And the lights! Even at one o’clock in the morning, bulbs burned in houses, bars and restaurants. Signs for drive-ins, liquor stores and movie theatres glowed. And everywhere was concrete. Stepping from the car to look up at the large rooming house – from outside, it appeared faintly grand, with a turreted roof and a pillared porch set well back from the road – she was surprised to hear the insects still whirring, and to feel the warm intimacy of the night air. That, at least, was the same.
Every night since they arrived, Gladys has begged Vernon to take her home, and Vernon has accused Gladys of having no faith in his ability to take care of his family. His mother, along with Gladys’s sister Clettes, Vester and their kids, will be coming out here soon enough, he keeps saying. Lillian has said she and Charlie want to come. And maybe Gladys’s younger sister, Levalle, with little Junior and Gene. She won’t be lonesome long! They’ll get a better place. His contact in Memphis, who found them this room, has explained it to him: they just have to wait a few months, then the public-housing people will give them an apartment. A brand new place, probably, with low rent and decent neighbours.
Elvis arrives home, and Gladys rises from her chair.
On his first day at Humes High School, he came back within the hour, saying it was too big, there were too many kids; he couldn’t even find his homeroom. Despite his tears, Gladys forced herself to march him back, and she has threatened to do so again if he ever tries another trick like that. She figures that he doesn’t yet know enough about the city to have the nerve to cut school.
She kisses him on the hair. He looks paler and thinner than ever. ‘Miss Richardson’s coming any minute,’ she says, ‘so wash your hands and face good.’
He bends over the basin she’s prepared for him. Their bathroom and kitchen are on the ground floor, shared with the rest of the building, but there is a tap by the door, and a hotplate.
‘How was school?’ she asks.
‘Good,’ he replies, unconvincingly. He reaches for a graham cracker and she slaps his hand.
‘Wait till she comes. I’ll get your butch.’
‘I can get it.’
He pours himself a glass of milk from the carton on the window ledge and sits at the table to drink.
There’s a knock at the door.
Elvis lets her wipe his mouth with a dishtowel, then she pats him on the shoulder and whispers, ‘This is it, baby. Do your best, now.’
When Gladys opens the door, a woman younger than her stands with her hand already extended in greeting. She has a flat face and copper-coloured hair, and is carrying a woven shopping bag full of papers.
‘Mrs Presley,’ she says, clasping Gladys’s fingers and giving them a single squeeze. ‘I’m Miss Richardson.’
Before Gladys can answer, Miss Richardson is inside the room.
Elvis scrambles to his feet.
‘Sit down, son,’ says Miss Richardson. ‘You must be Elvis.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
She stands on the rug, taking a good look around. ‘Yes,’ she says, nodding. ‘I can quite see why you’ve applied to us, Mrs Presley.’
‘Can I take your coat?’ asks Gladys.
Miss Richardson eyes the window and says, ‘No need. I won’t be too long. Is it all right if I sit at the table here and ask you both some questions?’
‘Of course,’ says Gladys. She pulls at her collar. She’s worn her best dress, one with yellow roses embroidered at the breast, and she suddenly realises it might have been better to look more ragged.
‘Now,’ Mrs Richardson says, once Gladys has taken the chair opposite, ‘tell me how long you’ve lived at this address.’
‘About four months. We moved from Mississippi.’
‘Oh? Whereabouts?’
‘Tupelo.’
‘Charming. What made your family come to the city?’
Gladys and Elvis exchange a glance but Gladys doesn’t falter. ‘My husband wanted better work. He was here during the war, in the munitions factory—’
‘He’s found it, I hope?’
‘Oh, yes, ma’am. But it doesn’t pay so good, and it’s a little unpredictable.’
‘I see. Your husband has stated in his application that he earns fifteen dollars a week. Is that right?’
‘I think so, ma’am.’
‘And your rent here is thirty-five dollars a month?’
‘That’s right. Can I offer you a cup of something, Miss Richardson?’
‘No, thank you. Is this your only room here, Mrs Presley?’
