Category: A Two Part Story
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THE BUFFALO BUS, Part II: The Resurrection
Part II of a two part story involving sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. Or, just another day in Fort Stockton. Then the title to the Buffalo Bus wandered into a fog most of us call paperwork and reappeared in the name of Iwania Goodman, the mayor’s newest wife and longest-standing donor to his campaign, though one…
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THE BUFFALO BUS, Part I: The Arrest at the Amphitheater
Part I of a two part story involving sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. Or, just another day in Fort Stockton. They called it the Buffalo Bus because calling it a miracle would’ve made the Baptists nervous. Thirty-five feet of pearl white and silver aluminum, the coach pulled into Fort Stockton like a traveling moonbeam: black-and-red stripes…
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THE GUTTER QUEENS, PART II: After the Strike
(Part II of II) By the summer of 1975, the legend of The Gutter Queens had settled into Fort Stockton like dust that refused to sweep off. Their brass plaque gleamed beside the water-payment window, their Kodachrome portrait hung over the Lucky Lady jukebox, and Big Brown—the ‘69 Ford Country Squire that carried them to…
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THE GUTTER QUEENS, PART I: The Long Roll to Glory
(Part I of II) If you go to City Hall in Fort Stockton and stand in line to pay your water bill, you’ll see it there—just to the right of the window where the clerk never looks up fast enough to catch you rolling your eyes. A modest brass plaque reads: THE GUTTER QUEENS —…
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THE BOY WHO BORROWED A WAR, Part II
Part II of a two part tale of fate by mistake. The road to Saint-Martin-du-Pin was marked by hedgerows that looked like sleeping giants. Somewhere, a cow bell clonked once, then decided against it. The blackout lights were little moons in their own right, enough to keep him between the ditches. He shifted the way…
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THE BOY WHO BORROWED A WAR, Part I
Part I of a two part tale of fate by mistake. On the afternoon the Japs hit Pearl Harbor, Fort Stockton gathered on the courthouse lawn like the wind had pushed them all into one corner of the world. The radios hissed and popped, and Pastor Peterson prayed loud enough to make the pigeons crouch…
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KNOX MAGNUS AND THE ZEPHYR ROAD, Part II: Jeep Country and the Battle of Los Angeles
Arrival in the City Los Angeles stretched like a rumor too big to be true. Knox Magnus eased the Lincoln-Zephyr down from Cajon Pass, the V-12 whispering against gravity, the hood ornament drawing a straight line into a basin shimmering with neon and paranoia. The first thing he noticed was light: searchlights wagging over the…
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KNOX MAGNUS AND THE ZEPHYR ROAD, Part I: The Last Lincoln Rides West
The Departure On the morning Knox Magnus walked into Frontier Ford–Lincoln–Mercury, Fort Stockton tilted slightly on its axis. The town didn’t have many spectacles, but everyone agreed this was one. Knox was the kind of man who made you forget what you were doing just to watch him do it instead. Wealthy family, oil money…
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THE SUBSTITUTE, Part II
Part two of a two part story. The Chalk Line By the time third period rolled around that Monday, the room already felt different. The air had that restless kind of quiet that follows gossip too vague to sit on. Then he was just—there. Standing at the board, sleeves rolled, chalk in hand, as though…
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THE SUBSTITUTE, Part I
Part one of a two-part story. By the fall of 1964, Jim Bowie High School—“Home of the Fightin’ Knives”—was running on chalk dust and cafeteria gravy. The football team practiced behind the bleachers, the band practiced in front of them, and somewhere in between was Mr. Schroeder, the only man alive who could make the…