Mystery cloaked my father like kudzu on an abandoned farmhouse.  He had been adopted as a young boy in Mississippi in the 1940s and had no memory of his birth family.  He once asked his adoptive mother (my grandmother) who his real parents were. With a pained look on her face, she told him he should consider himself lucky to have been adopted. He never asked again. The mystery of his origins remained. 

Whether he fantasized about the biological possibilities, I don’t know, but I sure did.  For a time I imagined him the illegitimate son of William Faulkner.  Other times I fantasized about a herd of aunts and cousins I had never met, seeking him out across the country.  Shortly after I found out he was from near Tupelo, the fantasy culminated with the King.

The thought first occurred to me as I sat in my bedroom paging through an illicit pictorial history of Elvis.  It was illicit because my parents didn’t allow anything Elvis in the house.  I had a family album out for comparison sake.  As young men, Elvis and my dad weren’t identical, but their eyes and their lips were.  Could they have been brothers?

The story according to Elvis mythology goes something like this:  In 1935 Gladys Presley had twins.  One was Elvis and the other, Jesse Garon, was stillborn.  The family was devastated and buried Jesse soon afterward.  They wanted his memory to live on, so they gave Elvis the middle name of Aaron.  Elvis grew up with this memory etched into his identity.  He remained affected by this loss until his own death.

But what if my father was the twin?  A dead twin was certainly much easier to accept than a twin you had to give away because you couldn’t afford it.  Maybe Gladys Presley had made it all up to protect her from the grief.  Maybe my Dad’s father didn’t die when he was eight.  Maybe Dad’s true father lived until 1979, when Vernon Presley died.  Maybe my uncle sang to a sold out Madison Square Garden in 1972.    

Elvis in 1956 looked like a young man on the verge of superstardom.  His thick, unkempt brown hair, sideburns, and uncertain eyes only hinted at the possibility of what would come.   And his cavalier lip crept up cautiously.  He was unsure of himself then, like a young kid wading into the vast ocean for the first time.  Little did he know that the ocean would be his alone in a few years. 

Elvis, in that picture, looked just like Sebastian, my nineteen year-old brother.  Sebastian had the same uncertain eyes, the wavering lip, the high cheekbones, and the mop of hair on his head.  Only his hair was blonde.  Girls loved him. 

That night at dinner, in furtive glances, I examined my brother’s profile for genealogical proof. 

“Any word on that interview with the museum?” my father asked, breaking my focus.  Finding good employment after getting a Master’s degree had proven difficult.

“He said he’d be in touch.”

“Well, that’s good,” he said kindly. “You have time to go to Mississippi?  Mother’s gonna move up here.  We have a spot for her in a nursing home.”

His mother had lived for decades alone in her house in Jackson.  For five years she had allowed arthritis to paralyze her and render her in constant need of a nurse.  Like the matron of the Confederacy that she was she had refused to abdicate her throne.  I guess finally my dad had convinced her that she’d get better care in a nursing home.

“We’re selling the house.  Sebastian and I are going down to move her things up here.  We’d like you to help out.”

“I don’t have anything better to do,” I said. 

The road was long and straight, twelve hours through hills and over lakes, then endless pine forest.  We took turns driving.  When Sebastian drove, he sat way back so he was almost laying flat.  His head kind of bobbed along to music only he heard.  His Elvis lips snarled, his Elvis eyes focused, and his Elvis hair stirred in the wind.  The only thing not Elvis about him was his voice.  His was deep and guttural, almost unintelligible.

“You get that job?” he asked.  He wasn’t familiar with the process of interviewing and waiting and following up.  He hadn’t gone to college.  In between his stints with the Army Reserves, he drove a delivery truck.  Very Elvis like.  His world was simple, black and white.  You worked.  You made money.  On the weekends you spent the money on beer and girls.  He aspired to own a bar.  I envied the simplicity of his life, the total lack of preoccupation.  He didn’t worry about living up to anyone’s expectations. He was just Sebastian.  Take him or leave him.  He didn’t care.

“Don’t know yet,” I said. 

We drove on, the spitting asphalt and bursting seventy-mile an hour wind the only sounds. The Bailey manor was the smallest house in a white, moneyed neighborhood.  It had been occupied for fifteen years by my father and his mother, and for forty more years by his mother alone.  Fifty-five years of living sat waiting for us to box up.

My mother kept a parlor—an unused room where the finest furnishings were set aside for the most distinguished guests.  We never had distinguished guests, but the family accepted this off-limits area anyway.  My grandmother’s entire house was that way.  Every room contained fragile knick-knacks, fine art lamps, sitting areas with old Reader’s Digest Condensed Books, matching chairs, sofas, and rugs.   

Now we tore it apart.  Despite the apparent cleanliness of the house, it stunk.  The carpeting, which covered every square inch of the floor, was probably thirty years old.  It smelled like an old shoe.  And the bathrooms, also carpeted, smelled like urine. 

“How could she stand it in here?” Sebastian said, waving a hand in front of his nose.

