If you enjoyed the previous sample of Cloning Elvis, here’s a couple more chapters for you to read.
March 20, 2017
Things hadn’t worked out as Randall Briggs had planned.
Not in any aspect of his life.
Randall refused to believe smoking caused lung cancer. Yet here he sat with clear plastic tubes up his nose and the canister of oxygen on the floor beside his chair. Two marriages hadn’t succeeded either. He had one daughter whom he’d never met. Ex-wife Number Two had split on him while still expecting, not wanting to raise a child with Randall.
On top of that, he’d never been able to unload that damned Elvis jumpsuit.
Randall had gotten away with the theft that night forty years ago, but the next day, all hell had broken loose. Elvis and his people knew the jumpsuit was missing. They suspected it had been stolen when they went to the movies.
Many of the hotel’s employees could have done it, but Randall was the only person known to have gone into the suite when it was unoccupied. Although he denied it, all suspicion fell upon him. Since the jumpsuit was never recovered, the manager fired Randall, hoping to appease Elvis and his people.
Randall had always hated that stupid job. He should have been glad to be gone, but he hated it even more that no one believed he might be innocent. Yes, he’d stolen the jumpsuit, but he could not tolerate when people didn’t trust him. He figured he’d lie low and sell it in a few months.
But then that damned Elvis up and died.
His death hadn’t surprised Randall at all. The Elvis he’d met that summer wasn’t the Elvis from the black-and-white TV shows or all those stupid movies. The Elvis he’d encountered was a fat, sweaty, disgusting mess.
And, as Randall had predicted, those drugs he’d found in the shaving kit had taken Elvis out. On the crapper, too! Randall laughed at the notion that the King had died on his throne.
The hysteria over Elvis’s death had been intense. Elvis records and memorabilia flooded nearly every store. People could not get enough of the now-dead singer. Randall could only imagine how much someone might now pay for the jumpsuit he’d taken as his enhanced tip.
And that was how it remained. Randall could only imagine his payday.
Before he could find a way to sell it, Randall received a visit from a private investigator working for the Presley Estate.
“I’m attempting to locate a jumpsuit that belonged to Elvis. It went missing here in Springfield during the final weeks of his last tour,” the PI said.
“I’ve been accused forever of taking that thing. Even lost my job because of it,” Randall said.
“I know that. It’s why I’m here,” the PI said in a matter-of-fact tone.
“I wouldn’t take that damn thing, nor would I want to,” Randall said, one of thousands of times he’d said it since stealing the jumpsuit that June. It miffed him that one would take his word on the matter.
“I understand that, Mr. Briggs. But if you did know where it might be and helped me recover it, Elvis’s estate would be very happy. And there wouldn’t be any questions asked about how you helped me out.”
Randall shook his head. Elvis may be dead, but his cheapness remained. If they offered him a thousand-dollar reward or something like that, he’d help the PI find it. But he didn’t, so Randall wouldn’t.
“Well, I can’t help you out ’cause, as I already told you, I don’t have a clue where that damn thing might be.”
“I’m supposed to believe that, Mr. Briggs?”
“I don’t give a hot damn what you believe or don’t. Now get off my property.”
Randall stepped back inside his mobile home and slammed the door in the PI’s face.
The PI knocked on the door for about five minutes. Randall ignored him, and finally the man went away. Randall hoped that would be the last he’d hear from the Estate. As usual, his hopes didn’t wind up matching with reality.
Once a year or so, Randall would receive a letter from the Estate’s lawyers and sometimes a visit from other PIs. They remained convinced he possessed the missing jumpsuit. Randall always denied their accusations, and they could never prove he was lying.
This had the unfortunate consequence of preventing Randall from ever profiting from the late Elvis’s jumpsuit. Even when the Internet came alive and the online auction of eBay was only a few mouse clicks away, Randall couldn’t risk trying to sell the damned thing.
Finally, however, things changed, but not exactly for the better.
Randall Briggs was dying and, as always, needed money.
But he didn’t need it for any creature comforts. No, Randall needed cash for his funeral. There wouldn’t be anyone to bury him. Like with everything else in his life, Randall had to take care of himself. So now, after all these years, he was taking a chance of selling the jumpsuit to afford a burial plot in the cemetery where generations of his kin rested. And since he’d never owned anything nice in this life, Randall figured he’d buy a nice coffin for his journey to the next.
Randall heard a car pull up outside and took a long drag his cigarette. He rose from his well-worn La-Z-Boy chair. It took great strength from him to even do that. He pulled the blinds aside and saw a black Dodge Charger in the parking spot beside his mobile home.
The man from Hollywood had arrived.
********************
The man from Hollywood wasn’t in the movie industry.
Cameron Edmund Ogilvie’s business was music. He’d made a career of finding hot, unknown new acts, making them superstars, and wringing every cent out of their recordings and performances before their fans tired of them and moved on to next hot thing.
But if things worked out for him today in this godforsaken place, he wouldn’t have to worry about the expiration date of his performers and their dwindling profitability. Those days would long be over. On top of that, Cameron would make music history and be remembered forever.
Those thoughts excited Cameron. He was eager to get out of the back of the rented Dodge Charger. Fatu, his stocky Samoan bodyguard and driver, took his sweet, deliberate time, as usual, to get out and open the door.