It’s all too brisk for Gladys, who has faced Miss Richardson’s kind before. She didn’t get Vernon his pardon from Parchman by rushing things and not taking time with folks. It had taken many afternoons, and a whole lot of listening to other people’s troubles, to get enough signatures on that petition. She smiles and pats Miss Richardson’s forearm, just lightly.
‘I hope you won’t mind me saying so, but you look like you could eat something, honey. Won’t you take a cracker?’
Gladys holds up the plate determinedly.
Miss Richardson’s face softens. ‘It’s very kind of you, Mrs Presley, but I’m fine. Really.’
‘We sure appreciate you coming, don’t we, Elvis?’
‘Yes, Mama.’
‘It’s my job,’ says Miss Richardson. ‘How old are you, Elvis?’
‘Just turned fourteen, ma’am.’
Miss Richardson leans back and studies his face. Elvis looks down at the tablecloth.
‘And what do you think you’ll do when you’re grown, Elvis?’
Gladys watches her son. During his God-fearing phase, they used to talk, a little, about him becoming a preacher. But she’s unsure if Miss Richardson would be impressed by this ambition. Big-city folks can be peculiar about God. Her own preference would be for him to become a businessman of some kind – perhaps running his own store. He loves pretty things as much as she does.
‘I’d maybe like to drive a truck, ma’am. My daddy used to do that, back in Tupelo.’
‘That’s a good, honest job,’ says Miss Richardson. ‘But maybe if you apply yourself at school you could get yourself a real trade.’
‘That would be wonderful, wouldn’t it?’ says Gladys.
‘It must be difficult to get your homework done with just this one room for your whole family, Elvis.’
Elvis nods gravely. Gladys blinks. The thought has never occurred to her before now. He has a table, and a chair, and pencil. Surely that’s enough.
‘It can be kinda … distracting,’ says Elvis.
Miss Richardson makes a note.
‘But Mama helps me,’ he adds, reaching over to squeeze her hand. ‘She helps me all the time.’
For the first time, Miss Richardson smiles at them both. ‘This boy’s a credit to you, Mrs Presley,’ she says. ‘I think I have all the information I need for now.’
Hope rises in Gladys’s heart.
1950
It is spring. Elvis’s mama rolls in to his bedroom, smiling. Ever since the family got approval for public housing a year ago, and moved to this apartment in Lauderdale Courts, Gladys is often rolling and smiling about the place. Within the large, modern, red-brick complex, they have not only a living room, but also a separate kitchen, two bedrooms and a private bathroom. The biggest bedroom is his, and his alone, and from the window he can watch the other kids playing on the lawn or listen to the adults talking in the apartments below. From this window he can hear all kinds of things. Music snaking from car radios. Couples fighting or making love. Girls giggling about their sweethearts. Young men making deals. More music from the church across the street. The rattle of the streetcar a few blocks over. The honking of horns on the Mississippi riverboats. He can also climb out – he’s tried it a couple of times, but so far he hasn’t cut out for Beale Street, or the river. He senses the whole of the city is there, just beyond this window.
Gladys likes to tour all the rooms of their apartment, stopping in each one to exclaim at the
ir luck. Every inch of the place is clean and almost brand new. Of all the rooms, Elvis loves the bathroom the best. Not only does it have a shower and a bath, it also has a lock on the door.
‘Baby,’ she says, holding out her pale arms. He closes his funny paper and goes to her, and is enfolded in her soft steadiness. She kisses the top of his head, right where he’s tried to shape his hair so it lifts from his forehead, and he has to stop himself from pulling away to put it right. She smells of grease from Britling’s, where she’s now working as a waitress, and there’s the sweet vinegar of her own sweat, too, which is sometimes more than he can take, although he knows it’s not her fault; it’s hard work and hot in that place and there’s only so much a tiny bottle of lilac cologne can do.
‘Elvis,’ she says into his hair, ‘I want you to come visit Mrs King with me later on. She’s doing one of her Stanley Products hostess parties. Your daddy’s working and I don’t want you here all alone.’
He is fifteen years old. All the other boys he knows are often left alone. But none of them have a mother like his.
‘I know it’s a trial, baby, all those brushes and polishes and stuff, but that’s what the ladies of Lauderdale love, I guess.’ She giggles delightedly.
