The Graceland Tales

by Donna D. Prescott

  Oriel the Hotel Manager says, “Girl, I remember hearing that story, too, at a slumber party. Kids these days, though, won’t know what a party line is since most houses don’t have land lines anymore. Shoot, that story still gives me shivers. I also heard one about the woman who had a dog who slept under her bed for security. A serial killer was on the loose. She’d trained the dog so that when she got worried, she’d put her hand down and the dog would lick her hand. One morning she was found dead in her bed with a note that said, ‘Maniacs can lick, too.’” A general shudder goes around the coach.

  Gita the Cook looks up from her sketching and says, “We told stories like that in India, too. My favorite is about a bride who was dressed for her wedding. As the ceremony began, she kept complaining that her head itched. Right before the ceremony ended, the bride fell down dead. Later, a scorpion was discovered in her headdress.”

  “OMG!” says Sandra.

  Dwight the Lay Minister blasts into his handkerchief rivalling any emergency siren of any rural volunteer emergency squad. Sir Kay a Techie stands up. “Dude, for god’s sake can you stop blowing your fricking nose so fricking loudly.”

  Joyce the Evangelist’s Wife looks over at Dwight. “See, I told you that habit was annoying. It’s gross and disgusting, especially when you do it at the table.”

  ASCII-me looks up from his screen and says, “Dude, if you’re going to call Dwight out for blowing his nose too loud, you need to cut out the farting.”

  Lance-bot a Techie adds, “Yeah, man. You been really stinking up the place.”

  King Arthur’s chain mail jingles as he says, “And it’s worse because they’re silent-but-deadly. You could at least fart out loud so we could have some warning.”

  Sir Kay says, “Hey, isn’t the saying, ‘he who smelt it, dealt it’?”

  ASCII-me says, “Good try, dude, but we know it’s you.”

  “You know, Chaucer included farting in The Canterbury Tales,” says King Arthur. I know he is referring to the Summoner’s Tale, but again I keep my mouth shut.

  “I guess it’s not surprising since he includes several dirty stories,” King Arthur says.

  I cannot bear to remain silent any longer. “Yes, Chaucer included six fabliaux, which are Old French dirty stories, in The Canterbury Tales.”

  “Give it a rest, darlin’. I thought we agreed you could talk about Elvis but not Chowser,” says Ernest.

  “Chawser, Ernest.”

  King Arthur says, “Most of Chaucer’s dirty stories deal with sex, like the Miller’s Tale and the Reeve’s Tale, but I like the Summoner’s Tale best because it raises the question of how to equitably distribute a fart.”

  “OK, dude, enlighten us,” says Lance-bot. “How do you divide up a fart?”

  “In the story, a corrupt friar tries to convince a sick, bed-ridden man to give him a special gift. The man, upset with the corrupt friar, tells the friar that the gift is hidden under the sheets near the man’s ass.” John’s wife winces. “Sorry. Buttocks. The greedy friar reaches into the man’s buttocks to retrieve the gift, which he has sworn to share equally with the other friars, when the sick man farts in the friar’s hand. Of course, the friar is humiliated, but the challenge remains of how to share the fart equally with the other friars,” King Arthur says.

  “I need to know this,” says Lance-bot, who is sitting next to Sir Kay. “I’ve been smelling my unfair share of his farts. So how do you share farts fairly?”

  “You get a wheel with hollow spokes. You open up the hub. You position the smellers at the end of the spokes with the farter’s butt near the hub. Then, when the farter farts, the smell goes evenly down the spokes to the smellers,” says King Arthur.

  Theresa stands up. “Um, we need to get the storytelling back on track, as it were. Let’s move on to different subject matter. Jack, you haven’t told a story, yet. Do you have a story you would like to tell, um, maybe something from your country?”

  Jack stands. “Rene/e told us a story from her JiaJia, her grandmother. I will tell a story my JiaJia told to us in the fields to keep our minds busy while we worked.”

