Franchise, the First Affiliate
It was already past eleven at night when I saw it.
At the far edge of U.S. Route 1, a battered sign that looked as though it had been abandoned by the roadside was fading in and out beneath the glow of a streetlamp.
Morgan Oil.
The paint had peeled away in patches so large the lettering was hard to read, and red rust had run down the steel post holding it up, as stark as dried blood.
Across the road, the view was the complete opposite.
A giant franchise gas station, a Texaco company-owned branch.
Under lights bright as midday, a state-of-the-art automatic car wash hummed and rattled, while an overnight worker in uniform wiped down the pumps and the artificial scent of detergent drifted on the wind.
Morgan’s station, by contrast, had only a single streetlamp blinking lonely and weak.
In the silence, two rusted pumps stood like gravestones, and on the concrete floor, oil stains and weeds had tangled together.
For businesses sitting on the same highway, separated only by one road, the difference was almost cruel.
And yet, at this hour, the office at Morgan Oil was still lit.
“Looks like he’s still up.”
My father parked the truck and headed toward the office.
I followed behind him.
Then, from inside, a sharp shout cut through the night.
Through the window, the office interior was laid bare.
“Hey, Mr. Washington! Do you not understand what I’m saying?”
Standing in front of the old wooden desk, a white man who looked to be in his mid-forties was slamming a stack of papers against it.
He wore a glossy gray suit that looked oiled to a shine, his forehead gleaming with sweat beneath slicked-back blond hair, and his thin lips trembled with irritation under a sharp, hawk-like nose.
Across from him, old Morgan stood hunched in overalls, clutching a crushed cap to his chest.
My father frowned as he looked through the glass.
“Who’s that fop? At this hour?”
“I think I know who he is.”
I recalled the black luxury sedan I’d seen parked at the station entrance.
The gleaming body, the sticker on the passenger-side window.
It was the mark of an authorized Union Oil distributor.
That white man was a jobber—a middleman who supplied fuel from a major oil company to small gas stations.
Jobbers extended fuel on credit while taking all kinds of collateral, and the most common target was the station’s land or equipment.
If payment fell behind, they seized the collateral and sent it to auction. That was their business model.
In other words, they were little more than loan sharks wearing the mask of a franchise head office or a supplier.
Since the oil shocks of the 1970s, the big oil companies had expanded their company-owned stations while also exploiting this jobber system to squeeze out independent operators.
They raised wholesale prices to destroy margins, charged usurious interest on fuel sold on credit, and when the station could no longer hold on, they took the land for a pittance and converted it into a company-owned branch.
I’d seen those kinds of vultures countless times before I regressed.
Hyenas that came running at the smell of a corpse.
And one of those bastards was here in the middle of the night?
He must have come during the day, been refused by the old man, and then stuck around to keep pressing him after dark.
Pushing until the other side was too exhausted to resist—that was basic tactics in this business.
I slowly opened the office door.
The white man glanced at me and snorted.
“What now? Who are you?”
Instead of answering, I read the name tag on his chest.
Philip Duncan - Texas Regional Representative, Union Oil
Duncan then looked away from me and glared at old Morgan.
“Mr. Washington, look here.”
He pulled one sheet from the pile and shoved it right in the old man’s face.
“These are your overdue crude oil payments for the last six months. March, $1,200. April, $1,350. May, $1,500... Total comes to $8,400. With interest, it’s $9,200.”
The old man backed away, but Duncan stepped in again.
“Union headquarters has issued a final notice. If you don’t pay off all outstanding debt by the end of this month, they’ll cut off your supply contract. And as for the mortgage lien on your land, they’re saying they’ll enforce it and send the property to auction.”
“Th-that can’t be...”
Old Morgan tightened his grip on the cap pressed against his chest, his gnarled hands trembling.
“You raised the wholesale price by twenty-five cents a gallon and doubled the interest on credit, and then...”
“There’s nothing I can do about that either. It’s company policy.”
Duncan jerked his chin toward Texaco across the road.
“Look at the Texaco over there. They’re selling at $1.20 a gallon. What are you charging, Mr. Morgan? $1.30? Are you kidding me? How are you supposed to compete with a company-owned station that gets its supply pushed down from headquarters? Customers aren’t fools. Why would they buy gas ten cents more expensive from you? Let’s be honest here, Mr. Morgan. The times have changed. Your era is over. It’s long past time to step off the stage. And the only person in the world who doesn’t understand that is you.”
