A week before they are due to join their son in Texas, where he is completing his army training, Gladys receives a telephone call. Since Elvis left, he’s called home every night to fill her in on his activities. As she picks up, she is expecting to hear about the weight of the pack he had to carry, what the other men said about the sergeant, and what horrors the army canteen dished out today.
‘Mama.’
There’s a waver to his voice which Gladys recognises immediately. Knowing what’s coming, she closes the kitchen door, then pulls up a stool and parks herself by the wall, cradling the receiver between her chin and her shoulder.
‘What’s wrong, son?’
‘Mama, I …’ He trails off, and lets out a dry sob.
‘I’m right here, Elvie. Whatever it is, you can let it out.’
Often he calls her from his friend Mr Fadal’s house. Mr Fadal is a disc jockey who has made Elvis feel right at home; his wife cooks the food he likes, and Mr Fadal has even bought special hi-fi equipment for Elvis to listen to his favourite music. She guesses he must be there now, away from the base and the other recruits.
‘Mama …’
‘What’s going on, baby? Those army folks treating you right?’
‘It ain’t that.’
‘Then what?’
There’s a pause, then he asks, very quietly, ‘Am I a good son?’
‘Elvie! Of course you are!’
His breath shudders over the line. ‘Mama, I want you here.’
‘Me and Daddy are coming in a week.’
‘You oughta be here. You’re sick, ain’t you, Mama? Real sick. I know it. I see it with my own eyes. You’re in pain.’
She twists the cord around her fist and clears her throat. ‘The doctors ain’t found but one thing wrong with me.’
‘My own mother is sick, and I’m four hundred miles away, doing nothing about it! I’m useless, Mama!’
Gladys steadies herself against the wall. ‘Son. I’m fine. Mama just misses her baby, is all.’
He’s weeping now. She can picture him precisely: one hand on his forehead, shielding his face. His open mouth straining downwards.
‘You at Mr Fadal’s?’ she asks.
‘Uh-huh.’ He lets out a moan, and sobs again. ‘Mama …’
‘I’m here, baby.’
‘Mama, I miss you so much.’
‘I know, son.’
‘Mama …’
‘Elvis …’
‘Mama …’
‘Elvis …’
On and on it goes. Every time he says it he cries a little louder, and Gladys takes the receiver from her chin, clutches it tight, and lets a tear slide down her own face. It’s such a relief to hear him weep for her, and to weep in return, that she almost takes pleasure in it. But the pain of not being able to hold him is physical. She hugs herself with one arm, feeling the hardness in her belly, and rocks back and forth on her stool. Her throat aches from withholding more tears, but she manages to control herself enough to say, ‘Listen to me, Elvie. Mama’s gonna be with you soon, you hear?’
A long sniff from the other end of the line.
‘We’ll be together, and everything will be fine.’
‘Yes, Mama.’
‘There, there, baby.’
‘There, there.’
She doesn’t hang up until his tears have stopped.
That night, Gladys sleeps well, and the following morning she feels lighter. Elvis may be in the army. He may be the nation’s number-one entertainer. But he still needs her. She sits in her garden chair beneath the shade of the large oak at the back of the house, flipping through Good Housekeeping and sipping her coffee, and her legs don’t give her a moment’s bother until lunchtime.
A week later, she can already feel the morning’s heat as she steps outside to check on her chickens. It’s a shock after the cool of her air-conditioned house, and she reaches back inside the kitchen to reduce the dial. At least when it’s warm all the time, you know what you’re in for. And if it’s hot in the house nobody can expect her to get dressed quick or go to the gate to greet the fans, many of whom have been weeping on the sidewalk since Elvis left. Gladys hasn’t had the strength to go down there, fearing she will say something she shouldn’t about Tom Parker, or the army, or Elvis himself.
Today Vernon will drive her and his mother through Texas to join Elvis in Killeen, near his base at Fort Hood. Alberta will follow them by train a few days later. Taking a flight is not something Gladys will consider. She’d rather be on the road, even in the heat of July, than up in a plane with nothing between her and death but the air.
