STORIES
If our lives are a book, the cars we drive define the chapters.
These are stories featuring cars, trucks, and even RVs that played a role in the lives of the people who owned or drove them. Many are set in Fort Stockton, Texas and involve a cast of characters in and around the dusty southwest Texas town. A lot of the stories are shared around the table at The Grounds for Divorce, where the ‘regulars’ meet.
Pull up a chair and let Lucinda pour you a hot cuppa joe and enjoy.
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THE LAST SLOW LAP
They rolled the old Ford out of the barn like pallbearers who’d lost their way to the church. The barn stood outside town where the mesquites thicken and the wind starts practicing for October. Dust had drifted inside through a century of nail holes and settled on the car in dunes. When the doors opened,…
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THE WOMAN WHO FELL FROM THE SKY
They say Fort Stockton has stories the way mesquite has thorns—built in, painful when you grab the wrong end. Lucinda keeps most of them behind the counter at Grounds for Divorce with the old Captain My Captain coffee mugs, but every now and then one hops the lip of a cup and lands steaming on…
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TAN AND WHITE REDEMPTION
The Straight Shootin’ Deal Coleman Callahan had spent weeks waiting for the phone call, the one that would announce his long-awaited prize: the very first 1958 Edsel Citation Hardtop Coupe to hit Fort Stockton’s dusty streets. He’d paid extra for the privilege. While everyone else was making do with their ’53 Fords, their beat-up Chevys,…
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GRANNY IN A GRAND MARQUIS
The big round table at the Grounds for Divorce had seen its share of arguments, bad jokes, and small-town philosophy sessions, but this afternoon felt different. Chad—the millennial interim manager of the Piggly Wiggly—was on break and, as usual, trying too hard to impress people who’d been sitting at that table longer than he’d been…
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CAN YOU DIG IT
Back in Fort Stockton, Texas, nobody thought much of young Clarence “Clay” Holbrook. He had a habit of digging where no one else cared to. Vacant lots, dry creek beds, even the dusty playground behind Jim Bowie High School—Clay would be there, on his knees with a coffee can and a bent garden trowel, sifting…
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BOOGER’S FOLLY
Pernell Barstow got the nickname “Booger” sometime in the third grade when he leaned too close to a glue bottle and sneezed. That was forty-odd years ago, and while most folks outgrow their childhood embarrassments, Booger just learned to wear his like a cheap cologne. The name stuck, the habit stuck, and so did Booger…
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THE LUCK OF TUG BARSTOW
Tug Barstow wasn’t the sort of man mothers warned their daughters about—he was the sort they warned their refrigerators about. Tug could empty your leftovers and your gas tank in one afternoon and still have room for pie. He came into this world with a cowlick, a laugh, and a coat of dust that never…
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TWO STROKE REDEMPTION
The Arrival Spike Van Horn wasn’t the sort of man you expected to hear before you saw. But on a windless Tuesday morning, the Fort Stockton Municipal Golf Course and Shooting Range trembled under the asthmatic wheeze of a 1961 Lambretta Li 175 that sounded like it was inhaling sandpaper. The thing came coughing across…
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WHITE DIAMONDS, STRAWBERRY & RHUBARB
Angus Hopper sat in the corner booth of Grounds for Divorce, right where the sunlight hit the Formica just enough to warm his elbows but not enough to blind him. He had a full cup of Folgers, a half-empty mind, and a whole lot of quiet—the holy trinity of peace in Fort Stockton. No New…
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DEATH HIGHWAY: THE SLOW-SPEED SHAME OF THE FIGHTIN’ KNIFE
“Every car is a story—even when it only goes forty-two miles an hour.” It started like most Friday evenings in Fort Stockton—dry air, 102 degrees, and the kind of wind that sandblasts your morals. The Dairy Twin parking lot was half full, and someone had just ordered three footlong corn dogs, which is usually when…