“You get used to it,” Dad answered, covering his nose with a handkerchief.

“Why would she stay here?” Sebastian continued.

“In her mind, she was fighting a war, son.  A war of attrition.  She worried that if she left, the wrong kind of family would move in.”

Sebastian glared at Dad, his lip snarling.  It was a scene from King Creole just before Elvis loses control of his fists.

“Right or wrong, it’s her thing.”  Dad raised his hands, palms out.

“Wrong,” Sebastian said.  “It’s wrong.”  He flicked the light to life and continued into the house.

Dad had rented a truck and parked it in the front.  We had loaded half the house into it.  Everything was the same, boring patterns and bric-a-brac.  Then I found something.  Hidden deep in the closet was a carved wooden box.  Inside were newspaper clippings from 1941.  A large headline blared at me:  WILLIS BAILEY DEAD AT 38. 

It is startling, to say the least, to see your own death emblazoned in sixty year-old ink.  Me?  Dead?  Then I realized I wasn’t in a time warp, but had found the clippings from my grandfather’s death.  Though not related by blood, I was named for him. The article said he had died from a massive heart attack at his home on a Sunday.  His wife and son were present at the time. 

I put the clipping announcing my death back in the box, wrapped the box carefully in newspaper and settled into a nearly filled moving box.  I taped it up and took it out to the truck.  Dad stood next to a huge black man.  They were standing in the grass, both with hands burrowed deep in their pockets.  If she were dead, my grandmother would have been spinning her grave.  The only black men who ever came to this neighborhood were either yardmen or thieves according to her.  “And that was the way it should be,” she always added.

“Willis,” my Dad said.  “I’d like you to meet someone.”

I approached warily.

“This is Reverend Mac King,” my Dad said.

“Folks just call me Reverend,” he said in almost Barry White voice.  He extended a massive hand.  “You must be Willis.”

I nodded and shook his hand.

“The Reverend is a friend of mine from my school days.   He’s going to help us move the piano.”

My eyes must have betrayed my thoughts, because my Dad followed up quickly.  “No, we didn’t attend the same high school.  When I was sixteen I used to drive over and play in the Reverend’s band.  Mother didn’t know about that.”

“But I know your grandmother, too,” the Reverend added.  “Recently she called us up, seeing us on the television and all.  And we been tending to her.  Coming by and praying with her.  Rejoicing in the Lord with her.  She’s a fine woman, your grandmother.  Been through a lot, that woman has.  The hate and the fear’s nearly gone in her.”

The Reverend removed his jacket and rolled up his sleeves, revealing forearms like lead pipes.  His chest pushed hard against his suspenders. 

Sebastian was waiting by the piano.  When the Reverend saw him, he stopped cold.  “Why he’s a spitting image,” he said.  He looked curiously at my father, then back to Sebastian.

“Cliff?  That boy’s yours?”  The Reverend didn’t wait for an answer.  “Can you sing, boy?”

Sebastian shook his head.  He bucked up, unsure of this new visitor.

“Cliff, I told you all along who you was and you didn’t never believe me.”  The Reverend wore a huge smile.  “Now here’s the proof, in this handsome young boy.”

“That’s Sebastian, my youngest,” my dad said.  “This is Reverend King.  We were friends in high school.”

“I known a man, who you are the spitting image of, Sebastian.  The greatest singer I ever heard.  He’d make your insides hum.  Only other man could do that was your daddy.  I told both of ‘em all along they was brothers.  They both said it was impossible.  But you are the missing link.  In God’s name, you are the missing link.”

Sebastian apparently didn’t like being the missing link, because he started to snarl.  That set the Reverend off even more.

“Oh my!” exclaimed the Reverend.

He sat down at the piano.  His fingers danced around the keys, banging out different notes until a familiar tune appeared.  Amazing Grace.  “Sing it with me now.”

“I don’t sing, Reverend,” my dad said.  It was true; I had never heard him sing.

“You sing.  Remember, we used to do this back in the day.”

“No.”

The Reverend silenced the piano momentarily.  “Your mama’s not here to disapprove, so sing.”

And he did.  His voice filled the small house, shaking it to its timbers.  My chest rattled pleasantly with my Dad’s baritone mixing perfectly with the Reverend’s bass.  It was like having Elvis live.  Had I closed my eyes, I wouldn’t have known it wasn’t Elvis singing.

I looked over at Sebastian.  He sat sullenly on the couch, his Braves cap pulled low, his hand resting on his head in a bored way.  He didn’t care.

When they were done, the air continued to feel electric despite their silence.   “Still got it,” the Reverend shouted.  “In Jesus’ name, still got it.  Whew!”

Reverend King slung the sweat from his brow.  “You tell these kids of yours?  You tell them the whole story?”

“They know I’m adopted.”

“They know from who?  You can’t deny it now.”

Dad raised an eyebrow to the massive Reverend, now stretching his thick legs.

“All right,” he said.  “Only now, if they don’t, they can’t hear worth a damn.”

