“I can’t believe you’ve named this little bastard. Better forget about that. It’ll make it all the harder when the time comes for you to part company with it.”
His words cut through me. Part company? Of course that was the whole idea of my coming here, but the further along I got in my pregnancy, the more wrenching became the thought of parting company with my baby.
I surmised that Miss Oldenburg planned to put the pressure on me to sign the surrender papers. I dressed as quickly as I could, all the while planning my strategy to delay the signing a little longer.
—||—
Seated in her office, I waited ten, fifteen, almost twenty minutes before she came in, her stockinged legs swishing beneath her skirt, her heels clacking. She settled into her chair and, opening the file she had brought in with her, she looked at me over the top of her glasses.
“I hear you’ve named the baby.”
“It’s not definite,” I stammered. “He just seems like a Nicholas to me.”
Miss Oldenburg looked back at the file. “It could be a girl, you know.”
“Boy or girl, my baby is sweet,” I answered without hesitation.
“Boy or girl, it’s not yours to keep. You do understand that, don’t you?”
“I know what you mean.”
“I’m not sure you do. You haven’t signed the adoption papers yet. That’s the objective of our meeting this morning.”
“I figured that.”
“Good. Then I assume you brought them with you?”
“No. I didn’t know I was meeting with you until the doctor told me, and he didn’t state the reason for the meeting.”
A dripping sound drew my eyes to the window air conditioner. A brimming bucket sat beneath it. Her tone aggravated, Miss Oldenburg said, “The man is coming to fix it today. Keep your attention on pertinent matters.”
Passing a fresh set of the adoption documents across the desk to me, she said, “Here’s a pen. You’ve had plenty of time to read these. Sign them now, and let’s be done with it.”
The heading across the top of the document read “Permanent Surrender of Child.” The papers appeared to be the same documents she’d given me to read earlier, but I skimmed them nevertheless. Above the signature line were the words “By signing below I hereby forfeit all rights as parent to the child I have birthed.”
Yes, the documents were the same. I laid them on the desk.
“I can’t sign my baby away. It hurts too much.”
“It’s not about your feelings,” Miss Oldenburg said. “It’s about what the child needs that you can’t give it.”
“I am the only one who can give my baby a mother’s love. There’s nothing more important than that.”
“The adoptive parents can give it a better kind of love.”
“What kind of love could that possibly be?”
“Turn the papers over to the back side,” she ordered. “Take the pen, and at the top of the page make two columns. Label one ‘Things I Can Provide for the Baby.’ Label the other ‘Things the Adoptive Parents Can Provide for the Baby.’”
I did as she asked, and then sat staring at the page.
“I don’t want to do this.”
“Your mother is paying her hard-earned money to keep you here, is she not?”
I gave a dumb nod.
“Tell me why.”
I looked up at her. “To escape the shame, of course, if anybody found out.”
“Who brought this shame down on the heads of you and your mother?”
Tears welled in my eyes.
“You did, did you not?” She sounded like a bleating goat. “Your mother is suffering because you made a decision to have carnal relations when you weren’t married.”
I cried harder. Miss Oldenburg passed me her box of tissues.
“I didn’t do it to hurt my mother,” I said, blowing my nose. I looked squarely at her and tried to speak with a conviction I did not possess. “We . . . Farrel and I . . . loved each other.”
“Is that so?” she cut in. “Then where is he now? Why aren’t you in his home as his wife, the two of you awaiting your first child?”
“We’re so young!”
“Precisely,” she said.
I shifted in the chair. “I didn’t tell him about the baby. He would have married me. I didn’t want to ruin his life. He’s working in the oil fields to pay his way to school next year.”
“Oh yes, of course.” Her smile was cynical. “Does he really love you, Julie? Are you entirely sure he would have married you, had you deigned to tell him?”
My arguments dried up and flaked into nothingness as I thought back on Farrel’s excited face when he told me the driving force of his life was to lift himself out of the poverty he and his family were mired in.
“Ahhh,” Miss Oldenburg said. “You’re not sure. You say you didn’t tell him because you didn’t want to ruin his life. I suspect another part of the truth is you didn’t tell him because in your heart of hearts you knew he didn’t love you and you feared he wouldn’t marry you. And who knows? Maybe in your heart of hearts you didn’t want to marry him.”
My courage flailed. She was right. I knew he didn’t love me. I knew he didn’t want to marry me, or anyone at this time in his life. And I didn’t want to marry him either, not the way it would have been. If we were ever to marry, I wanted it to be because we wanted each other for better or for worse, not because we had to.
“Now that we’ve come to terms with that little issue, kindly list in the column labeled ‘Things I Can Provide for the Baby’ all you know you can give it with no education, no job, no home—”
“I have a home!”
“Your mother wouldn’t have sent you here if she’d harbored any inclination at all to raise an illegitimate grandchild. Go ahead, write. And after the two seconds it will take, kindly write in the other column the things the adoptive parents can give the baby.”
