Traveling Light

by Lynne Branard

  I look around for Blossom. I want to ask her what she thinks of the space and whether or not a jungle room will be added to her dream house; but she is nowhere to be found. I wonder if she’s gone down to the trophy room or out to Vernon’s office, somewhere else on the estate. I hear some people coming my way and I move through the corridor, searching for her.

  Finally, I walk around a corner and head down the stairs. I meet a few other tourists, wait for them to pass; and just as I’m heading back in the direction of the kitchen and pool room I glance out a window and see Blossom.

  She has made her way to the Meditation Garden. She is at the grave.

  chapter nineteen

  “DID you know he had an identical twin born dead?”

  I walked around the fountain and over to the grave, where I found Blossom kneeling with her head down. I stood beside her very quietly and since she’s never looked up I’m surprised she even knows I am here; but now that my presence has been discovered I move closer, sit down beside her.

  “Yes, I think I heard that before,” I answer.

  Blossom has stopped at the first gravestone. It’s small and square, not like the others, not like the stones for Gladys and Vernon and Elvis, not even like the one on the opposite end, which I know to be Minnie’s, the paternal grandmother.

  She has Roger on the other side of her and she’s holding something in her hands. At first I think it’s her phone; but, having gotten closer, I can see it’s much smaller than that. She has her fingers clasped around it.

  “Jessie Garon,” she tells me. “That was what they called him.”

  I nod, even though she cannot see me. I didn’t recall from my limited command of Elvis trivia that Gladys and Vernon had given their dead baby a name; but now I see it before me printed on the bronze stone, the first loss for the young couple.

  “I wonder what life would have been like for him,” she says.

  “Maybe they would have been a duet,” I reply, but actually I find it hard to imagine two identical gyrating and singing Elvises. “Or maybe Jessie would have been his manager or the drummer or lead guitarist.”

  It seems unlikely, though, that the twins would have chosen the same path, sung the same tune. I glance up and see a Graceland employee, a guy dressed in a security guard’s uniform, walking into the house. It’s close to five so I guess he must be running everyone out and locking things up.

  “Or maybe he would have been jealous and angry all his life,” I say, “and caused trouble for the family like Roger Clinton did for Bill.” I know what it is to be a sibling to the crowd pleaser, the extrovert. Jessie would have probably had it rough, always feeling like he was never quite as talented, never quite as important as his brother.

  Blossom turns to me and her forehead is furrowed. It’s suddenly obvious that she doesn’t know about the president’s brother. I start to explain but then I let it drop. It’s not important enough to fill her in.

  “I wonder if he felt guilty,” she says. “I wonder if he somehow felt responsible for the baby’s death, that he thought he took all the air or space that they both needed, that he thought he somehow kept him from ever being born.”

  I’m still thinking about Bill and Roger and how they aren’t twins and are actually only half brothers and I’m getting ready to explain their relationship; but then I look at Blossom and I can tell she’s not talking about the Clintons. She is talking about Elvis. About survivor’s guilt, I guess. And then, peering at her like I am, being right beside her this way, I realize she’s not talking about Elvis and his dead brother, either; she’s talking about someone else. She’s talking about herself.

  I’m not at all sure what I should say.

  “I’ve always thought I did something wrong, you know.”

  I drop my head.

  She’s thinking about her own baby, the one she lost after running off with the hippies, the one she said she miscarried the night she got back to Tennessee.

  I remember our conversation at the restaurant when we first met, and how she spoke of the loss so easily, so void of emotion, and I suppose I should have known it wasn’t that inconsequential, that Blossom felt grief as surely as any mother would feel after such an unexpected death.

  “I know I wasn’t ready to be a parent; I wasn’t even seventeen yet. And it would have been hard with me and Dillon. We hadn’t really thought things through and there’s no way he could have provided for me and a baby.” She shakes her head. “It would have been a rough life for him.”

  I’m not watching but I hear her sniff. There are a couple of other visitors heading in our direction and I wonder if we should move from where we’re sitting to give them room to pass.

  “It was a boy,” she announces. “Died in week fourteen.”

  I forget about the other tourists and let her continue.

  “After the first trimester, the research says that he would have just begun to show reflexes—you know, fingers opening and closing, toes curling, his little eye muscles clenching.” She pauses. “Knowing he should never be born.”

  I lean into Blossom, touching her slightly on the shoulder. “You don’t really believe that, do you?”

  She clears her throat, wipes her nose with the back of her hand. She shrugs.

  “Your baby did not decide to forgo birth,” I say to her. “And you did not take his air or not give him enough space to grow.”

  Her head is still down.

  “Miscarriage is not a reflex from the fetus, choosing not to be born. It’s a bad thing that just happens and it’s not anybody’s fault.”

  She doesn’t respond and I lean into her again.

  “You didn’t cause your baby’s death.”

  One more time I lean into her, my elbow poking her in the side. “This was not your fault.”

  She’s giving me nothing.

  “Okay?”

