Father Dale’s Drive-Thru Exorcisms: After Dinner Conversation, #15

By Viggy Parr Hampton

Synopsis: A semi-retired couple living out of their RV decides to follow a traveling tent revival and offer drive-thru exorcisms for extra cash.

After Dinner Conversation is a growing series of short stories across genres to draw out deeper discussions with friends and family. Each story is an accessible example of an abstract ethical or philosophical idea and is accompanied by suggested discussion questions.

Podcast discussions of this short story, and others, is available on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, and Youtube.

• Language: English
• Publisher: After Dinner Conversation
• Release date: Nov 26, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393645306

Book preview

Father Dale’s Drive-Thru Exorcisms

After Dinner Conversation Series

THE EVANGELISTS SET the tent up somewhere near a Christian theme park called Heritage USA in Fort Mill, South Carolina. The park had been open for nearly a year, and the crowds had ballooned grotesquely, which spelled probable success for the old preacher hunting for the faithful.

To Dale, standing outside his camper and straddling the messy periphery of religion, the park’s very existence and its incredible popularity were two more pieces of evidence he could hold up to prove that the majority of middle America had too much time and too much money on their hands.

Which made him feel less bad, maybe even righteous, about being just one more person trying to take it away.

You gonna help, or what? Tina asked, pushing folds of sweaty hair out of her face. She was struggling to set up the camper’s awning, stretching it as far as it would go while simultaneously trying to jam the poles into the gravelly dirt below.

Or what, Dale teased, pushing his sunglasses up on his nose. He walked over to where his wife stood, and the two of them managed to wrangle the faded, delicate awning into the perfect position. To some veteran campers, an awning didn’t need to be perfect, just serviceable. To Dale and Tina Thrombus, anything less than perfect would mean that their car-bound customers would get trapped in the drive-thru, which was simply not an option.

They’d been following the crazy evangelists around the Southeast for the past five years, parking the camper close enough to the revival tent to attract customers, but far enough away to avoid the righteous fury of the fire-tongued pastor. He might have preached love, but Dale had heard enough to realize the man knew how to deal in hate.

The camper needed a new