In my column I wrote “My love.” After several minutes of being able to come up with nothing else, I focused on the column for the adoptive parents. That list flowed more easily: “A home, clothing, food.”
When I paused, Miss Oldenburg prompted me. “Don’t forget a college education.”
“I’ll be on my feet by that time. I’ll be making enough to put him through school myself.”
“On the salary from a menial job?” She laughed. “I highly doubt it.”
I frowned in confusion, unable to grasp her meaning.
“How quickly we forget,” she said. “You won’t have a decent job because you won’t have an education. You won’t be able to return to high school if you keep the baby, and likely no college will accept you. And as we’ve said before, no decent man will marry you.”
I shook my head in despair. The pen leaked a drop of ink on my finger. In my mind it became a symbol of my blemished self. I was a blot on the world.
Miss Oldenburg continued with her litany. “To that list in the adoptive parents’ column, add toys the baby will eventually want, such as Madame Alexander dolls, and a prom dress, if it’s a girl, or a basketball and goal to practice with, and a bicycle with gears, if it’s a boy. And how about travel to widen the child’s experiences? The couple I have in mind for your baby can take the child to Europe someday. Most important of all, add respectability to the list. With these fine people, the baby won’t be a bastard.”
The realities she was pounding into my brain stunned me. Everything she said was true.
“The adoptive parents will be college educated. They’ll own their own home and have good incomes. They’ll give the baby everything you cannot. You are unfit because you aren’t married. You did wrong. You are not worthy of keeping the child.”
She stepped from behind the desk and, coming closer to me, tried a different tact.
“It’s God’s will, Julie. God chose you,” she gestured to the dorm room above her office, “and all you girls, to bear children for these women who can’t have them. You gir
ls are all miracle workers.”
Still staring at the columned back page, I laid the pen on the desk.
“Don’t put that pen down. Turn the paper over and sign. Don’t add another mistake to your list. Do the right thing for once in your life.”
I knew I was ill-equipped, not just to care for and raise a child, but to perform almost any job other than the cleaning and maintenance chores she had me doing at the home. I knew I had made a terrible mistake by having sex with Farrel. But somewhere in the dark well of my essence, a small flame of the self-confidence that had come to me after the Christmas Eve visit with my father flickered and held steady. That small light was enough. Enough to reveal to me I wasn’t all bad. Like him, I had made a mistake, but also like him, there was good in me too. That feeble light was enough to give me the guts to stare straight into her eyes and say, “I’m not ready to sign away my child. I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready.”
Chapter 27
LOVING YOU
Elvis’s new movie, Loving You, came to the neighborhood movie theatre toward the end of July, and all the girls in the dorm went to see it together. I sat between Kay and Marty, and we screamed every time Elvis sang, especially when he sang to Dolores Hart, the ingénue who played his girl. A part of me envied her, being in a movie with him. It must have been wonderful playing the role she played and being around him every day on the movie set.
The featured song, “Loving You,” made me wonder if anyone would ever love me for always. Carmen’s latest letter said Eugene Hoffmeyer would, if I only gave him a chance.
When I answered the letter from Elvis that Mama had sent in my birthday envelope and used his new Graceland address, the girls begged so hard to hear my reply that I broke down and read it to them before sealing it. I’ll always remember that afternoon with everyone huddled around me, intent on hearing every word.
July 26, 1957
Dear Elvis,
Sorry I’ve taken so long to write. I will try to do better next time. My boyfriend and I have broken up, so I’m no longer two-timing you. Ha!
I went to see your movie “Loving You.” Elvis, you really have made it all the way to the top. You did a great job, and I’m proud of you. Everyone in the theatre cheered when you sang. You’ve got all the girls screaming over you now! But I was the first, and I’ll always treasure that title, along with being your good luck charm.
You will never know how much it means to me that you still remember. Just so you know, I still remember too. Take care, my friend.
Juliet
The girls were no longer squealing and saying they were going to fall out dead on the floor when I finished. They were long-faced, and some had tears.
“You’re lucky to have a friend like him,” Kay said. “He has restored my belief that there are still some nice guys in the world.”
“Yeah, but how long will he stay that way?” asked cynical Marty. “Hollywood does things to people, and they’re not always nice things.”
“I believe Elvis will always be good at heart, no matter how rich and famous he gets, and no matter what dissipated people he might fall in with out there,” I said. “I only hope he meets a nice girl someday who’ll be his true love.”
“Don’t you ever wish it had been you?” Kay asked.
I shook my head. “No. I like Elvis, but I love . . .” I broke off.
Marty peered into my face. “Who?”
“Someone else, whom I wish I hated.”
Everyone got quiet after that and drifted off, either in groups of three or alone. I put the letter in a manila envelope with no return address and sent it back home for Mama to forward to Elvis. Then I joined the other girls to try to make it through the rest of this day, and the next, and the next, until we finally would give birth and get out of this miserable place.
—||—
Kay was the first to leave us. She went into labor in the middle of the night and woke everybody up with her screams.
Miss Oldenburg came clacking into the room and immediately snapped into business mode.
