At the Rainbow Rollerdrome, he leans on the railing and watches the skaters. Packs of girls glide and swish across the floor, their skirts flying like trash at the side of the highway. Other boys from Humes also stand and watch, but Elvis keeps his distance. Even he fears he may have overdone it tonight, a little. If he were to join them – and he wants to – they might ask where the bullfight is, or when he’s going to break into a Spanish dance. Earlier on, at home, he’d felt powerful and ready in his pegged pants and bolero jacket. He tries to hold on to that feeling as he scans the floor for Dixie Locke, who is fifteen and has dark eyebrows and a pointed chin, which she likes to lift in his direction.
Dixie is the reason he has started attending the Bible-study group at the First Assembly of God on McLemore. He’s been going to services there for a while now, mainly to hear the singing of the Blackwood Brothers, the gospel quartet who form part of the congregation. During Bible-study, the younger members sit in a circle in the stuffy, carpeted room off the church to discuss the meanings of the parables and try to relate them to their own lives. Dixie says little, and Elvis even less. It seems a long time since he was saved on the porch of Brother Mansell’s house, and he dislikes the church’s list of things he shouldn’t do. These days, music is where he feels closest to God.
When he was within earshot Dixie had said – was it deliberately loud? – that she was going to be here tonight. It’s warm in the Rollerdrome, which makes the scent of teenage sweat and popcorn stronger. Elvis doesn’t want to smell these things. He wants to smell her, Dixie. He thinks perhaps she smells like fresh milk with a little molasses. She might taste like that, too, if he can get her in his mouth. Red claims it drives the chicks wild when you suck their earlobes. You’ve got to nibble on an earlobe, as if it’s too cold to take a bite, as if it’s a Popsicle, he says.
They’re playing Teresa Brewer now, and Elvis straightens his body to let the music in. Sometimes it feels as if the music enters his spine and enables him to stand taller. Miss Keisker hasn’t called to say she’s heard of somebody looking for a singer, even though he keeps stopping by the studio, just to say hello. Maybe next time he could mention that to her. It’s like it goes into my spine, you know? Right up my back. She might understand that. She might even tell Mr Phillips that he said it.
Then he spies Dixie, skating alone at the edge of the rink. In her white pantyhose and a little pink skirt, her hair set in the usual neat waves that fall to her shoulders, she weaves in and out of the other kids. Watching her, he comes to the conclusion that she’s not the best skater on the rink, but she is, unlike many of the others, utterly confident in her abilities. As she pushes off, she half-closes her eyes and leans into the air as if reaching for something. She never wobbles, or pulls a self-conscious face. Then she sees him and, just for a second, her arms flail, but she continues to skate, completing another lap before allowing herself to look again. He raises his hand and she smiles, showing the gap between her front teeth, then glides over to where he is.
All at once, her boots are hitting the barrier with a whack, and she’s holding on to the railing, her hands close to his, and she’s talking, too. ‘I know you from church, don’t I?’
Wrong-footed by her being the one to speak first, Elvis can only nod.
‘You’re Elvis, aren’t you? I’m Dixie, Dixie Locke,’ she says, and laughs brightly. When her eyelids flutter, he relaxes a little. She is nervous, too.
‘I know who you are,’ he says. ‘Wanna get a Pepsi?’
‘Sure.’ Her voice is not so bright, but it is warmer, now.
He fetches two drinks as Dixie waits at a plastic table, skates lined up neatly beside her chair, chin resting on both hands. Before setting the cups down, he wipes the table with a serviette, then, unsure what to do with it, lets it drop to the floor, hoping she hasn’t noticed.
He sits opposite her. The sweet stickiness of the drink is sublime in his mouth and he feels so revived that he’s able to say, ‘I’ve noticed you. In church.’
‘What did you notice?’ she asks, chewing on her straw.
‘Your hair, mostly.’
She looks off towards the rink. ‘Oh,’ she says, ‘that.’
‘It’s the same colour as my mama’s,’ he says, then wishes he hadn’t.
‘Uh-huh.’
‘Real black, I mean.’
She lets the straw drop from her mouth into her empty paper cup and says nothing.
‘Sure hope I ain’t offended you,’ he says, because it is something to say.
‘Lord, no,’ she says, studying the cup. ‘Why would you think that?’
‘Some girls are easily offended.’
She nods, holding a hand over her mouth.
There’s a pause.
‘What’s your mama like?’ she asks.
He brushes a hand across the ruffles of his shirt. Each one is deep red, soft as a rose petal. Where can he begin? ‘She’s real nice,’ he says. ‘Everyone thinks so.’ Then he adds, because he senses he should, ‘But she always wants to know what I’m up to!’ and feels immediately as though he has betrayed Gladys.
‘Mine too!’
‘Which is good, I guess.’
‘Kind of irritating, sometimes, though.’
He nods. ‘What about your folks?’
Her daddy is as tall as a tree and says about as much. Her mama is sweet but never misses a chance to read her the riot act. Her sisters get in the way but are cute, mostly. Her uncle is a tease and sometimes takes it too far. Elvis absorbs it all, amazed that Dixie feels easy enough to share this with him, and he wants to share something back, so they are even. But, when she’s finished, he just asks if she can stay for the next session. She says she can call her folks, they’ll be fine. And so they sit for another hour, talking about her family and his, about the church and the people they know there; Dixie makes it clear who she likes and who she doesn’t, and they discover a shared passion for the Statesmen. They’ve both seen the quartet at the all-night gospel singings at the Ellis Auditorium.
‘Those guys don’t just sing, they perform!’ he tells her, leaning back and hooking his hands behind his head.
‘I just love Jake Hess,’ she says. ‘The way he moves.’
He looks at her intently. ‘That right?’ he asks.
She giggles. ‘Oh, not like that!’
But he knows she’s lying.
‘We oughta go together next time,’ he says. ‘So I can keep an eye on you.’
‘I’d like that,’ she says.
Encouraged, he suggests they drive up to K’s for a hamburger, even though it’s ten-thirty and this will be the last of his money for the whole week. There isn’t a hint of hesitation in her voice as she accepts.
As he opens the door to the Lincoln, he says, ‘The car’s not mine.’
Red swears some girls will go with any guy who has a car, and Elvis doesn’t want Dixie to be one of those girls.
She pauses, studying his face. He’s not good at lying, never has been; he feels himself wanting to laugh and tell her it was all a joke, but then she says, ‘You can drive it, though, right?’ and he grins.