“Dammit. Can’t you move any faster, fathead?” Cameron said as Fatu opened the car’s rear door.
Fatu did not respond to the insult. He never did. He seldom spoke, which was exactly the way Cameron liked it.
Cameron climbed out of the Charger into the trailer park. He surveyed his surroundings and wondered if the place had at one point been hit by a tornado and never repaired. Who knew and who cared?
As Cameron approached the steps to Randall Briggs’ trailer, the door opened and Randall stepped out.
Cameron gave Randall the once-over. Randall appeared to be a living white-trash cliché, residing in a trailer park and chain-smoking despite the oxygen tubes shoved up his nostrils because he could no longer breathe. Cameron made a mental note to scrub his hands with sanitizer when he returned to the car.
“You Cameron Ogilvie?” Randall asked.
“Yes. I’m Mr. Ogilvie,” Cameron said. He hated when people he wasn’t friends with called him by his common name. And he wasn’t friends with many people.
Randall put his cigarette in his mouth, freeing his right hand so he could shake Cameron’s.
“That’s probably not the best idea,” Cameron said.
“No reason to quit now. Not like they can reverse what I got.”
“That’s not exactly what I meant,” Cameron said. He pointed to the green oxygen tank and the “flammable” warning painted on its side.
Randall took a deep drag and smiled. “Don’t worry. I don’t plan to blow you up before you’ve paid me.”
“Then let me see what you say you have for sale.”
Randall led Cameron inside. Cameron’s skin tightened being in this repulsive environment. He followed Randall through the living room of battered and worn-out furniture, where empty beer cans and discarded packages of microwave dinners abounded in the open spaces.
Randall stopped in the hallway and opened a small closet. He pulled the brass chain hanging down from the ceiling. The light came on. Randall stepped aside and Cameron stepped into the small closet. A bulging garment bag hung in the closet.
Cameron’s anticipation and excitement grew. He took the bag off its rack. Slowly he unzipped it. Inside the garment bag, he discovered a white jumpsuit adorned with numerous rhinestones. It had definitely been designed in the flamboyant and gaudy style of Elvis Presley.
This could really be it, Cameron thought. The rumored missing jumpsuit that Elvis’s estate denied even existed. They’d gone so far to tell people that in the last year of his life, Elvis could only fit into one of his jumpsuits on his final tour. That one was now on display at Graceland. The other one—its twin—had allegedly gone missing after a concert here in Springfield, Missouri. Could this be it?
Cameron pulled the bag completely off the jumpsuit. He knew instantly that this was the genuine article. This had belonged to Elvis. The King of Rock and Roll had worn it. But was there any Elvis on it? That was what Cameron needed to know more than anything else.
He examined the oversize collar. That would be the best place for him to look. Yes. There it was! Resting on the inside of the collar at the back of the neckline lay a hair follicle.
“When and where did you get this?” Cameron asked.
“I already told you,” Randall said.
“Tell me again.”
“Springfield. June of ‘77. The night he played at the university.”
Cameron’s eyes narrowed as he stared at Randall.
“And how exactly did you wind up with it?”
“I didn’t steal it,” Randall said, sticking to his lie.
“Of course you didn’t, but if you expect me to purchase it, then first I want to know how it wound up here with you.”
“Let’s say he should’ve tipped me better than a measly hundred dollars.”
Cameron smiled. While many people foolishly looked down upon greed, he admired that trait in a man. It showed they had drive and wouldn’t take no for an answer. Perhaps if Randall Briggs had been a little greedier, he wouldn’t have ended up in this pathetic trailer park.
Cameron turned and nodded to Fatu, who stood dutifully by the front door. Fatu received the silent instruction and went outside.
Cameron smiled at Randall Briggs.
“Mr. Briggs, we definitely have ourselves a deal.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
“Oh, I’m sure you are.”
Fatu returned a minute later with a black leather briefcase. He brought it to Cameron and held it flat, his forearms under it providing a surface. Cameron rolled the combination locks to their numbers then unlatched the case. Inside sat numerous packets of hundred-dollar bills.
Cameron counted out then handed over ten thousand in cash to Randall then closed the case.
Randall stood mesmerized by the enormous amount of cash in his hands. Cameron noticed a tiny bit of drool forming in the corners of the dying man’s mouth.
Cameron picked up the garment bag containing his purchase and headed to the door behind Fatu.
“Don’t spend it all in the same whorehouse,” Cameron said as he headed out.
“Hey, I’m not the kind of man who pays for it,” Randall said, lying once again to defend his reputation from this Hollywood big shot.
At the doorway, Cameron turned back to Randall.
“Of course you do. We all pay for the things we want because we also know that everyone has a price.”
Cameron didn’t wait for a reply. He had what he’d come here for, and Randall had gotten exactly what he wanted. There was no further business to conduct here. The sooner he was out of this pit and away from Randall Briggs, the better Cameron would feel. He stepped out of the trailer and followed Fatu to the trunk of the car.
The great prize he’d been seeking for so long—a strand of Elvis’s hair—he now had in his possession. He had Elvis Presley’s DNA. Now he needed to put his plan into action, but there was only one person who had the ability to help him with that.
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