  Jack

  THE IMMIGRANT MERCHANT’S TALE

  JACK: My story happened long ago in rural China. A couple had no child for many years. At last, they had a child, a boy child. They were pleased that the spirits had smiled upon them. They named him Ming, which means bright or light. They were poor and hoped their son would take care of them as they grew older. Ming grew bigger and the father took the boy out to teach him to hunt so he could help provide food for the family. From a young age, the boy would eat only what grew in the earth and returned home when his father took him out to hunt.

  The mother and father didn’t know what to do. They were old. Finally, they made a plan. They decided to save their money. When they had enough saved, they sent their son to market to buy some meat. They thought if Ming did not have to kill the meat himself, he might eat it. Butchers at the market would kill the cows in a ceremony thanking them for their sacrifice and blessing the meat. Much to their sadness, Ming came home with a live cow. He bought the cow to save it from killing. He said it was a special cow. They could not kill and eat this cow.

  GITA THE COOK: Good for Ming. Cows are sacred and a symbol of life in my country.

  JACK: Yes. As a Buddhist, I choose not to eat beef, but not all Buddhists are vegetarians. The father and mother in this story were unhappy. The father threatened to kill Ming out of anger and despair. Instead, he killed the cow in front of his son. Ming ran away from the angry father and began a pilgrimage of atonement. The parents ate the meat of the cow. In a short time, bigger hardship fell upon them. The crops would not grow. Animals they tried to raise died. The father could find no animals to kill when he went hunting. Ming on his pilgrimage became tired and hungry. He had problems finding food from the earth to eat. Finally, he came across a hut with goats penned in a rocky yard. A man came from the house and gladly welcomed him. The man brought Ming inside where a woman brought him a cup of tea and a bread pancake. Ming was very grateful for this food. After he had rested, the man told Ming that the people in the house believed that the spirits had sent Ming there to save them. He must kill a goat for the people of the house to eat and share with Ming. Ming became sad. He told the people about how he left home and his pilgrimage of atonement. He said that he would not kill a cow for his father, and he would not kill a goat for strangers. Ming left with sorrow.

  As he left, he heard the sound of a great wind. He turned around and saw that the goats had disappeared and people were in the yard. The rocks in the yard had turned to bread. Ming returned to the house where the people told Ming the spirits had put a curse on the house and he broke the curse. When a traveler came and agreed to kill a goat for the people, the traveler was then turned into a goat. When Ming refused to kill a goat, the goats took their human forms again. They shared bread with him in great happiness. He rested for the night. The next day when he left, he took only enough bread to continue his journey. The man at the house gave Ming a magic horse to make his journey more easy.

  ROSE THE WAITRESS: (without opening her eyes) A magic horse? Ride a magic horse to Memphis. (She sighs and leans her head against the window.)

  SEAN THE DEACON: Well, we are on an iron horse.

  JACK: The magic horse told Ming that he should get on its back so the magic horse could take Ming where he wanted to go. Ming said that he would not make his weight a burden on the horse but he would follow where the horse led him. The magic horse could not force Ming to get on its back, so the two walked together. After walking for a day, the magic horse led Ming to another house. Ming went up to the door. A young woman opened the door and invited Ming in. The house was full of young women dressed in bed clothes. The leader told Ming he should pick one of the women and she would feed him and bathe him and do as he wished. Ming refused. He said he would share his bread but he would not do as they asked. The women begged him to do as they asked. They said they h
ad a cruel master who would soon come to the house. He would be angry and punish them if he found that they had not attended to Ming’s desires.

  Ming left the house and told the magic horse to lead him away. As Ming and the horse walked away, a man heading to the house passed them. The man stopped Ming and asked if Ming had been to the house. Ming replied yes. The man asked why Ming was going away. Ming said the women there tried to tempt him to evil actions. He refused and left. The man cried out that he was the master of the house. If Ming had done what the women asked, he would have become a prisoner there. Before Ming, no man had escaped the house except the master. When the master realized what had happened, he burst into flames. Next, Ming heard the sound of the house falling down. The horse told Ming that the master had taken the girls from their families and turned them into slaves. When the master turned to fire, the spirits of the girls were freed. Their spirits returned to their families and took their human form again.