He has no idea what a Stanley Products party is, but all he says is, ‘Yes, Mama. Baby’s coming with you wherever you go, you know that.’
Mrs King’s apartment is on the next floor up. Elvis likes the shapes of the railings on the stairway: diamonds and stars stretched in shiny wrought iron. The whole building smells of laundry and polish and new paint, and the thick linoleum deadens the sound of their footsteps. Coming to Lauderdale was like entering another galaxy. Even Mama said that, in the end, Daddy was right: everything has been better since they moved to Memphis.
There’s a mat announcing Welcome outside Mrs King’s door. Recently it seems that his life has become one long succession of wiping: wiping his feet on the carpet tiles at the Courts’ main entranceway, then again on the mat outside his own front door, wiping his hands so they’re clean, but remembering not to use his pants because nobody here in Lauderdale wants to know trash.
‘Oh,’ says Mrs King as she opens the door. ‘You’ve brought your son!’
‘Say hello to Mrs King, Elvis.’ A firm pressure on his shoulder.
‘Hello, Mrs King, ma’am.’
Mrs King studies him as if she cannot quite believe in his existence. ‘I’m afraid he won’t have any other kids to talk to—’
‘I hope it ain’t a bother to you, Mrs King. I couldn’t leave him home. His daddy’s working tonight.’
Mrs King smiles weakly. ‘Go right on through, then, the two of you.’
She smells good, like the flower beds that surround the Courts. She’s wearing a large skirt covered with some kind of pattern in green, and Elvis can’t keep his eyes off it because it looks like somebody has splashed bright paint all over the material by mistake.
Gladys is studying it, too.
Noticing their stares, Mrs King stops in the hallway and twirls. ‘Do you like my skirt?’ she asks. ‘I picked it up downtown. It was on sale. Frank hates it. He says he has a headache just being in the same room as me!’
Elvis watches his mother smooth down the faded yellow roses on her dress. ‘It’s awful striking,’ she says, and suddenly he hates those roses; he hates the way they look so muted, as if they’re covered with dust.
Mrs King guides them into the living room.
‘All the ladies are here,’ she says, gesturing towards each of them in turn: ‘Mrs Nolan, Mrs Pratt, Mrs Lankers, Mrs Ericson – do y’all know Mrs Presley?’
The small living room – exactly the same size and shape as his own – is a mess of colour and perfume and creamy arms folded into laps and hair lifted and curled into fascinating shapes. And there is so much lipstick – lipstick the colour of oranges, the colour of sugar mice, the colour of blood.
The ladies nod and lift their painted lips in smiles.
‘And she’s brought her son along, too – it’s Elvis, right?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘Isn’t that … adorable?’
There’s a short silence while all the women get a good look at him. He fixes his eyes on the low table in the centre of the room. Multicoloured washing-up brushes and dishcloths, cookie cutters, plastic food boxes, rubber gloves, and packets of dusters spill across it like treasure. He’d like to plunge his hands in there and touch all those new surfaces.
‘Take a seat, please, Mrs Presley,’ says Mrs King, ‘and help yourself to potato chips.’
Gladys sits on a chair below the window, and Elvis sinks onto the rug at her feet, resting his back on her legs. He is used to the company of women, but there are a lot of females crammed into this room, and many of them are staring right at him. He retrieves the funny paper from his back pocket and tries to read. The Phantom, still his favourite superhero, is swearing once again to devote his life to the destruction of piracy, greed, cruelty and injustice, but Elvis can’t lose himself in the colours and danger of the jungle because he’s sitting so close to the calves of Mrs Nolan and, damn, they are fine. He notices that her nylons have no wrinkles; it’s as if the woman were born wearing stockings. He can’t take his eyes from the elegant dip and slide of her ankle as it meets her magnolia-coloured shoe.
His mama nudges his shoulder with her knee. ‘Elvis,’ she says, ‘Mrs King asked if you want an iced tea, honey.’
The way the ankle becomes foot and the foot becomes shoe. The whole thing a pretty mystery.