Dad smiled.  “Let’s get this piano moved.  We have to get going.”

Soon we had the piano loaded and left the Bailey manor alone and vulnerable to new owners, whoever they might be.  As we drove through radio signal after radio signal, Country through Christian through Rock, I replayed the last few days over and over again.  The assertion that my father was Elvis’ long lost brother had gone from a passing fancy to near truth.  I wanted to talk to him about it, but I couldn’t find the words to start the conversation.  And he either drove or sat in silence.  Maybe he, too, was searching for words.  Sebastian had slung himself back in the seat again.   His head bobbed to his own beat.  He searched for nothing.

“I didn’t know you sang,” I said, finally.

“Mother didn’t approve of what I liked to sing growing up.  So I either visited Mac or didn’t sing at all.  It became a habit, I guess, not singing.”

“You don’t think you were trying to hide something by not singing?”

Dad looked hard at me.  “You think you know what he was talking about?”

“He was saying that you were Elvis’ brother.  That they gave you up for adoption.”

“Elvis?” Dad threw his head back.  His laugh was loud and long.  “That’s a new one.” He started up again, his laugh shaking the bench seat. Finally, he stopped, then looked at me his eyes serious but his crow’s feet still laughing.

“That’s not what he was going on about?” I asked. 

“No, son. That’s not it at all.”

“Oh.” I felt deflated. I had become so invested in the story, in the possibilities, that I hadn’t considered that it was all in my head.

“There was another boy who was adopted out of the same orphanage as me, only he was mixed race, which, in those days, meant that he wasn’t accepted by whites or blacks. But, he could sing a snake to sleep. Mac always thought we were related somehow, and I guess he thought your brother bears a resemblance to old Tommy Jones.”

“So…you don’t think you’re related to him?”

“Don’t know,” Dad said. “It wouldn’t make any difference if I were his brother.  All this preoccupation with genes has gone to people’s heads.  Being a brother means a hell of a lot more than blood.”

“But wouldn’t you want to know?”

“I know,” my dad said.  “I know good and well who my real family is.”

Then I finally understood what he was saying.  We don’t choose our families.  They choose us.  And, why would he seek out someone who had abandoned him?  To be rejected yet again?  He had lived in an orphanage for five years.  No doubt, he had memories of families coming, choosing children and leaving him behind.  He must have had the orphan’s dream of being the son of a rich or famous couple.  Then an affluent couple came and accepted him.  They chose him, when the sting of being rejected still lingered heavily.  And they gave him everything good he ever had.  Whether his mother forbade him singing Gospel or Rock and Roll didn’t matter, because she chose him and loved him more than anyone in his lonely world ever had. 

Early the next morning we were unloading the van.  I was exhausted, and it took a moment to realize that I’d dropped one of the boxes.  Its contents spilled all over the truck floor.  Among the papers was the newspaper clipping that had startled me in Jackson.  I hadn’t looked below it then, but now a document stared up at me.  I knelt to get a closer look.   It was a judgment for legal guardianship from 1947.  Judge Merald Shandy awarded guardianship of a ward of the state to Anne and Willis Bailey. The child’s name: Cliff Doe.  Date of Birth: Unknown. Location of Birth: Unknown.

A shadow crossed the page.  I looked up and Dad loomed over me.

“What happened here?”

“I dropped a box.”

He peered over my shadow.  “What’s that?”

“Guardianship papers.”

He nodded slowly.  “You disappointed?” he asked calmly.

I turned and looked at my Dad.  “Why should I be?”

“I was, when Mother showed it to me.  I thought I would see a name there that would mean something, that would stir recognition. I stared at that Doe for the longest time.  Then I realized that it did mean something. It meant I was lucky enough to be chosen to be a Bailey. Wouldn’t have mattered if the paper had Tommy Brown’s family’s name on it or even Presley for that matter.  I’m not Cliff Brown.  I’m not Cliff Presley.” He chuckled at that thought. “I’m Cliff Bailey.”

Dad brushed past, grabbed a couple of boxes, and carried them out.  I gathered all the papers, replaced them in the box and continued on to the house.

The Museum of Southern History called that night.  They wanted me to come back for a second interview.  The curator said he wanted to test how much I knew about Faulkner.  I said I’d be happy to come in the next day and talk to him.  When I returned to the dinner table and sat down, I turned to my dad. 

“They want to know how much I know about Faulkner.   But, I guess what counts is what I know about me.”

Sebastian chuckled.  He curled his lips.  All along he had known something I didn’t.  

# # #

Culley Holderfield is a graduate of the Creative Writing program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His short stories, poetry, and essays have appeared in national and local publications, including Wildfire Magazine, Earth and Soul: An Anthology of North Carolina Poetry, Damfino Press, Literally Stories, Yellow Mama. He is currently shopping two completed novels, The Storm from Afar, a spy thriller about a covert agent with struggling to come to grips with his role as an enabler of America’s addiction to oil, and Hemlock Hollow, an Appalachian family mystery set in the 1890s.

Photo:  Joshua Ness