There wasn’t a sound in the house. Wayne shook his head, still waiting. He said, “All right, tell me what you want. Will you, please? So I’ll know?”
Carmen looked up at him. “How long are we staying here?”
“Till they get the two guys—I don’t know.”
“You told me three weeks,” Carmen said. “No more than that. But now you have a job you’re all wrapped up in, you have your whitetail, so you can go hunting. ...I guess you’re all set, huh? But what do I have? Outside of somebody else’s house to clean.”
Wayne said, “What do you have?” getting some amazement in his tone. “Honey, you have me, don’t you?”
The way she got up and grabbed the beer can from the night table, he knew she was going to throw it at him.
15
DONNA STARTED TALKING about Elvis. She said, “If Elvis was Jesus, you know who I think some of his apostles would be? I think Engelbert would be one. I think Tom Jones would be one. And I think, going way back, the Jordanaires and the Blackwood Brothers. Who do you think?”
Armand said he’d never thought about it before.
This was while Donna was clearing the table, setting the dishes in the sink to wash later on, and Armand was waiting the forty-five minutes it took for another chicken pie to heat. They’d had one each for supper and he was still hungry. Richie was in the living room watching TV. Donna moved on from Elvis and his apostles to Elvis’s greatest hits to how she had tried one time to get a job in corrections down there to be near Elvis’s home. The West Tennessee Reception Center was her first choice because it was right in Memphis. When they turned her down she waited a year and tried again, requesting Brushy Mountain, DeBerry Correctional, Fort Pillow, any one of those, even the Tennessee Prison for Women in Nashville would have been better than nothing. “And you don’t think there wasn’t some kind of conspiracy to keep me out?”
Armand never said there was. He was waiting for that Swanson’s chicken pie to hurry up and get done.
Donna told him the memory of Elvis was like a giant magnet drawing her to Memphis, that if she lived there she’d visit Graceland every day, the way people visit a church and light candles to get their burdens lifted or find a boyfriend. She’d do it knowing peace of mind didn’t come cheap. “But you don’t think it wouldn’t be worth the seven bucks’ admission to have some in my life for a change, after what it’s been?”
Armand said, “I believe you,” because he could see she believed it herself. She had a look in her strange eyes behind those glasses, like she was drugged or had been hit over the head.
Donna served him the chicken pie, left the kitchen and returned with a stack of color photos taken at Graceland Mansion. She had bought the prints off a girlfriend of hers for two bucks each and kept them in that velvety box a fifth of Amaretto comes in. Armand, mopping up chicken gravy with slices of bread he’d fold over, could look at the pictures as Donna held them up but not touch them.
“This is Elvis Presley Boulevard on a rainy day. This is the Heartbreak Hotel Restaurant, it’s not too far. I hear him sing that, I get goose bumps head to toe. I mean still. Okay, this is his famous pink Caddy. This is his lavish jetliner, the Lisa Marie. This is inside it. ...No, this is inside his tour bus. Elvis would bring some of his closer friends along on tours. They’d play cards, Yahtzee, listen to music. They’d cook right in there.”
“What’s the name of it?” Armand said, wanting to show he was interested.
“The tour bus? It don’t have a name. This is the front room of Graceland. That couch seats fourteen people.”
“How come his airplane has a name but not his tour bus?”
“If people knew he was in that bus, like if there was anything on it to identify him? There’d be a riot every time it stopped.”
“He could’ve called it some other girl’s name, like the jetliner.”
“Bird, that isn’t just some old girl’s name. Lisa Marie’s his daughter. Her and I have the same birthday.”
“Yeah, is that right?”
“I’ll tell you something else,” Donna said. “My life number is eight.”
“What’s that mean, your life number?”
“You add up your date of birth, like February is the second month, that’s two. I was born on the first, two and one is three, then nineteen, one and nine is ten, so that’s like one. You add that to the three you got from February first, then add up the next numbers—I’m not gonna tell you the year— and it comes to eight.”
“Is that right?”
“Okay, now add up 3797 Elvis Presley Boulevard, P. O. Box 16508, Memphis, Tennessee, 38186, and you know what it comes to?”
“Eight,” Armand said.
“And you wonder why I’m drawn to there?” Donna said. “Think about it. Okay, this is some of his personal jewelry, his gold Rolex watch, his Maltese cross and solid-gold I. D. bracelet. Here’s his famous American Eagle jumpsuit . . .”
“His famous queer outfit,” Richie said, coming into the kitchen. “Jesus Christ, Bird, you eating again? I’d take the Rolex and the pink Caddy, the guy did have a certain amount of class.” Richie was getting a bottle of beer from the refrigerator now. “But that fucking jumpsuit ...Would you wear it, Bird? You’d have to get the one he wore after he swole up like a pig.”
“You’re jealous,” Donna said. “You can’t look at these without making remarks.”
“Jealous of what? You know what the difference is between me and him?”
“Yeah, you’re ignorant,” Donna said.
“I’m alive and he’s dead and that’s the only thing counts.”
You’re alive, Armand thought, watching Richie take a swig of beer, his fist wrapped around the neck of the bottle. But you don’t have to be. He noticed Richie was chewing gum with his beer.
“I got news for you,” Donna was saying. “After you die, you think anybody’s gonna visit your grave? Even if you had a mother I doubt she would. But a hundred years from now, even longer’n that, people will still be going to visit Graceland.” She looked at Armand and nodded. “It’s true.”
“Is that right?” Armand said, feeling a little sorry for her.
Richie was grinning, chewing his gum and shaking his head. “Donna, you’re so goddamn stupid. . . . Lemme ask you a question. Which would you rather have, Elvis sing to you or fuck you?” He looked at Armand and winked.
Armand stared back at him. He didn’t think Richie was funny, now or anytime before. He watched Donna squinting at Richie, showing him she was being serious.
“I know what you think I’m gonna say,” Donna said, “and you’d call me a liar. Well, I can’t help that, ’cause it’s true. I’d rather have him sing to me.”
Armand believed her. He was surprised that Richie did too, Richie looking at him saying, “You know why, Bird? ’Cause he wasn’t a con. Elvis wouldn’t have been rough or smelly enough for Donna.”
“I don’t think of him that way,” Donna said. “He was a kind, generous person who helped people out, gave them cars, whatever they needed. He believed people ought’n to suffer more than they don’t have to. He read books—they say he was ever in search of the answers to life’s mysteries.”
“I heard he was in search of pussy,” Richie said. “Had girls brought to him and he’d take his pick.”
It might be true, Armand didn’t know or care, but decided that was enough. He was tired of Richie. So when Richie looked at him, fun in his eyes, wanting to be appreciated, Armand said, “Leave her alone.”
Richie said, “Who, Donna?”
Maybe a little surprised but still having fun, enjoying himself. Armand decided to push him. He said, “See if you can keep your mouth shut for a while,” and the fun was over. He watched Richie’s eyes become serious and then dull, sleepy, covering what he was feeling, no longer chewing his gum.