  She nods slightly and I’m glad to have that, at least.

  “And for the record,” I add, “I think you will make a terrific mother.”

  “Maybe later, but probably not at seventeen.”

  “I don’t think that,” I say. “I think you would have been just like your idol, Miss Loretta Lynn. You could have three children by the time you’re nineteen and you’ll do great.”

  She laughs a little at this.

  “She seems like she’s a good mom.”

  “Yes, she does. And just like Ms. Lynn, after you’ve had three or four you can sing, ‘There’s gonna be some changes made right here on nursery hill.’” I try to sing it in tune.

  She laughs.

  “You know the words to a country music song,” she says, her voice sounding a touch lighter.

  “Only because you have sung that song about a hundred times today.”

  I see the tourists walk away from the garden and head out the gate. The security guard is locking the front door of the house and glances over at us.

  “I think we’ve been given the notice of last call,” I tell her.

  Blossom follows my gaze and sees the guard. We hear a clock chime five times and know our afternoon visit to Graceland is coming to an end.

  “Lawrence Dillon Winters,” she whispers.

  She repeats the name as she places a tiny heart stone, a pendant she has been wearing, at the grave of Jessie Garon Presley. “Today is the anniversary of my baby’s death. Lawrence Dillon Winters.”

  And I stand up and step back, giving a mother a little more time to say good-bye to her son.

  chapter twenty

  “HE wants you to call him.”

  Blossom is lying on the bed in our hotel room.

  We found a place in West Memphis after having dinner on Beale Street. We stopped in a bar and listened to some live music, a blues-singing piano man, but it had been a very full day and both of us were ready to find our place for the
night. We didn’t think we would come back to Memphis the following day and went ahead and crossed the Mississippi River to get to Arkansas.

  I have just gotten out of the shower and I walk over to the bed we decided was mine, the one farthest from the window. “Who?” I ask. I sit down and drop my head and shake my wet shoulder-length hair, then I flip it all back and face her.

  Casserole is asleep in the corner by the bed. He has eaten his supper and taken his walk, and now he is out for the count.

  “You know who,” she answers, adding a snap of her fingers, as if that would signal me to remember something that I clearly do not.

  “Honestly, Blossom, I don’t know who you’re talking about.” I drape the towel around my shoulders.

  She holds the phone in front of me, but I cannot see the screen. I raise my hands and shake my head. Sometimes I feel like the age difference between us is too vast an expanse to cross. She’s seventeen and I’m . . . well, clearly I’m not.

  “Phillip Blake,” she replies and I suddenly feel the air leave my lungs. “He texted you about half an hour ago. I didn’t mean to be nosy, but your device was going off and I just happened to pick it up and read it.”

  I reach for my phone, which is still in her hand. “Why is he texting me? And how does he know my number, anyway?” I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this question, but I ask it nonetheless.

  I read the message. It’s really him. Give me a call, the text reads, and then it lists his phone number.

  “How did he get this?” I ask Blossom. I’m going to need to examine a lot more closely what she has posted on my Facebook account. “How did he get my number?”

  “I added it to your contact information.” She stops for a second. “But just for friends.” She grins. “Mostly just for one friend.”

  I place the phone on the nightstand and start to towel dry my hair, trying to resist the urge to look at the message again, which is making me want to jump around dancing and singing, Phillip has my number. Phillip has my number. I shake the thoughts from my head.

  “As soon as I have time to figure it all out, I’m going to delete that account,” I tell her, although I don’t think I sound very convincing.

  “Oh, don’t do that. You’ve already got, like, fifty people following us on this trip. We’ve added about ten just since we got to Memphis.”

  “Why?” I grab the phone again. “What are you posting?”

  I click on the Facebook app and find my profile page. Blossom seems to be posting to her own page, but because she lists my name, her updates are all showing up on my timeline, too.

  Roger has fun at Kentucky Lake.

  Roger enjoys the sights at Hurricane Mills.

  Roger makes his way to Graceland.

  Blossom has been taking the photographs and then tagging them for everyone to see.

  “You can’t post pictures of somebody without their permission.” I scroll down at all the information she has provided under my personal profile data. My number is there, all right, along with my e-mail address.

  “You gave me permission to use yours.”

  “I’m really not sure that is true. And I know that Roger Hart didn’t give his permission.”

  “Roger Hart is not available to give his permission,” she deadpans.

  “I know, but this is wrong. It seems shady. It seems like we’re exploiting the man and making a self-serving occasion of this trip.”

  “But that’s not what we’re doing,” she responds. “This is his last hurrah. I bet he loves it, knowing so many people are watching him have this adventure.”

  I scroll over to her page to read exactly what she’s written. Roger’s last name is never mentioned, only that Blossom is with me and we’re taking a friend back to his resting place. She took the business card off the top of the box before taking the pictures so there really isn’t any clear way to identify whose remains we’re carting around.