‘Yes, ma’am, I’d appreciate that,’ he says, and feels the women’s approval. His mama often gives him reports of how the other families in the Courts view him: as a nice boy, clean, well mannered, quiet. Unlike in the rooming house on Poplar Avenue, he’s heard nobody at Lauderdale call his family hillbillies, cornballs, rubes, rednecks, clodhoppers or hicks. Not, at least, to his face.
After handing round the drinks, Mrs King begins to display her wares. The women examine and exclaim over each item in minute detail, and Elvis admires them too: the sheen and crackle of the cellophane wrapping on the lavender pomander is particularly pleasing to him. As each woman speaks, Elvis imagines their words flowing to the tune of ‘You Call Everybody Darlin’, and pictures how they would look singing it. Mrs King is speaking now, and he likes the colour of her lips. Once, when his mama was late coming home from work, he tried her new Coral Rose lipstick. He blushes to think of how good the waxy cream had felt on his mouth, how he’d gazed in his mama’s looking glass and seen a stranger there. When he’d opened his mouth to sing with that colour on his face he could’ve sworn the sound was better; his voice was richer, fuller, lonelier.
‘And this little beauty is – well, can anybody guess?’ Mrs King is holding up a plastic box in the shape of a butterfly. It has a hook where the head should be, and is punctured with small circular holes.
His mama says, ‘Why, it must be a little insect house or some such!’
The ladies laugh, and so does Elvis.
‘Nice guess, Mrs Presley, but it’s actually a container for mothballs!’ Mrs King turns the box around and reveals the clasp.
Elvis wonders what his mama will buy tonight. His daddy has already told her that she can’t spend anything; they haven’t money to waste on boxes and brushes and towels, even though times are better. She’d kissed his cheek and said, ‘It ain’t about the buying, Vernon.’ But Elvis knows that it is, and that his mama will come away with at least one item, which she will hide for a while in a drawer before bringing it out and telling Vernon that it’s old. Whatever it is, it will be enough to keep her smiling well into the next day.
Mrs King is passing around the order form along with a complimentary Stanley Products pen. ‘Ladies,’ she says, ‘these prices are one time only, but don’t even touch your pocketbooks right now. Just order whatever you want, and if you change your mind when it comes next week, well, that’s absolutely all right. I won’t as
k for a dime.’
The room hushes as the women tick boxes and print their names and addresses. His mama straightens the paper on her lap and clicks the pen’s nib up and down. He daren’t turn to look at her; to do so would give the game away entirely.
He feels, rather than hears, her sigh, and it’s the kind he knows well: resigned, gentle. Her lap shakes a little as she writes her name.
‘I’m gonna get me the pink pitcher and matching cups,’ she says, to no one in particular.
He edges closer to her, resting his head on her knee to let her know that he has witnessed this transgression but he understands, and will not tell. She touches his head in recognition of their pact.
* * *
When Betty McMahon appears, Elvis is sitting on the front steps of the Courts with his new friends, Buzzy and Paul, who also live in his apartment block and attend Humes High School. It is a good moment to see Betty, Elvis thinks, because it is evening. Cardinals flit and whoop among the young cherry trees which edge the Courts’ square lawn. The dusk settles around them and in the half-light he can think about singing. Usually he would sit here alone, picking out a sweet, sad tune to sing softly to himself. Tonight, though, he’s asked Buzzy and Paul to listen, and they’re already bored with having to be quiet as Elvis readies himself, and having to pretend not to notice when he misses a note and starts over.
Most importantly, the cool darkness masks the acne which first appeared on his face a few weeks ago. His hands are often feeling for those sore little lumps beneath the skin that signify the start of another pustule. His fingers check the progress of each one as they gather around his chin and nose, leaving a spray of marks. He touches his jaw and feels a tender place. It will be red in the morning, but in this light it’s probably not so bad.
‘Hey, Betty,’ Buzzy says, and she stops on the steps beside them. Looking down at her feet, she turns one ankle this way and that, pointing her toes first at Elvis, then at Buzzy. Betty seems always to be moving, even when she’s still. She’s spoken to Gladys – sometimes they sit and talk animatedly on the lawn chairs her parents set up outside the Courts – but never directly to Elvis.
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