“...”
The color drained from the old man’s face.
The cap in his hand was shaking violently.
Duncan didn’t let the opening slip away.
He moved in as if to put a hand on his shoulder, lowering his voice.
“So I’m saying you should settle it now. I know a real-estate development company that’ll cover your overdue debt, add a little for the land, and hand you $8,000 cash. They’ll even pay the cost of removing these rusted pumps.”
The old man’s voice trembled.
“This place... has been in my family since my father’s time. I can’t give it up for eight thousand dollars.”
Duncan’s face twisted.
“You old bastard, are you serious? Then what are you going to do? Want to do this by the book? Don’t come crying later when the auction notice goes up next week.”
His index finger jabbed repeatedly at Morgan’s thin shoulder.
“Huh? Old man, are you deaf? Did you hear me?”
Once, twice, three times.
And on the last shove, he gave him a hard, dismissive push.
The old man staggered backward.
At that instant, a large shadow moved beside me.
Crack!
My father’s hand shot out and caught Duncan’s wrist.
“That’s enough.”
He held Duncan’s wrist in a vice grip and pulled him away from the old man.
“Don’t touch Mr. Morgan.”
“What the hell are you?”
“I’m the man telling you not to lay a hand on him. Consider this your warning.”
My father’s gaze was so intimidating that even I, standing beside him, felt a jolt of shock.
Duncan stumbled back.
“W-what the hell do you mean? Who do you think you are?”
“Who I am depends on what you do next.”
My father moved between Morgan and Duncan, then jabbed a finger into Duncan’s chest.
“If you turn around and crawl out of here right now, I’ll just be some rude Asian man. But if you keep barking and acting up, then I’ll become the worst kind of man you can possibly imagine. For example...”
My father tilted his head slightly.
On the wall hung a bright red fire axe.
“A Chinese axe murderer illegally staying in Garden Queens.”
“H-Hic!”
The color drained from Duncan’s face.
He hurried out of the office.
“You just wait! Don’t come begging when they auction it off for scrap later!”
Outside, there was a furious screech of tires.
Duncan’s car vanished into the darkness beyond the road.
“...”
Old Morgan adjusted his trembling cap.
“Mr. Lee... you’ve had to see something ugly.”
“Are you all right, Mr. Morgan? You’re not hurt anywhere, are you?”
My father gently brushed the dirt off the old man’s suspenders.
From the shaky coffee machine, Morgan poured lukewarm coffee into a paper cup.
“...He wasn’t wrong.”
It came out with a sigh.
Old Morgan’s gaze drifted across the road to the brightly lit Texaco station.
“The oil company’s wholesale price keeps going up, and the customers have all but disappeared. Ever since that Texaco opened across the street, I’ve just been watching flies gather. Big corporations buy cheap and sell cheap, but I have no choice but to buy high and sell even higher...”
Meanwhile, my eyes had drifted to a framed photograph hanging on the wall.
A faded black-and-white picture.
Old Morgan must have noticed, because he took the frame down and showed it to me.
“This was in 1887. My great-grandfather ran a stagecoach stop right here.”
In the photo, a stagecoach stood in front of a wooden building, while men in cowboy hats were watering their horses beside it.
Faintly visible above the building was a sign that read Morgan’s Station.
“It was on the route from Santa Fe to El Paso. The only place where stagecoaches could rest and cowboys could get water and supplies. Drovers, mail carriers, even bounty hunters... there was a time when everyone passing through the West knocked on this door.”
The old man smiled bitterly.
“When I was young, this was the only place within a hundred miles where Black folks could come in, fill up, and use the restroom without worry. This isn’t just a gas station. It’s our family’s history. It’s my life.”
His wrinkled hand trembled over the coffee cup.
“...And now it’s being treated like an $8,000 pile of scrap metal. I’ve got no face left to show my ancestors.”
I looked at the old cash register and the faded soda advertisement board in the corner of the office.
“Grandfather.”
“...?”
Old Morgan’s cloudy eyes turned toward me.
I said, “Don’t sell the land.”
“Child, I appreciate the heart behind that, but... the debt’s piled up mountain-high. This month’s oil payment is already overdue. Like that bastard said earlier, if I don’t want it going to auction, I have to sell.”