She crosses the grass to the coop which Elvis had built as far away from the highway as possible. The dew clings to her slippers and the tall trees stand perfectly still in the humid air. She looks back at the mansion, softly white in the early-morning sun. She won’t miss this place. Elvis called last night saying he’d found them the perfect luxury trailer, and Gladys thought that sounded just fine. Small enough for her to walk from end to end without pain, anyhow.
She sidesteps chicken shit with the practised moves of an expert, still light on her feet despite her weight, unlatches the wire door, and reaches for her favourite bird, Marmalade. She’s a fat, ginger, speckled hen with the softest feathers and the neatest turn to her beak. Cradling her to her chest, Gladys coos, ‘Don’t you die while I’m gone, you hear? Don’t let them old maids kill you.’
She lets the hen go and scatters corn on the dry grass. ‘Mama will be back,’ she says, ‘won’t she?’
The chickens gurgle and squawk in reply, and Gladys lets each one out of the coop to roam the lawn. With Elvis gone, nobody can tell her not to.
Wiping her hands on her dress, she walks quickly back to the house.
Vernon enjoys driving fast, and he settles himself into the seat of the Lincoln, making small contended noises as they race towards Texas. All the windows are down and warm air batters their heads. Minnie Mae snores softly in the back, one hand on her pocketbook. Gladys removes her shoes, not caring about the smell. She closes her eyes and, for a moment, with Vernon singing along to the radio, she feels like a girl again, being driven someplace in the woods in that truck he used to borrow. He always had a rug in the back, ready for her to lie beneath the pines. She wonders if he still has one in the trunk, just in case one of his women would rather do it under the boughs of an old oak than in some motel room.
‘Teddy Bear’ comes on, and Vernon sings along, tapping the steering wheel in time to the beat. She’s never liked this one too much. When she first heard it she didn’t understand why Elvis had made a record for children.
‘That’s a good ’un, ain’t it?’ says Vernon. ‘Ain’t heard it in a while.’
‘You know who that was!’ says the disc jockey. ‘U.S. Army Private Presley! And we want to know what you think of Elvis joining up! Does this mean the end of Elvis the Pelvis? We’ve got Marie on the line …’
Gladys reaches for the off switch, but Vernon clasps her wrist. ‘I wanna hear this,’ he protests.
‘I reckon Elvis is serving his country like a good American citizen and we all oughta be right proud of him and he’ll be just as popular when he gets out,’ says Marie.
‘That’s two years from now, Marie. Which is a heck of a long time in show business,’ warns the disc jockey.
‘Well, I’ll still love him!’ says Marie.
‘Course you will, girl!’ adds Vernon, grinning.
Steve is on the line now. ‘Presley is finished!’ he says. ‘He can’t keep his career going and be in the army! He was getting kinda long in the tooth anyhow.’
‘Aw, eat dirt, Steve!’ says Vernon, clearly enjoying himself.
‘Man could be right,’ says Gladys, quietly.
‘When he comes back,’ Steve continues, ‘nobody will remember what all the fuss was about.’
‘Who’ll they be listening to instead, Steve?’ asks the disc jockey.
‘Jerry Lee Lewis, maybe,’ Steve replies. ‘Or Pat Boone.’
‘Pat Boone!’ spits Vernon.
‘He’s a good singer,’ says Gladys.
‘Jerry Lee’s all right,’ says Vernon. ‘But not a patch on our boy. And he’s too rough round the edges to get real popular.’
‘I don’t like him one whit,’ says Gladys.
‘Presley’ll be all washed up, two years from now!’ Steve declares.
Vernon clicks off the radio. ‘What’s wrong with these folks?’ he asks.
‘Well,’ says Gladys, ‘maybe when he comes home again Elvis will think about doing something else.’
‘Damn well hope not!’
‘It ain’t like being an entertainer is a stable kind of career.’
‘Are you out of your mind? Think of the money!’
‘Boy’s made enough to last a lifetime,’ says Gladys.
Vernon tuts. ‘You don’t know shit,’ he says, not quite low enough for her to miss.
‘I know he’ll be dead before thirty if he don’t slow down.’
‘You gotta quit saying that.’
‘I’ll quit saying it when I know it ain’t true.’
Vernon puts his foot to the floor, and Gladys closes her eyes, trying to imagine what a luxury trailer might look like.