturing environment of an assembly plant, and possessed six wheels arranged in three neat pairs beneath a body that appeared to have been assembled after two automobiles suffered an unfortunate misunderstanding.
It also had a wing on the roof.
This was important because nothing else about the vehicle suggested that insufficient downforce had been its principal engineering deficiency.
New Guy turned off Dickinson Boulevard and entered the Grounds for Divorce parking lot slowly, which was fortunate because the additional rear axle introduced questions regarding turning radius that nobody inside the café was emotionally prepared to answer before coffee.
He parked directly in front of the big window.
Nobody spoke.
This was significant.
The regular breakfast crowd at the GFD could generate conversation during a tornado warning. On any normal morning, three unrelated arguments were underway before Delgado finished the first batch of bacon. Somebody was mad about property taxes. Somebody else was explaining why the Cowboys would be better if Jerry Jones would simply call him. Chad was usually reporting something from the Piggly Wiggly that he had been specifically instructed not to discuss publicly.
But when the six-wheeled EcoSport stopped outside, conversation simply died.
Hairless B29 held a fork halfway between his plate and his mouth.
Angus Hopper slowly lowered his coffee.
Rex Hall removed his glasses, cleaned them, put them back on and looked again.
Trixie turned in the booth.
Pastor Peterson stopped buttering his toast.
Even Delgado appeared in the kitchen pass-through.
Lucinda approached carrying the coffee pot.
She looked through the window.
Then she looked at New Guy, who had just walked through the door wearing the pleased expression of a man who had made an important financial decision without allowing research to interfere.
“What,” Lucinda asked, “is that?”
“My new car.”
Angus leaned sideways for a better view.
“How many cars?”
“One.”
“You sure?”
New Guy smiled.
“Six wheels.”
“We can see that,” Trixie said.
“I found it online.”
That explained considerably more than New Guy realized.
The internet had been particularly hard on Fort Stockton. Before the internet, a man could make a bad purchasing decision only within the practical radius of his automobile. He might come home from Odessa with an inappropriate boat or return from San Angelo towing a horse trailer despite not owning a horse, but geography imposed useful limits upon foolishness.
The internet removed those limits.
Now a man sitting at his kitchen table in Pecos County could make a catastrophic purchasing decision in Maine before his second cup of coffee.
“What kind of Ford is it?” Chad asked.
“EcoSport Titanium.”
Hairless stared through the window.
“Ford didn’t build one with six wheels.”
“No,” New Guy said proudly. “It’s custom.”
There are certain words in the automotive vocabulary that deserve respect.
Original.
Unrestored.
One-owner.
Numbers-matching.
Then there is custom, a word broad enough to encompass everything from hand-stitched leather upholstery to a man standing behind a mobile home with a Sawzall.
Hairless stood up.
“I need to see underneath it.”
Nobody questioned this.
Within four minutes, the entire regular breakfast meeting had relocated to the parking lot.
Lucinda remained inside because somebody had to operate the restaurant, although she stood near the window holding the coffee pot and watched with the detached concern of a woman observing grown men approach a downed electrical line.
Hairless was first underneath.
He simply lowered himself onto the pavement and disappeared beneath the Ford without asking permission. This was accepted procedure in Fort Stockton. Ownership established certain rights, but curiosity established others.
Angus began walking around the vehicle.
He counted the wheels.
Then he counted them again.
This was not because Angus had difficulty with numbers. He simply believed extraordinary claims deserved independent verification.
“Six,” he announced.
“Thank you, Angus,” Trixie said.
“Wanted to make sure.”
Chad examined the bodywork.
“Looks like they added another rear section.”
Rex crouched slightly.
“Why?”
New Guy put his hands in his pockets.
“For the extra axle.”
Rex stood again.
“That explains where. I asked why.”
Hairless’s voice came from underneath.
“Hold on.”
Everyone waited.
There was scraping.
Then silence.
Then more scraping.
Finally Hairless rolled himself back into daylight.
“It’s got three axles.”
Angus nodded.
“We established that from the wheels.”
Hairless ignored him.
“Only two of them are driven.”
New Guy frowned.
“What?”
“Front and middle.”
He pointed beneath the vehicle.
“Third one just rolls.”
New Guy stared at his automobile.
“What does it do?”
Hairless shrugged.