It feels like nothing on earth, driving the Lincoln with Dixie beside him. It’s January, and cold in the car. The old engine rattles as they cruise along Lamar. She sits close enough for him to be aware of her shivering. He still has a piece of board fixed where his side window should be, so he rests his arm on the back of the seat, close to her shoulders. Dixie edges a little closer. They’re both silent as the lights rush to greet them on the dark and lonely road.
What is the right thing to say to a girl as you drive into the star-clustering night? Perhaps it would be better to say nothing at all, but she’s opening her mouth to talk again and so he gets in first with, ‘I like to sing.’
Because he wants her to know that. He wants her to know how important it is, and how he means to be as good as, or even better than, Jake Hess.
‘I heard that,’ she says.
‘You did? Who told you?’
Is he known for this thing, even beyond his immediate friends? His scalp tingles with joy.
‘Oh, you know. Folks.’
‘I’m gonna try out for the Songfellows.’ Something he hadn’t quite decided upon until this moment.
‘That’s wonderful, Elvis,’ she says. ‘I’d love to hear you sing.’
And only then can his hand let go of the seat and find her knee. It’s warm and thrillingly alive beneath his fingers. ‘You will,’ he says. ‘I promise.’
When they arrive at the drive-in, it’s still cold in the car, even though he leaves the engine running, but nothing can stand in the way of his enjoyment of K’s hamburgers. They are the most delicious food he knows. In fact, he finds it hard to think about anything else while he is eating this burger. Dixie, the late hour, the music coming from the car radio (it’s Dean Martin, and he loves Dean’s smoothness, just as he loves the roughness of Muddy Waters), all fade as he sinks his teeth into the sweet and giving bread, tastes the sour smack of gherkin and tomato and the salty depth of the meat itself. He can hardly believe that now he’s out of school and in a job it’s possible to afford such things on a regular basis. There is only this: the chewing and swallowing, and the next mouthful. Elvis tries not to gobble, for the girl’s sake. His mama is always saying, Slow up, baby, it’ll still be there one minute from now. But it’s never felt that way to him. He must get it in his mouth, all of it, right now. And with each mouthful there is that small pang of regret that this one brings him closer to the last, closer to the moment when the hamburger will be no more.
He chases crumbs and drips of sauce round the wax paper with a finger until he notices that Dixie has left half her burger untouched. He stares at what’s left on her tray as she chatters. Noticing his eyes on her food, she offers him what’s left. While he finishes up her burger, she’s jittery. She keeps glancing at her watch and laughing and saying it doesn’t matter, they won’t mind.
His mama will mind, but she won’t say anything. Gladys will be sitting up, looking at the clock, listening to the radio, unable to sleep until he is home. But, tonight, that is her problem.
As Elvis hands their empty tray to the car-hop, Dixie fiddles with her hair, waiting. The stiff set of her waves reminds him of a corrugated fence, but he chases this thought from his mind, and reaches for them anyway, finding he can push his fingers right in and touch her unguarded neck. Her collar is high but not high enough to protect her earlobe, which he takes between his finger and thumb. She shivers and pulls slightly away, and, knowing he’s risking losing her, but not caring, he moves closer, as he’s seen it done in countless movies. Once he watched Red necking with Wendy Snipes and it seemed that their faces were so deeply connected one of them would consume the other soon enough. More than anything, it looked like hard work – Red’s body was tense and absolutely still while his jaw did everything for him, and Wendy was pushed back, her head crushed against the wall of the schoolyard. He senses this is not what Dixie wants. She doesn’t want to be squashed against concrete and have her jaw overworked, as if she’s chewing through a piece of gristly meat.
And so he chooses her hot cheek first, letting his lips brush against it; then he moves to her jawline, which is unmistakably tense. Her breathing is quick and shallow. As he finds her lips, he tastes malts and lipstick – he recognises the flavour from his own experiments with his mama’s make-up – and thinking of this urges him on until he has her mouth open to his own.
‘When can I see you again?’ he asks, drawing back.
‘Tomorrow.’ There is something new in her eyes, a kind of triumph. It reminds him of his mama’s look, the first time he brought a real wage home. Excitement and gratitude. But mostly gratitude. Finally, her eyes say. Finally, here it is: what I was waiting for. What only you can give me.
And it’s this look, rather than the kiss, nice though it was, that makes him forget he is even driving as takes Dixie home. It’s like the engine is him; his foot part of the accelerator, his hand melded to the steering wheel. He has only to make the smallest gesture for the car to take him exactly where he wants to go.
* * *
In the kitchen, Gladys stands above her son, watching him shovel egg into his mouth. She’s risen early, so she can catch him before he leaves for work. Often, now, she won’t see him in the mornings, and only briefly in the evenings. He likes his new job, driving a truck for Crown Electric, and she never has to prise him from his bed to get him there on time. Sometimes he borrows the truck on weekends to take her to church with him, and they’re both proud to sit up front and watch the road disappear so far beneath their feet.
‘Dixie?’ she asks. ‘That’s her name?’
‘Yes, Mama. That’s her name. Miss Dixie Locke.’
She’s known for over a month that something’s been going on. She knew as soon as he came in so late that night from the Rollerdrome, not because it was past midnight – he’s always going to listen to music being played somewhere, and she would never tell him not to do that; he’s been going alone to radio stations since he was eleven years old, after all – but because he’s been so distracted, so reluctant to sit down and talk to her when he comes in. They used to talk for hours sometimes, he always had boocups to tell her about his day, his hopes and his fears. Then, suddenly, this past month, it seems he’s had nothing to say at all.
‘It’s a nice name, son.’
She imagines her: trim, neat, a touch conceited. Over the past year, Gladys has put on forty pounds and can’t stop noticing the way her skin puckers and sags around her mouth. Every window she passes, she tries not to look at her reflection, but in the end it always catches up with her. And when it does, it’s a shock to see her forty-two-year-old self. She knows it’s herself looking right back at her, but it’s not a self she quite recognises. There are too many shadows on that face. Too often, it looks gloomy or plain afraid, even when Gladys has reckoned her mind to be empty.
Elvis forks in another mouthful. Will this girl, Dixie, fix his eggs in the way that he likes – well fried, not turned, left on a low flame until they’re absolutely solid?
He wipes cornbread around his plate. It’s often disgusted Gladys to see Vernon eating. The glugging and slurping like plumbing, the way his saliva escapes his mouth and beads his lips. But she finds the spectacle of her son eating nothing but charming. Few things give her greater pleasure than to see Elvis enjoy something she’s made for him. She remembers baking a pound cake for his fourth birthday; she’d saved up the ingredients specially, and had found herself going teary at the sight of him putting it in his mouth, chewing, swallowing, asking for more.