  Since it was late in the day, Ming decided to rest for the night. The next day, the magic horse led Ming to a village where the people had heard about the girls becoming free. The people bowed down to Ming, telling him their gratitude. They begged him to stay in their village with them and become their leader. They offered him riches and a house and a wife. Ming thanked the people but said he had no need for the things they offered. His true worth was within himself. As Ming followed the magic horse, a group of men from the village followed him, shooting at him with arrows. The men got near to Ming. Their arrows did not reach Ming and then the men turned into a grove of Happy trees.

  JOYCE THE EVANGELIST’S WIFE: Were the trees sort of human like the magic horse? How else could they be happy?

  GITA: A Happy tree is a type of tree in China, like an elm or an oak. Happy trees have special healing qualities. Herbalists use them to make medicine against sickness such as cancer.

  JOYCE: Oh.

  JACK: Ming and the magic horse stopped and looked at the grove of trees. The magic horse told Ming that he had proven himself true in his beliefs. His atonement was almost complete. To finish the journey, the magic horse would lead Ming back to his parents. The magic horse told Ming, though, that when they got back to Ming’s home, Ming must kill him as his final act of atonement. Ming said he would follow the magic horse, but he would not kill him. They made the trip home without words.

  Ming’s parents were very happy for their son to return home. Ming’s father repented of his past actions. The family shared a humble meal and Ming went to his mat to sleep. The magic horse then asked Ming’s father to kill him. The father said he could not risk sending his son away again after he had just come home. The next morning, the magic horse was nowhere to be found. Instead, they saw in the yard a pile of stones with a bright light coming from it. Since neither Ming nor his father would kill the magic horse, somehow he was transformed into this pile of stones with protective light coming from it. Ming’s parents lived for many more years. Ming found a wife. They had a son who grew up to take care of them in their old age. The family lived a comfortable life with the magic horse light shining on them.

  “Huh, a magic horse light. That’s a little different version of a pocketful of rainbows and a star up his sleeve,” says Oriel the Hotel Manager.

  Rene/e the Transgender Woman smiles, “We got us some good grandmamans, me and you, Jack.” Jack smiles back at her and returns to his seat by the window. Rene/e waits a moment and then moves to the aisle seat next to Jack and whispers something to him.

  Dwight the Lay Minister says, “Rene/e’s grandma’s story talked about being careful how you wish, but I’m not quite sure what Jack’s grandma’s tale wants us to learn. Not everybody has access to a magic horse.”

  “I once got a fortune cookie that said something along the lines of when you act with compassion, you can’t be wrong,” says Linda the Humanitarian Worker. “I see a lot of compassion in this story for people and the world we live in.”

  “Not everyone wants to be a vegetarian or even a vegan like Ming in the story,” says John the Pastor. “I respect the ideas behind vegetarianism, but I could never completely give up meat.”

  “It’s also about being true to yourself,” says Gita. “You can be true to yourself and to the world without making the kinds of sacrifices that Ming made.”

  “Ha! Polonius! To thine own self be true,” I say. Everyone ignores me, I guess since the reference was not to Elvis.

  “Truth,” says Blanche, running a hand through her Rod Stewart-style hair. “Ming suffered a lot to find his Truth, with a capital T. I have a story about suffering for Truth, capital T. Except this one deals with personal relationships, as in marriage.” She glances at Franklin. “It’s a true story, and, um, it happened to one of the women in my book club, which we refer to as a wine club with a reading problem. And no, the friend in this story really is a friend, not a euphemism for me. I would never have put Franklin through what our friend put her fiancé through. Even lawyers have scruples sometimes.”

  An anonymous “ha” sounds from somewhere in the coach. Theresa does not bother to stand. “Well, Blanche, since you’ve already started telling the next story, why don’t you, um, come to the middle and continue?” Franklin extricates his arms from around Blanche. She stands and rubs past him into the aisle, quite a different maneuver than Hector trying to get past Bella earlier to tell his story. Blanche’s black-lined eyes gleam in the dim light of the coach. The buttons on her Rockabilly shirt are misaligned by one button.