“Follows the other four.”
This was the first information New Guy had received about his new vehicle that visibly troubled him.
“You mean it doesn’t help?”
“Oh, it helps,” Rex said. “It holds up its part of the car.”
Trixie folded her arms.
“So does a jack stand. You don’t drive around with two of those attached.”
Pastor Peterson had arrived during the inspection and now stood near the front bumper holding a Styrofoam cup of coffee Lucinda had sent outside with him.
Brother Bob arrived shortly afterward.
This changed everything.
There are automotive questions.
There are philosophical questions.
And then there are automotive questions asked in the presence of two ministers.
Brother Bob circled the Ford once.
“Seems excessive.”
Pastor Peterson studied it.
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“Could be preparedness.”
Brother Bob looked at him.
“Preparedness for what?”
Peterson considered this.
“Two simultaneous flats?”
“That still leaves four.”
“Exactly.”
Brother Bob stared at him.
Pastor Peterson drank his coffee.
The group eventually returned inside because West Texas had begun warming toward the portion of the day when standing on asphalt becomes an agricultural experiment.
New Guy sat at the regular table.
From there, everyone could still see the EcoSport through the window.
It sat outside with six wheels, a roof wing and the absolute confidence of an object that knew nobody present could make it feel ridiculous.
Lucinda refilled the cups.
“So why did you buy it?”
New Guy thought about this.
“I’ve never seen another one.”
Nobody could argue with that.
“That ain’t always a reason to buy something,” Angus said.
“It ain’t always a reason not to.”
Angus considered this and nodded.
Fair enough.
“What are you going to do with it?” Chad asked.
“Drive it.”
“Where?”
“Around.”
“Doing what?”
New Guy looked irritated.
“Why does everybody need a mission statement for a car?”
That was actually a good question.
Several men at the table suddenly found reasons to study their coffee.
A town populated by people who owned old pickups, impractical convertibles, giant sedans, tiny cars and various other machines whose continued existence could not be defended on economic grounds was poorly positioned to demand rationality from another man’s automobile.
For perhaps thirty seconds, New Guy had them.
Then Trixie spoke.
“Most of those cars have the same number of wheels they started with.”
The advantage disappeared.
Brother Bob looked outside again.
“I still say six wheels feels prideful.”
New Guy turned.
“How can wheels be prideful?”
“It’s excess.”
Pastor Peterson shook his head.
“Not necessarily.”
“Four wheels have been sufficient for automobiles for more than a hundred years.”
“So have four cylinders,” Peterson said. “You going to preach against V-8s?”
Brother Bob hesitated.
He had not anticipated this.
Hairless looked suddenly interested.
“That sermon might get you killed.”
“I’m not preaching against V-8s.”
“You were headed that direction.”
“I was not.”
“I heard it.”
“You inferred it.”
Rex adjusted his glasses.
“Technically, Brother Bob’s argument is numerical rather than mechanical.”
Nobody had asked Rex.
This had never stopped him before.
“The question,” Rex continued, “is whether the addition of unnecessary components constitutes vanity.”
“Thank you,” Brother Bob said.
“Don’t thank me yet.”
Rex pointed toward the window.
“If unnecessary automotive components constitute vanity, half the chrome produced in Detroit between 1955 and 1960 becomes a theological problem.”
Angus stopped chewing.
“Careful.”
“And tailfins,” Rex added.
The room changed.
There are places a man may safely wander during casual conversation.
Religion is occasionally one of them.
Politics rarely is.
But questioning tailfins in Fort Stockton requires either courage or inadequate social development.
Hairless leaned forward.
“Nothing unnecessary about fins.”
“What do they do?” Chad asked.
Hairless stared at him.
“They’re fins.”
This apparently answered the question.
Pastor Peterson attempted to restore order.
“The Bible doesn’t specify how many wheels an automobile should have.”
Brother Bob looked triumphant.
“Automobiles aren’t in the Bible.”
“Neither are air conditioners, but I’ve noticed Second Baptist has six.”
“That’s different.”
“How?”
“West Texas.”
Pastor Peterson nodded.
Again, fair enough.
By 8:47 the original question of whether New Guy had purchased a sensible automobile had been abandoned entirely.
The discussion had become theological.
Brother Bob maintained that mankind had been given sufficient wisdom to recognize when something was finished.