‘You want more, baby?’
The sun shines through the window, covering her son’s knees in brightness. He pushes back his chair.
‘No, thanks, Mama.’
‘So when you gonna bring Miss Dixie to meet your family?’
‘Soon,’ he says, pecking her cheek.
‘A girl won’t reckon you’re worth too much if you don’t let her meet your folks.’
He blows her a kiss before stepping out of the apartment and into the crisp February morning.
In the event, he gives her little time to prepare. ‘Dixie’s coming tomorrow,’ he announces on Friday night, before heading downtown with Red.
On Saturday, Gladys rises early to polish the kitchen linoleum and scrub out the sink. She runs her cloth over every surface of the apartment, then considers washing the covers on the couch, but decides it’s too late to get them dry. She bakes a pound cake, remembering still that birthday treat that Elvis liked so much, and thinking that it wouldn’t be nice to come across too fancy, anyway. A pound cake is good enough. It’d be even better with some cool cream, but she won’t send Vernon to the store, even though they can afford such small luxuries now that Elvis brings home more than his daddy each week.
In the mirror on the back of the pantry door she yanks some grey hairs from her temples. She has on her second-best dress, blue wool with a pink belt. She doesn’t want the girl to think she’s tried too hard.
She means to love Dixie, as Elvis loves her. She doesn’t know the Lockes, but she’s managed to prise some information from her son about his meeting with them: Dixie’s mother was kind and pretty, Dixie’s father didn’t say much of anything. Gladys appreciates that Elvis’s appearance has become surprising, and could, to other families, be kind of alarming. She tries to imagine how it would feel if it were the other way around, if Dixie were her daughter, bringing Elvis for a visit. But she can only imagine seeing beyond Elvis’s long hair and interesting clothes – others might call them flashy, or worse; she wouldn’t – to his impeccable manners and softly spoken charm. How could any mother not be impressed by that?
She goes to the sink and rinses her hands, which are damp with sweat. She wipes the table once more, and peers out of the window. It’s started to rain lightly, and a couple of kids are jumping on and off the sidewalk with their hands held over their heads. Vernon is also out there, waxing the car in preparation for the girl’s arrival, despite the weather. He stretches himself across the windshield, all his back trouble forgotten.
Elvis’s car pulls up and Gladys inches away from the window. She removes her housecoat, scanning the apartment for anything out of place. She hears Vernon say, ‘Well, just look at you!’ and the sound of a girl’s laughter. Then their voices are echoing up the stairwell, Vernon’s taking the lead as he says Elvis ought to give Dixie a ride in the Crown Electric truck some time.
In order to look as though she hasn’t been eavesdropping, Gladys retreats to the kitchen and starts spooning coffee into the pot. Even when she hears the door open and their voices in the living room, she doesn’t turn around, wanting her son to come find her.
‘Mama! We’re here!’
The two of them stand in the kitchen doorway, both flushed and slightly damp, breathing quick and blinking. Elvis has a hand on Dixie’s shoulder. She barely comes up to his chest, and the black curls of her hair rest on her shoulders like jewels.
‘Welcome, dear, to our home,’ says Gladys, stepping forward and taking both of Dixie’s hands in hers. ‘I want you to treat it as your own.’
Dixie smiles. ‘It’s sure good to meet you at last, Mrs Presley! Elvis has told me so much about you!’
‘Call me Gladys, honey.’
‘Is the coffee ready, Mama?’ says Elvis, eyeing the cake on the table.
‘You two go sit and I’ll bring it on through,’ Gladys says, waving them out of the kitchen.
When she has the cake and the coffee served, she tells Elvis to scoot along the couch so she can sit next to his girl. Sandwiching herself between them, she says, ‘What do you reckon to our television set over there, Dixie? Elvis got it for us.’
‘It’s real fine, Mrs Presley.’
‘We love Candid Camera.’
‘Never miss it,’ says Vernon.
‘And did you see our piano, too?’ asks Gladys. ‘Since he’s been working, Elvis just keeps coming back with these little surprises! But I’m sure he spoils you as much.’
The truth is that Gladys frets over her son running up debts, but his joy at bringing such treasures home prevents her from mentioning it.
Dixie shifts forward on the cushions so she can look directly at Elvis. ‘And you call call me high class? When you have a TV and a piano both?’
Elvis slaps her leg playfully and she returns the gesture with a delighted squeal, prompting him to slap her again. This goes back and forth for a full minute, leaving Gladys with nothing to do but sit in the middle and witness the flirtation.
When their game is over, Elvis says, ‘Dixie’s Assembly of God, Mama.’
‘That’s real encouraging to hear, Dixie. We all need a little guidance in our lives, don’t you think? Especially when we’re young and all. What do you make of our Pastor Hamill?’
‘He’s neat,’ says Dixie. ‘Real dramatic.’
Elvis launches into a long tale of how they met at Bible-study class. As he talks, Dixie follows his every move, nodding, smiling and laughing a bit too loud at all the correct moments. Gladys watches her, thinking that she looks like a little doll. She decides that Dixie must have lived a sheltered life, with a father going out to the same job every day in a smart suit and tie, and a mother who has never had to dirty her hands in a laundry, hospital ward or field. How else could her brow be so smooth and her eyes so bright? How else could she sit there and smile and smile and eat up all that cake and drink in Elvis’s every word and glance like it was nothing at all?
After they’ve finished their coffee, Vernon suggests that Elvis help him finish up waxing the car. Dixie shoots a look at Elvis, clearly alarmed, but the two men rise and leave the room, leaving Gladys alone with the girl.
Dixie turns to Gladys and shrugs. ‘They won’t be too long, I guess!’
‘Don’t bank on it, honey. Takes those men the whole afternoon to polish up one car sometimes. I swear they love them old automobiles more than anything in this world.’
Dixie swallows and looks at her shoes.
‘Anyway,’ says Gladys, stretching her legs and leaning back on the couch, ‘this gives us girls a chance for a real good talk, don’t it?’
Dixie nods and makes a small noise that sounds like agreement. Glancing at the piano, she says, ‘Does Elvis play that thing?’
‘He sure does. Taught himself on my brother-in-law’s piano, not long after we moved to Memphis. He never played for you?’
‘Oh, he sings a lot. And plays guitar, of course.’
‘Ain’t that a beautiful thing?’
‘Do you sing too, Mrs Presley?’
‘A little. But Elvis’s daddy is a better singer than me. He used to serenade me some when we was dating.’ Keeping her eyes on her coffee cup, she continues, ‘Do you love Elvis, Dixie?’
