Fat Elvis

Fat Elvis --

My mother is at the stove frying up breakfast when my father comes out of their bedroom dressed all spiffy. He’s about to drive two hours to attend his thirty year high school reunion. There’s been tension in the house over the past few days. Apparently, my father feels he should go to the reunion without my mother.

“You don’t know those people,” he’d argued. “You’ll feel awkward and out of place. And you being uncomfortable will keep me from having fun.”

“I never said I wanted to go.” My mother pushed past him into her bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

He looked over at me then, my father did, and shrugged.

Now, standing in the kitchen, he’s got on these black polyester trousers that are too tight in the rear. The straight hems barely reach his black loafers. Beneath a white blazer with silver buttons that I‘m sure he can‘t close, he’s wearing a yellow shirt with ruffles, the two buttons nearest the neck undone, the wispy gray hairs on his chest visible.

My mother turns from the stove. She lays her spatula down on the counter and wipes her hands on her apron. “You’re not going dressed like that, are you?”

“What?” My father tries to raise his arms, but the tight blazer keeps them below his shoulders.. “What’s wrong with this?”

“Well, nothing if it was still 1978.”

He smiles and spins around. “This is how they remember me. Cool Elvis Addams.”

“Cool Elvis Addams doesn’t exist anymore.”

“He does today. Elvis Addams is back in town.” He does a silly shoulder shuck and drums the air in front of him with his fisted hands.

“You’re going to make a fool of yourself.” My mother crosses the kitchen and takes the right sleeve of his blazer. “Come on. Let’s get you changed into something at least a little respectable.”

He yanks free. “Not a chance. Cool Elvis Addams is baaaack.” He brushes some imaginary dust off one shoulder.

“Yeah,” my mother says. She turns and heads back to the stove. “Maybe she’ll throw her panties at you.”

My father doesn’t say anything. He runs his fingers through his thickly-gelled hair and positions a clump of it in front of his left eye. He clears his throat. “I gotta get going.”

“Have fun,” my mother says, not turning from the stove.

The front door closes behind him and my mother turns the knob on the stove to the off position. She goes over to the window and pushes the curtain aside. “Elvis,” she mumbles. “Fat Elvis.”

“Fat Elvis?” I ask, coming over to stand beside her. “Who’s fat Elvis? Dad?”

My mother lets the curtain drop. She looks over at me and grins. Her grin broadens. Something crazy‘s running through her head. Something real crazy. I ask her again, “Who’s fat Elvis?“

She keeps on grinning, knowing something, but not saying .