  Blanche

  THE LAWYER’S TALE

  BLANCHE: OK, one of our members, Livia, got engaged. Her first marriage had ended quite traumatically and dramatically because her first husband had been serially unfaithful, including with her former best friend. She was hurt very badly by this trial by fire. After she announced her engagement, conversation moved to fidelity in relationships and marriage. At this time, the group had just finished a discussion of Jeanette Winterson’s The Gap of Time.

  DONNA THE NARRATOR: Nice. That book should have shed some light on nuances of fidelity.

  BLANCHE: And, um, after her experience with her first husband, we wondered how could she trust any man to be faithful? Livia swore that her fiancé, Gregory, was the most faithful man ever, that no one—man or woman (BLANCHE winks at ERNEST)—could convince her man to be unfaithful to her. She was absolutely positive that Gregory would not betray her as her first husband had or else she would not be with him. Everywhere they went people spoke well of him—at family events, social events, work events—everywhere people spoke of the goodness of his name. Ultimately, Livia agreed to let us set up some challenges to ease our own minds because of her previous bad experience. We made a bet. We bet that within a month, one of us could seduce Gregory. If one of us succeeded, then Livia would call off the engagement and, um, admit that men were inveterate lechers. If Gregory proved faithful, then we would pay for the first night of their honeymoon, complete with expensive champagne. Since Franklin and I were engaged at the time, I did not participate in any attempt at seducing Gregory. Personally, I didn’t think the bet was a good idea, but I was willing to chip in my share for the honeymoon night.

  JOHN THE PASTOR: Then why didn’t you try to stop it?

  BLANCHE: I guess I fell into the herd mentality. We were good friends, and, um, I didn’t think any harm would be done in the long run. I believed that Gregory would prove true. We meant well.

  BELLA THE ACADEMIC: Ha! My mother always claimed that men were unfaithful by nature. They can’t help themselves, she said. Men are like that, she said. (BELLA elbows ERNEST, who looks up, startled, from his KenKen puzzle.)

  ALICE THE WIDOW: I know lots of men who have been faithful under difficult circumstances, men who have been faithful to dying wives or men in commuter marriages. (BLANCHE and FRANKLIN exchange glances).

  BLANCHE: We’re getting sidetracked here. This discussion could last until we get to Memphis and beyond. Let me get back to my story. (Everyone sits sil
ently.) So, our group set some ground rules. The seduction had to involve intercourse, not just oral sex. After Gregory refused three times, the seducer had to stop trying. And, um, only single members of our group could attempt a seduction.

  ORIEL THE HOTEL MANAGER: What, you only wanted to try and break up one relationship? (BLANCHE ignores this comment.)

  BLANCHE: A woman named Katie made the first attempt. Livia had to go out of town overnight on business. After Livia left town, Katie showed up at Gregory and Livia’s house wearing comfortable clothes, if you get my meaning, and, um, no underwear. She pretended that she did not know that Livia was out of town. She claimed she had just had a confusing conversation with a boyfriend and needed to talk. Since Livia was away, she hoped that maybe Gregory would listen to her and give her some advice. Later, when Gregory told this story to Livia, he said that he could not help but notice Katie’s state of undress and, um, wouldn’t let her in the house, hiding the astonishment he felt at Katie’s actions. Katie later said she tried everything she could think of to get Gregory to let her in, even turning on the tears over this alleged conversation. She figured once she got in, the rest would be a piece of cake. But Gregory claimed he was on his way to a guys’ night out since Livia was away. He closed the door on Katie and she heard him turn the lock. She waited until Gregory came back out with his keys and once again tried to get him to spend the evening with her instead of with the guys. Later, Gregory told Livia that he really didn’t have plans with his pals—he had planned on a quiet evening at home alone playing video games—but knew he had to leave the house in order to get rid of Katie. We teased Katie because she only got up to two refusals before Gregory got away. Of course, Livia was quite pleased with this result.