Dixie lets out a high-pitched giggle.
‘I hope you don’t mind me asking you that question. You see, I know my son is a very loving boy, he’s always been that way. And I know he loves you.’
‘He does?’
‘Why, ain’t he told you so?’
Dixie plays with one of her curls. ‘Not in so many words.’
‘Well, you know how boys can be, Dixie. Some of them find it a little hard to say these things.’
‘I do love him awful, Mrs Presley!’ Dixie blurts, kneading her fingers together in her lap.
Gladys takes her hand, which is warm and slightly sticky, and pats it. ‘I could tell the minute I saw you, dear.’
‘You could?’ says Dixie, blushing.
‘Oh, sure. But then, who wouldn’t love him?’
Dixie laughs uncertainly.
‘Now,’ says Gladys, ‘tell me. Are you a dancer?’
‘I have done a little ballet—’
‘I thought so! Your head sits in just exactly the right place on those pretty little shoulders.’
‘You’re too kind.’
‘Oh, Dixie, I always hoped Elvis would marry somebody just like you.’
Dixie stares at Gladys, her eyes brighter than ever.
* * *
It has been six months since Elvis and Dixie started dating and, at Gladys’s suggestion, the girl has agreed to join her in cooking a celebratory lunch. In the Piggly Wiggly, Dixie had suggested buying the ingredients for a fish gumbo and a baked Alaska, but Gladys managed to steer the first course back to meat loaf and mashed potatoes.
They arrive home from the supermarket before the men, who have gone to pick up Vernon’s car from the repair shop. While Dixie sets the table, Gladys focuses on the meat loaf. Once she’s got it in the oven, she takes the weight off, sitting on a chair to watch Dixie whip the egg whites for the dessert.
Gladys points to the spotted scarf Dixie is wearing to hold back her hair. ‘I wish I could wear a something like that!’ she says. ‘It looks so … carefree.’
Dixie stops beating the eggs and pulls the scarf from her hair. First shaking it out, she hands it to Gladys. ‘It’s yours,’ she says. ‘Why don’t you try it?’
‘Oh, I’m too long in the tooth for that kind of stuff,’ says Gladys, but she strokes the scarf, feeling its milky texture.
‘Come on,’ says Dixie. And, leaning close to Gladys, she loops it around her head, tying it on top, then steps back to admire her work. ‘It looks cute,’ she states.
Gladys touches her hair and lets out a giggle. The doctor has prescribed her some pills to help her reduce her weight, and they make her giddy with energy one minute, exhausted the next.
Dixie resumes her beating.
After a moment, Gladys says, ‘I ain’t sure if this is something you wanna hear, Dixie, but I want you to know that there are things you can do to make sure you don’t have a baby until you’re married.’
The beater stills, egg dripping from its wire.
‘I don’t mean to pry,’ Gladys continues, ‘but I do know how men can be.’ She believes Elvis to be different to his daddy, but she doesn’t want him shamed by this girl’s pregnancy.
Dixie starts up whipping again, even harder than before. ‘Elvis ain’t like that!’
‘I’m sure glad to hear it, honey, but if you’re ever worried about anything, you can talk to me, you hear?’
Just then, Vernon and Elvis burst in. Perhaps for Dixie’s benefit, Vernon has started wearing cologne, which makes the apartment smell like a hairdresser’s shop. Elvis shouts for his mama and rushes into the kitchen with his face all lit up, saying he’s got news, but, seeing Dixie with the wire whip in her hand, he pauses in the middle of the room.
Gladys says, ‘Congratulations on your six-month anniversary, son. Dixie here wanted to celebrate with a special family meal.’
‘I’m making baked Alaska,’ says Dixie, her cheeks still flushed.
Elvis doesn’t move towards either of them. Instead, he swallows and says, ‘What in the world is that?’
‘You’re gonna love it,’ says Dixie.
‘Well, what are y’all standing there for?’ says Gladys. ‘You men get washed up so we can enjoy our lunch.’
Vernon looks at Elvis, who blurts, ‘I got a call, Mama! From Sun Recording! They want me down there!’
‘What?’
‘Rabbi Fruchter downstairs just told me Miss Keisker telephoned—’
‘Miss who?’
‘She works with Mr Phillips, the owner … I didn’t tell you, ’cause I wanted it to be a surprise, but I went over there for a sort of audition—’
Gladys’s heart leaps as she begins to understand what he is telling her. ‘You did?’
‘And now Mr Phillips has a song he wants me to try!’
She jumps to her feet, nearly knocking Dixie’s bowl of eggs from the table. ‘Then you gotta get over there!’
‘I gotta change first.’
She gives her son a little push on the arm. ‘You look great! Get going!’
Elvis looks back at Dixie. The wire whip is still suspended in the air.
‘Sorry, honey,’ he says.
Dixie nods, but says nothing.
After he’s gone, Gladys beams at her husband and says, ‘We’ll just have to eat lunch at suppertime, won’t we?’
‘Just relax, and let me hear a song that really means something to you, now.’
Mr Phillips expects something from him, but Elvis isn’t at all sure what that something might be. The song Mr Phillips asked him to sing first – ‘Without You’ – hasn’t gone so well. It’s the kind of heartbroken ballad that Elvis loves, but he couldn’t get behind it, somehow. It just didn’t have the yearning that it needed, and it remained little more than a wheedling complaint. When the song was over, Mr Phillips had rubbed at his ear, as if the sound had been an irritation to him, and he wanted to wipe it away.
‘Sing something that comes from your own experience,’ he suggests now. ‘Anything at all.’
Elvis stands, hanging on to the microphone stand, rocking back and forth on his heels.
‘Elvis?’
He doesn’t think Mr Phillips wants to hear a gospel song, not even ‘The Old Rugged Cross’, or ‘Milky White Way’. He’d like to sing ‘My Happiness’, but it took Mr Phillips a year to call him back the last time he tried that one on him.
‘You’re doing just fine. Sing anything you want.’
‘Anything, sir?’
‘Anything that’s special to you.’
Knowing this may be his only chance to impress somebody within this thing called the record industry, Elvis panics. There are so many songs that are special, and he cannot seem to recall a single one right now. He pinches his nose, laughs, shakes his head.
‘I just can’t think of a song, sir.’
‘Sure you can,’ says Mr Phillips.
It has to be a ballad. A ballad was what Mr Phillips called him in for, and ballads are what Elvis has always liked the most, ever since he sang ‘Barbara Allen’ in class, ever since he heard his daddy singing ‘Clementine’. Ballads are sweet, and sad; they express the best emotions.