  I click off the site and can’t help myself. I go back to my messages and reread the text from Phillip Blake. My hands feel sweaty just knowing I have his phone number and that he has made an initial contact.

  “Dad is excited that we’re coming to see him,” Blossom says, pulling me away from my thoughts of Phillip Blake.

  “Yeah? Does he think you’ve taken up with a weirdo?” I can only imagine what this teenager’s father thinks about her most recent photographs and posts.

  “He didn’t say,” she answers. “Just that he hopes we are safe and that we will get to Amarillo soon.”

  “That’s parental code for he thinks you’ve taken up with a weirdo,” I inform her.

  “Hmm-mm,” she says. “I haven’t heard of that code.” She stretches out her arms and legs. She is the picture of a girl at ease and I’m glad to see she’s no longer upset about her baby son and about today being the first anniversary of his death.

  I put the phone down, connect it to the charger and then plug it in, and head back into the bathroom. I hang up the towel, comb my wet hair, and brush my teeth. I turn off the light, and when I’m back in the room, I check the locks on the door, give Casserole a pat on the head, click off the lamp on the nightstand between Blossom and me, and jump into bed. In exactly the same way it felt so good to fall on a mattress last night in Nashville, I am glad to be going to sleep in West Memphis.

  “What are you doing?”

  I slowly open one eye to look at Blossom. “What?”

  “Why are you getting in bed?”

  “I think you can figure that one out,” I say to her as I punch my pillow and roll over.

  She turns the lamp on the nightstand back on. I can tell she has something to say.

  “You need to call him. Or at the very least text him back,” she instructs me.

  “For the last time, Blossom, I am not calling Phillip Blake. We are too old, and there is too much water under the bridge.”

  And just as I say this, my phone rings. Blossom is pulling out the charger and reading the screen.

  “Phillip Blake,” she reports, handing me my phone with a big grin and another snap of her fingers, leaving me to wonder how his name and number have been added to my phone contact list.

  chapter twenty-one

  Ican’t help myself. I place the phone in my lap, slide my wet hair behind my ears, smoothing it down, and pat my cheeks for a little color; and then I clear my throat, sit up, and straighten out my nightgown. Blossom gets up from her bed and heads into the bathroom. She turns in the doorway, makes the sign of a heart with her fingers, and then shuts the door behind her.

  I pick up the phone, but then I realize I’m not quite sure how to answer.

  Does “hello” make me sound too provincial, too stuck in my ways? Is it best to say something a little less formal, like “Well, look who it is”? Maybe I should try “Al here,” making it sound like I do this all the time, get calls late at night. Or maybe it’s best not to answer as Al, but try to sound more grown-up. What about “This is Al,” I wonder.

  The bathroom door flies opens and Blossom glares at me with her hands up. Maybe she has a good idea for a greeting. I wait, but she just mouths, “Answer it!”

  Oh.

  I put the phone to my ear. Blossom rolls her eyes and shuts the door. “Hello,” I say.

  “Al?” It is Phillip Blake. I recognize that voice; it is really him.

  “Yes.” I do not want to give too much away so I pretend I don’t have his name and phone number staring at me from my screen; I don’t say anything more.

  “It’s Phillip.” And there is a pause. “Phillip Blake from Clayton.”

  “Phillip,” I say, but I don’t turn his name into a question, the way I might have done in my imagination, if this weren’t a real conversation, if he weren’t really on the other end of the phone call.

  “Hey,” he adds.

 
; “Hey,” I say back.

  “I saw you on Facebook,” he tells me.

  “Right.”

  “You’re traveling to New Mexico.”

  “Right.” I shake my head, disgusted with myself.

  “So, how are you?”

  I take in a breath. I can answer this one, I know. “I’m great, Phillip.” I pause. “How are you?” I think maybe I’m on a roll.

  “Well, I’m okay.”

  There is another pause. I realize that it’s my turn again. “You still live in Winston-Salem?” I ask.

  “High Point, actually. I moved a few months ago.”

  I hear him breathe.

  “Hillary and I split up.”

  I have to admit I’m a little shocked that he just put that out there so soon in our conversation; but I guess his move to High Point must be related to the breakup, so that to name the town in which he lives is also to say he’s not married any longer. It’s weird, though. I’m surprised that he assumes I know his wife’s name. Ex-wife, I mean. And of course, I do know her name, but it isn’t like he ever told me.

  “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” I say.

  “Yeah.” And there is that breath again.

  “Did you ever get married?”

  “No,” I reply.

  A pause. His pause, this time. I’ve got nothing to say for this part of the exchange. There is no expounding on my relationship status, that’s for sure.

  “So, you’re going to New Mexico with somebody named Roger? That’s great. Is this a vacation or a business trip?”

  Good, back to something I can talk about easily. “Well, it’s kind of strange.” Okay, maybe this isn’t something easy. “Roger is dead.”

  There is no response.

  “I’m just returning his ashes, his remains, back to his home state.”

  “Oh, that must be hard. Was he a relative?”