16 • JAiLHOUSE RUCKUS

“THANK-YOU-VERY-MUCH,” the chunky teacher in the studded white-leather jumpsuit slurred into the microphone as he flipped his calfskin cape over his shoulder.

The boys regarded one another for a moment before hesitantly rewarding their teacher for whatever he’d just done—a sort of seizure from the waist down—with faint applause.

There was no mistaking who their Beginning Opera teacher was: Elvis Presley. This had less to do with the boys’ knowledge of the King’s music—Milton had only recognized him due to his face being plastered on the Psychomanthium, otherwise known as the Elvis Abduction Chamber, back in Lester Lobe’s Paranor Mall—than the towering backdrop of red lights behind him on the small stage that spelled E-L-V-I-S.

“The first time I appeared onstage, it scared me to death,” Mr. Presley said as he stalked back and forth across the small, creaky platform. “Now that I really am dead, it all seems so darned silly. When I was out there, I really didn’t know what all the yelling was about. So I asked the manager backstage, ‘What’d I do?’ And he said, ‘I don’t know, but just go back and do it again!’”

“You still got it!” shouted a jowly African American man with a bowler hat as he swept his sausagelike fingers across a piano.

“Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Fats Waller!” he said, punctuating his shout-out with a wobbly judo kick.

Hugo, seated on a tiny metal chair with bowed, quivering legs, looked across the room with his puffer-fish face.

“Ladies?” he murmured.

The dapper pianist rose to his feet.

“Thank you, boys,” Mr. Waller said as he wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. “As I can tell by lookin’ at y’all, you’re all here on account of followin’ your appetites. Now, there’s nothin’ wrong with that, within reason. Me? I blame my parents. I mean, what did they expect, namin’ their son Fats?!”

“Now, now, Fats,” Mr. Presley chided. “You shouldn’t be disrespecting your momma and poppa.”

Mr. Waller sat himself back down on his bench. “Of course, you’re right, Elvis,” the man said contritely as he plunked out “Chopsticks” on the piano as penance. “I loved my momma. She couldn’t help that she confused hugs ’n’ kisses with chicken-fried steak ’n’ buttermilk.”

“Well, regardless of how we all got here—me, mostly through Momma’s fried peanut-butter sandwiches,” Mr. Presley said with his low, tremulous voice, “we’re all here to learn the finer points of opera.”

Mr. Presley adjusted his belt. His buckle, as big and shiny as a burnished serving platter, blazed in the boys’ faces.

“Let’s see what we’ve got to work with here,” he said.

Mr. Presley nodded over to Mr. Waller, who cracked his knuckles and played a stunning classical piece, his fingers summoning deep emotion from the keys.

Mr. Presley scanned the room with his blue eyes. “Let’s start with you, son,” he said, pointing to Milton, whose knack for being called on first had continued, unabated, into the Netherworld.

Milton stomped onto the stage. Mr. Presley winced as he got a closer look at Milton’s hideous suit of meat.

“Mercy,” he murmured as he flipped the chalkboard around. On the back were the lyrics to a French aria, or in Milton’s case, complete and utter gibberish. “It’s from Faust,” Mr. Presley explained, “which I thought was appropriate.”

The boys stared at their teacher with a profound lack of understanding.

“You know, the whole pact-with-the-devil motif … never mind. Now, don’t worry, son. I’ll sing along with you….”

Mr. Presley drew in a breath that, like most every breath the husky man took, was deep. Filling his lungs to capacity, the teacher began to sing.

Milton did his best to keep up, which is to say, he lagged behind, baying like a mortally wounded basset hound. The Fausters were to singing as Napoleon was to Extreme Frisbee. Milton’s Pang gullet only made things worse, drawing out each tortured “note” until it whimpered for release.

Mr. Presley pulled the emergency brake on their duet.

“We’ve all got talent, son,” he consoled. “Some folks just got to dig deeper than others to find it. Now, let’s give someone else a chance. You”—he waved his diamond-ringed fingers lazily toward Virgil—“step on up and show us what you’ve got.”

Virgil rose nervously, his metal chair sighing with relief, and trudged up to the stage as Milton shambled off. Ever the good friend, Virgil tried to high-five Milton after his disastrous debut, but due to Milton’s Pang-suited delayed reaction, he just ended up slapping him in the head.

“Sorry,” Virgil mumbled to his friend as he stood before the chalkboard.

“Just follow my lead, son, and relax,” Mr. Presley slurred supportively.

Mr. Presley began to mournfully croon.

“Au signal du plaisir,
Dans la chambre du drille,
Tu peux bien entrer fille,
Mais non fille en sortir …”

Virgil pulled in a great breath and began to sing.

“Bonne nuit, hélas!

Ma petite, bonne nuit.

Près du moment fatal.”

In a word, Virgil’s voice was stunning. In another word, he was a virtuoso. In four more words, Milton was very surprised. Virgil’s thrilling spectacle of pitch and tone was like a vocal fireworks display, and his breath control left the rest of the class breathless.

“Fais grande résistance,

S’il ne t’offre d’avance

Un anneau conjugale.”

Riding the melody as if it were a racehorse, Virgil scaled the piece to its summit, hitting the peak with a clear, beautiful note that pierced the heart.

Mr. Presley donned a pair of mirrored sunglasses, simply so he could peer over them in surprise. Virgil heaved in breathless confusion as if a spirit had abruptly fled his body. Mr. Presley put his hand on Virgil’s great slope of a shoulder.

“Diva Las Vegas!” the teacher exclaimed in an amazed rumble. “All you need is a flashy one-piece jumpsuit and a manager/mentor who takes complete control over every aspect of your life, and we may get you a gig at Carnagey Hall in Sadia … nice captive audience.”

As Mr. Presley plotted the details of Virgil’s burgeoning career, the bell rang. The boys stomped toward the door. Their heavy footfalls knocked a picture of Mr. Presley’s mother off the wall.

“Whoa, whole lotta shakin’ goin on there, boys,” he said sadly as he stooped down to pick up the picture, bursting a seam on his jumpsuit. “Before we return to sender, I want to stamp your young minds with a li’l something….”

Mr. Presley hopped off the stage and turned to give his microphone cord a tug. Milton noticed that Mr. Presley had one white wing, delicate and impossibly small, like that of a hummingbird, sprouting from just beneath his left shoulder blade.

“Songs are dreams that you dream with your ears. So no matter what happens, keep singing a song. It’s how you keep dreaming in a world of nightmares. Good night.”

The lights went out, and the boys, confused, staggered out into the hallway.

“You were amazing in there,” Milton said to Virgil as they lingered in the doorway. “I didn’t know you had it in you.”

Virgil’s freckled cheeks reddened.

“Neither did I,” he replied meekly. “I mean, I know I have a lot in there, but I didn’t know I had … that. I swear, when I was up there singing, I felt so light. Like that soul balloon in Limbo. Like I could float up, up, and away.”

Milton could see a fluttering from the corner of his eyes. In the classroom, Mr. Presley was chatting with Mr. Waller. His teensy-weensy wing flapped weakly when he laughed.

It must be weird, Milton thought. Not quite a demon, not quite an angel. A large man, gifted with some kind of flight but too heavy to actually take to the air. He keeps singing, so at least part of him can float up, up, and away.