He clears his throat, then starts in on ‘Tomorrow Night’, which he sometimes sings to Dixie on her front porch. He tries to picture her pretty little face as she drinks his voice down and gazes at him as if she’s still thirsty, but Mr Phillips’s shiny chin keeps interrupting the image.
When he’s finished, Mr Phillips tilts his head and rubs his ear again.
‘OK, son. Thanks for coming in. Thank you very much.’
The green light goes off. Nothing more is said.
Elvis doesn’t go straight home, despite the celebratory meal waiting there. Instead, he drives the Lincoln too fast along Riverside Drive, making the engine growl and cough. Keeping the radio switched off because he cannot stand to hear anybody’s voice right now, he considers how he could murder Mr Phillips and Miss Keisker, both. Maybe he could smash his car through the front window of the studio, straight into her neat desk, cleaving it in two. Maybe he could keep going, through that wall behind her and into the glass of the booth and right through Mr Phillips’s shining chin. Finish them both off.
He parks up and stares at the big brown river. He can smell its claggy dirt. Maybe he should drive down the muddy bank and into the water, let the river swamp the car, seep into his clothes and hair, fill up his mouth and lungs and ears. There’d be hardly any sound down there, beneath the surface. He wouldn’t be able to hear one voice, not even his own. He remembers the time at the swimming hole with his daddy, when he panicked that Vernon wouldn’t resurface. But Vernon always seems to come back up, to keep on going, no matter how tough things get. Many times, Elvis has been sure that his father was broken – after the pen, after Mama found out about the woman on the road back in Tupelo, after they first moved to Memphis and they were so poor Vernon had lined his shoes with cardboard. But Vernon has a habit of rising again. It’s something that Elvis knows he must learn if he’s to be any kind of man.
He remembers, too, Noreen’s red hair through the trees, and how he covered himself in shame. If Noreen saw him now, she’d laugh in his face. And Vernon would, too. You think you got it hard? You oughta try my life, boy.
Elvis decides that the best thing to do is not mention any of it to a living soul. He can just refuse to discuss it. Mama will press him, because she is used to him telling her everything, but he thinks maybe this time he can resist. He can keep this entirely to himself. After all, that’s what his daddy would do.
Feeling a little better, he guns the engine and drives home.
All week, Elvis relives Mr Phillips rubbing his ear and saying, ‘Thank you very much.’ Whenever his mama asks what happened, he holds up a hand and tells her he doesn’t want to talk about it. He does the same to Dixie, and she stops asking much quicker than Gladys.
Then there’s a phone call.
He’s in the Suzore Number 2 movie theatre, eating popcorn and watching an interestingly brunette Lana Turner in Flame and the Flesh when Gladys battles her way down the aisle.
‘Get yourself home,’ she hisses. ‘Rabbi Fruchter got another call from a Sun Records man.’ Then she glances up at the screen and says, ‘And what you doing watching nasty movies, anyhow?’
Standing in Rabbi Fruchter’s hallway, Elvis twists the telephone’s cord around his fingers and hardly dares breathe. The man on the line, whose name is Scotty Moore, tells him to come to his house on Belz on Sunday to run through some songs with him and a friend.
‘We’re in a group called the Starlite Wranglers,’ he says. ‘You probably heard of us.’
‘Oh, sure,’ says Elvis, trying to recall if he’s seen them anyplace. ‘You’re real good.’
‘So we’ll see you around three.’
‘What did Mr Phillips say about me, again?’
‘He said you sang.’
Elvis waits for more, but nothing comes. So he asks, ‘Want me to bring my guitar?’
‘If you want.’
‘Mr Phillips didn’t say nothing about me?’
‘He just asked me to listen to you, and tell him what I thought.’
‘So it’s a try-out?’
‘See you Sunday.’
By the time Elvis arrives on Belz, he’s found out from Mr Cuoghi, who owns Pop Tunes, that the Starlite Wranglers are about as far backwoods hillbilly as they come, but Scotty Moore is respected in the clubs around the city for his guitar playing. He also learns that Mr Moore has a cute second wife named Bobbie, and that his first wife is living out in Washington with their kids. Elvis decides not to mention this part to his mama.
The sidewalk by Scotty’s new one-storey house is clean and dotted with young trees. Up the street, a couple of kids are sitting on the kerb, too hot to do anything but suck on their Popsicles. It must be at least a hundred degrees out here. A man stops washing his car to watch Elvis as he walks up to the porch in his pink pants and white lacy shirt, which is sticking to his back. He carries his guitar in one hand, unsure whether he’s done the right thing in bringing it. It’s old now, and too small for him, and is covered in scratches. In the mirror at home, he’d held the guitar to his chest and practised what he’d say to Mr Moore: It sure is a pleasure to meet such a great musician, sir. I’ve admired the Starlite Wranglers a long time. I hope we can work together real well.
A skinny woman with short dark hair opens the door. She’s wearing a pair of pedal pushers and has nothing on her feet. Putting a hand to her cheek, she inspects Elvis with what he takes to be alarm.
‘Sorry to trouble you, ma’am …’
‘Scotty!’ she calls back into the house, fixing Elvis with bug eyes. ‘The kid with the sideburns is here!’
As she ushers him in, Elvis is careful to wipe his feet on the doormat, but he doesn’t apologise when his hand brushes her arm.
The living room is so tidy it’s like nobody lives there. It’s bigger than his parents’ entire apartment, and the shelves are lined with stacks of magazines and records. There’s no TV, but there’s a record player on the table by the window, and a double bass propped against the wall.
‘I’m Bobbie,’ says the woman, using her hand to wipe some imaginary dust from the couch. ‘Can I get you something? A beer or …’
‘A Pepsi, if you have it, ma’am.’
She nods towards his pants. ‘Where in the world did you pick those up?’
‘Lansky’s Tailors. They’re the best on Beale.’
‘That right? I might get myself a pair.’
‘You must be Elvis.’ A short man with a neat face is striding towards him. The man’s hair sits respectfully flat on his head and his jeans look very clean and new. He can’t be more than a few years older than Elvis but something about him makes Elvis feel childish by comparison. Slipping an arm around Bobbie’s waist and pulling her in close, the man says, ‘I see you’ve met my wife.’
Elvis touches his nose. ‘She’s made me feel right at home, sir.’
‘Scotty Moore,’ says the man, holding out a hand. His nails look manicured, and his shake is surprisingly strong.
‘I’m a real fan,’ says Elvis, having forgotten the rest of his speech.
‘Bobbie got you something?’ Scotty asks.
She frees herself from his arm. ‘I’m on it,’ she says.