“Marty, help her get her suitcase packed. Julie, go down to my office and telephone them we’re coming. The number is on the top of my desk in plain view.”
I was out of the room and headed for her office before they could get Kay downstairs and into Miss Oldenburg’s car. I fumbled around the doorframe, searching for the light switch. When I couldn’t find it, I felt my way in the direction of her desk. Her headlights shot into the windows as they backed away, illuminating the room enough for me to find the small lamp that sat next to the phone.
It took forever, but finally a receptionist answered. She spoke with a disgruntled voice. Maybe I’d awakened her.
“You’re calling from Happiness House?”
“Yes, one of the girls has gone into labor. Miss Oldenburg said to let you know she’s bringing her right over.” My breath was coming in fast jerks.
“Cool it, sweetheart. A baby pops out every day. We’ll let the doctor know.”
A click, and she was gone.
My fingers lingered on the receiver when I put it back down. Except for the few letters I’d gotten since I came here, telephones had become my lifeline, my only connection to home and the known quantities of my life, and I so seldom got the chance to make or receive a call. This was it. No one was here to stop me. The hands of the desk clock pointed to one in the morning. It wasn’t too late, I hoped. Did I dare?
With cold hands, I lifted the receiver again and dialed the operator. Up until a moment before, I’d intended to call Mama. I have no idea what steered me in that other direction.
“I need information, please,” I said into the phone.
“City and state?”
“Memphis, Tennessee. The number for Elvis Presley.”
“Have you lost your mind, honey?”
I wondered that myself. “He’s a friend of mine, operator. Get the number and put me through, please.”
“Who shall I say is calling?”
“His good luck charm.”
The operator laughed. “I can’t tell Elvis Presley that!”
“Just do it. You’ll see. He’ll accept the call.”
A long few minutes later, I heard the phone ringing. I tried to imagine Graceland and where the phone was located. With a silent laugh at myself, I suddenly realized he probably had many phones. What if the ringing woke his mom and dad, or his grandmother? A voice I didn’t recognize answered, “Hello.”
“Long distance for Elvis Presley,” the operator said.
“Who’s calling?”
The operator told him with an apologetic laugh.
“Hold on.”
As the guy moved away from the phone, I could hear him calling to Elvis.
“Says she’s your good luck charm.”
Then the familiar voice came through the wire. “And that’s exactly who she is. This is Elvis Presley.”
“Elvis? Is that really you?”
“It’s me, little Juliet. I’ve never been so glad to hear from anyone in all my life. How are you, honey?”
That did it. I burst into tears and could barely speak.
“I’m okay, just a little lonely tonight.”
“What’s the matter, honey? Missing your boyfriend?”
“That and a few other things I can’t go into,” I said.
“Operator, hang up on your end,” Elvis said.
“Yes, sir,” murmured the operator.
“Don’t need anyone eavesdropping. Now we can have some privacy. Listen, honey, why don’t you hop a bus and come on up here? You can stay at Graceland. We’ve got twenty some odd rooms. You can swim in my pool. I’d love to see you, and Mama and Daddy would be thrilled to death to meet a fine Southern girl. And so would Grandma. You’ll love her. I call her ‘Dodger.’”
That made me cry even harder.
“Tell me what’s troubling you, Juliet. I can’t help if you don’t, and I may not be able to help even then, but I’m willing t
o listen. Sometimes all a person needs is a friend to listen.”
My desperation drove me to trust him. “You have to promise you’ll never, ever tell a soul.”
“You got it.”
“Elvis, I . . .”
Moments passed during which I could not speak.
“You can trust me, Juliet.”
I covered my mouth to muffle my sobs.
“Is it your boyfriend?”
I nodded.
“Are you still on the line?” he asked.
Oh God, don’t let him hang up. “Yes! Don’t go away, Elvis. I’ll get hold of myself in a minute.”
“It’s all right. Take your time. I’m right here.”
In the background from his end, I could hear music. “What’s going on there?”
“Nothing. A few of the boys are jamming in the other room. No one can hear me. Now you tell me what going on. Did that jerk of a boyfriend do something to hurt you?”
“It’s not his fault, Elvis. I was the one who pushed it. Only once, and only with him, but that was enough.”
A heavy pause followed. At last he said, “I see.”
“Do you really?” I didn’t want to spell it out, if I didn’t have to.
“Yeah, honey. I think I do. You’ve got a little bundle of trouble. Am I right?”
“You’re right.”
“What about Mama? How’s she taking it?”
“You know the disgrace that goes with this. Mama sent me away.”
“Sent you away? At a time like this? Now is when you need her the most.”
“She’s trying to help both of us escape the shame.”
“Where are you? Want me to come get you?”
My heart pounded. “No, Elvis! Don’t even think of doing something like that. People would believe it was yours. It would ruin you.”
“Tell me where you are.”
“I’m in a home, but don’t try to find me.”
“What kind of home?”
“You know, for the unwed. It might as well be for the undead because we’re all existing in a sort of living death.”
In Those Dazzling Days of Elvis Page 17
