Elvis Has Left the Building

by Charity Tahmaseb

  I took that hand and followed her inside.

  I had never made love as myself. Despite giggling denials, women wanted to sleep with the King. The leather suit came off—sometimes—but the rest stayed. Except with Aimee.

  The next morning, I woke alone in Aimee’s bed. I considered the choice of pulling on the leather pants or using a bed sheet. I opted for the sheet.

  She sat on the living room floor, hands tucked in the sleeves of a thin, cotton robe. No sound came from the television, but despite the nine-inch screen I had a clear view of what she was watching.

  It could have been worse. It could have been Girls! Girls! Girls! or Harem Scarem. Instead, a uniform-clad Elvis crooned and gyrated in G.I. Blues.

  “Aimee—”

  “It’s funny,” she said, her eyes locked on the screen. “I was supposed to be some sort of prodigy. I skipped a couple of grades, then my parents decided to home school me. I was even on a TV quiz show for kids. Of course, we didn't have a television…” Her gaze darted from Elvis to me and back again. “Still, you’d have to be pretty stupid—” She pointed to the television then let her hand fall.

  My thoughts went to how she kept track of bar tabs for Ron, and I scanned the room. It was done in cinderblock chic and the plywood shelves groaned with textbooks, advanced mathematics, physics, quantum mechanics.

  “I wanted to celebrate moving out of the house,” she said. I’d never gone to a kegger or a frat party, but I thought it would be nice…”

  Her voice faltered. I squeezed my eyes shut, tried to rub the ache from my temples. Aimee moving out. Aimee having a drink, talking to a stranger, celebrating being all grown up.

  “At first I thought you were part of a practical joke,” I said, and when she looked at me, I shrugged. “It’s been known to happen.”

  She nodded. “And then?”

  “And then.” My throat tightened. “I liked that you came to see me.”

  She contemplated the Elvis on the screen. “But it wasn’t you.”

  “No. It wasn’t.” I returned to the bedroom, folded the sheet, and placed it gently on the bed. My skin rebelled at the thought of the suit. The leather was mottled from sweat, and I tugged on the pants, arching away from the stiff waistband, cringing at the feel of them.

  Jacket in hand, I stood at the doorway. “My father loved Elvis, loved making people happy by being Elvis. I’m not sure there was anything he loved more.” I could only hope he would forgive me, but there were days when I hated the King. “I didn’t mean—” To hurt you, I thought, to make you believe in something that wasn’t there. “I’m sorry.”

  I pulled the door closed behind me and walked to the car.

  * * *

  By late summer, I had reduced my circuit so I only played the Holiday Inn. The anniversary of the King’s death always brought income, and a touch more respect, but I floundered, trying to pinpoint what I had lost.

  I studied the Pinwheel jumpsuit in my bedroom closet. I’m a good two inches taller than my father was, so I couldn’t wear it to perform. I also couldn’t bear to part with it. The day my father brought it home, we celebrated. I remember the look on my mother’s face when she opened the box for the suit’s matching cape and found instead a new dress meant for her.

  My father didn’t have any of the King’s weaknesses. He didn’t drink, didn’t chase women, didn’t—to my knowledge—smoke a day in his life. It was a cruel irony that cancer eventually stole his voice. But by then it didn’t matter. He stopped singing the day my mother died.

  I hung onto the Holiday Inn, but it was clear Aimee wasn’t coming back, and I told the manager not to book any more shows.

  The night of my last performance, I stopped first at the bar for a ritual check-in with Ron.

  “Has she been in?” I asked, knowing the answer.

  He pushed a glass of water my way. “She only came to see you.” With a frown, he pulled several bills from his apron pocket and opened the register. “Shit. I’m already five bucks short tonight.”

  When he left, I slipped a five-dollar bill beneath my glass and headed for the stage. The manager caught up with me before I went on.

  “You know, if you change your mind, money gets tight, we can always arrange your own comeback special.”

  I laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. I wouldn’t be back.

  That night, I did something I never do. I broke character. For three minutes, Elliot, not Elvis, spoke to the crowd. The anonymous cry came from the back of the room—not unexpectedly.

  “What are you going to do next?”

  “Don’t know. You hiring?”

  The audience laughed, but they hadn’t come to see me. So with that, I launched into Hard Headed Woman and dedicated it to “the pretty little thing sittin’ at the bar” even though she wasn’t.

  I finished my last set at midnight on the sixteenth.

  Of August.

  The day Elvis died.