When she’s gone, Scotty grins, just briefly, and then looks serious again. ‘Sam said we might play around a little, see what happens. I got Bill coming over, too. He plays bass.’
‘I know. He’s real good.’
‘You seen us, then?’
‘Thousands of times, man.’
To avoid Scotty’s penetrating eyes, Elvis leans his guitar on the couch and walks across the room to look out at the yard. The yellow grass is patchy and could do with straightening out round the edges. ‘You make a living out of performing?’ he asks.
‘Not yet.’
Elvis turns to him. ‘But you mean to, right?’
Scotty takes up his guitar, which has a good sheen on it and looks like it means business, just like him. ‘Sure.’
‘Me too,’ says Elvis, having just decided this.
Scotty strums a few chords and says nothing.
‘I mean,’ says Elvis, stalking the room as he speaks, ‘Mr Phillips told me I could.’ He selects a few records from the shelf and flips through them, doing his best to appear careless. The Coasters. Muddy Waters. The Dominoes. The Platters. Hank Snow. Rudi Richardson. Coming across a Lowell Fulson, Elvis holds it up and says, ‘I love this guy.’
‘You do?’
‘I love all of these.’
‘Marion – Miss Keisker – said you’re a good ballad singer.’
Elvis cannot stop a big smile springing to his face. ‘Well,’ he says, slowly, ‘Mr Phillips said I could make it, if I hooked up with you guys.’
Scotty studies him for a long moment. Elvis goes back to flipping through the records.
Then Bobbie calls out that Bill has arrived, and Scotty leaves Elvis alone in the living room. There’s a lot of noise from the hallway. Bobbie’s laughing, Scotty and Bill are both talking about the show they did last night, how crazy it was and what time they made it home and what time they woke up, and how it’s hot as all get out. There’s a resounding slap, which Elvis takes to be Bill’s hand landing on Scotty’s back.
The door opens.
‘So this is the kid!’ says Bill, putting his big, grinning face up close to Elvis’s and grabbing his hand. He’s older than Scotty. His eye bags seem to be stained brown, like ashtrays.
‘I’m a big fan …’ Elvis begins.
‘Sure you are! Why wouldn’t you be? What’s your name, again?’
‘Presley, sir. Elvis Presley.’
‘Your mama give you that name?’
‘It was my daddy’s middle name.’
‘And he let you have it, all the same?’
Elvis looks to Scotty, and then back to Bill, who’s grinning broadly.
‘Elvis here says Sam told him he could make it,’ says Scotty.
‘With your help,’ says Elvis, ducking his head.
Bill bursts out laughing. ‘Sure he did, kid!’ he says, slapping Elvis on the back.
‘So are we getting down to this thing or what?’ Scotty asks.
Suddenly unable to stay in the room with these two men, one who seems just too big and loud to fit in the place, and the other so neat and contained that it’s downright spooky, Elvis excuses himself to the bathroom. As he rushes out, he hears Scotty mutter to Bill, ‘This won’t take long.’
In the hallway, Elvis takes a deep breath. Maybe if he can just get his bearings, keep smiling, he can do this thing. My name is FEAR! he whispers to himself. People tremble and shake when I am near!
He bursts back into the room. ‘What do you want me to sing?’
‘Up to you,’ says Scotty.
‘You know “I Love You Because”?’
‘Sure,’ says Scotty, leaning over his guitar and strumming it, making a deep and lovely sound which Elvis judges to be about ten times better than anything he’s managed to produce from his own instrument.
‘You can start,’ Scotty instructs.
‘You ain’t playing?’ Elvis asks Bill.
‘I don’t play on Sundays,’ says Bill, cracking open a beer. ‘It’s against my religion.’
‘He’s my second pair of ears,’ Scotty explains.
Elvis tries to strum the intro, gets it wrong, apologises, starts again. His hands are sweating madly. Scotty and Bill’s eyes are on him, so he fixes his own gaze on the drapes, which are blue and covered in cream swirls that look like ice cream, and he tries to start singing, but he misses his cue, apologises, and has to start over.
‘Just relax, man,’ says Bill. ‘Everything’s cool.’
Elvis manages to start singing this time, but just as he gets into the second line, and is beginning to feel as though he might be able to make it through the song, Scotty starts fingerpicking notes, so that his guitar sounds like it’s singing a completely different tune from the one coming from Elvis’s mouth.
Elvis stops. ‘How’d you do that?’ he asks.
Scotty shrugs. ‘Practice. We starting over?’
Elvis begins the song once more, focusing on his own voice this time, determined not to be out-sung by a guitar. He tries to wring some emotion from the words, but he knows what he’s doing isn’t impressing Scotty or Bill too much. Even though he plays as though he has electricity coming from his fingers, Scotty’s face remains flat as an iron. Bill just stares and drinks, as if he’s got better things to do on a Sunday afternoon.
They run through a few more ballads, and with each one, Elvis’s voice becomes weaker, and his heart sinks lower. After an hour, Scotty looks at his watch and announces that it’s been a real pleasure, and that they’ll be in touch.
Elvis leaves without saying goodbye. He climbs into his car and races over to Krystal Burgers.
After he’s got his order, Elvis drives straight back to Scotty’s, one sweaty hand on the wheel, the other on his paper package of food, and parks in front of the house. While waiting for his burgers, he had an idea that he could change their minds, that they could try again and it would all be different, but now he can hear music coming from the house. Unsure what to do, he starts in on the food. The afternoon has become even hotter. The sky seems to be pressing on everything. Nobody is out on the sidewalk, now. As he chews and swallows, he listens to the song drifting from the windows, and it sounds much better than anything they’d managed that afternoon. It’s a country song, ‘Bumming Around’, and although it’s fun, it’s got pump in it, and it sounds like Scotty and Bill are enjoying themselves plenty without him.
Elvis grabs the door handle, ready to run up the path, hammer on the door and announce his intention to sing something else, something with a good beat behind it, just like the one they’re doing now, if only they’ll let him. They have to listen! But then they begin their version of Hank Williams’s ‘Kaw-Liga’, and Elvis lets his hand drop. Hank died just a few months ago, OD-ing on drugs in the back of his Cadillac, having drunk up all that money and fame. Mama loved Hank, and so did he. The thought of the country star stops Elvis from running up that path. What would Hank do? He wouldn’t go back to beg. He’d move on, find another opportunity.
Elvis knows he ought to go home and tell Gladys everything. Perhaps they could cry together over Hank, and sing ‘I Saw the Light’, like they did back in January. But instead he starts the engine and drives a little way down the road, parks the Lincoln beneath the trees, and keeps listening to the music, banging his head over and over on the burning steering wheel.