“I’ll make sure it doesn’t go to auction. No—I’ll make sure you make more money than the Texaco across the street.”
“?”
Just then, my father, who had gone outside, returned with a small portable fuel can.
I opened the lid and held it right under the old man’s nose.
The liquid sloshed inside, and the sharp smell of gasoline filled the air.
“Take a sniff, and look at the color too.”
“Hm? This is... a very clear pink. And the smell is strong... There’s almost no impurity in it. This is premium gasoline, isn’t it?”
“That’s right. It’s a premium-grade fuel that’s much better quality than the regular gas sold at ordinary stations. Better mileage, smoother engine operation.”
I set the can on the desk.
“We’ll supply it to you for seventy cents a gallon.”
At the end of 1991, wholesale gasoline prices were around ninety cents a gallon.
In other words, we would be supplying it at more than twenty percent below market.
Old Morgan’s eyes went wide.
“You two? How? Stolen gas or something? I don’t deal in stolen goods!”
“I swear to heaven, it isn’t stolen. Let’s just call it ‘inventory liquidation’ that came in through a very special channel. Clean product, no paperwork problems.”
At my father’s words, Morgan blinked, looking thoroughly dazed.
“Mr. Lee, I know what kind of man you are. I know you’d never steal someone else’s fuel to sell it. But... if you sell it that cheap, is there anything left after expenses?”
“We’re going with a low-margin, high-volume strategy.”
I answered.
“There are just two conditions. First, all fuel payments are cash only. We won’t issue receipts. Second, you can never tell anyone where this gas comes from. If anyone asks, say you don’t know.”
“Hmm, well, that figures. The tax collectors would be nothing but trouble if they got involved.”
“You don’t need to change the sign or renovate the inside. Just keep running business as ‘Morgan Oil’ the way you always have. We’ll come at night, fill the tanks, and leave quietly. For the first three months, try it on an interest-free credit basis. If you don’t see enough profit, or if there’s too little margin, you can withdraw anytime.”
“...”
A franchise.
Only without a franchise fee, royalties, or interest.
Old Morgan looked back and forth between the fuel can and my face.
If we sold at a twenty percent discount, he could still make a healthy profit even if he priced it close to the Texaco across the street.
And if he undercut Texaco by more than that, the truckers would line up around the block.
My father added quietly, “Just don’t price it too obviously low. Put the price a little under the station across the road. And only give big cash discounts to people you trust.”
“Ah, yes, that’s right. If you sell too cheap all at once, the oil company you broke with will sniff it out. The IRS too.”
“Like my son said, for the first three months we’ll front the fuel on interest-free credit. Try running the business first. If it really works, then you can start paying cash from then on. And if you don’t like it, you can quit anytime.”
“Is that true? Really... are you trying to save this old man? Why would you go this far...”
Moisture gathered at the corners of the old man’s eyes.
My father took the old man’s rough hands in both of his and squeezed them firmly.
“Sir, do you remember that rainy night about twenty years ago? When our truck broke down and we came in drenched to the skin? Everyone else turned us away like we were some filthy Oriental beggars, but you opened the store for us and gave us warm sandwiches and coffee. You didn’t even take our money. If you’d think of this as repayment for that meal, I’d be truly grateful.”
“...”
The tears he had been holding back finally spilled over.
He tried to wipe them away with the back of his hand, but it didn’t matter.
Thick drops fell down his wrinkled cheeks one after another.
“Oh, Lord...”
The old man lifted his gaze to the cross hanging from the ceiling.
“The crumbs of bread I shared have come back to me as a basketful of loaves.”
All at once, he pulled my hand toward him and kissed the back of it.
“I promise you. Even if a blade is held to my throat, I won’t say a word. I’ll take this secret to the grave.”
His eyes had changed.
They were no longer dull with defeat.
The pride of a pioneer who had protected this land since the age of stagecoaches was alive again.
I nodded.
“Dad, let’s start today.”
“Okay. Let’s begin with Tank No. 1.”
“?”
While old Morgan stared in confusion, my father and I hurried back toward the truck.
We were about to fill Morgan Oil’s tanks with the top-grade gasoline we had hauled in the back.
November 1991, on a barren stretch of Texas highway.
That was the moment our first franchise was born.
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