Pastor Peterson argued that innovation frequently required adding something nobody previously thought necessary.
Rex began searching his phone for biblical references to wheels.
Chad remembered Ezekiel.
This proved unfortunate.
“Didn’t Ezekiel see wheels?” he asked.
Rex looked up.
“Four of them.”
Brother Bob slapped the table.
“There.”
Pastor Peterson frowned.
“That is not remotely what that passage means.”
“Still four.”
“They had eyes.”
Hairless looked interested again.
“The wheels?”
“Yes.”
“Factory option?”
“No.”
“Then why bring them up?”
Trixie closed her eyes.
Delgado rang the order bell from the kitchen although there was no order ready. He simply felt the conversation required punctuation.
New Guy had become increasingly quiet.
He looked through the window at his EcoSport.
For the first time since arriving, he appeared uncertain.
“What if I made a mistake?”
Nobody answered immediately.
This was no longer funny.
Every man at that table had purchased something he later had to explain to his wife, his banker or himself.
Angus finally spoke.
“You like it?”
New Guy nodded.
“Then you ain’t made the mistake yet.”
“What would the mistake be?”
“Selling it because we don’t.”
That settled something.
Not everything.
But something.
The front door opened.
Sister Thelma entered.
She had come from Our Lady of Immeasurable Concern and intended only to pick up coffee.
Instead, she encountered eleven adults arguing about whether an additional axle constituted a sin.
She listened for perhaps two minutes.
Lucinda provided the executive summary.
“New Guy bought that thing outside.”
Sister Thelma looked through the window.
“Ford?”
“Mostly,” Hairless said.
“Six wheels?”
“Yes.”
“Three axles?”
“Yes.”
“Do all six drive?”
“No.”
“Does the last axle steer?”
“No.”
“What does it do?”
The entire table answered together.
“Follows the other four.”
Sister Thelma nodded.
She walked closer to the window and studied the vehicle.
Nobody interrupted.
There are moments when even Fort Stockton recognizes that an authority has entered the room.
She examined the stretched body.
The third axle.
The roof wing.
Then she turned toward New Guy.
“Do you like it?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Did you spend church money on it?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Did you steal it?”
“No.”
“Are you planning to hurt anybody with it?”
“No.”
“Then I don’t see a theological problem.”
Brother Bob shifted in his chair.
“But six wheels?”
Sister Thelma looked at him.
Then back at the Ford.
“God gave the automobile four wheels,” she said. “Everything after that is commentary.”
Silence.
Pastor Peterson smiled into his coffee.
Rex put away his phone.
Hairless nodded slowly.
Brother Bob opened his mouth, considered the available terrain and closed it again.
Even Delgado stopped moving in the kitchen.
New Guy smiled.
“So you think I made a good purchase?”
Sister Thelma looked at him.
“I think the Lord gives each of us a different burden.”
New Guy considered this deeply.
Outside, the six-wheeled EcoSport sat in the morning sun, its third axle patiently carrying a portion of that burden without understanding why.
Sister Thelma collected her coffee and left.
The theological crisis was over.
New Guy finished breakfast.
He put several dollars beneath his plate, stood and headed for the door.
Hairless called after him.
“Where you going?”
“For a drive.”
“Where?”
New Guy stopped.
He looked through the window at his new automobile.
Then back at the table.
“I don’t know.”
He smiled.
“I’ve got six wheels. Seems wasteful not to use them.”
They watched through the window as he climbed aboard.
The Ford started.
New Guy backed carefully from the parking space, turned toward Dickinson Boulevard and accelerated west.
For several seconds the entire GFD watched him disappear.
All six wheels turned.
Four of them knew why.
Angus took another bite of toast.
“You know what bothers me?”
Trixie sighed.
“What?”
Angus pointed toward the empty parking space.
“That wing.”
Hairless nodded.
“Been bothering me all morning.”
Brother Bob looked toward Pastor Peterson.
Peterson raised one hand.
“No.”
“But if unnecessary aerodynamic devices constitute vanity—”
“No.”
Rex reached for his phone.
“I could probably find something.”
“No.”
Lucinda arrived with the coffee pot.
“Anybody who starts another theological discussion before nine o’clock gets decaf.”
That ended it.
There are, after all, limits to what a civilized society should be expected to endure.