That night, he drives around downtown, calling in to the Green Owl where somebody is singing ‘Fool, Fool, Fool’, which makes him leave again.
But the next evening, when he arrives home from work, Gladys and Dixie are waiting for him on the couch with the news that he’s had another call from Sun. Mr Phillips wants him back over there.
This time, Elvis changes his clothes and shines his shoes before saying goodbye.
The temperature is higher in the studio, and it seems to Elvis that he and Scotty and Bill are making heat and moisture more than music. Scotty is a little friendlier, patting Elvis on the shoulder and telling him to just relax and do it like they did at his house. For the first couple of hours, Elvis suggests songs endlessly, trying all his favourite ballads, putting everything he has into it, sometimes even breaking off in the middle of one to start another. Occasionally Mr Phillips tells Scotty not to make his guitar part too darn complicated. Other than that, he just rubs at his ear and looks impassively through the glass, like he did before.
It’s almost midnight when they reach the end of ‘Harbour Lights’. Mr Phillips sighs and says they might take a break, then disappears to fetch them some Pepsis.
When he’s gone, they look at one another in silence. Bill’s eye bags are bigger and browner than yesterday afternoon, and even Scotty’s shirt is creased and has become unhooked from the back of his pants. His hair, though, is still absolutely flat.
‘What I gotta do to make that man like me?’ Elvis asks.
Bill and Scotty sit on the floor, Scotty leaning back on the piano and Bill using his bass as a prop for his elbow. Neither of them has an answer, so Elvis stays on his feet, and starts suggesting songs again. He’s used to being awake at this hour; he sometimes thinks he feels most awake between midnight and three in the morning. If he was home he’d be watching the street from his window, wishing he was out there. Now that he is out, not on the streets but in this studio, making music, he means to hang on to every moment of it, even if it’s not the kind of music that Mr Phillips wants to hear.
‘You know that ol’ Arthur Crudup song? “That’s All Right”?’ Elvis asks, and when they ignore him he launches into it, just goofing off, imitating Arthur’s raspy voice and leaping around as he sings, dipping his knees, tipping his head back and shouting the song to the ceiling as a way of releasing all his frustration while Mr Phillips is out of the room. He imagines he’s one of the Vampin’ Babies on the stage at the Midnight Ramble, and starts wiggling his ass and his shoulders in time. Soon Bill is laughing and joining in, getting up to slap the bass as if it needs punishing, twirling it around on the spot and crouching to wiggle his own behind. Then Scotty is standing and making his guitar sing along in its own peculiar fashion, and for the first time that evening, all three of them are smiling at one another. Elvis sings louder, stretching to some ridiculously high notes, swinging his arm in a slow circle in time to Bill’s bass, imagining now that he’s in Ulysees Mayhorn’s band, among the mops and lamps and upturned vegetable crates of the store.
‘What the hell is that?’
Elvis stops, abruptly.
Mr Phillips is back behind the glass. He’s staring at Elvis hard, but he doesn’t look mad. He looks as if he has a thousand questions.
‘Elvis, I didn’t think you’d know that song.’
‘We was just fooling around …’ says Scotty.
‘Well, do it again!’ says Mr Phillips. ‘Back up, find a place, and let me get something of that.’
Elvis glances at Scotty, who shrugs.
‘Come on!’ says Mr Phillips. ‘You had something there! I don’t know what it was, but it was something.’
They start over.
* * *
The day after Dewey Phillips played her son’s record on the radio – not just played it, but damn near wore it out (she heard it fifteen times: she counted), Gladys puts on her good shoes and informs Vernon that she needs to go downtown to pick up some special things for a cake to celebrate Elvis’s success. Vernon gives her a look which tells her he knows that what she really wants is to hear Elvis’s song over the radio in a shop or a cafeteria somewhere, so she can tell somebody that voice is her son’s. But he drives her anyway.
On the way to the Piggly Wiggly, it crosses Gladys’s mind that she might see somebody she knows, perhaps Mrs King from her Lauderdale days, and Mrs King might even have heard the broadcast and be thrilled, not to mention envious. Even if she hasn’t heard it, Gladys will be able to announce the news. Oh, didn’t you hear? Dewey Phillips played Elvis’s record – yes, he has a record out – and apparently the phone lines at the station lit up like a fairground! And Dewey interviewed him, right there on the show!
It’s mid-morning, and the heat in the car is so intense she has to close her eyes and concentrate on breathing steady. Vernon just frowns against the glare. They’ve both been up the whole night with Elvis, going over it all. Elvis made her repeat exactly what she heard on the radio during his interview. He was so excited and nervous that he had no idea what he was saying. Gladys suggested they get Dixie over, but Elvis told her that Dixie had left town last night, on a family vacation.
‘You know,’ Gladys says to Vernon as they drive down Poplar Avenue, ‘we can’t let this go to Elvis’s head.’
‘Aw, Glad. Let the boy have a little fun.’
‘We want him to get his electrician’s certificate, don’t we? All this could be kinda distracting.’
‘Our son is on the radio all night – he’s interviewed by Dewey Phillips – and all you can talk about is certificates?’ asks Vernon.
Gladys giggles. ‘I loved it when I heard his name. Elvis Presley. I couldn’t believe I was hearing those words.’
‘I know,’ says Vernon. Then he launches into his Dewey impression. ‘That was Elvis Presley with “That’s All Right, Mama”!’
‘Think he’ll be in the Scimitar?’
‘I don’t doubt it, gal.’
She checks the money in her change-purse. ‘What do you figure they’ll ask?’
‘How should I know?’
‘I guess they’ll wanna know about where he’s from, what he likes to do … Do you think they’ll ask about his folks?’
‘He can make all that up.’
‘Vernon!’
‘That’s what the movie stars do.’
Gladys giggles again. ‘I’m still hearing Dewey say his name.’
‘Elvis Presley!’ Vernon hoots.
She doesn’t mention it, but hearing Elvis’s name on the radio had actually felt exposing – dangerous, even; to Gladys’s mind, hearing your full name in public usually means trouble. The last time Vernon’s full name was uttered out loud before an audience was, after all, when he was sentenced at the Lee County courthouse.
As she walks to the store, leaving Vernon in the cafeteria down the street, a thick wave of July heat rises from the sidewalk, making Gladys feel as though her body is seeping into her clothes. Her dress goes limp, flapping against her thighs, and she becomes aware of her own odour. But none of it matters, because soon she will be in the air-conditioned Piggly Wiggly, and she might even hear her son’s voice coming over the tannoy.
Of course, Mrs King isn’t in the store. Gladys doesn’t bother with a cart. She takes the aisles slowly, her ears keenly aware that the radio is in fact playing Perry Como’s latest. When she reaches the refrigerator, she stands before it, basking in the cool air coming from the metal shelves as she decides which margarine to buy. She’d like butter, but it’s so much more expensive. She wonders if they will have more money soon. Elvis has said that, if he sells records, there could be more coming to them. Vernon says he’s never met a guitar player worth a damn, and that guitars never mean cash, only liquor and loneliness. He says that’s why most country songs are sad songs. But Elvis’s song isn’t sad. As she listened to it last night, she understood that it was a song full of energy and youth and hope, and she noticed something in it that she hadn’t heard in her son’s voice before then, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on, but standing here in the cool air it comes to her: her son’s song sounded like money.
She chooses the Oleo and goes to the cash register. The girl doesn’t look at Gladys as she states the amount owed. Gladys has the change ready, but she hesitates, because the Perry Como song has finished now.
The girl repeats the amount and Gladys almost holds up a hand to shush her, but then realises that the next song is also not her son’s. Snatching up her goods, she leaves the money on the counter and hurries through the doors.
She tells Vernon that it’s too hot to be downtown and she wants to go home directly. Recognising her mood, he complies without comment.
When they reach their apartment, Gladys spots her sister Lillian waiting on the porch.
Since she moved to Memphis, Lillian has dropped by occasionally, but has been too busy with her own family to come regularly, which Gladys hasn’t much minded. Lillian has never been shy about letting Gladys know all the ways in which she is more knowledgeable, experienced and sensible than her little sister. And as they’ve grown, these ways seem to have become more numerous.
Gladys almost tells Vernon to turn the car around, but then Lillian waves, and she has no choice but to wave back.
‘I guess y’all have been out celebrating!’ Lillian calls.
Beneath the midday sun, Gladys walks slowly towards her sister.
‘Guess y’all are too grand to stay home, now!’ Lillian continues.
Gladys leans in to kiss Lillian’s cheek, and she notices something nervous in her sister’s expression, as if she is expecting Gladys to make some sudden, unexpected move.
‘Come on in,’ says Vernon, holding the door open.
‘Ain’t seen you in a while,’ says Gladys, when they reach the apartment.
Lillian plops herself in the easy chair and kicks off her shoes. ‘You know how it is,’ she says. ‘There’s always something.’
‘Let me fix you gals a cool drink,’ says Vernon, disappearing into the kitchen. The only time Vernon makes refreshments is when Gladys has a female visitor.
Gladys sits on the couch and mops her brow with a handkerchief. ‘If it gets any hotter my feet will just explode!’
‘How you been, Glad?’ asks Lillian.
‘Oh, you know,’ says Gladys. ‘We’re getting along. How are you all?’
‘Charlie ain’t been so good,’ says Lillian. ‘Heart trouble. He can’t work, as a matter of fact.’
‘I’m right sorry to hear that.’
‘Billy’s working, but you know hard it can be to stretch one wage to a whole family.’
‘I sure do.’
‘But I didn’t come here to tell you my troubles!’ says Lillian, leaning forward. ‘You better tell me everything. We didn’t know Elvis had a record.’
Gladys allows herself a smile. ‘Well, I hardly knew myself—’
‘And then Bobbie comes running in from Lord-knows-where last night and says to turn on the radio ’cause her cousin’s on it! Charlie told her not to be so darned foolish, but when we tuned in, there he was! We couldn’t credit it! How come you kept all this a secret from your family, Gladys?’
‘Like I said, I didn’t know myself.’
‘But Elvis tells you everything, don’t he?’
Ignoring this barb, Gladys says, ‘Elvis didn’t realise, till yesterday, that Mr Phillips – that’s the man who owns Sun Records – was going to take the song to the radio station. And then he didn’t want anybody else to know, in case Dewey didn’t play it, or folks didn’t like it.’
‘But he did play it!’
Gladys nods. ‘He played it fifteen times. Fifteen!’
Lillian stares at her sister. ‘What he do that for?’
‘Folks was calling the station, asking for it. Didn’t you hear Elvis being interviewed?’
‘I turned in early.’
‘Dewey asked Elvis all kinds of questions. Poor Elvie, he was so jumpy! Not that it showed, of course, but I could tell. We was up all night, we was that excited! Isn’t it just the most wonderful – the most astonishing – thing you ever heard?’
Vernon comes in with the iced tea and a plate of crackers. He sets the glasses on the coffee table, then stands back and beams.
‘Glad telling you all about our boy’s success, Lillian? Ain’t it something?’
Lillian casts a look around the room, then, glancing down at her hands, says, ‘Bobbie told me some folks thought maybe Elvis was a negro.’
Vernon, still standing, folds his arms. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘Well, I guess it was the way he sang the song.’
‘Who thought Elvis was a negro?’ asks Gladys.
‘I don’t know! But Bobbie said Dewey made a point of asking Elvis which school he was at, so folks would know he was white.’
‘But it’s obvious he’s white!’ Gladys says, her voice rising.
‘Obvious to us, maybe,’ says Lillian, dabbing at her mouth with a handkerchief. ‘But that Dewey Phillips, he plays mostly race records, don’t he?’
Sitting on the arm of the easy chair, Vernon places a hand on Gladys’s shoulder. ‘Well, what does it matter?’ he asks. ‘Elvis was on the radio.’
Lillian helps herself to a glass of iced tea and takes a long drink. ‘Oh, it don’t matter none, I guess.’ She nibbles on a cracker, then adds, ‘Good to get it straight, though. A mix-up like that could lead to all kinds of trouble.’
Vernon raises his voice. ‘Elvis was on the radio, and people all over Memphis liked what they heard. That’s what counts.’
‘That’s right,’ says Gladys, reaching for her husband’s hand.
Lillian slaps Vernon’s knee. ‘Now don’t go getting ornery on your sister-in-law, Vernon Presley!’
‘Vernon’s just proud of his son,’ says Gladys.
‘We all are!’ says Lillian. ‘And it sure is good to see you two again. This family ain’t been together nearly enough, lately. I want y’all to come visit just as soon as you can.’
They drink their tea, and smile.
After Lillian has left, Gladys and Vernon share a couple of beers.
‘We gotta watch her,’ says Vernon. ‘And all the others, too. I mean, it’s nice to share good fortune and all. But we oughta be careful.’
Gladys laughs it off, telling her husband not to be so suspicious. But it takes a few more beers to settle her nerves.